I walked back from the training ground after another long day at training. It had been another early morning and late night. I have been working on a jutsu for most of the day, but still no progress. I was beginning to doubt my own capabilities at this rate. For four days I've been working on this one stupid jutsu. Never before has it taken me so long to get one jutsu down, but this one was.

"You should just give up on it already loser," Sasuke says as I looked at my twitching hand. It hurt just to move my hand and even more to build up the chakra in it.

"Shut up," I spat back at my usual training buddy.

Sasuke and I are good friends, while he won't admit it I know that he likes having me around. I was one of the few girls who weren't fan crazed about him. We didn't bother each other when training and we could hold our own against each other. He would always give me a hard time about my training and it didn't bother me too much but there were times, like now, that I just didn't want to hear it. When that happened he would just lay off for a bit.

"We should go get something to eat," Sasuke says as he walks along side me.

"I'm not really hungry," I tell him not feeling like going out to eat. I was upset with myself for my lack of a jutsu. I couldn't figure out why it was taking so long for me to get this one down. I have the amount of chakra to do it, but I just couldn't get the stupid jutsu down.

"You need to eat as it is you're way too skinny."

"I am not! I eat my breakfast and lunch and I usually eat dinner. Not all of us eat every meal just because they can."

"So, it's ten and I saw you skip lunch today."

"Why do you care so much," I sigh. I see how he usually is and I know that if it was anyone else he wouldn't care, but for some reason he was like this with me. I skip a meal and if he knows about it I'm forced to eat with him.

"I'm supposed to be heading to Neji's house to night for a dinner Sasuke. It's a late dinner, but the main house is planning on taking me in like they did with Neji."

"But you're not a Hyuuga."

Sasuke was right, I'm not a Hyuuga I'm a Hashimoto. I have short black hair and dark blue eyes. I wore a black choker collar that represented my clan. To my clan it represented the darkness in the truth that our eyes gave us. Our eyes, when fully mastered, told us of the death of everyone around us, but never our own. Of course our eyes could do more, but it's the darkness that comes with our eyes that made us use black as our clans color. I wore the color with pride from head to toe. My shirt was a black long sleeved button down shirt, which I left the top two unbuttoned and only had three in the middle buttoned. I wore black pants that ride my hips and black boots. The truly ironic part is I don't completely like my clan.

"I know that's why I'm confused, but they were great friends with my parents and since most of my clan got slaughtered during the invasion they want to take me in. The Elder is approving this because he believes that it will help strengthen the bond between the Hyuuga and Hashimoto clan."

"The peace bringer," Sasuke says with a slight harsh laugh.

"I believe, but the dinner isn't until ten thirty. They are supposed to be telling me where I'm going to be staying."

"Do you really think you would be the best chose for this? You're proud of what you can do, but you distaste your clan."

No I don't think I'm the best choice. I distaste my clan because we are bond to the Elder and are supposed to bow down to them simply because they come from a family once strong. The family has grown so weak now and I can even take on the next in lead, who is older than me. Now I'm to moving into another clan similar to mine and live happily.

"My Elder is giving me to the Hyuuga to become one and they already have my ceremony of the branding tomorrow night." I spoke with detest in my voice. I was being traded off as if I was just someone's belonging. I didn't belong to anyone and my life wasn't just something that could be traded off. I hated this.

"Well I got to get my stuff, so see you tomorrow at training if I can." I tell Sasuke as we stand in front of the Hashimoto compound.

"See yeah," he says walking away in his usual distant hating the world way of his. There wasn't a hint of that caring side of his to be seen any more, now that I was leaving and we were in the village. That's how he is though, hateful and distant. I just seemed to be that one exception to that rule of his.

I walk into the compound and go straight to my empty house. There was no reason to tell anyone that I was home because no one would hear me. I live alone since the village was attacked during the Chunin Exam. I had been part of the Final Exam, but never had a chance to fight during the exams. It worked to my benefit though because I wasn't tired when the real fights began.

I enter my bare room to grab my few belongings. I never saw the point in accumulating anything personal because I thought they would only get in the way of my training. The only thing that was out of the normal in my room was the picture of my mother and father with me smiling. I was only seven at the time and it was during a time that I smiled more. It was only a few months after that picture was taken that I learned the truth behind my clan.

I grab the picture off of my bed side desk then head to my closet to begin packing my clothes. I only had a small duffel bag of clothes with the picture fitting nicely on top of my clothes and my weapons. I head out of my room with ten minutes to get to the compound. Fortunately the compound was only a five minute walk from my house and I could still get there early.

"Miss Hashimoto," Hiashi Hyuuga says with a polite smile as he greeted me. I've known Hiashi for most of my life growing up and since I first met Hiashi I've known of the power he holds. He is the head of the Hyuuga clan and was now the reason I was being branded and taken into the Hyuuga clan.

"Hyuuga, Hiashi," I say bowing deeply as I put on a smile of mine. "Thank you for having me over tonight and welcoming me into your clan." I was playing nice and showing respect to my higher authority, but on the inside I was resenting him. Neji had explained it to everyone what the mark does, but he didn't go into great depth. For me I didn't need him to because I've already been told the true power behind the mark that all Hyuuga's, except the Head House, bared.

"Please come in. We have made a nice dinner for tonight. I hope you're hungry and haven't eaten anything tonight." I know that he is being polite, but I could tell that there was a slight second meaning to his words.

"I have not eaten anything since I went out to train today," I tell him holding on to my smile as I slipped my shoes off.

"If you still train like you used to you must have just got done training." I nod my head.

"Yes, I had been training until ten again."

"Have you made any progress since the Chunin Exams?" He asks me question after question as he leads me to the dining table and even as were eating he's asking me more questions like this one. He wanted to know how far I've grown since the last time he saw me fight. It seemed so nice on the outside, but I could tell he really wanted to see how much more powerful this would make his clan.

"Miss Hashimoto."

"Yes," I ask before taking a bite of the food that Hinata cooked.

"Do you remember when you were younger and your parents had told you that you would be marrying a Hyuuga?"

"Uh, no I'm sorry to say I do not." I had to hold back chocking on my food by this sudden question. I don't understand where this had come from, but why he was taking me in suddenly made since to me now. He was planning on putting me with this person and live with them. He had taken me in and asked me those question because he finally found who I'm going to be married off to.

"Well that's alright. I have decided I would like you to take Neji's hand in marriage. The wedding isn't until a month from now, but I want you to get to know Neji as best you can in that month time span before the wedding." I turn my head and look at the Hyuuga boy who hasn't said a word throughout this whole dinner. I didn't really know anything about Neji other than his father had taken Hinata's fathers place in the exchange for the death of a ninja from another village. Everyone knew he didn't like the Main House and that he was strongly set in a destiny for everyone and that it couldn't be changed. That was the extent of my knowledge of Neji Hyuuga.

"You will be living in the main house with Neji and as long as it isn't too unconformable for the both of you." It did sound extremely unconformable but I wouldn't say that to Hiashi. If I was to say that I would only be screwing myself over.

"No, that sounds nice." I say it with the slightest smile on my lips, but it didn't feel real to me. Fortunately no one seemed to notice it. They couldn't tell that I wasn't alright with this at all. I had thought when he was offering this to me and I was forced to take the offer I would get my own room at the very least, but now I had to share a room and get married to a complete stranger in a month.

"Are you sure," Neji asked speaking up for the first time during this dinner.

"It's completely fine," I tell him widening my smile.

"Well that sounds great," Hiashi says sounding happy that I was agreeing to this.

"Hinata why don't you clean up everything," Hiashi says turning to Hinata now that everything he wanted to get out of this dinner is over with.

"Yes father," Hinata says shyly as she quickly gets up and starts to clean up the dishes.

"Would you like some help," I offer feeling bad that she has to clean up everything.

"Hinata can handle it on her own. Besides you need to get yourself settled in and get ready for the ceremony tomorrow."

"Do you think I'll have time to train before the ceremony? I normally train with Sasuke on the weekends and we had made plans to meet up with each other." I wanted to tell him about this. I wanted to tell someone who would be out of this situation and might understand my anger at this current arrangement. If I had maybe of known Neji before this it might not have bothered me so much but I didn't know Neji. I also wouldn't have mind so much if I had been told about this before hand and Hiashi hadn't of played this whole ordeal off as something it wasn't. I detest the clan as it was because of the way it reminded me of my own clan, but this had made everything even worse. I was learning to hate it even more than my own clan.

"No, you need to get ready for the ceremony in the morning and then by noon the ceremony will begin. After the ceremony we have a feast."

"And when are we planning to tell everyone about the wedding? It is normally announced to everyone a month before the wedding date and two weeks before the wedding the gathering of the families and friends are supposed to come for the engagement party." Personally I didn't care about the formalities of the whole ordeal. I didn't want to get married off when I'm only thirteen. I'm a whole year younger than the person I'm getting married off to and yet I still have to play as if I'm completely happy and ok with getting married to a stranger a year older than me.

"It has all been arranged. Tomorrow the letters of invitations will be mailed off to both the clans and your team mates along with your sensei."

"Has one been mailed off to Sasuke, Shikamaru, or Naruto?" I ask naming the only three people who I really care about coming to this stupid thing.

"No, would you like them to get a letter?"

"Yes, to the wedding and the engagement party please."

"I will make the letters myself and have them delivered tomorrow."

"Thank you," I say bowing my head because I was still sitting down.

"Now you two should head off to bed."

"If you don't mind I would like to take a shower before I go to bed," I ask as I stand up from the dinner table.

"Feel free. Neji show her to your room and unpack her belongings while she is in the shower."

"I can unpack my own things. That isn't necessary." I say panicking inside because I would rather unpack my own stuff and not have a stranger touch my under garments.

"It's fine," Neji says as he turns and starts to head upstairs. I follow behind him without a word up to his room.

"You don't have to if you don't want to."

"Why did you say yes," he demanded the moment the door was closed behind him and we were alone in his room.

"I didn't want to." I say keeping my voice down, but showing my anger. I was matching his anger with my own and while we both glared at each other it was our voices that we were using as weapons.

"They why did you? I don't want you in my room and I don't want you as my bride."

"And you think I want to get married to a stranger. I don't want to share a room with you, but I know if I don't then I'll only get myself into deeper trouble then I already am in. I didn't even want to come to live here, but I was forced by the head of my clan."

"You should have said no."

"We both know that once given an order by the head house or the Elder of our clan we can't because we always, always pay a cost for doing so."

"Just go take a shower. I'll unpack your stuff." He turns his back to me and walks over to his dresser. I decide to do as he said and grab a change of clothes to take with me to the shower.

Neji never bothered to tell me where the showers were located so I was left on my own to find them. I was scared to open any of the doors in case they led to someone's room.

"Hiroko are you lost," I hear Hinata's sweet voice come from behind me and it causes me to turn to look at her.

"Yes, Neji forgot to tell me where the bathroom is."

"It's this one," she says pointing to the door next to her.

"Thank you," I say bowing to her before heading to the shower.

I only took a quick five minute shower because I just wanted to get everything through with. I wanted to be back on the training grounds trying to get stronger. I wanted to be stronger than anyone in the clan, to show my clan and every other clan out there that the head of the family is not the strongest branch of the family. I couldn't do that with everything now going on and the faster I got through this the faster I could get back out on the training ground training.

Once I was done with my shower I dried myself off and got changed into my PJs for the night. I was reluctant to go back to Neji's and my bedroom. If I go back I have to go back to Neji and his new found hate towards me. He was blaming me for our new situation when I'm the one being forced into this right alongside him. I don't want this, just like how he doesn't want this either.

"The three bottom shelves are yours the top three are mine. I also put your picture on the bed side desk."

"Thank you," I say bowing my head.

"You don't have to keep the act up," he tells me as he throws a pillow onto the floor and grabbed one of the two blankets onto the ground alongside it.

"I can at least show gratitude when you're doing this though you don't want to," I say as I walk next to him and gently take the blanket from him.

"I'll take the floor. You take the bed."

"I'm not going to force you to sleep on the floor."

"I don't mind."

"Hiroko I forgot to tell you that your dressers will be here at eight thirty for you." Hiashi says opening the door to see Neji and me both gripping the blanket.

"Am I interrupting something," he asks looking back and forth between the two of us.

"No, I was just getting done telling Hiroko that I would be sleeping on the floor," Neji says turning to look at Hiashi.

"The propose behind you two sharing a room is so the two of you can share a bed and get closer to each other before the wedding," Hiashi says looking at both of us as if we should have known this sooner.

Of course I think to myself.

"I understand," Neji says bowing while he still held onto the blanket.

"Goodnight you two," Hiashi says as he closes the door behind himself and walks away.

"Can anything else go wrong today," I sigh to myself as I let go of the blanket and grab the pillow off the floor.

"Let's just try to get through this," he says as he puts the blanket back on the bed.

"Well once we get married we don't have to share a bed or a room together," I tell him as I slip under the covers and move to the farthest end of the bed.

"We could live in separate houses if we wanted to."

"Do you think our clan leaders would allow that?" I ask him as he slips into the bed with me but stays on the opposite side of the bed.

"It's hard to say," he tells me with his back turned to me.

"There should be an age limit for marriages like this or let the kids at least get a say on the matter," I grumble to myself before going to sleep in bed with a complete stranger.