Chapter Fifty-Seven: Double the Trouble
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Bodies, so many bodies, a swarm of flies bearing down on dead men, but dead men told no tales. In silence they slept and in silence they bore their song-less woes for another eternity. Their requiems never had the audience of smile-less faces.
Dead, so many dead, rank smells from rotting flesh accompanying the rain's discordant tunes—eager scavenger, it had come down early to dig deep into their skins and make them tender and soft for the beaks in the morning. The odour was tar for his lungs, but he had learnt to bear these things: they did not cause him distress.
Who would speak of their endless tales of war and murder if not him? He penned them, forged the final bits of their destinies in the manner of folktales, of which swords would speak if granted spirits and tongues. The last they saw were the strikes from his blade. That was the only sensation they would carry to their graves—if someone awarded them such a courtesy; otherwise, they would become a delicacy for the crows and vultures, and he knew that they would sing in joy, with bellies full, and pick the dead to the bones out of love. Nature was a love letter for the dead; it never had any tongue-less songs for the living.
"Itachi-Sama, I believe, I've found what you were looking for," the unsure voice of his subordinate spoke from behind him. It carried over the rain's noise. Nature was impatient today.
Serizawa held a wooden box in his trembling hands. His fingers were white as a wet scroll's paper; cold was never kind to him. It only took a fleeting glance of the sturdy black box to recognise it from the vast threads of his memories. A smile dangerously threatened to invade his face, but he did not allow it to tread that far.
Itachi made the hand-seals he had learnt by heart and memory and watched as the chakra set the wolf marking alight like a children's magic show. The seal was broken. How easy it was to get what he wanted? It almost amused him. He turned on his Sharingan and looked through the wooden barrier that was not enough to hide anything from his eyes. There it was . . . that prize he had been playing for . . .
Two days—two whole days had gone by in these games. The letters from Konoha had stopped coming. He placed his hand on the wood and his fingers clenched with unease, which grew less mild. His crows were gone. It was no use. He could make more and send one to Konoha, but a storm was pushing inwards from that direction. His crow did not have the strength in its wings to power through. He admitted that he had lost in one of these games. Was it Kikyo? He would not put it past her. Was it Sasuke? The child had always been precocious and stubborn.
The time to lay the blame on either one of them was gone. He had to act and he had to act fast. Slowly, trickle by trickle, his heart was filling with an ugly and soul-chilling paranoia. He raised his eyes, his Sharingan going to sleep, and he looked at the red in Serizawa's eyes—a softer hue that made him look compassionate and kind. He had joined the forces to avenge the untimely death of his younger brother in the past. He could not avenge him; so, now, he spent his days in the military to keep his mind off the tragedy: one game to forget another. Convenient . . .
Itachi inhaled the air and raised his eyes. The rain was less ferocious now, and a light was spreading along the horizon's vivid arc. It would be evening soon. He had to go back—end this foolish game. It was the only way. He slipped a hand into the pocket of his pants and took out a scroll.
"Take this to the Shitchi leader in the mountains," he spoke and watched Serizawa tuck the box clumsily under his arm. He was a rather peculiar fellow.
Serizawa pulled in a deep breath, his nostrils flaring. "What about the scroll?" he asked and took the scroll from his hand. A nauseous expression suddenly came to his face. The rain had left the rotting bodies soggy and wet. All that damp and rot made the air almost un-breathable. Even the wind was too weak now to push it away.
"Karin," Itachi spoke, and she came running from the edge of the forest, her long red hair swaying back and forth across her buttocks. "Take out the scroll we need and seal the rest." She nodded and took the box from Serizawa's hand.
Serizawa looked confused. He scrunched his eyebrows together and tapped his finger to his forehead as though he was in deep thought. "You said that we would leave in the morning, Itachi-Sama. I don't—" he stopped, still appearing as lost as ever. It was a trait he had never grown out of ever since he stepped foot into the Genin Academy. It gave him an air of innocence and charms that earned him a doting wife a couple of years back. Itachi never could understand his mannerisms.
"You ask so many questions, Serizawa," he spoke, and ran his eyes over Serizawa's reddening cheeks. The man was easily embarrassed. "Karin will be right at your heels in a few hours. It is a two-day journey. Make haste." And with that, he left them alone amongst the silent dead and their woes . . .
The night was a harlot that sang new songs: she was sweet and cunning, a vicious mistress of flesh. Everyone hid and played in their chambers, made a mess from the spills of their conjoinings. His eyes watched the ceilings, watery and hazy behind the twisting wreaths of incense. He let it sleep this time; it was not needed, the companion of his horrors.
He felt her plump lips and the bite from her teeth upon his throat, and the air throbbed about him like the throbbing slit between her thighs. Her smell went up his nostrils, and he knew that she was damp and eager to be filled for another union; and then she slid down to play with his genitals, to cast away the skin from a deadly shroud upon her flesh and strike him when he would not suspect—silly.
Itachi grabbed her smooth black hair, wound them round his hand with a quick spinning movement, and pulled her back. Kikyo let out a little yelp of surprise but quickly hid her anger with a bold expression. She bent her head down, her lips hovering over his—she wanted to plant a kiss there.
"You don't like to be kissed, Itachi-Sama?" she asked, and her warm breath fell upon his lips like rancid vapours of poison. The light from the lantern on the right cast her left side in evil shadows. The shade of berries was still there, red on her pretty lips, a colour she would remember till her final breaths.
The tea she had given him made him a little dizzy. She was still up to no good. He wanted to curl to his left side, ride it out. His body, now, was a temple for pain: all sick, shivering, sweat-ridden. Silence was past's ghost and future's spectre. It hovered by his side, always, and he had taken it into himself feverishly the way a woman in heat does a man. It was a pleasure of another kind.
And her girl-like tricks were apparent on her face now, treachery of murder in her eyes and betrayal of blood on her lips. Her whole body was a grave for primal sins. All Men paid the price. She would pay it sooner than most. He could not say the thought made him pity her. No, she bored him to no end now.
"You still refuse me?" she asked, whispering close to his ear and rubbing her fingers harshly against his throat as though she wanted to choke him.
Itachi did not speak, relishing the coming moments, his head spinning and shuddering in anticipation of the thrill of the act. Games were sweet. No man ever grew weary of them. An innocently arranged pile of tricks was the soul, and the art lay in transferring the blame elsewhere. He, too, was an unrepentant sinner—a betrayer of blood. Red was upon his spirit, and it vibrated in fear at the visitations from truth and secret.
Fear often read into his actions, but it was a matter of another time, another place. A bird's song rose, and her lips moved closer to his throat to kiss and sigh. "Why, Itachi-Sama?" she asked again and pressed her bosom against his. "I shall give you more wealth and an incomparable pleasure you can only dream of. Why do you deny me? I'll become your strength, another sword in your hand—give me a chance. Don't leave. I don't want to part from you so soon."
Kikyo's soft words died against the blackbird's song. Its tongue was pure, powerful, honest. He gazed at the ceiling, sensing his blood fight off the poison in his system. His limbs felt the foreign substance's weight that mirrored itself in the form of sweat upon his brow. The shadows on the ceiling were playing—little children turning in a new motion to conquer another one. Little ruffians! Slit that throat. Make it bleed. Watch the little harlot weep! A sound of children's laughter rose from within that song, shuddering like his skin and bones. Oh, so pretty a little murder of innocence was!
He knew what was coming: a dagger's shining tip arched towards his throat, and he clasped hold of her trembling hands. She curled her fingers firmly around the hand that held the dagger and pushed it down. Chakra was in her hands, and his weakness was preventing him from throwing her off him. She was strong, too strong.
Her hands began to shake, and her face warped in ugliness that he was not an easy prey for her to eat; then the dagger pushed down more and more, and he managed to change the strike's angle. Now, it was aimed at his right eye. The whole room had disappeared behind the silver of the dagger and the redness of her face and lips. Her hands trembled uncontrollably, and she grunted and pushed more chakra into her arms that the tip came down to brush against the fringe of his lashes. They did not flutter.
Itachi's Sharingan was still asleep—a silent watcher of her last moments. It would wear red upon itself to mock her. His expression was still the same, unkind and uncaring. It did not seem as though the situation perturbed him in any manner. There was no hint of nervousness in the black of his sinister eyes, and it made her very afraid. Kikyo clenched her teeth and applied all the force she could muster into her hands, but to her surprise, her hands were being pushed up.
Sweat was pouring down from her nose's tip to fall on his lips, disappearing into his pores, and, as if his lips were a dried-up bough that had quenched its thirst, she saw them tremble to mock her with a ghostly smile she so loathed. She did not get a chance to make another strike as his hand shot forward and grabbed her by the throat. It was a death grip, and her flailing hands dropped the dagger to go for his hand. It was choking the life out of her.
Kikyo clawed at his fingers, her eyes bulging out, her face going as white as the powder, with which she loved to decorate her face. He did not relent, and his hand did not falter as he threw her back, and she went flying across the room, her head hitting the beam on the ceiling in the process. She crashed down and coughed violently to catch her breath, her hands kneading the throat that burnt; it needed a few sips of water to cool the sensation.
She watched in horror as the lantern by his side dimmed; it felt the wickedness emanating from his body, and then, as if a puppeteer pulled at the strings of a puppet lying flat on the floor, his limbs vibrated subtly. Each invisible string pulled at his joints to lift him up, starting from his feet and going all the way up to his head, and he stood up in one swift motion without touching the bed beneath him. It was like a flexible bough, bent to its limit, was released abruptly to stand robust again in the same stance.
His head fell forward, and he just stood there, mechanically, like a toy, for a moment that was no longer than a single draw of breath. Her eyes widened, and she slithered back, a scared animal pressed to the ground, breathing hard as her eyes fell on the red awakening in his eyes, and she knew she had to run. Her clammy feet barely moved, yet she gave them the strength she needed to flee.
Kikyo spun away and ran to the door, moonlight blinding her for a moment as she pushed forward to open it, and crashed to the frost-chilled floor through the gap. Her legs hurt, but she ran to the hall when she heard his feet pursue her. This was not how she had imagined it. It was not right. And she ran and ran, blood going cold in her veins with a mortal fear she had never known before—her black-as-night hair, indistinguishable from night's shroud. They clung to her sweaty skin in curls and decorated the blush that invaded her cheeks from exertion.
The shadows danced by her sides, and the sounds from his sandals behind her back were the most cruel ones she had ever heard. Where were her accursed men? She had sent them out to fetch Meru and hide the scroll. How foolish she had been? He played her and now he was going to take her life!
Her feet felt too small to carry her enormous weight. Death and fear weighed heavily upon her soul for it knew it had to be liberated in the coming moments. The accursed bitch! She would not let it! So she heaved another breath and ran deeper into the black corner in the large temple hall: it would prove itself to be her final sanctuary or a final grave. She hid behind the rain-washed pillar, light lifting off her face.
She heard nothing but the watery sounds from the stream outside. His steps had gone silent. Had he left her alone? No, it could not have been that easy. The pillars around her were tall and thick, carrying their own shadows behind themselves. Suddenly, it was so quiet, and her breaths rattled through the sickly quietness like the whole place was a deathly trap to kill her here. She would wash him off her skin, if that was the last thing she would ever do.
Kikyo knew a little Sensing, and when she put it to good use, she felt a stilly, powerful chakra gather as a bubbling, congealing blood that came up from an old wound. Black veins travelled through the ceiling's stones and cement to the pillar by the door, throbbing grotesquely as though she was in the belly of the beast, staring at its pulsating innards.
They joined together in the middle, and a wound appeared in the ceiling and oozed blood like the delicate layer of skin had been ripped through with a cruel motion of a cock. It bubbled, a black goo, and dripped down. Something appeared in between the black mass: a beautiful white face whose body was being created from the hellish mass of void that sat atop the unformed world, cradled in its still-forming wings. White . . . and red eyes and that long white throat . . .
All of that melted and dripped down to the floor, and she watched in utmost horror as tiny crows formed in the misshapen lumps that clung to the slippery side of the floor like the black semen from a beast; it had erupted there after rutting, pleasured itself to contentment, and now it came for her throat!
The little crows rose, their hungry caws vibrating in the halls, striking the pretty red pillars with a force that she felt like retching. The sound . . . it stirred her insides in ways he had stirred hers with his organ, but it was fear that had gushed forth from the crown and cloven to her womb's walls, and she knew she was about to birth the final remnants of her lust upon the floor there. How disgusting.
And it blent, the unholy mixture of crows, bones, black sludge; and he rose out of it all, beautiful and divine as though he had never been kissed by the vulgar and ugly side of evil. Life's colours spread under his flesh, and he looked like a vile man with beauty's skin. He turned his head and looked around, amused by the chakra vapours dispersed in the air.
"You have spread chakra here? It would do you no good. I do not need Sharingan to see you, Kikyo," Itachi spoke, his face coming into the moonlight's thick shaft, spilling inwards through the large door.
Kikyo's heart trembled as his voice slid itself across her skin, hurting her spirit into a deadly submission. A shadow peered at him from behind the pillar, and he looked at it, smiling. "A child's trick," he spoke, and she fired off two poison arrows from the crossbow. He threw two kunais, with a lazy flick of his wrist, and the shadow disappeared.
His hand shot out and grabbed both arrows released at him with ease. There were strings attached to the arrows to deliver a Raiton charge and paralyse the enemy. She only got off a bit of her chakra when he yanked at the strings and she flew to him, her belly colliding with his fist. The crossbow fell from her shaking hands and clattered to the floor.
Her last breath got knocked out of her, and she saw her own reflection looking up at her from the floor as it got obscured by the spit and water she deposited helplessly upon it. He pulled his hand back and Kikyo lost her footing. She slipped and fell back to the floor, her eyes staring up to see him snap the arrows in two.
Itachi's shadow stood tall upon her, her body weighed down by its presence. The moon shone brightly behind his back—an escape that was far away for her to reach. "Passion leads to ugly things," he suddenly spoke, and his voice sounded loud and fierce in the empty temple's hall.
The Buddha statues that stood mighty and big in the shadows gazed at her—silent and still. They were watchers, spectators of her doom. She would be judged here ruthlessly before her trip to Yomi. How cruel this fate felt for someone so young, and she felt her eyes sting, shameless tears pouring down her cheeks. He was not moved. There was no change in his demeanour. He was watching her with an air of authority and a detachment . . . it was a game, and he had won.
"Why do you weep, Kikyo?" he asked, almost sweetly, and his voice broke the stillness in the hall and she grimaced in anger.
She craned her face up to him, blood smearing her lips. Raising her trembling fingers, she touched the foreign, hot wetness there, pulling away a thick string of spit and blood from her lips. Vomit came up to her throat, and she coughed out more red on her kimono and the floor, her eyes staring horrified as blood spilt from her lips and fell down by her trembling hands.
Kikyo panicked, her breaths turning ragged, and she clawed helplessly at her bosom as if she was dying. A pain exploded in her head and blood came from her eyes and nostrils in a string of droplets. She covered her face with her hands and looked at the red as they came away. Then she slapped them back against her cheeks twice and let out a loud, blood-shaking scream that pierced the hall deeply and shattered the silence. The Buddha behind her back was still quiet . . .
And she screamed and screamed, crying hoarsely as she felt something grab hold of her soul and rip bits of it from her pretty little body. The hungry crow had pecked her to his full. Her feet slipped on the blood and spit she had vomited on the floor, and she pressed her back firmly against the statue's legs, hoping for it to swallow her whole. She could see the red in his eyes from between her trembling fingers, but she had no air left in her bosom to scream anymore.
"W-What have you—d-done—?" she asked between hiccups whilst blood and make-up soot went down from her eyes in a thick and slow mixture.
Itachi considered her for a moment, red stabbing at her spirit's fabric, tearing it apart the way he had done with the delicate film between her legs. "It is not poison," he spoke, and she took in a little breath of relief, "but you are a foolish girl. Did you really think this would work? Your uncle's men have been warned of the coming raid. They will not come to ambush Cloud's men and destroy this treaty."
She gritted her teeth, breath hissing through her clenched jaws. "You bastard! You—b-bastard! You won't get your hands on the scroll. Meru will kill you and your brother if s-something happens to me. You'll get nothing!" she shouted and clenched her bloody trembling fingers into fists.
"Meru is dead. I killed him myself a day ago," he spoke and the loud, whistling sounds of her breaths vanished under the crushing descent of silence. "The missives you received were from me. You confessed to me that you loved them."
Then a faceless form drifted like dust towards her and shook her mortal cage. Her face shuddered and more tears wiped away the blood from her cheeks. "What do you w-want? Leave me be, you wicked man—l-leave me be!" she said roughly, trying her hardest to hide the fear.
Itachi took out the scroll from his pocket and showed it to her, and a careless cry tore from her throat. "You were playing a dangerous game," he spoke and pushed the scroll back into his pocket. "I would have left you alone had you not gone after the treaty."
And that heart throbbed in her bosom as she moved her feet again to move away from him as he walked to her. She locked her jaws to prevent a scream: he had reduced her to a snivelling little girl.
He sat down on one knee and brushed a thumb across her shaking lips. "Sometimes, it is wise to let go. Why did you not let things go, Kikyo? Look, how you have ruined the shade of berries upon your lips," he whispered and wiped clean his thumb against her kimono's white fabric and left a red smear there as a last reminder for her eyes. "Your death is inevitable. You will die in two days' time, bleeding from your mouth, eyes, and nose."
"No—no! Don't do this. Please, I b-beg of you!" she pleaded shakily, moving her head from side to side, crying fresh tears of great fear and greater sorrow. It was not true. It was just not true. It could not be true. Ice-cold sweat poured out from her body, and her heart forgot to beat at that revelation. She was really going to die! And then her heart beat so loudly in defiance that she could hear nothing but its flesh-shaking beats inside the frail chamber her spirit occupied.
"I cannot do anything for you now," Itachi spoke, his voice still so soft as he looked at her the way he always did, a touch of playfulness in his red eyes that mocked her in a cruel manner now. "You should have stayed put when I warned you, but you did not listen. You wanted to play. There is nothing more to be done. I could only delay its assault upon your senses one last time. That is the only reason I even stayed." He smiled and removed the pin from her hair and they tumbled down to her shoulder.
Itachi looked at the pin, as though it amused him, and pushed it into the fabric of her kimono's collar. Her mind was spinning wildly. Thoughts were going away, and she was trying to piece everything together to save her sanity, but everything flew away like dust. He stood up and started walking away from her; and she, in sheer desperation, cast aside a mortal's pride, moved, and fell forwards, her hands scrambling on the floor to hold on to something.
Suddenly, he stopped and turned a little to look at her face pressed against the crude layer of blood and spit and slime on the floor. "I must confess, the heave of your beaded bosom and the sounds of your pants were . . . delightful," he spoke in the softest voice she had ever heard from his lips, and then he smiled and walked out of there in silence, leaving her screams and fractured memories behind the walls. She forgot it all too soon again—everything was re-constructed into the lies he fed her . . .
He made it to the forest's edge, a night's journey. Serizawa was waiting for him there with Karin. Three days were wasted in her games. The rains were heavy, and the passages, deluged with water. They decided to take the long way around. His crow flew down to him on the fifth day with a missive: Kyo had killed her with the night-flower poison from the harlots. The poor thing had bled to death at the foot of the temple stairs—a crime of passion! They put him to death there and then. Her brother was aggrieved, though the matter was not any of his concern.
The Uchiha village was silent at this hour. Lanterns hung bright outside the doors, and trees whispered in strange tongues into his ears. It was the coming season's new song. He retraced his steps back to his home. It was silent. He did not need Sharingan to look inside his own house. He stepped into the manor. Tanaka had left the door open. He had sent a letter to Kai from the last outpost that he was coming. It was late and he was tired.
Itachi had just removed the sword from his back when the main-door opened: it was Kai and he was breathing heavily. He looked at Itachi in anxiousness—he wanted to speak—but Itachi forestalled him in a grave voice: "you think you can come barging into someone's house whenever it pleases you? Have you no shame?"
Kai went down on one knee and bowed low. "Itachi-Sama, please, forgive me. I—" he stopped and breathed in several quick breaths whilst he tried to calm his breathing, "—I tried to stop them—I truly did, but they didn't listen to me. I—"
Colour flew from Itachi's lips and cheeks and worry started to crowd his face. His Sharingan shuddered, a maiden's red-dyed cloth, in his eyes to see and to look. There was nothing in the house—empty! His lips trembled for a moment, and he gathered his stray wits to speak in a voice that was curiously low: "where is Sasuke?"
Kai breathed deeply once and got to his feet. He looked defeated, sorrowful, remorseful. "Root Shinobis came and arrested him," he said and watched Itachi turn his face away into the shadows that assailed light. "I tried to stop them, but they had warrants for his arrest. I couldn't do anything."
"When did this happen?" Itachi asked again in a voice that was the same as before, and the black lips of his shadow moved behind his back as it plastered itself, like a parasite, to the wall.
"Five days ago," he whispered, and Itachi turned his angry face to him. He was livid, red clamorous against the night.
He stepped towards Kai, his face dark as it bore the weights of all the shadows about him. "I asked of you to watch him, a mere boy, yet you could not even manage that," he hissed and Kai flinched in fear. "They must have dismantled his mind by now to amuse themselves. Why did you not tell me? You could have sent one accursed missive to warn me. Why did you not do this?"
Kai lowered his head, staring at his sandals, his weak heartbeats picking up the pace. "Tsunade-Sama told me not to. My hands were tied," he said, sounding fearful, his Sharingan refusing to rise up to bear the brunt of Itachi's wrath.
"She speaks of many things," Itachi spoke, and Kai felt him draw closer, though he had no strength in his legs to move away from his towering shadow, "yet you had done just that despite her protests. Did you do this on purpose?"
Kai jerked his head up, his eyes widening to meet Itachi's. The red there was steeped in a vile kind of anger. "N-No, Itachi-Sama. I would never do such a thing. She warned me that Root might interfere with your mission. She said that she had it all under control. I thought it was for the best—"
"—for the best that you left him to rot in prison, counting down the days till they put him to death? That must have been amusing for you," he spoke, and Kai saw the corner of his mouth twitch in anger.
Kai chose silence. It was hopeless. He would not win against him. He watched Itachi grab his sword and move towards the door. As he passed by Kai, he stopped and spoke again, and this time, Kai could hear a clear note of threat in his voice: "for the good of all? For your sake, I hope you are truthful." Then he swiftly walked out through the front door and left Kai standing there to stare at the Uchiha symbol that glowed under the lantern . . .
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