Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto

Itachi's Lover

~ by RC Mason ~

As Uchiha Madara said, Itachi had a lover. Who was she and what happened to her?

~ A Beginning ~

A whispered name, a broken kiss

This is amour in mortal bliss

She was a bastard.

An Uchiha, but a bastard nonetheless.

Her father, like many Uchiha men, had a way with women. Tall, dark, and handsome, with those captivating obsidian eyes, he had met her mother in the alluring shadows and flickering lights of a traveller's pub. She poured his sake with shaking hands – and blushed when he noticed her trembling too. She was a pretty thing, had thought herself accustomed to the appreciative glances from the mysterious strangers that were a permanent feature of her world, and was justifiably mortified to feel that blush deepen to a warm rouge when he asked for her name and number. Stumbling, she said that she did not have a phone (in the dim lighting, he probably could not see the frayed patches of her dress beneath the waitressing attire), but he did not seem to care. He said he had a room. He lifted his dark eyes to meet her wide ones. Her heart skipped a beat.

Finally, could this be … that long-awaited and elusive love?

Nine months later, she was screaming in pain outside the orphanage, as had many frightened teenaged girls before her. Rain splattered thickly against the battered weatherboards, smearing themselves against her cheeks and hiding the fact that she herself was crying. She did not want it to end like this, but she had nowhere else to go.

Struggling to stay conscious, she told the sympathetic Matron in laboured gasps that the baby would not be an orphan; it had a father.

'…Uchiha … Hidden … Leaf…' The Matron managed to discern.

She gave one final push, her body shuddering with agony, and felt a little creature slide out from her like a slippery fish. Its high-pitched cry was unmistakable.

'Is … she … beautiful?' her mother had whispered. Then the Matron felt the tight grip on her hand go slack.

The baby was indeed beautiful, as her dying mother had hoped for. Not by the conventional standards that would procure praises from a passer-by, but in a subtle way that would make such a passer-by stop and stare.

Silky, raven hair framed a pale, gentle face. And those eyes – large, dark and deep. Captivating like her father's. Anyone could tell that they were the eyes of an Uchiha, and for this reason alone were the Uchihas prevented from refusing the tiny bundle that the kindly Matron turned up with on their doorsteps one dusky morning. It was more out of precaution than out of love for the blood – Uchiha eyes were like forbidden fruits to the masses, ripe for plucking to unleash the secrets within.

Her father had died in the month before her birth (a dangerous mission or an ill-fated affair?) so the Uchiha elders kept the circumstances of her arrival hushed, slightly embarrassed at the behaviour of their wayward son. She was christened in a name that was quickly and rather impassively chosen – ending up as one of the more common choices for girls in Hidden Leaf – before being sent off to live in the allotted area for the poorer relations. A distant cousin, they would later explain. Within a few months, this would become truth.

And so this girl, with the startling dark eyes, joined the accumulating secrets of the enigmatic clan of the Uchiha.

Well, that's the first instalment of my story. Of course, it's only a taste of what's to come and I would much appreciate it if I could get your feedback on what you thought - worth continuing or not? :)

A bit of background info: this story actually started off as a one-shot and I was about 3/4 through when heaps of other ideas just kept on jumping at me and I realised that I could not do it justice and fit it into a one-shot. So now I'm just going over my initial sketches and filling it out more to make it into, hopefully, an enjoyable story. Though it sounds a bit dark here, this is only to establish the beginnings and I plan for the story to pick up in tone and pace in the future.

So please leave a review on the way out and let me know what you think.

P.S. This idea has its origins in the Naruto canon: Madara Uchiha said that Itachi had a lover whom he killed during the Uchiha clan massacre.