Sakura blinked.
Once, twice, thrice, as many times as she needed to grasp the meaning behind his words. He couldn't have really suggested that she, a merchant's daughter, barely out of girlhood and with only a subservient relationship to his clan would be able to accomplish those goals. The notion was laughable, and she decided that he was just trying to mess with her. Maybe he was like a cat, and liked to play with his food before eating it.
"That's ridiculous." She blurted out, receiving a sharp glare as reply.
"On that much we agree." He retorted bitterly "You are far from what I could have hoped in terms of aid, but you will have to make do."
"But why do you need me? I know the Uchiha, yes, but other than that there is little I can do to help. I'm sure you'd be able to do a better job yourself."
"If I were able to seek the Uchiha myself, I would have done so already." Madara retorted "I cannot leave this mountain, so I need someone I can act through." Well, that was a good thing to know.
"But I didn't do anything!" She pleaded, bringing her hand to her chest "You said it yourself that you punish criminals; I've never stolen anything in my life, you brought me here for no reason!"
"That is a self-imposed practice, not a vow."
"But-"
"And this has nothing to do with punishment. If you didn't have any dealings with the Uchiha I would have no use for you." Sakura grimaced, cursing her fate, and Madara let out a derisive snort "I hope you're not foolish enough to think you'd leave unscathed if that was the case."
Her mouth was agape for good couple of seconds before she finally managed to stutter her complaints.
"–That's not fair!"
The man in front of her didn't seem the least bit concerned about her opinion, and Sakura had to battle her inner-self to keep from advancing on him – the fact that he likely could wipe the floor with her be damned.
She took a deep breath to calm down and tried to assess the situation. She was convinced that Madara was somehow the wolf that had attacked her, though she decided to stay on the fence about any information he disclosed about his supposed past. If he truly tried to punish the wicked, he probably liked to think of himself as some sort of protector, and yet he seemed to put his own gain above justice. Still, he clearly had some sense of honor, however small, and she was going to capitalize on it.
"If I refuse…"
"I'm sure you'll make a suitable meal." He mocked.
"You attacked me, dragged me here, and want to force me to put my life at risk, while I have done nothing wrong. Do you think that's righteous?" Please, please, let it work…
"You claim to have done nothing wrong, but I'm yet to see proof of that." He countered "But I am not unreasonable. If you can perform those tasks, you'll be… richly rewarded."
Sakura eyed the man suspiciously, and the corner of his mouth twitched upwards in a smug expression.
"I have been here for generations; do you think I would've spent all this time sitting idly?"
No, no, but she assumed he spent his time snatching innocents to eat.
"You are paying me?" She questioned. Was this the way he found to excuse himself of forcing her into this?
Madara held out his hand, signaling for her to wait.
"Before taking any measure, I must know of the current status of the Uchiha." He was silent for a while, and at first Sakura wondered if he was coming up with a strategy, but as his eyes narrowed, she realized that he was waiting for her to say something, but he hadn't been clear, so she had no idea what kind of answer he was expecting to receive.
"Since… the Fujiwara have lost power they have been… better… b-but I-"
"What year is this?" He asked abruptly, and Sakura was glad that he had changed the question to something simpler.
"It's thirty-eight o-one – the month of the monkey, to be precise." She spoke smartly. Sakura had the tendency to show off just a little when she knew something, and she couldn't help feeling smug that she was the one with the answers now.
The man's brow creased, giving him an even sterner appearance. Uchiha, indeed.
But his eyes weren't focused on hers; instead he was looking down at his lap, and she concluded that he was in deep thought.
"It was… three-two-eight-five." Madara muttered, frowning in concentration, and Sakura's green orbs widened at his musings.
"That's over five hundred years ago." She blurted out. Was this the year he was born?
With a sudden movement, his head was turned towards her, his eyes narrowed in suspicion.
There was a light twitch in his left hand, and coupled with the nasty look he was sending her, Sakura thought he wanted to attack her.
"That long?" He inquired, his face contorted like that of a child that had just drank a rather bitter medicine.
"Five hundred and sixteen." She amended, very much wanting to know what he had in his mind. Whatever it was, it seemed to bother him, and right now she would take any information she could use against him.
Madara's posture slackened, and as he looked up to the ceiling, he seemed to lean back against thin air. She couldn't imagine this being a comfortable position.
It seemed to have been forever until he closed his eyes and the tiniest of smirks surged on his face.
"I never would have guessed so." He mused out lout, before shaking his head lightly.
Sakura had concluded that she found Madara to be a very strange person.
"It seems we'll need to acquire more information before proceeding." He spoke, his tone bored "It's unfortunate that things will take longer to come to fruition, but as I have said before, you will have to make do."
"But if you can't leave this place, how do you know I won't run away and never come back once you let me go?" Sakura wasn't sure what had possessed her to ask this question – it was a stupid thing to do, and she knew that – but she felt like she needed some sort of confirmation.
Madara seemed to think her question was foolish – amusingly so – if his smirk was anything to go by.
"Your question is enough proof that you won't attempt this. That, or you are ridiculously naïve, and if that is the case, I have no use for you. So which one is it?"
His gaze on her burned, and Sakura had to fight the urge to squirm under it, and so she looked down to escape it.
"I… you wouldn't have any guarantee that I would return. It might be bold of me, but I can't help but think you must be hiding something."
There was a pause, in which the man's eyes narrowed, and he seemed somehow larger in her eyes.
"Are you accusing me of trickery?" His voice seemed to echo all across the room, then turn to her like sharp knives.
She really had the worst of lucks. Kidnapping apparently wasn't enough; now Madara seemed to want to kill her for an offense to decorum. She thought it was downright hypocritical of him to be so angry about her being suspicious of him when he had accused her of being a thief, but she knew better than to voice her thoughts.
"I'm not accusing, I'm just wondering why you are doing this." She spoke in a small voice, huddling her shoulders to make herself appear as small as she could. Maybe he would lose interest and leave her alone.
"This should be easy enough to follow." His voice was strained, making it sound as if the suggestion that she could escape was painful. "Without any aid, I won't be able to accomplish my goals. If I'm unable to accomplish my goals, I will remain in this plane of existence. If I remain in this plane of existence, I will naturally need sustenance, and who is a better candidate than… Haruno Kizashi, is it?"
Sakura was certain that if her eyes got any bigger, they'd pop out of their sockets.
She had only known Madara for a few minutes, and yet she felt safe in saying that he wasn't the kind of person who would bluff about something like that, and if he was this monster, she didn't think he'd have any trouble keeping his threat.
Fear was replaced by fury, and this time she couldn't hide it. Her lips twisted into a near-growl, but it didn't seem to faze him in the least.
"You… you have no right to include him in this!"
"He might be harder to digest… I suppose I'll have to chop him up first…" He spoke in a thoughtful tone, and Sakura knew it was meant to mock her, she only didn't understand how someone could be so cruel to make fun of something like that.
She gripped the fabric of her kosode firmly and pulled at it to stop herself from doing the same to the man's locks. A heavy silence fell upon them, Madara watching Sakura impassively, and Sakura gritting her teeth so hard it hurt.
Finally, she decided one of them had to give in at some point, and that clearly would not be him.
"What do you mean by rewarded?"
"That's an awfully rude way to agree to a deal." He spoke, once more making it sound as if she had offended his sensibilities, while it was plain to see that he was just taking some strange form of enjoyment from the situation she was in.
"I apologize, I simply wanted to know what I'd be getting out of this." Sakura replied, aware that she didn't sound apologetic at all.
"I wonder what you planned on doing if that turned out to be a lie." He mused out loud, seeming to be too pleased with himself. He didn't take a long time to make fun of her though, suddenly standing up and motioning for her to follow.
Sakura obliged quickly, if only because she wanted to get all of this over with.
"You will return to me with any information you have gathered before your father passes by this mountain, otherwise I'll assume you went back on our deal, and I intend on keeping my promise." His words made her grimace. She didn't doubt him, but she wished he would stop saying this.
"What if I can't find anything?"
"I'm certain you'll manage to find something." But if his voice was anything to go by, he was annoyed by the prospective "Come one way or another, and don't worry about finding your way back; I'll know when you return, if you return."
"I will return." She spoke with conviction, and Madara sent her an indecipherable glance.
They proceeded through a series of winding hallways, neither of them attempting to strike any sort of conversation, until they reached a nearly vertical wooden ladder, and the man instructed her to go up first.
Climbing wasn't exactly easy in the clothes she wore, but with a little struggle she made her way up, to find a very dark room, and by the looks of it, large too. She could spot a few chests here and there, but nothing in particular caught her attention.
Her guide brushed past her, moving towards one of the walls. She was surprised when he slammed his forearm against a section of the barrier and a couple of wooden boards were lifted, revealing a window. It could have just been tricks played on her by the darkness, but to Sakura it seemed that whoever had projected the house hadn't wanted people to find passages easily.
As he repeated the process a few more times, glorious sunlight lit the room, and she could see various recipients scattered about in the floor and in shelves, in what she could only call a treasure room.
Satisfied with the amount of light, Madara walked towards one of the chests and kicked it in her direction, and she heard the distinct sound of something clicking open as it hit the ground in front of her.
Sakura crouched down to examine the contents of the coffer and her mouth hung open when lengths of colorful silk flowed from inside like water from a spring.
She wasn't sure how much time she spent examining the fabrics, but when she looked up, Madara had already opened several chests, revealing scrolls, fans, bronze mirrors, hair ornaments, vases, lacquered boxes, belts, figurines, jewels, incense burners, crystal balls, inkstones, tapestries and even more silk.
Only after Sakura had properly gawked at everything she looked at Madara, detecting a hint of smugness in his expression.
"I assume they are to your taste?" He sounded honestly concerned, but his eyes twinkled with amusement.
"I wonder where all those things could've come from." This was the best and safest way of accusing him of having stolen things she could come up with.
"Some are things that were left behind when the Uchiha abandoned this place" He replied, running a finger across one of the shelves to check for dust "but most were taken from bandits trying to hide in the woods."
Sakura hadn't expected him to admit this so easily. He might have taken them from bandits, sure, but that didn't mean this didn't make him a thief as well. Well, that didn't matter to her; She wasn't stealing anything.
"If I help you… you'll give me all of this?"
"If you are successful, yes." He offered her a curt nod "I have no use for any of this one way or another."
Sakura nodded, not really interested in his reasons for giving her those things, so long as she got them.
"And one more thing" Madara spoke, toying with a comb he had taken from one of the boxes "I expect you to bring me clothes once you return. There is no telling how long this will take and I have little to spare as it is."
Out of all the tasks he had ordered her to do, this was the one she objected to the least, but somehow it bothered her nearly just as much as the prospect of aiding him with the annihilation of a clan that had done nothing against her… though she was fairly certain it was just because he was using the opportunity to rub salt in this one wound.
So, just to not lead him to think she was ignoring him, she nodded in reply. Sakura didn't feel like talking to him anymore, and she was already exhausted from having to process so many bizarre bouts of information in such a short period of time.
"Can I have my things back?" She finally asked, and Madara's gaze fell on her for a fraction of a second, before he tossed her pouch in her direction.
As the young woman examined the contents to check if everything was still there, he decided to speak again "Whether or not you had any part in it, those were definitely stolen."
He was so adamant on this concept that Sakura had to conclude he wasn't just trying to mess with her or use it as an excuse to coerce her into doing his bidding, but he was fully convinced of those words for some strange reason, and she couldn't help but question his reasons "How do you know?"
"They smell like it." He answered plainly, and Sakura deflated at the answer. She knew that animals like dogs had excellent senses, but this suggestion was beyond ridiculous and she concluded that he was just messing with her in the end. "Come, I'll take you to the other side of the mountain."
Not waiting for her reply, Madara walked by her crouched form and climbed down the stairs, quickly disappearing from view.
Sakura scampered to her feet and ran to catch up with him, feeling annoyed at the man, but too tired to dwell on it.
The walk back was in complete silence, and Sakura managed to memorize the order of the turns they had to take from the treasure room to the entrance.
Madara opened the hidden closet and took out her satchel just before pulling a long length of dark fabric.
Sakura was about to walk up to him to retrieve the bag that he had left so inconsiderately on the ground, when she noticed that he was pulling the back of his collar upwards, and revealing…
Once she noticed he was taking of his shirt, Sakura knew should've looked away immediately and focused on forgetting that something like that had ever happened, but her wide eyes couldn't seem to turn away from the sight in front of her, and the voice in the back of her head became louder as more and more skin was exposed, but she didn't sound at all upset about this turn of events.
…This was so wrong.
Despite the fact that she wanted to slap herself for staring, the only thing that truly broke her out of her trance was the sight of Madara's fingers gripping the fabric of his pants and tugging them down – and she was glad that in this situation her common sense came out triumphant and she was able to cover her eyes and squeal as loudly as she could.
"What are you doing?!" The moment of silence that took for Madara to reply felt far longer than it actually was.
"Changing the position of one's limbs tends to destroy whatever clothing they are wearing. I had hopes you wouldn't need this explained to you." He retorted irritated.
"I-I just didn't think-"
"That is plain to see." He sneered, and she gritted her teeth in return. He could be attractive – especially for a demon – but he was still a demon, and one with a very unpleasant character to boot, so Sakura would do well to forget about what she had seen.
"Move." He spoke exasperatedly, and Sakura risked a peek, just to make sure that he was properly covered, and she was glad to find him covered by a long black cloak that exposed only his head. Something in her mind was mourning the change, but the girl quashed those thoughts as soon as they came.
Madara grimaced in the slightest and walked by her to leave the house. Meanwhile, Sakura's feet seemed determinate to stay fixated on the same spot. Her limbs were trembling a little, but with some insistence she found herself able to move again and followed him outside.
She jogged after the man on shaky legs, as he didn't seem to think that waiting for her was in his list of priorities.
As he lead her through the forest, Sakura noticed that he seemed to speed up whenever she got close to him, as if trying to distance himself. Could it be that she had offended him with that scene? Well… she had stared blatantly, then screamed. She probably wouldn't be particularly happy if she had been in his situation.
…The again, she would never just take off her clothes in front of a stranger. And she shouldn't care whether she had offended him, because he clearly didn't seem to mind doing the same to her. In fact, maybe she should try offending him more.
"Halt." A deep voice cut through her reverie like a blade through flesh, and Sakura looked up to find Madara a few feet away, his back turned to her and his arm extended, as if signaling her to wait. "From this point on I cannot continue in this form. If you have something to say, I'd suggest doing so now."
Actually, there was one thing she had thought about, but not thought of saying out loud up until that point.
"How do I know you won't hurt me even if I help you?"
The arm that was extended dropped at his side and he looked at her from over his shoulder. It was clear that the question had sparked his interest, but she couldn't tell if this was good or bad.
He moved from his position and walked in her direction until he was close – uncomfortably so – and he examined her face after something in particular.
"You don't." He spoke at last, and at first Sakura expected there to be more, but he turned around and walked away from her, this time not stopping.
At some point, with each step he took, Madara seemed to get shorter and the only part of him she could see – his hair – seemed to sprawl in every direction around his head. After it became clear that the cloak didn't conceal a man anymore, it fell down.
If the girl had had any doubts, now she was certain as to what Madara was.
The large wolf paused and turned to face her, his large red orbs observing her impatiently.
At this point, Sakura was too tired to be surprised by anything.
A/N
I'm not really going to give a reply to people who commented last chapter and were logged off, mainly because their messages were praise or requests to update, which I don't mind at all, is just that I see little point in replying to those things, especially after I've already published the chapter. From now on I won't reply to reviews that just say things like "This is great!" or "Please update soon!", but rest assured that this is not because I don't appreciate them (and you can totally keep sending them u.u). I'm really happy to see people enjoying my story, but if all the answers I can give back to you are "Thanks!" and "As soon as possible!", well… this message here for you xD
…Too late to put a 'Naked Madara' warning? In my defense, if I said that in the start, people would get the wrong idea. At least Sakura liked it. I wish I knew fanfictions where she is just as much of a pervert as Kishimoto has shown her to be in the original series. It makes her more relatable.
Unfortunately, I feel like this chapter went waaaay too fast. I guess I made Sakura accept everything very quickly, but this is one of the things I have to do to make the story flow. If I didn't give my characters a large suspension of disbelief or ignored some of the changes that must've happened in those 5 centuries, the chapters would be just Sakura and Madara yelling "WHAT?!" at each other over and over.
The years in the story follow the Chinese calendar because using the Gregorian calendar would bother me to no end, and that's why they are in the year 3801(which is 1103 in our calendar). I'd like to warn everyone that I took liberties by doing this, cause by the time Madara was alive (like… non-zombie-werewolf alive) Japan hadn't adopted the Chinese calendar yet, but for purposes of practicality, we'll ignore that.
Also, for some reason I like to write the numbers, instead of just using the symbols – probably because I'm a snot.
I feel like I should talk about wolves as they are perceived in old Japan. It seems there is this tendency to give animals some sort of personality and "spiritual meaning" in folk lore – and I don't know if they did this for every type of animal, but in this culture even gnats are supposed to be the reincarnated form of some people, so I don't think this possibility is far-fetched – and unlike most animals such as foxes, raccoons and weasels who were mischievous, wolves were much more "noble". I've read a phrase that went something like "wolf stories are not about good or bad wolves, they are about good or bad people"; there is also a little story that says that once a man met a wolf and this wolf gave the man his brow, and if the man placed it above his own brow he would be able to distinguish "people" from "animals" (good people from bad people).
Oh, and let us talk about the Fujiwara. The Fujiwara were a family that came to nearly control Japan due to an interesting strategy: back in Heian Japan, children were raised by their mothers' families (in particular their grandfathers), so the Fujiwara used their influence to get as many girls of the family turned into empresses, concubines and ladies of the court in general so that they would give birth to the emperor's children and those children would be raised by the Fujiwara, and some of them would eventually become emperors, thus giving the Fujiwara immense power.
I'd also like to point that Sakura is great with numbers, because in the series she is a big nerd, and, worst of all, a math nerd D: (jk, I wish I was a math nerd). Meanwhile, Madara is absolutely terrible at it (even though he can multiply five by five when it comes to trolling the gokage – Yay! Maddie gets a golden star!) – and that bit about his hand twitching was totally him restraining the urge to count on his fingers xD
And omg, is this crackship going well; Madara already threatened to eat Sakura's father. I'm going to have fun with this.
