On the altar, the wind blew from the south, carrying the salty, fishy scent of the Wasteland.
Kikyo stood where she was, her hand holding the longbow hanging at her side, her knuckles clenched white.
"Love?"
Her voice was soft, as though she were asking Sakura, yet also asking herself.
"You said... they loved each other?"
Sakura rose from the edge of the altar and brushed the dust from her clothes.
Her face was still somewhat pale. After withdrawing her consciousness from that scene, exhaustion surged over her body like a tide.
"I saw it."
"When that Miko sealed that King-level Great Demon, she was crying.
She didn't seal him because she hated him. It was because... she had no choice."
Kikyo said nothing.
She turned and walked to the edge of the altar, facing the black sword at its center.
The wind lifted her long hair, and the hem of her Miko robes snapped in the breeze.
"The First Generation Miko's diary..."
Kikyo spoke, her voice low.
"I've read it."
"She wrote many things in it that I couldn't understand."
"At the time, I didn't understand."
Kikyo lowered her head and looked at the Charm at her waist.
"Now, it seems... I understand a little."
Inuyasha stood nearby with the Red Fang Blade in hand, looking from Sakura to Kikyo.
He did not quite understand what they were talking about.
Saku hugged her doll and looked up at Kikyo's profile.
There was a glimmer in Sister Kikyo's eyes.
"Sister Kikyo."
Saku called to her softly.
Kikyo did not answer.
Her hand tightened around the Charm at her waist.
That indistinct face, that retreating figure walking farther and farther away beneath the setting sun, those words: "Some things were never meant to be carried alone."
And the person who had