Tales of the Shikon No Tama
Episode one: The Boy in the Forest
***

Chapter Three

“What did you call me?”  I asked him as I slowly walked toward him.  

“Kikyo.  Don’t you know your own name?”  He grunted and looked away from me.  “You can change the color of your hair and put on strange clothing, but you still smell like you.”  

“And how do I smell, exactly?”  I asked, crossing my arms over my stomach.

“Like something that would turn my stomach.”  He grumped, he shifted against his prison and winced a little as the arrow held fast, he put a hand on it.  But the arrow’s barrier – I guess – fended him off.  A breeze wafted through his silver hair.  

“I hate to disappoint you, but I’m not Kikyo.”  I said standing right before him.  

“My name is … “  I started, but didn’t get to finish.  The underbrush crashed and splintered beneath the weight of something large.  Suddenly, I was pushed against the boy’s chest.  His heart was beating strong and fierce.  My right arm was pinned, my left was free.  I grunted against the weight around me.  It was the centipede’s coils.  She’d trapped me against him.  The coils were smooth and soft all at once, they made my stomach turn.  

I heard Centipede’s chuckle as the rest of her appeared to us.  She licked my cheek, I felt squeamish.  “Inuyasha.  I see you’ve gained another mortal girl to add to your conquests.”  She said, pulling back from me.  “Pretty one.”

“Feh, please.  I don’t know this girl anymore than you do.   Besides, I could probably do much better.”  He said looking over at me with fire in his golden eyes.  

My eyes narrowed as his nose wrinkled at the smell of me.  

“Harsh words from a half-demon.”  The centipede growled.  Half-demon?  If he was only a half-demon, I wondered what his other half was.  “It seems you have a pretty strong spell on you.”

“If I didn’t, this meeting would be very short and your last.”  He said.  

“Can you do anything but talk?”  I growled.

“Really Kikyo, I’m disappointed.”  The half-demon said to me.  “You could just kill her with one shot.  You did it to me.”  

“Listen you, my name isn’t Kikyo, it’s Anayame.”  I said.  I got to my feet.  “Besides, you’re one to talk.  You can’t even break your own spell.”  I gave him a crooked smile and raised an eyebrow.  His eyes narrowed and a growl came from his chest.  

“You think I can’t tell the stench of the woman who---“  Then he stopped short.  His eyes widened, he sniffed the air once more.  “You’re not her.”

“I told you.”  I said.  

“Brave little pest.”  Centipede hissed.  “Give me the Jewel of Four Souls!”

“The Jewel of Four Souls?!”  The boy said in surprise.

“I don’t have your … stupid jewel.”  I whimpered.  I looked over toward the trees and saw Kaede and the villagers nearby.  They were watching everything in amazement.  The coils tightened around me.  I whimpered against the weight.   I put my left hand up.  

“Let. Me. Go!”  I screamed.  Then something, I don’t know - energy I guess – emerged from my palm, the centipede’s arms were torn off, her concentration wavered and I was able to wiggle out of my prison.  I fell to the ground on my stomach and propped myself up.  

“Insolent wretch!”  She yelled, she attacked me then and bit my right side.  I screamed as pain ripped through me.  She tossed  me up like a ragdoll before throwing me back down again.  I hit the ground with a thud.  My vision swam, blood soaked my clothing.  I felt something then.  An emptiness, like something had left me.  I looked up and saw a pink marble floating above me.  

“Finally!  It’s mine!”  The Centipede said.  She pushed me against the boy’s chest again, I whimpered.  I had no fight left in me.  “Too bad, Inuyasha, all you can do is watch.”  She snaked her long tongue out between thin lips and wrapped it around the marble.  I watched as she swallowed the Jewel whole.  A shudder ran through her coils.  

“Hey.”  Inuyasha said.  I looked up at him.  “Can you pull this arrow out?”  

“No, Anayame!  You mustn’t!”  Kaede called to me.

“I don’t want to die.  Not like this.  Not in this hellish place.”  I put my hand around the shaft of the arrow.  I felt the energy around it, at my touch it dissolved.  The spell was broken.  White-purple light surrounded the boy named Inuyasha and I.  He burst free.  I cried out as he threw me away from him, I landed in the grass and propped myself up on my right arm.  The left arm was across my stomach, my hand on the wound at my side.  Inuyasha stood there, cracking his knuckles and neck.  The Centipede had regenerated her arms and lost the young woman façade.  She was hideous and enjoying every minute of it.  

“Hell yeah, it’s about to get really messy.”  Inuyasha said.  He leapt up into the air.  “IRON REAVER SOUL STEALER!”  He cried out.  With one stroke of his power, the centipede was sliced into bits.  Kaede was at my side, I sat up near the old woman.  

“What have ye done?” She asked me.  

“Saved our skins, I hope.  I had no idea he was that powerful.”  I said.  Then, I heard a crack, like shattering glass.  Kaede and I looked up to see millions of pieces of … something … sail across the sky.  Small pinkish-purple points of light in every direction.  Through a rain of blood and demon parts, I saw Inuyasha walking toward me.  

***