Night fell upon them quietly and awfully slowly, and Sakura could only hum to herself as she sat a little ways away from the fire which crackled merrily in the centre of their recently constructed camp. Ever consistent was her soulmate's presence at her side, so she wasn't surprised to find him sitting down beside her, his existence like a burning sun compared to the dark, long shadow she cast. Her traitorous head was leaning against him, a contented rumble purring in her chest at the contact with something she could never ever have. She wished she could. But the sands of time were unforgiving, and the reveal of what sort of being she truly was undoubtedly inevitable. She just needed to steel herself for it all. Pathetic, the voice whispered, and her fingers curled around his arm.

Cool metal met her touch, fingers absentmindedly tracing the ostentatious patterns there. "You should rest," Glorfindel said, his words a soft murmur as she lay there, half draped over him. Probably inappropriately so. But she was such a greedy, unsightly dragon, and she relished in the scant amounts of affection thrown her way – even if it was just the unspoken permission to snuggle up next to him.

"Will you?" she asked, peering up into those eyes she loved to get lost in. They weren't the acrid, unsightly green ones she had to see in her reflection all the time.

"I do not need as much rest as you," he replied, uncaring or so very used to the way she had attached herself to him. "Nor do I rest in the same way," he added, fingers finding her face then, even as she leant into his touch, heedless of the way that so-called red string was undoubtedly binding them tighter and tighter.

Well, the voice purred, you wouldn't want him to escape, would you? It murmured, ever reminding her of what a terrible thing she was and the terrible actions she was committing. Part of her felt oddly numb at the reminder, a smile coming to pull at her lips. Her end would undoubtedly come to bite her soon. It was funny how the fears and worries about such a moment were slowly fading, replaced by an odd happiness and acceptance as the moment ticked closer and she thought on it longer and longer, rationalising it all. If killing her helped her soulmate… Well, that was good – after all, Glorfindel deserved the world after everything she had put him through merely by existing. Maybe she would finally be able to do something good? That was something she wanted in the end, and she was bound to be killed one way or another – or so she had come to the conclusion. There was no happy ending for her.

But if she could give her soulmate a happy ending… her thoughts trailed off, and she ignored the well of dread and fear which surfaced at the thought of her inevitable death after the inevitable reveal. "But you will rest, won't you?" she murmured, looking up at him still. Rest was still important, even to elves, and she hardly wanted him to lose any sleep over her for one reason or another.

A smile curled at his lips. "If it puts you at ease, then, yes, I will," he said, and Sakura smiled, content in the little victory she had won. The voice in the back of her head was mercifully silent for once, and she relished in the feeling of contentedness which came. It was like she wanted to exist in that moment now and forever, but time was merciless and unforgiving, and Sakura could only close her eyes and lean against her beloved soulmate who wasn't hers to keep forever and ever.

Sleep was eerily quick and easy to come by, though Sakura supposed she could blame that on the presence of her soulmate right there and then. His presence in itself was soothing and comforting to her in ways she would never be able to explain.

Dawn came just as swiftly, sleep never seeming to be enough for her to properly rest, and Sakura could only yawn as breakfast was doled out and eaten just as quickly – and then they were on the move once more.

She was comfortable once more, the presence of her soulmate behind her warm and bright – dare she say golden. Sakura loved all things golden and bright, no matter how they felt they ought to burn. She loved her soulmate most of all. Can dragons really love? the voice asked, and something curled in her belly. Revulsion and hatred. Old friends by such a point in time, arisen from the disgust at what she had become. What she had done. What she couldn't take back. The reasons she could never be loved.

Sakura let herself sigh, a soft smile coming to grace her lips as time kept moving and their little patrol kept going forwards – a direction she often wondered about in the metaphorical sense. She'd certainly lived long enough by such a point to ponder on how she was supposed to move beyond it all. The answer to that being she really thought she couldn't move forwards as such. Not until her soulmate moved beyond her, and he hadn't. There was a reason he still hunted her kinfolk, a reason he would hunt her should he learn of what she truly was.

And she would let him do just that, when he figured out that which she was – that what she was supposed to be to him. Though it wouldn't be much of a hunt. She wouldn't run, Sakura had long since decided. She was too tired of everything to run, even when the only thing which waited for her was the sweet, temporary embrace of death which looked more and more appealing with each day passed.

It was odd how as that time ticked closer and closer, the less and less she feared her inevitable end and redemption of sorts. A smile curved at her lips, a content hum escaping her as she felt almost at peace for a few moments before the familiar gnawing nervousness and faint fear decided to come back around to slam into her face like one of Tsunade's punches.

"You seem happier," Glorfindel murmured, alert as ever, both to the surroundings and her ever changing moods. Though how he still managed to remain oblivious to the fact she was a dragon was another story entirely.

"Maybe because I am," Sakura said, ignoring the whispered hiss of, do you really deserve to be? The answer to that was no, probably not, but she was too tired to really dwell on it. She just wanted it all to be over and done with. She wanted a conclusion of sorts. Though there would never be any real conclusion so long as she kept on bouncing between two worlds after each and every death. Her heart ached at the thought, and she did her best not to dwell on it. After all, it wasn't like the fate of a monster was something to lament or ponder over. Things like that – like her – never had happy endings.

"Then I suppose I can only wonder what brought this about," he replied, and she could just tell he was smiling somehow. "In the hopes that, perhaps, it will happen again."

"Hmm," she mumbled. "Does that mean I'm not allowed to be sad ever again?"

Laughter, soft yet cheery, met her ears. A wonderful melody. "I would rather see you happy rather than morose as you have seemed to be just a little too often as of late," he said. Sakura blinked, lips parting with a wet click, before she realised she didn't quite have a response for that. Not a verbal one at the very least.

"How is it"—Sakura wondered—"that you are so very perceptive?"

"I do not know," he said, and Sakura resumed scanning the bushes, attention only half on her beloved soulmate behind her. "There is something about you, I find, which always brings my attention back to you, like a weary sailor to harbour," he murmured, ignorant to the way her heart seemed to skip a beat at that, for both the best and worst reasons. There was really only one thing which could explain the straying gazes they both had for the other – the phenomena of soulmates. A phenomena which still had so much mystery surrounding it, even after the many years of their existence.

A choked, spluttering cough had her turning, and she already knew who it belonged to even before she had lain eyes on the perpetrator. Elrohir sat atop his horse, wide eyes meeting her acrid green ones for the split second in which she had to raise her eyebrows at him pointedly. Those grey eyes immediately found something else to fixate on, though the matching set so reminiscent of their grandfather's soon began glaring at her in suspicion.

Proof her time would undoubtedly soon be up.

Though those grey eyes soon stopped in their glare, returning to the woods around them. Sakura already knew who she had to thank for that. A smile curled at her lips, tainted with the bitter thought that she was still deceiving someone so very kind and lovely. "Thank you," she said.

"You are most welcome," Glorfindel murmured back wryly, a small grin on his lips, and that was that.

Night came upon them again, amber skies becoming a deep navy, stars twinkling in the midnight raiment above, their camp made and the company ready to settle for the night – alert as they always had to be, given how creatures of the enemy – creatures like her – long preferred the darkness of the night in which to carry out their misdeeds. They were due to begin heading back to Imladris on their route in the very morning, the entirety of the patrol having been exceedingly quiet and oddly relaxing, even despite Elladan's glares and Elrohir's utter nervousness around her. The night was still, beautiful, and she was so terribly content with her soulmate there by her side.

Which was, of course, when her rotten luck reared its ugly head and they fell prey to an ambush of orcs.

"Orcs!"

The cry pierced the night and Sakura stirred from her rest and leapt off her soulmate and onto her feet in one fluid move. Eyes narrowed, she scanned the darkness of the forest surrounding them. Chakra pulsed in her ears, hands drawing her blade so very smoothly even as Glorfindel rose to action behind her.

The clash of metal-on-metal met her ears, and she raced towards it, thoughts ever filled with the need to try and make things up before her inevitable demise. Feet pounded on the soft grass, eyes narrowed and filled with a familiar loathing as she caught sight of her once allies. Her nose turned up at the stench which wafted off of them. A biological weapon unto itself, part of her mused morbidly, even as she lunged towards her new foes. She was no longer chained by the insipid want to be loved by the one who'd made her that which she was, and they weren't her kinfolk, so she had no qualms about charging into the fight. Not that she would have had many, if any, qualms about decimating another of her kin.

Orcs were just as unsightly as she remembered them to be. Not that she had cared about that in the last life she had in that place, being as fixated as she was on being loved and admired by her pseudo-father-creator as such. Skin ragged and seemingly rotting in places where older wounds had festered. Creatures of the Enemy had never been great with healing – a fact Sakura was acutely aware of by such a point, even as she fell upon them with every drop of loathing she had towards her own past pumping through her veins.

Her blade sliced through flesh like butter, a wet gurgle the only noise the orc made as she wrenched her sword from its throat, watching dispassionately as blackish blood bubbled from its throat. More sounds of feet and blades being drawn reached her, trapped in the thicket of the fighting as she was, the hiss of an arrow making her step back, grabbing the would-be unfortunate elf beside her back and out of the way.

The arrow sunk into the wood of a tree instead, and Sakura turned, sharp eyes picking out the location of the shooter in an instant.

A hand grabbed her shoulder, and she turned back, blade at the ready, but rather than an orc, she was met with two wide grey eyes which stared at her in abject confusion. Scowling at the interference, she brushed him off, gritting her teeth in pain as a blade scraped her arm. It was just typical that the would-be unfortunate elf would be Elrohir. Sakura rolled her eyes, hissing at the pain the elf's distraction had caused for her.

Moonlight glinted off a blade, another graze marring her skin even as her clawed fingers stabbed through metal, hand coated in black blood even as she continued on her way to where the archer was – only to scowl as the orc she'd been going for was cut down by a friendlier arrow. If there were such a thing. Sakura frowned, the silence which descended then telling of the end of the battle. A lifetime of paranoia had her stabbing corpses, vindication surging when one of them gurgled in the throes of death beneath her blade. She hated it when people beside herself played dead, especially enemies.

"Lothien!"

Sakura blinked at the sound of her name there, turning to find Glorfindel making his way over to her. "Glorfindel," she greeted, as if she didn't have one foot on the corpse of an orc, and her blade in its neck.

"You are… not unharmed," he mumbled, seemingly more to himself than anyone else.

"Minor scrapes at best," she said. "We should head back—"

"That," Glorfindel said, gesturing to her arm. "That is no minor scrape," he uttered, and Sakura blinked as the adrenaline began to fade, giving way to feelings of pain. Something warm and sticky ran down her wrist and fingertips.

"Ah," she muttered, heart sinking as she realised just where she'd been cut in an instant, and she lifted her arm up, cuddling it protectively to her chest. "It's just a minor cut," she said. "I just need to bandage it," she reaffirmed, cradling the skin marred by black letters to her breast.

"Why must you consistently downplay your injuries?" he questioned, shaking his head, arm coming up to hover behind her shoulders. "That needs treatment – proper treatment besides simply bandaging."

Sakura gritted her teeth, hating how wonderfully kind and concerned her soulmate was in that instant. Fitting for an evil dragon, the voice purred, still an ever present presence there to remind her of all her numerous failings. "It will be fine," she grumbled. "I hardly want anybody else to nosy at my injury!"

"There is no shame in being injured," Glorfindel said, moving as if to grab a hold of her arm, and Sakura skittered away from him, speeding up in her efforts to get back to where they had camped even as other uninjured elves began dealing with the bodies of orcs littering the forest around them.

"Lord Glorfindel!" one of them called, and Sakura hurried away in the slim window of opportunity that earnt her. She felt his eyes watch her go, ever intense and lingering at their stare was.

Knowing she only had a short while before her persistent soulmate was back and hounding her as to her injuries, Sakura tore the fabric of the cloak she had been wearing, using the thick strips to bind her wound, ruined bracer and all. She winced, the torn skin tender and painful as she bound it all up as quickly and efficiently as possible.

"We must move," another voice sounded. "Sunrise is not far off, so the journey should be reasonably safe."

Sakura groaned softly, feeling the eyes on her the second he walked back into the clearing she had escaped. "Then we will move," Glorfindel said, and Sakura didn't even need to open her eyes to figure out he was moving in her direction. Ever were they guided to one another's sides, like magnets of opposing polarities. "Lothien, your arm?" he inquired, offering a hand to help her to her feet.

Sakura waved her bandaged arm as much as she dared. "Dealt with," she said, accepting the proffered hand, allowing herself to be helped to her feet.

A frown marred his face, gaze lingering on her injured arm for just a few moments too long. "Very well," he said, evidently unhappy with the situation at hand. "We must make for Imladris now, and at a faster pace than before," he explained. "It would not do for us to fall prey to another band of war orcs. The injuries we have sustained, though light, are numerous…"

"A band of war orcs?" Sakura echoed, thoroughly puzzled by the war denomination. She was fairly sure there were no other types of orc than those made for battle – it was why her once master had created them. Just like he had created her through twisting another's being in some twisted way. "I thought that was the only type of orc…"

"Though your knowledge of dragons is seemingly unrivalled, it seems your knowledge of the more common pests to plague these lands could do with some work," he murmured, lips twitching into a grin. "Come. I can tell you more on the journey there, or perhaps once we arrive home," he said, helping her up onto the horse and sliding himself into the saddle behind her.

Then they were off at a swifter pace, the night sky becoming a pale pink as dawn approached and the sun crested over the horizon, bathing them all in its warm glow. Yawning, Sakura mentally prepared herself for a long day of riding, sighing at the prospect of it. Though, in all fairness, she had chosen to come on that patrol.

"You can rest in the saddle if you would like," Glorfindel informed her. "I will not let you fall."

"Mm," Sakura grunted, hating the tiredness she felt thanks to the night time ambush. Or maybe you're simply not coping as well as you did in the darkness, like all creatures of Morgoth? the voice whispered. She closed her eyes, feeling awfully warm and uncomfortable as she did so – but she supposed that was only natural. People didn't tend to choose to fall asleep on a horse, thanks to the subpar pillows they tended to make.

A cool touch at her temples stirred her from her rest, grey eyes staring down at her with what was a by then almost characteristic concern. "Poison," Glorfindel murmured, seemingly holding her up as she slumped into him, limbs refusing to cooperate. "I suppose this is what happens when I believe you saying that you are 'fine'." He shook his head, and Sakura only closed her eyes and let herself drift off once more.

Screaming stirred her into consciousness, and Sakura felt her eyes flicker open, head pulsing and pounding as she lifted herself into a more seated position.

She was back in Imladris, she noted, staring at the familiar white walls of the Halls of Healing. It was a private room as before, the windows open and undoubtedly letting the rest of Imladris hear the dreadful screams of an elleth.

Dimly, Sakura glanced over at the screaming lady, frowning at how she had backed herself into the wall, legs shaking as she stared at… her? Sakura blinked, glancing around the room, wondering why exactly the elleth was screaming at nothing. Or was there a spider or other critter about? Lines furrowed in her brow, and she looked down into her lap, freezing when she realised exactly why the elleth had screamed. And why she was now whimpering and looking at her as though she thought she was going to eat her.

Glorfindel.

The black script on her arm read, an unsightly blot on her skin, chaining someone so wonderful to her, and obviously those of the Halls of Healing would know exactly whose name was on Glorfindel's back.

It was no wonder the elleth was terrified.

Laughter rang out in the room.

It took Sakura a few seconds to realise it was her own.

The door slammed open, her vision filled with gold, and Sakura only laughed harder. Oh, how she had known that moment would come. Of course he would be the one to run towards the sounds of screams. Of course he would be still armed. It was like the universe had orchestrated it all – her demise and hopeful atonement.

It was almost odd how she felt at peace with it all beneath the manic laughter.

"Lothien?" He looked between her and the elleth at the wall. "What exactly is going on in here?" he asked, looking so very lost in that moment.

The elleth raised one shaking finger, pointing at her arm.

Glorfindel followed it with his gaze, face turning ashen as he stared between his own damning name written on her skin. "Lothien?" he almost stuttered, and Sakura only smiled, letting her eyes shift.

She stared at him with a dragon's eyes. "Hello, darling," she murmured, watching as clarity came to him, and he drew his dirk.

"You," he stated, and Sakura could see the betrayal in his eyes, and the voice laughed mockingly in the back of her head. Her heart ached like it had been stabbed, but this time around there was no lightning speared hand in her chest. Rather it was a pain of her own making. She had lied to her beloved soulmate in a sense.

Sakura doubted he would ever forgive her.

But he probably didn't need to – she was a monster, after all.

She could still remember those bright blue eyes which had condemned her with but a glance, and anyone Uzumaki Naruto hated couldn't be a good person.

"Me," she said, a smile still in place on her lips.

And let the final curtain rise, the voice whispered, morbid amusement in its voice and Sakura laughed along with it. Everything was coming to a head in that instant. It was odd how freeing that thought was.

"Dragon," he spat, betrayal giving way to anger and a flicker of doubt Sakura didn't quite understand.

Sakura grinned, throat feeling oddly thick with something she couldn't place in that moment. "Elf," she responded, not even flinching as that dirk was levelled at her throat.

That was how it was meant to go – the hero was supposed to slay the monster.

"Did you enjoy making me care for a dragon?"

Did you like watching me make an unwitting fool of myself?

"It was a wonderful sight."

I never meant to make you a fool.

"How much of our conversations were all lies?"

How much of it was a farce?

"All of it."

None of it.

"Did you enjoy deceiving me?"

Were you laughing through it all?

"It was the best entertainment I've had in years."

No, of course I wasn't.

The blade dug into her throat, shaking then, in spite of it all. It really should have been so simple to kill her right then and there. Something hot and wet trickled down her cheeks, and she looked up at her beloved, golden soulmate through blurry eyes. But maybe he just needed a little hand, Sakura mused, a smile coming to curl at her lips even as she lifted her own hand.

"But it's all over now," Sakura murmured, something inside her burning at the tantalising end before her. Just one stroke across her neck and then he'd be free of her – free to move on, and free to stop hunting dragons and risking his life.

Her fingers curled around his own, part of her marvelling at how very kind he must be to hesitate at killing a dragon before him. She pulled the blade closer, smiling as she felt a bead of blood trickle down from her neck.

The door slammed open with a loud clatter once more. "Ancalagon!" a familiar voice snarled, familiar grey eyes boring into her even as his far more nervous brother waited in the doorway, and then she was shoved away from the blade and her soulmate, sent tumbling off the edge of the bed, head slamming against the tiled floor. Black spots reigned in her vision, the tiny cut in her neck burning, part of her lamenting at how close she'd been. How closer her soulmate had been to finally freeing himself of her taint.

Sakura closed her eyes, letting the darkness swallow her whole, wondering all the while as to whether she'd be in the Elemental Nations next when she woke once more.