It was a rare occurrence that Sakura did not haul a wounded person inside.
The moment she got a clear look at the man suspended between the arms of two others, she nearly paled. She thought of the samurai, and subsequently that his bones were still out there under the earth of her clearing. The first of them, but certainly he hadn't been the last.
From the way Okojo had tensed up and did not follow her, she swore to herself she wouldn't let this man be the next.
"On the ground," she commanded. "Gently." To the boy she called out instruction that shouldn't have been needed, but his shock was evident. She knew even without confirmation that she must be about to operate on his second remaining brother. When she gave a pointed look high over her shoulder to Madara, he gathered its meaning in the instant, dashing towards the shack to fetch clean cloths and jarred herbs.
She set right to work, ripping the man's bloodstained clothes to examine a gruesome gash along his side as she steadied her free hand at his heart—at the seat of his soul—where the flame of his life's force flickered with surprising strength, not struggling to stay alive as she might've imagined. With pursed lips she peered down through narrowed eyes, examining.
The slice across his left side was deep, but was already beginning to clot and stitch itself together—though slowly, and that seemed to be the main source of the bulk of his pain. There was a curious mark on his wrist, almost like twine had wrapped around it and squeezed so tightly that it'd left burn-like scars there. She delved deep into him with her monitoring chakra, finding his torn organs faring less well. With something for her to focus on, however, her confusion was pushed to the corners of her mind.
Madara had returned with damp cloths and wasted no time in wiping away blood, grime, and sweat from the other man. The former's hair was crusted in patches with blood—his own or another's, she couldn't say, and she fought off a convulsion to remember his awesome violence that she'd once beheld. As she stitched together a glancing cut along the man's liver and checked for infection, one of the other soldiers groaned and nearly collapsed, propped up by the fourth.
It seemed that Okojo had overcome whatever fear had taken root in him; he was crossing the clearing and helping the other injured man to the ground in an instant. Through labored breaths and with a tight voice the man said,
"Got you"—his wince was audible—"doing the women's work..."
Though she did not turn her head, Sakura sent her glare down at the split and bruised skin on which she worked. Tsunade-shishou would've hit any one who dared say something so stupid, as if any woman anywhere could heal without much in the way of practice. As if it were merely their nature, incapable of offense and defense in favor of a gentler art.
Madara hadn't even looked up to see the anger on her face. "Save your strength, Father. Do not speak."
Father. Sakura's heart sputtered as she moved on to check the condition of her patient's kidneys. She couldn't stop herself from shifting her gaze to where the boy was hard at work, the center of his tongue ringed with white for how hard his mouth was set around it as it poked through his lips. The man whom he was healing—their father—was so like them that it was a wonder she hadn't noticed the relation immediately. Even with his eyes squeezed shut in pain she could see the way they were set in his face, a mirror image of his eldest right down to the indents of stress and age darting from their corners.
Madara had padded over to them, tried to wipe at their father's face who, Sakura could see from her peripheral vision, weakly reached up to swat his hand away.
"She has...even hypnotized my eldest to—to do her bidding."
"Do not speak," repeated Madara, his tone dark. "I will not tell you again."
Sakura's discomfort gave way to an awkward feeling. Being caught between family squabble was not on her ever-growing list of strange things to expect in her time here. She tried to shift her attention back to her charge, noting with a small satisfaction that his breathing had eased. Her work on his inner organs complete, she then set upon removing any trace of budding infection before she re-tore the wound to heal it properly; his hunched-over posture from being carried here had made the skin mend in a way that was so wrong it was almost fascinating, sticking to itself where it should not be. The little tears along its edges were constant and must be causing him a great deal of pain.
"What is she doing—to my boy?"
"Keeping him alive." A modicum of patience had returned to Madara's voice. "Izuna will be all right, thanks to her."
She pressed the name to the forefront of her mind. Izuna. "I'll need to re-open his cut."
Simultaneously Madara and his father spoke, a clash of, Do what you must and Absolutely not! But it was the third man—silent until now—who spoke up as the mediator.
"Tajima-sama," he said, and Sakura would swear that she recognized his voice, "you must not cross her. I beg you to recall our report of her strength."
But the old man scoffed. "Acid-spitter, root-charmer, Sharingan-breaker. Nonsense, the lot of it."
Sakura's irritation grew as fast as her guilt. So one of the men who'd been sent to kill her—and by the events unfolding at present, she was sure she knew by whom—was here again, nearly face-to-face with the woman who'd killed three of his comrades. She bit at the inside of her cheek, letting herself focus instead that the Uchiha clan head did not believe in her skill.
"It is good, Tajima-dono," she said loud enough for all to hear, "that little Okojo has brought back your strength enough for your words to be so steady."
If the insult was caught, he did not comment on it—she could feel his angered gaze boring into her skull, though. She sent chakra to her fingertips and sharpened it in the same moment, readying her hand at the proper angle to tear open Izuna's poorly-healed gash. She kept the palm of her other hand close by on his abdomen to help soothe the ensuing sting.
"Just a bit more, Izuna-san," she cooed gently as she sliced him open. He gave a half-whimper, his face contorted in pain as more sweat began to bead at his temples. "You're doing great."
Okojo had returned, his face pale and anxious even in the dark of night. And where his father's breaths had evened, the boy's had thickened. He signed close enough for her to see on the edges of her vision, — is feeling better.
She pieced together that the sign she did not know meant Father.
"That's good. I'm proud of you, sweet thing." She looked up to give him a brief smile, trying to offer him comfort and stability where she could. "How are you feeling?"
There was a great pause, his hesitance likely attributed to the presence of his father. His next hand signs were small, subdued. I'm afraid.
"Your big brother will be fine. I'm already stitching him back up, see?"
The boy nodded, some of his fringe falling loose from its pile atop his head and obstructing his eyes. His shoulders gave small heaves as if he were crying, and she wished more than anything that she could take him in her arms.
Luckily, Madara was there to act where she was otherwise too occupied. He sat cross-legged—Sakura did not miss the pained grunt he gave at the effort, likely concealing his own injuries beneath his battle robes—and scooped the boy into his lap, holding him close. Okojo was too big for such a thing, but he didn't seem to mind as he tossed his arms around his eldest brother's neck and buried his face somewhere in that thick mane of his hair. He did not weep, but Sakura could see the tension release from both of them at the contact.
"I missed you," she heard Madara murmur as she eased the swelling near her chakra stitches. "Your hair looks like it's grown long as mine. Will you show me?"
It was as Okojo shuffled to his feet and let down his hair that Izuna cracked open his eyes, coal-black again for his exhaustion, his breaths strained not from pain but with the recollection of pain, apprehensive to feel it again. She glanced down at him to offer a small smile, but before she could manage it her heart leapt into her throat.
He looked so much like Sasuke that she nearly burst into tears then and there. The softness of his features that seemed somehow sharp both at once, eyes that seemed more in the realm of sleepy than Madara's tired touched something deep within her. Somewhere in time, her friends were caught in a monstrous genjutsu having the life stolen from their very bones—and Sasuke had only just returned to them, she recalled. She grit her teeth against the painful memory just as Izuna breathed,
"Of course." There was a small smirk on his face, ghost of a thing, as she leaned in and tilted her ear towards him to hear him better. "Someone like him...'course he'd fall for a girl who's—barely even human."
Her blood iced over in her veins. She whipped her head to stare wide-eyed down at him, but he had already closed his eyes once more and was drifting into an easy sleep. When she glanced around the clearing, no one else seemed to be paying them much mind, let alone heard what he'd said.
Madara was combing his fingers through some stray tangles in Okojo's hair. The other man—whom she'd fought all that time ago now—had approached them and gave a shallow bow. Sakura tried not to eavesdrop with intent, but they all sat in such close proximity that it was unavoidable. The man was pointedly not looking in her direction, and speaking of leaving for home within the hour.
"Absolutely not," said Madara, his tired voice still holding striking authority. "We stay for the night, at least. My father needs to recover as much as Izuna. You yourself should let her tend to your—"
"I mean no disrespect," said the man in a hurry, "but I am faring quite well."
Madara's gaze flicked to Sakura's for the flash of a moment before returning to his clansman's. "As you say. Take my father and head northwest. You will come upon a river; freshen up. You may make camp there as well, if you wish."
"But he—"
"Is disoriented from his injuries and not yet in his right mind. As acting clan head, my order is this: we stay. Fetch me at once if he gives you any trouble."
The man gave a small sigh of defeat before nodding and doing as commanded. Sakura stood to stretch and catch Okojo's attention, instructing him in small hand signs to take his recovering brother inside. He was returning to his usual self now that the stakes seemed to be so much less than they were only minutes ago, and she caught the way Madara's brows raised to see the boy's strength on display, able to haul a grown person in his small arms with ease. The older men shuffled off towards the riverbank, leaving Madara and Sakura alone together again.
He was watching her from where he sat on the dark grass. She swallowed, an influx of conflicting emotions hitting her all at once. Relief and attraction to see him again, alive and well, mingled in her belly with fear and a startling amount of contempt. She shut her eyes against it, swallowing once and reminding herself that he was not yet that man she'd known.
She bit down the voice inside her that whispered of his potential.
But he'd stood in a flash, strode to her side and was pulling her by the arm and into his crushing hold in the very next instant. She breathed him in, the seared fabric and the dried blood and the campfire scent of him. The passing seconds she counted by the beat of his heart, strong in her ear as she leaned into his embrace, one arm wrapped tightly around her middle that she returned with both of hers.
"You could bury me," he murmured into the top of her head, "if it would please you."
She pulled back to search his face. "What do you—"
"My father's behavior," he clarified, that crease returned between his brows. "I apologize. He does not trust outsiders, and sees you in particular as..."
He did not go on, and she heard the long-gone echoes of the men who'd attacked her that night. Witch, they'd whispered like she was a curse to even behold. Look at her face.
When she brought up a hand to touch her yin seal with her fingertips, Madara tilted his head, his eyes scanning the sides of her neck. "Your power has grown."
"Yes," she said in reply, her heart breaking a bit. Hadn't it only grown after she'd failed to save a life, and then again after taking so many others? "But it—I...I should be the one apologizing to you. The man tending to your father, he..."
"I am aware," he said quietly when she did not continue.
"I've killed your kin." There was a bitterness laced through her tone. "Your father has every right to—"
"He sent them in the first place," Madara hit back, his volume threatening to rise. "I did what I could to talk him down from it, but he does not often see reason. And the branch families..." He glanced away, the crease between his brows deepening. "They will do anything my father asks to garner his good favor. I will not fault you for defending yourself."
It didn't help, not much, to know that they were sent by a man aggrieved, misreading the situation entirely and so convinced of his own views that he could not even be swayed. She'd never felt comfortable with taking life, only nurturing it and, within the last two years, providing it. The soldiers were resting in their final places not far from where she stood with their clan's heir right here and now, and sometimes—if she concentrated hard enough—she could feel the bones poking at the dirt as if they were poking at her skin.
"I gave them full funerary rites," she said, as if it would help ease her stormy thoughts.
"Your thoughtfulness in such strenuous circumstances is appreciated." He smiled down at her, but then there was a small, pained grunt in his throat that he tried to stifle.
"Don't think I haven't noticed your condition," she said then, grateful for another distraction. "You're hurt. Sit."
His smirk still managed to seem sincere in spite of the pain he was in, his eyes closed and a small hiss of air coming through his nose to mark his small half-laughter. "Of course. I was a fool to think I could get away with it for long."
"At all," she corrected as she guided him down to the ground, his palm hot in hers.
She held out her hands—and she had never been so self-conscious of the rich blue stripes lining her arms as she was now—and reached for the braided cords that held his battered chestplate in place. With as much gentleness as she could manage she tugged at their knots, one by one, until they loosened. She pulled at the back end as he took the front of it with a wince and another small grunt.
"Let me do the work of it," she chided softly. She glanced up at him as she placed the thin armor beside them, then made to pull the belt around his waist from its fastening. "Tell me what happened."
He'd leaned back a bit to allow her better access to him; she had to fight to keep from blushing as she pulled the nearly pristine cloth from around his body. "A skirmish turned bloodbath. The main family of our clan's most hated enemy turned up to the battleground. They are of equal skill to my father and brother, but their heir..."
Sakura was listening intently as he let her pull apart his high-collared robes, freeing his arms and exposing his upper body to her. She frowned to see him dotted with blooming bruises deep in color, but had to give him credit: she hadn't realized his shoulder had been almost entirely dislodged—and like Izuna, it had begun to heal in the wrong place. She clicked her tongue at him, but knew now was not the time. "Their heir is better even than you?"
His nod was heavy, expression solemn in the glow of her healing hands. "To my shame. But he is a humble sort. It is hard not to feel lesser-than in his presence."
She frowned, confused. "You would speak so fondly of him?"
"I am fond of him," he started, "about as much as I loathe him, though Father would kill me himself to hear me say so. Perhaps it was the sprint here while wounded, or that your hands are the best thing I've felt in months...but I see no use in censoring myself at present."
"You won't be saying so in just a moment." She'd determined the proper angle to re-set his shoulder, pushing at him lightly to test its pliancy. "This will be unpleasant."
"Do what you must."
She lifted his arm at the elbow, held it out straight and pulled it in front of him. He gave another wince, visibly trying not to groan as she applied the proper pressure, channeling healing energy through him to help alleviate the pain. Then she snapped it into place as the joint gave an audible pop, the tension all but flying from Madara's face shortly thereafter.
He tested the limb, keeping his arm outstretched after she'd taken her hand away. She watched with a hooded gaze as he flexed his fingers, curled them into a fist—she was very much entranced by the workings of his bones beneath the flesh and the way the muscles in his upper arm bulged slightly.
"Thank you," he said, his fringe fallen over his face.
"Not done yet," she murmured, putting her palms against the bruises on his ribs. His skin was warm, and she was mere seconds away from leaning in to kiss at his collarbone when his hand snatched her wrist.
"Save your strength," he said quietly, his eyes holding hers. "I can weather a few bruises."
"It's a bit more than a few," she huffed with a pout.
"Some are already healed, along with a fair amount of cuts." He glanced away, their tension broken. "The same happened to my brother. I...Truly, I thought we would lose him before..."
When he did not go on, she filled in the silence. "I didn't realize you'd learned medical ninjutsu." Was he to blame for his brother's badly-healed gash?
"I didn't." He looked up and was watching her with an expression she could not name. "Ever since I left this place last year, my wounds mend themselves. My conclusion was that it was the hair you'd gifted me when we parted. So today, when Izuna fell, I..." He sucked in a great breath, the memory paling him. "I really thought it was the end for him. I untied the braid from my wrist and set it around his instead—it melted, dissolved into his skin like a salve. His breath steadied and the pain seemed to ease, though he was still delirious and feverish."
She felt mystified to hear about a power she hadn't been aware of. Long-distance healing was tricky on its own, but for a piece of herself to maintain her aura enough to ward off death itself? It would explain the burn-like marks on his wrist, too. She leaned in subconsciously.
"So you have saved the lives of two of my brothers," he said, "and through Okojo, my father's life, as well."
It was only just then that she realized her wrist was still caught in his hand. He was running his thumb slowly along her pulse, and she could feel it begin to beat wildly through her—and judging by his reaction, he could feel it, too. She knew without seeing that her blush was deep across her face.
"Why so shy?" he asked suddenly, just a hint of flirtatious mischief to his tone. "Surely I'm not the first good-looking man you've put your hands on."
A small burst of laughter left her, breathy for how her head was starting to spin. She shifted, throwing one of her legs over him to pull herself into his lap. "No," she said, matching his energy, "you're not. But I hope that, just because of what you saw that first night, you haven't supposed that I've fucked a slug, either."
His own laughter was low and rich, and somehow she was aware that it was a privilege to be allowed to hear it. He rested his hand somewhere at her hip, the other on her thigh. "Truthfully, I didn't know what to make of your condition."
"I'd be suspicious if you had," she said, opening her eyes to shoot him a playful glare. She reached out to push the hair from his face, relishing in the way he relaxed into her touch. How could such a gentle man be turned into the brutal warmonger she'd seen?
"What do I need to do," he asked slowly, "to get you out of your robes?" His fingertips were ghosting up the curves of her, the lightest of touches she'd ever felt. He cupped her jaw, the brush of her hair tickling her neck as he traced the stripes lining her. "I want to see how far these go."
She shivered, goosebumps breaking over her arms and legs. She definitely didn't see how he could be anything other than this. "I was worried you might find them repulsive."
"The seat of your power?" He ran his thumb along her lower lip. "Repulsive? Do not be nonsensical."
But that had caught her attention. She looked down at him, still dirtied from the battle from which he and his family had fled. "What do you mean?" She guided his thumb up to the center of her forehead. "All of my chakra is stored here, not those stripes."
"Sakura," he said lowly, and the sound of her name on his tongue shook her to her core, "you have no chakra."
Her limbs went numb. Izuna's weak words echoed in her mind, sending a tremor down her spine. Barely even human. She struggled to swallow, her heart sinking and her stomach feeling hollow—and of course that was when she remembered that she hadn't been eating much of anything at all lately.
"No chakra," she repeated, and from Madara's reaction she knew that her budding fear was evident to him. "And you saw this with your kekkei genkai?"
He was regarding her seriously when he nodded. "The Sharingan cannot be fooled. Though it was puzzling, at first: when I found you last year, you were radiating strength—but what chakra you had was exceedingly little. Then, tonight..." He seemed to be trying to find the right words. "Tonight the whole forest seemed alight through my eyes. My father signaled for us to halt before we broke into your clearing, for Izuna and I could see you shining bright as the sun, but Father and Ren saw nothing. He thought perhaps we were walking into a trap."
There in his arms, Sakura had all but stopped breathing. Memories sat on the outskirts of her mind, darting away like scattering bugs each time she turned her focus to them. Having such little chakra did make sense—she remembered how useless she'd felt as a genin, her only strengths being how precisely she could tune that chakra and keeping what she did have stored away in her forehead. She thought of the words of the Great Snake, sending a chill down her spine. If she was able to exercise her power without chakra, then would that not mean—
"I tried, you know," he said, seemingly terribly sentimental all of a sudden. "In what spare time I had, I tried to look for a remedy to your predicament. Even just an explanation, I thought, would suffice. It was our clan's onjin who told me of the Great Sages and those who serve as vessels of their natural energy, the antithesis of chakra. I didn't fully understand it as Granny Cat described until I saw you this night, like I'd been blind to it before.
"I wish I'd known," concluded Madara quietly, "that I'd had the honor of lying with a sage."
She wanted only to feel touched by his gesture, wanted to get lost in the imagery of him scouting to and fro just for her, but all she could see was Naruto and his ocean-blue eyes turned gold as if someone had poked holes through them and drained out the water. His pupils, too, had changed—toad-like and wholly inhuman. Orange flanked the corners up to his browline like he was an actor in a stage play. Blessed, she recalled then, by Gamamaru, the eldest and wisest of the Great Sages.
Tears stung in her eyes. She was sick to all of the hells and back of crying and near-crying, but she could not stop the creeping onset of the notion that what she was still missing was irreplaceable.
"Forgive me." His voice was a low rumble, soothing her. "I did not mean to upset you."
"No," she offered with a little shake of her head. "It's just that it's—it's like trying to recall a dream, always out of reach. Forgetting something important."
She shut her eyes and leaned her forehead against his temple. Why hadn't she realized it sooner, the extent of her connection to the ward of these woods, the Great Slug itself? Especially after her visit from the old snake, no matter how cryptic it'd been. And if, from the view of the Sharingan, she and the forest shared the same energy, it only made sense that she had been drawing her power from it all this time, letting it become her as much as she and the slugs she'd brought with her had become part of it.
Why, then, could she not think of the Slug's name?
"Are you all right?" he asked, barely above a whisper but snapping her out of her daze as if he'd clapped his hands. He'd brought up his fingers to caress her face, same as he'd done the night they'd spent together when the river had overflowed. Gently he pried her from him, the intensity of his gaze clear to her even before she opened her eyes to return it.
The memory from the future of his bloated body struck her then. She flinched, but then was overcome with resolve. Even without all of the answers she so desperately wanted, she knew at least one thing: with some of them, she could adequately warn Madara of his future demise. Unsure, though, of how she may have already altered the flow of time, she needed to be crafty—if not overly careful.
"I'll be fine." She stood from him, straightening her robes. "Can you walk?"
He eyed her curiously, hefting himself to his feet and retying the sash around his waist. "I feel better than when I arrived, for certain. Where are we headed?"
She rounded back to the hut, poking her head inside to find Okojo signing down at Izuna, who watched him through half-lidded eyes with a small smile on his face from where he lie on one of the cot. The boy caught sight of her and offered a little wave.
"Stay inside," she instructed, mindful of her volume. "And monitor his temperature, okay? Your other brother and I will return shortly."
When she took Madara by the hand, he did not protest. She led him towards the faintly glowing river, going upstream from where she could see through the eyes of the forest that his father was washing the blood from his clothes and hair. They passed near where his clansman named Ren was standing as if on watch, shortsword clutched tightly in one hand, his body not yet washed. Around one of his ankles were barely-healed burns—scars, she knew, from where her roots had gripped him and begun to seep acid into his skin.
"There is no need for him to be on guard," she whispered to Madara, blinking away the unpleasant memory. "Nothing that means any harm can get in anymore."
But Madara only shrugged and offered a few slow shakes of his head. "It is where he is comfortable. There isn't anything to be done about it."
She allowed him some time to stop and clean his own face and untangle the dried grime in his hair, watching as he cupped his hands to pool the cool water between them and bring it to his mouth. When the knot at his throat tightened and bobbed, she, too, swallowed.
They hiked through the landscape through the same route she and his youngest brother had taken. She traced their path by the little gentle memories of him skipping along and pointing out plants here or there, the ones he didn't know very well or even at all, pausing to explain their names and properties to him. It reminded her, now, of Ino—she wouldn't know half as much about flowers without her best friend's expertise.
The air thinned just as it had the night before as they walked higher, the forest thinning. She found herself scanning the treeline, putting Madara on edge, she could tell, but she could not stop thinking of seeing the Great White Snake in her human visage. Was Sakura, perhaps, hoping to meet her again? As if she would provide anything other than more riddles...
They stepped out onto the rocky cliff. Chills broke along Sakura's arms; even though she'd been stunned at the view before, it now seemed touched by a magic far beyond her understanding. The river cut through the low valley, its glow a sight to behold in the dark. She hugged her arms across her chest to ward off the cold, the wind kicking up the low hem of her skirts. Her hair had already grown in the hour or so since she'd chopped it, blowing past her shoulders now, a far cry from the black, unruly crown of hair billowing around Madara.
He was watching her, and she sucked in a steadying breath.
"Last night," she started—and it seemed impossible for it to have only been one night ago—"I was visited by the White Snake Sage, right at this spot." She was staring out over the valley again, but though the night was cloudless, the sickle-moon was nowhere to be seen. It was instead in its first phase—or wasn't it also the last?—dark and hidden somewhere out there in the sky among all those hundred-million burning constellations. She lifted her hand, let her breath come heavy and strong through her nostrils. "She told me I've been traveling through time."
With focus she exhaled, sending her chakra—or rather, her natural energy—through her shoulder and down past her elbow, feeling it thread through the sinew of her forearm until a slug beaded through the bones in the back of her hand. It slithered up through her skin as she turned her hand palm-up, letting it nestle there, its chubby body clinging to the expanse of her arm.
When she turned to Madara, he was still watching her with such severity that she had to suppress a tremor. He tilted his head, taking a step towards her and, almost apprehensively, held out his own hand.
"May I?" he asked plainly.
She did not know why her heart soared at that. She extended her arm, a smile breaking over her face to see the little slug regarding him with the eyes atop its stalks. It inched from her palm to his like they'd formed their own bridge, sitting patiently as it wrapped itself around his forearm like it had to hers.
A red glow flashed to life in his eyes, black pinwheels spinning from their center. To see them set an anxiety alight in her belly, but she stuffed it down as best she could while his gaze flickered from the slug to her and back again, studying, scrutinizing.
"It's remarkable, truly," he said. "You, the slugs, the trees—even the river...your pathways are activated as if you're constantly using some jutsu." He moved to return her offspring to her, but she shook her head and gestured to let it go on the ground. From his haunches he continued, "Traveling through time...it is not unheard of. Is it so simple for a sage?"
She bit her lip, nervous. "I don't know how it is I'm doing it," she admitted. "But I know that I am because I—" The words were hard, her throat tight—but there was no other way to say it, was there? "I knew you, then."
He did not look up at her, not at first. He stayed there crouched on the rocky ground, watching her slug slowly make its way into the woods, its little glow like creeping candlelight in the dark. She shut her eyes for a brief moment, looking through the trees and back at her little hut where Okojo was now nestled in their brother's arms. Comforted, she blinked and returned her attention to Madara. With his face obscured by his wild hair, she felt her pulse threaten to start racing—and then he stood, the full height of him seeming so much more substantial as he looked down at her with those powerful red eyes.
"You knew me," he repeated flatly, trying not to betray what he might be feeling. He was so handsome and terrifying both at once, and she was silent for another moment longer as she tried to find her best course of action. Should she reveal too much, wouldn't she run the risk of leading him down the path that led to his gruesome death and the end of free human life in the entire world? "And this is why we feel so drawn to one another."
She shivered. He'd said it in equal parts as a question and a matter of fact; barely perceptible, the invisible thread connecting them seemed to thrum. When she gave him a slow nod he hummed somewhere low in his chest, taking a slight step towards her that felt like so much more.
"We were enemies," she tried, uncertain. "You had been resurrected and strung up as a puppet by something greater than us; unknowable."
"I don't understand," he said with furrowed brows. "Resurrection? Strung up by whom?"
"She is a terror." Sakura was staring up at him, her neck craned almost uncomfortably for how he seemed to tower over her. "Ancient as the world. Her offspring will try to use your empathy against you and twist it into hatred. In the era I've come from, they succeeded."
"You've done all of this to warn an enemy of these perils?" He sounded hurt, and her heart nearly leapt through her throat in a spike of panic. It hadn't been her intention to make him think that the night they'd spent together was her, too, using him.
"You were used," she breathed in a rush, "to herald an apocalypse disguised as peace." Inwardly she cursed herself for having such scant details, but the war had been nothing short of chaotic. During her time spent in the medic tents and, later, the battlefront itself, there wasn't time to make heads or tails of the specifics that led to the war itself. What she knew were bits and pieces—and combining those with what she knew now, she couldn't miss her chance. "I know that you—that she—"
Madara took her by her biceps then, his hold gentle despite the worried look on his face. "Be calm," he instructed, not unkindly. "This has not yet happened. I'm right here. We can fight this together, can't we?"
She let herself feel his touch and the comfort he was offering, letting it seep all the way into her core. His Sharingan eyes had deactivated, replaced by his natural stone-dark gaze. He was a good man, she knew, trying to soothe her troubled mind when his own was so clearly turbulent with all of these things she was saying. With this knowledge imparted to him, she was sure things could be different.
"Without the details of how I got here, I don't know how much time I have left," she said, glancing away. He was so close that she could feel her breasts pressing against his ribs. Her heart nearly tore in two at the thought that she might be ripped away from all of this at a moment's notice, something she hadn't ever had to consider before. "I know you don't want to see anymore needless death—and I know that you want peace. So please trust me when I tell you not to lose yourself in search of it."
His eyes were searching hers, and when they dropped to her parted lips she felt her throat go dry with need. How could she resist him any longer, their bodies pressed together and his strong hands on her arms and their destinies intertwined? In the same moment she pushed herself up on her toes, he leaned down: their lips met hungry and eager, the pull of tension between them easing like a sigh.
She wrapped her arms around his center, relishing in the sturdiness of his middle, strong as the unbending trunk of a tree. His hands danced from their place on her muscled arms and held her face instead, right at the curve of her jaw—his touch was so tender, such a stark contrast to the jaded and battle-worn man he had become.
When he pulled back slightly for air, she ached at the loss of him. She pushed back in with fervor, nipping lightly at his bottom lip. The almost-growl he gave in response made her ache in other places, the little flip in her stomach unmistakable as his hardness she could feel pressing against her.
I thought of you, a part of him murmured into her. Just as it'd been the first time, she could not tell if it was his voice or his mind. It didn't matter, not when he was here and whole and hers, ready to give himself to her as much as she was to him. Every day.
Yes, she answered as nudged his face to the side, kissing the side of his neck as she parted his robes and smoothed them from his shoulders. I missed you, too.
His skin was warm beneath her wandering palms, and he seemed to be enjoying her re-exploration of his body. There was a handsome smirk along his mouth, almost mischievous were it not for the hint of blush she could see at the tips of his ears and streaking along his cheekbones even in the dark of night.
"Why so shy?" she asked coyly, tracing the indents of his collarbone. The echo of his own words was not lost on him, a low rumble of quiet laughter rippling in his chest.
"Surely you're not oblivious to how intimidating you are." He gripped at her waist, tugging and sitting slowly so that she sat on his lap just as they had in her clearing. Mimicking her, he nestled his face to the crook of her neck to kiss at her there while his hands wandered down her curves to grip at her. "You've been blessed by a Great Sage, your power born of a different plane than my chakra."
She laughed, a bubbling elation in her bosom amplified by his squeezing hands. "No pressure at all."
He kissed her again, deep and primal, her center on fire as he ground himself up into her straddling thighs. She reached between them to tug at his belt, pushing apart his dark traveling kimono and his underrobe both. Pressing her forehead against his, she looked down and took his hot length in her hand and marveled at the way his mouth fell open and his breath hitched.
She closed her thumb and middle fingers around him and pumped once, slowly. He gave a low grunt, strained, and gave another buck of his hips. One of his hands flew up to her collar, stripping it from her neck and shoulder in one motion. The cold air prickled the sensitive skin of her exposed breast, heightened when he brushed the pad of his thumb over her puckered nipple.
"So they do go further," he said, the heel of his hand pressed flush to her ribs where her blue stripes crossed at the center. Without warning he hoisted one of her thighs, parting her skirts to run his fingers along the side—she could feel her own heat reflected along his fingertips as he dragged them down to the knee, stifling another moan as she stroked him just a bit faster. "Here, too."
There wasn't time for her to give any sort of response; he ducked his head to suckle at her as he had the first time. Without her mythical pregnancies to make them plump and heavy—at least by comparison to her usual anatomy—she wondered if he would be disappointed. The way he'd drank from her still made her head spin whenever she thought back on it, that persistent need in her to sustain life finally sated in a way that could not be otherwise replicated.
But here and now, Madara did not seem to mind. In fact, he seemed more passionate than ever, tonguing and biting at her, sucking even though there was nothing for him to swallow down. She was only vaguely aware of the small sway of her own hips there in his lap, the small pressure of grinding on his upper thigh almost hypnotic for how good it felt as she stroked him all the while.
When he looked up to kiss her again, his urgency shocked her. A wild tremor snaked through his cock against her palm, eliciting a needy whimper from her.
"You're wet for me," he murmured.
It maybe should've embarrassed her that he could feel her there on his bare thigh, but it instead sent a lightning-bolt of arousal through her. To hear such an inelegant description come from his otherwise stoic and composed voice made her stomach flip.
Emboldened, she shifted her weight and propped herself up on her knees. She broke the kiss only to assure her balance and that there was no stray fabric in the way, his arm still steadying her from its lock around her waist as she leaned forward enough for them to be chest-to-chest. The front of her folds slid against his length, hot and all hers and making her hiss in the pleasure of it. And then she angled her hips, feeling the head of him pierce her tight entrance.
Madara tilted his head back slowly as she brought herself down upon him, inch by excruciating inch. Even on the nights she allowed herself to get lost in fantasy, she hadn't been able to replicate the sensation of how he stretched her. His hold on her tightened further, possessive and protective, exerting the slightest of pressure to push himself even deeper into her. With one hand flat upon the ground and the other in his hair, she buried her face in his neck and began to fuck him.
It took one of her vertical thrusts to have him moaning into her ear. She held fast to him, their shared body heat almost too much even as they sat half-exposed to the chilly air of the mountain. He peppered feverish kisses along her temples and at the tips of her ears, flexing his hips in opposing tandem with hers; each time she brought herself down, he would thrust upwards, touching her deepest parts. She saw stars each time, dizzied by the intense pleasure as her clit ground against the flat of his stomach.
I really did miss you, she told him, her heart sputtering over itself. From his tired eyes and the gentle way he would study her to his powerful body holding hers like a treasure to his to his life besieged by tragedy and violence that was wearing his soul thinner and thinner by the hour.
For what seemed like the hundredth time that day, tears pooled in her eyes. She hated Kaguya more in this moment than she had when the false-goddess had descended into their world. It burned in her belly, overwhelming her from the inside out. To use a man who loved nothing more than his family—wanted nothing more than to end their useless suffering for a war they did not start—was beyond heinous.
"Don't cry," he said softly, his thrusts slowing and his hand running through her hair. He kissed her face, turned her head to look her in the eye. I am here with you, now. Nothing else matters. Not yet.
It was enough to renew the spark in her, eviscerating the melancholy that'd almost taken hold of her. She crushed her lips to his once more, bringing herself down and up and down upon him over and over, letting herself feel him inside her and all around her, encompassing all parts of her—as much herself as she was, their bodies and spirits linked at the most intimate levels possible.
I won't lose you again, she swore to him; a groan caught in his throat at that. I won't let her have you. I promise.
Somewhere around her, he nodded smally. She was still braced half on the ground and half on his chest, the scrapes forming on her knees from where they dug into the rock healing themselves already. She was losing herself to him, little by little and slowly but surely. With each thrust she ground herself against his middle, moving now in more circular motions, knowing her release would come sooner and harder through the external simulation.
There was a desperate sound from him then, enthralling and exhilarating as he clung to her. I trust you.
Was that all it took? Three simple sounds—but they'd spoken magnitudes. A great shiver shot down her spine, her insides contracting in time with the satisfying bursts beginning to radiate from the nub of her pleasure. Her hips bucked, all semblance of rhythm gone from her muscles as her body fought to draw out the orgasm for as long as possible. Her walls pulsed around Madara's member, thick and hot inside of her until he, too, pressed down upon her lower back, forcing himself deep up into her one final time.
A sheen of sweat covered his temples; he brought a goosebump-covered arm up to pull her in for an unceremonious kiss. Connected so intimately she could feel the wild pulse of him through his cock, his heart beating hard as a pounding drum in his chest against hers. His seed leaked from him in powerful spurts that made her shiver again, contentedness spreading through her as her climax started to fade.
He was still for a moment, catching his breath. When he planted a long kiss off-center of her chin, she hoisted herself from him and got to her feet. She stumbled a bit, her legs still weak and her sex still pulsing faintly as she pulled up her collar and re-situated her robes. The sensation of his essence leaking out of her was still unfamiliar, though not altogether unwelcome. It made her feel womanly; human.
Madara, in turn, took a few moments longer to collect himself. He took his hems and flipped them over his softening nakedness before he, too, stood. As he dusted off his backside and combed his finger through his hair, his eyes wandered back to her.
"Perhaps my father was right," he said, the teasing levity evident in his tone. "I don't know how it is you've done it, but I've been bewitched. I'm sure of it."
Her laugh was a loud thing, almost intrusive here in the deep quiet of night, a slight snort at the height of it. He smiled when he heard it, a light in his eyes that made her heart squeeze. Hopefully, she had taken away even just a bit of the stress from his mind. And, of course, had given him enough of a warning to keep him from the terrible fate that had befallen him.
She swallowed, looking through the eyes of the trees. Okojo was fiddling with his thumbs as he lie next to Izuna, both seeming comfortable enough were it not for the boy's restlessness.
"We should get back," said Madara, stealing the very words from her tongue. "I am...growing anxious to be in the company of my brothers once more."
They walked hand in hand through the night-dark woods, less of a hike and more of a stroll. She told him of Okojo's progress, beaming to speak of it as if he were her own son. Neither of them mentioned the possibility of their father dragging the boy back home with them, when it came time for them to leave—but she pushed the thought from her mind. She wouldn't let that happen, not unless it was what Okojo wanted.
He'd sat up and was waiting for them by the door as they approached, bouncing on his heels in his excitement to see them again. He ran to Madara and threw his arms around him, signing to him in wide motions while the eldest brother praised him quietly for his diligence.
It was as the boy turned to Sakura to tell her they should refresh the water in the basin before bed that Madara pinched the bridge of his nose, his frame drooping by a fraction that she did not miss.
"Rest," she commanded gently. "And take my futon. Okojo and I will be back in just a second."
His only protest was a small humph. That he wasn't fighting back was evidence of his exhaustion, she knew, and he slunk back into the alcove of her bedroom in a way that left her with a satisfying feeling budding in her chest. She took the basin in both hands and hauled it up to balance it on her hip, freeing a hand. Then she nodded to Okojo to signal she was ready.
"How are you feeling?" she asked, brushing back the hair from his face as they stepped down into the open air. "You've done a lot of hard work tonight."
He nodded slowly, trying to cut a yawn short. I'm okay. It will be crowded at home tonight.
She hummed in agreement, thinking on that. She would not put it past him to curl back up at Izuna's side, and it seemed more likely than not that Madara would sleep with her. The idea made her smile, girlish.
Will my father really sleep by the river? he wondered as the banks came into view.
"Seems that way." She shifted the basin to her front, holding it now with both hands. "Did you want him to come back to the hut, too?"
Maybe. He kept his eyes straight ahead, his brows furrowed. He isn't a very nice man, but he's still my father.
"Right," she said sadly. "Maybe we can convince him to be a little kinder. What do you think?"
He'd smiled a bit at that, nodding once as he reached out his hands. Can I pour out the dirty water this time?
Well, she couldn't well say no to that face, even if he was trying to deflect from the meat of the conversation. She passed him the bowl and watched as he darted ahead, kneeling to spill over its contents and watching the blood and grime be carried away downstream. Tajima and Ren had moved, consolidating their makeshift camp now that they were both washed, but lingering near enough to not be so far from the boys. She knelt at Okojo's side, who returned the basin to her so she could start scrubbing it clean.
He made a sound of surprise that made her glance up at him. I forgot to tell you about my dream, he signed.
So much had happened in the last few hours that she at first didn't piece together what was about to happen. "Oh yeah? What kind of dream?"
It was strange, he started. It happened while we were on the cliff, and then I couldn't get you to wake up, so I was afraid.
Her arms slowed, a foul feeling beginning to swirl in the pit of her stomach. It was a futile effort to fight away the voice of the Great White Snake echoing in her mind. You can ask the boy, she'd said, when he wakes in the morning.
"I'm sorry I put you in that position," she said, trying to hide the pitch of anxiety rising in her tone. "You don't have to talk about it if it scares you."
But he shook his head, determined. There was a sprout, he began. It grew into a pink flower, and then into a tree with a lot of pink flowers. All of the blossoms fell like they do every year, but...everywhere they fell, they withered and died.
She frowned, sitting back on her haunches to look at him. The symbolism of cherry blossoms falling and wilting was not lost on her, and subconsciously her grip on the bowl tightened.
It made me so sad...I tried to catch them as they fell, but they were too –—. I only managed to catch one, and then it –— in my hands.
Her brows furrowed deeper as she failed to decipher the words she did not know. "Too what? And what happened to them in your hands?"
With his index finger he began to write, starting at her bicep. The characters for the word scatter came first—so the petals were too scattered for him to catch with any accuracy. Except for the one, which, in his own hands...
On the inside of her forearm he was writing the character for the word divide, his finger catching slightly on her sleeve. The edges of her vision blurred and everything seemed to still around her, the sounds and the starlight and even the beat of her own pulse.
Her heart stopped, she was certain of it this time.
In her mind was that otherworldly hum again, mystical and powerful, breaking slowly into rhythmic chants as it grew louder and louder as if something indescribably large and important was inching towards her. There was an ancient pronunciation for the word that was rarely used by humans anymore, though of course it was not a human who'd coined it, nor was it a human who'd given her the word as a name.
The world around her went black. Not even Okojo's fingertip pressed into the bare skin of her wrist could reach her here on some astral plane, outside of herself and within herself all the same, her head spinning and that chanting a never-ending gnawing in her ears. She blinked, letting out a shaking breath and seeing before her that white circle, just a ring of hot steam, the same that poured from the men and the rocks onto which she'd spewed acid.
And then it split apart in my hands, Okojo had signed.
Sakura was no mere vessel of something beyond her understanding.
To divide—katsu.
She was one with the earth and with the water, born in the mud; she with the power to give life as easily as she could take it away. She who had been there near the very beginning, so awash in her own loneliness that she'd learned to split herself apart for company until Gamamura had found her and Hakuja-sennin had named her; until she'd set out from her little forest in all directions, all of her segments their own collective conscious feeding back into one. Until she'd met these humans and fallen in love with them, devoted her long life to them wherever she went, forging contracts with them in blood and lending them her aid, traveling through time and space to answer their summons. She was the source of what they'd begun to call Mokuton, the growths of wood carrying her shinzen energy through their roots like so many veins, the antithesis to chakra; a master of senjutsu, capable of seeing through any illusion the mind could conjure, her link to nature its own living, breathing thing.
No, indeed not a vessel; she was the Great Slug Sage itself.