This seriously just came to me out of the blue. I'm trying to write for my active stories, but seeing as I just updated all of them, my inspiration for them is running dry at the moment.

Not the best thing I've ever written, but this'll do.

For You

His narrow golden eyes observed the way the hanyo-turned-yokai struggled not to dig his claws into his friends. The boy had dropped Tessaiga yet again.

Sesshomaru held out a hand to his tiny, fragile mate, to stop her from running towards the out-of-control demon. He ignored the knowledge that she had eased the hanyo's demon side in the past.

"Pick up your sword, Inuyasha," Sesshomaru called out, stepping away from the group of humans he and his half-brother chose to protect. The other demon snarled mindlessly. "Pick up your sword or I shall do it for you."

A streak of blue jeans, white shirt and black hair flew past him and Sesshomaru saw Kagome clutch the sword and practically toss it at Inuyasha. The yokai threw up a hand instinctively to catch it. Immediately, he began to return to normal.

The scene sat with Sesshomaru more than normal. He had joined the group of shard hunters shortly before defeating Naraku and fallen for the little miko from the twentieth century. After killing Naraku, he and Kagome had been wed and mated. Several years had passed since that time and Inuyasha continued to travel, hunting down threats to human villages. Kagome liked to travel with him and Sesshomaru liked to give his mate whatever she desired. He was devoted to her, as she was to him.

The thought of her mortal life ending troubled him. When he was feeling particularly honest, he could even admit that it terrified him, if only to himself. It wasn't so much the thought of her dying – for he knew, probably more than anyone else in the group that everyone's time came – but the thought of living without her. Now that he knew what he was missing before, he did not want to lose it.

For that reason, Sesshomaru had been looking into turning Kagome into a yokai. Or sorceress living in his lands claimed she could do so, with a powerful spell and his blood. With a yokai lifespan, they could live for eons, together. They could watch their future, yokai, children grow and have children of their own. They could live to Kagome's true time.

Now he realized what a fool he had been.

Sesshomaru caught his brother's eye after the humans in the group had gone to sleep and tilted his head subtly to one side. Inuyasha got the idea and followed the older man a few yards away from the camp.

"Can you not remember yourself when you revert to that form?" the elder asked.

It took a moment for Inuyasha to realize what Sesshomaru was talking about. Several days had passed since that incident. When he did figure it out, his ears went back against his skull. "It's like I just can't control myself. I want to taste everyone's blood. I want to see what their guts look like. In the back of my mind, I'm thinking 'Maybe this is wrong,' but the rest of me can't stop." Inuyasha dropped his eyes. "Keh. Maybe it's just because I'm only half demon."

Sesshomaru examined the younger man thoughtfully. "No, it happens to all with demon blood. But most of us learn to control it from the time we are but pups. You have the strength of an adult yokai with the control of an infant." Sesshomaru noticed that his brother was about to take offense. "It is through no fault of your own. It is simply the curse of being a hanyo."

The elder brother's eyes drifted toward his mate. Inuyasha followed his gaze.

"Keh," he said, his eyes softening. "Maybe your pups will learn control early on."

Sesshomaru said nothing. The image of his Kagome tearing apart another being with her claws, eyes gleaming red, haunted him. The thought of her even having those thoughts, though she was such a lover of life, was almost as bad.

Ah-Un and Sesshomaru were gone when Kagome awoke the next morning, stretching with a yawn. Her brow furrowed as she realized the dragon that her mate rode only occasionally was gone.

"Inuyasha, do you know where Sesshomaru is?" Kaogme asked, shifting Shippo gently so she could stand without waking him.

"Keh. He ran off in the middle of the night. Wouldn't tell me where he was going."

Kagome frowned but wasn't too concerned. Sesshomaru occasionally had to leave to attend to things in the Western Palace, though he normally would give her the option of going with him. She shrugged off the suspicious thoughts and started to make breakfast.

It wasn't until the third day of her mate being gone that Kagome grew truly worried. Rin and Jaken were still with the group but there had been no sign of Sesshomaru or Ah-Un. Kagome tried to keep Rin calm without betraying how worried she herself felt.

"It's alright Rin-chan. He probably just needed to take care of urgent business at home. I bet he brings us all back nice presents, since he couldn't say goodbye."

Kagome refused to leave the spot where they had been camped the night Sesshomaru left, despite knowing that he would likely be able to find them no matter how far they travelled.

When Sesshomaru arrived, a full five days after he had left, he was grateful for that. It was the middle of the night when he landed, aching and tired from riding Ah-Un for several hours straight.

Brown eyes met gold.

"So that's what you were doing," Inuyasha said, circling his brother. "Did you ask her how she'd feel about it?"

"It was not her decision."

"You could have done it the other way."

"And watch her become as you are without Tessaiga? No," Sesshomaru said derisively. He pulled the only remaining katana from his sash. "Here. Tenseiga is yours now. I have no use for it anymore."

With that, Sesshomaru dropped down, leaning against a tree and fell asleep. Inuyasha stood with his father's second sword in his hands for a moment before leaping into the tree above his sleeping brother to watch over him.

A soft touch on the cheek awoke Sesshomaru shortly after dawn. He opened his eyes to see his wife's dark blue eyes staring at him.

"Sesshomaru, what happened?"

"I became human," he said simply.

"But why?" Kagome asked, tracing along his cheekbones where his markings should have been.

"Because I could not stand to live after watching you die and I could not stand to see you become a bloodthirsty yokai. It was the only option."

Kagome smashed her lips to his inelegantly, leaning on her husband. "Sesshomaru…"

"Don't cry about it wench. He's right that it was the best way for your two to stay together."

Sesshomaru smirked. "Something I forgot last night, little brother."

Inuyasha's expression immediately turned wary. "What?"

"You are the new Lord of the Western Lands."

"What? Why the fuck would you do that!"

With Kagome held close, watching his brother panic over a new responsibility, Sesshomaru thought that being human would be worth it.