Sakura slipped her sandals off and placed them down carefully beside the front doors. She padded barefoot along a worn, threadbare rug, her shaded eyes intent upon what was ahead.
Sun rays grazed the backs of her heels through high latticed windows behind her. Passing through with hesitant steps, she lifted her eyes to the art mounted on the far wall, a gentle draft flowing past her hair and rippling the rows of painted flags and lanterns that hung from the gabled ceiling.
This was a modest shrine, built from the modest incomes of the people who had once lived down the hill nearby, their homes now abandoned and dark. High above this shrine, they dreamt, slumbering in their tightly-bound cocoons as they had done for nearly half a year now. Even without lavish decor or expensive furnishings, the humble and solidly-constructed building brought a sense of comfort and peace, housing a space that felt hallowed without need for wealth.
Sakura swallowed, looking down at her feet. She didn't practise a religion; she'd never had much interest, being too focused on her studies and learning ninjutsu. She didn't quite know what traditions she should be following, didn't remember the steps she was missing for approaching this humble space for prayer; but she stepped forward anyways, her footfalls soft and silent upon the worn rug as if in apology, driven by the aching in her heart.
She fell to her knees in the center of the space, bowing her head until her forehead touched the ground; she closed her eyes.
The calm and the quiet around Sakura gently creaked in the howling wind outside. She welcomed the ambient sounds, breathing in the scents of old wood, woven fabric, and dust; faded smells of incense that was burned before the war warmed her nose.
For a moment, peace filled the void in her chest, but soon Sakura was clenching against herself, her head falling lower as pain quivered about the corners of her tightly-shut eyes. Her expression was taut with conflict and pain, her hands sliding up along her folded arms, and she shook slightly, tension shivering down her hunched body.
She shouldn't ask for anything. She knew that. What little she remembered about proper protocol was that one doesn't come here with the intent just to make a wish, to ask the kami to grant you what you want; but desperation welled in her chest, and Sakura's wish bubbled up anyway, driven by all the worries and doubts that swirled through her being.
Please let there be a way for all of this to end without anyone dying.
The memories fresh in her mind continued to hurt, and Sakura shook away the tears gathering beside her eyes as she recalled them once more. She had seen so many dreams in the past day. Hundreds, with many imprinted upon her mind like she'd dreamed them herself, the sensations and images strong in her mind's eye. She had let them overwhelm her, swimming in the river of Tsukuyomi dreams until she'd nearly drowned in them, only the powerful influence and watchful eye of Madara at her side preventing her from being drawn into the Divine Tree's greedy flow herself.
The faces of all her trapped loved ones haunted her still, each radiating contentment and relief. For some of them, she had never seen them so fulfilled, so whole. Each dream they lived was feverishly vivid, all of them afloat in well-established lives.
Lies, all the dreams are lies, but Sakura now recognised their haunting beauty. She pressed her palms over her eyes as if willing her mental vision to be blind to it once more, tilting her face against the rug and fighting back her tears. She hated this, her conflicting feelings, the way that her previous easy hatred of the Infinite Tsukuyomi was cracking. No matter what she kept telling herself, she could not deny that the sweeping contentment that everyone dreamt now was in perfect opposition to her memories of when she'd seen them last, many months ago… grim-faced, anxious and paranoid, some outright afraid. Everyone had been preparing for war and their likely deaths, just barely clinging on to hope the longer the fights went on.
Sakura stared dully at her tearstained palms. She could not deny what she had observed. Every single one of the dreamers was at peace.
Sakura pressed her hands over her heart, fighting back pain with gritted teeth. No… she couldn't accept that. Her friends, her family, everyone was trapped in a fabrication, their true bodies bound and enslaved in cocoons. It didn't matter how happy they were, the reunions in their dreams Sakura had witnessed – Tsunade and Jiraiya, Tenten and Neji. It didn't matter the antics of some; Ino delighted by several competing suitors, or the saddening moments in others, such as Yamato feeling surrounded by love and family at last. None of that mattered, because it was false. Right?
Sakura lifted her head, her reddened eyes dragging across the faded symbols hanging along the walls, the paintbrush strokes graceful and elegant. She thought she recognised some of them, and she calmed herself by examining the mounted art that hung along walls and the curves of artful drapes of fabric, following the beautiful lines of swirling seas and symmetry until her heartbeat slowed and her tears began to dry.
Releasing a deep breath, she bowed her head, her eyes hollow upon the red rug beneath where she knelt. How could what she had believed was so wrong, seem so right? How could her conviction of hatred for the Infinite Tsukuyomi be shaken like this? Was it the empathy she'd felt, witnessing the ideal lives that nearly everyone she loved now lived?
When Madara crossed her mind, Sakura closed her eyes once more.
He had said nothing when she had finally emerged from witnessing dreams. Nothing, as he'd severed the tree's temporary bond from her, turning away with a smug, knowing look; like he knew she must be fully converted to believe in his cause, as if it was undoubtable when known in its full truth.
Sakura's fists clenched as she remembered shouting at him then. The argument that had ensued between them was worsened by the fact that her clone's memories had been released to her shortly after she'd withdrawn from the dreams. She had been furious: memories fresh with hot blood up her arms as she'd desperately healed Obito's wounds, the haunted pallor of his face as he'd nearly died again – his grievous injuries from Madara's hands had burned into her mind and stoked the fires of her rage. She had known she couldn't call Madara out for his crime, as it would give away her earlier deception sending a clone to her team. Instead, Sakura had let her anger further fuel her passionate arguments against the Infinite Tsukuyomi, her resulting fight with Madara pushing her into a nearly incoherent rage.
Sakura ran a hand over her cheek, feeling a mix of shame and frustration. Black Zetsu was right, she'd insisted. Can't you see he was right? Who cares if they're all at peace in their dreams? They're dying. The Divine Tree is stealing all of their chakra like he said… you're no saviour. Is a dead world what you want to rule over?
Their heated altercation had escalated to a point where Sakura had started taking her rage out on the branches, shattering them in a desperate attempt to free the victims, the wild white ribbons ensnaring the falling dreamers once more. Madara had restrained her, and she'd ripped free with such force that she'd broken both of his arms — he'd struck her in return, his wounds steaming as they healed on their own. Having spotted this little shrine on a hill from high above on their Divine Tree branch, Sakura fled to it in a tearful fit of rage, leaving Madara and his threatening objections behind.
Sakura wiped away her fresh tears with frustration. She was still angry, but now felt a cloud of guilt hazing her vision, prickling her eyes like smoke. She had shattered whatever rapport she'd built with Madara now. The chances she might have had to end the war peacefully through persuasion seemed again swept out of her reach, and this time by her own hand.
Sakura cursed aloud, wringing her fingers through her hair. She should have kept better control of herself; she should never have thrown her truthful anger at Madara like that, no matter how strongly she had felt. She'd not only shown him her honest hate of the Infinite Tsukuyomi, but injured him to boot, her fiery opposition all too telling of her loyalty to Konoha and her team. He would be finished with her now. She'd ruined her own plan as well as lost her strange new companion, all because she couldn't hold back how she felt.
The guilt flared painfully in Sakura's chest, and she felt an unexpected grief from this loss. Her clone's promise to Kakashi that she was only with Madara for the sake of her plan felt even thinner as she ached, and she shook her head at herself, sitting back and wiping at her eyes once more. She couldn't deny that she did not see Madara as just a mark to persuade, nor even her enemy, anymore; she didn't know what he was to her. No label came to her mind that seemed to fit, especially now.
At least he was respecting that she had taken this shrine as her respite. Sakura bit back her swirling emotions, blinking through blurred vision at the beautiful little building around her, the elegant gables she didn't doubt were carved by hand; the paintings, the splashes of colour, the comforting symmetry. Though she did not feel soothed, she did feel safe, and felt a tang of gratefulness for its existence and that Madara had not destroyed it just yet. Part of her never wanted to leave its comfort, its creaky quiet and faded incense smells bringing calm back to her troubled mind.
Regardless, he might simply be waiting to dispatch her as soon as she came back out. Sakura sighed. Once she inevitably ventured outside again, Madara would probably throw her to the Infinite Tsukuyomi in punishment for her vehement opposition to it.
She fought a fresh stinging of tears at the thought that she would dream of him.
The little shrine creaked in the wind, and Sakura looked out at the distant painted symbols, the faces and beautiful stretches of nature depictions along the main back wall. She sought peace, but felt only conflict. Is there a way to have a happy end?
Sakura already knew the answer, shaking her head. No; there wasn't. It was an implicit and silent expectation in the shinobi career that one would not live to see old age. Even as a genin she had come to realise this, watching the suffering and deaths of others, but she'd always tried to maintain a positive outlook, saving lives as she could in the hospital and working hard to be strong.
She bit her lip, her thoughts circling back to the dreamers swinging high above the creaky shrine roof. Those who dreamed now, technically lived happy ends. They would be content in a perfect world until the day they finally died, drained completely of chakra. Technically, the Infinite Tsukuyomi had solved so many endless problems: there was not only no more conflict or war, but no violence, no famine, just a perfect peace, widespread and unshakeable. It was truly a world of only love, and shinobi and civilians alike got to reunite with the dead as well, something only dreams could offer.
Sakura felt a conclusion coming to her, and she feared it. It came first with the tides of understanding why Madara had plotted and contrived for the Infinite Tsukuyomi to be brought to light for so long. She still didn't have the full picture of his side, but she knew enough that she could no longer blindly hate the Divine Tree and its given dreams of peace, just like she could no longer blindly hate Madara himself. Regardless of what everyone had believed before, he'd striven for peace – widespread and unbreakable, just as the Infinite Tsukuyomi had created now.
No. It wasn't true peace. Sakura shook the word out of her thoughts, adjusting where she sat and glaring out at the painted far wall. How could she feel for the Infinite Tsukuyomi cause when, if she herself was trapped in it, she'd never end up where she was now? None of it would have happened. She would be a different person.
Sakura scowled as she imagined it. She would hang there, dreaming a useless dream of Sasuke, who she now understood would never have reciprocated her former interest as she'd naively hoped for too long. She would never have tasted all she had felt and experienced since that first night – since that amplification poison, and still, she felt no regrets for any of it, savouring each memory eternally.
How many of them dreamed useless dreams? Sakura looked to the side, her gaze distant like she could see the dreamers where they hung high up beyond the shrine's walls. How many of them were dreaming of false happiness that paled in comparison to what could be?
And dying, to dreams that were empty. Sakura bit her lip, feeling a mix of relief and anxiety at once as her true feelings emerged once more. She believed in the depths of her heart that reality, in all of its complexity and capriciousness, was yet still more beautiful than the idealistic lives lived by dreamers. Her belief was founded not only by her original convictions before the war, but in the memories she held close to her heart now: moments balanced in light and shadow, love and hate – beautiful, because they were complete.
Sakura brought shadowed eyes to the dim light that fell through the high latticed windows beneath the gabled roof, some of those memories returning to haunt her in their victory over her conflicts.
Images of her teammates, the long nights running in crimson moonlight through midnight forests. That subtle way Sasuke would look at Naruto after their arguments, betraying a hint that he did care for his old friend, or the way firelight crackled orange over each of their calloused hands as her teammates sat side-by-side beside the fire, sharpening blades and tending wounds. Obito's cantankerous moods softening when Naruto would make him laugh, all the harshness in his face fading and taking the years away from his expression, making him look impossibly young. Kakashi's kindly eyes sweeping over each of them as he pretended to read his book, weary, but brimming with unspoken affection.
Sakura didn't realise her own smile as she wandered through many moments with her teammates, her love for them all swelling in her chest. Those memories had darkness and pain, but they also had spots of relief and joy, the balance between the heaviness and light creating the beauty that reaffirmed her belief in reality over the easy escape of dreams.
Her warming heart pounded a harder tempo as other memories rose up, reminding Sakura that it was not only her memories of her teammates that brought her to her epiphany now. The sensations it called back made her blood race, her skin heating. She shook her head as if to dismiss them, but they rebelled, flushing her with memory. Lips dragging along her ear, hot breath rushing across her skin, Madara's voice rumbling in a deep purr of pleasure as his body twined with hers, surrounding her completely — Sakura stared unseeingly forward, pulse racing, as she recalled more, the thrill of her memories burning from the tip of her tongue to drip down her throat. Each image that was spiced and heated was met and matched by ones that were sweet instead, drawing reactions just as potent from her heartbeat: skipping rocks in the sunlight, the flash of his eyes both in anger and in amusement, the feeling of his hands around her shoulders as she had emerged from his memories, keeping her from falling. Sakura closed her eyes in her favourite memory, sinking deeper into Madara's grip as he had taken her away from the aftermath of their reunion.
With a ragged breath, Sakura knelt against the mat again, wrought with a fresh wave of pain. Reality was so much harder than idealist dreams. Reality is what brought her here now, praying to gods she didn't believe in, pleading for fate to give her a way to have the things she needed most: for her world to find peace in reality, for no one else to die, and if fate allowed it, to fix the bond she'd just broken that she needed more than she'd realised before.
Sakura seized up with desperate hope. No more death. Nothing more for her to have to heal. No more close calls on the lives of those she loved.
Sakura jumped hard enough to tear the tatami mat beneath her palms when there was a thunderous rapping against the tall front doors. She pressed a hand over her pounding heart, turning her head and staring behind her with wide, frightened eyes. It was time to face either the beginning, or her end.
Sakura looked back up at the paintings, and this time she recognised the Sage of Six Paths Hagoromo among the painted kami. She met his ink-swept flat stare with all the passionate yearning of her hopes flaring in her heart. "Please," she murmured, barely above a whisper. Please.
Holding her head high, heart hammering, Sakura pulled the heavy doors open, squinting up at the bright sunlight pouring over her. Darkness relieved her of her sun-blinded state as a tall, jagged silhouette appeared before her, the glint of his eyes his only visible feature through the heavy contrast of light versus dark. Madara blocked exit or entry as he loomed over Sakura through the open doorway. Enveloped entirely in his shadow, she held his stare.
"You are religious?"
"No." Sakura swallowed her mixed apprehension and relief, her former anger a tight knot of regret in her throat. Tentatively, she lifted a hand, reaching out through shadow and setting a hand along Madara's arm. She glanced downwards, hair falling over her face as she sighed, her thumb drawing along the inside of his elbow in a gentle stroke. "Did you heal all right?" she asked softly.
"Of course," Madara replied coldly, and he shook off her touch, resetting the distance between them. Sakura retracted her rejected hand, flushing slightly red and taking in a shaky breath. She stepped back slightly as she felt the frigidness of his presence. His tone was as cold as the breeze sighing in between their feet through the open door, making her shiver, and she knew that she could not mince her words. Dread curdled in her stomach like Madara was about to give her a death sentence, and she lifted her eyes back to his face as she tried to read if that was indeed his intention.
His shadowed features were as impassive as ever, the glint of his metallic eyes as unfriendly as if they were enemies again, and Sakura recoiled from him slightly, a fresh stinging push of guilt biting through her chest. She felt something in her heart plead for her to lie, to capitulate and bend for the sake of both saving her own life and for the plan she'd been determined to follow through with; a plea for her to pretend, so that their bond might be at least superficially repaired. There was so much at stake, but Sakura's jaw set stubbornly as she frowned at Madara. She had refused to lie to him before; she would not lie to him now.
"Look…" Sakura drew in a shaky breath, silently willing the right words to come to her lips. "I can't apologise for the fight we had. I won't." She searched Madara's cold stare, finding not even a hint of warmth in his strange metallic eyes. "I still don't believe that the Infinite Tsukuyomi is the right way for peace. I can't; not now, when I know Black Zetsu wasn't lying." She released a breath in a white puff, afraid enough of Madara's impending reaction that she hurried with her admittance, "They might all live a temporary peace, and I will admit to you that I understand why you pursued it. I recognise its beauty in how it has made everyone equally happy, how there's no war beyond what's left of us awake. You're right—" Her brows furrowed as she searched Madara's guarded expression, " —you're right that it's a world of only love, and I would believe in it with you if it weren't for two things. First, that they're dying, like Black Zetsu said. Second…" Sakura took in a deep breath as she reached out to him again, her fingers sliding along his wrist as she went on, "Second, that as idealistic as those dreams might be, they pale in comparison to reality. Peace has to be possible in a living, conscious world. It's worth pursuing, still."
Sakura looked down at where her hand slid along the side of Madara's. "If we hung there in dreams," she said quietly, her pale thumb tracing the back of his gloved hand, "I wouldn't be here with you now, as we are. None of this would have happened. I'd never have dreamt of this; an ideal dream couldn't predict our reality, and that's a good thing," she persisted, her fingers tightening over his hand before letting go, her arms folding over her chest. "The dream I would have had," Sakura finished, meeting Madara's eyes once more with a creeping redness across her cheeks, "would never have even compared."
Sakura felt the tiniest thrill of hope upon seeing the lines that drew between Madara's brows in response to her passionate entreaty. The shadows in his expression deepened; he frowned down at her, his deep rumble echoing throughout the empty shrine behind Sakura. "You simply haven't lived long enough to understand. You," he told her, narrowing his eyes, "have lived a soft, easy life. Yet unjaded, you are blind to the true horrors of this world. You do not understand that it will never have true peace beyond the dreams that they live now, no matter the moments in reality that you perceive as worth fighting for." He leaned against the doorframe, long fingers indenting the wood. "It has been proven time and time again that shinobi strive for fighting and bloodshed. The wars will never end… in fact, failed truce after failed truce, war has only gotten more violent."
"That doesn't mean it's impossible to stop the cycle of violence," Sakura protested, gripping her arms tightly, "I lived a relatively easy life because of the vision of peace that you and the First Hokage created. Konohagakure."
Madara scowled. "A failed experiment." Sakura broke her hold on herself, gesturing at him angrily. "It didn't fail! You just gave up on it. Is it really better for all those shinobi and civilians alike to die, rather than to keep trying for peace and live?" She held her ground, the sun catching in her fierce green eyes as she met his stare levelly. He eyed her as she stood tall, all her honesty afire in her expression, her ardent words hanging between them.
After a pause, Madara shook his head. "You will not convince me, woman." He tapped his fingers along the cracked doorframe. Sakura stilled as his tone softened somewhat, blinking up at him as he went on, "I don't need you to believe in the Infinite Tsukuyomi. It is already cast, and there is nothing you can do to stop it anyway." Madara closed his eyes with finality. "It does not matter to me that you do not agree with its existence."
Sakura parted her lips to speak, her expression twitching between frustration and anger, and Madara interrupted her. "I do, however, demand that you are loyal to me." His voice deepened as he overshadowed her completely, blocking out whatever sunlight had reached her before. "You are no longer a part of Team Seven. You are not beholden to any of them: not Naruto, Sasuke, Kakashi, nor Obito."
Madara's powerful eyes kept Sakura pinned where she stood, his commanding tone surrounding her. "You are not even a Konoha kunoichi anymore. No…" He brought a gloved hand along the fine curve of her jaw, his slightly luminescent eyes narrowing upon her dangerously. "You are mine, and mine alone."
Sakura's pulse throbbed high in her throat, her heart sinking down into a churning pit of conflict below. She swallowed, paling beneath Madara's intense scrutiny.
No, she was still all of those things, no matter what he told her, but his tone was that of an imperious command, implicit with the risks should she deny his rumbling declaration. Sakura's breaths came short, unsteady and inconstant. Perhaps his previous insistence to show with touch rather than speak was helpful here, where she did not want to confirm nor deny what he'd said. She never wanted a betrayal to her village or team to leave her lips, even as a lie, though it was clearly what he was asking of her now. The command he'd given her was implicit with the demand that she reciprocate with her affirmation that he was right.
Touch was far preferable, and Sakura reached up decisively. She seized the dark fabric of Madara's wide collar, pulling herself up against his chest and tilting her face along his, kissing him soundly. Her pulse raced as his lips quirked beneath hers, hope pounding beneath her ribs as she felt his hands sliding into place around her waist. For the briefest of moments, she closed her eyes with the slight yielding of his mouth along hers, breathing in the familiar smoky warmth of his skin, ready to give in and forget their conversation for now.
She let out a sound of disapproval as he shook her off again, though his metallic eyes sparked with renewed heat as he looked at her then. "No. This is a time that you tell me instead." Sakura released Madara's robe with an embarrassed huff, warmth circling red in her cheeks. "What do you even want me to say?" she asked frustratedly, hating how much she wished that he had accepted her physical answer and invited more rather than persisting with this subject.
A possessive darkness shadowed Madara's vivid stare. His voice was a velvet purr as he leaned over Sakura, the serrated outline of his towering form her only view. "Dedicate yourself to me."
The colour drained from Sakura's face when she met his simmering stare, as if he'd stolen the colour from her features himself. Her lips parted, and no sound came out, her throat tight and her thoughts troubled. Sakura quickly bit down on her hesitation upon seeing the dangerous flash behind Madara's glare, and she knew that she could not say no. She couldn't tell him what she really thought: I am not a belonging. I am loyal to my village, and I won't truly betray them or my team. Knowing that she didn't want to betray Madara either made it all the more difficult, putting her in a conflicted space that felt confined from all sides.
Sakura knew that if she was honest with Madara about this, she would be cast aside without question, and all her hopes to peacefully end the war would die with her.
This was the point in which everything would begin or end, and she ducked her head, taking in a slow breath to calm herself. She couldn't bring herself to lie to him that she was going to turn against those she loved, no matter how much it might please him to hear. Sakura bit down on her natural urge to declare her loyalty to her team and village, and her hands flashed outwards, gripping Madara's sleeves and steadying herself; she held on to him as if he might disappear in light of her hesitation to answer.
Feeling the seconds pass with increasing weight, Sakura thought of a way to try and express what Madara wanted without lying to him. She exhaled softly, her fingers shaking slightly in the tight grip she had on his sleeves. "Not as your follower," she said, her stare on his boots beginning to harden as her voice grew steadier. "Not as your student, or your prisoner, nor as your servant." She stepped closer, breathing a little harder, her eyes travelling up to his waist and dragging higher. "If you will accept that I am not your underling, then…"
Then this might work. Then, perhaps, you will someday listen to me as someone you value. When that day comes, you will also accept that you cannot change who or what I am. Sakura lifted her head, her heart resounding. She met Madara's eyes, her voice steady and her back strong. "Then I'll stand by your side unquestionably."
Madara met Sakura's unwavering gaze with a calculating expression. Sakura hid her heart-pounding terror of his impending rejection behind her confident veneer, unfaltering in the tense silence between them. She had meant every word she'd said, and it helped her to withstand his intense scrutiny.
Gradually, Madara's features relaxed as he observed her. He tilted his head slightly as a mocking edge glinted in his Rinnegan eyes. "You are not my equal." Sakura's frown deepened as he stepped back with a hum. "You will give me a more thorough promise of your loyalty to me soon. However… I will accept your answer for now."
Sakura shivered, trying to hide her immense relief as she hugged herself. She'd managed to repair their rapport, though thinly, and her blood still raced with adrenaline, panicked and heated. She tried to just be glad that she'd staved off the rest of that difficult subject for a future date, having pleased Madara in the moment with her confident answer… but she still felt a deep unease. She did want to stand at his side, but doing so went against her loyalty to the rest of the people she loved. Guilt fuelled the conflict in her heart that only clashed harder after their terse exchange. How long until he would see through her and understand that she still cared for her team? That she didn't know what she would do if they had a battle here and now?
Sakura closed her eyes at the horrifying thought of that. She was torn: she would defend her teammates with her life, but she didn't want to see Madara hurt either, knowing she would defend him as well. What would she do? Stressed, she breathed harder, sweating along her neck and palms, trying not to think about it and failing as her heart ached in her chest.
She startled upon seeing the black-gloved palm that hovered before her, and looked up with wide eyes to see that Madara was offering his hand to her. "Come."
She searched his face for a moment, her gaze meeting his sun-touched eyes, finding that buried warmth again. With the stress receding to a heated ache between her heartbeats, Sakura slipped her palm over Madara's, allowing him to lead her out of the shadows and back into the sunlight.
She blinked at the little Japanese house, stunned. It was elegantly simple in design, and clearly new; its wood was perfectly cut and lacking the weathering of age, with greenery growing up around it eagerly in fresh shoots of green beside tall stalks of meadow grass. It stood across the meadow from the shrine atop the grassy hill, and she knew for a fact that it had not existed before she had stormed into the shrine a mere hour or so ago.
"You…" Sakura brought wide eyes back to Madara. "...can just… summon that with Wood Style?"
"It's not difficult." Madara turned from her, his Six Paths robes swishing about his tall frame, and Sakura followed him through the rippling tall grass with a light protest. "Wait, but it is difficult. I know someone with Wood Style and he's mentioned it's very tiring to create entire buildings."
"He must not be a very skilled Senju, then."
"He's not a Senju. It's complicated," Sakura answered, remembering what she'd seen of Yamato's Tsukuyomi dream and blinking it away. Upon seeing the Uchiha symbol printed above the door of the elegant house, she stopped, her heart wrenching her while she made a wry, bittersweet smile.
Madara paused where he had been leading the way, eyeing her impatiently. "What?"
Sakura glanced at him, trying to hide the emotion from her expression. Pain rose in clouds through her mind's eye as she listened to her old dreams dying, giving way to the new ones that grew through the back of her heart.
She swallowed, wanting to hide how strangely glad and upset the sight of the Uchiha-stamped house had made her. "It's old-fashioned." Madara's eyes narrowed as Sakura's smile grew, her voice teasing. "...Like you."
"Do not try to tease me about age. You are still a child, yourself." Sakura's smile turned over into a scowl; she folded her arms in a huff. "I am not."
Madara scoffed while Sakura quickly adjusted back to putting her hands on her hips, realising she had played into his point. She bit her lip coyly, meeting his dark stare. "I thought you had well familiarised yourself with the fact that I am very much a woman, not a child."
Sakura laughed a little breathlessly as he arched a brow, her cheeks reddening; she pushed a hand through her loose pink hair and looked away.
She was disappointed when Madara returned his attention to the house instead of pushing the subject. He gestured towards it with a dismissive hand. "It is only temporary and I will be destroying it after we are finished with it. Make use of it for now."
Sakura stepped towards it eagerly, but paused, pivoting to look at him. "What will you be doing?"
"Hunting."
She swallowed, shifting where she stood and tabling her curiosity of the house's interior for a later time. "I'll join you, then."
Madara shook his head, gripping a long black staff she hadn't noticed him summoning. "No."
"Why?" Sakura resisted stamping her foot, folding her arms frustratedly instead. "I know how to hunt. I won't get in the way."
Ignoring her, Madara advanced towards the treeline, and Sakura gripped her arms with frustration. "I might not have Uchiha eyes, but I'm good at foraging! I could help. I know I could be useful. I'll even be quiet, since you apparently hate conversation so much."
"You are a distraction."
Sakura's annoyance remained until Madara disappeared into the trees. The colour returned to her cheeks as his words repeated in her head, and she stared after him a moment longer, inclining her head with the slightest smile. So it wasn't her lack of skills or how much she talked. It was that she was distracting.
Sakura rubbed at her hot cheeks, forcing back the thought that she could follow him before turning and striding towards the elegant house. She would not follow. She had declared to him and to herself that she was not any kind of follower. Besides… what was wrong with her? She hated hunting.
She had dedicated herself, however, and Sakura slipped a hand over her forehead as she slid the door open and stepped inside. She closed her eyes as the cooler air soothed her heated skin, and she leaned back against it after shutting it behind her, wondering when her head had started spinning with adrenaline. Her pulse was quick like she'd been in a battle rather than a passing conversation.
Sakura passed herself through a thorough diagnostic check, finding nothing wrong but the inexplicable rapid beating of her heart.
She shook her head at herself. Maybe Madara was right that she was still a child if she felt like this just by being near him. How far gone was she? She hadn't pushed herself this far just to catch feelings like an infatuated schoolgirl; she was here with her unshakeable resolve to find a way to end this war for good. She tried to just be glad that her heartfelt words earlier had been enough to convince him that she was loyal to him, trying not to think about how passionate she'd felt and what that meant for her own intentions.
Perhaps she was still just overwhelmed from her realisations in the shrine, and the way he had purred the words dedicate yourself to me. Sakura let out a hot breath and shook her head at herself before looking around the beautiful little house with more attention. She admired the symmetry and strangely authentic craftsmanship she knew was really just from the wood growing into exact shapes rather than from being hand-constructed.
The distraction worked for only a moment before the heat returned to her cheeks — you are mine alone, came his velvet words through her mind, and with a frustrated scowl, Sakura flicked herself in the temple. You shouldn't have made that promise to Madara.
You're a traitor. She could hear Sasuke's echo, and she shook her head, feeling her stomach flip. She turned towards a slim hall, seeking a washroom; she needed to splash herself with cold water to cool her hot cheeks and process what exactly she had just done.