8

Chapter 8: EightChapter Text

EIGHT

Sansa stared at the Fox-Beast, the Kyuubi. It was as terrifyingly magnificent as she remembered; towering high, burning a fiery red and smiling. There were terrible things in that smile; razor teeth and crimson death and the meaty crunch of crushed bone.

Sansa wanted nothing more than to run screaming as fast as her short legs could manage, but the she-wolf inside her reared up and snarled, refusing to show its throat, to bare its tender belly. Her pup was in trouble and she swore an oath, she swore she would do anything she could to protect him, and Sansa Stark and Fuyuko Uzumaki both were no oathbreakers. From porcelain to ivory to steel, she reminded herself, and then she stepped towards the cage of weirwood trees. Towards the Fox-Beast.

Its terrible grin widened as she approached, wobbly and unsure on her tiny legs. She could count on one hand the number of times she had walked in this body, but she was determined and she made sure to hold herself with all the grace and poise her lady-mother had once taught her.

As she drew closer, the heart-tree drew her eye. Or rather, the glaring abnormality on its snow-pale trunk. Where the face should be carved, blood-red and dripping, there were lines of ink, thick and black, swirling and twisting in a strange pattern. A seal, she vaguely recognised it as– like the one Minato had drawn on her stomach. It looked like art, like a painting, except something about it itched in Sansa's head. It irritated her, like a pebble in her shoe. It made her fingers twitch and she couldn't help her frown. Apparently the Fox-Beast noticed.

"Clumsy work, I know," it said, and its voice... she recognised that voice, so dark and hateful. She'd heard it before, that faint echo in the moments her emotions ran darkest. "No Uzumaki would ever create such a seal." The Fox-Beast added. It almost sounded disdainful, like the inferior work was an insult to it. It may very well be. Sansa supposed being trapped in a cage built by an amateur would be a blow to her pride. It would feel... disrespectful. And humiliating.

Immediately, she had a notion of the approach she should take with the Fox-Beast (but no, she should not call it Beast, not when the Fox showed such human intelligence). She had faced dangerous opponents before; she had negotiated hostages, argued trade agreements, written treaties, sued for peace, proposed new laws and so much more with enemies and allies alike in the greatest of games, the game of thrones. Her mind and her diplomacy were two of her greatest weapons, and she wielded both with deadly precision. This would be no exception.

Her tiny body could barely stand upright, but Sansa dipped into the best curtesy she could before the Fox, only wobbling slightly. "I am Sansa Stark, your grace," she felt the address was apt, for the Fox must surely be Royalty amongst Foxes, "and I am also known by Fuyuko Uzumaki*."

"You are young for such a burden, Sansa Stark, who is also known by Fuyuko Uzumaki," the Fox rumbled, and Sansa tasted smoke and ashes, felt a heat scorching her where the Fox stepped closer, hungry flames flickering and crackling along the edges of her vision. "Many who are decades older than you have shattered and broken, twisted beyond recognition, beneath such a weight."

"And what is it that I am, your grace?" She asked softly.

The Fox bared his teeth in that terrible smile, predator-sharp and crimson and blood-dripping.

"You are a Sacrifice."

Sansa smiled back at him, baring her own sharp little fangs. "Of course I am," she said. "I am a woman."

The Fox was silent for a moment. Her answer seemed to have surprised it. She didn't have time for it to be surprised.

"I apologise most sincerely, your grace, but I have come to entreat upon your goodwill, knowing that I have very little to offer you in return," she said, bowing her head humbly before it. "My brother is gravely injured and to gain the attention needed for him to receive help I must flare your chakra."

The Fox tilted its head, as if curious. "Why my chakra?" It asked. Sansa decided to take it as a good sign that it hadn't outright refused.

"Because he is grievously hurt as we speak, perhaps even dying, in the locked room we have spent our entire lives in, all while the caretaker who is our jailor, who has not spoken one word to us our entire lives and ignores our existence, remains ignorant to his screams, his pain, and his injury," Sansa answered honestly.

The Fox snarled, suddenly furious, and it was terrifying in its fury. Despite herself, Sansa couldn't help but tremble in the face of it. "Liar!" It accused, the roar loud enough to make her entire body rattle, "you pathetic little sack of bones! You are trying to manipulate me!"

Sansa shook her head, pointing up with a trembling hand. "That is impossible, your grace," she said, her voice shaking despite her best efforts, "we are standing beneath a heart-tree," she told it, for the branches of the towering heart-tree were far-reaching within this strange space Sansa was beginning to suspect must be within her mind. The pale branches with their blood-red leaves stretched far out beyond the cage of weirwood trees and over the sky she stood beneath. "No one can lie beneath a heart-tree."

The Fox swished its nine tails agitatedly. "You are too young," it repeated its earlier words. "Too young to feel such deep hatred. I have felt you. I have felt the depths of your rage, your spite, your hate. You have enough darkness in you that you to physically manifest aspects of my being, and that is no small thing."

Sansa shook her head. "I am not young," she said, for she could not lie to this being, not before the heart-tree. "This body may still be at a toddling age, but I am a woman grown, a woman who died and was reborn. I am a woman who loves my pup, a little boy who is innocent and dying, who I swore an oath to protect from harm, and I am not an oathbreaker. Name your price, your grace."

The Fox leaned forwards, its hot breath washing over her like the heat of a Dornish desert in summer. "You say you cannot lie beneath this tree? You say you are not an oathbreaker?" It demanded.

"I do," Sansa replied, steady and sure as the stones of Winterfell. "And I am not."

"Then my price for your brother's life is my freedom," the Fox snarled. "I will give you my chakra, I will help save your whelp, and in return you will dedicate yourself to learning the art of sealing until you can free me from this cage!"

"Oh," Sansa said, and then she smiled. "I thought you were going to ask for something difficult." Fox looked so surprised it was almost humorous. She wasn't sure why she'd shocked it. It had felt her hatred. It must know how she wanted Konoha to burn. Why wouldn't she wish to free the Fox, when she knew it wanted to do just that?

"I will dedicate myself to learning the art of sealing until I can free you, in exchange for your aid. This I swear by blood and bone," she vowed, stepping forwards until she had reached the trunk of the heart-tree, the largest tree in the ring of weirwood trees that made up the Kyuubi's cage. She had no blade, but her teeth were sharp and when she cut her palm in this strange place in her mind, she bled. The Kyuubi watched as she knelt and pressed her small hand to the pale trunk, sealing her vow with a magic older and more enduring then the Wall, an oath made in her blood and etched in her bones. "Let the Old Gods hear my oath and make it true," she finished, bowing her head.

Sansa could feel her oath settle over her, could feel it in the thrumming of her heart in her chest, in the breath of her lungs. The Fox must have felt it too, because it started to laugh, vicious and victorious, and Sansa smiled back at it, fierce and fanged like the wolf that she was. "Such an interesting little thing, you are," it said, crouching and lowering its head so its eyes, each larger then her, were almost level with her and gleaming through the tangle of pale branches and red leaves. "This will be more interesting then I thought," it said.

Before she could reply, before she could even bid it a polite farewell, there was a sudden rush of burning something, the same something she felt that warned her of the presence of their watchers. It pushed her back into her body, and the sudden shock of it caused her to fall back from where she was standing, holding the side of the cradle for balance, and she landed on her bottom with a startled oof.

A heartbeat later, she was burning. It felt like fire had replaced her blood, like the air around her was heavier, pressing down on her while malice tightened around her neck like a noose. It took mere moments for their caretaker to kick the door in and the moment she did, the something– the Fox's chakra, she realised– vanished just as quickly as it had appeared. Their caretaker took in Naruto's still form, unconscious and bleeding on the ground, and swore viciously. Sansa felt their caretaker pulsing her something, her chakra, in an odd pattern and in half a minute four people in animal masks had appeared in the room.

It was a terrible repeat of that horror-filled night with Adachi. Naruto was carefully lifted up by an owl-masked woman with glowing green hands, while a young man in a dog-mask, barely grown if Sansa's guess was correct, very tentatively picked Sansa up, holding her like she was a delicate piece of glassware. Or perhaps a cache of wildfire liable to explode into deadly flame at any second. Sansa wasn't surprised when Dog-mask hastily passed her on to a set of arms that were familiar to her, if only because she had so little experience to compare them to.

"Hello again, fierce little thing," Tora murmured, and Sansa wanted to smile, almost. She settled for nipping his hand though when he stroked her face, and Tora chuckled.

She was prepared this time, and she buried her face against Tora's vest when he started to run; he moved so smoothly that she almost thought they weren't moving at all, only when she peeked out from his vest all she saw of the cloudy sky was a blur. It made her stomach turn violently and she was quick to bury her face back into the vest.

She would deny it fiercely if ever asked, but she couldn't deny feeling a certain comfort in how gently she was being cradled in his strong hands, how carefully he held her, like she was something precious to be cared for. All babe's felt secure and comforted when pressed against a parent's chest, Sansa remembered her lady-mother explaining that to her when Rickon was born, and Sansa's new, small form could count on one hand the number of times she had experienced such a thing.

When they finally stopped and she was dared to risk looking up again, she immediately recognised the room they were brought to as the same room they'd taken Naruto to after Adachi slit his throat. Everything was the same; white ceiling, white walls, harsh smells that hurt her nose, even the same the woman, the one the Hokage had called Iyasu-sensei. She was already hovering over Naruto who had been laid out on the cot, his blood seeping into the white sheets, and Sansa whimpered, unable and unwilling to stop the way her small hands automatically reached in Naruto's direction. Naruto didn't even stir and her whimpers grew louder until Tora started rocking her and humming in an oddly soothing motion.

The door to the room opened suddenly and the Hokage, Hiruzen, swept inside. "Inu, report!" he barked out, looking over the room, at the opposite side to where Naruto was.

Sansa followed the direction of his hard stare and her eyes widened slightly. Dog-mask– Inu– had one hand fisted in their caretaker's hair, forcing her into a kneeling position before the lord of the village, and one hand holding a strangely-shaped sharpened blade to her throat. She didn't even flinch, just knelt there, passive and blank.

"Hokage-sama, ANBU Team-177B was patrolling A-sector when Gekko sensed Kyuubi chakra. Approximately six seconds later, ex-ANBU operative code-name Bat flared their chakra in emergency code 72S61. We were on site within thirty seconds, upon which we found Uzumaki Naruto unconscious with what Owl diagnosed as a fractured skull and possible bleed in the brain. Possible fatality is unknown due to the Kyuubi healing factor."

The Hokage's face was a terrible thing to behold, all shadows and hidden knives as he looked coldly down at their caretaker.

"Your negligence almost lost the village a Jinchuriki," he said coldly. "How do you defend yourself?"

"I cannot defend myself, Hokage-sama," the woman said flatly.

It was the first time Sansa had heard her voice. She would have focused more on that if it wasn't for the fury she felt at the Hokage's words. Was that all Naruto, her precious brother, meant to this lord? A Sacrifice? She wanted to scream, to rage, but she tucked her emotions away, buried them deep within her. Now was not the time to be emotional; now was the time to listen, to learn, to wear a mask of innocence and childishness and naivety, not unlike she had long ago, as a prisoner to a mad boy-king. Let them think she was just a stupid little girl, a little bird, a dove, not a wolf hiding her teeth.

The Hokage gave their caretaker one last cold look then nodded at Inu. Sansa blinked and almost missed it, for in the next moment Inu slit her throat and she slumped forwards, lifeless, her lifeblood spilling on the ground.

Sansa wondered if she should feel some form of grief. After all, the caretaker had been her and Naruto's only true form of human interaction for nearly twelve moons, other then Tora's very, very sporadic interactions with them– which, she was beginning to suspect, he wasn't actually supposed to be doing.

She had mourned before for those she rightfully shouldn't have. She had felt grief when Petyr had died. She had hidden it from Arya, of course, but later, in her rooms, she had shed private tears for the man who had taken her from King's Landing, who had taught her so much about playing the great game, who had touched her and kissed her, who had murdered her aunt and sold her to the Boltons, who had betrayed and murdered her father, who she had ordered to be executed, but who she still grieved for.

She had mourned Cersei too, the woman who had been both mother and queen to her during her years in King's Landing. Cersei was cruel in her kindness and vicious in her anger, but she had equipped Sansa with the tools she needed to survive; she had taught Sansa how to be ruthless, taught her how to don a woman's armour, taught her how to survive in a nest of vipers. Joffrey had never beat her in his mother's presence, he hadn't dared, and Cersei had had her moments of softness.

Her love for Myrcella had been gentle, in a way her love for her sons was not. Sansa knew why, of course; the bruises Cersei wore proudly on display when Robert Baratheon still lived were proof that not even a queen, not even a Lannister, was spared the violence of men. Cersei must have ached, thinking of what horrors lay in Myrcella's future. And how terrified she must have been when Tyrion had sold her daughter off to Dorne, to the Martells, the House that hated Lannisters more then any other.

Sansa had even mourned Jaime and Sandor, though not to the extent that she had mourned Petyr and Cersei. Jaime had died as he lived, at Cersei's side. She could not deny him his great love, though she had been furious with him for leaving Brienne behind, heartbroken and with child. Sandor was... complicated. He had been her brave protector back in the Red Keep where the knights were monsters, but she'd also seen the way his eyes tracked her blossoming figure. She'd considered leaving with him the night of the battle, but had ultimately refused, doubting his restraint when they were alone together in the wilderness. She'd never know if she'd made the right choice, but the choices she had made had allowed her to grow to be the Queen she'd been.

So many that had wronged her, so many that she would never forgive, and yet she still mourned. But as she searched inside herself now, looking for any trace of sorrow for the caretaker's fate, all she felt was a hollowness. Her enemies in Westeros had been so human, with human weaknesses and vulnerabilities, but the caretaker was just a blank slate. Emotionless. Sansa couldn't find herself to care for a woman who may just as well have been carved from stone for all the life she showed.

"Clean up that mess," the Hokage ordered one of the masked people, before finally turning to Naruto. "Iyasu-sensei, what is his status?"

"The Kyuubi healed most of the damage, Hokage-sama," Iyasu-sensei dutifully reported and Sansa was glad when Tora moved closer to the cot Naruto was laid out on. "He had a depression fracture on the lateral superior surface of his skull, as a result of the fall. There is some swelling in the brain, but it is already healing without my help. I did not locate any bleeding in his brain, but he will have a concussion. I suggest keeping him sedated for now, though it will be difficult to determine a dosage that the Kyuubi won't burn out of his system."

The Hokage nodded. "Thank you, Iyasu." He said, before turning back to Tora and Inu, a frown on his face. "When Naruto is healed," he said, "it may be time for the twins to be moved to the orphanage."

Sansa didn't miss how both Tora and Inu stiffened. Neither did the Hokage. He sighed heavily.

"It pains me too," he said, "to think of Minato's children growing up as orphans, ignorant to their heritage, but their safety is paramount. They are getting too old to be kept hidden away in a locked room, they will need to interact with other children. In the orphanage they will blend in."

"And no spy would ever think Konoha was heartless enough to abandon their beloved Yondaime's children in an orphanage," Tora snapped.

Sansa wanted to snarl, to howl her anger. Not about the orphanage; at this point, anything would be a step up from the room. No, she was angry that not one of them had mentioned her mother. Kushina, the Princess of the Whirlpools who Sansa had inherited her title from, had fought alongside Minato that night. It was her chains that had held the Fox down, and this was after she had given birth to twins, one of which she'd had to cut out of her own body. Her mother had sacrificed herself for Sansa and Naruto and all they could talk about was Minato's children and the Yondaime's children.

I am an Uzumaki, the wolf inside her soul reared its head to snarl, Naruto and I, we are the last to hold the ruling heart of Uzushio inside us. We have been given our mother's name and we wear it with pride.

"I can take them."

Sansa almost missed it, Inu had spoken so quietly. Then she almost gave herself away, she was so shocked.

"Ka– Inu!" the Hokage corrected himself. "You know why that's impossible," he chided, as if Inu was a misbehaving child. Inu growled, a guttural sound that belonged more to Wolf than Man.

"They're Minato and Kushina's!" He snarled, beginning to pace– or rather, prowl. There was something animalistic in his movements, something feral, and by the careful way that the Hokage and Tora were watching him, they were both quite aware of it. Sansa was focused on something quite different.

Kushina. He was the first one to acknowledge Kushina. And he wanted them.

"Inu–" the Hokage started to say, but Inu interrupted him.

"They're my pack!" he said, and there was a desperate, dangerous edge to his voice that had Sansa's blood begin to race.

"The Council will not allow it, Inu." The Hokage said, an unmistakable tone of finality in his voice.

"You are the Hokage! You rule, not the Council!" Inu snarled. The Hokage straightened, clearly beginning to lose his temper.

"Enough, Kakashi!" He snapped, and Sansa blinked, because where did she know that name?

A memory of silver hair and the expression of drowning flashed before her eyelids, as she placed the name 'Kakashi' in her memories, matching the grief-stricken boy with this warrior, far too young for the weight on his shoulders. This boy who growled and snarled like a wolf, who prowled like a wild thing, who called her and Naruto pack; this boy who knew her mother.

"You can't look after two young children," the Hokage continued, "the village needs you out there, running missions, keeping us looking strong! We are still weak from the Kyuubi attack, the damage and destruction caused was immense, and you are one of our best ninja! You are needed as a show of strength, not a babysitter! I will not hear of this again, do you understand?"

And Sansa had thought she couldn't hate Konoha any more then she already did. 

It seemed she was mistaken.

*Sansa refers to herself as 'Fuyuko Uzumaki' not 'Uzumaki Fuyuko' because she doesn't understand that surnames are spoken first in the Elemental Nations. That's the same reason she refers to the Hokage as a lord.