“Wolf’s teeth,” Tsume muttered, glancing over as canine heads lifted, nostrils twitching as wet noses checked the scents on the two new visitors. Not Inuzuka: that had been clear from the anxiety smell coming ahead of them through the forest. She hadn’t been paying closer attention than that, not until a giant stepped out of the shadows, little brother in tow.

Kiba had invited him, she remembered that. She’d just hoped that it would get forgotten afterward.

“You came!” Kiba bellowed, bulleting from the other side of the common area, barely skirting the banked bonfire. “I told you guys I invited ANBU and they’d come! ‘Cause my mom’s like, the ANBU alpha now!”

Kiba was trailed by a dozen Inuzuka children, and another two or three non-tattooed cubs from his class. Most of them were looking at the two newcomers suspiciously.

“He isn’t ANBU,” one cheeky little boy said loudly, puffing up his chest and lowering his chin. “He’s not even wearing armor.”

Kiba threw his arms around Ibiki’s waist and dangled. “He is too! Aren’t you, Ibiki?”

He was, indeed, and Tsume wasn’t going to forget it any time soon. She edged around one of the tables, putting more distance between them, and glared hotly at her nephew when his eyebrows rose.

Ibiki’s eyebrows rose, too, but not because of anything Tsuma was doing. He hadn’t even spotted her yet, distracted by her huge, black familiar, wearing a pink rhinestone eyepatch, a gaily striped party hat, and trailing a bright green feather boa, who was trotting up, head high and single ear pricked forward.

“Niisan is so in ANBU,” Idate declared hotly. “He’s got the tattoo and everything.”

Ibiki pried Kiba loose. “Happy birthday,” he said. “This is your mom’s familiar, right? He’s very... uh... decorative.”

Kiba gave the dog, who was strutting proudly, tossing his head so that the boa ruffled, an uninterested glance, then launched himself at Ibiki again, trying to scale the tall man. “Show, ‘em, Ibiki! Show ‘em your tattoo!”

Idate took a step closer to his brother and reached up for Ibiki’s left arm. “Yeah. My big brother is too in ANBU. ANBUs don’t have to wear their uniform all the time, right, niisan? ‘Cause they have their tattoos.” He made a valiant attempt to reach Ibiki’s sleeve.

“Yes, I’m part of ANBU, just like Kiba’s mom,” Ibiki said. He pushed the sleeve of his t-shirt up, revealing the red swirl indelibly inked on his left biceps. “Does she wear her armour all the time?”

“Nuh-uh,” several children chorused.

“What about your moms and dads who are ninja, do they have to wear their uniforms all the time?”

There was a fresh series of denials.

“My mom wears a dress sometimes,” one little girl offered.

“My dad has pajamas for night, they have bears on them,” said another child.

“Are your parents still ninja when they’re wearing dresses and bear pajamas?”

“My dad doesn’t wear dresses,” someone protested. But there was a general consensus that even out of uniform, a ninja remained a ninja.

“Come on, you gotta see my cake!” Kiba declared, putting an end to the discussion. He grabbed for the hand Idate wasn’t holding and tugged Ibiki towards the other adults.

Tsume edged away from the cake, picking up a bottle of beer as she did so and taking a long swallow.

“Can we cut the cake yet, Ma? Can we, can we?” Kiba nearly shouted, high on attention and ice cream. She lifted her eyebrows at his tone, and he deflated slightly, scuffing the dirt with one bare foot. “I mean, please?”

“I suppose everyone’s here,” she said, stepping closer again. If they served cake, maybe the party would end faster and Ibiki would go home.

He wasn’t far away, dragged into place by an eager Kiba. Tsume picked up the knife, slicing through frosting and bread, keeping half an eye on Ibiki.

“I’m surprised you came,” she said quietly. “Didn’t think a six-year-old’s birthday party would be your thing.”

Ibiki grinned. "Your budding little extortionist made it clear this was a command performance. He's clearly got a great future as a ninja ahead of him."

Tsume’s eyebrows shot upward and she looked at Kiba, whose scent went sugary sweet and sour apple all at once, and who smiled broadly, showing a missing canine tooth. “I just suggested, Ma. Idate wanted to come, but he’s not in my class, so...”

Idate, growing braver by the second as he carefully petted Kuromaru, looked up. “Kiba said I could see the wolves that are too wild to be ninken.” He looked at Ibiki, all big eyes and his own sugary-sweet scent. “I told you they were real. They’re real, huh?” he asked the group at large.

Kuromaru answered. “‘Course they’re real. We can’t all be ninken.” He angled his one good eye at Idate. “Besides, they help protect the grounds.”

Idate looked both awed and horrified. Tsume started handing out cake, putting pieces on plates and shoving them toward the edge of the table. Kiba grabbed the first plate and started to run, past the sparse buildings around the back end of the bonfire and off toward the river. “Last one to the river has to forfeit his cake to me!”

That caused a stampede, even canine familiars getting in on the excitement and tearing off after the kids — or just tearing around in general.

“You could go with them,” Tsume said to Ibiki dryly. “Since you came for the party and all.”

“Ignore her.” Tori elbowed Tsume out of the way with one arm, her other full of tiny baby, too young yet to even have clan tattoos. “She’s probably just PMSing.”

Tsume snorted.

“Hello, I’m Morino Ibiki,” Ibiki said with a bow to the newly arrived woman. She was a little taller and a lot curvier than Tsume, and her pale blue eyes were lit with considerably more friendliness.

“Inuzuka Tori,” the woman said, and returned a little bead-bob that was probably a bow. The baby in her arms opened milk-blue eyes for a moment, turned its head, and waved a miniature fist in the air before settling back down.

“He’s... She’s?” Ibiki hesitated.

“She,” Tori said. There was a tiny softening of her face as she looked down at her newborn.

“She’s... amazingly small,” said Ibiki, and tried to stare more at the baby than the generous bosom she was nestled against.

Tori laughed. “Well, she’s a baby. They come this size, to start with.”

“Yeah. I remember when Idate was born. Well, I wasn’t there...” He felt the beginnings of a blush, and shunted chakra into his face to clamp the capillaries down.

Tori laughed again, and Tsume howled with amusement. That was startling. Although perhaps welcome: if she was laughing at him, maybe she’d get over her animosity. There was a part of Ibiki that wanted to bring up that interview he’d put her through last spring and point out that he’d just been doing his job. The better trained part of himself kept that impulse in check.

Idate ran up, shouting. “Ibiki-niisan, you have to hurry up, or you’re gonna have to give Kiba your cake. Aren’t you coming? Kiba said we could go in the river.”

“Stay in the shallows,” Tsume said firmly, though she’d said it a thousand times that day alone. It was amazing how children forgot. “It gets deep.”

Hana climbed slowly off a log-bench nearby, rolling her eyes. “We know, Mom.”

“Does Idate know?” Tsume said sharply.

“He does now. Does Ibiki know?” Hana mimicked back.

Frustrated, Tsume corrected the only thing she could. “Ibiki-san.”

Hana glared at Tsume, then walked to Ibiki and gave him a smile, tucking her hand in his. “Come on, I’ll show you to the river. We can tell Kiba he has to get his own cake. Unless you want to stay here and talk to them.” She gave Tsume a cool stare.

Tsume growled. The throat-bare Hana gave her was more adolescent head toss than any apology or submission. She was going to kill the girl, she really was.

Tori nudged her again. “One of you has to be the grown-up,” she murmured under her breath, so soft even Tsume barely caught it.

Tsume bridled her frustration and bared her teeth at Hana in what might have been a smile. She knew Hana was only interested in Ibiki because Tsume herself wasn’t. “Go have fun, then. You and I are going to talk later.”

Hana looked elsewhere.

“Excuse them.” Tori smiled at Ibiki. “Mothers and daughters. They have tiffs.”

Which wasn’t at all what Tsume really wanted Ibiki knowing. In fact, she didn’t want him knowing anything about her family life. “I need another drink.” Hana tugged him onward, and Tsume went in search of more beer.

The riverbank was teeming with small bodies. The Inuzuka children had already begun stripping down to their skin, boys and girls alike. Ibiki looked down at Hana. “You’re Kiba’s big sister, huh?”

“Uh huh.”

Idate ran over before the conversation could continue, concern written all over his face, which looked strangely plain in the sea of clan-tattooed Inuzuka cheeks. “Niisan, I didn’t bring a bathing suit.”

Ibiki laughed, looking at the swarm of naked and half-naked Inuzuka kids who were well on their way to complete and unconcerned indecency. “I don’t think anyone else did, either,” he said. “It doesn’t look like you need one.”

Idate looked dubious.

Kiba raced over then, naked as the day he was born with a tumble of puppies close at his heels. “Aren’t you gonna swim, Ibiki? Did you already eat your cake? Ma says you have to wait an hour after eating to swim, but only if you ate a lot of meat, and cake isn’t meat. I bet you could make a meat cake if you wanted.” He paused for breath and gave Idate a coolly appraising look. “Don’t you know how to swim?”

Idate was outraged. “Yes. Duh. Everyone knows how to swim. I can swim really good.”

“Bet I’m faster,” Kiba said, arms crossed.

“Bet you’re not,” Idate retorted. He shimmied out of his t-shirt, hesitated with his hands at the waistband of his shorts, and looked up at Ibiki.

Ibiki grinned. “Idate wants to know if he needs a bathing suit,” he said.

Kiba gave Idate another incredulous look, but it was Hana who spoke. “He could swim in his underpants. Sometimes people do.”

“Underpants, underpants, underpants,” Kiba chanted, putting a tune to it so it became a song.

Idate looked mortified.

Ibiki glanced at Hana, who seemed wholely uninterested in all this young male nudity being pondered. “Go on, boyo,” he said. “You’ll be a faster swimmer if you’re naked.”

“Yeah,” Kiba put in. “That’s why Inuzikas swim naked, cause it makes us faster.”

Idate hesitated a moment more, then made up his mind, skinned out of the rest of his clothes, and raced down to the water’s edge.

“Stay in the shallows,” Ibiki called. He waited for the splash, as Idate and Kiba entered the water at the same time. Then a smile at Hana. “Are you going to swim?”

She hesitated, curling a strand of hair that had fallen out of her ponytail around one finger. “Are you going to swim?”

“Possibly,” Ibiki said, and began to kick off his shoes. “Maybe I’ll just wade.”

“Me, too,” Hana declared, shimmying out of her tank top and tossing it over a low branch. She wasn’t wearing shoes to take off, and her shorts didn’t take long. She wasn’t going to be teased for wearing her underwear; she stripped out of those, too, and made a dash for a low cliff that overhung the creek. “Don’t go in the middle!” she shouted to her brother and his friend, who were trying to bait Idate out even farther than he already was. Then she jumped, dropping five feet and splashing into waist-deep water.

“You shouldn’t be so far out, either!” Kiba yelled.

“I can swim much better than you,” she told him imperiously, taking a few steps deeper just to show him.

The creek was wide, anyway, and shallow for a good twenty feet out from each bank. It was only in the middle where the ground dropped away and the current grabbed hold; there, she could see the ripples of rapidly flowing water and knew that the real strength ran far deeper than her eye could view. She was already near the twenty foot mark, and could feel the strong tug. Hana turned back to the bank. “You coming, Ibiki?” Not even Ibiki-san. Her mother might not like him, but Hana liked him just fine.

“I’m coming,” Ibiki agreed. He rolled his jeans up, exposing long, darkly-haired shins with enough tan to show he’d been wearing shorts at least some of the time this summer. Why he’d chosen jeans today he couldn’t really justify, except that maybe he’d been aware that Tsume would be here, and he didn’t want to look too much like a teenager in her eyes. Although he had hoped for an end to her animosity over that springtime interview, so maybe looking younger and unthreatening would have worked in his favor?

Too late now, anyway. He’d swim in the jeans if he had to, he thought, and shucked wallet and belt into the grass next to his sandals.

It was an entirely warm day, and the water looked more than inviting, with kids and dogs splashing and shrieking and yipping. Hana looked up with ripples spreading around her like a skirt and grinned at him. “Come on!”

Ibiki grinned back, stripped off his t-shirt, and loped down the river bank, stopping just at the edge. Hana looked up expectantly, and he could feel Idate’s and Kiba’s and half a dozen other childish eyes on him, with his crimson ANBU tattoo and his bare chest. The urge to show off, just a little, was irresistible. He grinned, stepped off the bank, and chakra walked across the undulating surface of the river to just beyond where Hana stood.

“Okay,” he said with a big grin. “How’s that?”

While the little kids laughed in delight, Hana resisted the urge and instead rolled her eyes. “I’ve seen lots of people do that.” A few Inuzuka, anyway. She tried not to stare.

Kiba splashed her. “Nu uh! Almost no one does that!”

“They swim instead!” his friend, Hiyao, shouted.

Kiba grabbed for Ibiki’s leg, hanging on while he stood on his toes. “Do something cool, ‘biki! Something ANBU do!”

“ANBU are just ninja.” Hana grabbed her brother’s shoulder, trying to pull him off, but he clung to Ibiki furiously, legs kicking as his lost his footing on the creek bed. “Saying ‘something ANBU do’ is like saying something ninja do!”

“It’s not your birthday, teat-less!”

Hana screeched and punched her brother.

Ibiki let himself drop into the water and put his body in between the squabbling children. He caught Kiba’s clawed hand before it could rake Hana’s face, and grabbed Hana’s shoulder with his other hand, aborting her launch at her smaller brother.

“One of the things ANBU do,” he said mildly, “is keep the peace.”

Kiba was still struggling and spitting and carrying on about how Hana had hit him and it was his birthday. Hana was stiffly indignant, with an ugly frown plastered across her face. From the other kids, there was the hushed “ooooh” that always came when one of their own was in trouble.

“So...” Ibiki let Hana go, but kept his hold on Kiba. “How should I keep the peace here? Anyone have any ideas?”

“Hana started it, niisan,” Idate said, evidently hoping to stay in Kiba’s favor. There were nods and agreement from several of the Inuzuka boys, but one of the little girls declared hotly that Kiba deserved it for challenging the pack order.

“Yeah,” put in a red-headed girl in pigtails. “Just ‘cause it’s Kiba’s birthday doesn’t mean anything. He still gots his milk teeth an’ Hanna’s got real fangs.”

“I thought you wanted me to do something an ANBU would do,” Ibiki said. “An ANBU agent doesn’t care who was right and who was wrong. You know what I think?”

Hana was still sulking, but Kiba was listening now.

“I think you both deserve a ducking.” Ibiki laughed, tossed Kiba gently back with a splash, then turned and splashed Hana as well.

Tsume had gotten there just in time to see Ibiki break up the fight. She paused under the tree, Tori stopping beside her. They’d both caught the sudden rise in voices, the peak of anger-scent over everything else, but it seemed they weren’t needed.

Tsume crossed her arms over her chest, watching intently, while Tori leaned against the tree.

In the water, Ibiki was getting splashed by Kiba on one side and Hana on the other, kids flailing around to align themselves with whichever child they liked best. Hana laughed and swam a little ways away under the liquid onslaught, but Kiba shoved his way closer, bellowing at the other kids, trying to organize them by sheer volume.

“Remind you of someone?” Tori said wryly.

Tsume looked at her older sister, then followed Tori’s gaze down to the creek. Kiba was clinging to one of Ibiki’s arms, attempting to hold it still — which wasn’t remotely working — and shouting, “Splash him now! Splash him now!” Two thirds of the Inuzuka children — older and younger than Kiba both — were doing their best to follow his wild and reckless command.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Tsume said, and stifled the urge to grin when she heard Tori snort.

At least Ibiki was playing nicely. Playing dirty — chakra surged through the water, a small wave rising up and falling over the crowd — but nicely. She relaxed a little more, watching him.

“Come on.” Tori tugged at her. “Join them or leave them. They’re fine.”

Tsume hesitated. Upstream, a few adults had joined in, two Inuzuka — a man and a woman — bounced small children, while Yasuo ran interference for kids big enough to swim on their own, but not not big enough to join in the water fight. They did look like they were having fun.

Then she glanced back at Ibiki, hugely tall, shoulders promising that someday he’d be a monster of a man, though stripped down to his jeans he still carried the lankiness of youth. “No,” she said slowly. “I’ll go with you.”

“You really don’t like him, do you?” Tori walked away, shifting the baby in her arms.

Tsume made a non-committal noise.

“Any reason why?”

“He’s in T&I.” Surely that was reason enough.

Tori only rolled her eyes. “And you’re a tracker and an assassin. Yasuo led a unit and killed off dozens in the last war. Mother tore out several throats.”

Tsume gave her sister a dark look and didn’t answer. Behind her, though, children were still squealing with delight and she could hear Ibiki’s laughter. She relaxed a little more.

Kiba was clearly going to grow up to be a charismatic leader. If he managed to learn some tactics while he was at it, he’d be a ninja to be feared, Ibiki thought. There was no telling at this age, though, which way a kid might grow. For the present Kiba was making up for any deficiency in military skill with sheer enthusiasm, launching frontal assault after frontal assault and gleefully ordering, “Go for his eyes! Go for his eyes!” as he and his cohort churned the water into froth.

Ibiki sent another chakra-powered wave cascading into them, pushing the kids shoreward. They tumbled and shrieked and surged back, renewing their attack. When a fresh gout of cold water caught Ibiki in the back, he turned, expecting to see Hana leading a secondary wave, but to his surprise it was Idate who had organized a flanking phalanx. He grinned and sent a swell of water at the new force, pleased with his little brother’s cunning.

Hana and a few of the older girls had drawn a little ways off and were kicking around and giggling under the boughs of a willow that trailed near the water’s edge. Doing the inscrutable things that girls that age — and older — did, when they were in groups. They seemed self contained.

“Got you, niisan!” Idate shouted. He and his team scooped water with frantic arms, trying to send it as high as Ibiki’s head. Ibiki ducked, and found himself smacked full in the chest with a wet child — Kiba — who howled a war cry and made a valiant attempt to shove Ibiki under the surface.

Ibiki let him, crouching down abruptly so that Kiba was carried with him right to the gravelly bottom. Then he stood, just as quickly, and tossed Kiba in a shallow arc. Kiba landed with a tremendous splash, high pitched voices squealed, dogs and puppies barked and yipped... It was delightful chaos.

A sharper, altogether less joyful shriek came from the girls under the willow. Ibiki turned in time to see two red-cheeked girls pointing and screaming. Dark-haired Hana wasn’t there. She was...

She was out in the swift current, already halfway around the river’s bend.

Ibiki dove for the river’s center, swimming towards Hana with long, powerful, chakra-fueled strokes that cut through the water faster than the current. Hana disappeared under the water’s surface as it swept around the bend. Ibiki kicked harder, swam faster, surging past the curve. He saw a dark head bob up, a flail of tan arms. Just beyond her, the water boiled up into rapids. He stretched, hooked fingers into Hana’s hair and pulled, got one arm wrapped around her slippery chest and tried to lift her head above the water.

She grabbed back, and not just with slender, half-trained muscles. Chakra surged out from the girl in a shockingly large wave, latched onto Ibiki’s own energy, and yanked, drawing Ibiki’s chakra off like a wide open drain.

Tsume flung herself out over the creek, grabbing hold of a branch just before she would have taken a dive. Her gaze swept across the water, ears and nose working to pinpoint where the scream had come from.

Hana’s scream.

Children splashed for shore under the direction of snarling canines, Kuromaru dragging Kiba out with his teeth around the boy’s skinny arm. Yasuo was downriver, almost around the bend, chakra surging as he water-ran with difficulty over the choppy waves.

On foot, Tsume cut across land toward the twist in the creek. She leaped logs, ducked under branches that whipped at her face, poured chakra into her muscles to go faster. A canine outpaced her, burning chakra -- she couldn’t see its familiar -- then another.

Then the cliff was there, and she poured chakra into her feet to stop before she overshot the ledge.

Dirt and rocks fell into the whitewater beneath her and were swept away. Yasuo had dropped into the river, unable to run on foam, and swam onward.

And there, in the middle of the torrent, swam Ibiki and Hana. Hana clung to him, gasping for air, face white. Ibiki struck forward, but even from this distance Tsume could see something was wrong; he struggled, surged up, sank below the water and came up again ten feet downstream -- but five feet closer to shore.

The water was shallower as it headed into rapids, but the stream bed much more treacherous, full of jagged stones that had fallen from the cliffs on either side. Swimming back upstream against the current with Hana draining Ibiki’s chakra in sharp, panicky jolts was out of the question; it was all he could do to keep both of their heads out of the water and keep her small body away from the rocks.

He tried to strike for the nearest bank, a narrow bar of gravel barely a person’s width across at the base of one cliff, but Hana’s chakra surged again and his own bolted out to meet it like lightning seeking ground. For an instant they were sucked under the surface, then Ibiki felt one leg strike a submerged slab of stone. He twisted until he could plant both feet on it and power his way up again, still aiming for the shore.

He felt Hana gulp a breath, and he did too. “It’s okay, I got you! We’re almost at the edge,” he shouted, and hoped she’d hear. “Don’t pull—”

She pulled.

They were in shallow enough water now that Ibiki didn’t go under, but he felt his muscles go dull and weak, like his arms and legs had gone to sleep. It was a little like the after-effects of being hit with a electric jutsu, but not quite the same.

As abruptly as Hana had sucked his chakra away, she let go again, though her arms stayed wrapped around Ibiki’s neck and shoulder in a vice-like grip. He used the chance to climb onto the shore at last, landing on his knees in the gravel. Hana was shaking and coughing, and wasn’t letting go for anything in the world.

“Okay, it’s okay,” said Ibiki. “You’re okay, we’re okay. You did great, kiddo. Okay? You’re okay.” He couldn’t see any obvious injuries on her, beyond a few bumps and scrapes where they’d brushed the rocks, and a quick feel of large hands over her arms and legs didn’t reveal any obvious fractures. He took a deep breath and coughed himself, and found he was just a little shaky, too, as if he’d run at his top speed for miles, or cast one too many jutsu.

“Whew, kiddo. You’ve got some talent,” he said.

Tsume skidded down the cliff in a controlled fall of chakra, dirt and small rocks tumbling alongside, toward where Hana clung to Ibiki. Hana shifted her grip as he made sure nothing was broken, refusing to let go. She took a deep breath, coughed, fists tightening on Ibiki and leaving runnels of red skin, and then burst into tears.

Tsume reached out, wrapped her hands around Hana’s thin biceps and tugged. Hana broke away from Ibiki and twisted, falling over Tsume’s chest and halfway into her lap, one leg still draped over Ibiki’s folded knees.

Long hair tangled in everything, and bony joints poked uncomfortably. Tsume petted Hana’s hair, pulling her closer. “There, it’s okay, you’re back on shore.” She glanced up at Ibiki, gaze raking his pale skin and the broad hands that had a slight tremble, as if exhausted.

Upriver, someone was shouting at Yasuo, helping to pull him back in, too. For the time being she and Ibiki were alone on the sheltered gravel spit. “Are you all right?” He wasn’t bleeding, but he didn’t quite look all right, either. She hugged Hana tighter, pulling the lanky girl into her lap and rocking unconsciously.

“Yeah. I think so,” Ibiki answered between breaths. His sides were still heaving, his heart still slowing from its adrenaline-fueled race. He blinked at Hana, who continued sobbing, and Tsume who cradled her with the fear only now ebbing from her tense face.

“Do Inuzuka who aren’t bonded to a dog yet have some kind of ability to drain your chakra or something?” He shifted onto one hip and stretched his leg out, eying the skinned bruise that was already blooming on his shin. “She sucked mine out like.. like.. I don’t even know. I’ve never felt anything like that before.”

Tsume froze, then shifted Hana closer, wrapping her arms around her child as if protecting her from a threat. She looked away from Ibiki’s face as her expression flickered through something as defiantly guilty as any Ibiki had ever seen on a subject in an interrogation. "She's bonded,” Tsume said. “It's — it's a clan thing. Funny chakra tricks. You know."

That wasn’t just a lie, that was a lie with some serious stakes behind it.

Should he press the issue? Clearly Tsume didn’t want him to, but on the other hand Hana could be downright dangerous, and evidently without any conscious control. If she did that to a classmate, another child, someone with a smaller chakra reserve than Ibiki had...

“I don’t think that’s the case,” he said slowly, in a tone to make it clear he knew Tsume was lying. “I’ve worked with Inuzuka before. She manipulated my chakra and practically drowned us both. I bet if we went in to the hospital and hooked up a monitor, I’d look like I was way overdrawn. If that were part of an Inuzuka bloodline limit, it wouldn’t be a secret.”

Tsume held Hana tighter, wrapping one arm around the girl’s head. Hana was ignoring them both, still crying, the occasional cough blowing wet air across Tsume’s clothes, which were now soaked. “She’s half,” Tsume growled, willing Ibiki to back off. “Things don’t always work right.”

He waited, eyebrows tipped expectantly, muscles tired and loose. He was still pale, wet hair dripping down his back.

She floundered. “We should go back up. Get you checked out.” She staggered to her feet, carrying Hana awkwardly. Hana was almost as tall as Tsume was; the girl’s legs dangled until they wrapped around Tsume’s hips in a vice-grip.

"Half what?” Ibiki asked, startling Tsume into a halt. “Is there any reason to think I won't be fine if I take it easy for a day or so?" He looked skeptical for a moment, as if still doubting Tsume’s story. Then he reached out, the skinned knuckles of one broad hand visible as he brushed Hana’s shoulder. "Is she as drained as I am?"

Tsume yanked Hana away. Her crying was beginning to subside, tears coming slower. “Half Inuzuka. She’ll be fine. You’ll be fine. Just rest.”

Tsume hoped. Her stomach twisted, making her feel vaguely ill. She didn’t know. Not really. It had only happened a few times, and the only experience she had with Hana’s father—

It had never seemed to hurt him. Tsume had recovered. She thought she might puke. This was more thought than she cared to give to Hana’s occasional mishaps.

“Mom,” Hana whimpered, squirming. “Too tight.”

Tsume opened her arms slightly.

Hana rubbed her face on Tsume’s shoulder, opening one eye to peer at Ibiki. “I’m half Inuzuka, an’ the bloodlines go funny sometimes.” Then she turned her head the other way; not looking at Tsume, but refusing to look at Ibiki, either. “I forgot.”

Tsume patted her, studying Ibiki for any response. “We’ll deal with it, cub.”

“And I’m guessing it’s not the Inuzuka half that’s ‘going funny’,” Ibiki said. He pushed himself to his feet, testing the strength in his legs before he tried to climb the cliff. Above them several anxious canines peered down.

He could see the flinch in Tsume’s expression, her eyes darting up to where her assembled family waited.

What had there been about Tsume’s eldest child in that dossier Ibiki’d read last spring? Nothing he could recall with certainty, except that Hana’s father was unknown, while Kiba’s was another Inuzuka. He thought he remembered reading that some time before Hana’s birth, there had been a mission on which Tsume’s familiar had been separated from her, and she had gone AWOL looking for him. Intel had suspected she had a secret lover, possibly a civilian, and that she had broken off the relationship, or perhaps he had, when she became pregnant.

No civilian would be able to drain a man’s chakra like that, but another ninja... Bastard bloodline limits sometimes manifested as uncontrollable; that was why the Hyuuga and the Uchiha — and for that matter the Inuzuka — were so very careful about how and with whom they bred.

Tsume’s scowl had deepened.

Discretion was a ninja’s best weapon.

“Okay,” Ibiki said. “Then I won’t worry about it.” For now. “What do you think, Hana-chan. Ready to go back? Maybe there’s still some cake left. I bet we’ll both feel better if we have some cake.”

“I would like some cake,” Hana said, turning back to face Ibiki. Tsume grunted and braced with the shifting weight, careful not to pull on her own chakra. Not that she had any reason to think it would be a problem, but the impulse to use her pathways made her heart race and her hands go clammy.

“Okay, cub,” Tsume said, arcing to look up at the faces ringing them overhead. She spoke louder, then. “Everyone’s fine! Someone grab her!” She heaved, switched her grip to Hana’s hips, and lifted straight up.

Hana put a foot on Tsume’s shoulder and stretched. A teenager grabbed her, heaving her up to the top amid cheers.

Which left only Tsume and Ibiki at the bottom, Ibiki still shaky and pale and, Tsume had no doubt, feeling a little uncertain about chakra-climbing the cliff. Whether or not the clan would notice...

“If we wade to the edge,” Tsume pointed back into the water, “there are roots sticking out of the cliff. The water’s only about knee-deep, there.” She offered a wary smile, still uncertain of the big man and all the questions beneath those sharp eyes. “We’re both already soaked.”

Ibiki gave the water and the cliff dual looks. Tsume recognized that look; every teenage boy and young man she knew had worn it at one time or another, usually when the smart thing to do was also the less impressive thing to do. Her anxiety washed away and she lifted one eyebrow.

Ibiki relaxed, decision made, and smiled at her as if he were doing her a favor. "Okay. I guess that must have been a real scare for you. It was a lucky thing I was already in the water." With that, he started wading back in.

“Hm, yes,” she said dryly. “I’m still all a-flutter.”

He glanced over his shoulder, torn between giving her a serious look and being sheepish. It wasn’t a particularly good combination.

Tsume relented and followed him into the river, picking her footing carefully beneath the frothing water. Softly, she said, “I’m glad you were in the river. Thank you.” Then she rounded the corner, found a root that would hold them both, and blazed a trail upward so he didn’t have to think about it.

Ibiki smiled. Pleased with himself, pleased with the world, and riding the tail end of the adrenaline rush. He was also still shaking, and even climbing up the easy way Tsuma had picked was far more effort than his tired muscles really wanted to give. Whatever Hana had done, whatever secret Tsume was harboring about her child, it was a big one. One he would have to look into. Although it didn’t need to be an official investigation. In fact... Yes. It would be a private undertaking. If he actually turned up something that revealed a threat to the village, he’d talk to Shida-sensei, but for now he’d keep his research clandestine.

Although he was definitely going to suggest to Tsume that she get her daughter onto some kind of training program before Hana killed someone.

“Oniisan!” Idate peered over the edge of the cliff as Ibiki and Tsume climbed up. He looked like he wanted to say more, but Kiba elbowed him out of the way.

“Mom! Mom! Hana almost drownded!”

“And my brother saved her,” Idate said.

“And my mom. Right mom?”

“I was there, cub,” Tsume said. An amused smile played at the corners of her mouth. “But Ibiki pulled her out.”

“See?” Idate declared. As soon as Ibiki was standing on solid ground, Idate launched himself at his brother, wrapping his arms around Ibiki’s chest.

It was almost hard just to stand up under the extra weight.

“Oooooh blood!” Kiba said, sniffing the air with a predatory glee. He eyed Ibiki’s scraped leg. “I know what your blood smells like because of before,” he said. “’Member that time me and you fought a lion?”

“I remember,” Ibiki said. He yawned, took a deep breath, and shook Idate off. He felt Tsume’s eyes on him for half an instant.

“How come you’re tired, niisan?” Idate asked.

“Because I never got to eat my cake,” Ibiki said. He scruffed his hand through Idate’s hair, then reached for Kiba’s and scruffed his hair, too. “Is there any cake left?”

“Yeah, come on. Race you!” Kiba said. He tugged at Ibiki’s hand.

“Race Idate.” Ibiki gave both boys a gentle push. Mercifully there were several Inuzuka adults in the growing crowd of curious children, who started herding the kids back towards the picnic area. Hana was still in someone’s arms, but she’d stopped crying and was trying to put on a brave face. And it seemed Tsume didn’t hate him quite so much anymore, if that quiet little ‘thank you’ was any marker.

Well. Mission accomplished.

Now he just needed to think of a way to grab a nap without arousing Idate’s suspicions. But he was smart, he’d think of something.