8
Bright as noonday sun
Smiles shine so joyfully
Against deception
By the end of the week, his chakra had returned. Inazuma had done everything she could think of to help him, and he found it exasperating, annoying and a little of a round, snowy feeling he couldn't quite place.
So it was on the seventh day that Inazuma stumbled around the bush that she found him sitting upright and writing complicated seals on a scroll, his eyes narrowed in concentration.
"I brought a… what's that?"
"A seal."
"A what?"
"Your parents are ninja and you don't know what a seal is?"
"I haven't started going to the academy yet."
He looked up from the scroll and narrowed his eyes at her for a while. Suddenly, he reached his hand out and touched two fingers to her forehead. She flinched at the dead-coldness of hand.
"Your hand's really cold, mister."
He muttered something she couldn't quite catch, and felt an odd heat spread against her forehead and vanish.
"There, brat. Now you won't be able to rat on me, even if you want to."
"What?" She rubbed the back of her thick mitten against her forehead, trying to get rid of the last of the odd, tingling sensation.
"What's your name, kid?"
"Um, I'm not supposed to…"
"Tell that to strangers, I get it." He painted a few more characters onto the scroll, attempting to ignore her as she kneeled next to him and leaned over the scroll. Unfortunately, her woolen cap began obscuring his vision of the seal, so he made his body sigh to let her know he was irritated. She took no notice.
"If I tell you my name, does that mean that we're not strangers anymore, then?"
"I guess…" she said, cocking her head at the scroll.
"Good. My name is Sasori."
She glanced up and leaned back on her heels. "Cool name! But it kind of sounds like a girl's…"
He sighed again, and finished up on the scroll, letting her watch from the side. Swirling patterns of tiny black symbols covered most of the pale cloth, and staring at them for too long made her eyes water and blur.
"Can you write your name here?" He pointed to the middle of the scroll, where there was a blank circle surrounded with lettering.
"I could, but why?"
"If I was ever stuck in the snow again, would you help me?"
"Sure, Sasori!" She giggled. He watched as her hand stretched out to take the brush from him, and she clumsily wrote her name in the circle. He read the scrawl with some difficulty.
"Inazuma, huh?"
"Yep."
"I'm an impatient man, you see."
"But you could lie here for a whole week! I don't have the patience for that."
He ignored her. "And I'm as practical as I am impatient."
"Okay…" This was starting to get boring.
"That's why I sealed your mind from telling anyone about me, and that's why I had you write your name."
"You sealed my mind? What does that mean?"
"It just means you can't tell anyone about me."
"Oh. But you said the poison…" Inazuma frowned, trying to understand what it all added up to. The thought that he'd lied to her didn't even surface in her conscience.
"Just in case."
"Why do you need to be a secret?"
"I have a lot of enemies, kid. And that's also why you wrote your name. If I ever need you again, I'll summon you."
"Wow, really? I didn't know you could do that."
"Most likely though, you'll never see me again."
She looked down at the snow and scooped some up with her mitten, letting it crumble back off to the ground. She sniffed.
"Never?"
"Most likely never. But you never know. I'm impatient and practical."
She looked up at him. "Does your hair bleed? Is that why it's red?"
He raised his eyebrows. "What a foolish question. Hair doesn't bleed."