Her heart ached, feeling as though it had been torn asunder. For a third time. Sakura could barely hold back the snort which came with that dark thought. Rubbing at her chest, right over her sternum, she recalled the cold, pale white hand which had ripped through flesh, bone, and organ there. She would never be able to forget that hand, nor the spinning red eyes which had whirled as they met her acrid green set, nor even the betrayal which had set in both times, giving rise to her anger. She had thought Sasuke loved her, and in her mind back then love didn't have anything to do with ripping people's hearts out. Sakura smiled, a grim little thing. Ah, how blissfully ignorant she had been back then. Love, it seemed, for her had everything to do with heartache and pain.
But in that world she definitely deserved it – penance for her numerous sins. She was a monster. A terrible beast who only brought death and destruction, who ruined the lives of everyone around her. Yet another reason why she should have been as far away as physically possible from her soulmate as they trekked back to Rivendell. Imladris. She shouldn't have been going there either. It was practically sacrilege. She was a dragon through and through, a creature of Morgoth, a weapon for the enemy to use and discard. There was no place for her in an elven settlement, even if her soulmate was an elf. Who thankfully thought her dead. Sakura wouldn't enlighten him otherwise.
"You are not in too much pain, are you?" Glorfindel asked, blissfully oblivious to her wish to be on the other half of the continent to him. "My offer from before still stands…"
"Not happening," Sakura hissed, baring her teeth at him. "Ever." She could make it to Rivendell on her own steam. Like hell she was letting an elf carry her to a place which would repel her very nature itself. If she was going to walk into a dragon's hell, then it would be on her own terms with her own feet. Nothing more, nothing less.
"Stubborn fool," he murmured, oblivious to just how sharp her ears were, and Sakura rolled her eyes. She was that and more. An utterly stupid fool for ever craving the love of her so-called 'creator'. An utterly stupid fool for taking her rage against Sasuke out on the world there. "Though I suppose we might as well indulge in more conversation to pass the time, and perchance move your thoughts onto something less painful."
"Such as?" she questioned, cursing her curious nature. And the fact she couldn't seem to deny him anything. She should have been hurrying away – not indulging in more conversation with her beloved, wonderful soulmate.
Glorfindel smiled, and Sakura was hit with the full force of his beauty. She wanted to scream at him not to play with her heart like that. "Did you ever get your dagger back?" he asked, and Sakura felt her brow furrow in confusion at the question. What dagger? Clearly, her confusion was palpable, and so her soulmate elaborated. "The one you used upon the dragon – to slit its throat open – you did not have it when Aravir and I found you," he said, and she blinked dumbly. "It was a terribly messy cut. In fact, it looked more as though you tore through its skin and scales with your bare hand… but that would be impossible, even as strong as you are, Lothien."
Sakura swallowed, throat suddenly incredibly dry because that was exactly what happened, albeit with chakra involved. Thank Valier she looked human, and that elves and men knew naught of the fact there once existed a dragon skin-changer. "Er… No," she said. "It appears to have been lost. Though I had forgotten all about it, if I am perfectly honest." When are you ever perfectly honest? the snide voice questioned, and Sakura ground her teeth together.
"Well, seeing as that dagger served as a great aid to you, it would be rather remiss of you to not replace such a weapon," he said, and Sakura blinked as a dagger was held out to her. Swallowing thickly, she stared at the unmistakably elven craft, blinking once more as the weapon was thrust in her grasp and left there.
"Uh…" She stared at him, glancing between him and the blade – his weapon – which he had just given to her. "I… cannot accept this," she said, holding her hand out, blade and all. Not least because the blade stung her somewhat. She carried Melkor's taint, a stain on her very soul itself. It was no surprise any elven craft would reject her so. But saying that fact aloud would be tantamount to admitting to the fact that she was a dragon. She smiled sombrely at the thought. A creature of death and destruction who only brought ruin to those around her.
"Then consider it a loan," he spoke, that sunny smile still fixed in place on his lips. "Until we reach Rivendell."
She opened her mouth, ready to argue at him – demand that he take the blade back – but the fight drained out from her as swiftly as it had arrived. "Alright," she mumbled, feeling so terribly spent, and she was fairly sure she was only on her feet out of pure spite. Added to her unnatural strength which could only belong to a wolf in sheep's clothing. "But just until we reach Rivendell," she snapped, glaring at the one who had imposed such a blade upon her.
"Not a second longer," he agreed, humming to himself then.
Seeing a chance to escape, she glanced around, stiffened at the sudden realisation that they were quite a ways away from the main group behind them. And there was no way for her to easily re-join them as such without making her avoidance of Glorfindel blatantly obvious… he had already asked her once why she despised him so, and she had answered in anger. She didn't want another situation like that to arise, so staying where she was it was. "We should probably slow down," she remarked, glancing between her soulmate and the group behind them. Then she would be able to slip away so very easily.
"They have been keeping up with us," Glorfindel informed her, and Sakura blinked at the news. "Though they appear to be giving us some space to talk." A wry smile curved at his lips. "Indeed, this is likely the most they have ever seen me talk to one of the edain."
"I take it you do not venture out much, then," she said, all too aware of how the elves tended to keep to themselves in their realms barring war or another terrible crisis. Particularly those her kin had inflicted upon them. But those belonged in tales of years long passed. "Though I feel as though I have taken up too much of your time as of late…"
"That is nothing to concern yourself with," he said. "One might even presume we were bound to do as we have done ever since you emptied the contents of your stomach upon my boots."
Sakura blinked, blood rushing to her cheeks at the memory. "Not one of my finest moments," she grumbled, folding her arms as she fell back in step with him.
"I would have to agree with you there," Glorfindel said, eyes alight with mirth. Something completely different to how he no doubt felt at the time. "Though I dare say you have since redeemed yourself and your image after your heroic feats."
A snort escaped her before she could stop it. "I am no hero," she declared. The thought was laughable. How could a dragon be a hero? That was an impossibility unto itself. "In fact, I am probably the furthest thing from it…"
Grey eyes bore into her skull, and Sakura dared not to meet that gaze. She hated it. She hated herself. It really was asking too much of the world to allow her to be loved for once. It shouldn't have bothered her – she should have been resigned to that unloved fate… "The furthest thing from a hero would be a villain," he remarked. "I highly doubt you would be classed as one of those."
"You would be surprised," Sakura murmured, closing her eyes briefly, gathering her courage so she could meet that gaze which felt as though it ripped through her. "You do not know my past, Glorfindel, though neither do I know yours."
Sakura barely refrained from flinching at the considering look then directed her way. With those eyes which felt as though they could uncover her secrets – her lies, and the many deceptions which accompanied them. "I thought you were well learned of the First Age…" he murmured, and Sakura frowned at that. Because what did the First Age have to do with him… unless… Her heart pounded at the thought that he might have lived through her admittedly rather short reign of terror, rather than simply hearing tales from his ancestors.
"I am well learned of dragons, my lord," she said, staring around at the wonderful trees, hating the niggling feeling at the back of her head which ate at her. What was she forgetting? "I know about most, though not all, events involving them."
"Tell me, do you know of a city named Gondolin?" he asked, and Sakura turned to him, the name dimly ringing a bell somewhere in the back of her memory. His expression was oddly shuttered all of a sudden, and Sakura felt the hairs on the back of her neck raise in warning.
Sakura sighed softly, body tense, nerves on edge for a reason she couldn't work out. Probably because of her damned soulmate and the fact she felt like he was too close. Too close to discovering the truth about who she was… about what she was. There was no changing that. "Why are you telling me of this?" she asked, wanting for them to simply walk in silence. One which would be far too comfortable because they were two pieces of a puzzle which were meant to slot together so very seamlessly. "You do not owe me tales of your past, just as I do not owe you tales of mine."
"Does it not make for conversation?" he questioned, and Sakura felt as though her heart had dropped to her toes. She didn't want to make conversation with the soulmate she could never lay claim upon. She didn't want to be taunted by those golden locks which she would never be able to add to her non-existent hoard. "For all that we have spoken, we indeed know little of each other, and there is a long way still yet to go until we reach our destination… We have yet to return to those who we separated when we ventured off deep into the tainted woods." Sakura frowned, that same niggling sensation coming back full force. It whispered that she had missed something – something big, something important. Her mind wouldn't let her rest properly until she had solved that mystery. And a tired mind meant for more slipups when conversing with her beloved soulmate. "Perhaps I hope to come to know you a little better before we part ways?"
Damned soulmates and the bonds which tugged them together so, Sakura thought bitterly. "Because we are kindred spirits in a way?" she offered jokingly, remembering their little pity party. In which her soulmate had argued about her soulmate who ought to not hate her, whilst reminding her of his contempt for his own soulmate. Part of her, the same part which had enjoyed watching other's suffering, wanted to see the face he made when he came to realise that she was his intended. It would be terribly exquisite, the snide voice whispered, and Sakura swiftly quashed the thought.
It was so terribly hard to stop being a horrible monster.
"That may be the answer," Glorfindel said, smiling at her then. Like she was a friend. Like she wasn't a filthy monster who only sought ruin and death.
Sakura sighed, feeling the sudden absence of the breeze as they ventured post an outcrop of rock which shielded them from the wonderful breeze which made the summer's stifling heat that much more bearable. Ah, how she hated summer. The warmest of the seasons. She preferred winter more – she always had throughout at least the last of her lives. Dragons had been so terribly bothersome in summer, when the time came to pair up and—
"It's summer," she mumbled, stopping dead still all of a sudden, biting at her thumb as that niggling sensation became that much more prominent. She had missed something big – something terribly big when it came to their recently defeated foe. Wracking her brains, she ignored Glorfindel's next words, chewing determinedly on her thumb, the sensation helping to ground her on the problem set before her.
"It takes quite a long time for beasts such as this one to subvert and twist the nature around them…" Her words spoken a matter of days ago came back to haunt them, and her eyes widened as she remembered. It had been unusual how quickly the dragon had overtaken the forest. But two voices were stronger than one, especially when they worked in harmony to create discord.
"It's summer!" she repeated that much more urgently, hating the confused look Glorfindel gave her as she said the same words. "Do you not—tch. Of course you do not know…" She ran a hand through her hair, hating how sticky and grease-laden it was, hating that the part of her so obsessed with fashion had seemingly come back to haunt her. "Summer is the mating season of dragons – well, for fire-breathers, at least – the incubation of the egg clutch takes a year and dragons are meant to be born at the peak of summer, given their fire-aligned nature. Do you understand where I am going with this?" She stared at him pointedly.
Glorfindel only frowned. "Those are some facts I feel as though I would be better off not…" he trailed off, and Sakura watched as comprehension dawned on his face.
"It explains why the forest fell so quickly under the dragon's sway – or should I say the dragons' sway?" she exclaimed, watching as Glorfindel turned, ready to hurry back to the group they had allowed to lag behind them somewhat. But the universe utterly hated Sakura – or so it proved – as the dragon they had overlooked burst over the outcrop of rock. Truly, the timing was terrible, and Sakura hated – both the universe and herself for having such cursed luck.
Scales glimmered like jewels, emeralds and jades compared to the ruby colouring of its dead partner, with eyes the colour of fresh blood gleamed with an inhuman rage. It was slimmer than the other dragon, and ultimately faster too as it snaked down the steep drop, eyes locked on the pair of them before it sighted the larger group. Swearing up a storm, Sakura chased after her soulmate, chakra pumping to her legs as she spotted the long, limber tail performing an all too familiar move. It was going after the larger group, seeing the both of them as minor annoyances. Sakura gave into her urge to scowl. The bitty bratty baby of a dragon was writing her off – she, a dragon. One of the dragons of the First Age. Dimly, part of her mind reminded her that she hated herself due to that very fact, but most of her thought process was taken up by the pressing need to get between her soulmate and that dangerous tail.
She succeeded in that endeavour, and the joys of success rang through her—
Wait. No. That was the pain from her ribs.
The pain of the impact was exquisite upon her already bruised, and possibly cracked ribs, despite the chakra which welled up the lessen the damage. But as always chakra could only do so much. Her world was consumed with pain, and vaguely, Sakura was aware of another body close to hers and the odd sensation of rolling and falling. There had been an incline to one side of them – not too steep, but not particularly shallow either.
Her breath came in short pants, pain piercing her chest with every movement, a low moan escaping her as she tumbled and tumbled down until water surrounded her with a loud splash. A river, part of her numbly realised, the larger part of her screaming out in pain. Pain she so deserved. Penance for her sins, numerous and uncounted as they were.
Water closed over her head, the world becoming dim and murky, and Sakura wondered if that was how her fourth life was going to end. Alone under the waters. It was probably a terribly fitting ending for a fire-breathing monster. She wondered if Aravir would mourn her, despite their short acquaintance.
A smile curved at her lips.
Probably. Bubbles of air escaped her lips, the waters around her darkening as if tainted by something, even as the currents swept her away, further away from her troubles. Humans of that world were so emotional like that… so very caring about the lives of the others, even though they hadn't uncovered the many secrets they each held. Humanity was so very wonderful. Well so long as they were on the side of good.
Sakura hated that she would never be able to count herself amongst them. Once a dragon, always a dragon. Nothing could change that fact.
Fingers, large and more calloused than her own, closed around her thin wrist, pulling her up, and Sakura felt her eyes crack open, staring up at the way the sunlight shone down through the waters. The way it shone down on those golden locks which almost appeared to be glowing as he swum up through the deep river waters. He pulled her up, up towards the light, up towards the air she needed to keep on living.
Sakura didn't know whether it was a good thing.