Some Fall By Virtue

Chapter Five: the chemicals inside my brain

Rain poured down from the sky, dribbling down over her damp clothing, spattering on the ground around her as it washed away the flames. Flames she could still breathe. But she hadn't been the one to breathe those. If she'd have been there, she only would have breathed those flames to push back the others before they could touch her precious village. Her hands dug into the charred wood and baked ground which greedily drunk up the water which fell from the skies above. Water was nice. Water was good. It washed away everything, though it couldn't quite manage her regrets and sorrows. If only she hadn't run away then... if only she hadn't been such a coward...

Blood welled up under the harsh grating of her tooth against her lip, the taste of coppery blood filling her mouth as she suckled on the stinging wound. It was nothing compared to their pain, she mused, staring down at her dirtied hands. She couldn't bring them back. She couldn't demand answers as to whether or not they would have accepted her, war-torn and bloodstained as she was. Those were no badges of honour. They were the stains of her previous association. The marks of what she had done in the midst of her anger and longing for love and acceptance. Sakura smiled. "I don't need pity," she muttered, wrapping her muddy fingers around herself as sobs wracked her chest. What sort of monster cried? she wondered then, turning her gaze up to the bright blue sky above her.

Morning had long since come, and she had just sat there, numb. There would be no more going to the market to pick up that which she needed. There would be no more greeting the actual edain who lived there. They were dead now. Turned to ash and bone. And Sakura didn't quite know what to do with her life from then on. She had grown comfortable there. She had wanted to stay there and bask in the warmth and acceptance she had found. Life was always so cruel to her though.

The pain of loss sliced into her heart like Sasuke's chidori, and dimly, she rubbed at her chest, hating the feeling there. It was so familiar. So painful. She didn't want that – she wanted, longed for, the happy ending she had dreamt up as a child. She wanted her soulmate, and she wanted to never lose anything ever again.

She wanted peace.

Monsters don't get peace.

Her teeth ground together, blackened wood crumbling under her fingers as she squeezed a piece of the ruined house in her tight grip. She didn't know what to do. Wind whistled through her hair, and quietly, Sakura prayed there wasn't a storm on the way. Not when she couldn't even seem to bring herself to move from the ruins of the place she had called home for what seemed like an age. Hardly. It had only been two and a bit years... But those years had been the happiest in a long time. She wished she could have continued living in that blissful bubble.

Reality loved catching up with her. It loved reminding of her how hated she should be. How hated she would be if they knew of her name in those lands.

"Fainbarad!"

Sakura froze at the sound, heart pounding in her chest. Was she not too late?

"Hurry, Aravir!" the young male voice sounded, and Sakura felt tears bite at her eyes yet again. Because why would Fainbarad be calling his own name? Why would they be shouting and searching for him if he was amongst their numbers?

"Calm yourself, Aradan," another voice spoke up, and Sakura wept. Because they were probably searching for their friend. The one she had failed to save, because she had been too busy being a coward.

"But—"

"Your voice carries... and whatever manner of being was behind this destruction is not something we wish to disturb as few in number as we are," the older voice – Aravir, she presumed – said, and Sakura smiled grimly. The being which had laid waste to her home was long gone. She knew it, deep in her bones. She knew her kin. She could sense them, or so it seemed, going off what she had felt but not realised earlier. If only she had put two and two together and figured out exactly what was coming for them.