The Dancing Fields

by VesperChan

Sakura stepped into the wrong fairy circle and ended up trapped in the fae courts where people are compelled to dance themselves to death-if they're not keen enough to find a way around the manners of their captors that is. Deidara is a 'friendly' fae who she finds on her sides more and more often. It wouldn't be wise to fall in love. FaeAU, Sakura Centric, DaiSaku

The Dancing Fields

"Faeries, come take me out of this dull world,
For I would ride with you upon the wind,
Run on the top of the dishevelled tide,
And dance upon the mountains like a flame."

― William Butler Yeats, The Land of Heart's Desire

---

Contrary to popular belief Sakura had not been born angry, she had just perfected the look like it was an obscure art form no one else could fully master. She wasn't sure if her temperament was what attracted the eyes of the Moon court or if it had something to do with the dormant blood of a fae ancestor, but either way the result was the same and she was just as stuck in their realm regardless of original intent.

Unlike other 'trinkets' she didn't seem as susceptible to their enchantment and charms, delighting them to no end when she managed to reject one after another for a dance. The other humans who had been spirited away were not so lucky. She refused to let their loss not be a lesson for her to learn by.

In all the realms of lawful fae there were two high courts, those of the Moon and Stars, but countless lesser courts. Only the high courts could adopt lesser courts under their banner, leaving all others to fend for themselves with lesser levels of fae nobility until the tides of politics changed again and an upheaval rearranged the powers in play. It was just her luck that the fae trap she had stumbled into had been one belonging to the high family of the moon court, ensuring her entrapment being one of the most ironclad possible. No simple wordplay or human intuition would be enough to wrestle her freedom from the hands of greater beings. The fact that she was still alive and not danced to death was a small miracle in and of itself.

Sakura felt a cool breeze against her bare back and glanced up again to find the ballroom unchanged. The same glittering skirts swirled across the polished floor and the same laughing faces flickered in between the transfixed dancers. She was off her feet, lounging on one of the day beds that overlooked the dance floor from a minor platform. Not too far away fae of greater status and importance lounged on their high platforms but no one was above the Dias where their high king lounged upon his throne of silver moonlight. Even from the floor the throne was an impressive sight that flared out in stylized moon rays.

Caught in her own thoughts she almost didn't catch the approaching dancer until he was in front of her, extending a hand. "May I have this dance?"

Their charm fell off her like water off a duck's back. She felt the itch of his magic as it frayed and disintegrated around her. He hadn't been very high ranking if that was the best he could do. He was dressed well enough to be a lord with wild red hair that fell over each shoulder in a set of braids that complemented the scarlet feather in his hat. He wasn't anyone she recognized.

Sakura reached with one lazy hand for her fan and let it fall open in front of her face, covering her lips as she replied, "No, I think not, sir."

Instead of being upset her rejection seemed to delight the fae lord. He complimented her once more and then bowed before retreating. Sakura watched him go, seeing him flanked by a pair of fae ladies who tethered and cooed to hear his story. Somehow rejection never seemed to get old and always ended up being a fabulous story to gossip over. It wasn't unexpected when she rejected their requests and they always seemed proud of her for being smart enough not to dance herself to death in their arms. It was almost as if they were watching a fancy toy survive a toss between children. When she remained unbroken it was always a surprise. Other people who couldn't shrug off the magic succumbed and their death was entertaining at first, but quickly led to boredom. They didn't cheer as clearly for the bloody shoes or corpses as they did her insults and rejections.

How long had she been caught in this horrendous place?

"Royal balls are such a bore, aren't they?"

She hadn't even heard him approach, but she looked back to see a tall elven man with long golden hair and a bird mask standing at the top of her platform behind her lounger. His hair was unbraided but partially pulled back into a high tail that seemed to make him seem taller than he was. If she stood up she doubted he'd be too much taller than her. The mask made it difficult to see much more of his face but all the fae were handsome and lovely, as was their nature to be so.

"I'm not sure I know what you mean, good sir."Sakura kept her fan up and watched him over the edge of it, using much of her shoulder to hide the bottom half of her expressions since he was still mostly behind her. She wasn't about to get up and turn to face him but she knew better than to ignore someone without merit. It was odd he had greeted her so uniquely. Most dancers came up asking her to dance or to offer her a drink. This one almost sounded like he wanted a conversation with her.

"I may be a sir but I assure you fair lady I am not good ." He rounded her seat and before he could bend at the waist there was a chair magic-ed up underneath him to fall into. "There's no fun in that."

"So I've been told, I've yet to understand the concept myself," Sakura dryly replied. Her mind was filled with all the different deaths she had been forced to watch while her host and his court laughed on in amusement. When the fae said they were good or not they never meant it in terms of morality, the way humans saw it. Manners were what determined a good fae from a bad fae. The fact that he came up to chat with her without introducing himself was an example of how he was so bad.

"You'll have to forgive me as I could not help myself. You so rarely give the undeserving knaves such as myself an opportunity to catch your ear. I had no other means of reaching you. Allow me to introduce myself." He reached up to pull the bright blue bird mask off and bend over it in a sloppy bow. "I am Deidara."

He was just as handsome as she feared with striking blue eyes and a delicate set of features. "No court?"

The fact that he had introduced himself so simply was further evidence he saw himself as a bad fae, since it was basic manners to introduce oneself honestly upon first meeting someone you wish to converse with. Withholding one's affiliation could be enough to count as an insult in some circles.

"I was born to the Stone Court but as you might have surmised by their absence, I travel outside their circles. The invitations are better."

Sakura kept her fan up. "And you've found yourself here in our Moon Court. Exciting."

"Will you give me your name, fair lady?"

"No," she scoffed, insulted by the ask. She hadn't stumbled into the fair lands yesterday. She knew the most basic rules when dealing with the fair folk. Giving someone else her name was tantamount to signing her death certificate. She'd seen more than one fair folk use a human's name to make the mortal do things they never would connect to when free will was a feature of their humanity.

"I didn't think you would, Sakura."

"You are quite rude, Deidara."

"Thank you." He seemed at her words, accepting them like some sort of praise when it was obvious they had been meant as an insult.

Across the room a different human who was too dull to know better stood on the edge of the dance floor and turned when a beautiful woman in a swan mask asked him for a dance. He gave in too easily, even as his friends begged him to stay back. A pair of dancing ladies in glittering gowns descended upon the friends, begging them to come dance too. One relented after making his partner promise not to hurt him.

"And you'll let us go in the morning?" the other one asked.

"You'll all return to your lands in the morning time," the ladies promised together.

The third friend hung back, still unconvinced as the other two were swept out onto the dance floor to dance endlessly.

Their first mistake was in not being clear with the ladies, of course they wouldn't hurt them, but an enchantment didn't count as hurting . There was also plenty of ill that could befall a human without the fae trying to hurt them directly. Who's to say a sister or brother didn't come up behind him and cut off his head when he stepped out of line.

Secondly, they were foolish in failing to clarify which morning they'd be sent back on. It wouldn't be tomorrow-time worked too differently under the fair mounds. Outside in the land of mortals time rolled on and a hundred mornings might come and go in the span of a single dance. Their corpses would return to the mortal world during the morning time, as promised, but that was so many sleeps and dreams from now.

"You enjoy watching them too, don't you?" Deidara asked, leaning forward in his seat. Between his knees his hands played with the feathers of his bird mask, pulling them apart and then flattening them back into shape like a nervous habit lived in his fingers.

"I take no delight in their misery."

"That isn't what I said, you enjoy to watch them and learn." When she looked back over at him his smile only deepened. "You aren't the only one who likes to watch. I've been keeping my eyes on you for a while. It's not that you never dance, but you never accept an invitation that doesn't offer you something."

"You think you know what I'd want?"

"If I did, I'd have offered it to you for a dance already."

Sakura looked away from Deidara, watching as the two human men were danced into ecstasy and stupor. After a few spins their eyes turned hazy and their expressions went vacant even as their footsteps followed perfect patterns during the various spins and rotations. They passed a young girl who had been dancing for two days. Her shoes were bloody and her body was close to dropping. The fae lord who pulled her along looked delighted even as the weights in the bottom of her dress bruised her ankles worse. That was the price of a dress woven by the most skilled fae artisans; such designers were also sadists.

"If you couldn't guess what it is I want then you're duller than you look, fae lord."

He ignored the insult to lean out a little further, stretching his neck to get a better look at her. "Oh, do I look sharp to you?"

"I don't need to be kind to you or answer any of your questions. I am not bound to the same code of etiquette, nor am I so easily enchanted." Sakura snapped her fan shut and pushed up off the couch. "Go away and leave me alone."

"I didn't come up here to ask you to dance," Deidara said.

"You came up here to bother me then, is that it?"

"More like I came up here to see what I could offer you."

The girl on the dance floor finally fell. When her dress fluttered into place against her dead body the skin of her legs had been beaten raw from the stones in her skirt so that one was barely still connected. It was a grisly sight that made the passing dancers stop to giggle and laugh when they saw it. Some of the humans not yet caught in their enchantments gagged. One ran for the exits but as far as he went he always ended up right back where he left from. The eternal ballroom was like that.

"Nothing you could offer me would tempt me to risk such a death," Sakura said while watching the dead girl get dragged off by the moon knights. White rabbits were hopping between the legs of dancers with dish rags to clean up the blood before disappearing in between the swishing folds of different robes and dresses. In moments the ballroom had been reset and was back to dancing.

Mercifully, their death had interrupted the dance, and all those humans who only promised a single dance with their parents were released. It was all per the terms of their verbal agreement. 'May I have this dance' meant only one dance, but when that dance ended it was up to the fae should nothing external interrupt the dance.

A hand reached down and braced against the corner of her couch. A strand of honey blond hair fell over her shoulder as a face leaned down, close enough that breath curled against the shell of her ear. "What if what I offered was the means of freeing yourself, my lady?" A different hand reached for a strand of her hair and she felt it being picked up to be kissed. "I said it already, you aren't the only one who has been watching. It's rare, but you do dare to dance with those who know what to offer you."

"And you think you can do the same when you're not even a member of the Moon Court?"

"It's because I'm an outsider I can help you better than anyone here."

Sakura dared to lean back, knowing how close their faces would be. There was no magic in it, but when she looked up at his beautiful, perfect face there was temptation. She had been a young thing when she first stumbled down into the lands beneath the mounds. She had wanted what all village girls who worked with cattle and corn could only dream of. What milk maid or shepherdess didn't wish she could be rescued from simplicity to a shining castle in the sky where dresses were made of silk instead of handling down scraps? They had been harmless dreams full of wanting that helped her through sad days until the wrong step in a circle of mushrooms dropped her in the net of a fae.

When she looked up at Deidara with all his flawless skin and perfect angles she couldn't help but feel her anger stroke. She grabbed his chin between her forefinger and thumb, angling in down so she had to turn to look at him. Instead of him being over her she had pulled him down to be level with her. It meant he had to let go of her hair and brace against the couch to avoid toppling over.

"You have no reason to help me. Don't open your mouth to waste words."

His eyes were shimmering and wide as he watched her. "I won't. Dance with me."

"No."

"I don't ask without something to offer." She felt him press something against her arm and she released his face to grab at his wrist, angling it back so she could see what he held.

"A comb?"

"An enchanted comb," he gently corrected. "Wear this in your hair and you don't need to breathe underwater."

Sakura thought of the endless lake underneath the dancing field when the Mirror Court hosted the Moon Court's ball. Different lesser courts would host balls for the high court throughout the lunar cycle, and each host offered up a different location for the dancing fields, even if they all filtered back to the Moon Court lands. Right now the Royal Court was hosting, there were eight other courts who would need to finish their hosting duties before the Mirror Court would have their turn. Each court had their own exit, some were more obvious than others, like the guarded arches, while others were cleverly hidden. She wasn't positive, but she strongly suspected the mirror lake to be the key to the exit in the Mirror Court's dance hall.

But didn't Deidara know that too?

What would he gain if I danced with him, and what would I lose? Sakura thought to herself. She tugged his hand closer to her eyes to better see the comb before glancing up over it to gauge his expression. He was too unlike the others for her to feel comfortable with, but the offer was tempting.

"What are the conditions?" she asked.

"You can set them."

Sakura almost laughed at how eager he was to hook her. She figured this was his way of lowering her defenses around him, making it too easy for someone as keen as her to set the rules. "I decide when the dance is over, my voice will never be stopped, you will exercise no manipulation over my will-for I give you no such permission. I will be returned to my seat in the condition I was taken from it. Do you agree?"

Deidara reached over to fix the comb into her hair. "Gladly, my lady."

She took his hand and let him lead her down to the dance floor, ignoring the whispers and murmurs around her as fae and folk alike craned their necks to get a glimpse of her. Deidara had realized the bird mask but Sakura had no such defense. She picked up one corner of her skirt and set her hands where they were supposed to go. Naturally, Deidara reached for her and then dipped into the music.

Sakura followed his steps with ease, complying so well with the dance steps that the magic of the dancing floor couldn't find a foothold to grab onto her. If she had been a messy dancer it might have been able to get past her defenses and compel her to move in accordance with the will of the dance, but she had never tested such a theory.

"You said you've watched me. How come I've never seen you before?" she asked.

"I've gotten better at seeing without being seen," Deidara chuckled. "I'm not unwelcome in the courts, but there is a vast difference between being banned and being welcomed that I'm still learning how to gauge."

"You sound like you didn't grow up in the fae courts, or is the Court of Stone so different from being aligned to the Star Court?"

"See if you can uncover it for yourself, for indeed the Star Courts and their lesser councils are not so different from those of the Moon Court alliance. I am forbidden from saying more." Deidara tugged her closer and they spun a little faster to weave through a pair of women in swan feathers and silk.

Sakura almost missed a step. "You're a changeling then?" She had never danced with a changeling before, though she knew they were a thing. Many humans were spirited away because a fae infant had been nestled into their sleeping cradle in exchange for the kidnapping. When poor and rich alike left a wish open it was as good as an invitation for a fair folk to act out a little mischief. A mother wishing out loud for a fat calf might promise 'anything in the world' for something she believed to be out of reach, only to be blessed with a miracle thirteen months later. Fae never took newborns, but would pick up children who were at least 100 days old.

Those changeling children grew up alongside other humans until something drew them back to the mounds and they realized their true nature. Most came back as children, when it was commonplace to act out on selfish interests, while some never came back at all.

"Such a smart bird," Deidara murmured, blue eyes softening for her at the corners. She hadn't noticed until then how wrong she had been about the height difference. He was a head taller than her so she had to lean back to look up if she wanted to see his eyes. "I knew you were a keen one to have made it so far for so long."

"I don't know how long it is so long," she admitted.

"Time is a measure of decay humans rely on to track their days. What use does the flower or the tree have for such means? Yes, the seasons rotate and spin, but nothing is ever new, nor is anything ever old." Deidara tugged her away and they neared the edge of the dance floor where smaller, softer steps were taken. "Not even I can tell you how long you've been here."

"Too long," Sakura answered, feeling her tightly bound anger nestle deeper behind her breastbone, hurried like a secret that was just waiting to come out. "I'm almost afraid of what the world will look like when I find it."

"When?"

"I believe in myself," Sakura assured. It was no secret that every human captive wanted freedom, most fae just assumed that glitter and gowns and good food would be enough to seduce humans out of their wants. She hadn't been the exception to those wants, but something else burned a little hotter in her.

"You wear your confidence well. Should I bring you a dress to match next time?"

"Next time?" She almost smiled. "You're going to come back after you got your dance?"

"Of course." They split to turn and spin away from each other before coming back together again, fingertips to fingertips. Then the music picked up and he had to grab her again to go back into the swirling steps that crossed them in front of the highest dias in the room, the platform where the young Hyuga princess lounged. Most dancers spared Hanabi a second glance but Deidara only had eyes for Sakura.

"Why should I believe you?"

"You shouldn't, but I am still a slave to my nature and can not tell a lie."

"Sounds like something a liar would say," Sakura teased even though she knew he was telling the truth. It was one of the reasons fae were so tricky by nature, they had to be to get anything done with humans.

The music was swelling but Deidara pulled her to a stop in the middle of the floor, interrupting their dace and giving her a justification to leave him. The magic of their bargain was fulfilled but she held on, listening to what he still had to say.

"Then you may think of me as a liar, but do not let go of me."

After the Royal Court, the Flower Court took over and the dance floor turned wild. Walls became flowering trees and pillars were replaced with hedges. The polished floor turned into a secret mosaic that peeked through the earth with moss growing through the spaces where grout was supposed to keep the tiles in place. Instead of shoes the fae danced barefoot with flowers in place of jewels.

Deidara found her again and always had something fun to offer in trade for a dance. He never set the conditions and let her leave that so favorable she couldn't justify saying no, even if his gifts were not magical.

An unintentional benefit to their arrangement was the adaptation of other court dancers who wished to dance with Sakura. They would approach with finer and finer gifts, some of which she knew would be helpful in her efforts to leave, but no one let her set the conditions like Deidara did. She had to bargain or reject each one depending on the risk they posed. Some were clear traps while others were curious excursions.

Still, as much as the worlds around her changed there was one constant. There were new faces with every change but Deidara stayed the same. The only thing different about him from one court to the next was his outfit.

She couldn't put into words how comforting the feel of his arms became.

Time was a funny thing but she knew she must have spent hours with him, speaking of a myriad of topics from art to life and whatever passed for politics in the courts of the fae. For being one of the fair folk Deidara had an odd perspective on beauty and what he called art. Everything the fae made was meant to last, immortal just like them. Humans struggled to capture immortality in their art too, in stone and paint and poetry and song.

"If it is true art it shouldn't last."

"What would that even look like?"

Deidara shrugged. "Everlasting things might dazzle and amaze you, but that isn't art. Art is sorrow and loss and the feeling that comes next."

"How silly for a fae lord to speak to me of feelings," Sakura teased.

Deidara smiled wide and tapped the side of his nose. "I've learned a thing or two from my human mother. Maybe it's real, what I felt. True art is a bang, it's the rainbow that is here and then gone, the sunset and the sunrise, the smile of a loved one. All those things are precious because they are impermanent."

Sakura chuckled. "You must be so popular with the other fae folk. Do they entertain your silly notions as well as I?"

Now it was Deidara's turn to scoff. "Not in the least. I don't give them the option to hear what I think. You're the only one I'll tell my secrets to so keep them well."

After the Flower Court, the Strawberry, and the Horned court all came and went. She woke up in the Red Moon Court and knew at once she was in the most powerful of all the courts, and saved the High courts themselves. Their king, Madara Uchiha, had once ruled as High king until his court broke and splintered with civil disputes. In their weakness the Hyuga seized the opportunity to unite and rise up, taking the high position for themselves. In was in the Red Court she received the most gifts and beneficial offers, but only from the Uchiha princes.

"You're not sure why?" Deidara asked her in between dances.

A fur from 100 different frost wolves that would keep her warm in even the coldest lands took up half her couch. Her dress was studded with red diamonds, another gift from a different lord in the Strawberry Court. On the low table in front of her different desserts and foods started to pile. She dared not take any food for herself. Everything edible had a hook in it, the magic woven into hospitality made it so. Only food explicitly offered was safe to consume.

"I'm a plaything in their eyes," she answered before sipping on honeyed wine. "It seems this is the season where toys are more in demand."

"Not even a prince would waste so much on a plaything," Deidara warned. He was looking at the wolf fur pelt with a weary expression. The magic woven into it was loud to Sakura so she could only assume it was deafening to someone more keen than her.

"I'm human, plaything is the best I can be to these other races."

"You haven't seen yourself in a while, have you?"

Sakura hesitated, a grape halfway to her mouth. "Seen myself? I saw what I looked like when I dressed for tonight."

Deidara shook his head and then leaned over, touching the shell of her ear. He traced it to its tip and then down about his touch felt wrong and Sakura reached for one of the dinner plates to clear. She picked up the empty silver and angled it so she could better see her ears. Their round edges were gone, and now each end was a little narrowed, coming to a point like a tree leaf. It wasn't as pronounced as the fae, but it was…different.

"How did this happen?"

"The human in you is dying and the fae is what survives." Deidara took the silver out of her hands and replaced it on the small table. "It'll be only a matter of time before the last bit of your humanity dies out and you truly can't leave, but more importantly-"

"What could be more important than that?" Sakura hissed, nails digging into the fabric of the couch under her. "I might not make it at this rate." There were three more courts before the Mirror Court and if she somehow ended up as a full fae the portal wouldn't work for her. She had never heard of someone turning into a fae. What had she missed?

"Maybe not more importantly, but more pressing is how they are looking at you now. Have you ever seen a good neighbor delight in the mutilation of another fae?"

"That doesn't mean it doesn't happen." There had been wars between the courts and infighting so of course some of that had to involve bloodshed.

"Not like it does with humans. But consider what this means for you in this room now."

Sakura looked out across the dance floor and saw more than one face turned her way. The Uchiha prince who had gifted her the wolf pelt coat was standing next to a pair of raven girls, each wearing bird masks and acting like his left and right hand, but his face was turned towards her. She saw his eyes and watched as they turned red, spinning like pinwheels with a new color. He passed off his drink to one of the girls and the other rushed away, making a beeline for Sakura's platform.

"Oh no."

"That's right," Deidara murmured, watching a cold realization dawn on her face. "The courts are courting you."

Just then a raven faced girl materialized on the edge of the platform before stepping closer to Sakura and dipping into a curtsy. "My prince wishes to dance with you. Would you name a price or will this suffice?" The girl held in her hands a small tin case of four different paints with a brush fit into the case above them all.

Sakura knew better than to assume the paints weren't magical somehow, but that was beside the point. "Will he let me set the conditions of the dance?"

The girl in the bird mask looked over at Deidara and hiked her shoulders. "Yes, he said he would allow it. Will the offering suffice?"

Sakura heard Deidara curse under his breath but didn't pay it any mind. She took the box of pigments and set it on the table next to her other gifts. The girl in the bird mask burst into feathers but at the base of the platform Itachi waited, watching for her to descend even though his rank allowed him to trespass onto any high place, save the platform of his Uncle King Madara. He offered her his hand but she held back.

"I decide when the dance is over, my voice will never be stopped, you will exercise no manipulation over my will-for I give you no such permission. I will be returned to my seat in the condition I was taken from it. Do you agree?"

"I agree," he said in a voice far softer than Deidara's.

She reached up to his shoulder and his hand found her waist. The music swelled and they danced across the floor. Unlike many of her other partners, Itachi spoke far less. Sometimes when a dancer would turn too close to where they were he would whisper 'careful' under his breath and tug her closer to himself. Sakura wasn't one to fill in the silence with mindless chatter so they danced wordlessly for as long as Sakura felt like dancing.

She might have kept on dancing but the music stopped as someone cried out. Behind her another human body fell to the ground, a boy this time. He was rail thin with bloody shoes and sunken eyes. As soon as he hit the floor he started to decompose until the magic of the dance floor caught him in a new way and preserved him for the knights to carry off. All around him the dancers stopped to laugh or look, but when Sakura looked up Itachi was still staring down at her. He hadn't so much as blinked.

A heat Sakura didn't recognize burned behind her breastbone. She felt it drip into her stomach and hated how realization came to her a moment later when Itachi leaned in closer to whisper in her ear. "The dance is finished, let me walk you back to your seat."

Sakura nodded, taking his arm as he guided her off the dance floor. Only too late she realized they weren't heading back to her platform. She tried to tug away but a different magic had latched onto her-one she had never felt before. This was the magic of will, of consent. She had agreed to let him take her back to 'her' seat but was there something vague in the wording of that? Why was she going elsewhere?

"Here, it isn't far," Itachi said when he felt her try to pull away. He led her up to his platform and the two raven girls scurried away, revealing a plush couch that had been newly fashioned to suit her size. Right alongside it was Itachi's regular seat. He guided her onto the couch and as soon as she was seated the magic fell away and she moved to flee but stopped when she felt his hand on her wrist. "Please!" It was the loudest he had ever been with her. "Please don't…no harm will find you here, I promise. Just sit with me a while. I have food for you. All of my tables are yours."

"I shouldn't be here, prince," Sakura said, trying her best to find that anger again. "This isn't my seat."

Itachi slid his hand down off her wrist to grab at the curve of her fingers, lifting them to his lips. "It is, it was meant for you. I know it was a bit of trickery but you are safe. Please stay a short while."

Across the room Sakura saw where Deidara stood, watching her from her platform. He could see her angry expression from across the room and had to know what she was feeling. He nodded slowly, assuring her it was okay. She wasn't in as much danger as she thought.

Slowly, Sakura turned back and lowered herself into the couch prepared for her and let Itachi settle into his seat beside her. "I will leave when I wish to leave."

"Of course, please eat. You can't receive these treats from any other server. Such delights are reserved for the royal family." He pressed a small plate of deserts into her hands. Through the bits of sugary delight she caught sight of her reflection and saw the shape of her ears again.

"You are wasting time on me, prince. I'm not fae like you, I'm human with a little unfortunate racial mixing. You shouldn't be confused."

"I'm not."

"Then maybe you shouldn't have poor taste."

"I don't."

Sakura struggled to hold onto her anger. Itachi looked like the sort of beautiful dark knight that would swoop down to rescue maidens in the story books of children. The soft velvet of his deep voice did nothing to hinder the budding heat in her face. It only grew harder when he offered her food, pressing scones and cake bits into her hands to try.

The man who died on the dance floor had starved to death.

Sakura pushed away the desert dish and turned to more fully face Itachi. "What do you want, prince? I know you can't follow the rest of the court into the next realm. The Uchiha are the only ones forbidden from mingling."

"I know. Once our turn is done I won't be able to follow you until our cycle comes up again. It was like this last time too."

Sakura tried to remember the last time she was in the Red Court and if she had danced with anyone. She knew she had, she must have at one point, but the specifics of who and where all blurred together. How many cycles had she lived through now? How many courts had she endured and survived?

"I don't remember you from last time. Did we interact?"

Itachi seemed to hesitate before speaking. "… We didn't but you danced with my cousin, Shisui. I never left this platform. It was thanks to him I bothered to look up at all."

"And now you've danced with me twice and absconded with me to your high place. What was your intention this time around?"

He hesitated again and Sakura almost thought it was because he hadn't heard her but just as she was about to open her mouth and repeat the question he answered. "Wouldn't you like to stay here with me?"

"I'm too human for that. It would only be a matter of time before it killed me just like that man on the dancing floor."

Itachi made a face of minor confusion, likely not recalling the human death that happened at his feet, but that expression quickly morphed into one of confidence. "I would ensure your safety and watch over your metamorphosis. You would not be in danger and you would not remain human for much longer. You'd fit in as one more of us, you'd belong."

What a beautiful sentiment he offered her, all her girl hood dreams on a silver plate with dessert on the side. It was almost tempting enough to forget the girl who danced herself to death in a dress lined with stones or the boys who died of starvation on their feet.

There was once a boy on the dancing floor who wept himself sick, caught in the arms of another fae who thought it great fun to dance him to his death. The boy begged and sobbed the whole dance until he went hazy eyed and delirious. He still moaned but they were incoherent slurs and babbles for the others to laugh at. Only Sakura seemed to watch and know what the boy was saying as he died over the course of several days.

Sakura stood from her seat and Itachi looked pained to see her go. "I have no desire to remain where the death of my kind is still treated like a game."

Each new night Itachi tried to dance with her, offering more and more elaborate gifts for less and less of her attention. Even when he insisted he would let her set the conditions, Sakura refused and lounged on the couch until the magic of his court fell away and a new world emerged.

The Harvest and the Hunter Courts passed with little issue. Though now that Sakura was aware of it she felt hyper sensitive to the increasing scrutiny and attention her new appearance was encouraging. Her ears had elongated noticeably, to the point where it was hard to distinguish her from other fae. Her skin turned smooth and blemish free while her hair and nails grew stronger and healthier than ever. She didn't age, but she felt herself change.

Just before the Hunter's Court gave way to the next court, Sakura started to feel pain in her back and limbs.

"The rest of your body is starting to change now. Fae bones are different from human ones," Deidara explained. One of his hands rubbed soothing circles into the base of her neck, careful to avoid the place where her back felt like it was ripping open.

Sakura lounged on her stomach, face half buried in her pillows as she waited out the last few days in the second to last court. The world was preparing to change but her platform and her things wouldn't shift too terribly. "I don't want fae bones, I don't want any of this to happen. This is too fast. Why did this get so bad?"

"Thank your ancestor. This is so rarely seen due to the fact that fae don't typically breed with humans and produce offspring that survive." Deidara's hand trailed down her back, rubbing circles until he touched a point that made Sakura flinch. "Sorry!"

"I've never been sick before, even when I was a child growing up, others would get sick but it always seemed to pass over me," Sakura absently confessed. She couldn't keep her eyes open for how the light seemed to hurt her pupils. Even her eyes were changing it seemed.

"Fae don't get sick, maybe you were more fair folk than you first assumed. Did you know your ancestor?"

Sakura scoffed, "I didn't even know my parents. I was raised with cousins and my aunt and uncle. I don't even know what they looked like or who they were."

"I'm sorry to hear that."

Sakura peeked up from her pillows to try and see Deidara. He was still sinfully handsome and practically perfect with flawless skin, hair, nails, and enough fashion to attract even fae glances, but he seemed far too familiar to be gorgeous . Now he was just…comfortable. She knew his face well and didn't get stunned when he smiled down at her. "Did you know your parents?"

The question seemed to amuse him if the crook to his smile was worth analyzing. "I'm not allowed to mention them."

"I wasn't talking about the humans, I meant the family from the Stone Court."

Deidara's hands went still on her back. "Oh, you meant those people." He started to massage her neck and shoulders again. "I'm not sure. I never bothered to get to know them and they never sought me out."

"Can you tell me how long you've been in this place then? Did you come back when you were a teenager or an adult…?" Sakura let her question hang purposefully, hoping he would finish it for him.

"I've been in the courts…" Deidara tried to stress out a word but it was stopped in his throat. There was a flat of magic in his eyes and Sakura smelled the enchantment burned onto his tongue. He coughed and gave up trying to force those words out and tried saying something different. "Time is odd here, but not as long as you."

Sakura pushed herself up, feeling dizzy and nauseous but also shocked beyond belief. "What? You just got here after me? Why didn't you-what are you even doing here then? Shouldn't you try to find your family?"

"Those people aren't my family."

"But you didn't get to know them for very long. What if they missed you?"

"They weren't, they're fae."

"And so are you."

Deidara touched her ear, tracing the curve of it with only the calloused tip of his finger. "As are you now."

She batted his hand away. "I'm still human on the inside where it matters. I still feel like a human. A fae wouldn't mourn or rage like I do when human blood paints these floors."

She had tried to remember all their faces, even if she never knew their names, but she had begun to lose track and now the way they dressed whenever they fell into a circle seemed so different from what she was used to she was afraid she had been stuck in the fae lands for decades upon decades and forgotten whole scores of humans who had danced and died for the immortal's entertainment. But even if she forgot their faces and never knew their names she refused to forget their lessons. She had learned from all of them and now knew better than to accept duplicitous offers.

Deidara gently coaxed her back into the couch, turning around so he could massage her shoulders again. "I want to tell you a story. Will you listen?"

Sakura hummed into the pillow and waited for him to continue.

"Once upon a time a boy loved his mother badly. He didn't know what the value of love was or why he should bother with it, but if you were to ask him he would tell you that yes he loved his mother even as he gave her endless days and nights of grief. She should have thrown him away when she learned the truth, he was too naughty for her, but the woman was as determined as they came and refused to part with her child. Even when her husband left, even when the money ran out, even when the neighbors turned on her, she never turned on her child or abandoned him. Do you think she should have?"

"It doesn't sound like she had a choice in it," Sakura mumbled into the pillows. After another moment of silence she added, "She loved him, clearly. Even if it made sense, she couldn't if she loved him. There's nothing more powerful than that."

"…Maybe you are right. She couldn't give him up so she didn't. When the money ran out they ate dandelions from the fields and eventually the boy grew to realize he should try to help his mother. He got a job that took him away from her for days at a time and when he would return it would always feel right, like a puzzle piece sliding into place. The boy grew into a man and finally seemed to fall into line with what was considered normal for young men. He fancied a girl, got into fights, felt stress, regretted his mistakes, and grew up more and more. One year he saved up all his money for his mother and devised a plan to buy her something of luxury she had never had before; a hairpin or comb."

"I've heard this story before," Sakura spoke up, remembering a similar tale.

"Maybe you have," Deidara chuckled. "The boy bought his mother a beautiful comb with all the money he had and she bought for him new boots they couldn't afford, but she had sold all her hair to pay for it-her pride and treasure."

"A similar story was told in my village where I grew up."

"I told you it was only a story," Deidara chuckled as the dance hall melted around them into something new.

Sakura dressed extra well and extra slow. Her body seemed so sore these days and her back was the worst of it, but maybe that had something to do with her stress. Out of all the courts the one she hated the most was the Death Court, and not for the most obvious of reasons. Yes, it was a court that stylized themselves in the more macabre fashion and represented the lowest point in the cycle of living things, but it was who she would see in this court that aggravated her to no end.

The Death Court had been the first of all the courts she fell into and it was the one she had been trapped into until someone nominated her for the dancing floor. ' She's too fair to not run out in something pretty. ' Back then it had been called the Dirt Court, but the Hyuga branch family were all the same people. It was one of these branch members that caught her in his net and held a power over her that, to this moment, she had trouble shrugging off. He had bested her in battle and that carried a special sort of magic with it.

"Sakura?"

She forced her eyes open and pulled at her coat a little tighter. She was cold but it wasn't because of the environment. "I don't feel well."

"Humans don't get sick here. I've never seen that happen before," Deidara said, reaching for her forehead with the back of his hand. It was a cool touch that reminded her of one of the rare moments her aunt would be soft with her. Those moments never lasted. She had gone nearly her entire life without so much as a sniffle. Every complaint had been faked for attention, but this wasn't a cry for attention. This time she truly felt unwell. "I'll bring you some nectar to drink."

Sakura hummed, watching him go and then shut her eyes again.

"I almost didn't recognize you, Sakura."

Her eyes shot open wide, heart in her throat as she turned to look up and see Neji Hyuga standing over her, looking just as regal and dignified as the day he pulled her out of his net. His breast coat was double buttoned with silver mirrors in place of buttons and a long sweeping cape of soft blue velvet fell over one shoulder.

He extended a hand in offering to her and the very edge of his stern lips flickered into a smile. "I request a dance, my prey."

The magic forced her up and she reached for his hand before she could stop herself, hating him with even more passion as he tugged her to the dance floor. He had this power over her because he had caught her first, but he couldn't hold her for long. While he would always be someone she couldn't deny initially, his charm would run out before it became dangerous and she'd be able to retreat to her platform, impervious to his magics for a time.

"Was it long, when you were elsewhere?" He asked, bowing his head to hers as they danced closely in a tight box step that was far more rigid than the other dances.

"Time doesn't count here, Lord Hyuga."

He squeezed at her hand, the one he held while the other rested neatly on her waist. "You know what they call me here. You can say it, there's no power in its partial form."

She knew he liked it when she called him Neji. Even when she cursed and swore at him he still seemed to enjoy the sound of his first name when she said it. Other fae seemed to take delight in just her tantrums and rages, but Neji was too stoic to be moved by such outbursts. This was a trait shared by many of the fae knights and guardsmen as opposed to the high born nobles. Figuring out what pleased Neji took a little more detective work-work she was no longer willing to commit herself to. She didn't need to know her enemy anymore, she had her object as well as her way out. All the other gates were too well guarded or still unknown to her, but she was one world away from freedom. As much of a pain in the ass Neji was, he wasn't going to get her off track.

Sakura looked away from Neji, searching past his shoulders for a streak of familiar blond. Deidara had gone off to grab her something to drink but the more she danced and moved the better she felt. She feared that meant something more was happening to her bones she couldn't see. She was losing her humanity in ways both seen and unseen. Her ears were long enough to help her pass as fae now while her eons spent in their court made her wise to their ways. Even when she moved she seemed to look so much like one of them.

"Are you looking for someone?" Neji asked. There was a pull of magic in the charm that kept her in his arms, making her want to answer before she knew what she was saying.

"Yes, he's supposed to have my drink." Sakura swallowed down Deidara's name, exerting as much as her will as possible to twist her words into something that could minimize the damage. She didn't want Neji thinking Deidara was important to her.

"Are you thirsty? I would have brought you something freely given."

"I want something now ." She tried to tug away but he held her firm. The magic hooked her in place and she felt the way his hand dug into her side. New anger, a familiar rage, made her face twist as she glared up at him and he chuckled.

"There you are," he breathed, eyes half lidded and hazy. "Struggle some more."

"Let me go," she snarled. She could feel the short strands of her hair flowing away from her face as she struggled against his magic.

"You are caught and should learn to love these luxuries. Would you have ever dressed so fine on that milk farm with all those cousins? Where else would you have tasted delights such as ours or danced to melodies as enchanting as these? It's a paradise worth dying for."

"I'm not dying for any of you," Sakura ground out, knowing the double meaning to his words. They put on such a party and it was the privilege of every host to expect something of their guests; their ask for the humans who wandered in was merely their life. But she hadn't been invited, she had been captured, she owed them nothing .

"I would be disappointed if you did. It's not been forever yet."

His magic faltered and she pushed against it, trying to break the line that ran through her but Neji caught her and pulled her back. When she stared up at him again the veins around his eyes stood out as he exerted effort to reinforce his charm over her. His eyes were white pearls staring down at her, memorizing all her features and expressions.

"You can't hold me forever."

"And you can't avoid me forever. You'll alway come back here, you will always dance, and I will always be here, waiting." The magic between them slackened again and he redoubled his efforts to hold onto her, even as more veins stood out around his eyes.

"Humans don't know the meaning of forever," she bit our, baring her teeth like a threat.

The hand at her waist reached up to touch the edge of her ear and she almost flinched at the contact, still sensitive at the tips to any measure of touch. His hand settled on her neck, cupping the underside of her jaw. "You will learn it," he promised right before the magic broke.

She remembered gathering dandelions for salad and eating half the basket before she could realize what she had done. Her stomach pinched and ached but she brought back what she had found and had the basket thrown at her head. There was shorting and she ran out, promising with tears to not come back.

Why would she? There wasn't enough food for a family of ten with a single cow that wouldn't give milk anymore. They would have it butchered and sell the meat to make enough money to buy a new one but it was such a poor old cow that they would be still struggling to save up enough after even the bones were sold. It was just their luck that the only cow that had survived the wolves had been the oldest, driest. Overnight their prospects had gone from bad to worse.

Even the neighbors could see it, and that bothered her aunt. Someone had left cheese and bread on the doorstep of the house for Sakura to find but her aunt took it and screamed at her for accepting handouts like some beggar. It was better to be useful instead of pitiful.

Sakura pretended not to hear it when she heard her aunt complaining to her husband that it would have been better to lose a child instead of a cow. Out of all the mouths needing to be fed in that house, she was the only one who hadn't come from that woman so she knew which child her aunt would have been okay with seeing mauled by wolves.

The boys tried their hand at hunting but too much of the woodland belonged to the local lord and all the game within was his property. Anyone killing game for themselves was thieving from him. Yet he would take no new maids for his castle or offer easy work that a young woman could hope for.

What did that leave for Sakura to try her hands at?

The berries weren't in season yet and the bark she could peel and suck on all tasted bad enough to turn her empty stomach. She was so hungry when she found the fairy ring in the woods, far away from anyone who would care or see.

The moon rose in the sky and she sat, transfixed by the sight. She knew the stories as did all the other children she grew up alongside. They had all been warned and taught what a toadstool ring meant whenever they saw one in the world.

"I f you get stuck in one it ain't no better than a fairy's trap. You'll be gone from this world and spirited off to live with the good neighbors. You think that would sound good, don't you, but it ain't for no good like they'd bother taking humans. What would you think they'd do with you? "

Sakura thought they'd love her.

It was a silly thought for a silly question but Sakura had dreams. She had fantasies where in her mind a fairy knight found her in the woods and fell in love with her. He would pledge himself to her and take her to his castle to be a fine lady who was never hungry, who wore rich fabrics and furs, who sparkled with gemstone and jewels. Every finger would have a ring and she'd shimmer wherever she walked.

Her uncle had told her once, when the night was long and he spoke too freely, that someone in Sakura's lineage had fair folk blood. She had asked him who and he went back to his drink and never mentioned it again.

Maybe other children had to be scared and worried about the good neighbors, but she was different. Those stories weren't meant for her, they were meant for other children who didn't have fairy blood.

Sakura stepped into the fairy ring, holding her stomach as it rumbled and pitched once more. She imagined a new world where houses were made of bread and trees dripped with ripe fruit she had never been allowed to try. Even if there was no fairy prince then maybe there would be food.

But no one came to spirit her away.

She stood in the fairy ring and fell asleep there, waking up to dew on her lashes.

The second day away from home wasn't much better than the first one, even if she found water and better weeds to eat. The half moon swelled in the sky but the fairy ring refused to take her when she slept in it again.

And again.

After another week her dreams had grown thorns. Not even the nefarious fair folk seemed to want her and couldn't be bothered to grab her. Fine, fuck 'em. They were probably a waste of her time too. Who was she kidding? Her own family hadn't wanted to take her in or feed her. Her aunt would rather have a cow than her. Why did she think she deserved gowns and jewels?

She walked through her shoes, feeling the pinch and sting of dirt getting into her cuts as she kept on moving. Anger seemed to be the only thing that kept her alive as she climbed up trees to avoid the wolves and sucked what nutrients she could from the cabmen under bark peels.

Deeper she found the dark parts of the forest where light never made it through the thick canopy of the tallest trees. Fungi and other mushrooms with colorful tops grew. She dug around the dirt until she found white ones she recognized as edible and scarfed down the last of them.

It was hours later when she realized her mistake.

In the dim she hadn't seen well enough to be sure but what she had scarfed down hadn't been edible. Whatever was in her gut was gnawing on her in new and painful ways. The world swam in and out of focus. She could barely walk but hobbled on, desperate to get somewhere safer from the places wolves could reach.

Like some cruel joke she found another fairy ring. On all sides towering trees shaded it from view, but she could see through their gaps the light of a full moon.

"Might as well," she thought to herself, bitterly.

Sakura laid down in the fairy circle and closed her eyes, never expecting to open them again.

But she had.

Caught up in a golden net along with several others she hung until a troop of white eyed fair folk in uniform emerged from the oddly colored trees to cut them down. A fae with long brown hair left loose reached up to cut her out and Sakura dared to hope when she saw his face. He was beautiful and the stuff of girlhood dreams.

But dreams didn't bind her in shackles or lead her to a slave house where humans were sold off or passed into different curses-the way she had been passed off into the dancing floors.

And the rest was history.

A long history.

Years of it?

Maybe.

It was funny how much Neji had changed from the cold, indifferent soldier he had been when he first cut her down. He hadn't frozen in wonder when he first saw her or ever stared transfixed at her face. He hadn't given her a second glance until she was passed off and even then it was more so a curtsy than because of interest.

Sakura got her gowns and shoes, but not at first. She had been cleaned and then dressed as a serving maid, placed on the sidelines like some sort of joke. It had been odd when the first fae lord asked her to dance when she had a job to do. She turned him down without thinking too much of it, but a different servant girl took him up on that offer. Her serving dress turned into a glittering gown and Sakura felt a stab of envy until the girl died in that dress.

Carefully, Sakura spent the rest of her days in the Dirt Court until it was rebranded with a new name and the next court took over the dancing floor.

"Are humans supposed to be this warm?" Deidara asked her, startling her awake. She slept oddly while in the courts. There were resting chambers where the fae were pulled off to change their hair and dress or paint their faces, but they didn't sleep. The only sleep she could manage was the sleep she stole on her couch while the rest of the world danced on.

"I only have one more rotation, I can manage a little fever until then."

"And then what?"

"Hmmm?" She thought his question was odd. Of course she'd leave this place. Why would he want her to say that out loud? Nothing about her being a little ill made her want to change her plans.

"What if you were worse when you emerged on the other side? Who would take care of you?" he asked.

" I would take care of myself. I don't need another person to do that for me."

"It's lonely work without someone."

What sweet words, they almost made her smile for him. "Deidara, it isn't a choice for some of us. I'll be fine if I've made it this far on my own."

Down on the dance floor a fae knight stepped out and scanned the floor, returning to the dancing hall after a shift of duty with the other guards. He was scanning the different platforms and she knew it would only be a matter of time before he saw hers. She had been fortunate with the last few dances. Each time he invited her out onto the floor it felt like his sway over her grew weaker. She broke away sooner and stayed outside his reach longer.

"Who is waiting for you on the other side? A family member?" When Sakura didn't answer, Deidara ventured another guess. "A lover?"

"I don't need any of that, I'm fine on my own. Even alone it would be better to get out of this place. I was such a fool of a child to think this place was better than anywhere else in my world," Sakura said. Neji had spotted her and was making a bee line across the dancing floor to her platform.

"I think it's a tad better here now that you've managed to figure out how to manage yourself through all the tricks," Deidara said, also spotting Neji. "This court might be abysmal company, but you can say no to all the others and just celebrate with me on the side like this. Isn't this better than starving?"

"Watching fool after fool make the same mistake and die in front of me? There is only so much bloodshed I can stomach. This is hell, Deidara, even if your company is a balm I'm still on fire and I need to be free."

Deidara's smile stretched wide. "I'm a balm? Tell me more how I soothe your burns."

"I dare not inflate your ego any more than it already is."

"As you should not," Neji interrupted, stepping onto their platform. He spared Deidara a look out of the corner of his eye, recognizing the blond as the man who hung out in Sakura's company the most. He didn't look to Deidara long before turning back to Sakura to bow over his hand. "May I have this dance, my prey?"

Sakura felt the magic pull at her but it was too weak to move her and it snapped apart. Neji had come too soon after his last dance and would have to wait a little longer before asking again. "No, my lord."

Neji withdrew his hand, looking sore before his eyes swiveled to land on Deidara. Sakura recognized a look of calculation pass across his features as Neji reassessed his options. Sometimes Neji would stay on her platform, sitting across from her until his magic grew strong enough to take her out again, and sometimes he retreated to rest and recover his magic faster with food and drink. He seemed to be contemplating something different this time as he looked at Deidara. Neji turned to face the blond and extended his hand. "A dance, sir?"

Deidara almost laughed, his grin stretching wide. There was no magic between two fae, even if they were from different courts or different stations. Neji was a lower ranking knight while Deidara was an outsider of nebulous origins. For all Sakura knew his parents were kings and queens or high elders in their court. There was no danger in Deidara accepting or rejecting the invitation as if he had been human when Neji made the offer.

"I was feeling a little stiff. A dance would do me good," Deidara said while accepting the hand. Sakura watched them go, nearly standing up to follow them down the steps until Deidara glanced back and winked at her over his shoulder. He was up to something and that devious smile was all the clue she needed to know that.

She watched from her perch as Neji led Deidara out onto the dance floor and the pair began to spin. She knew they were conversing, she could see their lips moving, but couldn't make out what they were saying. The pair stayed close, turning and mirroring one another while the steps carried them out of view across the floor. She had no idea what Neji was thinking to pick another fae up, but she was nervous for her friend's sake.

Odd. Since when had she thought of Deidara as her friend? He wasn't even human. How could she call a fae a friend after all she had seen and experienced in their courts?

Still, the fact remained that Neji was unlikely to leave Deidara unbothered. Even if Deidara was another fae, Sakura didn't doubt there were ways Neji could make mischief for the outsider. She got off her couch and came down from her platform to mingle in between the other fae on the sides, watching the dancing like a spectator sport. Someone tried pushing her back but she elbowed her way up to the front to better watch the pair of dancing fae.

She was just in time to see Deidara go down, tripped by a fae guard who wore the same uniform as Neji. Deidara had been so focused on watching his partner he hadn't seen the swipe coming for him from behind. He tried to stand back up but a third knight came by and kicked out at Deidara's face while he spun with his partner across the floor.

Deidara turned over and struggled to get upright again, hurt more from the recourse that came from the dancing floor. He had failed to follow the steps and there was a punishment for such failures he needed to pay. It was a simple one but the embarrassment was worse than the magical recourse.

"Stand, interloper, lest you lose your welcome in our halls," Neji warned.

"That is something you can revoke, good lord?" Deidara challenged. He stood back up and brushed the dust off his jacket "This court is not yours to manage is it?"

"But it is mine to protect." Neji produced a sword and leveled it at the blond. "Declare your allegiance or vacate our dancing floor."

Fae were expressionless by their very nature, mimicking smiles for the sake of manners but never meaning it. It was rare to find one showing any genuine emotion apart from the glee that came when a person danced themselves to death on their floor.

"I am not your equal, knight." Deidara seemed to measure his words carefully. He sounded calm but there was something in the way he held himself that made Sakura think he was nervous.

"Then declare."

"I will not."

"Then defend."

And because this was the Death Court, where murder and bloodshed were welcome motifs, Deidara's sword came to him easily and their dance became one of blades. The other fae backed off to give them space and a natural circle formed. A new magic bound them to the outside, this was a duel between two and no others might interfere.

Between the two Neji was the one who knew what he was doing while Deidara made do with his natural grace and talents, even if they were a little unpolished. It was clear from the first few strikes who would have the upper hand. Even Sakura could predict the end before it happened.

Fear made her heart hurt.

Was this the real reason he didn't bother to ever learn or remember the names of other humans who came to die on the dance floor? Knowing someone hurt when you lost them. She had been alone for so long she had forgotten what it was like to not have someone she could talk easily with, someone she could recognize in a crowd, someone she wanted to touch and hold.

The crowd murmured in anticipation for the prelude to bloodshed but couldn't move in as the magic of the duel held them in place. Metal sparked on metal and then one of the blades went flying through the air, clattering uselessly to the ground while Deidara crawled backwards, away from the tip of Neji's sword. A hush fell as the blade raised.

"No!"

The magic of the dance floor couldn't hold her back.

Sakura raced across the floor and threw herself over Deidara, turning her back to Neji as she pushed Deidara down onto the dancing floor like a shield. The blade came down above her back and she felt herself split open. Hot liquid spilled onto the dancing floor and she flinched, Deidara's head wrapped in her arms and pressed to her shoulder.

The fae in the crowd cried out but instead of glee and cheers there was horror and gasps of amazement. Neji's blade clattered to the ground, clean of blood as he fell on his knees. Soon the rest of the room was falling down too, no one dared to stay upright. She felt hurt in her back but why were they all so still and low, staring at the ground?

"Sakura?" Even Deidara seemed amazed.

"What is it?" She asked, pulling away from him and wincing. She felt sore all through her body but it was worse behind her, just below her shoulder blades. When she looked out across the floor no one dared lift their heads or move another step in their dance. Not even Neji. "What happened?"

Deidara gasped her name and then reached behind her. Sakura cried out when his hands made contact, prodding at the wounds on her back where two identical cycts had burst and spilled white ichor along with human blood. In the midst of the wounds a wet sort of membrane stretched out from her, colorful and iridescent. Deidara touched it again and Sakura flinched but didn't cry out this time.

"What is it?" Sakura asked, turning her head to see as well as she could whatever it was that was coming out of her.

"We were wrong, you didn't have a fae ancestor," Deidara breathed.

He blinked hard and then seemed to come back to his senses. He turned back to face Sakura and helped her up, being careful to pick her up off her feet and keep his hands under her legs without disturbing her back. She folded over his shoulder and held on as he carried her back up to their platform, but as soon as they stepped on it the platform shifted up, higher than all the others. The edges flared out like flower petals, wanting visitors away. Her couch was now a daybed and the trays of food around her were overflowing with sweets and wildflowers. Deidara set her down and then instructed her to stay on her stomach while he went off to grab a cloth. When he returned he used the warm fabric to wipe down her back and massage the junction where something new was growing out of her.

"These need to dry more."

Sakura turned her head to see what he meant and almost gasped when she saw the iridescent wings he had pulled out like wet fabric. It had come from her back but was still damp with the membrane fluids.

"Fae aren't supposed to have wings," Sakura gasped.

"You aren't fae," Deidara carefully explained as he wiped down the opposite wing, showing great care in making sure he didn't hurt or pinch the sensitive limb. "Your ancestor was one of the Vanir, the progenitor to the fae folk. They were closer to nature and more akin to gods, but they all turned away and became human to sire children. Now there are no more Vanir, not even tales of them."

"Then how would you know all that?" Sakura asked, watching him from over her shoulder as he worked. He seemed contemplative as he cleaned her wings, refusing to look up and meet her eyes.

"How do monarch butterflies know where they're flying? It's in their nature to know such things, and no one can say how or name it." Deidara lifted his eyes to meet hers. "I just know it's because I'm fae. It's my nature to know this."

"I've never heard of the Vanir before or how they could be related to the fae. They're not the same, are they?"

He shook his head. "The Vanir were thought of as gods by mortals, but they were the first exhales of nature if you can believe it. In nature next came the fae, utilizing mimicry to try and model themselves after the stronger predator in the forest. But while we may look similar, the Vanir drew power from their passions and desires. Fae, meanwhile, were all but devoid of emotion and have struggled to understand the nature of feeling since time immemorial."

That made sense for the fae, so much of what they did seemed to be a means to an end, to provoke a reaction or feeling. They murdered and plundered and plotted without empathy. Not even their offspring were precious enough to save from trading off in some vain hope of understanding love.

Sakura turned away, feeling her stomach flutter and drop at the sound of his voice. She had been so preoccupied with making sure he was safe she had forgotten how close he was. The surprise about her nature was an added bonus, but it felt too unreal to even begin conceptualizing. She turned away and instead looked out over at the dancing floor where the fae folk were gossiping and whispering to one another, too caught up in the reveal to bother with the steps to their dances. But in a moment the dancing floor's magic caught hold of them and the people began to fall into place, compelled to continue the tradition. Neji was still kneeling off to the side with two other knights next to him, whispering to him with animated gestures.

"What does this mean for me now?" Sakura asked, unwilling to look away from Neji like he was still a predator and she was prey.

"There isn't anyone who can compel you now. What little hold people had over you will fall away once you finish your inheritance." Deidara hesitated. "You're a greater existence than even the high king and queens. There is now no danger here for you. No one would be able to make you dance to death."

There was fear in his words; it sounded like hesitation.

"But…?" She let her words hang, unfinished in the hopes that he would fill in the blanks for her. There was something more he wasn't mentioning, something he didn't want her to hear.

"No one will be able to compel you ever again, but you won't be able to leave as long as you are one of the Vanir."

She had seen them covet pretty things before, never understand the true value in the people they broke in trials and on dancing floors. "Because they'll try to stop me?"

He shook his head no. "It's because those are the rules of this place. Such a nature can not pass between worlds. It's too heavy."

Her back still hurt but now she could better distinguish where the pain was coming from. Now that her wings were unfurling and drying the aches were lessened but her new nerve endings still tingled with old pain. There wasn't any power in her that was new, she was still weak and soft, a newborn that was still coming out of a chrysalis.

Sakura grabbed for Deidara and squeezed his arm with her pitiful grip. "How do I stop it? How do I keep it from getting any worse? I'm not a god, I'm just a human. I still bleed red, there has to be a way for me to go back. Isn't there a law I can defy or a rule I can break?" Maybe there were forbidden words she could utter or sacred lands she couldn't step on. If she took a light into the wrong dark corner would she lose out on this inheritance like those who traveled east of the sun and west of the moon?

Deidara turned his wrist over to grab her forearm and hold her back, careful to keep her from shaking and shivering any more than she already was. He whispered her name once more like it was some magic spell or prayer that could help ground her, then bent his forehead to touch hers. She felt him reach up to wipe away something wet on her face. "I don't know," he confessed. "Don't cry please, I can't bear the sight of your tears. You'll be okay, I'll make sure of it."

Sakura nodded and closed her eyes. When she looked up again, through her lashes she could see the dancing floor where Neji still knelt. His head was bowed and his shoulders were up but he was looking up through his lashes at her too.

Deidara was gone from her side more and more, leaving for what seemed like whole days at a time, knowing Sakura was safer than ever before. Fae would approach her dias and then turn around as soon as she waved them off. Rose brambles grew over the steps and she let them line the way in thick layers that only ever parted whenever Deidara returned.

The world around her seemed overly eager to adhere to her dreams and desires. Whenever she wished for something the object would be there, just beyond the reach of her fingertips. Dresses and jewels and sweet foods were only a thought away. It was funny how such a reality had been all she dreamed about when she was a girl, starving and lonely. She had everything she could have ever wanted and yet it brought her no happiness.

She dreamed up a mirror to watch herself as she draped her body in glittering cloth that swooped low under her back to make room for her wings. They were iridescent and ever changing in the light thanks to a layer of extra fine scales that coated the soft wings, creating the optical effect of different sunsets colors depending on how the light hit it. When she stretched them out they were long and swallowtail but not tall, resembling a sunset or luna moth more than anything. As lovely as they were to behold, Sakura would trade them in a heartbeat for her freedom.

One positive that came as a result of her transformation was the new, booming authority she had over the dance. Whenever she saw a human fall into a trap she would declare the dance over and the music would end for a brief period before starting up again. She wasn't powerful enough to stop it completely but her authority was enough to interrupt it and that meant humans could get out of their agreements instead of dancing to death.

The Death Court seemed to last forever. Each rotation felt long and maybe it was because she was different, but now the cycles of time that kept her in one court over another slowed to a near nonexistent crawl. She was one court away from the Mirror Court and then she'd be able to free herself and return to the human realm before her transformation completed itself, but the Death Court seemed to last forever.

"You." When she spoke the whole room paused in different ways to look and listen. It made her skin crawl and her wings ruffle. Sakura pointed to a nearby fae and beckoned her to approach. The fae started to climb over the brambles instead of wait for Sakura to finish pulling them back.

"Exalted one, what is your wish?" the fae woman breathed out, keeping her eyes downcast.

"I've been here so long, how much longer until the Mirror Court has its turn to host?"

The fae opened her mouth and then swallowed before trying to say something different. Sakura recognized the magic that prevented people from speaking of things they had been forbidden from."That is up to you, most dazzling one."

"Explain."

"The dancing hall must have its share." It sounded like a carefully worded answer and Sakura knew it was exactly that.

Using magic was something so completely foreign to Sakura and still mostly not understood, but she managed to pull up some magic into her voice. " Explain it clearly, fae ."

The room echoed with the reverb of her will. It wasn't a spell that borrowed magic from a working long ago, which was what verbally recited spells did, but it was uniquely new magic driven by pure will. Fae who were nearby fell to their knees and clutched their throats to keep from spilling all their words at her behest.

"The dancing floor must be paid its due of mortal blood before it is full. Only when we have satisfied its hunger may we exchange greetings with a new court," the fae woman cried out, bleeding white ichor from her mouth as she said the forbidden things. As soon as she was done speaking she screamed and her tongue turned to sea foam; the price for her honesty.

"Go," Sakura absently instructed, looking out at the dancing floor with new eyes.

It was beautiful, dazzling and sparkling with handsome and glamorous fae folk, but now when she saw it she saw a monster with a mouth wide and open. They were all dancing in the throat of a beast hungry for sustenance. The dancing floors were evil in ways Sakura hadn't properly comprehended until just then. The fae were immoral creatures because how else were they expected to develop when they were just as trapped as her. Sure, they could leave and dally in realms other than hers, but if the dancing floor needed to be fed then she could only imagine what would happen if they all decided to leave it together. The fae stayed to feed the beast because they had to.

How old was this place? The foundations of this realm that existed outside of time with its own space had to be older than most fae, old enough to have been made with the bones of the world. Older than the gods maybe?

Another human got swept up in the dance and Sakura watched him spin in the arms of another handsome fae in a wolf mask and a rakish grin. Numb, she followed their dalliance across the floor until she remembered what anger felt like and reached for that dim anger to stoke.

"Stop."

The dancing stopped…

But only for a moment.

Sakura woke up when she heard shouting and dragged herself out of bed. Her wings were so much longer now that they dragged on the floor behind her. Scales were starting to grow out of her temples around her eyes to match the ones on her wings.

She stepped down from her platform and the bramble bushes pulled back to make way for her. The chaos was happening on the dance floor but it would not last for long before the dancing floor would compel more and more of the fae to go back into the waltz it wanted.

A number of fae guards were snuggling with someone who was trying to force his way through. Neji was at the head of them and under his arm Deidara clawed at the air, trying to reach her.

"Let him through!" Sakura cried out. Some of the fae around her grabbed at their heads and backed off, trying to shake off her suggestion, but the knights continued to struggle. "I said, let him go."

The other knights fell down, releasing Deidara, but Neji went to his knees with Deidara under his arm. He got one last massive smack in before Deidara also fell onto the dancing floor. Neji's pearl colored eyes were wide and furious, glaring over at Deidara. Now that he was free Sakura could see his clothing was tattered and his hair was wild, unbound and free.

"Deidara, what happened?" Sakura asked. She stepped up to approach him and several knights jumped up to block her way, straining against the magic that dictated their manners.

"No, please, he is cursed," one coughed out.

"The hex is on him," the other elaborated.

Sakura didn't care and pushed past them to reach for Deidara. Neji's hand went out to grab her around the wrist and stop her before that. "No," he said, sounding desperate and angry. "His corruption is no good to you."

Sakura pushed Neji off her and knelt down in front of Deidara, ignoring the cries of the guards who wanted to pull her back. There were other fae cursing Deidara and crying out at the injustice of it all.

"What happened?" Sakura asked. She lowered her head to see under his bangs while he pushed himself up off the floor. "You were gone so long."

When Deidara lifted his eyes they were pinched with shame. "I'm sorry." He whispered. "I couldn't find you what you wanted. I misstepped and they're right. You shouldn't touch me." He pulled back from her reach and held up his hands. All down his arms were cuts and slits, some opened for mouths and others for eyes. Part of his dress jacket fell open and she could see that his entire body was slowly being overwhelmed by these odd and unnatural inserts. A mouth at his elbow stretched wide and yawned, showing off rows of teeth while an eye with three different pupils fixated on her from his bicep. Across his chest was a mouth large enough to devour his whole heart and that's what it looked like it was trying to do.

Sakura felt sick when she saw it all.

"What did you do?"

"I messed with something I shouldn't have," he laughed. His voice was sardonic in a way she had never heard before. He almost sounded human.

"You said you were going to go look for something but you never said where. I-I don't know what to do to help you," Sakura breathed.

"There isn't anything you can do, this is the cost or price for what I risked. I guess this is what they meant by curses. I didn't even know this could happen to a fae like me. Maybe I'm a little human too."

"Now isn't the time for jokes," Sakura whispered, horrified by the oddly colored eyes that were staring up at her and the mouths that were biting at the air. The skin between these additions was turning gray. "What can I do to fix this? There has to be something, some way I can help." She turned to look at the crowd around her. "Tell me, tell me how to fix this !"

"You have to kill him," someone said while another fae hissed out, 'death.'

"No, how do I make him better? How do I heal him?" She had authority and power now but not enough knowledge to do anything constructive with Deidara's curse. As she watched him more and more of his skin turned gray as more slits opened up into new eyes or hungry mouths.

"There is nothing to fix."

"There is no healing what is not sick. This is the cost."

"It isn't fair," Sakura boomed. "The cost for something that didn't even come to pass?" She turned back to Deidara and knelt at his side, drawing as close as she dared without touching. "What the hell is this? Tell me, please."

"It's the price," was all he said. His own eyes, beautiful and blue, were starting to droop. A second set had opened up underneath him and they were wide awake but Deidara seemed to be listening. "I asked and they answered, there is nothing you can do to reverse what you are. The Well of the World and the Cauldron of Life both are empty of answers I can stomach."

At the mentioning of such sacred spaces several more fae drew back, shrieking and hissing. They were names that were not spoken of casually and vertically not together. Deidara must have been gone longer than she first assumed.

"How could they not have helped you?" Sakura's face was wet but she didn't let the tears into her voice when it looked like Deidara was already having a hard time listening. His head was bobbing as he struggled to stay awake. The gray parts of his skin were starting to harden and Sakura watched as they petrified right in front of her, turning his body to stone.

Deidara forced his face up and even as one of his eyes started to shut for what she feared was the last time, he faced her fully. "I'm sorry I couldn't do this for you, I'm sorry I couldn't ever be of any help to you, not here in this damned place and not out there either when you were struggling in your own home. I've never been any good to you, couldn't even give you bread without it becoming something for her to scream at you for." He was crying too. "I thought-I thought it could be different here but it took so long to find you in the right court and then to get here and then I was different so you wouldn't have known, but I've-I've…"

He coughed and his lungs sounded torn. There was a sick echo as something came apart inside of him. He pitched sideways and braced to keep from rolling onto his back while he fell to the floor, still looking up at her.

"You're going to be okay, this isn't going to happen-this isn't happening," Sakura chanted, feeling the panic punctuate her words. More and more of him had turned to stone.

"Liar," he whispered with a smile.

Sakura pulled up her power, not knowing what it was, and tried to layer it over him like a blanket. With all her will and thought she wished and prayed for his health. Her hands glowed white and iridescent before they fractured into every color of the rainbow and the petrification rapidly picked up. She screamed and pulled back but the damage was done.

"For a long time I've-" Gray overtook his face and his good eye and his twisted smile were the last thing to be trapped in stone.

But she never heard the last of his words. There was no air in his lungs and his mouth was a cavern of gray stone. The price was paid and he was gone. Sakura screamed and reached for him, ignoring what was said about not touching. He was rock now and none of the eyes or mouths on his body moved.

He was dead.

And then the music started up again and fae began to dance again. Someone snatched up a mortal and twirled her around the dance floor, stepping around Sakura and the stone 'decoration' left on the floor. It was what they were enchanted to do, it was what they were commanded to do, but the fact that they were dancing over his literal body not even minute after his death…

"Damn it all," she sobbed, almost laughing at how broken and sore she felt inside.

He had suffered for her, the boy who left bread on her doorstep, the brat that made grief for his mother all throughout his childhood and adolescence, the one who teased her and pulled her hair when they were children, the kid she had gone out of her way to avoid even when she heard he had matured for the sake of his mother. She hadn't seen him in years, not since things got bad and now…like this?

How was any of this fucking fair?

"May I have this dance?"

A hand reached down for her and Sakura stared up, wide eyed and wild with a frenzied rage. Neji looked pained as he watched her but he didn't know the meaning of pain. He probably looked at her, raw with emotion, and wished he could have some of that feeling for himself.

"Run," Sakura warned, being very intentional in leaving the magic out of her voice. It wasn't a command, just a warning. Neji startled and stepped back, but didn't leave right away. He lingered just out of arm's reach, watching her like some catastrophe he couldn't take his eyes off of.

Fine, don't look away.

Sakura crawled over Deidara's body, stretching out her arms so that the scales flared and bloomed. At her temples she felt the feathery construction of a moth's antennae curl back over her hair. The world went vivid and panoramic as her eyes evolved into something better.

Around her the new dancers cried out and stepped out of her way. Some scattered and others stood transfixed as Sakura forced herself through the last bit of the transformation, like a newborn breaking free for the first time the world opened up to her.

"RUN!"

This time it was a command. Three sets of wings flared around her as she rose up, some stretching from her forearms and the rest from her upper and lower back. She was fully inhuman but she wasn't done yet.

With both fists she slammed down against the dancing floor and broke up the bits of polished stone that fae ladies and lords were still escaping. She felt the crack and raged again, smashing at the floor until it was broken.

The dancing fields were ancient and living. They were a creation of the fae. They were a mistake that could never be unmade with their own efforts. The price for their destruction was too great, but what else did Sakura have to lose?

She didn't know what it would cost but she didn't care. She was manic, furious, and ready to take the world down with her-all the worlds if she could!

Slam after slam, magic in her fists, Sakura made a wound in the world and reached deep into it with both hands, grabbing for the soft meat of its beating heart. She didn't know what she found but her hands grabbed onto something that could bleed and she made it suffer.

The world turned white and then it was every color of the rainbow, then it was a million different colors humans didn't have names for.

And then it was nothing.

The alarm screamed and Sakura woke up with a jolt. Her face was wet and she could still remember how she felt at the end of her dream. It had been so vivid and terrible.

Blindly she fumbled with the clock on her nightstand and struggled out of bed. Her pants were already pressed and her things were hanging up, waiting for her. She went through the motions of her daily morning ritual, feeling numb to all of it as her heart and mind stayed stuck in what she could still remember from her dream.

It had been so real.

An hour later she was swiping into work with her lanyard badge and exchanging tired morning greetings with the security officers who were in the middle of their shift change. The museum wasn't open yet but there was still a bustle of activity as the curators and various other museum employees made their way to their designated stations.

Sakura hung up her coat on the back of her chair and put on her gloves before picking up where she had left off the night before. Different artifacts found in the Connemara peat bogs were still coming in, but she wasn't finished restoring and preserving the first crate. Her work was slower than anticipated so her boss had reached out to bring in an expert for her.

"You look tired again."

"The coffee hasn't kicked in," Sakura shot back without looking up. She knew the voice of her best friend when she heard it.

"You don't drink coffee. What's in your tea today? Maybe it isn't strong enough."

Sakura glanced up over the magnifying lamp, pulling down her work glasses. "I had that dream again, but I think I died at the end of it."

"The one with the missed harem opportunity."

"Ino, be serious."

Ino sighed dramatically. "I've never been more serious about anything in my life. You missed out, forehead. I wish I could dream like that. The last time I did it had to do with monkeys in suits stealing my money."

"Yeah, but like I said, it was crazy. I woke up crying like a baby. I still feel…I don't know, numb or something? I don't feel like I should be here."

"Same," Ino snorted. "I just clocked in and I can't wait till five."

Sakura couldn't help but smile, feeling a little more grounded next to her friend. "Yeah, sure, that's what I meant. Now get off my desk, you're in the way of my light."

"Your light is a lamp. How am I in the way?"

Still, Ino hopped off Sakura's desk and started to head back. In the hallway Sakura heard Ino bump into someone and give them directions. She didn't bother to listen in and hear anything else but fixated on her tools and how they could help her clean the relic under her hands. A long black obelisk with different ogham script etched into the side was being a bitch to get clean without damaging.

"That's a unique piece," someone said behind her head, but Sakura didn't look up.

"Thank you, it'll look better once it's cleaned."

"I wanted to ask you what it cost."

Sakura snorted. "Not for sale, buddy. This is an artifact."

"Not the obelisk."

Sakura set her tools down and steadied herself. The voice sounded…familiar. She turned in her seat and stared up at Deidara, wearing the same lanyard as her with a rakish smile. Things clicked into place and the first tears stung in her eyes. She felt whole all of a sudden, like her journey had finally finished but was only now just getting started.

What had this miracle cost?

She reached for his hand.

"Nothing I wasn't willing to pay."

---

AN: It's been a million years since I was last here but I wanted to try something.