Venatori

Summary: Kankuro was a few minutes too late, and Kiba died. Now, Shino and Hinata work to ensure that no more traitors get away alive. Divergence from chapter 212.

The Laughing Phoenix does not own Naruto and makes no profit from this work, other than her sense of accomplishment.

WARNING: Massive spoilers in future chapters. Character death. Blood, gore, and questionable use of medical knowledge and techniques. Some OOC-ness.


Hospitality of the Desert

The minute the team wearily jogged through Suna's main gate, they were set upon by a group of med-nin and chuunin under Baki's command. Isago crouched, letting the medics take Hinata off his back, as he rattled off the mission number and its success. Shino paced his teammate as she was laid on a stretcher, watching anxiously as Hinata's eyes closed and she fell unconscious. At Isago's shoulder, Kurenai watched her students out of the corner of her eye as she listened to Isago's initial report, while Kankuro cracked Kuroari open so that the chuunin could take their prisoner.

"The Kazekage wants to see you both for an initial debrief," Baki told the two jounin. "I'll take you back to the tower." He turned to Kurenai. "Your subordinate will receive the best of care."

Red eyes met his single brown as Kurenai called out an order to her uninjured student. "Shino, go with Hinata. I want you to get yourself checked out while you're there. I expect a basic toxicology scan." The implied command was perfectly clear: Guard your teammate. Make sure that any who try to pull something while Hinata is vulnerable are dealt with.

Shino nodded sharply, turning his gaze on the med-nin as though daring them to order him to stay behind. The medics, used to overprotective shinobi teammates, ignored him. "Kankuro-san," one called. "We'd like you to come with us, give us an initial report."

The puppeteer jogged over to the group, Kuroari returned to his back. As the medics moved out at a fast trot, he rattled off the course of events, ending with the list of symptoms Hinata had displayed. "She didn't want to eat, so nausea, and she was pretty fatigued. She had two seizures today and her heart rate was through the roof. I know whatever they gave her was a plant toxin, but she seemed to recognize it. Too fuzzy to name it, but she said it was a bean and there was something about oil."

The medics exchanged glances. "Sounds like Castor Bean," one muttered. "When did she start displaying symptoms?"

"About twenty hours after the injury," Shino told them. "She also treated the wound with a general anti-toxin almost immediately after she received it."

"That's Castor," the other medic nodded. "Delayed onset, nausea, fatigue, seizures, tachycardia…I'd bet she's got hypotension too."

"There may be a complication." Shino hesitated, then bulled along, his worry for his teammate overriding his usual reticence. "Hinata has a history of heart injury. About nine months ago she received an injury to the chest that severely damaged the valves and weakened the muscle, along with lacerating the pulmonary tissue nearby and partially collapsing her left lung."

The first medic swore colorfully and they picked up the pace, moving at a fast trot. Shino and Kankuro increased their speed to match, Kankuro mentally ticking back nine months. After some mental calculations he arrived at the Forest of Death, and the preliminary matches. A paint-covered eyebrow went up. He was impressed both by the damage dealt during the match and the fact that Hinata had not only managed to pull herself to her feet but speak coherently.

Once they reached the hospital Hinata was whisked into a private room and a nurse joined the two medics. The second rattled off figures and names of medicines while the other two efficiently removed the Hyuuga's jacket and shoes before bundling her into the bed. The nurse ran for medicines while the first medic took her blood pressure and the second unwrapped the dressing. Before long, Hinata had been injected with medications to slow her heart rate and been attached to an IV line carrying a basic fluid drip. The second medic carefully closed up the cuts from the weapon, cleaning out infections before they had a chance to become established and leaving new pink skin behind.

That done, Hinata was hooked to a heart monitor and her blood pressure checked again. Shino watched it all carefully from the corner of the room. Kankuro stood next to him, doing his best to keep out of the medic's way. He could hear a slight hum under the noise of the machines, but it took him a moment to place it as coming from the younger boy beside him.

"Hey," Kankuro asked, glancing sideways at Shino's impassive face, "are you okay?"

Shino did not turn his gaze away from his teammate. "Perfectly fine, Kankuro-san."

Kankuro desperately wanted to say "You don't look fine," but was saved from sticking his foot in his mouth by his sister's appearance in the doorway, sans fan.

"The nurses told me I'd find you guys here," Temari said, dodging a medic as she slipped inside. She moved along the wall until she was standing next to the other two.

"What're you still doing here?" Kankuro wanted to know, brow furrowing. "Shouldn't you be back at the house already, or with Gaara?"

Temari rolled her eyes. "Gaara insisted that I come over and get checked out when he saw this," she gestured to the fine line on her neck, where the missing-nin's kunai had scratched her. "The bloodwork only just got back in – the medics wanted to check for everything – and when I heard you were in I decided to just come over here rather than go back."

Kankuro nodded, glancing again at Shino, who had not visibly reacted to Temari's approach. Shortly thereafter, the swirl of activity around Hinata's bed ceased, and a medic-nin came over to the group standing near the wall. "Hyuuga-san has been stabilized," he informed them. "If you will follow me, I'll take you to be checked out."

None of them moved. "I would appreciate details about Hyuuga Hinata's state," Shino said coldly.

Seeing as he would have to answer if he wanted their cooperation, the medic shrugged. "Hyuuga-san was given a poison extracted from the Castor Bean. She has been given medication to lower her heart rate and is on an IV to keep her hydrated. There is a partial antidote to the poison, which we administered, but we were unable to use chakra to extract the poison, as there was such a small amount of it and it has already spread throughout the body. This long after exposure, the chakra expenditure would far outweigh the benefits of the procedure. At this point our best course of treatment is to ameliorate the effects and keep her as healthy as we can until the poison runs its course and is naturally removed from the body."

Shino nodded once, sharply, eyes locked on his teammate.

"Now if you will come with me," the medic continued, taking advantage of Shino's silence, "then I will be able to give you a quick examination."

Kankuro obediently shrugged his puppets onto his back, but Shino didn't move. Temari sighed. "I'll stay with her, Shino."

There was another moment of silence, then Shino turned to follow the medic out of the room. Temari shook her head slightly as she settled back against the wall, watching the younger girl on her hospital bed.

XxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

As Shino was allowing the medic to lead him from Hinata's room, Baki was letting Kurenai and Isago into the Kazekage's office. The genjutsu mistress made mental notes as she surveyed the room, surprised and a little pleased by its simplicity. She'd been to Suna before, when it was still reigned by the Yondaime Kazekage, and appreciated the changes that had been made. At that time the Kazekage sat on a dais behind a screen, and anyone who wished to speak with him was expected to kneel. The new Kage seemed to have dispensed with both dais and screen, and the room was dominated by a sturdy desk, piles of papers and scrolls covering most of it. Behind the desk sat Sabaku no Gaara, clad in the blue and white robes of the Kazekage, the hat hanging off the back of his chair.

Kurenai let Isago do most of the talking, adding her own thoughts and observations to the report only when he turned the thread of it over to her. Gaara didn't interrupt once, and when they were done he sat quietly for a minute before straightening up. "Suna thanks your team, Yuuhi-san." Kurenai bowed, and he went on. "I may have some more questions once we've interrogated the prisoner you brought in, but right now it's late and I believe you must be tired."

"Actually, Kazekage-sama, I was wondering if someone could give me directions to the Hospital. I'd like to check on my students." Kurenai said, making the next move in the shinobi's dance of manners. By letting them know what she had planned and requesting directions, Kurenai was tacitly telling the Suna-nin that she had no plans to go wandering off on her own or snoop around the village.

"I can do better, Yuuhi-san," the young Kazekage told her, standing. "I will accompany you, if you don't mind. I'd like to check on my brother and sister."

Kurenai bowed her head, recognizing the triple meaning. She'd get to her team the faster for being accompanied by the Kazekage, and she'd be less likely to be harassed by bitter Suna-nin. It would also give the Kazekage an opportunity to keep a personal eye on her, preventing her from seeing anything she shouldn't.

The walk over to the hospital was largely silent, broken only by the occasional person still out on the streets offering a salute to their Kage. The senior shinobi seemed to look at the child-leader with true respect, although in the younger shinobi and civilians the respect was heavily tempered by fear. When they arrived at the Hospital the receptionist was all solicitousness, directing them to Hinata's room.

Hinata laid unconscious on the bed, Shino sitting next to her, Temari and Kankuro leaning up against the wall on the opposite side of the bed. At the entrance of the Kazekage, Temari and Kankuro straightened up, while Shino stood and bowed briefly.

"Shino?" Kurenai asked, letting the rest of the question remain nonverbal.

The boy pushed his glasses up his nose, a maneuver that Kurenai recognized as Shino stalling for time while he got his thoughts in order. "Hinata was poisoned by the Castor Bean," he told her. "At the moment the medics say that all they can do is keep her stable until it works its way out of her system."

Kurenai nodded. The answer might not have been what she wanted, but it was not unexpected. "And you?"

"The toxicology report came back negative, and I am uninjured." When Kurenai kept looking at him, he went on. "I lost a significant portion of my hive, and it will probably take me about seventy-two hours to regain the numbers."

Relaxing a little now that she knew her students were out of danger, Kurenai sat in the other chair at Hinata's bedside. The girl frowned a little in her sleep and the older woman gently brushed her hair out of her face. Hinata's forehead slowly smoothed at the gentle touch, the girl sinking deeper into sleep.

"Yuuhi-san."

Her name had Kurenai glancing up at the Kazekage and his siblings, standing on the other side of the room. All three were watching the interaction around the bed.

"If you would be willing to write out your report tonight," Gaara said, "I can arrange for a messenger hawk to take a copy to Konoha tomorrow morning. The medics should be able to provide you with paper and a pen."

"Thank you, Kazekage-sama." Both Kurenai and Shino stood and bowed slightly as the Kazekage left the room, trailed by his siblings. About half an hour later, one of the medics knocked on the door and came in, carrying a small lap desk, a few sheets of paper, and a pen. Kurenai thanked him and began to write out her initial report. That done, she made another copy, using a form of shorthand designed to keep the message as short as possible while still including the necessary information, so as to weigh down the hawk as little as possible. She finally re-wrote it a third time, encoding it using the cipher she'd learned shortly before the mission, one designed for communication between Suna and Konoha.

As she worked, Shino meditated in the corner, performing what Kiba had once jokingly referred to as 'hive maintenance'. His reserves had been more compromised by the mission than he liked. The queens and the small cadre of workers and drones set aside to maintain and increase his colony's numbers were fine, but he'd lost a little more than a third of the rest, of his battle-ready insects.

That was unacceptable.

Shino dove into himself, more closely examining his hive. The youngest of his queens, tucked in between his shoulder blades and ribcage, was easily stimulated to increase the amount of eggs she laid, and a number of his surviving battle workers were detailed to help the nursery workers feed the larvae. The older queen, the daughter of his original queen, was another story. Tucked between his pancreas and liver, she was slower to respond, and her egg output was far below that of her younger counterpart. Shino knew that within the next month or two he'd have to make sure a queen cell was made and the arrangements put in place for a new queen – at about seven years old, the queen was reaching the end of her lifespan.

Shino came out of his meditative state to find a tray of food next to him, along with a piece of paper covered in his sensei's shorthand. The genjutsu mistress was next to Hinata, eating from another tray. "You need to eat," she told him. "And I would appreciate it if you would deal with that." She gestured to the paper.

Shino wordlessly picked up the paper and called out some of his hive, destroying it, before turning his attention to his meal. His bugs picked up no poisons, so he let himself eat, figuring that Suna wouldn't be so stupid as to poison another village's shinobi within the hospital.

The next morning, Baki stopped by the hospital room assigned to the Hyuuga girl to collect the Konoha jounin's report to be sent on to her village. Kurenai met him at the door.

"Here you are, Baki-san," she said, handing him two scrolls. "This," she indicated the smaller, "is the report to go to Konoha. The other is a copy for Suna's records."

Baki blinked. "Thank you, Yuuhi-san. May I enquire as to the state of your student?"

Kurenai smiled and stepped back, letting Baki have an uninterrupted view of the bed. Hinata was sitting up, deep in conversation with her teammate, dark heads bent over a piece of paper. "Hinata woke up just about an hour ago. They're putting their own report together now."

Baki nodded. "I'll stop by the aerie and send this on my way to the interrogation offices," he told Kurenai. "Depending on what information the prisoner has given us, the Kazekage may require the three of you for a more thorough debrief sometime this afternoon."

He was as good as his word, sending the message later that morning (after, of course, decryption had taken a quick look to make sure Kurenai had not lied) and walking down into the bowels of the interrogation complex. Not entirely sure what to make of the report he got, Baki brought the officer who'd been working the man over to Gaara's office.

Twenty minutes later, a genin runner was leaving the Kazekage's offices, making a beeline for the Hospital.

XxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

As they paced along Suna's streets, Hinata and Shino couldn't help looking around at the village. It was their first time within another shinobi village, and they found the similarities to Konoha intriguing. While it would make a certain amount of sense for them to be similar, bar a few major differences the street they were on, the fastest route between the Hospital and the Kage's offices, could have been a desert version of its Konohan counterpart.

There were open stores, a few vendors with canopies braving the desert sun, a number of jounin with genin students passing by. They got a few sideways glances, largely thanks to the fact that their clothing was obviously not desert attire, but in general once the onlookers saw the Konoha plate their eyes slid away. They made it to Gaara's office unmolested, although a handful of the shinobi gave the team truly venomous looks, setting Kurenai on edge.

Despite the alliance, firmly backed by a young and incredibly powerful Kage, Konoha was not necessarily welcome in the heart of the desert.

Upon entering the Kazekage's office, the Konoha team found themselves meeting not only with the Kage, his siblings, Baki, and Isago, but a woman wearing the generic jounin uniform, with the hooded cloak ubiquitous to Suna-nin. The one personalization of her clothing was a red-brown scarf she wore wrapped around her hips as a belt. Baki introduced her as "Chinatsu, the shinobi working on the Ame rogue you brought back" before naming the Konoha-nin for her.

"Yuuhi-san, Isago-san, would you please repeat the report you gave me yesterday?" Gaara asked, shuffling through papers to locate sheets of paper, presumably the written reports. He looked up in slight surprise when Hinata stepped around Kurenai to hand in the report she and Shino had spent the morning working on. Scanning it briefly, he gave the Konoha chuunin a soft 'thank you'.

Isago and Kurenai repeated the verbal report they'd given the night before, expanding on it and turning to their subordinates for details when necessary. When they'd finished, Gaara turned his gaze on Chinatsu, who looked up at the ceiling as she began her report.

"Kaito, that's his name, by the way, is a stubborn man. He has to this point refused to divulge the finer details of his orders, but thus far we've been concentrating on determining his loyalties." She dropped her head until she was looking at Gaara. "He's not loyal to Sanshouo no Hanzo, but he either can't or won't give us much in the way of details. At the moment I'm guessing won't, but it will take a little more time before we can determine the exact answer."

"What did he tell you?" Baki asked.

Chinatsu shrugged. "He told us he served a god, and that his orders were passed on by an angel with great white wings."

Kankuro made a displeased noise in the back of his throat. "That makes no sense," he muttered.

"Ignoring for the moment how much sense it makes, Kankuro-san, it is what Kaito believes. As far as he knows, he is telling the truth when he says he is on a mission given to him by God." Chinatsu shrugged. "It's not as uncommon a scenario as you might think, but fanaticism makes him difficult to talk to. Now that I've got some more background there are a couple more avenues I can pursue."

"Good." Gaara dismissed her. "Make a second copy of your reports for Konoha as well."

"Thank you, Kazekage-sama." Kurenai said softly as Chinatsu disappeared through the doorway.

"This impacts Konoha as well as Suna, Yuuhi-san. I cannot withhold that kind of information."

Kurenai decided that the more she saw of the Kazekage Gaara, the more she was impressed by him.

XxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

In Konoha, a messenger hawk arrived. Recognizing it as a Sunan bird, one of the shinobi on duty at the aerie removed the messages and passed them on to be decoded. As primary reports for a diplomatically important mission, they were placed toward the top of the pile of reports going to Tsunade's desk.

After the 'desk shinobi' who had decoded and transcribed the reports came off shift, they made their way to a quiet restaurant at the edge of the civilian sector. Passing through the kitchen to the stockroom, they made their way down a hidden flight of stairs and through a maze of halls. Finally, they knocked on a door and were bidden to enter, dropping to one knee once they'd closed the door behind them.

"You ordered me to inform you when the report for the joint Suna/Konoha mission came in, Danzo-sama."

"Report."

The Root-nin, eyes on the ground, recited Kurenai's report and the addendum Baki had attached word for word. There was a moment of silence when they finished.

Danzo sat in his chair, considering. While Yuuhi's report of a battalion of trained men on a mission to disrupt the alliance between Konoha and Suna was bad enough, the report the Suna-nin had added was even more troubling. The survivor claimed to serve a god…Danzo clenched his unbandaged fist, remembering the confrontation with the Ame rebel years before.

The odds of two men with the power to be compared to a god rising out of Ame were vanishingly slim.

Coming to a decision, Danzo pushed himself out of his chair and reached for his walking stick. "Take a message to Homura-san and Koharu-san, asking if they'd be willing to meet with me in forty minute's time. Tell them it concerns the alliance with Suna." Ignoring his soldier's 'Hai', Danzo made his way back to his official office, mind spinning out possibilities.

As little as he might have liked Tsunade's desire to forge alliances, a move that weakened the village, he liked the idea of a third party interfering in Konoha's affairs even less.

XxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

After the meeting in the Kazekage's office, Temari escorted the team to a suite of rooms in a building not far away. "We keep this building prepped for VIPs," the Suna kunoichi told them. "Visiting shinobi on diplomatic missions, the daimyo's officials, you know. It's been largely vacant since the Yondaime took over, but we figured it was about time we started using it again."

The rooms were on the second floor of the building, a suite of two bedrooms opening onto a central living room with a small kitchen and bathroom, both scrupulously clean.

"Kankuro or I'll come take you for dinner at around 18.00. You can go walk around the general market down the block, but I'd not recommend it. At least, not alone."

Taking Temari's advice, the Konoha-nin remained in their suite for the rest of the day, resting up after the mission. When Kankuro arrived late in the afternoon, he brought a scroll with him.

"The hawk we sent to Konoha brought this back with him." He passed it over to Kurenai, who opened and scanned it. Her lips thinned in a way that caught her student's attention.

"Sensei?" Hinata asked.

"I have been recalled," Kurenai said to nobody in particular. "I'm wanted in Konoha to give my report in person, and I need to leave now. You two," she glanced at her students, "are to stay here for another two days, until Hinata is well enough to travel, and you are to bring back a scroll with you. Kazekage-sama apparently has something to send to Tsunade-sama."

"Would you like us to get you food while you pack?" Shino asked.

"Thank you, Shino."

Kankuro led the Konoha-nin to the market down the street and accompanied them while they made their purchases, buying food that could be eaten while on the move and would travel well. He did have to raise his eyebrows when Shino purchased more jerky than anyone could possibly want to eat, though.

Nor was he the only one confused. "Shino-kun, what-?"

"Our collective cousins may appreciate it," Shino said. "And I would appreciate a way to distract them sometimes."

Kankuro blinked. He hadn't known Hinata and Shino were related, nor that either the Hyuuga or Aburame might enjoy copious amounts of jerky. But Hinata seemed to accept the explanation, so he filed that snippet of information away in the back of his mind for later examination.

Kurenai was packed by the time the little group returned to the suite. Accepting the rations her students handed her, she slipped them into her bag as the group left again, headed for Suna's gates. Stopping just at the entrance, she smiled at Shino and Hinata. "I know you can handle yourselves, but I'm still going to say travel carefully, and I'll see you back in Konoha in five days or so." With a gentle squeeze of Hinata's shoulder and a light touch to Shino's, she was gone, trotting off into the cool of the evening.

Kankuro cocked his head to the side as he observed the two Konoha-nin, before shifting his weight to gain their attention. "You guys still hungry?"

Leading them back into the market, Kankuro brought them to a stall that did takeout. As the Konoha-nin looked at their options, he purchased enough food for himself and his siblings, then insisted on the other two's joining them for dinner. Exchanging slight looks of surprise, Shino and Hinata followed him back to a larger house in what looked like one of the nicer sectors of town. Temari and Gaara were already there, and the group settled in the dining room to eat.

The conversation was, while a little bit awkward, surprisingly not as stilted as it might have been. Hinata had been trained in the courtly art of keeping conversation going by an aunt, back when she was still a small child who might one day be displaced in favor of a younger brother and best suited for an alliance marriage. (That it was also a good way to get information from a target was a bonus.) She slowly drew Kankuro into a discussion of tactics and poisons with relative ease while Temari and Shino listened, throwing in their occasional two cents. Before long, Hinata barely had to make an effort as the topic wandered from tactics and poisons to locations of oases and on again to the anatomy of the border region between Kaze no Kuni and Hi no Kuni. Gaara sat quietly, preferring to watch and let the conversation wash over him.

XxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

Hinata looked up from her morning tea at the sound of a knock at the door. Opening it, she found herself face-to-face with Temari, battle-fan and all. "Gaara said he'd have the scroll for you tomorrow morning," she said. "In the meantime, if you need to restock on anything before you go back, I'll escort you."

It took Shino and Hinata perhaps half an hour to restock on rations and replace the first-aid equipment they'd used. Temari was chattier than her brother, pointing out good places to eat, shops that sold better-quality weaponry, and other locations of note. As they walked, they couldn't help but notice the curious glances of the locals and the wary looks of some of the shinobi as they recognized Hinata's eyes or caught sight of one of Shino's bugs.

Temari grimaced as a jounin crossed the street to avoid getting near them. "Sorry about that," she muttered to her companions. "Konoha shinobi have made something of an impression on some of our older nin."

"As Suna shinobi have on ours." Shino replied softly.

Temari nodded once, and the walk back to the apartment was finished in silence. That evening, she collected them again for dinner then led them back to her family's house. Gaara was absent, but Kankuro wandered in shortly after they did, muttering about workaholic Kazekages. Dinner passed in easy conversation, the teens becoming more comfortable with each other as they got to know each other better.

"Next time I get sent to Konoha, we're doing this again." Temari said as she shoved her plate out of the way. "You two," she pointed at Hinata and Shino, "are going to have to show me the place properly."

"Of course," Hinata agreed, bowing her head.

"It's the least we could do in return for your hospitality." Shino added.

Temari batted that thought aside with a hand. "I'm glad we got the chance to work together. The only Konoha-nin I've worked with so far have been combat specialists and strategists."

"And the next time you're out our way, come look us up," Kankuro added, scooping up the last of his meal. "S'always fun t'talk to somebody who knows different bits of the craft." He nodded at Hinata, then ducked as Temari tried to swat him for talking with his mouth full.

"Only so long as you do the same." Shino said, a slight smile appearing from behind his collar.

XxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

Gaara passed a scroll across his desk to the two Konohan trackers shortly after dawn. "Thank you once again for your work." He hesitated, then went on. "I hope we may meet again in the future." There. That was nicely neutral, just in case.

Shino and Hinata bowed slightly. "It would be a pleasure, Kazekage-sama." The Hyuuga said, smiling softly.

Gaara nodded once. "Travel well." With another bow, the two left the room quietly and were gone.

Baki slipped into the room quietly, a number of scrolls tucked under his arm. Observing his youngest student for a moment, he found a slight smile turning up the corner of his mouth, and turned to put the scrolls down to hide it. It was a very interesting change, to see Gaara attempting to reach out to people, and not at all unwelcome.

XxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

Tsunade looked at the two chuunin from over the top of the scroll they'd delivered. "Well done, the pair of you." Setting the paper down, she leaned back in her chair. "The Kazekage was impressed. If the hunter-nin didn't have first claim, I'd assign you both to diplomatic missions." The Hokage turned to look at an apparently empty corner. "Thoughts?"

Jakkaru stepped into the light as if from nowhere. "They did pretty well. There were a number of mistakes we'll need to correct, and they could use more experience in ambushes, but nothing so drastic that we can't fix it."

"Good. Jakkaru, I'll expect the usual progress report at the end of next month. Hinata, Shino, dismissed."

All three bowed before leaving the office – Hinata and Shino through the door, Jakkaru slipping back into the shadows. That evening, both the chuunin found notes waiting for them in their rooms: Training ground 43, 6.30. Be prepared to work.


A/N: I'm finally back. After two and a half weeks fighting virii for possession of my computer, another week recovering and dealing with the fallout from my hacked e-mail account, crazy work hours and illness in the family, I post again!

Okay, I probably just jinxed myself. But we have another chapter, even if this one did not seem to want to be written.

Kudos points to sasori into the nothing, pharix, and Oh My Fudge for correctly guessing the poison Hinata was hit with: Castor bean. The seeds contain a compound called ricin, as little as 1.8 milligrams of which are enough to kill a human if injected or inhaled. It damages the body's ability to make proteins, causing what amounts to death by shock as the entire body starts shutting down. If you want the gory details, Wikipedia's not a bad source.

I'm afraid updates are going to become even more sporadic. I'm going to be traveling most of the next month, my grandmother was recently hospitalized, and as if that's not enough I'll be temporarily transplanting to the Iberian peninsula in September. Until things settle down (which might be mid-September, probably a little bit later) I'm not going to have much time to write.

Next chapter: Double-Ended Candle.