| Stories We Tell [closed] |
[Apr. 5th, 2008|08:53 pm] |
Set after Puking Up Is Hard To Do
Dinner was over by the time she arrived, slinking through the forest on silent feet. The lights in the ramshackle house shone from the windows, gilding the family inside and brushing gold across the snow outside. The people were a montage of likeness, brown hair and red tribal tattoos marking them as one, while differences in eye color and scent marked them as individuals. They were all family, in one form or another.
Tsume spent a moment watching through the windows, smiling as her five-year-old son launched himself off of the sofa, caught mid-air by his father. Yasuo spun the boy before setting him down with a ruffle of unruly hair. A woman entered the room from the kitchen, heavily pregnant, her eldest son--fifteen and painfully grown up--carrying a glass of water and hovering over her elbow. Yasuo spoke to the son he and Tsume shared, then to Tsume's ten-year-old daughter, taken on as his own.
Bedtime.
Tsume didn't pause to knock, but simply crossed the fresh, crisp snow to stride through the unlocked front door. Pandemonium erupted, canine familiars barking and children leaping at her. Tsume laughed and caught Kiba as he jumped, kneeling to fold Hana into her other arm. Kuromaru stood nearby, bristling at the other familiars, stiff-legged as the beasts sorted each other out again.
"We were just putting them to bed." It was exasperation more than anything else that colored the words. Yasuo stood half a foot taller than Tsume and fifty pounds heavier, yet there was no challenge in his bearing. Her teenaged nephew, on the other hand, tensed and glowered. Tsume regarded the boy assessingly for a long moment, knowing he'd back down but wondering how much of his newfound courage was simple hormones and how much was true alpha.
"You've gotten them all riled up again." Tsume's sister glowered, levering her bulk into a chair.
One eyebrow climbed Tsume's forehead, the tip of a fang showing as her lips quirked. She didn't mention she'd seen the children's far from good behavior through the window.
"I'll settle them," she said instead, and stood up with Kiba in one arm, the other hand on Hana's shoulders.
"Can we stay up late?" Kiba asked, ever optimistic.
Tsume just laughed, carrying him down the hall.
"Did you go on a mission?" Hana stared, brown eyes wide.
"Did anyone die?" Kiba breathed.
"Blood-thirsty little monsters." She couldn't keep the air from filling with the sweet-lemon scent of delight at her cubs, though. "No, I haven't gone on a mission yet." She was headed out shortly; it was why she'd come to see her children. Not that she wouldn't return, because she would. She'd come home on other high ranking missions for years, and this was no different. Better, maybe, with ANBU to back her up.
But if she didn't go see her children, irony would dictate that she didn't return.
"Have you brushed your teeth?" she asked, kicking open the door of the bedroom they shared.
"Yeah!" Kiba squirmed in her grip.
"Did you see my puppies, Mom? I got three!" Hana darted across the room to a basket filled with balls of fluff, all currently sleeping.
"I saw them, Hana." Tsume caught the girl before she could wake the pups, heaving the child up and hurling her toward the futon. She didn't say it wasn't normal to have more than one familiar. It had happened before, with other half-breeds. There was no reason to worry about it.
"Are you going on a mission soon?" Kiba grabbed a blanket and yanked it over himself. "Are you gonna kill lots of people?" His pale blue eyes sparkled with excitement.
"I'm going to let my teammates kill people, and Kuromaru will eat their guts." She snapped her teeth together, grinning to show off sharp canines.
Kiba squealed and bounced on the bed while Hana crawled under the covers, rolling her eyes.
"Everything all right in here?"
Tsume resisted the urge to snap at Yasuo, instead turning to regard him steadily. "Fine. Did you need something?" They were her children. She could put them to bed without help.
He hesitated. "Just checking." He pulled the door partially closed as he left.
"Can you tell us a story?" A slim hand reached up, grabbing a plush dog and curling up around it.
"A real one! With lots of blood!" Kiba grinned, showing off a missing tooth.
Tsume ruffled his hair absently. "Do you both know the Inuzuka myth?"
Hana smiled, head of dark hair nestling deeper into her pillow.
Kiba frowned. "No…"
Tsume looked at him sharply. "No? Well, settle in, pup."
He did so, looking suspicious. "Does it have blood?"
"Does it have blood!" Tsume grinned. "How about demons dying, and people dying, and heroes being wiped out!"
Kiba's eyes were as wide as Kuromaru's ears, pink mouth slightly open. "Okay," he breathed, and snuggled down next to his half-sister.
Tsume fell into the story-telling cadence easily, having grown up listening to the legend told with the exact same words, passed down through generations. "Many years ago, before there were Hokages or Hidden Villages or even ninja, there was a great warrior. This warrior was one of the best the world had seen, but she wanted to be stronger still. Deciding that the way to strength lay through a summons, she went in search of a summons powerful enough to defeat all of her enemies."
"Summons aren't all that great," Kiba announced. "Not as great as familiars."
"Shut up," Hana muttered, elbowing him.
Tsume waited until they were done, finding herself smiling. She wasn't much of a mother, but some nights she wished she was. When the two were done bickering, she continued. "At long last, she came across a minor demon in the form of a great, black-faced wolf."
"Like Kuromaru?"
Tsume nodded, smiling. "Exactly like him. Only blacker. She brought out the scroll and showed it to him, telling him what an honor it would be if he were to be her summons."
"But summons are dumb…"
"Ki-ba!" Hana glared at him. He fell silent.
"The demon laughed, scoffing at her human abilities. 'I am immortal,' he told her, 'and would never lower myself to one of you.'
"'Humans are immortal through their children, and their children's children,' the warrior answered him. 'Our descendants would be unconquerable.'
"'That is not immortality. I am already unconquerable,' the demon answered. 'Why would I become mortal?'"
"I wouldn't want to be a summons, either." Kiba rubbed his nose with the back of one wrist, filled with great disdain.
Tsume grinned. "Shall I continue?"
He nodded.
"Full of rage, the warrior attacked him. He knocked her aside with a sweep of his giant paw, and to make sure she remembered her lesson, he clawed a long, bloody mark down each side of her face." Tsume stopped when Kiba gasped and reached a hand with stubby little fingers up to trace the marks down the sides of her face. She smiled, and continued. "The great warrior was humiliated, and went back to her tribe in shame. Determined to show the demon that he could be conquered, she began training. She trained for forty days and forty nights, in deserts and through floods. She hunted down her remaining enemies, and then she hunted the greatest beasts, and then she hunted the heroes of other tribes. When no one could defeat her, she caught and killed a great wolf, donning its skin and fashioning a weapon from its claws.
"Then she again searched out the demon. She found his lair and she killed the animals nearby, leaving him a feast. When he came out she hid her true form in the wolfskin. She spoke with him, feasting long into the night, and learned that he would never be a summons; his arrogance was too great, his pride too strong.
"When his belly was full of meat and blood, when the moon was setting and he was at his weakest, she struck. With a swipe of her claws she ripped open his throat, and as his blood spilled onto the ground she tore open his chest. She ate his heart and stole his chakra, sealing it within her own body and her own blood, stealing his immortality. His power coursed through her veins, making her stronger and faster and more lethal than any human before."
"That's like you, huh, Ma?"
Tsume stopped and laughed.
"Mom didn't kill a demon!" Hana's tone was the ultimate in big-sister superiority and disdain.
"She killed the Fox!"
"No, Kiba, the Fourth killed the Fox," Tsume corrected quickly. People didn't always like the Inuzuka as it was; the last thing they needed was for others to start thinking they were bragging about that.
"But you helped," Kiba argued, his jaw setting in a gesture so like his father that it made Tsume wince.
"Mom helped keep us safe, dead last." Hana glared.
She could feel the tension escalating, and cut it off with, "Did you want to hear this story?"
Both children focused on her again.
"Shortly thereafter, the great warrior discovered she was with child," Tsume continued.
"Was it a demon child?" Kiba chirped hopefully.
"Kiba!" Hana yelled. "Be quiet!"
When he'd settled, Tsume started again. "Shortly thereafter, the great warrior discovered she was with child.
"As her time grew closer and closer, she began to feel the demon's chakra stir in her blood. Under a full moon she ran back to the forest where his lair had been, only to discover he was once more alive." Tsume paused to give her son a chance to interrupt, but his light eyes only remained fixed on her, mouth a tiny circle. She continued.
"'You have stolen my heart,' he growled in a voice like thunder. 'You have stolen my chakra. You have taken my power, created a hole in my chest that bleeds into your frail human body. You have made me mortal.'
"'And I will keep it,' the warrior answered. 'It is mine now, taken from you, a great demon.'
"'There is one thing you have forgotten. I may be tied to you, but you are also tied to me.' And the demon pulled the warrior's soul from her very body.
"They fought long and hard for their souls and chakra, a battle unlike the world had ever seen. It created valleys and rivers, destroyed forests and turned swamp into desert. When all was done, the demon stood victorious as the warrior died. He found her summoning scroll and destroyed it, unsigned.
"But she had fought valiantly, proving herself an opponent worthy of even a demon's respect. With his claws he tore her belly open and pulled free the babe, licking it clean of blood and afterbirth. With a talon he cut open its face, one long mark on each cheek to remind it of its mother and her bravery.
"'Your mother was a great warrior, and you shall be one as well. She ate my heart and stole my chakra, as I now take your blood and strengthen the pathway she created. I will never be your summons, but rather your companion, your protector, and your Pack, as you will be mine. We will be immortal, dying and passing our bond to our children, and our children's children. We will be neither human nor demon, wolf nor dog, but inuzuka, and we will be unconquerable.'
"And they were." Tsume fell silent, the words of the old legend whispering around the room for a moment, carried by generations of clan before her.
Slowly, a grin broke over Kiba's face. "That was SO COOL. I wanna be the demon-wolf! Hana, you be the girl!"
"She dies," Hana pointed out, sitting up in bed. "I wanna be the baby."
"It's a boy."
"It is NOT!" Hana yelled.
Tsume laughed, rocking back on her heels, canines flashing. "All right, you two, settle down before your dad comes in here." She could smell him in the hall, hovering.
Both cubs quieted, though she had no doubt the battle would begin again as soon as she left.
"Be good. Good hunting." She leaned down, giving each a brief nuzzle and pulling the blankets over the pair before pushing to her feet and leaving the room, warmth in her chest. She'd stay the night with her family, reconnect old ties, remember why she was coming back. And in the morning she'd leave on her assignment.
The disapproval in the hallway hit her like a wall. She stopped, closing the door slowly behind her. It latched with a small click, keeping puppies and cubs safe. She eyed Yasuo, standing in the hall.
"You have a mission?" His voice was tight, his scent anxious.
"I do." Tsume waited. He said nothing else. Warily, she brushed past him, striding down the short hall. He followed silently.
"You shouldn't be in ANBU." That was her sister, ambushing her from the corner. "You have children, Tsume. They need you more than the ghost-ranks do."
The warmth in her chest vanished, turning sour with old arguments. She'd told herself she wouldn't be angry about this again. She was. "They don't need me, they have you." She glanced around for Kuromaru, her plans changing as dramatically as her scent went from sunshine-pleased to sour-meat-bitter.
"I'm not their mother!"
Tsume's nephew growled low in his throat, responding to his pregnant mother's yell.
That threat she didn't have to take. She whipped around, hand flashing out faster than he could follow, locking around his jaw and digging into the heavy arteries on either side of his neck. The room fell silent. "Enough," Tsume said on a growl. The room filled with her scent, her chakra laden with alpha.
For a tense moment he held her gaze, body quivering with fight. Then he whined and flicked his eyes sideways.
She let go. "Kuromaru." He melted from the shadows near the kitchen, padding across the floor like a bit of darkness given breath. Tsume hesitated, wishing for an instant there was something she could say that would make it better. That would make them clan again. Something that wasn't 'I'll quit.' Then she nodded once. "Good hunting," she said simply, and in heavy silence walked out the door. |
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