209Don't ask me where this came from, I couldn't tell you. Probably from me thinking "why's it gotta be a virgin sacrifice?"
Probably just a quick 2 parter.
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. Shocking.
"Your bravery and sacrifice will be remembered." The elders read the official words quickly, but Tsunade remained stone faced to the side, disapproving but helpless. Sakura had come up here (mostly) willingly, and there wasn't anything to be done.
"Your name with be recorded on the monument to the fallen, and…" the man droned on, but Sakura only had eyes for the gaping maw of the cave in front of her. The demon kept to its own schedule, and it was rare of it to take the sacrifice in front of people. Sometimes, people would come up to check on the status of a sacrifice and they'd find a limb left over, or a splash of blood. There was one time, rumored by the village miles to the west, that they had lingered too long and he had killed everyone there including the elders.
So clearly nothing good was to be expected in the next few hours.
The bindings that Shizune was tying around her wrists were just a precaution, in case Sakura got cold feet. There was a 'sacred' paragraph for that to as they talked about the ties of blood and obligation that she had to the village and they to her. Tsunade's lips thinned out as did Sakura's when they got to that part.
Utter bullshit.
"… and your family will be awarded a yearly tithe to compensate them for your loss."
Cold comfort. Sakura was pretty sure her mother would reject it on principle. What pays for a life? A haunch of beef and a bushel of apples? At least she wouldn't live long enough to discover how little the town council thought she was worth, journeyman medic notwithstanding.
It was midsummer, and the sun was scorching on this outcropping of rock. It had taken a couple hours since the morning to climb the mountain, and that was after two days journey on horseback at a brisk pace to get to the base of the trail. Sakura was tired, she was dirty, she was scared, but most of all she was furious.
All the villages in the province had their blood tithe and, while it roughly worked out to once every ten years for each moderately sized village, it loomed large in everyone's minds. Particularly the girls.
Particularly the virgin girls.
The lottery excluded those younger than ten, but the odds simply were that the longer a girl remained in the village the less likely it would be that she wouldn't be married so this was often considered a child sacrifice. Standing there, drawing lots with shaking pre-teens, Sakura had almost sighed with relief when she had drawn the polished black stone from the leather pouch. None of those scared little girls would have to face this, while Sakura was no stranger to the face of death in her line of work. None of her friend group had been eligible. That had been a bit of a shocker.
If she had been sensible, she would have taken the practical route. It wasn't like Lee hadn't offered for her hand two spring's ago when she turned seventeen. But it hadn't felt right in her heart, and Sakura really wanted to hold out for better than vague appreciation as a basis for a lifetime commitment. Better, even if it existed, was moot now.
Gods, this dress was HOT. The bridal linen should have been cool, but instead it was soaked with her stress sweat and plastered to her frame. The long hem was completely covered in dirt from the trek up the mountain, and the high lacey collar made her neck itch. All the diaphanous white veil did was partially hide how she was grinding her teeth and tickle her nose with its movement in the wind.
"Do you have any parting message to relay to your family and community?"
Sakura came back from her reverie, she had had weeks to consider this but she had also left her friends and family notes and small personal trinkets to remember her by. She spoke from her heart to the men and women in front of her.
"This is barbaric and you all should be ashamed."
There was shuffling and a low murmur. Tsunade's lips quirked up a moment, but she didn't allow herself to smile. They would have to carve her words on the stone that would mark Sakura's empty grave.
"Farewell, Sakura Haruno." The speaker finished, and bowed low.
As was custom, no more words were exchanged and each elder bowed to Sakura as they passed. Breaking with tradition, Tsunade touched Sakura's shoulder, and it was that more than anything that started the tears again despite Sakura thinking herself cried out. Her mentor was like a second mother, in a way, providing the guidance and discipline that hadn't come from her home. Sakura would miss her, wherever her spirit was commended next.
The shuffling and grunting of all those adults making their way down the narrow trail faded to nothing, and all Sakura was left with was the wind.
Given that the demon kept its own schedule, it sure took its sweet time. She had been baking in this sun for hours, with hours more to look forward to on the longest day of the year. Sighing, realizing she'd rather wait in comfort for her inevitable and probably messy end, Sakura began to struggle against the ropes. Between Shizune not wanting to bind her too tightly, and Sakura having angled her wrists out to create more room, it didn't take particularly long to get out of the ropes. First thing she did was tear the veil off her head, scattering pins everywhere. She stuck a rock on it near the sacrificial stone, and let it flutter in the breeze.
Examining the rope burn on her wrist with mild concern, Sakura then went about tearing off pieces of the dress. From mid-thigh or so down she tried to tear it across, but it wouldn't budge. The weave was too strong. Instead, she found the hems at the side and tore up and that allowed her legs some unfettered room. Next came the sleeves, which were easy enough to remove, and lastly she took a stone point and perforated around the neckline until the horrible diaphanous collar was gone as well.
Taking a steadying breath she wandered into the cave.
It was cool but not cold, with a hot wind blowing from inside. Curious, Sakura slowly made her way into the near darkness. There were breaks in the cave ceiling occasionally which allowed sunlight in, but nothing explained the hot air.
Sakura kept walking directly back until she was in utter darkness, and at that point she halted her steps. It would take more planning to find or make a torch, and just as she turned to go back and get the sleeves she had removed for that purpose she heard a groan.
As a medic she'd know the sounds of suffering anywhere and she rushed towards the person before thinking better of it. Collapsed on his side, near an outcropping in the dark, a body in rags seemed to be just holding on with shallow breaths. Sakura was strong from lifting bodies of men and women bigger than this pitiful heap, and so didn't hesitate to wrap her arms around the injured man and speak softly.
"I'm taking you into the light to examine you. I'm a medic, I'm here to help," Never mind that both of them were probably lunch, Sakura had a purpose beyond feeling scared for herself and she would take it.
Insensible groans were all she got. The man looked to be somewhere in between sleeping and waking, but maybe he understood her on some level because he didn't resist her even as she saw his limbs stiffen at her contact. Sakura carried the man as far as she felt was wise, until she found a shaft of sunlight closer to the mouth of the cave, and from there she moved aside wraps to find where he was injured.
What looked to be a vicious bite mark covered an entire side of his abdomen. No animal that large and with that bite pattern existed in this country, as Sakura was sure she had seen every kind of bite. It reminded her of a dog bite, in a way, but regardless it was festering and angry. Nothing else seemed to be wrong with the man, other than being rather pale and sweating profusely. The fever he was gripped with had to be related to the infected bite.
"I can treat your infection, but I warn you I don't have any of my materials here, so it will take some time to collect what I need and come back. This is very important… have you seen the monster? Is it here?"
"Monster…" the man stuttered. "Kurama," he spat with more energy a moment later, then curled into a painful ball. Light green eyes not too unlike Sakura's own widened as he finally seemed to uncurl and notice her. A hand reached out, which she grasped. Oddly, as soon as she touched him he seemed to try to pull away, but her grip was tight for reassurance.
"I'll be back, and if you aren't eaten by then, I'll try to keep you alive. Assuming I don't get eaten…" There was a tickling sensation, and she looked down at the sand moving on her hand near the ground. The wind in the cavern was blowing, but instead of coming from the back it seemed to be swirling around them. There must be openings to the side here, creating a cross breeze.
It was going to take most of the afternoon to walk down the mountain, and Sakura was hungry having skipped breakfast due to assuming she would be dead by lunch. Tsunade had forced her to learn survival tactics along with foraging so that she wouldn't be ill prepared away from the village, so she wasn't afraid of a little hunger nor was she unsure of finding the root she needed to make a poultice to draw out the infection. However, the idea that Sakura would miss her date with destiny and the beast would assume the blood rite had been ignored this cycle did fill her with fear.
Was she damning the country to be ravaged by the demon? Sakura quickened her steps.
"Hold on, this is going to hurt. A lot." Sakura had seen that the wound was already oozing so it didn't need to be lanced, and there wasn't anything to wash it out with, so the smashed root would have to do.
It had taken time to find the right plant, dig it up with the last of twilight, and then make her way up the hot mountain trail from memory alone after sunset passed her by. The mouth of the cave had only been recognizable from the flapping veil in front of it, and Sakura had grabbed that up along with rocks sufficient to her purpose.
The hot breeze wasn't as vigorous as earlier, and under the light of the half moon she pulped the root between two rocks. Next, she used a sharp stone to tear the thicker material off the front of her dress to make a binding. Sakura then used the thinner material of the veil as a way to tie it all on more securely.
Even with the warning, the man cried out, and she felt what she would have sworn was water rush around her ankles. She must have been imagining it because the feeling ceased and she was fully focused on her patient once more.
"I'll be right here all night, so you can rest knowing I'm here to protect you." It seemed futile, particularly with a demon coming to eat them, but she took strength from the fact that she was using her training to save a life. Giving up would be to no purpose. Tsunade would want her to fight until the end, so she'd try to do just that.
Sakura fell in and out of sleep all night, hearing the man groan and thrash next to her. He seemed to be in a lot of pain, and she wished she could do something for it, but all she could do was run soothing hands over his forehead and through his hair and talk about inane subjects: the festival that had taken place the month before to celebrate the children moving to adulthood in the village, the betrothal ceremony for her friend Ino that she was lucky to have witnessed prior to the choosing of the sacrifice, a fancy dinner that had been held in her honor not long ago to allow the village to send her on in style…
That last one was probably described with more bitterness than joy.
"They presented me with the dress we're both kind of wearing now. The fabric had been chosen ages ago, and as the seamstress made it she commented on how since there was so much savings on the bust the train could be extra long." Sakura chucked a stone towards the opening, where the dawn's light was breaking. She was exhausted between the frequent wake ups and the generalized anxiety about the monster finding them. "Why did they even put me in a wedding dress? Is the implication that I'm getting married?"
There was a groan next to her but it almost sounded like a word that time.
"And why does it have to be a woman, or a virgin for that matter? Is the monster going to check? Is this all some sort of stupid leftover tradition from after a war when there were fewer men? Do they pick virgins because they aren't leaving children behind?"
The words were faint, but it sounded like something above the wind that was whipping rather strongly this morning.
"Are you doing better?" Sakura leaned down to try to catch his words.
"Do you shut up?" was what she made out from the redhead's chapped lips.
Her first instinct was to pick up a rock to throw at him, but she thought better of it and tossed it to the side. He was already injured and Sakura had a powerful arm. Instead, she leaned back next to him and stared at the cave ceiling. The rocks were pretty, uneven and of different colors. It was nice to be able to appreciate something. It was nice to be alive another day.
"Are you hungry?"
There was silence except for his labored breathing for a minute. "Yesssss." Came the sibilant reply.
"I think I saw some berry bushes near the path up, and I'll see what I can bring. I can get enough if I rip off the back half of my dress as well. I guess all that fabric is getting put to use."
"Blood," the red-haired man murmured.
Sakura snorted, then sat up. "I don't have the time nor the means to set a trap for meat. You'll have to make due with roots and berries today, same as me. I'm not sure what to do about the water…" His fever was lower than yesterday but not gone by any means, and both of them would need water soon. Sakura never thought that not-dying would prove so inconvenient to her short term goals. "I'll get more roots to change out your poultice as well. Keep improving like last night and you might even live long enough to get your revenge on the thing that did this to you."
There was a snort from the man, which Sakura took as a good sign.
"Open your mouth, dammit, I can see you don't like being fed but you can still barely raise an arm." The berries were juicy and the water in those and the roots would help until she could go search for whatever water source existed around here. There had to be one with all the vegetation around.
Sakura had changed his poultice and the bite marks were already looking less angry, with the ones on the far edge of the bite having already scarred over. It was strange, really, but maybe it already been that way before she applied the first poultice. No one healed that quickly.
"There's no other water and I don't know how dehydrated you are. Eat this berry or I'm going to make you."
"… like to see you try…" he wheezed.
Sakura put on her most determined expression. "Here I was thinking you wanted to live. Especially since there doesn't appear to be any monster, yet. Our odds are looking better every day."
There was a huff of what might have been laughter. As soon as his lips parted she stuck the berry in between them. He responded by biting her fingertips.
"Ingrate…"
There was another laughter huff. "Should have let me die." The expression in his fever bright eyes was deadly serious even as the corners of his mouth quirked up.
"That's not what I'm about. And even if this is my last day on earth, I'm not going to let someone suffer and die if I can help it." She looked at him carefully. "But we're both going to die anyway if I can't find some water in this heat."
They sat it silence, Sakura munching on berries and flexing her sandals on and off her dirty feet. It was weird that she felt dirtier and more anxious than ever, but also really grateful to be alive and kind of happy. Clearly she was cracking under the pressure of the semi constant expectation to die every second of the day. It would have been harder to wait for death if she had bee truly alone, so she was grateful for her wounded companion.
"What's you name? I'm Sakura. Sakura Haruno, of the Konoha Harunos."
The man seemed thoughtful, and he stared above him at nothing. "Gaara."
"Just Gaara?"
He turned away from her, onto his uninjured side, and Sakura stuck her tongue out at him. "Ok Gaara, I'm going to look for water. Try not to get eaten while I'm away. And if the monster comes, tell him I'll be right back."
Sakura was well out of hearing distance when Gaara answered her. "He knows."
