One More Kill

Prologue

He thought that he could get rid of her –not by physical means because then she would never cease to haunt him, but in a way so that she would never return to his torn mind. It was useless though. There was no way he could completely purge her from his thoughts and that thought, in itself, drove him crazy and helped to feed his raging blood lust. The only way to distract himself from the memory of the taste of her, the smell of her horror, the memory of her pounding heart and her wide, mournful eyes was to kill.

At least that's what he told himself over and over again, a mantra like battle cry that seeped into his very soul –one more kill and you'll forget about her, one more kill and you won't be plagued, one more kill and it'll all be over, just one more kill… just one more…

So he killed. Human's bored him- they cried and begged for mercy like he would actually listen, running around in circles like rabbits. Their stench gave him a headache and their useless screaming made his delicate ears ring for days afterward. Third class youkai were no better; although they didn't beg, it was possible they were even dumber than the earth crawling humans. Second class demons were harder, almost to the point where he actually broke out into a sweat before the struggle for life was over. It would quench his thirst for blood for a while, but then her face would return to him, more detailed than the time before, and he would kill again, spilling blood into the earth.

He knew each line that appeared on her face and the way she moved her body before she screamed, he saw her cry out his name every time he shut his eyes, and he felt her struggling against him every goddamned time he moved. Even in sleep he could not escape, the taste of her blood rolling around in his mouth, over his rough tongue and under the sharp points of his ivory fangs –of all the blood he had tasted hers was the sweetest and the hottest. Most of the time he woke up panting and unsatisfied, longing for more than just a few measly drops of blood, a splitting sensation growing in between his narrowed eyes.

It was then he needed to kill. Of course, just pushing down the feelings and laying useless lives to waste wasn't enough –he had to see her. It took him a while to reach the first breaking point; what was he afraid of anyway? She was just a stupid little human with barely enough power to destroy a third class. He was in no way that weak, that powerless. It wouldn't surprise him in the least if he learned that he didn't belong to any class at all, so why was he afraid when there was no reason to be?

He went to her, half to get her out of his mind and half because he knew he was no coward, luring her away from her friends. Though he longed to quell whatever was surging like a wave of the great ocean inside of him, he could do nothing more than put a mark of interest upon her carotid artery. When he left her, he did so partly due to the fact that he needed to kill again but mostly because going any further with her would feel wrong, moving too fast for something that should not be hurried. The beating of her pulse underneath his needy touch became another thing to add to the growing list of why he needed her.

His resolve crumbled quickly after the first breaking point. The second breaking point came sooner than the first and the third followed the second on Obsession's swift wings. He barely slept, and only ate so he could keep on killing, deceiving himself into believing the blood he spilt squashed the growing urges within the confines of his narrow body. During the second breaking point he did not even confront her, only watched her as she laughed, as she frowned, as she read strange scrolls that were unlike any he had ever seen before –which was almost an absurd idea, for he traveled across even the oceans to try and get away from her. The mark upon her called out to him but he stayed in the shadows, blending in as if he was a creature of the dark. Perhaps he truly was.

Somewhere in the dusty corners of his forsaken mind he knew that he could never be rid of her no matter how many times he tried to tell himself otherwise. Never did stretch a long time, and even if he died the next day he would be reborn, the thirst for her and only her would be reincarnated with him. Never to be satiated, he was a tortured being who barely managed to think straight –she was protected by humans that could actually do him harm and drive him away if they really wanted to. Then there was that thing that practically fawned over her, declaring that he would protect her at all costs. If he didn't already see the world in shades washed over in red, those declarations and her shy blush would certainly have done the trick.

Even though he wanted to rip that asshole's tongue out with his claws, he wasn't idiot enough to challenge any high ranking first class youkai while he was so disorientated. Instead he lured her out again, deep into the forest that smelled of her and reeked of her comrades. She was skittish, unsure, and though he could smell fear in her, it was nothing compared to the terror she released when she saw him.

A smirk graced his lips and he languidly crossed his arms over his chest. Though she knew she was already six feet under and in inescapable danger, he watched with mild amusement as her eyes trailed down his form, taking in the wild tangle of his hair, the state of his shredded and blood-stained clothing, the way the sunlight of early afternoon bounced off the light hair of his arms and chest. Her hands gripped a bundle of cloth tightly and when he turned his burning gaze to it, she pulled it to her chest protectively.

He didn't like that.

"Drop it," He snarled. His voice hoarse and jagged like uncut gems. He hadn't really used his vocal chords for anything that didn't go along the lines of feral growling. Talking in the choppy tongue of humans did nothing for the parched feeling that was ever present in the back of his throat. When the girl who was marked with his sign of interest dared to rise against his wishes, he barked at her in a commanding way. His pack had done that to him when he was a disobedient pup –the mark on the girl's neck understood him when she could not and the bundle of cloth and whatever was in it dropped effortlessly from her limp arms.

The corners of his dark pink mouth dropped, his arms uncrossing and stretching out as though to embrace the air. When he took several steps back, still holding out his abnormally long arms, the young human who made his existence both bane and blessing paused for a second. He was a little surprised, but not unpleasantly so –his previous actions should have proved his dominance over her and she should have complied to his obvious request without a second thought. A deep rumble filled his chest. Though she couldn't hear such a low sound over their distance with her human ears, the mark on her neck reacted to his annoyance. Like a shot of demon morphine it dulled her reasoning and the only thing that mattered to her became closing the distance between them.

One brown, scuffed loafer stepped over the bundle, followed by another. The beads that were in the little black pouch on her waist clacked together ominously and still she moved on. Her blood pounded in her ears as she tentatively closed the three or four meter distance between them, pressing her dark head against his chest and shivering as his long arms folded in around her, one wrapping around her waist and the other going around her neck. One of his claws traced little circles on his mark, a mark that looked like some sort of love bite. His heart thundered in her ear, racing almost as quickly as hers.

He didn't trust himself to move –the surrounding forest had gone still and the sun burned in the silence. A trickle of sweat ran down the length of his spine and he didn't know if it was because of the stifling heat or because the girl he obsessed over was at his mercy. The girl's weak, human claws scratched four lines down his stomach and she had the bravery to give a whispering laugh when he reflexively curved away. His resolve bucked once, twice, and then shattered as his emotions came tumbling down. All traces of her fear vanished and that certain something in the certain dusty somewhere of his mind sighed in relief. This was entirely too dangerous to be considered a game of cat and mouse anymore.

He titled her chin up then, and kissed her. She fell against him, her hands clutching at his narrow shoulders, pushing full flush against him. With every second that passed his world became lighter, slowly fading back into color, which he would have seen if his eyes would have been open. The girl was overwhelmed as he seemed to press in on her from every angle, smothering her senses and overriding every irrational moment she ever feared him. Contrary to what others liked to think about her, she rather liked the rush of adrenaline that came from flirting with danger.

Not even thirty meters upwind of the pair, the man who loved Kagome tightened his grip upon the hilt of his sword. He turned around, looking into the grim faces of the youkaitaijiya and her houshi lover, before viciously snarling, "Now."