Two chapters after this. Next one will be longer, this is just a little bridge before the big feast, wedding procession, and unveiling.

Strayed into comedy as per usual...

Disclaimer: see part 1

Gamos : Afternoon

Hinata was in full party preparation mode. While Gaara was supplying the banquet hall and all of the seating, wine, and small dishes, it was Sakura's family that was preparing all the main dishes. Hinata was everywhere that required answers about food, leaving Ino to spend time with Sakura after Gaara had dropped her off back at her aunt and uncle's home like a sack of grain. None of the gods, Titan or Olympian, needed anything other than the nectar and ambrosia but food was both novel and expected. There would be a small meal after the wedding ceremony, which would take place in less than an hour. It was a mere formality, as everyone knew the marriage wasn't truly sealed until she had entered his rooms and the whole deal was consummated. If it came to that.

"There's still time." Ino said, trying to cheer her gloomy sister. "I mean, it has to be a good sign that he practically didn't even stop the horses as you got off the chariot."

Sakura huffed something like a tense laugh, turning the crown around in her hands over and over as if the tactile sensation would ease the stress she was under. Outside, the goat that was to be sacrificed to the gods before the ceremony (and then eaten at the feast) was bleating as the bustle of people coming and going agitated it. Never did Sakura think she would feel so psychically aligned with an animal.

"You didn't see his face." Sakura finally tossed the crown on the veil, both waiting to be reapplied to Sakura's head. It seemed like a lot of trouble, when she'd have to take it all off again for the ceremonial bath. "What could I possibly do or say that would change his mind about all this?"

"Did you try just, I don't know, asking him?" Ino, who had been brushing her hair out before putting it up again, pulled a face that let Sakura know she was making a joke.

Easy for her to joke, Sakura thought, but tendrils of inspiration wormed their way into her mind. "Why don't I ask him?"

"I wasn't serious…" Ino looked worried all at once. Crossing the room to put a hand on Sakura's shoulder, she tried a searching glance in her eyes as if she were examining her for an illness. "Maybe that crown is too tight, I think it's pinched all the sense out of you."

"But don't you see? If he takes me seriously then maybe we can get somewhere with this. If he doesn't take me seriously, then it isn't much different than how I've been behaving around him anyway." It seemed a little more directed than the generalized rudeness she had been trying thus far.

Ino, eyes narrow with worry, was about to say something when Kurenai burst into the room with a large piece of fabric. Sakura picked up the brush and made a few quick passes in her hair to get the tangles out as Ino was drafted into action.

"Help me put this up! Asuma will be in shortly with the bathtubs. Ino, you'll be the one carrying the loutraphoros for Sakura, and I believe Gaara has made arrangements for his own water carrier for the baths."

With a groan Ino helped Kurenai pin up the sheet that would provide the almost bride and groom with the needed separation until the unveiling later than day. The room was a little small, since this house had only been constructed for the purpose of the wedding and neither Kurenai nor Asuma were the kind of people to spend a lot of time indoors. Having two bathtubs and all the supplies that the sisters had brought made it a slightly tighter squeeze than they were all expecting. Sakura, still sustained more by nerves than anything, replaced the veil on her head and tried to pin the crown on herself while letting her hair fall loose behind her only to stick herself in the scalp a few times and give up on the pins. Her colorful language was ignored by the bustling Kurenai and Ino, but Asuma laughed at her struggles when he entered with the first bathtub.

"Delicate as always, our Sakura." The hammered out copper bathtubs weren't heavy, but they didn't fit through the door well and it took Asuma some time to get everything in and placed as Kurenai and Ino tried to keep him from tearing down their cloth panel in the center. It was comical enough that Sakura almost forgot the sense or foreboding she'd been fighting against.

This was how a wedding day should be, full of family and laughter. And maybe Ino will have that experience…, her inner voice sighed.

The goat didn't know what hit it. Sakura was glad that it had been quick and the animal had gone straight to the kitchen after the priest said his words over it. While she couldn't say she was envious, she did track the goat with her eyes as it made its way to the indoor roasting spit instead of paying attention to the words being spoken on her behalf to ask for the blessing of the gods. If she really needed that then she could do that in person, but it was always about keeping up appearances.

Gaara had arrived again in his chariot with the uncanny horses, priest in tow, to 'get this over with' as he so romantically put it. His callousness made her angry enough to forget the fear she experienced this morning in his presence. They had been alone then, as well, and surrounded by her family this time she was sure he couldn't just strike her down if she made him angry. Reasonably sure, at any rate.

The goat entrails were placed on the fire and the smoke flew to the heavens even as the rain began to drizzle down onto them. Whoever decided January was a favorable month to marry was either already married and enjoyed a good joke, or lived somewhere with significantly better weather than the rest of the country.

"You couldn't get Jiraiya to give us good weather?" Sakura hissed under her breath as the priest droned on.

Somehow all that prompted from Gaara was a quirk of the mouth that she assumed was a stifled smile. He thought this was funny? Then again he wasn't covered head to toe in cloth. It was getting very cold and humid under her veil. Shifting from foot to foot, casting secret glances at her family, Sakura saw that Ino was just as put out by the rain. Kurenai and Asuma, who were outdoors most of the time anyway, didn't seem to care. Hinata was in the kitchen, and the smells of lunch wafted out to them prompting Sakura's belly to give a gurgle. Darting her eyes over she saw another one of Gaara's stifled smiles. He was enjoying her misery and she had to stifle the urge to stomp down on one of his sandaled feet to give him a taste, too.

"… and as you take your sacred bath, your loutra, think hard on the blessings…"

Sakura snapped back to attention, this was her cue. Ino stepped closer, and Sakura turned towards her. The priest lifted the back of the veil and she extended her hand for the ceremonial knife. With Ino whispering encouragement, Sakura grit her teeth and sawed through her handful of hair. When it finally gave with a tug the veil fell again and Sakura saw the priest throw her long hair into the fire. That bundle of hair might have been the symbol of her virginity but she was still determined to hold on to the reality.

"It'll grow back." Ino whispered as she brushed any scraps of hair from Sakura's back and stood back once more as the priest finished.

The ceremonial bath and what was probably her second to last chance to talk Gaara out of this folly of a marriage would be following shortly. But as his eyes tracked from the open flame over to Sakura she saw something dark in his demeanor, his pale skin glossy from the rain, wet hair almost the same color as the blood that had spilled from the goat. Goosebumps travelled up her arms as she realized the look he had given her hadn't caused the blooming dread she expected, but something more like anticipation.

This was not in the plan.

He wasn't the sort of person who liked traveling with a retinue, and he didn't allow for much help in his forge. Today, as he remembered from last time, it might have served him to ask for a little help because emptying each loutrophoros of water into the copper bathtub was time consuming. He and Sakura's blond sister made trips in turn to bring enough holy water to fill the tubs. Like every other ceremonial bath, it was going to be cold. While he could channel some of his power and heat the water, he was pretty sure what made it holy was how you suffered in it.

"Done?" He watched the blond sister, out of breath from her many trips with the heavy containers, give a little kick to one before turning suddenly towards him at his question.

"Y-yes." She wouldn't meet his eyes at first and then all of a sudden turned a glare at him that made him think it was possible the whole family was unbalanced. The sun god should have attended better to his daughters. Maybe it was fitting that Gaara of all people be married to a woman who wasn't entirely sane, the Fates had a sense of humor sometimes.

Sakura entered the doorway and didn't hesitate as she walked to her side of the room. The yellow veil, dry again, had gone from a dark mustard back to the golden saffron and he watched her move to her side of the curtain without even bothering to hide his interest. Through the entire interminably boring marriage ceremony he had been picturing that smiling face from the wine cup. The hunted gasp she had given in Tsunade's temple combined with her infuriating displays of temper had ignited feelings that vacillated from anger to desire when he thought of her. He had almost been afraid of how curious he was to lift up her veil and see her face as she made her tart observations, to bite down on her lips to stop her words and swallow her indignation.

Shadows moved silently as he made out a vague outline of her body as she was helped out of her clothes. There was a murmured conversation between the two sisters before the blond exited without a backward glance. Alone with Sakura, separated by only a sheet, he finally got out of his clothes and climbed into the water audibly splashing so she would know he was in the bath. Leaning over the side of the tub he watched her silhouette similarly climb into the water.

"Oh." It sounded like a scold, as she snapped out. "Would heating it up make it less sacred?"

Get in the water, a part of him pleaded, as her silhouette was much more exciting than he had expected it to be. He was equal parts disappointed and relieved when she dunked herself fully into the bath.

They had maybe ten minutes of peace before the girl cleared her throat dramatically.

"So…"

He could tell she wanted to talk again, and while the last thing his body wanted to do right now was talk, he recognized it would help take his mind off of the thought of her naked less than a body length away from him.

"Does it seem to you like this is all kind of… sudden?"

He waited long enough to see her begin to fidget, head bobbing around and uneven short hair swaying. Controlling a conversation with her was easy even if he couldn't predict what she'd say. "How so."

"Well, I mean, you could have your pick of all sorts of Olympians or nymphs or mortal princesses and on and on." He already didn't like where this was going. "So what about me, a Titan's daughter, seemed better than those other choices?"

Was this her way of fishing for compliments? He wasn't good at that game, as he learned long ago with Karin. So instead he stayed silent, which was his only tactic whenever he had noticed Karin was sighing and wandering around in thin dresses draped with jewels. It always ended up as a fight anyway.

"I mean, when you think about it, I'm not as pretty as most of those girls." Things had taken a severely different turn than he was expecting. "My powers aren't exactly vast. I don't own a lot of land and my immediate family is remarkably small. And you can attest to how agreeable my personality is."

This is where he was supposed to break in and tell her how pretty she was, he knew. Naruto had explained this to him once not long ago, but it still seemed like a pointless conversation.

"So why even marry me?"

Women always said they wanted the truth, but whenever he had told Karin the truth she had called him boorish and rude. He considered Sakura's question carefully and realized he had to answer in the only way he knew how: bluntly, truthfully.

"There may have been a time when anyone would do," She wasn't going to like that, but he didn't feel the dangerous aura that surrounded powerful women shortly before they tried to take a goblet to your skull. "But right now I'm not sure I would be able to let anyone else have you without bloodshed."

After he spoke there was empty space between them. Then all at once her anger spouted. She lifted her arms above her and brought them down in the water with a forceful enough splash that it hit the sheet.

"You don't even know me! Why me?!" Her frustration was perfectly evident, and Gaara was feeling his own mercurial temperament shifting to match her.

"I'll do as I want you will not question it." The water began to steam around him as he felt his control slip.

Sakura stood up to get out of the bath and had started wrapping herself in something as she spoke in clipped angry tones. "Order me around all you like, if you don't learn how to be a little more persuasive then I don't have to listen!"

The water was boiling around him and he reached out at her silhouette as if he could tear her apart but all he got was a handful of sheet that he balled in his fist with a growl. "Woman…"

There were popping noises above him and Sakura's shriek echoed in his ears as the fabric came off the ceiling and floated down to cover him. People rushed in the room next as he heard Asuma's voice began to loudly ask what was going on and then cut itself short. A feminine giggle from the doorway further cemented his bad mood, but he wasn't about to tear himself out until he could do it alone with a little dignity.

"Lunch will be served in a…. oh my." Another soft voice came from the doorway only to fall silent.

Not for the first time, Gaara wish everyone would just die and leave him alone.