This story is relentless in its desire to be written, but also very difficult to write. I am wrestling with a lot and I can already see there may be issues I have to fix. If you do notice them, please let me know as I can't see the forest for the trees.
Much love,
inky
"You know, just because you smile like that at me doesn't mean I don't know you think I'm ugly." Ino's voice was soft and deadly and Sai felt his insides swirl around inside like his paint brush over canvas. That was an interesting feeling, he perused it within his mind, turning it one way then the other curiously, picking it apart.
"Shall I frown then? Would that be more acceptable?"
"No, frowning would not help." Ino's blue eyes flashed and he wondered how one might be able to capture that flash in a painting. Not that he would have an opportunity to do so. Of all the colors difficult to find in the wild blue was the one most prized and therefore the one least likely to be within his reach, economically speaking. He could get away with blacks, browns, even reds easily enough as those he could make himself. Yellow he was able to buy off the apothecary's apprentice, mashed from the lemon scented flowers that grew in the grasses of the fields.
Although, even that might become less likely if he couldn't get a handle on how to treat Ino right, being the aforementioned apprentice, she was finding delivering his paints tiresome.
"Will you two, please?" Shikamaru shouted from the tower on the other side of the stretch of gate. Sprawled on a bench with his feet up on the watch window he hardly looked like he was working. "I mean, if any of the nomads decide to try to take the gate we won't hear until they're practically on us with your blabbering."
Ino thrust the packet of paint at Sai. "I doubt they would find your sleeping mass a hindrance to their plans, Shika. Look at you, you're hardly on duty. Shall I mention this to my Master?"
"Tsunade knows I do my job." Shikamaru retorted thinly.
"Right, because with your head on that bench you'll see the nomads coming a mile away, right?"
"Excuse me." Sai called, trying to barge into the conversation. Ino raised a hand to silence him, waiting for Shikamaru's snarky reply.
Sighing the young man tightened his arms around his head for a moment, like that would block out her healthy and overly enthusiastic voice.
"It's the middle of the day." Shikamaru finally explained. "If they're going to attack it's going to be at shift change, or at dusk because that's when we have low visibility and the predators who would hunt them will not be prowling quite yet."
"Right, so that gives you the chance to have a nap on shift?" Ino continued. Beside her Sai glanced over the gate and back at them.
"Shikamaru...Ino...I really think-"
"Sai, wait." Ino snapped, putting her hands on her hips. "Shika, sit up. I don't want to have to tell Master Tsunade that you-"
"Hello?"
This fourth voice was surprising because it was neither Sai, nor Ino, nor Shikamaru. Small, and although clearly attempting to shout it was feather light and a little wary.
Shikamaru and Ino froze, looking warily at each other and Sai let out a long breath. "I was trying to tell you. There's someone at the gate."
There was a flurry of limbs moving and then all three faces were peering between the pointed tops of the iron tree tops, down several dozen feet to the girl who stood on the patch of clear land before their entrance.
"She's filthy." Sai commented, and Ino slammed an elbow into his rib hard.
More proffesionally Shikamaru squinted at the girl through the brightness of the trees, trying to make out her face.
"Hello." He began, uncertainly. "What do you need?"
"I...I was hoping that your village might have an apothacary or a healer." Her tight shoulders shifted, and her eyes flashed over the fortification, catching Ino and Sai's faces and flicking back to Shikamaru. "I have...I'm hoping that I could perhaps trade."
"Shikamaru, let her in." Ino whispered, already turning to run down the stairs to the dirt below where the gate would fling open. On the bottom floor of the opposite tower sat Chouji, a mountain more than man, half asleep himself with his battle axe leaning casually on his shoulder.
"I don't know about this." Shikamaru muttered, shaking his head at her from the porch above. "What if she's with the nomads? What if she's a decoy? I won't open the main gate. You need to ask Tsunade about this."
Ino frowned, about to snap at him to open the door for the poor girl to get through when a voice asked behind her. "Ask me what?"
Beaming, Ino turned to find her tall blonde master behind her, looking curiously from Shikamaru to Ino and back. "There's a girl, on the other side of the gate seeking entry." Ino explained. "She says she wants to trade, with the healer of the village."
"She didn't know your name," Shikamaru put in. This was telling because if there were sentient beings anywhere near the village they knew Lady Tsunade's name. It was exchangeable with the word medicine.
"Trade?" Tsunade leaned a hand on her hip, frowning at the darkness of the gate before her, keeping her from the stranger on the other side. Without a word she was climbing up the stairs to the viewing deck, followed closely by an excited Ino. "She looks like she's been out there for a while, she's in rags." Ino began explaining quickly. "Do you think she's alone?"
"Doubtful." Sai mumbled, squinting at the girl still. "She's so small, a horkney would make one bite out of her."
Standing beside him now Tsunade frowned, studying the little creature on their door step hugging a filthy bundle of fabric in her arms.
"Stranger!" Tsunade called, and the girl snapped her eyes to the source of the sound like a magnet. In the brightness of the sun the paleness of her gaze shone from her dirty face, framed by the tangles of black hair. Stunned to silence Tsunade stared for a moment.
"...Hawk Eyed..." she whispered, then snapping out of her reverie she cleared her throat. "What have you to trade?"
"I...I bring Doula's Love, from the forest." Hinata lifted her bundle, unwrapping it so the fungi flashed white and brilliant like pearls in the midday sun. "I do not wish for much... I... I need clothes...perhaps a satchel. Oh...um...arrow heads." she added, glancing over her shoulder distractedly.
"She's not alone." Shikamaru muttered, eyeing the woods carefully. "I'm sure of it, how could she have survived on her own?"
"She's barely survived, look at her." Ino snapped back. "Maybe she has someone else but I doubt she's part of a large band and she looks nothing like the nomads."
"She's not a nomad." Tsunade muttered firmly, starting back down hurriedly. "Open the gate, Shikamaru."
"But...Lady Tsunade..."
"Do it now. Even if she had nomads hiding in those woods those mushrooms are worth a fight. Do it."
Grumbling to himself about females Shikamaru nodded at Chouji who lumbered from within the tower to the metal wheel tightly wound with chains. With a heaving grunt the giant of a man pulled a tightly cinched lever and soon enough the mechanical whine of a machine pulling the chains hard began, followed by the creaking lift of hundreds of pounds of iron tree lifting at once.
Jumping down from the porch above Sai landed nimbly beside Ino and Tsunade, hands lingering at his sides where a series of deadly looking knives hung. "What a strange dirty little creature." He murmured as Hinata's shredded leggings and then tattered tunic came into view, leaving for last the stained anxious looking face that topped it all.
"I would tell you to mind your tongue if it's got nothing to say that is pleasant, Sai." Tsunade grumbled mildly. "But I'm afraid you would end up mute."
"Mute might be fine." Ino muttered even as Sai flashed her another unnaturally wide grin.
"Hello," Tsunade called, just as the girl came into focus. Despite everyone's tense shoulders and searching eyes nothing came sprinting out of the woods towards them, and the girl remained standing where she was, shoulders tight, eyeing them all carefully.
"May I see what you've brought us?" Tsunade asked gently, noticing suddenly the skittish twitch of the girl's fingers, her almost uncontrollable glance backwards every few seconds behind her.
"...Y..yes. I'm sorry, here." She moved forward rapidly then, as though she had finally made a decision, extending the bundle forward like a swaddled babe.
"Oh." Ino sighed as Tsunade took the offering. "They're so bright."
"...Doula's Love." Tsunade nodded, toying with the delicate cap on the fungi carefully. "I've only seen them once before." She glanced up at the girl again then, focused on her unusual gaze.
"So..." She sighed deeply, taking in the state of girl's blood stained tunic, the torn clothing and smears all over her. "When we saw what looked like a falling star in the sky I thought there might be a visit from a pair of Hawk Eyed hunters on the prowl, but I did not expect to see one lonely Valley girl in my woods." She handed the mushrooms to Ino absently.
"Has the Hawk Eyed Clan fallen to the Rot then? Or nomads?"
Flinching visibly the girl narrowed her eyes, just enough to show distaste and carefully, slowly she answered. "My clan continues." She swallowed. "Or at least...that is what I last knew to be true. I am...wandering." She paused.
"And your name?" Tsunade frowned. "Your people don't often wander. Were you exiled?"
Another flinch, this one very annoyed. "My people do not exile."
Something about the elegant cadence of her voice and the contrast of her tatters made Tsunade pause, studying her. "Hm."
"Are..." the girl continued, eyes flashing to Ino with the mushrooms. "Are you interested in trading or...?"
"Oh, I'll take them." Tsunade nodded. "But I cannot pay you for them."
Wary now, stranger glanced back to where the gate was just coming down behind her, locking her in. Like an animal suddenly finding herself caged all the muscles of her body tensed and she took a step back slightly.
"They are extremely expensive, very difficult to find. The most I can do is stock you heavily for your...wandering." Tsunade continued quickly, sensing the wariness in her guest's body. "We mean you no harm though. This is a blessing you have brought us. Please... you're safe."
"I don't want much." She replied slowly, eyeing the ax on Chouji's shoulder with obvious dislike. "Just...some food, some clothes...?"
"Come." Tsunade nodded, extending her hand. "Come with me, we will take care of you."
And as the blonde led her away Ino watched, her grin spreading as much as her infectious curiosity. "Wow!" She breathed. "A Hawk Eyed."
"She seems jumpy." Shikamaru muttered, not looking after the girl walking away but towards the woods where she came from. "I wonder what the Hell's Maw she's doing out here by herself. The Valley is a good month's walk from here."
"Master said the star would be hunted by the Hawk Eyed." Ino mused, cocking her head at the petite creature disappearing into town with Tsunade's arm over her shoulder. "Do you think she's one of the hunters?"
"If she is..." Sai stated plainly beside her. "...it didn't go well."
He watched it from deep within the trees, as the gate swung wide open like a gaping mouth inviting her in. Her glances back struck him with curiosity and he pondered what she was thinking. Was she perhaps nervous that he would burst into the village and destroy it? Was she wary that he might come after her, having changed his mind and drag her away under the eyes of these strangers?
A third strange possibility whispered in his mind and he squashed it with the same firmness he used to flatten a spider meandering by his feet. Could she be nervously looking for something familiar?
For him?
Once the gate closed he turned, heading towards the slate wall she had so nearly died on. In the sudden solitude and silence he listened to the shift of the world around him, breathing moving, always fidgeting.
With Hinata's steps behind him constantly distracting with her almost ghost like movements he had not noticed how very still this particular bit of wood was. The colors were as vibrant as ever but the life seemed less so. There were less calls of birds through the whispering foliage and the scampering pitter patter of tiny feet in the underbrush was less common.
This however made any predator with an eye for them more deadly. Hunger made bold those who would usually cower and the memory of the horkney was still too fresh in his mind to put aside. If she had not reacted with the speed she had the damage could have been severe, and although his blood could have put her pieces back together the time it would have taken he simply could not spare.
She needed something to defend herself with and it needed to be something that kept threats far enough away that he could be in reach before they were on her.
Absently he looked up at the sheer wall of slate that Hinata had found the fungi on and after studying it for a moment contemplated the use of his wings before scrapping the idea. If there were people watching from the village towers they would catch a glimpse of his wingspan and if they were at all clever put two and two together with the display he had made on his fall to the Veil.
Without bothering to allow himself too much time to contemplate he reached up, feeling the slick wet of the slate beneath his pale fingers. Mossy bits of growth that had rooted on the deeper edges. Forcefully trying not to think he began to climb, taking note of his breath and the strain on his muscles, wondering if she had felt fear at all, because despite all her shaking and tears... He was starting to doubt that she could.
With the effort it took to climb he was glad to have his thoughts distracted, focused on the movement of his body, the in and out pull of the oxygen laced heavily with the decaying smell of the Rot nearby. He had a feeling from the way it drifted that the dying stink that was spreading throughout the Veil had widened since the last maps from home had been made. Upon reaching the top of the tower of stone he let out a breath of dislike at being right.
On top of the cliff-like edge the world was a sea of shifting branches and leafy vegetation moving at the soft touch of the breeze. Only half hidden now by the foliage was the brown oddly shaped fence that housed the village. From his vantage point he could see the puffy gray streaks of smoke from chimneys and hear the bustling chatter of a lot of people and animals packed into a smaller space that necessary.
It had always puzzled him that the Veil spread so far and wide yet the people who lived upon it's face packed together like sheep, always compressing each other into smaller and smaller spaces.
With the light of the suns bright and shining he let his eyes rest on the scarred ground beyond the village, still some distance away and separated from it by a thick knot of vegetation attempting to stave off the obvious origin of the deadly perfume that lingered on the wind.
Even from so far he could see the occasional bubbling of the muddy earth, the tall thin grassy vegetation that seemed to sprout on it like wayward hairs yellow against the sludge brown and black gray of it's rolling uncertain surface.
It stretched as far as he could see, with perhaps several days length of forest jabbing into it like a knife on the right.
At the very end, just as his eyes were unable to fathom shapes was the outline of a mountain range with the tallest of peaks at it's center, tipped with the snowy white of an ice cap. Beneath that looming darkness was the Scaled Worm's domain.
Even flying he was unlikely to get there without needing to stop and rest or replenish his stores of energy. Especially not with his wings the way they were. Almost without thinking he turned his head to look at the limbs he had so carefully retracted into his body, a bit put off to not see them looming pristine white and all encompassing beside him on either side.
The razor sharpness of the black feathers had been rather useful more than once already but the weight was nearly unbearable and for a star so unaccustomed to withdrawing his wings and loping around on foot the change was almost humiliating. To fly with the obsidian wings had proved exhausting, and although it seemed she had not noticed, to fly with Hinata had practically nullified any of the tears he had consumed at their meeting. If he had had his normal feathers back the trip over the Rot would have been a thing of simplicity, a day's flight at most.
But, although he was consuming tears at a rate he had never heard of his wings remained stubbornly black, not even fading to gray despite the magic.
Irritably he turned from the direction of the dying landscape towards the wood they had just passed, eyeing the leafy canopy for something that might promise a bit of the osage wood for his project.
Osage was a wood he had only ever seen in pieces, already harvested. The branches had been removed, the planks had been mostly bark free. But like anything that might have touched on the subject of destroying his brother his tutors had taken it upon themselves to teach him well.
The drawings of the twisting octopus shaped timber had been detailed in it's shape, it's coloring and the giant double fisted fruit that grew on it's low lying curving branches well captured by their scribes. Almost black the hard outer shell of the osage orange cracked open to reveal a fruit not unlike tubers in it's density and crunch. But the fruit was useless to a star, especially one with tears in abundance.
What he wanted was the wood, the most appropriate for a bow fashioned rapidly in his expert hands.
"It seems rather a waste of time." Sasuke's small voice was on the verge of petulant and Itachi fixed him with a look. "Why would creating something of beauty and elegance be a waste of time? Explain this to me."
"Because, archery is only ever used at festivals for competition not battle, because none of the war arts I am being forced to learn are ever going to be used, because I would much rather master something else. Something more...useful."
"Useful." Itachi mused as he sanded down the osage carefully, looking for the least knotty pieces for Sasuke's first attempt at a bow. "How about, learning archery is useful because it teaches you perseverance, to maintain practice until you can draw the heavy bow string? How about it teaches you patience because to learn a new skill requires long suffering nights of work? How about it teachers appreciation because it requires you to see the wood for it's faults and it's blessings? How about-?"
"All right." Sasuke snapped, grabbing the sand paper from his hands. "All right!"
Smiling just a little his brother offered him a plank. "Just remember what you are doing. This thing is not just a bow for a competition. It is an art, that was created because once upon a time we hunted, we fought wars. It's more than just unnecessary."
"Wars." Sasuke grumbled, sanding absently. "The last war in heaven was-"
"A millennia ago." Itachi nodded. "And shouldn't you count that as one of the blessings poured upon you and your generation?"
Jaw tight Sasuke scanned the shifting foliage of the trees surrounding him, trying to dispel the voice in his head that both twisted his soul with longing and hatred.
Determined to root the thoughts of his brother from his head he began the rapid climb back down, having caught the wide leafy shape that might mean an osage if he was lucky, some distance away. If he kept himself busy for the day, perhaps he wouldn't be left alone with his thoughts of the traitor in his mind, even if he was using one of the skills he had imparted with such care.
How strange it was, that the man who called him to count peace as a blessing helped in tearing it apart in the end.
They had watched her right until she disappeared into Lady Tsunade's bathing room, with eyes wide and faces carefully still in an effort to not be rude. Still, Hinata was fully aware the moment she looked in the tall spotty mirror that she looked like a nightmare.
"Oh...Veil." Sighing softly she studied her own reflection. She had felt the grime and mourned the hot springs of her valley every day since being ripped from her sister weeks ago, but looking at herself now she realized she had not grasped the scope of her descent into homelessness.
Her hair once a long curtain of ebony had tangled and with chunks of other people's blood in it had dried in patches. Her attempts to wipe her face of the horkney blood had only really smudged it and crusted bits still clung to spots along her hair line and jaw. Her tunic once white was largely brown where it was not dried stiff and roan red or smudged metallic bronze from Sasuke's blood.
Shaking her head at herself she stripped off the filthy rags, studying the bathing room nervously. It was small, with wood walls and cracked but pretty tile on the floor. A large tub carved of stone looking oddly out of place in the otherwise mundane space.
Everything about the village looked like it was borrowed and put together in patches, the mirror had silver gilding that looked faded with age, it's reflective surface spotted despite it's length. The tub had been filled with water steaming hot from pots boiled over smoky fires in a kitchen somewhere in the hodge podge of rooms pushed together that made up Tsunade's tipsy house. Near the city center it towered over the rest of the squat buildings within the expanse of the fort walls and Hinata had learned quickly that this was because she was the healer as well as the elected ruler.
The house was both a hospital and another look out for approaching nomads that seemed keen to invade the fortress for the supplies they hoarded.
Slipping into the water Hinata sighed deeply, grabbing a handful of a rough home made soap that sat by the tub, polka dotted with large seeds that upon closer inspection were herbs she recognized, sage, mint, and the tall lemon grass familiar from home.
She didn't have to be a genius to know that just outside of the bathroom door Tsunade, her apprentice Ino and the others who had seen her enter the village were probably huddled together discussing her at length. If she was lucky, they would hand over what she had hoped to get for the mushrooms and let her leave without insisting on knowing her name. For the sake of her Clan's honor she would keep the fact that their heiress had been enslaved as long as she could.
Glancing out the window at the afternoon light she turned back to her hair, floating in dirty clumps in the water and set to lathering her hands, ready to tackle all the filth of being in Sasuke's keeping before the sun went down.
Just down the hall from the door hiding the only Hawk Eyed girl within several hundred miles Ino peered, popping her head back to look at Tsunade with a nod. "I think she's likely busy by now."
"She's not alone, I'm certain of it. She can't stay here." Shikamaru put in directly, arms crossed as he leaned against the wall. "I don't even like that she's in here now."
"She was starving, and filthy, Shika. She needed help." Ino frowned, glancing at Tsunade. "What could she possibly do against all of us and just one of her."
Tsunade looked back at them, moving around the small kitchen to gather the things she needed for what looked like tea, although while she poured from a teapot for them, in the end she pulled a sealed bottle from a cupboard above her head and cracking the wax filled her cup with the strong fermented liquid instead.
"Well she's here, and she's getting what she's asked for. I'm not taking those mushrooms without paying her with what I can. Then she can..." Tsunade paused, considering. Sending the girl out into the wild seemed like a death sentence. Her expression at the suggestion of being an exile had been so insulted that Tsunade almost felt embarrassed to entertain such an idea as sending her into the forest before night fall and yet...
"Well, you've heard my opinion on the matter." Shikamaru shrugged with eyes closed. "I know she has someone in the woods waiting for her, I know it in my bones. She kept looking back. If she stays the night, she could open the gate, or let them in some other way."
"She's not a nomad though." Ino fretted, thinking about the blood staining her tunic, about the long matted hair and the cautious wary look on her face. "Surely we can house her for one night? Maybe if we lock her in?"
"Yes, I'm sure that she would be happy to be imprisoned by strangers for the night." Shikamaru nodded sagely.
"Better than being out in those woods alone." Ino snapped, fixing him with a look. "That was blood all over her clothing."
"Not hers however." Tsunade suddenly stated, sliding their tea cups towards them at the table Ino sat in. "She's in...perfect condition, in fact. Considering."
"Is she?" Ino's eyes couldn't get any bigger. "But... she looked like she had been out there for..."
"Too long." Shikamaru supplied. "Too long to be in the condition she's in and not have help. She has to go, Tsunade."
The blonde nodded. "All right... I... we can discuss it with her when she comes out. After she's been fed."
Sudden as a ghost a voice whispered. "...there is food?"
Ino jumped so high her tea cup spilled and gasping she scrambled to her feet, glancing where Tsunade and Shikamaru were looking at the hallway. Hinata stood there, expression cautious in the tunic and leggings that Tsunade had offered her. Decked in black and brown with a scarf wrapped several times around her neck the girl that looked back at them was a different creature from the feral being that had stared at them on the other side of their gate.
Nervously Hinata shifted the darkness of her bangs, freshly cut. "I...I hope it is okay that I used the scissors in the bathroom."
"Of course. You look refreshed." Tsunade put in softly, pouring another cup of tea and pushing it towards her while Ino mopped up the mess she had made. "Would you like some stew? And we have bread, Ino just finished baking today."
"I...I...I do not eat...flesh." Hinata began uncertainly, adjusting the hem of her new tunic with long elegant fingers "And I cannot stay very long. I...I am looking for a few specific things." Sheepishly she fretted. "Arrowheads, sinew for a bow string...um...leather?"
"You're making a bow?" Shikamaru studied her with interest, glancing at her fingers, noting the lack of callouses on either hand.
For a moment Hinata stared at him, eyes wide in her face. Without much conviction she murmured. "Yes."
Smirking a little Shikamaru turned to Tsunade and Tsunade purposefully refused to look at him.
"Arrowheads, bow string. Anything else? That is hardly enough for the mushrooms."
"Um...some...some dried food, I... I cannot carry much but..." Feeling awkward Hinata looked at her boots. "Oh, um..a..man's shirt." Feeling their eyes on her Hinata pushed on. "Needle and thread perhaps? I... I am not sure, to be honest, I just hoped for some clean clothes, but if you're offering more..."
"Those are all do-able." Tsunade nodded at Ino. "Go upstairs please, and retrieve that roll of leather I've been saving, and the blue shirt from my closet."
Uncertainly Ino stared. "But...that's...Master Nawaki's-"
"Go upstairs and gather a couple of the men's shirts from my closet, and the leather please." Tsunade's snap was brutal in it's force and before Ino had a moment to even think about disagreeing she was already down the hall.
Hinata jumped as the blonde ran past. "I...if it's an issue-"
"It's not. Shikamaru, please go to the armory and gather two dozen arrowheads, if they don't have them to spare then just gather a quiver and bring it to..." she paused, turning to Hinata. "I still don't know your name."
Hinata looked back, recalling only too clearly how badly her last lie had gone. "...I would rather not say."
Shaking his head Shikamaru moved to do as he was told before Tsunade decided to start using the same tone of voice on him that she had used on Ino.
Left suddenly alone Hinata looked awkwardly back at the healer. "I...I hope the Doula's will be of use to your village."
"Oh they will be. Plenty of mother's gestating." Tsunade straightened with a sigh, taking a long sip of whatever was in her tea cup. "Wouldn't your village also have use for them however?"
Hinata looked back at her, calculating nervously. "I'm sorry that I cannot disclose more about myself, I do realize strangers can make people...wary." Delicately she sipped from the tea cup, finding pleasure in the warmth that seeped through her bones at the flowery drought.
"I heard you all mention nomads." She added, and Tsunade smirked. "Yes, although we know you're not that."
"You have had trouble with other peoples?"
"There is a clan that seems to have decided to embrace the Rot." Tsunade sighed, rubbing at her forehead where a shining bead glinted like a third eye. "They cover themselves in the filth that bubbles from the decay, it taints them the color of dry blood." Swallowing another mouthful of the foul smelling spirits in her cup she grimaced. "They have been trying to get into the village since we put up the walls nearly ten years ago. You'd think they would give up but I suppose we have too much they want. Although it's hardly enough for us." she eyed Hinata then. "How do the Hawk Eyed fare with their angel bone superstition? Are you all starving yet?"
Hinata flinched, wondering what she would say about it being superstition if she could see Sasuke, and watch his blood seal her wounds and set her body to fire. Swallowing the instinct to defend her people she murmured. "We do what we can, as always."
"Vague." Tsunade allowed herself a smirk. "But I suppose we have our own wariness about you, you're entitled to your own."
"I'm sorry I cannot be more...transparent." Hinata bit her lip and just as they were sizing each other up again Ino appeared, bearing some folded cloth in her arms, one black as the night and smooth, unblemished cotton, the other a navy so dark it hardly looked different from the black, lined at the long sleeves and the neck with silver thread.
Hinata stared at them, aware that they were not just well kept, they had been well made and from some time ago, going by the dark blue.
To get a dye so dark one would have had to find the correct plants for it, and she had not seen them on her approach to the village with Sasuke. It would have been hard to miss the fields of blue sprouting bellflora so dark they were almost black.
"These...are..." Hinata hesitated as Ino handed them over. "It...they need not be so fine, it is only for-"
"It's all I currently have." Tsunade waved a hand. "And they are not needed, please."
Uncertain still Hinata accepted the offering, with a thick neatly rolled strip of leather beneath. "Thank you."
Ino smiled, her look curious. "Such pretty eyes... what did you say your name was?"
"Let's feed her." Tsunade put in quickly before Hinata's cheeks could redden with distress. "Ino, get the bread, and I'll start her on some of that squash soup."
"Yes, Master." Ino nodded, moving quickly. Hinata allowed herself a look of thanks at Tsunade which the blonde returned with a smile. Sighing she settled at the table, her pale eyes flickering to the suns through the window behind her, inching closer and closer to the horizon.
Strangely, although the smells of warming food and the feel of being clean were a great reprieve she kept looking over her shoulder, confused by the fear of being left behind.
"What...did this?"
Kiba scooped up Akamaru before the pup could wander towards the rotting corpse of a giant horkney. The creature had been dead for at least a couple of days going from the smell, and the bits of it's entrails tossed throughout the forest ground by whatever had taken it's fall with gusto.
"Not a predator." Lee stated firmly, walking around the skeletal figure, wincing away from the smell of the rot and the wriggling of many worms within it's remaining flesh. "The jaw is nearly completely torn away."
Tenten was standing well back from the mass, her stomach tight. It was one thing to slay a triple horned doe in the woodland of the Valley mountains where the men of the village skinned and butchered it so no part of it's body would go to waste. In that instance she had nothing to do with the body, just the slaying of the beast. She didn't have to smell it's rot, see it festered with worms, it's eye gauged and bloody.
"Feathers everywhere." Kiba put in softly, glancing at Neji who was studying the piles of luminous insects so interested in the feathers that were sprawled everywhere. It had been days since they had last seen sign of the star, and for a time Akamaru had seemed able to trace onlt Hinata's scent, or sometimes the smell of burnt wood from fires, moving from campsite to campsite long after the fires had cooled and died.
"Did it attack the star, perhaps?" Tenten threw in after getting a good handle on her roiling stomach.
"Or Hinata." Shino murmured suddenly, and group glanced warily at each other.
Only Neji remained silent, studying the creature and the waste of it's life on the ground.
"It was female." He muttered finally, eyeing the bits of it's stomach not torn to shreds by the scavengers that had taken the opportunity of so much sustenance. "Lactating."
"We need to move." Kiba put in, watching Akamaru in his arms turning his head sharply one way then the other, nose twitching. "Something approaches."
"I wouldn't be surprised. You can smell this a mile away." Lee winced as the putrid scent hit him again with the breeze.
"Let's go." Tenten stopped beside Neji who studied the creature's body with pale haunted eyes.
"If this got a hold of her..." he whispered, and Tenten shook her head. "Hanabi was at death's door and the star's blood brought her back." Gently she placed a hand at his elbow."She's all right, Neji. "
"...Akamaru found something." Kiba muttered, and the others turned to look at the pup struggle out of the young man's arms, scampering over the dry leafy carpet a spot where the feathers were the most dense. Sniffing at the ground the hound looked at Kiba, and promptly lay down.
Shino's hardly visible wince was all the movement in the clearing and because of it Neji's gaze flickered to him.
"What is he saying?" He finally forced himself to ask watching as Kiba gathered his pup in his hands and stood back, looking at where he had been sitting.
"Hinata's blood." Kiba's voice was dry. "Just... a bit, not much."
"Let's move." Lee put in sharply, watching the tension snapping across Neji's shoulders. "Let's go, we've been here too long, too close to such a strong attraction."
Wordlessly the others hurried forward after him, following the shimmering lights of the luminescent bugs gathering in fits and starts on the feathers discarded like petals in an uncertain shaky trail.
Tenten kept her hand on Neji's arm, lips pressed tightly together. "That means she fought... it means she is alive, just-"
Startled she gasped when his arms wrapped around her and he buried his face into the crook of her neck, holding on like there was a tidal wave upon them and she was the shore.
"...if we have to go to the Scaled Worm... I'm sending you back."
"You can't... I'm your shadow, where you go I go."
"I can't have you both out here."
Tenten breathed, feeling the heat of his hands on her hips and the softness of his hair across her cheek.
"Why is that?"
He did not answer, just pulled away, gripping her wrist hard as they walked deeper into the wild they did not know.
It was just as Luminatus set that Hinata turned to wave at the two blondes, stepping out of the glow of their fire torches and into the coming darkness of the woods.
"Are you sure?" Ino called, even as the gate began to lower. "Are you sure about going out there?"
Tsunade glanced at her apprentice, hands on her hips in disapproval but said nothing, waiting for Hinata's reply. Firmly the girl nodded. "I thank you..." Stepping back from their human familiar glow she gripped the straps of the pack on her back, gripping tightly. "Thank you very much."
Leaning over a little so she could still see her Tsunade smiled, a pained worried sort of half grin that made Hinata feel a blooming fondness for the blonde. "For our glory!"
Surprised Hinata jumped, and smiled back. "And for those of the Hawk Eyed Blood."
The darkness seemed strangely thick when the gate finally closed and their fires were cut off from her. Turning slowly back to the whispering trees she adjusted the thick wool scarf on her neck and began marching forwards despite all instincts telling her the darkness of the wood was exactly where she should not go.
Nervously she eyed the growing shadows, the stretch of branches seeming less and less familiar and more macabre. Like long fingered skeletons they swayed and danced against the steadily darkening heavens. Slowly, moving with the grace of the deer she hunted in the woodlands of her home she traipsed through the saplings, keen eyes searching for that familiar porcelain glow of Sasuke's skin.
Only a handful of steps into the shadows had her freezing, listening intently as the feeling of eyes on her raised the hair on the back of her neck.
Hand lingering at the small of her back where a hunting knife now sat snugly she waited, holding her breath.
"So you did come out willingly."
Her jump was involuntary and had her training been less ingrained she might have drawn and thrown the knife before she registered the voice.
Letting out a breath so heavy it fluttered her bangs she turned, frowning at him openly. "I said... I promised I would come back."
"Armed, I see." Sasuke nodded then at the knife she gripped still at her back. Arms crossed he studied her while leaning casually against one of the saplings. Clenching her jaw Hinata let go of the blade, raising her hands to show their unoffensive lack of weaponry.
"I...after the horkney...I can't not... I need something to-" she paused, swallowing her natural need to please with some concentrated effort. "I don't want to die out here, I need something."
His smirk was surprising and nervously she shifted, fiddling with the hem of her tunic again. "Please don't make me leave it here."
"No." He shook his head. "It would take more than a knife to take me down, princess." He pushed from the sapling, his dark eyes wandering over her as he approached, a small frown flickering on his face.
"You...appear different."
Standing very still, like she would in the face of a creature with entirely too many teeth Hinata stared determinedly at her boots, ignoring the heat turning her ears pink beneath her dark hair.
"I got the arrow heads and bow string." She mustered, keeping her voice even by sheer force of will.
"Hm."
"Are you building a bow, for hunting the Apostate?" It was a forward question and she would not have asked it any other day, but feeling quite a bit better fully clothed and with a full belly she dared a glance at his face. Finding interest there surprised her more than anything he could have said.
"No." His voice was nearly amused and abruptly he began to walk away, moving with the confidence that she would follow his steps.
After a moment Hinata did, frowning. "No?"
"How is your aim?"
The frown refused to shift from her forehead as she watched her step carefully, noting with more surprise that the silence of the wood was almost welcome after the tense bustle of the village.
"My...my aim..?" she twitched her hands in front of her with each step. The truth was she had perfect aim, the blood in her veins decreed sight as sharp as any bird of prey. Throwing knives and spears posed no problems to someone with eyes like her own.
Suddenly she paused, realizing what he was insinuating. "Oh...oh I'm...I am no archer, I..." she touched her arm lightly. "I am proficient with the throwing knives, the spear-"
"The glaive." He glanced back and Hinata winced, remembering too well their meeting.
"Yes."
"Metal is hard to come by." He turned. "You will have to make do."
Flabbergasted that he would have thought to arm her she followed until they reached the same slate wall that she had climbed earlier, beneath it's massive weight a little nook was carved into the darkness, a pile of timber signified that he intended them to spend the night there and Hinata shifted uneasily. "Is it not too close to the village? What if they tried to follow me?"
"I assumed you had the good sense not to mention who you were travelling with."
Stung, Hinata bit her cheek. "I did not even tell them my name."
"Well then, they should have no reason to come after you." He glanced up, just as he was kneeling to light the fire. "Unless you stole."
Finally finding the bite of her irritation rising to meet his onslaught of insults Hinata opened her mouth to snap at him, cheeks flushing in her humiliation. Before she could get a word out of her mouth she watched in terrified awe as he breathed in deeply and lips pursed to kiss a flame sprouted from his mouth, elegant and shimmering, casting his eyes to glow.
She had never seen him light the fire, had never wondered how it happened so rapidly, how a pile of wood he threw so carelessly could suddenly be ablaze when the villagers fretted and struggled with the wood they burned in the earth itself to bake the meat they were brought from hunts.
Shaking hard she stumbled back a step, hands raised against the blaze. "Y...you breathe fire- " Suddenly the concept of him being Firebound, aimed for the Maw of Hell seemed less an insult and more of a certainty. "How can you-?"
"I'm a fallen star." Sasuke lifted his eyes from the crackling heat, and in them the fire danced. "What did you think stars were made of?"
Swallowing the knot of fear in her throat Hinata stared back at him, slowly lowering herself down to the pine needle covered ground, hugging her pack to her chest.
"Fire is what killed my mother." Her eyes were unmoving from his face, seeing him and at the same time seeing the blaze that haunted her dreams.
Sasuke looked back at her, seeing more clearly in the light the soft contours of her face, the full mouth so pink and undisturbed by dirt or blood. Her eyes loomed, framed by the darkness of her hair suddenly smooth around her face and forehead. It was not so much terror in her face as the memory of it, and looking away he settled on the ground himself, pulling the crude shape of the bow from the darkness behind him.
"While you are with me, you need not fear it. I promise." Fingers deft he flipped one of his feathers in his fingers before focusing on the smooth osage before him, carving slowly in the dim light.
Shifting from the glare of the fire to him, Hinata blinked, clearing the memories from her mind's eye to look at him.
It seemed the right moment.
"I brought you clothes."
When he looked up there was surprise he could not hide and she studied him, like he had studied her outside of the village gates, like he was someone she had not met before.
Carefully she pulled the two tunics out of her pack, setting them down on top of the leather roll. "I...can modify the back, for your wings."
They sat in wordless silence after that, both busy with their projects, frowning not so much in concentration but in growing confusion.
TBC