His Little Girl by WhisperingWolf

Can Rin be thier mother?

The mid-day sun shone brightly overhead in the cerulean sky, occasionally covered up by the wandering white clouds. The day was beautiful with a soft breeze blowing and bird and wind spirits alike were playing in the sky above. As one looked down upon the land below, they would see the Taiyoukai of the Western Lands and his unusual entourage making a rather lazy trek across the open meadows.

No matter if he were pressed for time or not, Lord Sesshoumaru doubted that he would have made this day's trek in haste. The day was too beautiful, and though he would admit it to no one, he was gaining too much enjoyment from watching his young charge dart in and out of fields of wildflowers to ruin her fun. There were times that just thinking about what had happened in Rin's young life brought a frown to his usually stoic face. There were still times even now that she would crawl into his bed, when they were in the castle, or nestle herself tightly against his side when they were traveling, after nightmares. There were still times even now, when he would be forced to simply hold her tightly in his arms until she was able to awaken from the throes of her horrid night terrors.

Rin came bounding over to the frowning youkai, snapping him from his thoughts as her small hand slipped into his.

"Sesshoumaru-sama!" Rin smiled happily up at him and he noticed that she had lost another of her pup's teeth. Even now her two front teeth seemed somehow out of place in her mouth, their larger size against the rest of her smaller baby teeth still remaining.

Gracing the young girl with a soft lightening of his eyes and a barely there smile reserved for her alone, he spoke, his voice soft and melodic. "Did you enjoy chasing the butterflies Rin?"

"Oh yes!" she exclaimed with a smile large enough it would surely split her face. Tugging on his hand, she pulled him along with her. "Rin wants to show Sesshoumaru-sama what she's found!"

Lord Sesshoumaru let the small girl lead him where she pleased, Jaken following behind. Coming to a stop amidst a portion of the flowered field that held flowering bushes as well as ground flowers, Rin released his hand. Moving next to a covered nest, she lifted flattened flowers and loose branches away, uncovering a nest of sleeping fox kits. Three tiny kits, curled together and nearly on top of one another lay sleeping in the small shallow hole in the ground. Reaching over near them, one perhaps a bare foot or two left of the nest, she lifted fallen dead leaves from the battered and decaying body of the mother fox.

Looking up at her Lord, guardian, and as she come to think of him, Otou-san, a sad frown marred her normally jovial face. "Their mother mother's dead, just like mine. They need a new mother...Sesshoumaru-sama...could Rin," she hesitated there and looked down at the still sleeping kits as tears came to her eyes. Putting on a brave face, she looked back up at the Taiyoukai who was now kneeling next to her. "Could Rin be their mother?"

Focusing her attention on Sesshoumaru, her eyes grew wide and frightened as her attention caught something behind him. In the blink of an eye, she had covered the nesting kits with her body, narrowly missing being hit by Jaken's staff of heads.

"You stupid human fool!" the toad retainer spat at her. "You would dare attempt to bring their filth onto us!"

Sesshoumaru's golden eyes grew cold and hard, and left Rin's still form, her head buried in the foxes fur as she strove to protect them, and focused on the youkai next to him. Rising to his feet gracefully, the taiyoukai wrapped his hand around Jaken's throat and lifted the toad eye level to him as he stood.

"You would dare harm my pup?" Sesshoumaru growled out in a low and dangerous voice. My pup? Sesshoumaru thought, yes, MY Pup!

Forgetting his place, and the jeopardy his life was in at that moment, Jaken's brazen temper flared with hatred as he thought of Rin. "That human filth isn't worthy of being your pup! She –" the rest of the retainer's words were cut off as he was thrown clear across the clearing and through into the woods.

Returning his attention once again to Rin, he sat upon the grass and gathered the child into his arms, holding her close against his armoured chest, her head upon his shoulder as he soothed her slight fear away. He looked down at his left arm and still marveled at it's reappearance, his still doubted he would ever forget the day or the cause of it's return.

It was just a day, not unlike any other, that Lord Sesshoumaru and his small party came into the clearing of InuYasha's Forrest. Days earlier he and his brother had stood side by side in a battle against three of Naraku's offspring. The final battle was getting closer, and the disgusting hanyou was getting arrogant and desperate all at once.

As he came closer to the old Miko's hut, where he could sense his brother and his pack staying, he heard the terrified and desperate plea of a mother – of Kagome.

"Please Kaede-sama, is there nothing you can do?" as Sesshoumaru quietly stepped into the hut, he could both see and smell the tears running down the young miko's face.

"I am sorry child, but there is nothing. His injuries are too great. Shippou will not live to see the morning light."

"No!" Kagome cried desperately as she looked upon the battered body of the young orphaned kitsune youkai that she adopted and come to treasure as her son. "No," she sobbed. "Please no."

The stoic taiyoukai watched in silence as his hanyou brother wrapped the girl up in his arms and let her cry into his chest. Sesshoumaru found the scene oddly touching and was reminded of when he had found Rin dead in the forest, killed by wolves. In that moment, Tenseiga pulsed against his side, and he looked upon the dying kit and then at his father's fang.

"Move," he said simply to the houshi who had moved to give the dying kitsune soul's rest.

Miroku moved, too cautious of the taiyoukai to not obey the command given. Sesshoumaru stepped forward and removed Tenseiga from it's scabbard and sliced a graceful arc across the dying kit's body. Kagome looked from Sesshoumaru, to his sword to her sleeping and completely unharmed kit. Shippou was healed with no sign or symptom of the injuries he had suffered.

With a gasp, Kagome launched herself out of Inuyasha's arms and into Sesshoumaru's holding onto the demon lord and hugging him tightly, her arms around his neck and her face buried in his chest as she sobbed out her thanks.

The words, barely intelligible through her sobs and muffled into his chest could be heard repeated like a mantra. "My baby, you saved my baby. Thank you! Thank you!" Her arms tightened around him as a purple-pink glow rose from her body and surrounded him. So lost was the young time traveling miko in her cries of thanks that she didn't notice the power rising from her body, didn't notice the power surround the demon lord that she held so desperately onto, and didn't notice when that same power healed his missing arm and returned it to him as though it had never been taken.

The power died down as quickly as it had risen and all stood transfixed as they saw the return of the taiyoukai's arm. Stepping back with an embarrassed flush to her damp cheeks, looking nervously into the youkai's golden eyes, she stammered out an apology. "I-I'm sorry. I-" her voice cut off as she looked confusedly at his new arm. "You got your arm back. I'm glad, now you can hold your pup as a father should. I guess full demon's truly do have advanced hea-"

"I did not do this. It would have taken a full decade for my arm to have healed itself."

"Then how...?"

"Miko you did this. Just now as you embraced me." Sesshoumaru looked upon the girl in wonder. How could she not know what she had done with her own power?

"I did?" she asked and noticed the surprised nods of her companions. "But how? I don't...I'm not that strong. I can't even make a barrier...how could I?" her voice trailed off as she held Sesshoumaru's new hand in hers and trailed her fingers over the back of his hand, along the stripes that lay upon the snowy skin. It was as though only by touch alone could she be sure that the newly restored appendage was real.

The soft, butterfly light touches, sent shivers up his spine and had Sesshoumaru feeling things he never thought he would for a human. It was the young fox who broke the tension in the hut by choosing that moment to awaken.

"Kaa-san?" his small voice asked as he awakened.

With a soft gasp Kagome turned and swiftly, taiyoukai forgotten, scooped her son into her arms and held him tightly to her breast. "Shippou, my Shippou!" she sobbed into his fur as she held him tightly.

"Mama-nani? What's going on? Why's Sesshoumaru here?...Mama?" Shippou looked frightenedly to Inuyasha, who he secretly thought of as his father, with wide eyes. "What's wrong with mama?"

Looking upon the young girl in his arms, and down at the slowly awakening kits, Sesshoumaru, saw Shippou in them in that moment.

"Rin," he said softly gaining the young girl's attention. Her mocha eyes looked upon him and in that moment he knew he could never part with her. "You may be their mother. They will need plenty of care and attention for they are still quite young. Do you still wish for them as yours?"

"Oh yes!" she nodded fervently.

Moving the young girl to stand before him, he bid her to hold her kimono together as he undid the wide sash in the back and then lifted the drowsy kits up and held them to the girl's waist.

"Hold them now Rin," he instructed and retied the sash, wrapping it once around her waist, then around the kits and bound them to her making a small pouch for the tiny kits to sleep in. "You must be careful now and go slowly, do not jar them too much or they will be come frightened and may attack."

Rin nodded and wrapped her arms around his neck, much like Kagome had done weeks earlier, and hugged her lord, burying her face in his neck and inhaling his scent. It always calmed her so to smell his scent, something so soothing and protective about it, just as her own father's arms had once been. Little Rin often found herself wondering and dreaming about what it would be like to have a mother, never having known her own. Once her own father had been killed, the other villagers spared no expense in letting her know that it had been her wretched life that had cost her mothers. Often times, it were those memories of her mother's sister throwing stones and curses at Rin for killing her sister in childbirth that haunted her dreams.

"Rin?" Sesshoumaru said as he smelt the salt of her tears.

"Rin...is...fine," Rin said as tied to put on a brave face but failed. She soon found herself lifted off the ground and into Sesshoumaru's arms as he stood holding her against his chest.

Kissing the top of her head he carried the child over to where Ah-Un stood patiently waiting. Lifting her atop the dragon's back, he wiped away the tear that had fallen. Will you ever tell me Rin? Will you ever trust in me all of what happened to you in that village you once called home? If only I could protect you from your memories my pup, I would guard your spirit and mind from the past that haunts your dreams. You, little Rin have healed my heart and spirit in ways you may never understand.

Lengths away a small cursing form struggled through underbrush and wild forest to escape into the meadow, dark thoughts clouding the youkai's mind.

Sesshoumaru-sama used to be a proud formidable demon and now he dotes after some filthy ninjen child. A child that I'm suppose to play with! Even in Jaken's mind the words were spat with such hatred that it would have made even Sesshoumaru himself cringe. How dare she! How dare that filthy human child do this! She has bewitched my Lord Sesshoumaru! She has be spelled him, made him weak! A cool resolve and frightfully twisted smile came to his beak like mouth as a thought came to him. If Sesshoumaru was in fact be spelled...well, all knew the only way to end a curse was to destroy the one who cast it. And if the one who cast it could not be broken, then they must be killed.

Yes, that was the answer! He would break Rin, and then he would kill her. Soon, it would be only him, the dragon, and his Lord again, and this foolishness for humans would be gone. Rin would be gone.

If one could hear into Jaken's mind they would hear the most frighteningly maniacal laugh, something nearly more frightening than Naraku's own ominous laughter.

A.N.: Well, that's the end for now. Don't worry, I will post again as soon as I can. Please review and tell me what you think.