Dumbledore returned that afternoon as promised, and began his tour.
One of the things that was most disconcerting about the school, was how dense the chakra in all the stones was. She'd assumed it was limited to the room they'd given her, fortified against escape. No, the entire place truly was a fortress. It was impossible to sense anything through them. Each corridor felt as if she was being compressed on all sides compared to how open the forest was. She guessed that it would take an exceptionally destructive jutsu to break through those walls.
Oh what the hokage wouldn't give for a fortress like this.
There was another phenomenon that disturbed her immensely.
Along the walls there were whisperings. Breathy chatter, from which she could make out real words although not in the language she knew. Faint chakra slipped alongside the whispers, but nothing substantial enough to be a person unless they were extremely skilled at masking their presence. It wasn't even as concrete as a seal or a jutsu, more like some sort of chakra residue.
Anyone that skilled at masking their chakra wouldn't be caught dead whispering.
Dumbledore-sensei shuffled alongside her, chatting happily about the school's history and locations of the various classrooms as they passed. When she slowed her steps, he was careful to match his pace to hers.
He wasn't going to allow her to slip behind.
"I think we shall visit the great hall next," he finally announced. "I'm really too old to be on my feet all day and I'm not certain how much benefit you will get from marching up and down near identical halls."
Halls you can't even see, was the implication she heard in his statement.
She nodded slowly, tilting her head from right to left as whispers rippled around them.
"What is making that sound?" she finally asked.
"Ah, that would be the paintings," he explained. Apparently her face betrayed confusion, she'd have to work on that. "The paintings at Hogwarts are animate and sentient."
Well, that was highly inconvenient. For her anyway. It held potential as a brilliant form of surveillance, which made her glad she hadn't assumed her private room was actually private.
Summoning the crows had been a gamble. She'd wanted her crows to observe Dumbledore-sensei quietly, along with wanting their help to discern whether the food was drugged or otherwise tampered with. It would have been better to keep the fact that they could speak secret. Although, he didn't seem surprised by Tsuchibue's demands.
Maybe that meant summon animals weren't unusual here.
On the way to the hall, he held up a hand to stop her. If he thought it odd that she slowed without making contact, he didn't say it. "The staircases are ahead. You must know that they have minds of their own, and are subject to changing their destinations on a whim. Sometimes while people are halfway up or down. Please be extremely cautious here, as a fall from the stairs could be messy."
She cast her chakra out around him when he turned away, careful not to brush up against his large, firey presence. When she reached the stairs, what she sensed fascinated her.
The stones held the same dense chakra as the rest of the fortress, only they moved. She could almost picture them clearly, as solid as they felt under her probing chakra and their placement so firm in her mind. For the first time, she wondered if the building itself was sentient in some way.
The ceilings expanded higher and higher as she approached the great hall with the ancient sensei, relieving the sense of claustrophobia pressing in around her. Smells wafted through the corridor, tantalizing her with nameless sweets and the achingly familiar scent of pine.
This, it was her favorite room by far. Like stepping out into an open meadow compared to the rest of the building. Even the stones in the ceiling felt breezy somehow. At the far end of the room was a giant prickly mass which had to be the source of the pine scent.
"This is where students and staff take their meals," Dumbledore said. "If you would like to eat with us rather than in your room, your company would be most welcome."
She hesitated at that. How many other senseis were there? How many students? She didn't like the idea of being surrounded by strangers, and suddenly wished that anyone else was with her. With a pang, her thoughts went to pudgy little Fukumaru and she wondered yet again if he'd escaped that night. If anyone was looking after him. Or had he been left to beg on the streets of Konoha.
She tried not to imagine him, limp and lifeless on the floor like her mother.
She wondered too, what had become of Sasuke. Was he still attending the academy? Did he awaken his eyes too? If so, was he being targeted like her?
At least, she still had her crows.
The old man's voice intruded on her thoughts, like clouds breezing through and obscuring them. "In one week we will be hosting a holiday celebration. I believe that would be an ideal event for you to take the potion we discussed. You would be immersed in the spoken language for several hours."
She didn't answer right away. Instead she been considering fleeing the castle before then. These adults were complete strangers. And while it was true they could have easily poisoned her before this, she still didn't trust them. It wouldn't be too hard to find a new tree, far from here where they wouldn't find her so easily.
He'd already brought up the Uchiha name too. If he started contacting people in Konoha about her, it could undo every step she'd taken to survive so far.
Yet, all this time he'd phrased everything as suggestions. Besides locking her in the room, he wasn't requiring anything so far.
She wished his chakra was easier to feel out. He was so careful to keep it contained, serene, it was hard to tell if he was doing all of this out of pity, some legal obligation to look after an unaccompanied child, or if she was simply an object to exploit.
Later that evening, Sayuri sat cross legged on the floor of the room. She'd decided to build a blanket fort with the table for privacy, in case one of those spy paintings had been hung on the wall where she couldn't see or sense it.
Turning the chairs so the seats faced outward made her feel like she had something of a solid barrier along the sides, holding the sheets in place. She'd pulled the squashy cushions off the couch and piled them underneath, then slid the cool metal tray of food from the tabletop and pulled it under, balancing it on her crossed legs.
It smelled like grilled mackerel and steamed rice. Her stomach twisted painfully in both hunger and nostalgia. She bit her lip hard, fighting the wetness that welled from her empty eyelids. After a second's thought, she wiped the dab of blood from her lip and flickered through the seals to summon her friend.
Tsuchibue appeared with a poof.
"Sup?" he croaked.
"Are you guys able to deliver messages?" she asked.
"Verbal and written," Tsuchibue preened.
"Could you get one to Konoha?"
Tsuchibue's chakra dipped in disapproval. "Neh, we can but why would you contact anyone there when we went to so much trouble to hide you?"
Her hands started fidgeting with the strangely shaped eating utensil on the tray. "I just, thought maybe I should let Sasuke know. He should keep his eyes secret when he awakens them. Just in case."
"Hmm, that may be an issue for us."
She stilled her hands. "Why?"
"Well, if you could have seen the contract you signed, you would know the name of our only other living summoner," he said.
"Dad is gone, so that means-,"
Uchiha Itachi.
"Dammit!" she snarled. "He'll think you're from his brother!"
"Right. But, you shouldn't worry about Sasuke. He's safe right now."
"How do you know that?" she growled.
"Because," the crow began awkwardly, "We've been keeping a lookout. Itachi left him alive. He intends to fight Sasuke himself one day. He won't allow someone else to cripple Sasuke before then."
Sayuri was silent for a moment as she digested this new information. "Are you telling me, that sick fuck slaughtered everyone except Sasuke so that he could secretly watch over him and eventually fight him to the death too?"
"Yes," he said. "He wants a real challenge. I suppose he thought Sasuke had the potential to become that challenge." Then as an afterthought, "you shouldn't use that language. Shisui would be appalled."
"Don't tell me how to talk," she snarled. "Don't talk to me about my father. And don't talk about Sasuke like he's some kind of toy for that monster."
"You sound exactly like your mother," he sighed. "She was so unladylike when she got angry."
Fury radiated off of her. This, this dumb bird. "Good. I'm glad I sound like her. Now get the fuck out of here."
A silent moment passed before there was a poof of the summon reversing and she was left utterly alone in her personal darkness.
Fuck those crows, she thought. Fuck Itachi. What if they were secretly passing information to him? What if Itachi knew she was right here? What if her own summons betrayed her?
She pushed the tray off her lap, panic thick in her throat. If there were two summoners at odds with the same contract, which one were they more loyal to?
The stronger one, right?
All she really knew about the contract was they had to fight on her behalf, and she had to fight on theirs. She hadn't been able to read what she'd signed. Her arms trembled. Suddenly the smell of fish was nauseating. Fighting the compulsion to throw up, she pushed the tray out from under the privacy of the sheets. Out onto the floor where it sat, forsaken in the cold air.
There was no doubt Itachi was strong enough to break into this place. That he could carve holes in its walls if he chose. Carve her into a dozen pieces.
Worse yet, he didn't need to know where exactly she was. Even if she ran away from here, all he had to do was have his crows reverse summon her.
Shit.
How could she have trusted them? Her only allies, gone just like that. She couldn't risk summoning them. She couldn't risk giving them any more intel about anything.
But they saved your life, came an intrusive thought. They could have just abandoned you to the bug user. They could have let you die of your wounds. They could have sent you away with no contract. But they cared for you, even taught you.
Did Itachi have some twisted future use for her as well? Was that why they'd been willing to let a tiny blind weakling like her sign their contract?
She buried fists in her hair, pulling it until her eyelids grew wet from the pain of it instead of the ache in her chest. Choked back a sob that fought to escape her throat. She had to get stronger, no matter what. Had to get her eyes back. Had to help Sasuke, somehow, because otherwise that monster Itachi would take him too.
Severus Snape made his way out of the blessedly quiet great hall after breakfast. Christmas break was one of his favorite times at the castle.
The strange child he and Albus had found was given free access to the castle during daylight for the past three days, but so far she hadn't intruded on their meals. Some of his colleagues had worried. That she might run away, or get lost in the castle. The few students who had stayed over the holiday searched for her out of curiosity and boredom, but had no luck finding her.
Severus wasn't worried. Not about the girl anyway. He was more concerned she would intrude on or damage something she had no business getting into.
It was still his opinion that St. Mungo's was the most ideal place for someone so clearly disturbed. They had first rate healers, secure wards, and competent potioneers who were more than capable of brewing Lingua Nova. He could have devoted his Christmas holiday entirely to relaxing, but instead was spending the days leading up to Christmas closely tending the brew as requested by the headmaster.
Something about the child had deeply rattled the old man. Severus took comfort in the fact that after she drank the potion, she'd be out of the castle and into the hands of whatever poor soul Dumbledore managed to set the little monster on.
At least for the next few years.
Severus' attention was drawn by Mr. Filch's screams of barely coherent rage. He stalked closer to the castle entryway, where the sound reverberated from.
The child in question was standing in a pool of liquid she'd tracked from the entry despite it being completely frozen and icy outside. Her sodden black robes and unruly black hair dripped with slush, and the ever present blindfold obscured half her face. Clenched tight in her mouth was a slick eel, which writhed pathetically. The overall impression was of a kitten someone had thrown into the bath.
Mrs. Norris meowed pitifully, her claws tugging at Mr. Filch's pant leg.
The little girl didn't flinch from his shouting. She might have been deaf as well the way she just stood there. After a minute of silently being berated, she took a step forward, dipped into a crouch, and dropped the eel from her mouth onto the floor.
The elderly cat immediately darted forward, snatched it, and ran down the corridor with Mr. Filch limping after her crying, "Mrs Norris! You don't know where that's been! It hasn't even been cooked, don't trust it!"
As the caretaker and his cat disappeared around a corner, the child strode forward with purpose. He saw that her arms, were crossed tightly over her chest, not against the cold but to restrain an armful of live eels. He stilled his breathing and watched with narrowed eyes as she swept closer. He almost thought she'd failed to notice him, but she inclined her head in his direction as she passed.
"OhayĆ gozaimasu, Snape-Sensei."
He didn't say anything back.
"Unagi wa ikagadesu ka?" she said in a small voice. She shifted her armload and stretched a pale little hand toward him, a wriggling eel draped over her outstretched palm.
Lip curling, he infused his his voice with the full force of his disdain so the meaning would not be mistaken even if she did not know the words. "I think not."
Shrugging, she tucked the eel back in with the others and continued on her trajectory down the corridor.
He shook his head and in a rare act of charity toward the groundskeeper went to draw the wand from his pocket so he could vanish the mess.
Only, something else was in his pocket too. Something cold. Slimy. And alive. It coiled around his hand.
With a hiss of irritation he jerked the eel out and threw it to the floor, then vanished it along with the rest of the unwanted slush.
When had it gotten there? And how? Accidental magic?
Only a few more days until Christmas, he told himself. A few more days, then I won't have to see that little beast for several years.
Author's Note: Thank you for sticking along and reading through this so far. I was trying to get through the Christmas holiday in this chapter, but my brain is just too tired and it felt like an okay stopping point for now. There's a time skip coming up fairly soon, so it's not going to be 100 chapters of her being 8 years old.
When she spoke to Snape, she basically just said hello, then asked him if he wanted an eel. Then decided he needed one anyway.
