Queen of Air and Darkness

V. Fifth Interlude

Hope was a dangerous thing in war. It burned as easily as fuel and disappeared as quickly. And the lack of it was just as deadly on a winter's night.

In a forgotten cavern in the mountains outside the city, Sai realized that even he was not immune to its temptations. And as Sir Jiraiya spoke, he felt that spark flicker and die.

"Konoha has chosen its fate." Sir Jiraiya's voice was firm with denial when he spoke. "It is not my duty to go back and rescue it."

Duty was something of a foreign concept to Sai. It had not been drilled into him the way it was fed to the true knights of Konoha. Duty, obligation—all these things came with the nobility. Such things were the providence of the nobility, who had wealth and power of their own. Without purpose, they would never offer those resources to a king. It would be far more prudent to tear the land apart for a shred of independence.

People like Sai needed no such purpose. He had no family name, no inherited wealth to guide his hand. For people like Sai, there were merely orders and obedience and survival.

And yet here he stood, facing down Jiraiya and bargaining for Konoha.

"War comes, and we need every sword hand we can muster," Sai offered. "We need experienced leaders most of all."

Yes, war had come to Konoha. And with it had come change. Change in the night watch as it increased shifts to keep a steady eye on the monsters that prowled the edges of the city wall. Change in their rations as they dwindled to nothing.

And change in Sai himself, as he disregarded Danzo and ventured out to bargain for a kingdom's fate.

"Your master Danzo has never trusted me," Sir Jiraiya fired back. "What changed his mind? Why does he now suddenly need the aid of one old hermit?"

Sir Jiraiya did not bother to conceal his surprise. Why should he? To him, Sai was nothing more than Danzo's lackey, a smiling extension of the private army that Danzo had amassed to keep a hand on his own power. Sir Jiraiya did not need to know that Sai had been hand-picked as a child to be the perfect aide. Nor did Jiraiya need to know the real orders Danzo had given him: assisting in the arrest of Sakura Haruno, disposing of the body of Kakashi Hatake, concealing the truth from King Naruto, spying on the people of the city as they hungered through the winter. And whispered.

But perhaps Jiraiya did need to know that Sai had...wavered. That not all of Konoha turned to the tune of Danzo's demands.

"He didn't send me here," Sai said.

"Then why," Sir Jiraiya asked. "What purpose could you have here?"

"Konoha starves. Sasuke and his army have blocked supply lines, and at any moment they will begin their assault on the walls. The people are afraid, and our army has been depleted. The knights on the border are trapped on the other side, an army standing between them and home. And every day, the monsters watch the city, waiting for their moment."

He had spent long nights observing the pale creatures as they wove through the forest trees. Their yellow eyes reflected the firelight from Konoha's watchtowers, making them shine with malice. He had taken to walking the ramparts in the dead of night, carrying a torch and counting the pairs of shining yellow orbs, like counting carrion crows waiting to strike.

At first, Konoha had thought the white monsters nothing more than an odd military from the north; normal human men altered by some magical aberration. They had even tried to send a messenger to parlay with the beasts, without the presence of Sasuke Uchiha.

Danzo and Sai had stood on the city ramparts and watched as the monsters tore the messenger apart, devouring him with teeth sharpened to a fine shark's point.