A/N: From now on, I'll be using a dot '•' between two lines to signify a change in POV.
Madara sits across from her and tells her the Senju will not come again. For one naive moment, she thinks perhaps he's remembered who they are and what they will take from them, given the chance. Her hope is shattered when he informs her that he and Hashirama have settled their terms and she will marry Tobirama in a fortnight, one week after the village will have been named and their shared dream realized.
"I thought it was best you have a chance to heal in peace," he offers.
"A lamb for the slaughter, rather than a wounded gazelle." She does not look at him as she says it.
"I wish you would be reasonable," he gripes, reaching across the table for a hand she denies him. "You've always known marriage is a matter of duty and you've never been precious about it. Why have you suddenly—"
"Stop speaking." She faces him and her jaw aches with how tight she winds it. It's pathetic, to see him want so badly to alleviate himself of his guilt. "You've already done enough, don't subject me to the humiliation of seeing my brother so desperate to lie to himself, as well." He looks at her as though a slap would've been gentler before his expression hardens into one of wounded pride.
"I am still your clan leader, Izuna. Watch how you speak to me."
"Why? I am more bound to Hashirama's leadership than yours, now, am I not?"
"Don't start this—"
"How can you not be embarrassed?" She asks as though she truly wishes to know. She'd intended to stay cool, keep him away, but vicious tendrils of anger have crept through the cracks in her control. "So desperate to find a way to lie to yourself about what you've done to me, all the ways you've set for our clan's secrets to be unravelled. The long legacy of the Uchiha, ruined in one generation, by one man. It's almost—"
"I know you are hurt," he hisses, "but that doesn't excuse—"
"Hurt?" She laughs, incredulous. "You think I'm hurt? Brother, I am ashamed. I should never have put my faith in you. I see that now, and when the clan is crushed under Senju boots, my hands will be as red as yours." Her last words sound precisely as bitter as they feel, she's glad of it. "At least you'll have your peace, though."
When she looks at him, she expects to find the rage that sits so familiarly on his face, but instead she sees only sorrow. She half-expects some apology, for making her miserable, for reducing their clan to this. Instead—
"I can't lose you too, Izuna." She hears the fear in his voice, the plea for understanding. "My love for you has made me weak."
"Madara," her heart breaks as she reaches out to cup the side of his neck, run her hand along his hair and tug gently at the ends, as she would when they were small, "you already have. I was lost to you the second you offered me to him. You will be alone after all."
His face crumples in on itself and she pulls back her hand, looking away from him and willing away the desire to hug him, take comfort in him.
"Leave."
"Sister—"
"Leave."
•
When Hashirama informs him the date has been set, he also gently reminds him of what rests on their marriage. The irony, he thinks, is that in trying to ensure that Tobirama knows what he must do, it's Hashirama who doesn't fully grasp what he is asking. His brother is forever hopeful, he doesn't see the depth of spite that fills Izuna's heart. He doesn't see that in asking him to see to her happiness, he asks for the impossible.
Unfortunately for them all, Tobirama loves his brother, so he will try. He's not delusional enough to believe that Izuna will ever be happy in their home, but he will make her comfortable and, he hopes, she will love their children enough to forget the misery of making them.
When he lies down to sleep, it's impossible to find rest.
Tobirama is rarely a man plagued by regrets, but the words from their encounter—both hers and his own—ring loud enough in his head to keep him awake.
He's ashamed of his behaviour, in truth. Izuna may be an Uchiha, but she will be his wife and if he allows her to drag him down to her level so easily, he will have no one to blame but himself when his people inevitably lose their respect for him.
He's always been praised for his level head, able to keep his calm almost to a fault, except where she is concerned. It's always been this way and he still cannot make sense of the way the blood in his veins always seems to turn to fire the moment she begins to needle him.
The thought that she'd assumed him to be so vile, assumed he would force himself on her and worse yet, the reality that he may be forced to prove her right. That neither of them will have much choice, in the end—
It's not much, but he tells himself he will save them both as much unpleasantness as he can, if only for the sake of not giving in to her expectations entirely, and make sure she finds her own pleasure so she cannot accuse him of that particular form of carelessness, as well.
•
She flanks her brother as he stands with Hashirama in front of the village—their village. Tobirama is at his brother's side and she's grateful there is no reason to turn her head and be faced with the sight of him.
When the treaties have been signed and tentatively celebrated—the villagers are eager for peace, but wary of that which seems too good to be true—Hashirama turns to the village with bright eyes and announces the marriage between their clans in one week's time.
The shift in the crowd is palpable. Even the villagers with no stock in either clan are aware enough of the history between them, having been witness to decades of fighting, to be surprised. The rumours have swirled since peace talks began, but rumours are one thing and this, she knows, is another.
Izuna is not typically given to fear, but she can't bring herself to search the expressions of her clansmen and find what they think of her.
She goes to the most discreet physician she knows of, an ancient Uchiha woman with neither the time nor the inclination for gossip, and tells her what she needs.
"You must use it exactly as directed," she cautions. "Never more, never for longer than a month's time without allowing your body to recover in-between."
"How long is the recovery?"
"At least a fortnight." Many questions rise to her throat, the urgency of them makes her nauseous. How is she meant to keep him off her that long? What excuse could she create once, much less several times over? But those aren't the problems of the woman in front of her, so she thanks her graciously and hides the small bottle of silver liquid in her belt.
She has no mother to paint her lips and see her off to the shrine, it feels like a mercy to them both.
The priests bless their marriage and ask the gods for their favour, Izuna wants to laugh. The gods must already hate her, to have given her a husband who is too much of a coward to even meet her eyes. Asking for their favour now seems like a waste of breath.
•
He is cleansed of his sins, his guilt, his bad luck, and finds he feels no different.
Tobirama has always preferred to keep his feet firmly on the ground in this world, and thinks it would take more than divinity to cleanse him of the sins yet to come. The ones Izuna will no doubt drive him to commit.
He avoids her eyes all throughout the ceremony and reception, but the sight of her cannot be entirely escaped and he thinks that if she bore any other name, she would be beautiful. It feels like a special kind of cruelty.
•
When she changes from stark, virginal white to blood red—Uchiha red—after the ceremony, the irony of it is painful.
Madara tries to speak to her at the reception, she refuses to even look at him. He is not her brother anymore, nor even her clan leader, and she owes him nothing.
Still, when he turns away, some part of her—small, but present enough it cannot be quieted—wants to grab him and cry out his name so he can take her hand and promise her everything will be alright. Make her believe it, the way he always managed to when they were small.
But they are not children, and they are not naive enough to believe any promises that things will become any better than they are. When she is led from the reception, she is accompanied only by the weight of her own dread and the forbidding presence of her new husband.
A/N: The next chapter will be much longer, I'm sure you can guess why 💜