"Night Light"

Written for the InuKag Week 2017 prompt 'Fear'

*set during and post canon

Kagome always thought she understood fear. It had become part of her life: fear of death, fear of losing her loved ones, fear of being forgotten, fear of a broken heart. Those fears were vivid and present and traceable, and when someone came along to fight them off (usually a young man dressed all in red) she could face them and let them go.

But this… this was a fear she couldn't fight, a fear she couldn't understand. She knew where it came from, knew it was silly and unfounded and she shouldn't let it get to her like this, but for all her logic, it just wouldn't go away.

She first felt its tendrils the night after the well closed. The final battle with Naraku and her struggle inside the jewel were swallowed up in her joy at seeing her family, the pain feeling just as far in the past as the world on the other side. She'd been ignoring the aching void that had opened up the moment she saw Inuyasha disappear inside the well; she'd try the well herself tomorrow – it would work tomorrow. She'd see him again, but right now... right now she needed to rest. If just for a night, she needed peace.

That night she climbed into bed, her curtain drawn to keep out reminders of her missing friend, and let the fatigue of the past few days wash over her body. She was asleep before she could turn out the light. She dreamed that night of darkness; an impenetrable black save for a tiny point of pink light that lit nothing. The jewel was taunting her, testing her, and the darkness was so thick she nearly choked. It hurt to breathe, and the image of the jewel suspended in the black of space burned with laser-like intensity. She was blind in this place, trapped, lost in a world without features or exits. And all the while the jewel tempted her with promises of sunlight if only she'd make a wish.

Her eyes snapped open to see blackness, and Kagome was sure that had been no dream: she was still stuck within the jewel, forever in darkness. Inuyasha had been the dream, her family welcoming her with warmth and tears had been the dream… this void was reality.

A lump caught in her throat, her fear too intense for tears and too debilitating to allow her to scream. Her fingers clutched her blanket in a white-knuckled grip – and that's when she realized: she was in bed. She was at home. It had only been a nightmare. But the dark was still surrounding her, and her lungs burned as she held her breath. Blindly she felt around for her nightstand, clutching the wicker corners and fumbling for the switch on her lamp. Soft yellow light spilled across her room, barely lighting her desk and bed and still curtains; but it was enough. The illusion was broken, and Kagome could finally breathe. She stayed awake, grateful eyes taking in every contour of her solid room bathed in artificial light, until her mother came in to wake her.

For the next three years, that lamp stayed on every night.

She adapted to that fear, let it become part of her life, and then she forgot about it – until the day she slipped through time again, and realized there were no more electric lamps.

It was easy enough to hide at first – all it took was a glance, a soft stroke of her hand against his, and Inuyasha was more than happy to spend the night under the stars with her. If he noticed that for her first few weeks back she never slept in a hut, he didn't say anything.

But when they married, he built them a hut of their own, and nights under their tree or on their hill became a thing of the past. The moonlight and starlight were stronger here than her time though, lighting the sparse inside of their wooden hut the way her lamp used to, and she learned to sleep facing the window. Her husband never seemed to mind spooning up behind her.

Then a night came where her nightlight went out: when the moon was only a thin sliver in the sky, and thick clouds covered the blanket of stars so completely that Kagome wondered if they'd all fallen. She could hardly see to slip into her nightclothes, her limbs shaking as she descended to the futon and pulled the blanket up to her chin. Wide eyes stared at the vague lines of the window across from their bed, but she could hardly make it out, and in her panicked state of mind it seemed to vanish completely. Her chest tightened as the dark around her closed in, her other senses heightened as she searched for something real to latch onto. She could hear Inuyasha rustling around in the dark behind her, but in the surrounding blackness he seemed so far away. He'd never reach her, he'd never find her; the darkness would never lift and she'd never see him again.

Suddenly she felt movement behind her as her husband settled into bed, and before she could gather her courage to say something, a hand had slipped around to grasp her shoulder and turn her over. On her back in the room which she couldn't see, Kagome felt Inuyasha's soft hair brushing over her cheek, her shoulder, her arms, as he leaned over her to press his lips to her own. She kissed him back desperately, clutching at his bare shoulders once she found them and almost crying as he pulled away.

"Hey" his rasping voice broke through the eerie stillness, as welcome to Kagome's ears as when he'd called out to her inside the jewel. "I've got you – you don't gotta be afraid."

A tidal wave of relief swept through her very bones, taking her anxiety away in a rush of breath which she didn't realize she'd been holding. Her hands on his shoulders reached up to swathe his neck and pull his cheek next to hers, her breath ghosting over his skin as she whispered "how did you know?"

"Stupid…" and she felt him smirk as he pressed his lips to hers again, "you think I didn't notice? I know you don't like sleepin' outside that much."

Kagome couldn't help but laugh, shutting her eyes tight as the feel of his body next to hers painted a bright and shining picture of silver hair and golden eyes, her light in the dark.