I am now publishing on Ao3 as well as on Fanfiction dot net, for this story at least. Copies posted to other websites are not authorised by me.
Beta'd by the inestimably excellent Insane Scriptist.
Fair warning to all, this story started life as an exploration of consent, coercion and all the various associated degrees of dubious. Therefore dubcon is a major feature of both plot and worldbuilding. If that's not what you want to read about, please press the back button.
Unchained
Tobirama did not expect to wake up. At all. He'd felt the seal trap close its jaws over him, felt his chakra ripped from his control just before he lost consciousness; Izuna had finally outsmarted him. Logically, he was dead.
Except he isn't dead. This is too strange and consistently detailed to be a dream either. His chakra is suppressed and inaccessible, his weapons, armour and even his happuri and sandals have been taken away from him, but he is alive and not physically restrained. Not that 'unrestrained' means much when he can barely even feel his chakra and he is trapped in a small stone room with Uchiha Izuna between himself and the fragile-looking shōji door.
"Just listen please and if you don't like my offer I'll do you the favour of a quick death before my father returns," Izuna hisses, still fully armoured but coat, sandals and weapons nowhere in sight. Tobirama has already tried to force his way past and out of the door; he'd been thrown backwards with little visible effort, indicating that the chakra-suppression seals affecting him are either on his skin somewhere or else have been carefully tailored to only cover Senju.
Tobirama ponders the mercy of a quick death when it will leave his clan at his enemy's mercy. It is still better that his most likely fate should he fall into Uchiha Tajima's hands, which is to have his mind peeled apart layer by layer so the Uchiha Head can steal every last Senju secret he holds.
He straightens and lets his shoulders relax, hands dropping to rest against his hips with as much space between himself and Izuna as the room will allow. "So talk."
Izuna puffs up, glaring at him past the asymmetric magatama necklace tattoo snaking over the bridge of his nose. "My brother is probably never going to marry, which means I am the one who needs to give him heirs, and I can't because you are in the way!"
Tobirama draws in a sharp breath through his nose to snap back at the utter stupidity of that statement, then stops dead as his opponent's scent hits him. Izuna usually smells like ash, dawn sunlight on dew, feathers and a hint of star anise, which he still does, but right now he also smells like…
He focuses on his long-time opponent's face, notes the sharpness of the chin and cheekbones but also the softness of the jaw usually hidden by loose hair and high coat collar, then at the distinct absence of a throat knot.
"You're a woman," he says flatly. He can think of at least six reasons why Izuna would go to great lengths to keep that a secret, so he doesn't ask why. Part of him is relieved; even if he does choose to have his throat slit, the Senju likely won't die for it. Izuna will simply retire to breed heirs for her brother and the feud will remain balanced.
"I am a lady," Izuna snarls. "Uchiha are noble! Kuge! We own the very land your clan insists on fighting us upon! And your brother believes we should bow our necks and deal as equals with you, you who trespass and murder our children and do not own so much as a field! Were we any other noble clan the daimyo would have long since censured you for your crimes against us, but because we are kuge and our lordship here predates his, he turns away!"
Tobirama opened his mouth to snap back, but was interrupted by a loud thump and a bitten-off scream from through the paper door behind Izuna. A familiar bitten-off scream echoing with pain.
"Izuna-sama!" a voice calls, barely muffled.
"Yes Hikaku-kun?" Izuna answers, keeping her eyes on Tobirama.
"I caught the Fatal Flower," the Deathblow says from beyond the closed door, "and broke eight different legs and three backs dragging her home for you. What do you want me to do with her?"
Tobirama's breath catches in his throat; he can condemn himself to death for his clan should it be required, would do so in an instant, but his cousin–
"Broken bones?" Izuna asks.
"Both femurs, cousin."
Tobirama can't help wincing, although he manages to limit it to the skin around his eyes; an exceedingly painful injury and slow to heal without considerable chakra assistance.
Izuna hums in her throat. "Strip her of armour and weapons then bring her in here."
Tobirama waits. Izuna is watching him avidly and he will not give his enemy the satisfaction of seeing him break down. He can wait to see Tōka.
Several interminable minutes later, punctuated by muffled whimpers and garbled muttering, Deathblow Hikaku and one of his squad shoulder open the shōji door and carry Tōka in through it, his cousin's face tight and grey with pain and all her hairpins stolen, long, twisted locks of hair hanging lopsidedly down one side of her face. He can't see any other injuries, but Hikaku breaking her legs would end a fight before it could even begin; a second successful manoeuvre on the battlefield and one ending with debilitating injuries for the Senju side, if their throats haven't all been slit and their corpses left to rot.
"On the floor behind me; bind her wrists," Izuna says calmly, not looking away from Tobirama. "Then put the armour and weapons with my effects and fetch a medic. If there is one to be spared."
"Izuna-sama," both men murmur, the response echoed by at least two more voices in the corridor behind them. Tōka is briskly lowered to the floor –they are at least carrying her on a narrow futon– her wrists and fingers firmly secured with sharp-edged wire and then the paper door is closed again, leaving Tobirama with his critically-injured cousin and his enemy.
"What do you want?" Tobirama demands bitterly. Izuna most certainly wants something from him, to not only capture him and spirit him back to this well-made cage but have Tōka dragged along as well for leverage.
"From you?" Izuna specifies, head tilting ever so slightly. "I want you to father my children."
Tobirama's throat closes; behind Izuna's ankles Tōka hisses.
"The Uchiha have very specific laws concerning concubinage," Izuna continues without pause, as though her demand is not utterly insane, "and if you agree I can keep your cousin alive as well. If you refuse, the best I can offer you both is a quick death."
"Why?" Tobirama manages.
Izuna bares her teeth, fierce and triumphant. "Your brother longs for peace," she says confidently, "and he will be Senju Head one day soon; neither of our fathers is likely to live more than another five years at best if both continue to lead from the front lines; age will catch up with them as it does all warriors. And when he is Head, I want my brother to be able to tell him that for every day the feud continues, his nephews are bereaved by the actions of the Senju. Because if my brother can say that, your brother will bow his head and submit to a peace of our choosing rather than knowingly harm your children."
It is utterly underhanded and brilliant in its simplicity. It will work.
"In the short-term, you are both removed from the field which provides my clan with an advantage," Izuna continues briskly, "so the Senju are likely to pull back and stop attacking us, or at least reducing their assaults on our borders. Also, without your frankly peerless sensing on their side they will be unable to target our trading parties."
Also true; a great many of his father's current battle strategies depend heavily on Tobirama's sensory prowess.
"On my side, I hopefully secure my Lineage's succession by adding your blood to mine and ensuring that sensory brilliance and intelligence is available to my descendents," Izuna concludes, "but none of this will happen if you don't make a decision quickly before my father and brother get back. Because if they do get back before you're fully and legally my concubine, I can't save either of you."
Tobirama breathes. It helps that Izuna is utterly matter-of-fact and blatantly mercenary about wanting him in her bed; she has not done this out of lust, but out of a desire to secure her clan's succession and protect her older brother. It makes it… not easy, but less difficult to see her perspective.
He would die for his clan if he thought it would help, but he refuses to murder his cousin out of squeamishness. If he does this she will live, he will live, and maybe there will be escape open to them in the future. If he is dead, he cannot do anything.
"Yes." He lets himself met Izuna's eyes for the first time ever. "I agree to your terms."
Izuna smiles, bright and delighted. "Excellent."
"Not with me in the room, please," Tōka says from the floor, tone strained but still desert-dry.
"What, a genjutsu isn't private enough for you?"
Tobirama feels his face flush; he's not completely inexperienced –he is twenty and his kinsmen have bought him prostitutes before– but the prospect of his older cousin being right there is not comfortable, even if Izuna ensures she can cannot see or hear anything.
He is saved by somebody else calling beyond the door.
"Izuna-sama?"
"You may enter!"
There is a pause, then the shōji are opened by two women in plain linen smocks, one carrying a small many-drawered chest under one arm.
"Move Tōka-san into the fusuma room, secure her wrists with the manacles there, ensure her femurs are set and she is not otherwise injured," Izuna orders, "then once she is treated and comfortable, close the doors and leave. Nobody else may approach until I order otherwise."
"Yes, Izuna-sama." The medics easily lift Tōka's futon between them and carry her from the room; the doors close behind them.
Privacy granted, Tobirama stiffens his spine and takes a step towards Izuna. She holds up a hand; he stops. Watches as she quickly and efficiently strips out of her intricately enamelled armour, opens the shōji and piles it outside in the hallway. Then the paper doors are closed again and it is just him and her, both in their under-armour and bare feet.
"What do you want me to do?" Tobirama asks, uncomfortably aware of the defeated note in his voice.
She takes a few steps towards him, but pauses just outside arm's reach. "Where would you like to start?"
So obtuse. "You said I needed to hurry, before your father and brother returned."
"And so we do, but with my squad on guard both Madara and my father will be… disinclined to interrupt us if we are busy when they return to the clan compound. There is time for a little acclimatisation."
She is being oh so accommodating now she has what she wants; Tobirama loathes it on principle. Loathes it so much, in fact, that he immediately decides to push. He drops to his knees and edges forwards, keeping his eyes on her hands –now level with his face– until he is right in front of her.
"Tobirama?" There is an uneasy note in her voice and he likes it very much.
"You asked me where I wanted to start," he says, half spite and half daring as he tips his face up to meet her eyes up the length of her torso. "And I want to unlace your hakama and taste you."
He has never been so bold, not with the Uzumaki who'd taught him to do this or with the prostitute his cousins had hired for him for the night a week after his most recent birthday. He half-expects Izuna to kick him across the room.
She does not. Instead her eyes bleed red –Tobirama can't help flinching but doesn't dare look away, not now– and she considers him thoughtfully.
"Is that really what you want?"
Tobirama opens his mouth and pauses. Yes, he does want to. Mostly because he is very sure that given a little time and effort he can make her voice crack when saying his name, which would be extremely satisfying considering his current predicament and what she has coerced him into agreeing to. And yet, he does not get the impression that is what Izuna was asking.
"Lust really isn't your thing, is it," Izuna muses, sharingan still spinning ever so slowly.
"No," Tobirama agrees without an ounce of shame.
"Hm." Izuna taps her own thigh idly. "It can grease the wheels a little, in moderation. Make things less awkward."
"What exactly are you offering?"
"I am very good at genjutsu," Izuna says matter-of-factly, "and lust is not hard to induce. It won't stick for very long, but it would be enough to get us both in the mood. I certainly have difficulty enjoying myself without a little push to get me moving."
A vulnerability offered, but also a test. Then again, she has his life and mind in her hands, so what is one more step when he is already well past madness?
"Very well."
Izuna smiles, sharingan whirling a little faster, and then Tobirama's blood and mind are hot.
Her trouser ties resist him, but not for many seconds; her skin tastes amazing and the way her breath catches when he daringly closes his teeth over her hipbone makes him want to bite her. He wants–
–oh he wants–
Tobirama washes his face again, purely because he can; Izuna warmed the water in the deep sink back almost to scalding before leaving on legs that were markedly steadier than her initial stumble to the washroom. Then he picks up the towel left behind for him and eyes the neat pile of clothing on the shelf.
Long underwear and Uchiha indigoes, the outer layer more akin to what he considers formalwear than everyday dress and not something he has ever worn himself. But he knows how to put them on now. If only for having helped Izuna take hers off.
He should not have agreed to the lust genjutsu, no matter how 'minor' it supposedly was; he does not wish to experience a more potent version if that was 'just' an aid. If he had not agreed, he would probably feel less conflicted right now. He would have kept his head while being intimate with her.
He most likely would not have enjoyed it so much either.
Shaking his head sharply to dislodge that supremely unhelpful thought, Tobirama briskly dries himself off in the tiny, curtained-off washroom and dresses himself in the clothing provided. He made the deal with Izuna, who has already gone to talk to her father and ensure a letter is written to the daimyo registering her marriage, as is appropriate for a member of the nobility taking a concubine from outside their clan. He made the deal and now he must abide by it.
Tōka is safe, at least for the time being. Izuna has explained that her having a concubine in the Diplomatic Quarters –what a charming euphemism for this well-appointed prison– means no other clansman is allowed to approach the building or do Tobirama harm, on pain of death. So as long as Tōka is in the building she is safe from all save Izuna.
He has made Izuna bleed countless times before today –including today in fact, she has a shallow slice across her wrist covered by a fresh scab– but this is the first time that the sight of her blood spilled by him has made him uncomfortable. Is it because of the nature of the injury? Or that this is the first and only time he did not actually want to harm her yet has done so anyway? His vigorous explorations with mouth and fingers had revealed little enough of a barrier remaining, so he had not expected her to bleed when sheathing his body within hers. And yet.
Tobirama shakes that thought off as well. Izuna promised to bring back food for him and Tōka, so he will go and sit with his cousin. Perhaps between them they will be able to find another way out of this trap. Knotting the ties of his crisp, new Uchiha-style shirt, he heads out down the corridor for the room Izuna said Tōka was in.
He does not try to walk out of the open front door opposite; he can see the Uchiha still standing guard, and if he leaves then Tōka becomes a valid target. It also feels unwise to test what the fuuinjutsu will do to him if he tries to leave, at least for now. When Tōka is better perhaps he will risk it.
His cousin is flat on her back wearing a plain linen hadajuban, the cord and wood braces around her thighs visible as ridges through the fabric. A chamber pot is set within arm's reach, along with a stack of thoughtfully unfolded blankets so Tōka can pull them over herself if necessary. Currently a single blanket is covering her from the knees down, the upper half a thick wedge she is using to lean on so as to scrutinise the heavily-decorated walls of her cell.
She tips her head to look his way as he closes the fusuma panel behind himself. "Little cousin! So kind of you to join me."
Her face is still pale and tight; evidently the Uchiha do not care to expend good painkillers on a prisoner.
"Tōka-nee," he replies, settling down to one side of the futon where she can easily see him. A wave of exhaustion buffets him; Tobirama smothers a yawn. Having almost no chakra is exhausting. Being held hostage, the lust genjutsu and his subsequent exertions had thoroughly distracted him from tracking his energy levels, but before getting up to wash he'd been fighting sleep even on that chilly stone floor.
His cousin's eyes glint. "Tired, cousin? Over-exert yourself stabbing Izuna so vigorously?"
"Tōka–"
"You have always been very vocal over wanting to run her through, so maybe I shouldn't be so surprised that given the opportunity you have taken to it with such audible pleasure. Given her appreciation of your efforts will you be sparring again later?"
Tobirama lets the vitriol roll over him; his cousin is never pleasant when in pain. "How are your legs, cousin?"
Tōka glares at him. "I am assured they are properly set," she admits grudgingly, "and they do hurt less. But the inflammation is still going down and I am going to be bed-bound for most of three months." Of course the Uchiha will not waste chakra healing an enemy when their injury cages them far more efficiently than mere steel ever could.
"No painkillers?" There are always fewer complications with properly dosed painkillers, as the patient sleeps better.
"Willow bark tincture," Tōka makes a face, "and the suggestion that I request Izuna provide genjutsu assistance before going to sleep."
Tōka will not ask tonight, but it's very likely that by the day after tomorrow she will be tired and sore enough to give in. Tobirama could say that Izuna had been very punctilious about asking him before putting him under a genjutsu and meticulously ensuring it was clear of his mind before leaving him, but that will only invite more invective right now.
"I will ask about opiates when Izuna returns," he says instead. "Are your wrists alright?" He can't see either of them, tucked under her lower back as they are.
"Manacled," Tōka says shortly, "but they padded the chain under my back. Shallow cuts on my hands from the wire, but they cleaned those. And me."
No wonder she's prickly as a thornbush; Tōka hates to be helpless and two Uchiha –at least they were both women and easily identified as such compared to Izuna– have stripped her, washed her, dried her, redressed her in different clothing and tucked her up in blankets. His cousin is a terrible patient at the best of times, but to be such in enemy hands with the prospect of a further three months of similar treatment…
"There is a toilet and wash-basin through the stone room," he offers, "although I would rather leave that until you are a little more mobile." Without chakra enhancement to call on he doesn't trust himself not to drop her. Crutches would do no good either with both legs broken.
Tōka sighs, then takes a deep, deliberate breath. "Thank you, cousin." She attempts a smile. "Did you enjoy yourself, at least?"
Tobirama feels his ears heat and looks away hurriedly, then glances back as she chuckles weakly at him.
"So it's abduction and restraint you like then, cousin? If only we'd known sooner, we could have found you an Uzumaki to tie you to your own bedframe much more safely–"
"Tōka, please–"
"Or is it that she boxed you in with cunning and out-thought you so effortlessly? That fuuinjutsu she caught you in didn't look like anything I've ever seen before and even when we thought Izuna was a man she looked all skin and bones next to Madara. I would not have put money on the Izuna of yesterday being able to catch you over one shoulder and run full-tilt carrying you, armour and all, and yet here we are." His cousin pauses. "And don't talk to me about chakra enhancement, Tobira-kun, that was not all chakra. You definitely weigh more than she does and unbalanced loads are the worst."
"More fuuinjutsu?" Tobirama offers weakly, having rather avoided thinking about the gaping hole in his memory between his capture and awakening. "I am almost certain that the chakra suppression is on the building, but I suspect there is something extra on me somewhere to keep me from leaving." It is fairly evident, from the heavy manacles embedded in the wall of the stone room and the pair chaining Tōka to a ring set in stone through a hole in the floor here, that those usually imprisoned within the 'Diplomatic Quarters' are not permitted to move around freely.
He feels exhausted. Which yes is partly from his recent activity, but most of it is being so completely cut off from his own chakra. If he were this tired at home he'd be courting chakra exhaustion and take a break to eat well and nap, but that really isn't possible here. Tōka is lying on the only futon and he doesn't want to use any of the blankets that the medics have set aside for her.
"If there's a seal on your back I could tell you," Tōka muses, "but if it's on your scalp somewhere we'd have to shave you bald to find it and we don't have a kunai between us." Or enough chakra to so much as twirl a leaf, let alone form a scalpel, but that hardly needs to be said.
Tobirama takes his shirt and undershirt off anyway, turning to give his cousin his back.
Her sharp hiss of breath is not remotely comforting.
"I should have paid more attention to Obaa-san's lessons," Tōka admits tiredly after a few tense seconds' silence, "but I think there is more to what I am seeing than just keeping you indoors, little cousin. It is very intricate for something that simple, given what Mito-chan has told me about barriers."
"What does it look like?" He wants to know, even if there's nothing he can do about it.
"There are several sections. The smallest is at the nape of your neck, a pattern of nested and intersecting circles reaching from your hairline almost to your shoulders. The largest is in the small of your back, precisely that part of your back that you can't see without a large, high-quality mirror or genjutsu assistance." Tōka's tone is grim. "It's in the style of Uchiha facial tattoos, so if there's kanji in there they're too elaborate or obscure to puzzle out, and forms the shape of a crow with outstretched wings grasping a sunburst in three claws."
Yatagarasu, the attendant of Amaterasu? That fits with what scant knowledge he has of Uchiha kami worship, but is also deeply dispiriting when combined with the equally little he knows of Uzumaki invocation fuuinjutsu. Anything that calls on gods is best left to those with the training and experience to not die when doing so, as Obaasan put it. "Anything else?"
"It's connected to the circles at your nape by various swirls and magatama that run the length of your spine, ending with a sharingan mark just above your ass that matches the one right at your hairline. Going by the style it's a single piece, or at least created by the same person, and I will eat one of those blankets if Izuna didn't draw the whole thing on you herself; it's been made very clear that she didn't get her father or brother's permission for this even if she did suborn her own little cousin to assist her." There's a rustle of shifting blankets. "Put your shirt back on Tobira; ask her when she comes back and see what she says. Or doesn't say."
Izuna does not return until the weak spring sunshine has almost faded away entirely, forcing Tobirama to open the fusuma to catch what little remains of the afternoon light. There are no lamps or lanterns in the Diplomatic Quarters, no doubt as a safeguard against fire, but he cannot simply sit in the dark with Tōka while waiting for a meal, as though he is a child again and is being punished by his father for disobeying orders.
When she does return, it is with two large bento boxes hanging from one hand and a lantern from the other, wearing gold-embroidered red silk rather than indigo cotton, elaborate filigree greaves holding the fabric in place around her calves and tabi and geta rather than sturdy leather sandals.
"Well, the good news is my father is not contesting my marriage, nor my keeping Tōka-san in here with you," she says to Tobirama, passing him the bento boxes as she steps out of her geta. "The less good news is that he's currently insisting on holding off until your father jumps one way or the other to inform the daimyo of my having acquired a concubine, which will probably take a full month."
Tobirama winces internally at the thought of Hashirama, bereft of both himself and Tōka, for an entire month. Mito will do her best, but Hashirama is a lot of work at the best of times and this is not a remotely good situation.
"What's with the get-up?" Tōka asks from the futon. Tobirama managed to nap for a few hours after she threw half the blankets at him, but he doesn't think she got any rest due to the pain. He's still tired –his chakra blocked so convincingly that his body still thinks he's exhausted his reserves– but as long as the food is filling enough, he should manage. He knows the fatigue is an illusion but it will still impair him until he adjusts.
Izuna grimaces, which is more use of her facial muscles than Tobirama has ever seen before today. "Well, it's not much of a marriage without a wedding party," she says a little apologetically, "so it's going to get loud tonight. It's also why it took me so long to arrange food; the top box is for tonight" –she hands Tobirama two pairs of chopsticks– "and the lower box is for tomorrow, since I'm not going to be allowed to go to bed until dawn at the earliest."
"A wedding party without the groom?" Tōka snarks dryly.
Izuna grins briefly, a quick flash of teeth as she sets the chakra lantern –a glowing chunk of quartz set in a paper shade– to hang from a concealed hook in the ceiling. "Oh, there's a groom alright; that's me. But the clan recognises that stealing a concubine off the battlefield is perhaps not the best basis for a successful marriage, so a few kinswomen will be dressing up as kitsune to stand in for my bride."
"Kitsune?" Tobirama knows various fox-wife stories, of course, but such things are usually considered unlucky. Not generally the kind of thing it is politic to mention at weddings.
Izuna's smile this time is a bit more strained. "Well, who knows how a kitsune marriage is going to go. I might end up with beautiful children and a happy old age, or my spouse might vanish in a puff of smoke one afternoon and curse the fields on their way out. Who knows! Certainly not me. Also seeing as I have made a profoundly inappropriate match, I get a profoundly inappropriate wedding party. With far too much sake, attendant kitsune, lots of dancing and all the songs that usually only get sung outside clan grounds, because Baachan can and will wash your mouth out with soap."
Tōka cackles, then winces. "Is my cousin invited?"
Izuna pauses. "If you wish to participate I can have people congregate in the garden outside the tatami room," she says carefully, "but you won't be able to join in. That's part of the concubine rules: nobody can so much as approach what's mine without my express permission."
Rules that are as much for his own safety as for everybody else's, Tobirama assumes.
"But if Tōka-san wishes also to watch, people might talk to her," Izuna adds judiciously. "Although with those legs, Tōka-san would do better to get what sleep she can."
"That would be easier with proper painkillers," Tōka grumbles, watching Izuna warily as the red-clad Uchiha slides past Tobirama to kneel behind the head of the futon.
"I was assured you had all the willow bark it was safe to give you, Tōka-san," Izuna replies calmly. "I can offer you a pain-blocking genjutsu, with the caveat that moving while under it is extremely ill-advised."
"Whatever is wrong with opiates?" Tobirama asks, also sitting.
Izuna raises an eyebrow. "I do not see how mania, hallucinations and permanent brain damage are desirable side-effects, but perhaps the Senju consider these things minor inconveniences given the berserker strength and violent tendencies they are regularly accompanied by."
Tobirama blinks. "I have never seen or heard of such side-effects," he ventures cautiously. He had not realised they were even a possibility and he has been given opiates for broken bones before.
"Probably something to do with how they interact with our bloodline then." Izuna shrugs. "But the result is the same: you will find no opiates on Uchiha ground; they are a poison we can do without. There are a few stronger things, but Tōka-san is able to breathe without screaming so I am disinclined to offer them. The dosage slides from 'useful' to 'lethal' far too quickly unless the pain is so powerful the victim cannot even pass out." She briskly lifts Tōka into a sitting position. "You are not dying by inches, so willow bark is all you get. The same as everybody else."
Tobirama can't keep his mind from trying to chase after the implications of that, but he is also too tired to track all the nuances properly. His nap helped but he is still tired.
"I," Tōka says through gritted teeth, "would very much like to watch your wedding party, Izuna-san." She snatches a pair of chopsticks off Tobirama. "Also, my cousin needs a futon."
"I'll bring one over before the party gets started," Izuna agrees, rising to her feet again and stepping carefully over Tōka's legs. "And extra blankets for both of you; it's much easier to chill with suppressed chakra and I don't want either of you getting sick."
"Be easier for you to take advantage if he was sick," Tōka says with acid sweetness.
Tobirama freezes as Izuna goes utterly, dangerously still.
"If I truly wished to take advantage, Senju Tōka," the Uchiha says softly, "you would not be here, and Tobirama would be shackled to the wall in the stone room, earning bed, blankets, food and clothing with clan secrets and sexual favours."
Izuna is being kind. Tobirama had not put much thought into how kind, but now–
She leaves, closing the fusuma firmly behind her.
"Tobirama? Tobira! Tobi, little cousin, look at me please, I'm right here–"
Tobirama presses his face against his knees, hands folded over the back of his head and trembles.
When Izuna returns an hour later with futon, blankets and several changes of clothing –still all Uchiha indigo– Tobirama has eaten his half of the fish curry, washed his face and thoroughly explored the tatami room as well as poked into all the corners of the fusuma room. The fusuma on the side facing the tatami room do move, and he has opened them so Tōka can see through and will not have to negotiate the hallway in order to reach one of the many shōji doors that make up all three of the other walls.
Izuna eyes the new arrangement, then places the rolled-up futon and blankets in the corner of the tatami room, beside the open fusuma, and hangs the clothing over the flimsy rail in the fusuma room along with two towels.
Not much, but enough to create the illusion of hospitality.
It's louder outside already; Tobirama can hear music and singing, including some songs previously encountered in bars and outside brothels. If this is the beginning of what the Uchiha consider inappropriate, then he is morbidly curious how bad things will get later.
Izuna leaves again briefly, then returns with a tray of jugs and cups, a stack of smaller lacquered boxes and more blankets. She somehow still manages to tease open the shōji to the left of the fusuma room and steps out onto an engawa, dropping a blanket and laying it out flat with a wisp of chakra, flicks open a set of legs under the tray so it becomes a table and sets that down as well.
With the paper door opened the noise is abruptly much more immediate; the relative gloom indoors means that Tobirama's eyes do not need to adjust to the dimness outside; in fact outside is brighter as there are a great many paper lanterns –most of them red– hanging from trees and standing on fence posts.
There are also a lot of people out there, all in regular indigo rather than festival clothing or kimono, covering the low-lying garden around the Diplomatic Quarters with straw and sawdust then laying tatami over the top. Wooden benches are set out around the fence and people are setting up tables and more benches in the open spaces beyond, and the scent of food is already carrying on the chilly wind.
Along with the scent of alcohol.
"Here."
Tobirama accepts the item thrust at him, then realises it is a coat; an Uchiha coat.
"It's Madara's spare one," Izuna says in response to his raised eyebrow. "Touka will have to settle for blankets, but she's not going to be moving around and you might be."
"Madara's?"
Izuna raises a playful eyebrow in return, the curve of her facial tattoo shifting. "Your shoulders wouldn't fit into mine." Her face becomes more serious. "Don't worry, as my concubine you're entitled to wear my Lineage's coat patterns. Well, some of them at least. This one is entirely inoffensive, I promise."
All the Uchiha coats Tobirama has ever seen have been entirely identical; he sets his confusion aside for later and shrugs into the coat –it's already cold, being early spring– and eventually manages to decipher the discreet fasteners. By the time he's finished Tōka is wrapped in blankets like a dumpling and sitting on the engawa by the tray-table; the pain-furrow between her eyebrows has gone, making it clear that she has succumbed to the offer of genjutsu.
More lanterns are handed up to Izuna from the Uchiha in the garden –now almost entirely covered in tatami, making the occasional bushes all the more incongruous– and hung around the outside walls of the Diplomatic Quarters, providing more light and an increasingly festive air.
"Get down here so we can start, Izuna-bi!"
Izuna laughs and leaps off the engawa, turning an entirely superfluous somersault in midair on the way down and landing light as a cat. "I'm here, Jakuchi, I'm here!"
"Should be you in the kitsune mask, Izuna-bi!" another warrior shouts, eliciting widespread laughter. "So many lovelorn ladies left in the dust!"
Izuna shakes her head but allows herself to be slapped on the back and hustled over towards the fence as more lanterns are set up, outlining a decently-sized tatami-covered open space punctuated with bushes roughly opposite where Tobirama and Tōka are sitting that is likely intended as a dance floor. It's all in ruddy half-light, the lanterns being around it rather than above it, and the people moving around on the tatami are wearing tabi rather than sandals.
Tobirama is grateful for the knitted underwear and tabi that had been folded in with his outfit; spring is only just beginning and without his usual almost-unconscious chakra enhancement the air is cold, even with a thickly padded coat over the top. It may well be the cold that eventually drives them both back indoors to bed, not the late hour, but at least he can bring the futon to Tōka rather than the other way around if he is truly that uncertain of his ability to carry her more than a few steps unassisted.
Then the bustle and hubbub abruptly quiets, making way for the sound of a steady drumbeat. Tobirama cradles a large cup of hot spiced sake in both hands –the jug is staying hot, which is a very clever bit of fuuinjutsu– and settles in to find out what the Uchiha consider necessary for a 'profoundly inappropriate' wedding party. At the very least it will be entertaining.