Written for Naruto Rare Pair Week.
By the time the maid ushers Karin back to her husband's chambers, he's already gone back to work, scratching out notes at his desk. He faces away from her, his dark hair and grim face framed by soft candlelight as he writes in measured, efficient strokes.
He's still wearing the same dress shirt and overcoat he'd worn to the wedding ceremony, every polished, jet button still in place, as if he'd immediately returned from the ceremony and begun preparing correspondence.
The realization that he has not yet bothered to change - into what, exactly? - sends a heated bolt of annoyance through her, as does his lack of greeting.
So, Karin ignores him in turn.
There is a mirror and vanity set up across the opposing wall, bare enough that she assumes that it's new, freshly placed for her use. And if not - because Lord Uchiha does seem like the sort to have a room full of barely-used furniture bare of any personal effects - she'll gladly requisition it for her own use.
As Karin marches herself to the mirror, she tugs irritably at the veil that's all but been welded to her head, the white lace woven so delicately in between strands of her tightly bound hair that there's no convenient way to extricate it.
The maid's fearful, placating voice echoes in her head: Pardon my saying so, ma'am, but this seems to be the only way to make it presentable…
After some struggle, Karin manages to partially dislodge the veil, only then it hangs crookedly around her eyes like a set of blinders for a horse. She tosses it back and pats it down with one hand, glad enough to have it out of her way for the moment.
She'll give the rest of it another go later—most likely, she'll need to have it all undone first, an arduous, time-consuming process that her maids likely had not considered when they'd started.
Or, more likely, they felt safe enough in it, given that it is apparently not within their Lord's nature to snatch or wrench a garment from a woman's body in a fit of passion.
All the more pity.
The veil a momentary lost cause, Karin sees to her jewelry next, tugging each sharp pin from her hair and spilling them onto the vanity in a series of musical clinks, the weighty earrings and tight rings she'd been loaded down with that morning soon to follow. Her hair loosens with each pin she pulls free, the maids' neat braided bun teasing out into kinked half-ringlets of hair that give her a suitably ravished appearance.
The vanity mirror is conveniently placed to give her a clear view of her husband's actions, though she supposes the more appropriate explanation is that it gives him a means of keeping one surreptitious eye on her.
She spies a glass on the desk beside him, filled with a pinkish, watered down wine he must've brought with him from the ceremony. Several bright berries bop along the surface of it, evincing either a childish sweet tooth, or a very poor tolerance for spirits.
The latter, at least, could be entertaining.
"Are they not to your liking?" her husband asks, catching her glance at him through the mirror's surface. "Those earrings were my grandmother's, but perhaps your own grandmothers' are much more fine."
Karin bristles at that, from both the very sharp edge to his words and the unaffected means by which they were delivered. Her Lord Husband - a title which inspires very little affection in her - has toed around the issue of her heritage quite delicately, never once raising the issue of her questionable origins, nor her much more questionable benefactor.
She has no doubt that it is not for lack of awareness, but not once has he said what certainly has been on the mind of each one of the fine lords and ladies who'd attended their wedding that very evening: that Karin is a fraud, and not a particularly good one at that.
She was decorated almost as well as any other lady who'd been present that night, but there is a certain stink, she's found, that cling to the poorest of the poor, regardless of how high they climb above their station, that the well-to-do are always quick to sniff out.
But apparently deft innuendo are all that Lord Uchiha cares to bother her with for now, least of all because he has his own investment in their farce that keeps him from wanting to upset its fragile, porcelain artifice.
What exactly he gains from marrying a fake heiress to a family with no lands to inherit is beyond her, though his willingness to accept it thus far has indicated that somehow, for reasons unbeknownst to her, the name Uzumaki means something to him, so much so that he'd settle for a less than authentic claim to it.
And an heiress Karin very much is not, but with her red hair and bright eyes, she apparently plays the part with deceptive ease, so much so that she - a penniless, parentless gutter rat - is now only several untimely deaths from becoming true royalty.
She's pleased enough by that sudden, miraculous change in fortune that she ignores his comment, in favor of peering into the wardrobe nearest her. The wood is new, so much so she can smell the fresh scent of varnish on it. The handle sticks like honey to her fingers as she opens it, indicating further that this had been something of a rushed production.
The wardrobe itself is filled with women's clothes, presumably ones meant for her, though she's never seen - let alone been fitted, or asked to choose - any of the pastel dresses and dressing gowns hanging inside.
Kabuto is the likeliest culprit, she thinks with a grimace—while having a heritage just as worthless and lackluster as her own, he has a hunger for refinery that rivals even Lord Orochimaru's.
Not to mention, he's the sort of prig who would intentionally fill a closet with clothes she would detest.
Karin sorts through the modest hanging gowns, in all their washed out, demure coloring and matronly fringes and scowls. A change in fortune indeed.
Lord Uchiha sets his pen down and reaches for a pinch of sand to sprinkle over top of his writing, indicating that he's finished whatever note he's been preparing. "Will you be dressing now?" he asks as he swishes the sand around his paper, likely because he's too well-bred to ask so bluntly whether she'll be undressing.
He keeps his eyes trained on his paper as he talks, and his voice, much like his overall demeanor, is all but emptied of even the slightest hint of arousal or interest.
"Only admiring these," she says, as she runs one hand down the lace and frills of one particularly fine dress. Her hand rolls over several threaded lines of bumpy pearls, an extravagance that makes up in part for the otherwise bland coloring and design of the gowns.
"Will you require the assistance of a maid, or are you able to manage on your own?" he asks, somewhat more pointed.
Karin wrinkles her nose, unsure whether he is mocking her, the presumptive heiress of a great house, for being unaccustomed to having basic tasks performed by servants, or if he is suggesting that she's such a poorly trained fraud that she couldn't manage to extricate herself from one simple gown.
She lacks sufficient familiarity with higher classes to say which it is meant to be, but either way, she does not find his remark to be a particularly charitable one. Because she is a lady now, Karin does the ladylike thing and continues to back over to her vanity a sharp hmph.
She removes his grandmother's precious earrings - teardrop pearls, with inlaid diamonds - from her still-healing ears and tosses them over top of it, letting them roll like dice over its surface. With her hair now much looser, the limp veil is much easier to remove.
"It is not my job," she says simply, almost as an afterthought, opting for a lack of conscientiousness over a lack of class, as she crumples the lace in her hands. "I'm perfectly fine as I am."
The rings are much more troublesome, her fingers swollen from wine and the few dances she'd been permitted to join. The first few come off easily, but she struggles with the last—a heavy ruby on her pointer finger that, instead of sliding off as the others had, shoots off from her hand when she attempts to push it from her finger and pings off the glass before rolling off of the vanity and onto the floor.
Karin swears sharply.
"Truly refined," her husband responds, disdainfully.
Karin grunts as she bends down to pick the ring up and smacks it back on the table, thoroughly unimpressed by her first true impression of the Lord Uchiha.
Their few interactions have not been noteworthy thus far, but this is the first time he and she have been truly alone together, without either the watchful eye of his towering manservant, Kisame, or the slitted, gaslamp eyes of her benefactor.
Karin frowns as she rubs her swollen hand, red and aching where the ruby ring had bit tightly around her knuckle.
He had spoken gracefully - reverently, even - of her at the marriage ceremony, to the point where even she had been surprised by it. Or rather, not of her exactly, but of the esteemed lineage from which she'd allegedly come, the bloodline which was meant to recommend her. Two queens before their time, both deeply beloved by their countrymen: Queen Mito, wooed away from the Uzumaki's home country almost two hundred years ago, was known for her great wisdom and great temperance, in great contrast to her more bombastic husband.
Queen Mito was followed several generations later by the more temperamental Queen Kushina, whose reign had been as brief as the flames she was now compared to, and whose untimely demise had done very little to diminish the great affection her people had felt for her, which continued to this day.
For all the careful time and research that'd seemingly gone into Lord Uchiha's wedding address, though, his delivery was as dull as a school matron's, so prim and rote that what was otherwise a rather well-done speech echoed with a strange hollowness, the way that shaved ices seldom satisfy an empty stomach. From the indifferent faces of the other party guests, Karin sensed she was not the only one to walk away feeling unmoved by it.
A soldier he may be, but an entertainer Lord Uchiha surely was not.
And that, Karin thinks, is the true crux of the matter: for all his glory and learning and successes on the battlefield, and for all his famed strategic brilliance, Lord Uchiha has yet to truly learn the act of charisma, something even her own benefactor had mastered.
Lord Uchiha, despite all of his wealth and success, is terribly, incurably unlikeable.
So perhaps it is not so unclear, she thinks, why someone so uncharismatic would take an interest in cultivating such a well-beloved bloodline for himself, given that their Lord Regent's time is drawing near, and it will not be long before he sees fit to name himself a successor. That, at least, would provide a charming story, for how little charm the Lord personally has.
Karin grumbles and tugs at her dress collar, intending to loosen it but managing only to choke herself more. Most assuredly, a charmer he was not. She runs her fingers over the lace at her neck, looking for something - buttons, a tie, something holding it secure - but comes up short.
After several more seconds of useless sorting through ruffles, Karin breathes a hot sigh and turns towards her husband of two hours. "Are you going to do it, then, or should I truly call a maid?"
He glances over at her, looking vaguely disinterested. He has the gall to reach for another clean sheet of paper, as if he intended to continue working through the night. "Hm?"
Karin tugs at the front of her dress. "This damn thing. Are you going to assist me in taking it off, or do you simply intend to flip up my skirts and be done with it?" she asks irritably.
For all his caustic talk before, Lord Uchiha seems genuinely off put by that. "Ah. Well." There is a brief pause. "I hadn't planned on that quite yet."
"You—" Karin furrows her brows, unsure how to respond to that. Was not consummation the only part of the wedding night a man truly enjoyed? "Have they not explained it to you properly, is that it?" She frowns, her mouth twisting sharply. "If the concern is about your performance, I can assure you I did not set my expectations so high."
"Of course you would not have." Lord Uchiha pinches the bridge of his nose and lets out a sigh, the first in her hearing that night, though it is delivered with such ease that she assumes many have preceded it. "I have no use for a child as of yet, so there will be no need for that. You may spend the night here and be gone in the morning. I do not intend to trouble you further."
Karin feels a cloying prickle of sweat break out along the nape of her neck, burning hotter under her too-tight gown. No need? "It is not like a lord to be so hesitant to claim his bride upon his wedding night," she offers primly.
Lord Uchiha spares her a disinterested glance, his dark eyes flat. "And it is not like a lady to be so insistent upon it." He waves his hand dismissively. "I had not imagined that this would be a contentious issue between you and I. Would you be more amenable if I were to award this one night of peace as a gift to us both?"
Karin's cheeks burn at the condescending tone in his voice. "Surely a man such as you wants heirs as soon as he can manage."
"'Surely,'" Lord Uchiha repeats slowly, as if savoring the word. "How sure of that are you?"
"All men want heirs, the sooner the better."
"A bold proclamation."
"Do you intend to keep me here at your leisure, then?" she demands. "To—to avoid consummation, so that you may dispose of me as you please once a more suitable woman comes along?"
He raises an amused eyebrow at that. "What I want is of no concern to you. So long that it suits me to keep you as a wife, I will. Otherwise, I am fully content to leave you to your own business, as you will leave me to mine."
Karin's dress collar is just short of choking, each subsequent breath more labored than the last. She grits her teeth, unsure of what exact ploy he has in mind, but finding very little of it reassuring. "I would not find that proper at all, my Lord," she asserts. When he refuses to meet her eyes, she takes one bold step towards him. "I will not do things by half-measures. If it is a marriage you are wanting between us, it must be a marriage in every sense of the word."
Finally, he deigns to meet her eyes fully, his own dark and unreadable, as black as the jet buttons on his coat. For a moment, the room seems to have grown much colder, a certain chill creeping under Karin's skin. "And on what authority are you making such a demand?"
"I will have it. All of it." Her heart beats wildly in her chest, cautioning her against venturing too far in ordering around Lord Uchiha, but there is enough anger in her veins to propel her forward. "I do not care to wait until you are ready for an heir. I will not live at your leisure."
She waits for him to make a counteroffer of sorts, but he does not respond to her demand. Fine—if he will not deal civilly, neither will she. "There are things they say about men who are unwilling to go to bed with their wives," she starts. "I wonder what they will say on the morrow, when the maids return to find our marital bed unblessed. I wonder what sorts of rumors might be born from that."
"So you are that sort of woman, then." With an annoyed sigh, Lord Uchiha stands from his chair and removes his coat, tucking it carefully over his chair before he begins loosening the cuff on one sleeve. "If you would go so far as to doubt my honor, then fine."
Karin frowns sharply as he moves onto his other cuff. Was that simply the sort of man he was, the type who intended to make a production of everything?
Was he craven? It would be by far the most interesting thing she's learned about him so far, though she doubts he'd be so careless as to discard any facades immediately on their first night, when he's shared very little else to her in confidence.
"Well?" Lord Uchiha asks. "Do you intend to 'bless' the marriage bed from across the room?"
Karin bows her head and mumbles a reply.
"Pardon?" Lord Uchiha cocks his head. "I'm afraid I didn't catch that."
She turns her head away, trying to fight off the horrible burning in her cheeks. "I said, I can't unfasten this myself. I cannot find the tie."
"Hm." He almost looks annoyed. "And certainly at this point, there would be speculation if I called for a maid."
Karin's face turns absolutely scarlet, though with anger now rather than embarrassment. "It is the least that you might do to pretend that this is nothing more than a chore to you!"
She turns to show him her back when he finally takes a step towards her, dropping her eyes. "Just—do whatever it is that you need. Be quick about it, then, if that is what you'd prefer."
Karin suppresses a shiver when his hands - warm though they may be - meet the back of her neck and push her hair off from her shoulder.
"There was no button that I—" Her next words are cut off by her dress collar, which suddenly constricts painfully around her neck like a noose.
"I would, in fact, make one thing clear to you," Lord Uchiha tells her, his voice deceptively calm, even as the lace around her neck grows tighter.
Karin's hands scramble fruitlessly to free herself as she struggles to draw in another breath, spots dancing in her vision.
Lord Uchiha continues. "I do not tolerate threats made against me, nor will I be ruled in my own home. I will be lenient tonight, given the circumstances, but do not think to try something like this again."
Unable to respond otherwise, Karin gags and nods fervently, willing to agree to anything he might say only if he'd allow her to breathe again.
Finally, his grip loosens, and she sucks in a deep, painful gasp of air, her head spinning. She stumbles forward, one hand wrapped protectively around her throat. "Well?"
"Fine," Karin wheezes, her lungs burning. "I understand you very well, my Lord."
"Good." He beckons her back over. "Now come back over so I may finish."
Karin hesitates but has no choice but to turn again to allow his access.
From there, his hands move deftly, though her throat constricts tighter even as the top of her dress grows looser around her.
Lord Uchiha is one of the most dreadful men she's ever had the misfortune of meeting, of that Karin is certain—if his intent in marrying her is to make himself more palatable to others, even Queen Kushina's own blessing would be woefully inadequate. Better he stage an unfortunate fall from his horse, and pray that the trauma to his head be enough to change his repulsive demeanor.
The dress slips from her shoulders as Lord Uchiha works his way downwards. Her arms and shoulders prickle, her heated skin kissed by cold air. In the vanity mirror across the room, she can see his eyes are downcast, focused on the laces criss-crossing her spine.
She holds her hands in front of her chest, keeping her dress from slipping any lower. When he reaches the bottom laces, he rests his hands on her hips, though more with the steadying hand of a schoolteacher than with the tender caress of a lover.
"This is, in theory, a commitment for the rest of our lives," he says, almost conciliatory. "I do intend to honor that."
"You may say whatever it is that you like," Karin wheezes, indignant. "I do not care to listen."
An odd expression crosses Lord Uchiha's face, before it is smoothed over by the indifference she's already growing used to. "Perhaps one day you might." He frowns, before removing his hands. "I would at least start things out amicably, if that is still possible. I have no love of conflict, especially within one's home." He gestures toward the bed, as if directing her there. "Take a moment to prepare yourself. I will be along in a moment."
"What—" Karin looks toward him, the loose front of her dress still held closely to her chest. "By prepare yourself, you mean—"
Lord Uchiha is standing at his bedroom window before she can finish, pulling back the curtain to look out into the night. "Whatever it is you take it to mean."
From the tone in his voice, it's clear that she'll be getting no more from him than that. "Fine."
Given that it has long been her policy to assume the worst, and plan accordingly, it is not the most helpful instruction he might have given her.
With a careful eye on her husband, Karin wiggles out of her dress, which is now loose enough to slide down effortlessly over her hips. Assuming - hoping - that she will never need to wear it again, she balls it up roughly and tosses it over into the corner of the room, where perhaps a maid may mistake it for something thrown off in an uncharacteristic fit of passion by her master.
The remainder of her underclothes follow in similar fashion, until she's standing stark naked in front of her husband, who is still greatly preoccupied with the outdoor garden and spares her not a single glance.
Having nothing else to remove, Karin sits down on the bed, facing him with her arms crossing her chest. He remains fixed at the window, however, which tells her he's at least somewhat serious about giving her an opportunity to Prepare herself.
But still. Feigning even a little interest wouldn't kill him.
With a sigh, Karin scoots further back on the bed, stretching her bare legs out on the soft blankets there. She's suddenly grateful for the grueling, hour-long bathing session she'd endured that morning, being scrubbed raw and aching by unsympathetic servants until her skin had pruned and her legs had grown sore in the tub.
Now though, stretched out on her Lord's crisp white sheets, she can see why they'd been so thorough with her.
Prepare yourself. Karin grits her teeth. That is nothing. She's been prepared since the first time she was packed up in Lord Orochimaru's carriage and carted over the Uchiha estate to be looked over by Lord Uchiha and his sharp-eyed manservant.
She's been thoroughly prepared, though perhaps not in all the ways she needs to be. Lord Orochimaru had talked about Lord Uchiha with the reverence he's only ever reserved for God himself: of equal parts skin-prickling envy and awe-inspiring terror. The man himself is something less than that, at least, where the marital bed is concerned.
Prepare yourself. She can do that. Karin closes her eyes and lays back on Lord Uchiha's soft pillows, imaging—
Well. Karin crinkles her nose. She'd not come fully prepared to imagine anything, so much as she'd come prepared to maintain a stiff upper lip. The men she knows best are the least impressive, and none are likely to inspire the sort of dreamy love making scene she's due. Not Kabuto, who still treats her as the dirty, ruddy-faced child she'd been when they'd first met.
Not Suigetsu, either, who used to tug at the ends of her braids and flick bits of ink into her face when he could manage to sneak up on her.
Before then, there'd been only—well, the memory is so faint now, from so long ago, but there had been a knight once, as well—a dark eyed, dark haired knight who'd saved her from bandits as a young child, before he left her there on the side of the road, bruised and shoeless.
For as brief as that encounter had been, her knight - and how he'd smiled at her, how he'd spoken to her - has been the primary feature of many a late night fantasy, even as Karin has gotten older and the memory has deteriorated, becoming moth eaten and yellowed like an old cotton dress.
Still, Karin thinks of him, her knight, over all else, because in truth there's very little else in her life that's ever brought her comfort or pleasure without making demands in turn. She thinks of her knight, his haughty smirk and firm hands, and tries to avoid thinking about the sure bruises around her throat, Lord Uchiha's hand at her neck. Blood, on his white bedspread, from where he'll split her apart.
Karin prepares herself, because that's what her Lord Husband has asked her to do.
She slips one hand over her center, palming the clammy flesh between her legs. A shiver runs through her, not quite yet arousal, but a place to start.
"What are they?" Lord Uchiha asks.
Karin's eyes flutter open. "What?" she asks.
"What are they?" he repeats. He's staring at her, but his eyes are aimed low. Not at her face, despite his direct question, but at her body.
More specifically, the bands of scar tissue that cross her ankles, forearms. and neck.
They'd been hidden before, under the stiff collars of the dresses she'd worn during their visits, and had been especially concealed under the layers of white lace and seed pearls that had made up her wedding dress.
"Where are they from?" Lord Uchiha asks, when she doesn't respond. "Those marks."
"Exactly where you'd expect such things might come from," she responds, venom creeping into her tone. "Do you intend to stand there and marvel at them?"
It is only then that Lord Uchiha meets her eyes. The seemingly bottomless depths of his gaze provoke a sense of breathlessness in her, as if he could consume her with his eyes alone.
"What?" she asks, defensively. "What is it?"
He frowns, as if finding something displeasing.
"What?" she asks again, more insistent. "Will you not answer me?"
Finally, Lord Uchiha looks away, back towards his darkened windows. There is nothing he could be looking at out there that could be so interesting—assuming he is even able to see anything at so late an hour.
"To an extent," he begins, his voice gentler, "it will be necessary for you and I to be able to cooperate. There are things I intend to accomplish that will be difficult otherwise."
Karin's hand stills between her legs in an obscene portmanteau, closer to a Bosch nude than a Titian one. "What in the hell is that supposed to mean?" she demands, incensed.
It is a foolish response, one that comes at the cost of strategic advantage she might have otherwise treasured—pity from any man, she's been taught, is a weapon just as any other. It is the knife to slip between their ribs, the weapon that will make her the equal of men much larger and stronger than she.
But right now, Lord Uchiha's pity only makes her angry.
"Explain what it is you mean," she demands again, "and stop speaking in riddles."
Finally, Lord Uchiha lets the curtain fall close, before he walks to the edge of the bed. He sits down on the side of her, next to her naked legs, the mattress sinking under his weight. "Exactly what it is that I said," he tells her. "That you and I ought to be able to cooperate with one another."
He rests one hand on the bed, his eyes trailing down to stare at her bare ankles. Even his gaze seems gentler now, his dark eyes betraying deeper, stranger depths. She has the sense that he'd like to touch her, though incomprehensibly, he seems either unable or unwilling to do so.
There is a slight draft in the room and Karin, still naked as the day she was born, shifts once to cover herself more fully. "I do not come to trust so easily," she finally says, though it feels as though she is conceding something even by saying it. "Let us get this over with at last, and perhaps then I will give it greater consideration."
Lord Uchiha gives her a stern look, one that seems to foretell a reprimand, but he complies. He lifts his hand and sets it over the top of her foot, his thumb brushing up over a scar that encircles her ankle. The tissue is soft there, she knows—soft and velvety, like the membrane of an egg that has yet to crack.
His touch is equally gentle, and the warmth of his hand sends prickles of gooseflesh up her leg. "It is a happy story they'll be wanting," Lord Uchiha muses, his eyes stuck on her scar. He continues to stroke it, though his thoughts seem to wander as he does. "A romantic one, something akin to King Minato's own. Queen Kushina was a peculiar sort of woman, one who cannot easily be imitated."
Well. If there is anything that Karin has learned, it is how to play the pitiable orphan. "I can act the part," she promises, abandoning any attempt to conceal her falsehoods. "They won't ever know the difference. I'll be as sweet and meek as they've ever seen. The most gracious and dignified woman to walk this earth."
"It will require more than simple manners, where the Uzumaki lineage is concerned," he says drily. "But that is a matter for another time. Lie back."
Their eyes meet, and she draws in a deep breath. For all his fair appearance - and she cannot help but admit that he is an incredibly fair man - his eyes are difficult to meet, and the intensity of his gaze has her wilting under it, drawing her arms further back. His hand, still resting by her ankle, grips her more firmly, though not painfully.
"Karin?"
Hearing her name from his lips so informally is strange, in a way she's not yet sure how to process. "Yes, fine." Slowly, she drops her elbows and leans back on the bed, allowing the plush mattress to eat up her weight, sinking down into it until she feels half ready to fall to the floor.
Lord Uchiha draws his hand along her bare stomach, then moves it down to her hip, her thigh, the curve of her knee, sending shivers through her body. His fingers tighten there, fitting themselves around the tendon running along the inside of her knee the way he might curl a finger around the trigger of a pistol.
It is an exploratory movement, though he is surprisingly gentle.
"You will sell it," he says, his voice so soft that she cannot tell whether it is a command, or an assurance. "That is all that I will ask of you, for now."
Karin lets out an involuntary gasp as his hand dips between her thighs, trailing down her mound. The tips of his fingers are warm, cooler than the heated center of her body, but not frigid.
He presses his thumb against her slit, parting her, and running his thumb down her seam, as if he were inspecting her, though his eyes betray very little.
She hisses when his finger teases her entrance, and her legs instinctively press together at his touch, as she grips his sheets tightly in one fist.
He glances up at her, more curious than anything else. "I—" He shakes his head. "I am not in the habit of making bastards," he confesses, which may be the oddest way a man has ever tried to express his sexual prowess - or lack thereof - to her.
"So you…" she prompts.
"Cannot say much as to what ought to happen right now," he finishes. Before she can raise a question to that, he adds, "the mechanics of it, yes. The pleasantries—not quite so much."
"Ah." Karin suppresses a shiver as he once again brings his thumb to pass over her. He did not seem to be the sort inclined to pleasantries to begin with, though she finds his remark oddly mollifying. "Is—do you mean that as an invitation?"
He raises one imperious eyebrow to that, though he doesn't outright refuse. "You may choose to treat it as such."
"I see." It seems unlike a Lord to make such a concession so willingly in the marital bed, the one place a man is free to indulge to his heart's content. It is unexpectedly considerate of him.
Perhaps he will only occasionally be inclined to choke her.
Karin sets her hand on top of her Lord's, directing it up from between her legs to square over her breast, starting him off with a gentler seduction. He grasps onto it obligingly, with almost an appraising eye, and squeezes her lightly before circling her hardening nipple with his thumb.
It is a fair enough start, and yet… "Kiss me," Karin demands. "As if you mean it."
His eyes flicker, first to her eyes, then to her lips. His own mouth presses into a thin, uncertain line.
"Like this." Karin fists her hand into the hair at the back of his head and directs him down towards her, until she feels his warm lips meet her neck. "Ah—there."
"Do not handle me so," he orders, his breath hot in her ear, before he nips her none too gently at the base of her throat. It is more pleasurable than painful, and Karin cries out, warmth flooding her body.
It was likely not his intent to please her, and his next kisses are regrettably mild, though he continues to work his way upwards, guided by her hands. A shiver runs through her, both from his warmth and his sudden closeness, how his clothed body presses up against her naked skin.
Her encouragement makes him bolder and his kisses grow more substantial, more confident. More bruising, she thinks dizzily, as he latches onto a spot beneath her jaw and sucks at it, wrenching a moan from her throat. It only emboldens him more. He scrapes his teeth across her Adam's apple, turning her next moan ragged.
She shudders bodily and fists her hand into his hair, tugging hard on it when he finds a particularly sensitive spot just below her ear.
He pauses.
Karin swallows a lump in her throat. "I—" She doesn't particularly have it in her to feel sorry for it this time, but he only shakes his head.
"It's fine," he says, though it puts a certain stop to their momentum. His lips are still near her ear, though she'd be glad to guide him lower.
"Ah—"
"Like this," he says, as he takes her other hand - the one not already clinging to him - and guides it down to his waist. A muted shudder runs through his body, though Karin only tightens her grip and pulls him closer, hooking one of her legs around his.
"Let's have this off, then." They are still moving much too slow for her liking, so she makes quick work of his shirt, then runs her eyes appraisingly over his bare chest after tossing it to the floor. "Quite the military man you are, they've said."
And to be certain, he has a constitution that is rather unlike most other men his age: firm but lean, with a deceptively thick swell of muscles around his upper arms and shoulders that are easily concealed beneath his formal wear.
With his tacit permission - he doesn't, after all, attempt to push her away - Karin runs her hands down his chest, down his stomach to the waistband of his pants. Fair, is all she can think. Fair-skinned, unblemished. He has the form of a soldier, but his body certainly does not reflect the scars and disfigurements she's come to associate with the former soldiers in Orochimaru's employ.
Captain's privilege, she thinks, uncharitably. Always in the fight, but never in the thick of it.
"Well?" she asks, resting her hands on his shoulders. "Do you intend to compromise me tonight or not?"
His own hands sit idle in a way she finds particularly frustrating, so she sets about putting them to good use. "Here," she instructs him, as she guides one hand up back over her bare breast. "Try this again."
The look he gives her isn't a particularly amused one, though he obliges. His palm - soft, patrician, even with his soldier's background - molds to her body with an almost-perfect fit. At the very least, his well-bred education can be put to good use—really, the man seems as quick a learner as one could hope for.
She arches into his touch, seeking the delicious friction between them like a flower seeking sunlight.
His eyes follow her, dark and uncertain, though his grip is light, hardly enough to make her breast wobble. Certainly not the type to ravish a woman, even when given license to do so.
Damned gentleman, Karin thinks irritably. His not-so-gentle nips had certainly been preferable to this.
She tugs at his hair again, more harsh this time, until she's able to elicit something short of a growl from him. "Like this," she breathes against his mouth as she claims it again, running her tongue over his lips and teeth, tasting the sweet wine and fruit he'd been sipping earlier that night.
He responds slowly at first, though his cautionary stiffness gradually bleeds away. His body melds to hers, malleable like orange marmalade, his hands caressing her hips, her shoulders. He holds her, as much as she clings to him, and begins to push, ever so gently, without Karin needing to first pull, as his weight bears down on her.
A new hunger overpowers his kisses, something punishing and brutal behind his temerity. Something that is starving, but bound up so tightly that he's never learned to indulge himself proper.
Well, Karin's seldom ever found so good a handhold for herself. "Yes," she gasps, hardly able to find the chance to speak.
He runs his tongue along the seam of her mouth, then captures it fully with tongue and teeth, prying open her jaw with all the gentleness of an army at siege.
Her hand fumbles blindly into the space where their bodies meet, groping for the buttons on his pants. He stiffens, breaking the delicious contact between them. "What are you doing?" he asks.
Karin follows him closely, hooking one arm around his shoulders to keep the space between them at a minimum. "You intend to disrobe, do you not?"
"Well—yes. I can manage that fine. One moment." He extricates himself from her and slides off the edge of the bed. Much to her chagrin, he undoes his pants himself in short order, leaving them and his undergarments folded neatly on his chair.
Karin scrunches her nose as she watches him. She'll have to dump them on the floor later, once he's asleep—if not for the passionate picture it paints, then as revenge for him not permitting her to do it in the first place.
He seems almost startled when he turns around to find her watching him with the same mischievous, elfin smirk Kabuto had reprimanded her for to no end. Something sets in his face, becoming harder, if not harsher. He sets one knee down on the bed before lowering himself down beside her, eyes still locked on her face.
Lord Uchiha cups her face between his hands, not roughly, though not out of gentleness either. He tilts it back lightly, examining her increasingly confused expression from different angles. "I would not presume to ask a woman whether she is a maiden," he begins.
"Isn't there only one way of knowing?" she retorts, though part of her immediately regrets not phrasing it in a more enticing way. "You may find out now, if you'd like."
"If you have no concerns." Still, he continues to search her face, looking for what, she can only guess. "You will sell it," he eventually says. Again, it has the shape of a command, though this time she hears more confidence behind it, more certainty than there had been before. His thumb runs tenderly upon her cheek. "Sell it. That is all that I ask of you."
"I can do that." It feels almost like a negotiation, though she's long passed the point of having leverage over him, or being bold enough to assert it directly. She takes one of his hands in hers and clasps it to her bare chest. "Once you've taken me to bed, you shall have anything from me that you desire, my Lord."
He crinkles his nose. "Your bluntness will be something to work on."
"Oh." Karin bats her eyelashes, her voice dripping with all the insincerity she can muster. "I burn with the desire to do nothing but to please you, m'lord. My aching woman's heart does nothing but crave your delight." She rises on her knees and leans into him, her hair hanging loosely off her shoulders. "There is nothing I want more," she whispers, brushing his cheek with her own, "than to make you a father tonight, my Lord."
Lord Uchiha pushes her back to arms' length and frowns. "That will need some work as well."
"You're welcome to work at me to your hearts' content, my Lord."
Something seems to twitch at the corner of his mouth, but he only shakes his head. In a rare fit of optimism, she wonders whether she's managed to endear herself to him.
"Lie back. Any longer, and we will risk the maids coming to check in on us."
Karin dutifully nestles back against the pillows on the bed, angling her head up at the ceiling. "Then we can tell them the first attempt went so well, we both insisted on a second."
She twitches when he slips his hand between her legs, his fingers once again finding her slit. She's somewhat wet—she can feel the cool air on her when he drags one finger down through her, parting her lips and pressing lightly, though not insistently, against her entrance.
"This is the last time that I will ask," he says, as he continues to drag his finger over her, gathering wetness, circling the place where he'll be entering her, "whether this is something you are insisting upon now. If you have concerns about being put away, I would disabuse you of any such notions now."
Karin resists the urge to roll her eyes in an unladylike fashion. "And for the last time," she responds, "I am telling you to be done with it."
"If you so prefer." With that, Lord Uchiha takes himself in hand, spreading her wetness over himself, before he runs his length over her seam, slicking himself further. The friction is unexpectedly delightful, so much so that Karin finds herself moving in tandem with him, welcoming each glide of him between her thighs.
"An heir born from first consummation is considered a good omen," he says, almost thoughtfully, as he takes hold of her thighs, and positions himself at her entrance. "An heir will seldom manifest after one attempt, however."
He seems to be hinting at something further, though it is not immediately clear what precisely he has in mind. Karin raises an eyebrow. "No, I am aware that they do not."
"So long as you understand that," Lord Uchiha says, before he pushes into her.
Karin sucks in a sharp breath and clenches at his bedsheets as he enters her fully in one swift motion, filling her completely. The sudden intrusion makes her head spin, and the pain is so deliciously sharp that even once he's stopped moving, it radiates through her.
Lord Uchiha waits a moment, seated inside of her. His hands hold her hips steady as she tries to relax herself, and he rubs a gentle circle into her hip, as if coaxing her. "Open your eyes, Karin," he orders, though softly. "Allow me to see you."
His request, strangely, invokes a greater sense of intimacy than the act of entering her had.
Karin's eyes flutter open to find him bowed down towards her, his face closer to her own than she'd initially imagined. He scans her face, his hair hanging loosely over both his shoulders.
"Yes?" he asks.
Karin bares her teeth at him. "Yes, what?" she snaps. "What are you waiting for?"
"You, Karin," he says simply. "Your hands. The expression you are making." He adjusts himself, pulling back only part way. Karin groans at the sudden pain that stabs at her insides, as if there were a knife twisting within her.
Lord Uchiha's face grows serious. "Breathe deeply," he coaches her, as he stills again. One hand touches her side, almost consolingly. "Relax yourself."
There is an odd sense of adjustment that, too late, she realizes is due to him going soft inside of her. "Go," she murmurs, squeezing her eyes shut. "Get it over with. I will manage."
He adjusts himself again, lifting her thighs to give himself a deeper, more brutal angle with which to thrust. Karin cringes, bracing herself for another sharp spike of pain.
"Stop that." Lord Uchiha moves again, pushing deeper into her, though this time it comes with a rush of something else—something that makes Karin gasp out loud and arch backwards. "Hush," he orders her, mistaking it for another exclamation of pain.
His next thrust brings on a feeling not unlike agony, though Karin cannot parse it fully—there is pain, of course, a rough, live pain that flares brightly each time he pushes back into her, but there is something wild as well, that is left hungry and empty when he finally withdraws from her completely, leaving her raw and throbbing.
Lord Uchiha looks down, at the place where they'd been joined. The expression that crosses his face - eyebrows draw closely together, mouth pressed into a firm frown - makes her hesitant to follow his gaze.
Karin presses her knees together, more by discomfort rather than any sort of modesty, though the mournful look in his eyes rouses certain feelings of concern in her. Closing her legs does nothing to soothe the ache between them, though there is a certain jolt of—of something that she has trouble naming as her thighs meet, something that burns low in her stomach like liquor.
She rises on her elbows, drawing closer to him. "What are you—"
"I'd rather not this way," Lord Uchiha says, cutting her off before she can finish.
Before she can protest, he holds out one hand and, upon taking hers, pulls her forward, so that she's sitting up with her legs bent awkwardly in front of her. Karin grimaces at the sharp stab of pain that strikes her low in her belly when she moves, and spies a smear of red across his bedsheets when her hips rested.
Lord Uchiha sees it as well. "That much is taken care of, at least," he remarks, rather dispassionately. For as fierce a warrior as he is rumored to be - though she does recall having heard, without having listened particularly close, that his truth strength was in the realm of strategy and tactics - Karin is coming to understand that dispassionate is more so the default, rather than the exception, where her husband is concerned.
"Like this may be better," Lord Uchiha notes, as he leans back and stretches his legs out in front of him.
Karin gives him a dubious look, unsure that she understands his intent. "It is not what you'd expect from a lordling," she says carefully.
"Well?"
"Do you mean it?"
"I am not in the habit of making jokes," Lord Uchiha says, which Karin has no trouble believing. "I would rather you manage it anyway," he adds. "Go as you please."
From another man, she might see it as skittishness, or perhaps a kind of perversity not uncommon among men - there are many, Karin has learned, who will take untold pleasure in receiving their orders from a woman such as she - though for Lord Uchiha, it seems to be neither.
Rather, it feels more like courtesy, a ceding of the means to her. Perhaps he is a gentleman after all.
"Fine," Karin growls, as she crawls into his lap, ignoring the sharp sting between her legs as she maneuvers herself. Skin meets skin, her thighs over his, her palms against his chest. He is warm, still, in a way she has yet to find unpleasant.
"You've gone soft," she grouses, as she takes him into her hand. His cock fits neatly into her palm, the skin silky and stained with her blood, so dark it's reminiscent of wine. "Well," she says, willing to make some light of it, "if you had any doubts."
"None that mattered," he responds blandly, which—
Karin grumbles and turns away. What an idiot thing to say, as if a Lord didn't care whether his wife was a maiden on her wedding night.
Fool.
She leaves one hand on his shoulder as she works the other around him. Neither he nor her hand are slick anymore, and so she opts for force over friction and jerks him with short, firm thrusts that don't require her to actually pull or tug his skin.
It is not a courtesy he is due exactly, but if she intends to have him finish, it is a necessary one.
Then again, perhaps it is not so discourteous either.
There is, after all, something strangely gratifying in the way her Lord lowers his eyes, his long lashes fluttering shut as she continues to work him in her hand, once again bringing him to hardness.
Men are so unlike women that she almost immediately discounts the possibility that he would be the sort prone to entertaining fantasies, though she can't deny the far-off look in his eyes as she continues to stroke him, or the soft, almost inaudible breathes that escape his mouth with each tug and squeeze.
What does her Lord dream of, when his mind is at ease?
Or rather—who does her Lord dream of, that he would look away from her to imagine them, even as she holds his own cock in her hands?
No one, Karin decides, as she tightens her grip, and runs her thumb lightly over his slit. A drawn out, sibilant hiss escapes from his lips that Karin greedily drinks. "Very good, my Lord," she encourages, as she licks into his mouth. "Exactly like that."
She hastens her pace, gratified by his mild attempts to fuck into her palm, but his hand soon after closes around hers, halting her mid-stroke. A pulse runs through his shaft, almost like a heartbeat.
"Enough," he says, quite short of breath. His grip tightens around hers, though he shivers at the stimulation. "That should be sufficient."
"If you say so, my Lord," Karin says meekly, though inwardly she preens from having nearly caused him to spill in her hand. "Shall I proceed?"
"Go," is his only instruction, which is enough for Karin.
She presses herself up against him, relishing his own bare skin against hers, then positions herself over him, taking him back in hand and rubbing his head over her slit. It makes her cunt ache for him—she's grown wetter in the time she's spent fondling him, and his smooth skin glides smoothly through her folds.
In a fit of impulsive confidence, she leans up to peck him on the mouth, relishing his soft lips against hers. He seems taken aback a moment, though he neither pushes her away, as she believed he might, nor does he ravish her, as he'd come close to doing before.
Rather, when Karin pulls away to rest in his lap, her eyes searching his, he only looks surprised.
She likes him this way just as well, she thinks: impassive, unlikely to paw at her or be demanding. Willing to cede direction to her. "My Lord," she murmurs.
The pain is less sharp this time, though there is still a sting as she sinks down onto him, like salt caught in a fresh cut. It helps that she is wet, though, and he slips inside her easily, despite the burn and the stretch.
He supports her hips as she goes down and shudders lightly when they come to rest down on his. Even then, he rubs slow soothing circles as she adjusts to his fullness, though he - all of him - is still so much to accommodate that it has her momentarily dizzy.
She leans forward, burying her warm face into his neck. One hand comes to rest on her back, neither forcing or directing her but holding her steady.
"I'm going to give it a go now," she murmurs, lulled partly by the warmth of his skin and the calming, measured beat of his heart. A man of many faces, he is: one day, perhaps, she would not be so sorry to fall asleep in his arms.
Slowly, Karin gathers her legs out from under her and rises, feeling the drag of her Lord's cock inside of her as she does. He lets out a sharp breath, and his arms tighten around her, pulling her hips closer before she sinks down again, gritting her teeth against the intrusion.
Her thighs quickly begin to ache with the effort, with each scraping thrust in and out of her. Being wet has helped her move quicker, without tearing her skin or chafing, though it hasn't made it entirely painless.
She closes her eyes against it, determined to soldier her way through it and let him finish.
"Here." Lord Uchiha's hands support her on her next move downwards, cushioning her descent. "Less strain."
"Right." The next thrust comes down at a strange angle, and Karin pants, struck by the sudden heat in her stomach. "So you—you just need to finish, huh?" she asks.
Her husband doesn't respond, but his dark eyes flicker up to her, clouded over with desire. Karin digs her nails into his shoulders and continues with renewed effort.
Lord Uchiha works with an almost mechanical precision even through her sudden burst of enthusiasm, his eyes drawing shut with each renewed thrust, his fingers digging deeper into her hips each time her thighs smack into his. He fucks into her with such vigor that it forces the air from her throat each time he drags her back down onto him, his own breaths heavy and hot against her jaw.
Eventually, his pace seems to slow, though he loses none of his intensity. He pushes into her with an agonizing, calculated restraint, as if he were savoring it, chasing the feeling. Karin, her mind clouded over from pleasure, rather than the pain, fists her fingers into his hair and grips tightly onto him, as if she were in danger of falling away.
He's beautiful like this, his cheeks flushed, eyes dark. Vulnerable, even, because he doesn't seem like the sort of man who openly shows his pleasure often.
Karin opens her mouth to speak but is caught by a moan, which she muffles by digging her teeth into his shoulder and biting down until she tastes blood.
"Mine," Karin hisses, over the metallic taste of blood in her mouth. Her husband, her Lord—hers. She bites him again, higher, not hard enough to break the skin, but where a mark may still be left behind.
Where other people may still see it.
Lord Uchiha cries out and spills inside her, scalding her raw insides. His grip becomes impossibly tight, enough to bruise, and he buries his face into her hair, inhaling deeply as his body trembles through his release.
His hands remain in place even after he relaxes, though his hold on her becomes more tender, less bruising. She feels completely and utterly full of him, even as he softens inside of her, and his seed begins to drip down her thighs.
"There, Karin." He leaves a light kiss in her hair, then starts to help her off of him. In another fit of impulsivity, though, Karin grabs him by the back of the head and brings their mouths together again, savoring his heavy-minded slowness, the honey-like smoothness with which he kisses her back.
"Lie back," Lord Uchiha instructs her when they pull apart, as he guides her back onto the bed, her skin buzzing. It seems to be his favorite command, which is particularly well-suited to them both. He takes one slow, appraising look at her, before he shakes his head. "I'll be back in a moment."
He steps away into one of the adjoining rooms. Karin does as he says and rests on her back, waiting for him, as she hears him in the other room—water sloshes into something tinny, before her Lord returns, wrapped in a robe and carrying a metal basin of water, which he sets on the bedside table.
"You first," he says, as he turns to wring water out of a washcloth.
Karin rises on her elbows to watch as he reaches between her thighs, washing away blood and seed. His touch against her sensitive skin makes her hiss, less from pain than the still unsatisfied half of her that hasn't been fully exorcized.
"I am not so barbaric," he says, though all Karin can do is nod dumbly as he gently dabs away at the inside of her thighs, until he seems satisfied and pulls away.
It leaves her feeling strangely hungry for more of it, though her brain feels cloudy with the enormity of it all: the teeth marks she left on his neck, the bruises he left on her hips. The blood still on his cock—her blood.
Hers.
When he turns back to clean himself, Karin rises on her elbows, ignoring the dull ache between her thighs, and tugs Lord Uchiha down by his arm. Her lips catch his own at an awkward angle, hunger prevailing over artistry, but he allows it, and remains until a soft whine crawls up her throat, goaded on by the growing heat in her stomach.
Karin rises further, onto her knees, and guides his hand down between her legs, where he'd just cleaned her. "Here," she growls, fitting his hand to her sex.
He initially tries to jerk away, but she holds him firm, setting her weight down into his palm and moaning as his skin meets her soft flesh. "Sell it," Karin demands, pecking the corner of his mouth. "Make me believe in it."
Lord Uchiha's face becomes deathly still, until he seems to remember himself. His hand relaxes slowly, molding more perfectly to her body, his fingers teasing at her entrance. "Like this?" he asks, as he rubs her with more force, his palm meeting her slit.
Karin hisses and wraps her arms around him again, clinging to him as his fingers begin to work at her in earnest, his warm fingers caressing wet, hot flesh.
"Quick learner, aren't you," Karin grits out into his shoulder. She fists the delicate fabric of his robe into her hands, whimpering lightly as he builds her up higher, pushing her closer to her end. "Inside me," she demands. Her grip is so strong that the tendons in her hands have begun to ache from it. "Put your damned fingers inside of me."
He makes a disapproving face at her unladylike cursing, but he dutifully rearranges his hand. The tips of his fingers press against her opening, still sore and stretched where he'd been inside of her not long before.
Karin growls as he pushes two fingers into her, curling them gently as his thumb swipes across her, making her jump and shudder in his lap. "Close," she cries. She places erratic kisses along the column of his throat, as her knees begin to tremble, sucking angry welts into his neck.
She finishes with a loud cry, one that's greedily eaten up by the wooden panels in his room.
"There," Lord Uchiha murmurs, almost consoling. He pats her back gently as her minute cries die off, and her heartbeat slows again.
"Ngh." For the moment, Karin is content to rest there, in his arms, as she begins to drift off to sleep.
"In a moment," her husband whispers, before he lays her out on the sheets again.
Karin cracks open an eye to watch him move away, reaching again for the towel he'd brought. His hand is covered with her own slick and the remains of his seed, which he wipes away again with a dour expression.
He notices her watching him, and his face twists into something resembling a scowl. "That's a good deal of effort likely gone to waste despite your insisting upon it," he tells her, almost chastising.
"Hm?" Karin blinks up lazily at him. "That you've made a mess of me again?"
His reddened lips press into a thin line. "You ought to have laid down afterwards," he says. He gestures towards the soiled towel. "Or at least waited longer to be moving about so much."
"Mhm." Karin tilts her head to the side, drawn down by the peaceful warmth of her husband's luxurious bed. She sets one hand over her stomach, appraising. "Then I've not disturbed your plans in the least."
She hums with contentment as he sighs again and raises his towel to dab lightly at the new stickiness between her thighs.
He isn't the worst sort of man, Karin thinks. Even if he is not so gentle with her all the time, so long as this side of him exists, it does not seem to be the worst sort of way to live.