Queen of Air and Darkness

xxii. naked before the world

Winter had struck while Sakura had journeyed through the underworld. They had washed up on a black-sand beach dusted with powder- white snow. Behind them, the ocean was a roaring grey expanse. Her breath appeared crystalline in the air before them and the taste of salt permeated her senses as if she was still struggling through the current of the underworld. Snow and chill could only mean one thing: months had passed while she was in the underworld.

Sakura took a shaky breath in.

Then an exhale.

She was alive, with the future stretched out before her; unknowable and too vast to hold in her own two hands.

But she had not come out of the underworld unchanged. The cold burned against her skin, and Sakura could summon no magic to ward it away. She wore nothing but her thin cotton shirt and breeches—nothing against the winter. She had no source of warmth but the feel of Kakashi against her body. The firm strength of him, the vitality that she had fought so hard to bring back to the world of the living. Sakura entwined her fingers through Kakashi's, relishing in the feel of his hand on hers. They could face the future together.

Unbidden, thoughts of the bridges she had burned on her journey rose in her mind.

Thoughts of a forsaken home.

War comes for Konoha.

Tsunade's words raced through her. War. That fabled nightmare of history, the thing that all knights prepared for but never truly expected. And now Tsunade had asked her to ride to Konoha's defense even as it had cast her out.

"You're troubled," Kakashi said, his hands on her waist and his lips at her neck. The feel of his breath was a hot desert summer compared to the wintery chill of the black sand beach.

"Konoha is in danger," Sakura said. The words were flat as they left her lips. "Tsunade spoke of war on the horizon."

Suddenly Kakashi's face was alight with purpose. "From where? From who?"

"She did not tell me. I didn't....I failed to ask when I had the chance. " Suddenly she was furious with herself. She had not thought to ask questions, had been so determined to find her way to Kakashi that in the moment she had cared little for thoughts of war and home.

Some darker part of her still questioned—what did it matter to her? What duty did she still owe that place?

"We must hurry then" Kakashi murmured.

Sakura tilted her face up to look at him. His expression was the face of a man divided. "Why?" she demanded. "What is there for us? Are you so eager to return to the land of the dead?"

Kakashi paused, and when he did speak again it was slowly, as though each word had been weighed and measured.

"You feel it too," he said. Gently, he reached up and cupped her cheek in his palm. Sakura let her face lean into the touch, privately marveling at how warm he felt against the winter cold. "You can't abandon it. I know you well, Sakura. You are a knight of Konoha, and you would do your duty to the realm."

"Duty," she snapped. "My duty is to you—isn't that what you swore? Well, let it be the same between us. Let us have no duty to that place. Let us have no duty but to each other."

"And what of the realm?" Kakashi's question was gentle, but she could feel that he was leading to a point.

"What is the realm to me?" Sakura fired back. Tears rose in her eyes, hot with fury. She had journeyed to the underworld for him, had thrown everything aside to bring him back, and still, his loyalties were divided. "What is the realm when it has cast me out when it has seen your blood on my hands? What is the realm with Danzo at its head, pulling Naruto along like some foolish puppet?"

She knew she sounded young and frightened and stubborn. But Sakura was past pretending for Kakashi. After all of the sacrifice, after sliding her blade through his ribs, after seeing the light fade from his eyes, there could be no pretension between them. But for all her honesty, she could feel her words crumbing as they left her lips. Somewhere in her heart, she knew they were not true—not wholly.

Kakashi's expression was soft. He wore no mask—somehow it had not come with him through the underworld. Sakura could see every angle of his jaw and the soft way his lips parted into a regretful smile.

"What is Tsunade's memory to you? What is Ino and Shikamaru and Hinata? What is Naruto?"

Each name hit Sakura like a slap, despite the gentle way Kakashi spoke. But he was not done.

"The realm isn't the land, Sakura—you know that as well as I. It is home, it is family. It is the members of the Guard. That is what we swear fealty to—not territory and stone walls. Not Danzo's ideals. It's the people we care for back home."

"It is your decision," Kakashi said, his voice so gentle it broke her heart. "I will not ride without you, and I will not go where you would not follow. Because my duty is to you—always."

Then, instead of continuing his speech, he kissed her. It was gentle, even as his teeth worried at her lower lip. It was not a kiss made of sensuality and passion but shared understanding. It was a promise.

But Sakura knew she could not change him, just as he could not change her.

And his loyalties were not the only ones divided. Because he was right, damn him. It was not only her fight with Sasori. It was rebuilding the castle brick by brick. It was mourning Tsunade. It was Ino and the rest of the squires, sneaking beer in the training fields past curfew. It was gathering around a campfire with the members of the Guard.

It was Kakashi.

And she could not abandon it—not to Danzo and not to war.

They could not rest yet. For all that she had done, it was still not enough. For whatever reason, Tsunade in the underworld had thought that it was important that she be the one to take up arms and join the fray. Although she had no magic, no family name behind her, no power to call her own, Tsunade still saw something in her.

Just as she had seen something in Sakura four years ago when she had first chosen her as a student.

When Kakashi pulled away from their kiss, his eyes were sad. As if he prepared for her denial. She could see in the grey storm of his eyes—he truly would follow where ever she decided.

"We will need horses," she said. "You're right. We can't abandon Konoha."