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A litter of idiots, thinks Temari of the Sand as she glances around the room. The tavern thrums with noise and swells with desert heat, the air spiced with cardamom and anticipation. Each of the hunting groups gather in their own corners. Ninja have come from far and wide to claim the power of the Apep for themselves; it is why she cannot let anyone else have it. In the wrong hands, it would wreak havoc and destruction. Only her brother, the Kazekage, could possibly be strong enough to contain it.
“Your mission is this,” said Gaara, when he gave his orders. “Capture the Apep before anyone else. Especially him.”
Most of the groups are four or five ninja, but hers is a party of two. She glances over at the man to her right—the snivelling son of the Hidden Sand’s largest silk merchant, a fragile lily born among desert acacia. Her betrothed. Koninobu Bainao. Temari scowls as he blows bubbles into his tamarind juice. He glances up at her, noticing her stare, and gives a sheepish grin. She does not smile back. Their betrothal was a political decision her father made when relations between Hidden Villages were tense and resources were scarce. Koninobu’s father, Tahara, had been a key power in producing necessities for the Hidden Sand. For such effort, her father had thought it imperative to give the Bainao’s a proper reward: his only daughter.
She had not even known of this agreement until a few months prior, when Gaara held court in the Council Meeting Chambers. Shinobi and non-shinobi alike had come to ask favors, to air grievances. She had taken her usual post at Gaara’s right, as the Kazekage’s guard dog. When things got ugly, she swept the belligerence away with a stroke of her fan; oh how she wished she could have swept him away, too. Koninobu had reminded Gaara of their father’s agreement, and now that both son and daughter were of age, he demanded that the conditions finally be met. Upon investigation into old paperwork, they discovered all of it to be true. There was a contract in Father’s handwriting, stamped by his own seal.
Upon or after her twenty-first birthday, my daughter—Princess Temari of the Sand—shall be wed to the son of Tahara Bainao, Koninobu Bainao, as a promise of alliance between the governance and industry of the Hidden Sand. This contract shall forever remain valid, so long as both son and daughter are able.
The last sentence contains the framework for her plan. Able. If Koninobu Bainao, a “formidable” shinobi who somehow passed through the rigorous training of the Sand, was not capable of succeeding at something as simple as a hunt…surely the council would see him as un-able to marry her, a Kazekage’s daughter, a princess. The contract would be nullified, so long as she ensures to capture the Apep herself. Temari does not sweat as she takes a sip of her iced tea. She is not worried about this. Not in the slightest. She did not fear the reincarnation of Madara Uchiha when she took him on. Why should she deign to fear anything else?
A man strides into the center of the room, lithe but strong, a golden ring shining against the side of a copper nose. He speaks with the voice of a storyteller, the haunting narration of the shadowpuppet plays that appear during festivals. His purple sleeves swish with his movements, until he settles into the illumination of a skylight. “Welcome, friends, to a journey none are sure to forget. My name is Agabara and I shall be a guide of sorts. I see that not all of us here are natives of the desert. Tell me. Who here knows the legend of the Apep?”
The foreigners all gawk at each other, clueless. All they know is what’s on the job listing: the promise of a great reward upon the retrieval of a desert snake’s head. Temari eyes Koninobu. He’s not even paying attention. She intones, “The Apep is a serpent known as the Lord of Chaos. He was born of an oasis goddess in the middle of the Sand Sea and has been a shithead ever since. He wreaks havoc and destruction and kills without mercy.”
“Succinctly put, Princess.” Agabara winks. The foreigners look over at her at the mention of princess. She’s gotten used to it over the years. “Indeed, the Apep is chaos in animal form. Its powers should not be underestimated. Legends often compare its might to that of the Tailed Beasts—that is, when it’s not sleeping.”
A ninja with a cloud on his headband rises to ask, “Is that what it’s doing now? Sleeping?”
“I wish it was,” comes a new voice from the tavern entrance. A tall figure steps inside, cloaked and hooded. Ha. A pathetic attempt at concealment. She would know that rasp anywhere. He reeks of sweat and tobacco and the hinoki woods of his ancestral home, standing out like a sore thumb among the sand. “Various attacks have been reported in the Land of Wind, as well as along the borders of Earth and Fire. All claim to have seen the same thing.”
Agabara sticks out his hand. Shikamaru drops his hood. Dark eyes dart to hers, meeting for a split second, before returning to shake hands.
“Welcome. Thank you for the knowledge,” says Agabara. “May I know your name?”
“I’m a trapsman of the Deer Woods,” says Shikamaru, taking a seat. A funny truth. But why remain a mystery? “That’s the important part.”
Temari hears Koninobu chuckle to himself. He mutters under his breath, “This guy won’t last a second. He’s not even a shinobi.”
Instead of saying he’s far more of a shinobi than you, she keeps her mouth shut.
“I suppose it is. Well anyway, the trapsman is correct,” Agabara announces to everyone. “The Apep is not as dormant as it used to be. It had been asleep for hundreds of years…until now. But I believe it is sleeping once more, just for a little while.”
He walks forward and hands each of them a map. Across the desert’s vast expanse is a marked X, placed atop the peak of Mount Manu—not a mountain, but the tallest dune in the Sand Sea.
“I will be escorting all of you to Manu’s base. From there, you are free to compete as you wish, but before then there is to be no fighting under any circumstances. We will travel today until we reach the lodgings of a friend of mine. When we wake tomorrow morning, you should reach the summit by late afternoon.”
“All you need for the reward is its head, right?” A stone-symbolled ninja asks.
“Yes. Bring me the head of the Apep, and the 30 million ryo is yours.”
The bounty riles the groups of ninja to excitement. It’s likely more money than any of them have ever seen in their entire lives. Koninobu laughs again. “Look at these pigeons, squabbling for breadcrumbs. It’s kind of hilarious.”
Temari looks over at him, steeling her expression as she always does. Playing nice might be the worst part about the job—other than the deadly snake. “They’re all irrelevant,” she says. “We won’t be claiming any reward. The Apep has to go straight to Gaara so he can seal it away.”
“No reward? I don’t think that’s true.” Temari nearly flinches as Koninobu takes her hand, pressing his lips to the back of it. “Once I have the serpent, the greatest reward of all shall be mine.”
A shiver rolls down her spine, and not the good kind. She wishes she had a bar of soap. Or something to peel her skin off with. Temari pulls her hand away, tucking it out of sight.
“I’m already promised to you,” she remarks.
“But I want to prove myself, Temari,” he purrs. “I want to show you that I can give you whatever your heart desires.”
If that was true, then all he’d be giving is a knife to his own stomach. She insists, “It doesn’t matter. The contract's already been signed.”
“You’re telling me it would make no difference if I were some lazy bum?” he asks, and Temari glances at Shikamaru for a split second. “You’d still marry me just because the contract was signed by our fathers all those years ago?”
“I am a Princess of the Sand, Koninobu. I must honor what duty commands.”
She can feel his smile and it’s far too warm, too bright. “Still, I will prove myself. Consider it a wedding prize.”
Temari finishes her tea with a sigh. “Then I thank you in advance.”
“Gather your belongings!” Agabara announces, breaking through the noise. “We will depart in a few minutes!”
“You can finish your drink,” Temari tells her betrothed, slinging her fan onto her back. “I’ll ready the sheep.”
“Are you certain? I wouldn’t want to make a lady—” With a glare, his argument dies like a match upon water. “Very well.”
She walks out of the tavern, knowing it won’t be long before Shikamaru follows. The sheep, desert mammoths bred for transport, are tied and saddled by a long trough of feed. She finds her own and strokes it gently, a sturdy thing she named Stormy because of its gray wool. Sure enough, the smell of tobacco returns, and the hints of a smile dare to curve at the edges of her lips. So predictable.
“You’re a long way from home, trapsman. What are you doing here?”
“I could ask the same of you,” he says.
“I’m doing what I always do. Ensuring the safety of the Sand.”
“So you bring a bozo with you? Sounds real safe.”
“The only sound I’m hearing right now is jealousy.”
Shikamaru scoffs. “Enough crap, Temari. Who the hell is that guy?”
“You mean you don’t know?” She finally glances up at him, a smirk upon her face. She isn’t sure why this is so enjoyable, but her stomach started doing somersaults ever since he walked in the room because he’s here he’s actually here I’m finally seeing him again. Months had gone by without any need for specific ambassadorship to the Hidden Leaf, without any letters from him. Too many months. “I thought you were supposed to be smart.”
“I’m smart enough to read lips. I’m promised to you? I must honor what duty commands?” Shikamaru takes a step forward, his gaze burning into hers. He really is jealous. “When were you gonna tell me you’re engaged?”
Her brow arches. “You’re that worried?”
Frustration radiates off him, a brewing storm. He huffs again, “I mean—Temari, come on. You’ve—we’ve—”
“What, Shikamaru?” She steps up to him now and they’re close, so close, close enough to put mission-compromising thoughts in her head. “Spit it out.”
He turns away. “Forget it.”
Temari kicks him in the knee. Shikamaru topples onto the sand, and she cuffs him by the collar. “If your Hokage has sent you for the Apep himself, then forget it,” she warns. “It’s mine. I won’t let anything stand in my way.”
“The Hokage didn’t send me,” he reveals. “The Kazekage did.”
She nearly drops him in shock. Her eyes widen. Gaara…sent him?
“He told me there was a dangerous mission concerning both the Sand and the Leaf,” Shikamaru continues. “He told me you would need my help.”
“I don’t need anyone’s help.”
He rolls his eyes. “Clearly.”
Temari lets go, tossing him back to the ground. “Just stay out of it, idiot.”
“Stay out of what? Your mission? Or your marriage?”
She levels him with her fiercest glare, letting her heart slip through it, just enough to make her eyes sting. She mutters, “If I marry him, he certainly won’t forget about me.”
Shikamaru softens with regret. “Temari.”
She can’t stand to listen to him anymore. Temari marches back into the tavern to find Koninobu, relieved all but for a second. At the sight of her, he grins and shouts, “READY TO GO, MY LOVE?”
Temari sighs.
* * *
In the densest heat of summer, just before autumn, the afternoon of the desert is close to unbearable. The only ones able to keep pace are herself and Agabara—even Koninobu of desert blood lags a bit behind. The foreigners stray at an abysmal distance, all except for Shikamaru. Through spite and sheer endurance, sweat pouring down his face, he manages to remain just a bit behind Koninobu. She’s almost impressed, but of course she won’t tell him that. She wants to keep up the impression that she’s mad at him, and that she has a better option she might marry. It amuses her to think of the gears in his head turning, too prideful to speak.
“So, Princess,” Agabara says to her from his sheep, passing her his canteen. She takes a drink, only then realizing how dry her throat was. “What brings you on a mission like this? Surely you’re not in any kind of dire financial situation.”
“I have expensive taste,” she says. “I’d be terrible if I used government funds to pay for my shopping list.”
“And what, may I ask, do you have your eye on?” He glances back at Koninobu. “A wedding dress?”
She nearly pales with embarrassment. “You could guess?”
“He isn’t exactly subtle.” Agabara laughs. “Nor is your paramour behind him.”
Now she’s really pale. This man’s ability to read a room is impressive, if not frightening. Either he’s quite adept, or he’s known something the whole time, much more than he initially let on. Temari glances down at her gloved hands, her firm grip on Stormy’s reins. “Well, a girl’s got to have her fun.”
“Is that what it is? Fun?”
No. It’s miserable. Being so far away from someone you wish you could see every day…especially when you don’t even know what you are to him…a weaker person might not have been able to endure. But duty calls for both of them. His abilities are indebted to the Leaf, just as hers are indebted to the Sand. She would not feel so strongly about him if he had not risen to every occasion that pleaded his name. And though she blames him for the recent silence, it is not so harsh as to suppress the longing that stays with her in secret, in the dark emptiness of a bed without him beside her. It’s funny. She always assumed she’d prefer the space, that sharing a blanket was merely something to tolerate in the aftermath of pleasurable activities. Now she hugs a pillow at night, pretending it smells like him. Not that she’d ever let that slip, of course.
“Something like that.”
She slows Stormy down to fall behind a bit. Koninobu looks up from the ground, meeting her with eager eyes, but she slows down even more. Shikamaru’s sheep, borrowed of course, trods up to her left side. “You’re going to blow my cover if everyone sees you talking to me,” he mutters, wiping the moisture from his brow.
“I don’t care,” she says.
“Oh, well good. That’s what’s important here. Your personal feelings on the matter.”
“That’s the first thing you’ve said that’s made sense.” She grins when he glares at her. “They don’t know what we’re talking about. I could be gathering intel on how best to take you down.”
“I wouldn’t doubt that. That’s why I don’t plan on trying.”
“You’re not?” He’s perplexed at her disappointment, but she adds, “With reward money like this, you might have enough to…I don’t know. Buy the hand of a princess?”
“Oh, yeah? Which one?” He looks around with a hand over his eyes, shielding them from the sun. “I don’t see any here in my price range.”
Temari scowls. “And I never will be. Lazy ass.”
“You told me to stay out of your way!”
“And since when have you ever liked listening to me?” She gives Shikamaru a knowing look. “You’re just going to give up? Let my betrothed win the prize, whisk me to the altar?”
“So that’s his plan. Make himself into some hero to impress you.” His expression is sulky, especially as he asks, “Are you going to let him?”
“Are you?”
It’s then that a large mass wedges in between them—none other than Koninobu and his sheep. Shikamaru glares. Temari fights the urge.
“Do you know this man?” Koninobu asks, like Shikamaru isn’t even there.
“A bit,” she lies. “He works for the Hokage. One of the unimportant office clerks, you know. I met him last time I was in the Hidden Leaf on a diplomatic mission.”
“Ah.” He nods, determining that there is no need for interest. Shikamaru is just another pigeon to him. “No doubt he’s looking for money. The Leaf is all debt, what with it being blown to pieces before the war.”
Even Temari would not speak out of turn on something so serious. It was devastating to hear of Pain’s attack. Even more so when she had not known whether her competitor from the Chunin Exams, who had struck a chord in her memory ever since, was dead or alive. She glimpses the vitriol in Shikamaru’s gaze, more intense now, and decides to practice her diplomacy, “The Leaf has come to the Sand’s aid more times than I can count despite our former hostility. You could say we are indebted to their forgiveness, after my father’s failed coup.”
“Debt is an ebb and flow,” says Shikamaru, sage as ever. “Everyone is settled with it at some point.”
Koninobu scoffs a laugh. “Not me. I am always ready with payment. It is a standard the Bainao clan prides itself upon. Our motto is such: We owe only ourselves.”
“Catchy,” says Shikamaru, “but illogical.”
Now he’s earned attention—provocation enough to succeed his assumed low birth. Koninobu’s gaze whirls upon him. “And who are you to argue the logic of an ancient clan?”
“Marriage, for example,” Shikamaru continues, ignoring the question, “incurs a great debt.”
“Not one politically suited, such as ours,” Koninobu rebuts. “In fact, I think it shall make the Sand a great deal richer.”
“There is more to owe than money. If a couple decides to have children, the man owes the woman a life. It's only because of her that the child can be born. Then say childbirth was too strenuous and the man has to stay home and care for both of them. That’s a debt of care she owes. Not to mention a debt of time. The promise made upon an altar is of sacrifice, and when someone sacrifices something for you, you’re probably going to feel indebted to them, no?”
Temari stares at Shikamaru, dumbfounded. She has always been certain of his intelligence, but it’s in this moment that it steals the breath from her lungs, the wind under every playful barb and noncommittal taunt. This is his view of things. Of love. Not wild gestures and sappy romance, but limitless, glad sacrifice. She realizes she knew that even before he put it in words. From the way he wept over his peers after failing as their leader, to the way he lives in constant remembrance of his former master and his father—he feels indebted to all of them. He pays for it, every single day, with the support he gives his friends, with the extra time he spends with his mom, with the doting he shows Kurenai and Mirai. Debt is his Will of Fire, whatever powerful thing that means.
“Those are the problems of a less fortunate man,” says Koninobu. “If my wife gives me a child, she only has to point at a thing for it to be hers. If she falls ill, then I will hire the best doctors in the nation to nurse her back to health. You act, trapsman, as if marriage is an indenture. I really don’t think it should be all that strenuous—again, not when you have a fortune like mine.”
“All the money in the village couldn’t save my mother,” says Temari, her voice like an echo over the shifting wind. “She gave up her body to serve my father’s own ends. Her life.”
Her mother’s love had been sacrifice, too. She had given up her life to see her youngest born, to let him grow and bloom from the nutrients of her decay. Had her father felt indebted to that sacrifice, perhaps he would not have made his youngest son into a monster. Perhaps he would not have turned her and Kankuro into little more than his pawns. His weapons.
“She was like you, Temari.” Koninobu’s eyes shimmer with admiration, ignorance. “She understood her duty to the Sand.”
Temari alights with rage. The air swirls around her, warping and compressing, as sharp as blades. For a moment, she imagines letting emotion win over; she eliminates the wretched Bainao clan without any thought of repercussions.
He would do the same to me.
The nightmare of her mother’s fate, reimagined. The thought of that plausible reality—of her only value being her martyrdom—festers in the deepest caverns of her, driving her mad, keeping her awake at night. She is a warrior by design. The only thing that stops the fear is violence. Be as ruthless as you can be, she’d once thought, so he sees you’re more valuable than she was. He never did. Every time her father looked at her as a child, she glimpsed the pain in his eyes. She knew that all he saw was the wife he killed. He never differentiated them. He used her all the same.
“Temari.”
She does not realize the blindness of her anger until she feels a hand grip her arm. Temari looks to her right. Shikamaru winces against the wind as it slices a cut across his cheek. Immediately, the air softens. The storm stops. Regret creasing her brow, her hand raises, fingers smearing the blood over his skin, onto her own.
“I—I’m sorry. Did I offend you?” comes Koninobu’s voice, a mouse’s squeak.
“I am nothing like my mother,” she seethes low under her breath. She yanks her arm out of Shikamaru’s grasp, then pulls Stormy’s reins, urging her forward. They run across the sands, riding off into the distance.
* * *
Temari had expected Agabara’s friend to be a pastoralist, some humble nomad wandering the Sand Sea with sturdy hide tents and a flock of sheep. Who else would live in the middle of the desert, at the base of a dune said to shelter a deadly serpent?
Apparently, the myth has garnered quite a bit of spectacle over the years. Enough for Mount Manu to have its very own bathhouse.
“Until recently, nobody really believed in the Apep itself,” explains Semi as she guides them down lush, airy halls. Curtains dance in the breeze, as does the gauzy fabric of her gown, trellis-climbing jasmine becoming more perfumed the higher the moon rises in the sky. Their complexions glint against the gold of brass lanterns, fires set to burn long through the night. “But there’s a legend which says that the waters of this oasis are the same that the goddess Neith birthed the Apep in, and that bathing in it can cure one’s own chaos.”
“So the water is relaxing,” muses Agabara.
“Whatever the case, it kept my business afloat. People would come from all over to stay and bathe in the waters themselves. But now that the Apep is awake—and real—everyone is scared that it will come here. I haven’t had a visitor in weeks.”
“That’s a shame,” says a kunoichi of the Hidden Mist. “This place is beautiful.”
Semi smiles. “Thank you. In any case, I am happy to finally have the rooms filled, even if you won’t be staying for very long.” As she says that, nearly a dozen attendants approach the corridor, all dressed in white. “My staff will show you to your rooms. Once you’re settled, I’ll have them bring food and refreshment. Though I would love to share a meal with you all, I would not make you endure it after such a gruelling day of travel.”
“Thank you, Semi.” Agabara takes both her hands in his own. “Your hospitality knows no bounds.”
“It’s the least I can do,” she says, “if you’ll promise to get rid of that damned snake.”
“Remember. No fighting until dawn,” Agabara tells them before walking off with Semi, “and may the best hunter win.”
Temari follows a young girl to the very end of the corridor. Her muscles ache from a full day’s ride but she cannot rest yet. There is more work to be done.
“Madam wanted you to have the grand suite, Princess Temari,” the girl says as she opens the double doors. “We hope it is to your satisfaction.”
She steps into the room. More curtains, linen of turquoise and violet and magenta, sway from over the posters of a plush bed. A grand vanity sits in the opposite corner; a sitting area with rugs and cushions and a low table is off to the side. Behind it all is a balcony. Temari walks towards it, hands bracing the stone railing as she looks up at a sky full of brilliant stars.
“It’s amazing,” she whispers, awed.
“I’m glad you like it,” says the girl, taking her leave.
Temari turns back to the room and notices a gown atop the mattress, not unlike Semi’s. It’s breezy and quite sheer, like a well-draped sheet, belted with gold and dyed a grayish blue. Rather fancy for sleeping. Nevertheless she freshens up a bit before changing into it. Her hair looses from their four tails, wild as ever. Some things can’t be helped. The last thing she needs is the vial from her bag, a container the size of a knuckle full of clear liquid. She’d gone to one of the greenhouses herself to collect the valerian root; in a concentrated dose, its consumer would be guaranteed to sleep for days. Slipping it in a fold of her gown, she leaves her room at last. Across the hall is the door she saw Koninobu enter. She walks over and knocks on it. It swings open.
He’s dressed in his own gifted clothes, a pair of gold pants and a matching tunic, looking slightly ridiculous. “Temari,” he breathes, red as a beet by the sight of her. “Is everything alright?”
“May I come in?”
“I—well—sure. Of course.” Koninobu steps aside. She passes by, satisfied that her room is far more luxurious by comparison. No balcony. The door shuts behind him as she approaches a table laid with two glasses and a tin pitcher. She sniffs the pitcher. “Do you like wine, Koninobu?” she asks.
“On occasion,” he says.
Temari pours the first glass. “You know, in the Leaf they brew wine from plums.” She pours the second, slipping the vial in, tucking it away just in time. “It’s quite good, but very potent.”
Now standing by her side, Koninobu asks, “What’s the occasion?”
“An apology.” Temari hands him the second glass, taking the other. “I’m sorry I overreacted when we spoke about my mother. I think, even after all this time, I still…”
“Miss her?”
As Koninobu tips the rim of the cup to his lips, she walks toward the mirror propped in the corner of the room—gazing at her reflection. It’s been so long since her mother’s death, that even the memories of her have turned fuzzy. The only way she can find her face again…is by staring at herself. “You were right,” Temari admits. “I am like her. I know what my duty is, and I know I would do anything to uphold it.”
“Including marrying a man you’ve hardly met?”
He says like it’s a joke, but there’s a wobble in his voice, a need for reassurance. She turns to face him. He drinks the rest of his wine for courage—and now her duty is fulfilled. Temari drinks her own, setting down the empty cup as she passes the table. She puts a hand upon his chest. “I’ve realized that the Sand is like the Apep,” she says. “A viper. It has sought to destroy everyone I love. It has sunk its fangs into me, filled me with venom—but still I wear its crest. Do you know why? It’s not because I’m my father’s pawn, or my mother’s reincarnation. It’s because the one it poisoned the most found the cure, and will never rest until he’s healed all of us.”
Koninobu’s brows furrow. “Who—?”
“My brother would sacrifice anything for a place that once gave him nothing. For siblings that shrunk away from his abuse like it was normal, like to bear it was his birth-given duty. I am indebted to his grace, to his love, after all I put him through. I should’ve cared for him like I did Kankuro. I should’ve—”
His knees buckle. The fatigue has begun, no doubt feeling like a lead weight, pulling every bit of him down. So as not to garner any suspicion, she guides him onto the bed. “Temari, you…”
“Poisoned you?” she finishes. “You won’t die. Just sleep.”
“W—Why?”
“Because the Kazekage’s orders were to obtain the Apep before you. I will obey his command no matter the cost.” Temari leans in close, her gaze boring into his own. “This is my duty to the Sand.”
Koninobu’s eyes slip shut. She breathes a sigh of relief. Now that he’s taken care of, everything is in place. She shuts the door gently behind her, glancing around. The hall is empty. She could go back to her own bed and be done with the day, as taxing as it was. She could go find Shikamaru—but that would be admitting something she doesn’t feel ready to admit. We’ve come all this way, she thinks. Perhaps the waters can settle my chaos, too. Unsure of where exactly the bathhouse is, she wanders the marble halls until she comes across a wide, curtained threshold. Temari pushes through. Concentrated steam billows through the short tunnel, but when she emerges through the other side, it escapes into the grandeur. The pool is so vast it seems a mile long; painted tiles frame its rectangular edge. Palm trees bend in planted corners, more jasmine climbing up the rows of ivory pillars. And there, arms splayed along the tiles, head hung back, is Shikamaru. She startles for a moment. Unexpected heat creeps into her face as her eyes capture the length of his loose, dark hair—the line of his extended neck, curved at the apple, limned in lamplight.
She realizes, This is what he looks like when he thinks no one is watching. Until he speaks without opening his eyes, “Seems everyone else went straight to bed.”
More heat. Strange, strange butterflies. “You could say that.”
Temari walks to the opposite side of the pool when Shikamaru asks, “How’s your fiance?”
“I just tucked him in.” His eyes snap open. Temari smirks as she pulls down the left sleeve of her gown. “Turn around.”
Shikamaru gives her a look, sighing as he obeys. The water ripples around him, droplets sliding down the strong planes of his back. A gust of her wind shifts the mirror facing them so he can’t see their reflection. “That’s cheating,” he says.
“Nobody smart plays fair.” Gown discarded, Temari wades into the pool, the warmth enveloping her aching limbs. It feels like heaven. This might be heaven. “That’s why I planned on sedation all along.”
“Sedating who?”
“Shikamaru,” she muses, amusement curling within her. She swims until her back presses against his own. “Did you really think I was going to let Koninobu claim the Apep for himself?”
“I never know what to think when it comes to you,” he mutters.
“I bet you hate that. Being stumped. It frustrates you.”
“Endlessly.”
She laughs. His candor swells in her heart, a new warmth. “I told you from the beginning,” she says, “that I’d be a drag.”
“Yeah. You did.”
“You also tried taking me to a bathhouse then.” That day…that was when she realized she was in much deeper than she preferred. Even remembering it embarrasses her the same way. “And here we are now.”
Shikamaru chuckles at the memory. “I was an idiot. But my intentions were honest.”
“Like your intentions coming here?” she asks, leaning back to look up at him. He won’t meet her eyes, too sheepish. “How much did Gaara tell you, exactly?”
“Enough for me to travel all this way. I figured you had a pretty good chance at beating a mythical, deadly sand snake but I’m not Lady Tsunade. I don’t gamble. And besides,” his voice softens, “I know Gaara wouldn’t ask unless he felt…you really needed help.”
“You don’t know my brother well enough. Yet. He worries far too much.”
“If I hadn’t been here, you would have drowned everyone in a sandstorm,” Shikamaru retorts, frustrated again. “I get why you almost did. Trust me. But you’re really going to—” He huffs, trying to spit out the right words. “You’re going to marry someone like that?”
“The Bainao’s are the wealthiest merchants in the Sand,” she pretends to flaunt. She’s never been good at quelling flames, not when armed with a fan.
“Yeah! I can tell! Everything’s about money to that guy. He’s materialistic and self-serving and the sound of him reeks of douchebag. I mean, he thinks he’s invincible just because he’s loaded.”
The water ripples as she turns around to face him. At the sound, Shikamaru does the same. She can see the adamance in his expression, the anger in his brow. She watches the path of his eyes as it searches her face for agreement, only to find himself far more distracted. At this, Temari smiles.
“My father signed a contract, just before I took the Chunin Exams,” she says, swimming closer. Shikamaru swims back, until he’s pushed against the pool wall. “As a reward for the Bainao clan’s services, he promised I would marry Koninobu on or after my twenty-first birthday, so long as we both were able.”
“Isn’t your birthday…”
“Tomorrow. That’s why Koninobu insisted on accompanying me. He wants to slay the Apep as proof of his devotion. A wedding prize. Only the sun will rise, and he will still be fast asleep, failing his mission and failing to prove himself as a groom. I will take the Apep myself to Gaara and the Council. I will insist that Koninobu is not…able.”
She watches Shikamaru’s throat bob as he swallows. “So you’re not…?”
“No. You idiot.” Temari swims away like she’s bored, resting on the opposite edge of the pool. The jig had to be up at some point. “I’m not marrying him.”
“What if the Council insists?” he counters.
“Then I’ll mount their heads right next to the snake’s.”
Laughter spills out of his lips, abrupt, like it’s a surprise to him. “You have it all figured out, huh?”
Temari’s eyes slip shut. She takes a long, deep breath. “I always do.”
There’s silence for a moment. Whether it’s thirty seconds or thirty minutes she can’t really tell. Though she’s never been superstitious, she’s beginning to think there’s truth to what the legends say; everything other than the warmth, the velvet water, just slips away. Rippling sounds flit in her subconscious. There must be a waterfall somewhere. Yet impulse makes her open her eyes, and there’s Shikamaru, an inch in front of her. He’s risen to some of his height, water from his skin dripping onto hers. He’s staring. His eyes are intense as they bore into her own.
“What are you doing, you creep?” she scoffs, trying to push him back. He seizes her wrist. Her heart pounds; her face is on fire.
“Temari.”
“Don’t just stare like that!”
“Temari.” His voice simmers with emotion. Electric.
“What?!” she snaps.
“Do you want me to get it for you?”
“...What?”
“The Apep. I’ll bring it to the Council…to your brothers.”
The heat of the water, of the bathhouse, becomes unbearable. Does he even know what he’s saying right now? Temari stutters, “W—Why would you do that?”
Shikamaru brings her wrist to his lips, muttering over her pulse, “To prove myself.”
She yanks her hand out of his grip despite every urge to let it stay. “If you want to prove yourself,” she sneers, “you’re going to have to do a hell of a lot more than a stupid serpent.”
He says in all seriousness, “Tell me.”
She thinks. Then— “One letter every day. No exceptions, even death. And every time I visit the Leaf, you have to take me out to dinner,” says Temari, the list going on and on. She knows it’s impossible. She’s impossible. Yet she can’t help but desire these things, as foolish and impractical as they may be to two dedicated shinobi. “I want dessert, too. The buns shaped like little fish. You know them. And when we’re at dinner you can’t roll your eyes at me, or call me a drag, or—”
“But I can roll my eyes when we’re eating dessert?”
She lets out a roar of a groan. “And you can’t ask me any more stupid questions!”
“Hmm. Stupid is a bit subjective. Would it be stupid to ask if I’ve told you how much I like it when your hair is down?”
“Well…that’s not…”
“No. You’re right. That’s stupid.”
“Keep it up, Shikamaru,” threatens Temari. “And I’ll really never marry you.”
She doesn’t realize the weight of her words in time. He does. He closes the gap between them, cradling her face in his hands, as gentle as he’s ever been. He grins and asks, “So you’re saying there’s a chance?”
“Idiot,” she mutters, looking away. He bends, and his lips press to the curve of her cheek.
“I will write,” he says in full earnest, “and I will feed you anything you want. And I’ll probably still roll my eyes. But if you choose me, I—”
“I choose you,” she says. She needs no more convincing; truthfully, she needs none at all. Not since he spoke of marriage in the desert, of what it meant. His trespasses pale in the might of his substance, his sacrifice.
“...Say that again.”
Her touch splays against the dampened ridges of his abdomen, the warmth of the chakra at his core. She looks into his eyes and repeats, “I choose you, Shikamaru.”
His smile, gentle as damnation, claws into the heart of her. “Now can I get that in writing?”
She rolls her eyes. Then she kisses him. His lips, by now, are a familiar thing—yet they never cease to surprise her. For a man so calculated, he is something else entirely when he decides to give into inhibition. He returns her kiss, roughly, hungrily. The friction is the same as when they once fought: two prideful generals, never imagining that someone could ever claim to conquer them. Every movement is a challenge, like in a game of shogi.
Her teeth tug on his bottom lip. His hand tugs on her hair. She plants both hands on his chest and shoves him away—only to wrap her arms around his neck and bring him back in, on her own terms. Temari’s lips find the edge of his mouth as one hand snakes down, down, down. He seizes her wrist again, pressing her firmly into the pool wall.
“What’s the matter?” she teases. Her kisses extend to his jaw, his neck, slow and open-mouthed. She wills a cold gust of wind to trace the edge of his ear. Shikamaru shivers. “You’re not still scared of me, are you?”
“You always try to outsmart me.” His head rolls back as her mouth finds that apple, tracing it with her tongue. She can feel the vibration of his vocal chords on her lips as he mutters, “But not this time.”
Everything suddenly…stills. No. Not everything. Unable to resist him, Shikamaru’s hand fits around her jaw as he kisses her gently, deeply. Only her lips can move in reply, “Asshole.” He had not just backed her into the wall. He backed her into the light. His jutsu assuming control over her shadow, he now has the upper hand—or rather, the lower one. Beneath the water, his fingertips brush the curve of her hip, parting the crease of her thighs. He traces circles against her skin. Maddening. She nearly smacks him for teasing her, but realizes she can’t. Even more maddening.
“I hate you,” she seethes, swallowing the embarrassing noise willing its escape from the back of her throat. “I hate it when you make me lose. When you let me win.”
Shikamaru’s lips dote on the warm crook between her jaw and neck, tongue lapping the sweat on her skin. He responds, “I never said I was fair,” before meeting her gaze once more. There is a dark look in his eyes, but also caution. He’s worried that he’s gone too far. He’s worried that she won’t want him to go farther.
Her brows raise. Another challenge.
He accepts it. A skilled master at this particular game, he begins his gambit. His hand moves, and he presses on that spot hidden in the heat of her, easily found. She shudders. “You need to keep going or I’ll—” A moan cuts her off. Maddening circles.
“Temari,” he croons in her ear. He doesn’t even have to think about what he’s doing; his instinct is the perfect pace. “You might want to be nice to the man currently keeping you at his mercy.”
“Fuck—” She chokes out. “You.”
Shikamaru laughs. He kisses down her neck, her chest. It’s more flames added to an already stoked fire. She feels her stomach twist as his touch responds to what her body demands. His fingers dip lower just then, curling inside of her. Her hips jerk in response—as if she doesn’t already seem desperate enough. I am desperate. So, so desperate. More of his laughter. More insanity.
“Shikamaru,” she gasps, first a curse, then a plea. Every ounce of pride melts off her, washing away in the water below. “Oh, please—please.”
“There she is.” His breath is hot against the side of her ear. “My sweet girl.”
The pit of embarrassment feels like the peak of ecstasy. Tangled up with the rushing blood to her face, the pleasure electrifies. Only Shikamaru would dare to pin such an endearment upon a monster. She is nothing of the sort—yet the thought of him thinking so tears through every nerve, convincing her to believe it. Yes, I am sweet. Reward me.
He pulls his hand away completely. She stares at him like he’s suddenly imploded. She’s so foggy, so needy, that anger doesn’t even come to her. It’s all panic as she grips his shoulders, “What are you doing? Why are you—?” He hooks his grip beneath her thighs and hoists her up onto the pool’s edge. The water all rushes downward, ice cold now that the wind can blow against her. Temari shivers two-fold, barking, “I’m going to freeze to death!”
“We’re in a desert,” he murmurs. His hands reach the backs of her knees, and he tugs her forward, her legs thrown over his shoulders. “You’ll be fine.”
His head dips. Freezing is no longer a concern. A whine pulls from the pit of her as his tongue swipes across her, lips savoring every morsel. The heat between her legs sits in stark contrast to her cool skin; like the opposite ends of a magnet, it creates an energy all its own, a pull toward a swift coalescence. Though she wants him to do this forever, she knows her utter forfeit is on the swift horizon. Her abdomen cramps; she cries out again. It is the reclamation of that most tender spot, enveloped by his lips, that assures his victory. Waves of pleasure crash upon her, a mighty storm indeed. The wind tunnels around them until the shock is over, then everything returns to thick, damp air. Temari sighs. Shikamaru heaves, breathless.
When she sits up, she realizes his hold upon her had ended quite a bit ago. Scratches litter his shoulders and chest, the crescents of her own nailbeds—accompaniments to the one across his cheek. Just like then, he doesn’t seem to mind. She scoots away from the pool, pulling her gown over still-damp skin for the little warmth it can provide. Shikamaru, resting his head atop his arms at the edge of the pool, asks in earnest, “Is that all?”
She’d be cruel to deny him his own pleasure, but he would never say a word of it. The first time they had sex—good in its naive sort of way—he’d been so in his head about how she was feeling that when the time came to do it…well, it took him a few minutes longer than anticipated. He’s always selfless at his own expense. She’s determined to be the one thing that will never cost him.
“Come here,” she beckons in a soft voice.
He pushes himself out of the water. She enjoys the view, the proof of hard-won shinobi muscle, even despite most of his work being tactical. He’d sworn to himself long ago that he’d never let his physicality be a weakness—probably around the time she’d physically kicked his ass. It’s for his benefit and her own. Shikamaru kneels in front of her, dark strands of hair stuck to the sides of his face and neck, his desert tan the color of sun-baked sand. She lifts a hand to his chest, fingers tracing a scar across his collarbone. That one’s from the war, she remembers.
“You are cold,” he agrees, skin prickling gooseflesh at her touch.
“Warm me, then.”
He wraps his arms around her waist, and they lay down together, him holding her tight. His face buries into the crook of her shoulder, lips meeting the gauze of her gown sleeve. She is acutely aware of the pressure at that low space where their bodies touch. He is, no doubt, wanting. But every limb of his relaxes as he melts into her, kissing her neck.
“Shikamaru,” she whispers, now her turn to trace circles upon his back. “I have something to tell you.”
He hums in reply, a question.
“I’m letting you win.”
His expression is puzzled. “I did win.”
“Because I let you,” she insists, “and now that it’s over, I don’t want to fight anymore.”
Shikamaru’s brows furrow. He props himself on his arm to look at her properly. She smooths the wrinkles out with her thumb, before brushing the tender apple of his cheek.
He has challenged her like no other, forced her to ask questions of herself she might not have known to ask otherwise. Their competition, their equal-mindedness, is what drew her to him in the first place. They are daring opponents. Two sides of a game board. And when they have sex, it is stimulating and exciting—another round, another winner. They do this because it is the only thing they have been to each other. The only thing they know how to be. But as Temari gazes into his eyes now, she realizes she does not want to fuck him to claim any laurels, to tip the scale back in her favor. She’ll forfeit now because she wants him to make love to her. She is not a loser; she is a girl besotted. She wants to have sex like they are not ninja at all, but an ordinary couple.
Somehow, he ascertains all this. Understanding illuminates his features and he bends to cup her face, to kiss her forehead, her cheek. “Sweet girl,” he murmurs again, and it is all the more devastating now than before. “I don’t either.”
“Shikamaru,” she beckons again as he continues to lavish his affections. He finds her lips at last, drawing her in slowly, gently. It is intoxicating.
“You think I don’t see it? I do.” He speaks against her mouth, in the space their lips must close to meet. His hips, whether on accident or on purpose, roll against hers and she whimpers into his mouth. “The way you mentor the Sand genin. That time you met Konohamaru in the woods. When you encourage Naruto, or look after your brothers. When you showed up for me back then, when Choji was in the hospital. When my dad died.”
He looks at her and tears well in her eyes. Baki’s words had long echoed in her mind: Harden your heart. That’s what she’d done. However unlovable it made her, it was what was necessary to survive. She couldn’t be like her sweet mother—who had deserved a loving husband, who had deserved so much more. Shikamaru’s words permeate through years of trauma, piles of guilt. They deem her the one thing she’s always wanted to be.
“Those were the moments I fell in love with you,” he admits, smiling. “When I saw your gentle side.”
Gown bunched up to her waist, Shikamaru braces her hips as he slowly slides into her. She hisses; her back arches; the tears leak from her eyes. He groans, fully-enveloped—fingers digging into her flesh.
“Keep…” she mutters, “going.”
He obeys. The length of him moves in and out, creating friction against that blessed ridge, electricity shooting up her spine. They moan in tandem. It is a symphony of profanity and names, pleas and wretched noise, fluid and bodily and disgusting and wonderful. It is slow. Deliberate. Dedicated and selfless, like he is. Not a challenge. Her legs hook around him and he is pushed deeper. She feels him nearly in her ribcage. Vile. Euphoric. He’s panting in her ear. She steals what little breath he has for a kiss. Even slower and open-mouthed, lips moving in the same vicinity, uncaring of aim or accuracy. I love you, Temari. I love you I love you I love—
Heat seeps into her, his end reached, and it’s not long before she joins him for her second time. They are weary, breathless animals. It takes minutes before he pulls himself out of her, and they return to their position on the bathhouse floor, his face buried in her shoulder. She runs her fingers through his hair. Poofy like hers.
Hours pass of laying, talking, admiring. When they gather the strength, Shikamaru carries her—like a princess—back to her suite. They hurry under the covers because it is freezing with a windowless balcony and a merciless wind, cuddling close.
“The desert at night is a different thing entirely,” she says to prove her earlier point, just as they’re falling asleep.
“Not a different thing,” says Shikamaru. “A thing with different sides.”
* * *
Dawn creeps above the orange-dune horizon, and Temari realizes she’s already too late. She jolts up, wrestling out of Shikamaru’s grip— “Get up, you ass, get up!” He groans in defiance. She chucks his borrowed shirt at his face as she pulls on her tunic, and when that doesn’t rouse him, she rushes to the bed and pinches his side as hard as she can.
He swears at her, wide-awake. “What, woman?!”
“We’re late,” she hisses. “Go to your room and put on your gear. Be outside in four minutes.”
“What do you mean we’re late? Agabara said we can’t start until—”
“Guess what time it is!” She has no time for argument. “Go! Now!”
He mutters something under his breath (she smacks him over the head) before pulling his tunic on and heading for the door. She doesn’t care to watch him leave, not when she has so much to do in so little time. She loathes all the belts and buckles a shinobi must wear; at this point, she’d risk the shame of nudity to ensure she obtained the Apep. Though she’s running behind, she allows herself one quick glance in the mirror.
Temari freezes. It’s only now that she sees it that she hears it—a faint rattle, a slow ssssssss. Atop the mess of bedcovers sits a large, black snake. Is this…it? She reaches toward her back on instinct, but she has yet to put on her fan. It sits in the corner of the room. The far corner.
It’s only now that she realizes another crucial aspect about this mission: how much she loathes snakes. Chills creep down her spine, like another one is slithering across her skin.
“So much for a mighty serpent,” she barks out, despite her disgust.
“It’s not their might that does the work,” comes a voice—a voice of storytellers, of mystics…of snake charmers. “But their venom.”
She’s afraid to look away from the bed, but she’s even more afraid of confronting danger blind. Temari turns her head for a second. Agabara strides into the room, all gauze and glamor, a smirk across his face. A trick.
“I thought you said no fighting,” Temari mutters, turning back to the snake.
“Until dawn. It is dawn, no?”
“I just took you for more of a pacifist.”
“Because I outsource my work?” He chuckles. “No. I am a strategist, if anything.”
“And? Your strategy?”
“Convince a bunch of poor, gullible fools to bring me the power of a god for a fraction of the price,” he says, “yet I did not take the Princess of the Sand as poor or gullible.”
“But I am a fool?”
“A bit. For not seeing this coming.”
“You know I’m not going to bring you the Apep,” she realizes, speaking it aloud. Her heart hammers wildly in her chest. “You knew the whole time.”
“Anyone who knows you knows your devotion to your younger brother, Lord Kazekage. The only reason you do anything is at his behest.”
True. She’d come because Gaara had commanded it. No, not entirely true. The matter of her betrothal needs a resolution; this mission is more than the Sand’s wellbeing, or Gaara’s—it’s her own freedom at stake. But Gaara had commanded her to go because of what was at stake for her. What if he had declared the alliance beneficial, essential? Would she have listened to him? Would she have given up…everything?
“No,” she murmurs. She wouldn’t have. He is the one sacrifice she will not, she refuses, to make for lord and country. For anything. “You misunderstand why I am here.”
“Do I really?” Agabara takes another step forward. At the same time, the snake raises higher, poised to strike. Steel glints from beneath his sleeve; venom drips from an ivory fang. If I’m bit, I’m screwed. If I’m stabbed, I’m also screwed. There is no good solution to this problem, an ambush by all means. Their desert guide played his cards quite nicely. “No matter,” he says. “I don’t really need to know a thing to kill it.”
“Be very careful, Agabara,” Temari warns. “Treason will not bode well for your ambitions.”
“It is my ambition that allows me to commit treason. Once I have the power of the Apep, I will be unstoppable. I will be stronger than the Five Kage combined. But first…” His dark eyes glimmer. “Let me get rid of the obstacle in my way.”
Snake or charmer? Pick, Temari, pick!
The snake and Agabara lunge at the same moment. She withdraws the kunai from her belt, two at one time. An old trick in the book might do the trick. Throwing them at an angle, she ducks. They soar into the air and collide. Clink! One pins the snake to the wall. The other pins Agabara’s sleeve. Temari races toward her fan on purchased time—but it is clear she did not buy enough. Agabara wraps his hand around her neck, squeezing, using unknown strength to lift her off her feet. Immediately, the air escapes her lungs; her chest starts burning. Now she is the one pinned to the wall, fingernails scraping against his arm.
Out of air, the word can hardly escape her mouth, “Sh—Sh—”
“Look who’s hissing for me now,” Agabara croons.
“A warning…when it’s heard by other snakes.”
The shadow jutsu has taken its hold. Temari feels Agabara’s grip loosen. Coughing, she sinks to the floor, clutching her throat.
“What did you say you were again?” Agabara seethes. He’s frozen in place, ire alight upon his features. “A trapsman?”
Temari looks up and sees something that startles her. Not a different thing. A thing with different sides. His eyes are full of lightning, the wrath of an angry god come to pass judgment. He does not carry the pride of a shinobi. He has chosen another path: the heavy footfalls of a man wronged.
He mutters darkly, “Something like that.”
“We don’t have time for this,” she interrupts, getting to her feet. She would like to marvel at the creature before her, beautifully cruel, but they must get their hands on the Apep before someone else—unknowing of Agabara’s true motive—fucks it all up. “We’ll tie him to the bed, knock him out. Once we’ve dealt with the Apep, we can come back.”
Shikamaru says nothing about her orders, which she takes for agreement. Fashioning a rope out of a strip of torn curtain, she maneuvers Agabara to the floor to restrain him. It’s easy work, a basic skill for the Sand shinobi. Agabara is surprisingly silent. Perhaps that’s Shikamaru’s doing.
“Alright, come on,” Temari says once she’s finished. At last, she straps her fan to her back. “We need to go now.”
“I forgot something,” Shikamaru remembers, a sheepish look on his face. “I’ll meet you outside. Two seconds.”
She rolls her eyes, storming out of the room. Sure enough, as she paces down the halls of the bathhouse, she sees no sign of the other shinobi. They’ve all left already. Temari swears under her breath. Now is not the time to freak out, but with the impending threat of a political marriage looming large, she can’t seem to ignore the knot in her stomach. Bursting through the front doors, she squints, looking past the desert sun. Mount Manu is five miles to the west. Five long, arduous miles for walking, or for the sheep. They’ll need an alternative mode of transportation.
Just when she’s about to hunt him down, Shikamaru appears in the doorway. He walks out onto the sand, joining her. “I’m here,” he says.
“Evidently.” Temari shoots him a glare. Spreading out the length of her fan, she tells him, “Get on.”
Now Shikamaru’s glaring. “...That thing?”
“It’s the only way we’ll reach the summit before everyone else.”
“Well…you know…maybe…”
“Get on the fan, Shikamaru!”
He obeys. As Temari sits beside him, she hones her chakra into the air, lifting themselves and the fan up. It’ll take a lot more with another body weight. Her brow furrows in concentration. When the fan starts moving forward, he screams, clutching onto her like a child.
“You could slow this thing down a little!” he screams over the wind.
She speeds up because they need to—but also on purpose. Ignoring him, they whisk past fields of sand dunes, due west. Temari tries to make out any figures on the ground, signs of competition. It’s all orange. All sand. This is worse than I thought. Heart racing, it feels like hours of the same repetitive scene until a far taller peak rises above the horizon. Mount Manu.
“There it is,” she tells Shikamaru, who has resigned himself to silent trembling. Temari glances at him with a smirk. She croons, “Almost done.”
“You’re annoying and nobody likes you.”
“That’s not what I was told last night.”
He flushes like he was not privy to the scene. She focuses the wind to carry them up the side of the dune, needing all of her force to bring them higher. She withstands the downwinds; they land upon the summit, met with the face of a giant cavern—a hole resembling the fanged gape of a serpent’s maw. Temari’s blood simmers in her veins, electric at the sight of legend turned truth. Indeed, the Apep has made its lair here.
“Holy shit,” Shikamaru mutters under his breath.
“Stay behind me,” she warns him, trudging ahead.
“What?” he scoffs. “Like I need your protection?”
“You never know. Maybe the Apep will like me. You…I doubt it.”
“Ha-ha.”
Despite his grumbling, Shikamaru keeps a steady pace two steps behind. He’s not cowering, rather guarding her back, surveying every inch of the cave as they walk inside. Daylight begins to disappear behind them. Temari pats her utility belts for some kind of torch, but Shikamaru supplies one before she can find it. It gives a steady shimmer—bathing them in red.
The deeper they descend, the more worried she becomes that she has not seen a single trace of the other ninja. She’s sure that by now, even if they had faced violent deaths, there would be something. A mangled limb. A fallen headband. Her temple suddenly throbs; she’s been furrowing her brow the whole time.
“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” she asks Shikamaru.
“You also want to get the hell out of here?”
“No. Well, a little,” she admits. “But I’m wondering…why haven’t we run into anyone else?”
“Maybe you overestimated the competition,” he offers. “Maybe they’re still in bed.”
“That’s stupid. They’re all ninja. Chunin at least.”
“I think you underestimate the shinobi of the world. Not all of us can be as proficient as Temari of the Sand.”
She allows herself a small smile, despite her stress. “Sweet. Unconvincing.”
“True,” he says, “yet so hard to please.”
Perhaps still dazed from their romantic evening prior, Temari has to fight the urge to kiss him in the middle of a treacherous cave—but the treacherous reinforces itself in the sound of a low ssssss before she acts on impulse. Her gaze darts toward the direction the hiss is coming from.
“You want to follow it, don’t you?” Shikamaru guesses correctly, following behind her.
The cavern narrows before opening wide into a clearing. Wax candles, hundreds of them, litter the space, illuminating the dark. Their torch goes out just in time. It is an odd space in and of itself, only…the oddest thing stands still in the middle of the room. A man. His back is turned to the entrance, but he spins around at the sound of their footsteps.
Temari gasps. “Koninobu?”
“Hello, Princess.”
His features are the same as when she left him sleeping. All except the silver scales crawling up the sides of his neck, marring his face. His eyes have changed, too: pupils narrowed into a deadly sliver. He…is…?
Shikamaru scoffs, stunned, “You’re the Apep?”
“Not really, no,” he answers. “But people think I am.”
“I don’t understand.” Now her head really aches. She rubs it, trying to sort everything out. It’s not working. “I don’t. You were—”
“Asleep?” Koninobu strides forward. It doesn’t escape her notice that Shikamaru’s fingers itch for a kunai. “It was the perfect dose. I would be, had I not been this thing. Had I been human.”
“If you’re not human, what are you?” Shikamaru demands.
Koninobu glares at him, venomous. “A different thing. I believe you’re familiar with this kind of biological enhancement in the Leaf.”
“Lord Orochimaru,” says Temari, putting the dots together herself. “You know him?”
“Not personally. When I was younger, about fifteen, Father sent for him to come to the Sand. He wanted Orochimaru to hone his science; he would pay any price for a solution. A weapon.”
“Your father isn’t a shinobi. He has no need for a weapon. He is not fighting a war—”
“That’s where you’re wrong,” says Koninobu. “War is not confined to a battlefield. Father wages it every day from his office. When opposition arises, he must see it slain.”
Shikamaru swears so loud it echoes off the walls. Temari glances over at him as he explains, “The border villages. They weren’t just any towns. They all manufactured something. Weapons, clothing, jewelry…rendered obsolete after the Apep’s attack.”
“Supply and demand,” Koninobu muses. “We have all the supplies. We garner all the demand.”
There is no word to describe the feeling rising in her chest, like boiling magma, like the blistering fire of a giant sun. “So your Father—so you—have killed innocent people, just to put more money in your pocket?” she seethes. “You’d taint your coin with blood?”
“Show me a clean coin,” he says, “and I will repent from that day on. But I doubt very much that you could ever find one. You ninja, being as powerful as you are, are blind to the truth—that the vast majority of the world is not dependent on chakra or jutsu to turn its gears. Money is the only power an ordinary man might ever possess.”
“It’s Tahara’s power. But he’s not limited to ordinary means. Not when he has you.”
“You know my struggle well. Perhaps you are the only one, Temari,” Koninobu drawls, “that can understand me for what I am to others.” His words feel like a knife to the chest. They blister with truth. She had dismissed him all this time as some silly suitor, when in fact…he was something far more sinister. The Sand has made them into the same kind of monster.
She looks at Shikamaru then. He has returned to the form of fallen angel, of angry god. The striped shadows from candlelight simmer beneath the electricity of his anger, his righteousness. He has always been good. Done good. He has never faced the tall mountain of regret and reform, of unlearning and relearning all over again. He’s too smart for all that—moral compass all figured out. Koninobu…may have a point. Now she understands why they were bound to each other those long years ago.
“Don’t pretend,” Shikamaru growls, cutting through the hot air, “that you’re anything like Temari. It’s bullshit. Complete and utter bullshit.”
“And how would you know, trapsman?” Koninobu drawls, taking another step. His thin pupils narrow even further. “You are a child of leaves, of rain. You can never understand the brutality of the Sand, necessary to our survival—you have never thirsted.”
Temari tries to listen but cannot focus. Her eyes are glued to the shadows slowly slithering behind the serpent. Trap laid. He hid his identity. Koninobu doesn’t know. She’s stunned by his quick thinking, his utter genius.
“We may have water in the Leaf. But in its murky depths lies our own serpent, stealing children from the riverside, warping their cold bodies into marionette skins.” Shikamaru’s voice echoes through the cavern. A shiver crawls down her spine. She thinks of the last Uchiha then, of the red-eyed devil he’d become. “That’s all you are, Koninobu. In order to protect a greedy man’s ambitions, you were turned into a puppet.”
“I am a weapon.”
“No. Weapons are still sharp when held by accident. You are only powerful when wielded.”
A shadow wraps around Koninobu’s ankle. He glances down and swears. “I should’ve known you were more than just a simpleton.”
“Should’ve,” Shikamaru agrees. He yanks on the shadow and Koninobu comes sliding toward him. His kunai is at the ready. It all happens so fast, she has no time to act, to come to his aid. Shikamaru kneels, the blade at Koninobu’s pale throat—
“I smell memories on your breath, I see them in your eyes!” Koninobu shouts, laughing. He sounds insane, but Shikamaru’s expression pales with comprehension. “Do not pretend to hunt deer, Shikamaru Nara! For there is a corpse in your woods still begging for your mercy! My father, Lord Orochimaru, knew the Akatsuki you see—”
Hesitation costs Shikamaru. Koninobu wrenches his hand from the shadows’ pull, taking the knife for himself. The blade plunges into Shikamaru’s stomach.
Temari screams. It is not of peril, or fear. It is of sheer rage. The wind is hard to pull from with no open air around them, so she draws it from Koninobu’s breath, squeezing her fists. His eyes bulge as he chokes. His skin turns purplish. She drops to her knees beside him, and staring deep into his pathetic gaze, she reaches forward to cradle his head—as if she’s about to kiss him.
She snaps his neck.
Temari throws his head to the ground. A gasp escapes her. She’d held her own breath the whole time. Though she feels the urge to kick in Koninobu’s skull, she swiftly swivels around. Shikamaru barely props himself up on his elbow as he pulls the kunai out of him. It clatters to the ground. Crawling to his side, she presses her palm over the split flesh. His blood seeps between her fingers. Her chakra has been spent. Between flying them and choking her ex-fiance, there is little of her left—yet she must. Her med-nin skills are frightening but she employs them anyway. Blue-green light covers the wound, seeking healing.
“When…” Shikamaru grabs onto her shoulder. He squeezes it as he groans, limbs writhing with pain. “When did you learn this?”
She ignores him. The answer is that she begged Sakura to give her some basics last time she was in the Leaf, for fear of something ever happening to Gaara or Kankuro or him…again. She hates that it already has.
The light flickers when she has spent all that she can give. It will be enough for the journey back to the capital, to the Sand hospital. At least, she hopes so. Fatigue wearing on every inch of her, she sits back and sighs, wishing she could fall asleep.
“Temari…” A hand reaches for her face. She slaps it away.
“Fuck you.” Shikamaru’s lips pinch. He doesn’t say another word. She goes on, “Why did you hesitate? Huh? He could’ve killed you!”
“I—I don’t know.”
“Lie to me one more time and I’ll slit your throat myself,” she seethes, finally gazing into his eyes. Her own burn with more than unshed tears. “Why?”
“I killed him,” says Shikamaru. His silence after it makes it seem like she was not the one to send Koninobu to a deserved hell. “I killed Agabara.” Her own silence gives him room to explain, and he does, “I heard him in the tavern. I knew he knew who you were and I knew he had to be questioning why you were there. I didn’t trust him. So when I left your room this morning, I laid a trap. The moment he stepped through the threshold, a shadow alerted me. That’s why I came. How I knew. And when I saw you gasping for air, for life, I—”
A sob catches in his throat. He turns from her, putting his face in his hands, hiding as he reveals the ugly truth. “Fuck, Temari. Fuck.”
He does not need to fill in the gaps. She knows now that when he saw her choking, almost dying, he saw his helpless master and his helpless father. The thought of her being among the corpses laid at his feet was too much for him to bear. “I don’t care that he wasn’t successful,” he says, livid. “I wanted to flay him alive just for thinking it, for trying it. But then he told me…”
Shikamaru has to take a breath. He swallows. “Koninobu killed the other ninja last night. All of them. For you.” A wretched explanation. Temari’s eyes go wide. Her heart hammers in her chest as he continues, “And when I slit Agabara’s throat, I realized that I’m no different from that monster. I wanted to torture him like I did Hidan in the woods. I just didn’t have the time. But I would. I would because…it’s you.”
His confession rings clear as a bell. Because it’s you. She had felt that same rage when the kunai pierced him, when the possibility of a world without him became unspeakably close to real. Ninja are meant to be ruthless. But between them lies a dangerous sort of compromise, the kind that inspires teeth and claws and venom, that justifies frivolity in both feeling and in killing. This is not the brutality of the shinobi. This is the monstrosity of any lover, of any two trying desperately to hang on to the other and never let go.
Temari crawls to face him. He picks his head up from his hands, face red and puffy and raw. She leans in. She kisses him. It tastes of smoke and blood and sand, tears finding their way into the mix. Hers or his. Both probably. When she pulls back, she says to him, “Neither am I.”
“What?” he croaks out.
“Different.” Her hand finds his chest, forgetting that it’s covered in blood. It smears against Shikamaru’s tunic. “When I saw the knife go in you, I remembered the war. I remembered Gaara’s dead body. I remembered Kankuro in the hospital, poisoned. If I had gotten my hands on Sasori, or any of the Akatsuki, I would have watched them writhe. I would have enjoyed it.”
His hand finds her cheek, and this time, she doesn’t swat it away. “I saw the knife in you and I saw my failures a third time—” Temari cuts off, her breath ragged. Her lip quivers. “I couldn’t help them. I nearly lost them. I nearly lost you.”
Shikamaru pulls her into his arms. She sobs. Guilt wracks her. He’s the one stabbed, she should be comforting him, but she gives into the sandstorm of feeling that engulfs her. She is not impenetrable, indomitable—fearless. Her fear and her guilt and all of her sorrow are pinned in the very same places her love resides, to the things that matter most. He is the only one that understands this. He is the only one who can. And because he understands, he does not give her any false promises. He merely tells her, “Let it out.”
She does. It feels like hours have gone by when her tears finally subside, a war and its trauma kept caged inside her chest even years after its resolution. Temari sits back, giving him a break from propping up the weight of her. She wipes her face on her sleeve. “I’m sorry—”
“Don’t,” says Shikamaru, severe. With a much cleaner sleeve, he takes up the mantle, drying her eyes for her.
“We should go,” she manages, after a moment.
“What do you want to do with him?” he asks.
“The sand will bury him soon enough.”
* * *
They scrambled down Mount Manu on their own two feet, resting at its base. Using her fan to shield themselves from the unrelenting sun, Temari waited until she could feel that enough chakra had returned to her. Then they flew straight back to the Hidden Sand.
The minute she arrives, she barks her first orders to the waiting guards, “You, go to the bathhouse by Mount Manu and find the corpses of ten ninja from various villages, as well as the corpse of a snake charmer. Also bring back my sheep. She has black wool. And you, take Shikamaru to the infirmary. Tell the best nurse there to repair him immediately—”
Shikamaru grabs her by the wrist, smiling at her. “One, I’m not a vase. Two, I’ll go to the infirmary after we report to Gaara.”
“My healing is abysmal. You’re probably bleeding out internally,” she exaggerates for effect.
“Comforting,” he says, “but I’ll take my chances.”
She is too tired to argue. Temari leads the way to Gaara’s office, holding his hand until they are allowed entrance through the door. At the sight of them, Gaara stands from behind his desk. His expression is stunned. Putting what must be his thoughts into words, Kankuro says from beside him, “What stampede ran you two over? You look like shit.”
“And you used to play in it,” barbs Temari, sneering.
“Lord Kazekage,” Shikamaru greets, reminding the room of manners. “Kankuro.”
“Shikamaru Nara,” Gaara greets in return. “I thank you for your prompt response to my correspondence. And for aiding my sister.” She recalls Shikamaru’s earlier confession, that he came because of Gaara’s beckon. Her wrath turns to the younger of the brothers.
“That’s right.” Temari storms up to the desk, looking him straight in the eyes. “I had the mission handled. Was it your idea to start meddling in my affairs?”
“Well, I—” Though he is her Lord Kazekage, Gaara still manages to stutter. “After you left, I received intelligence from Lord Hokage that a connection to Orochimaru may be involved. We felt it best to have both a Sand and a Leaf representative investigate.”
“And so you took the liberty of singling out a specific Leaf jōnin yourself, rather than leaving the task to the Hokage?”
“Now, now, Gaara, let’s not be coy,” Kankuro drawls. He leans against the desk himself, bending so he’s right in Temari’s face. Annoying wretch. “We wanted a little show.”
She raises an eyebrow. “A show?”
“You know. Two mighty warriors, duking it out for the hand of the fair maiden. That’s always good entertainment.”
Temari promptly pinches Kankuro by the ear. He howls in pain as she drags him to the ground, seething, “Koninobu was a pathetic imbecile and I am not some maiden!”
Kankuro squeaks out, “That’s a bit more personal information than I needed—”
“One more word out of you, Kankuro, and I’ll—!”
Gaara clears his throat, and it’s all the noise he needs to bring them to silence. He speaks softly, “Uh, Temari?”
“What?”
“Koninobu…was?”
“We can explain,” Shikamaru swiftly offers.
Gaara beckons to the two seats before his desk. “Please.”
They sit, and they tell him everything. Well, not everything. But about Agabara’s schemes and Koninobu’s sick sacrifices and how they both took a (literal) stab at trying to eliminate the two of them. About how, yes, Orochimaru was involved in it after all—tying their villages together in a too-familiar tragedy. Time and time again, children are made into monsters, into weapons. They tell him about twelve endings, fair and unfair.
“I just received another bit of intelligence today from Captain Yamato,” Gaara reveals once they’ve finished. “Tahara Bainao has been arrested by the Leaf. He was found in a raid of one of Orochimaru’s abandoned lairs. Lucky for us, this means we can prosecute him before he might inflict any economic wrath upon the village at the news of his son’s death.”
Temari’s expression sours. Guilt creeps back in. “I’m sorry, Gaara. I should have set my emotions aside. I should have brought Koninobu to you like you ordered.”
“Don’t apologize.” Though he was born in a desert, his voice often carries the softness of rain. It’s nearly enough to bring about another of her downpours when he says, “This mission wasn’t really about the Apep, though I was certain you would find a solution to that, too. It was for you.”
Her brows furrow, puzzled.
Gaara explains, “Our father inflicted a great deal upon us as children. But when we found the marriage contract between you and the Bainao clan, I realized that you were the only one still shackled by his shadows, even so long after his death. I knew it was something I had to free you of. I also knew that the freedom you deserve would only be gained by your own hand. So I let you go, uncaring for the outcome of the mission so long as you had found a way to break the contract.”
“We would’ve never let you marry that rat bastard,” scoffs Kankuro. “Especially now that we know how rotten he really is. Death is mercy compared to his sins.”
“It was necessary,” Gaara assures her. “It was what you had to do. Therefore no one, not even yourself, can blame you.”
Once more, her brothers’ faces turn to horror. She realizes it’s because of the tears dripping down her cheeks. Now that the floodgates have gone, there is no stopping them. Not today, at least. Their words have placed a bandage over some fretful, cracked part of her heart—making her feel like perhaps they have always seen her as a worthy sister after all.
“She didn’t want to let you down,” Shikamaru interprets for her, knowing her heart as well as his own.
“You never do,” says Gaara.
Though her guilt refuses to fully believe it, the sentiment wriggles into her nevertheless. A warmth, an ease spreads across her body.
“If you think you’re the disappointment of the family, I’m scared to hear what you think about me,” jests Kankuro.
She gives him a black look. “Imbecile.”
Kankuro grins.
“Uh, if I may, Lord Kazekage—” Shikamaru interjects. She glances at him, and swears she sees the hint of a blush on his tan cheeks. “Well…I’m still not certain why you wrote to me specifically. Not that I mind. I mean, I would have seen the correspondence as secretary and insisted I go anyway. So. Just curious.”
Gaara shares a look with his brother. Then he says, “I believe Kankuro answered that a little bit ago. Entertainment, or whatnot.”
Temari balls a fist. “You’re lucky I’m too tired to deal with you.”
On behalf of her fatigue, and Shikamaru’s injury, she excuses the both of them. But before she leaves, she acts upon an urge she doesn’t get very often—forcing Gaara into a hug. He verbally exclaims, “Oh,” as he stiffens in her embrace. He’s still not quite used to them. Kankuro hisses like a cat when her attention turns to him, though he softens at the end. Absent-mindedly, he mutters in her ear, “For a moment, it felt like Mom.” When she pulls back, she pinches his cheek.
“Come on,” Temari beckons Shikamaru. “Time for a real medical ninja to look at you.”
“I need to report some Hokage things to Gaara,” he says, sheepish. “Classified stuff. I’ll meet you there in a minute.”
You are the world’s worst liar, Shikamaru. Luckily she’s rather attracted to transparency. Though she acquiesces without a fight, she knows better than to leave completely. Temari finds the secret post she’d occupied as a child in the room above the Kazekage’s office, where the ventilation between rooms lets the sound drift, and a crack in the floorboards allows enough of a view.
“The last thing I want is a contract,” says Shikamaru. “Or to pressure her, or to steal her freedom. I just…I want to know that when the time is right, I’m able to ask. Her call entirely. I mean, I would today if she wanted it, I just—”
She glimpses Kankuro mouth to Gaara, “Entertainment.”
He steels himself, taking a deep breath. In much clearer terms, he states, “When I return to the Leaf, I’m going to petition the elders of the Nara clan for permission to marry an outsider. Then, when it’s right, I’ll ask Temari’s permission…to allow me to be her husband. To become my wife.”
Temari’s heartbeat flutters. She presses a hand over her mouth, feeling the stretch of her smile against her palm. He’s serious. Before, the dream she’d had of a wedding with a herd of deer for the guests seemed peculiar. Now it seems like a portent.
Gaara mouths back, “Entertainment,” before interrogating, “You plan on stealing Temari from her homeland? From her family?”
Shikamaru pales. “No. I mean, that’s not my intent.”
“It’s a side effect, however. Unless you plan on becoming a ninja of the Sand.”
“Well, as lovely as that sounds, I sort of promised Naruto that I’d be there for him when—if—well, yeah, when he becomes Hokage.”
“Sounds like you should marry Naruto then,” jeers Kankuro.
“Unfortunately, he’s already married,” Gaara says, “remember?”
“Is the Nara clan as illustrious as the Hyuuga?” Kankuro asks. “I would hope so. A princess’s bride price is a rather hefty sum.”
“Uh, no,” Shikamaru answers in earnest. “But I can provide whatever! Whatever you need. Whatever she needs. And we’re currently planning construction of a rail line that directly connects the Hidden Leaf to the Hidden Sand, so if she did move, it wouldn’t take her long to return. She could continue her diplomatic work—or live with me only part of the time—or none of the time—or—”
“Was there something you wanted, Shikamaru?” questions Gaara. “Other than our sister?”
Realization that he has yet to spit out his question dawns upon him. He flounders to the floor, onto his knees, making his bow as low as possible. Temari flushes with heat.
“You both mean the world to her,” says Shikamaru, “so before I do anything, I want your blessing. I dare not ask permission from anyone other than Temari herself.”
Another scheming smile shared between brothers. Though she believes that somehow this one isn’t all mischief. “Yes, well, there will be tons of paperwork,” sighs Gaara, “and the joining of villages in matrimony is always a big political spectacle, but…I’m sure something can be arranged.”
Shikamaru looks up from his kowtow. “Yes?”
Gaara glances at Kankuro for confirmation. Kankuro shrugs, “Yeah, whatever.”
It’s good enough for Shikamaru. He thanks the both of them, close to beaming, and just before he walks out of the door Kankuro mutters, “Welcome to the family.”
Temari grins. She gets up from her post, heading down to meet Shikamaru in the infirmary.
* * *
The head medic at the Sand hospital said her healing had “sufficed,” just as expected. After some follow-up care and a few stitches, Shikamaru was deemed fit for discharge. Thankfully, home was only a block away. They showered, changed into the comfiest things she could find, and promptly passed out in her bed—a mess of sheets and sprawled out limbs and loose, unruly hair.
Temari wakes hours later, drool sticking her pillow to her cheek. She glances over at Shikamaru, the lazy oaf, sure not to rise until morning at least. Her irritation at his habits, and his leaving her alone when they have such scarce time to spend together, fades at the remembrance of his earlier speech. They will have much more time in the future. Soon. Pressing a kiss to his forehead, she gets up, heading toward the kitchen. Hunger complains aloud, a rumble in her stomach. She’s about to search the fridge for something appetizing when she spots the note on the counter.
Kankuro and I are making ourselves scarce. Enjoy your time together. : )
- Gaara
Her cheeks alight; her eyes roll. She thanks whatever overlord that made this shit-pot world that she has at least one brother with some tact. At last she appraises the refrigerator for ingredients, settling on a chicken and lentil soup that Mom always used to make. Garlic and coriander start to simmer in a hot saucepan, soon filling the room with aroma. She hums to herself, an idle folk song, maybe a lullaby. That is, until footsteps round the corner. Shikamaru rubs his eyes of sleep, stretching as he yawns. Temari gets a glimpse of a favorite male aspect: a sliver of abdomen. She smiles to herself.
“Smells good,” he mutters.
“Soup,” she informs.
“It’s usually me treating you to dinner,” he remarks.
“As it should be,” she affirms, “but you were asleep and I assumed I wouldn’t hear from you until lunchtime tomorrow.”
“Where are your brothers?”
“Probably getting dinner somewhere. Kankuro downing an entire keg of ale while Gaara disdainfully sips tea.”
Shikamaru chuckles. “I can picture it.”
A comfortable silence falls between them, the music of sizzle and bubble taking over. Shikamaru comes up behind her, his arms around her waist, chin resting upon her shoulder. She glances over at him, smirking. It’s not often he’s this cuddly. Not that she minds. Certainly not. She wonders if certain…aspirations have spurred it on.
His brows furrow. “What?”
“Nothing.” Her attention turns back to the pot. “Any pain?”
“No.”
“Good,” she says. “I don’t like ordering beheadings, but a princess does what she must.”
He smiles against her skin, muttering, “Tyrant.”
“I rule by fear. Love is overrated.”
“Is it?” She can hear the tinge of worry in his voice, and rather than reassure him of her devotion, decides to continue with tyranny.
“Wholly. Fear is an indisputable thing, but love…well, it comes with so many unwanted side effects.”
“Like?”
“A ball and chain,” she teases.
Shikamaru lets go of her, standing at his full height. His hands press to his hips. “Or a parakeet,” he barbs, “constantly shrieking in your ear.”
“A goodbye note.”
He sighs, “I thought we were over this.”
“Oh, you’re never getting over this, jackass.”
“We’re ninja! Kakashi-sensei called me on a mission and I had no choice—”
“Shikamaru.” She levels him with a stormy glare. “I would suggest you make like the Chunin Exams and forfeit.”
He barks a laugh. “You should’ve beat me, by all means, considering you’re two years my senior but…” Shikamaru shrugs. “I knew you could use the win.”
“You were a lazy, uninspired bum. You were tired because I wore you the hell out.”
“Is that why you were lagging at the end? Fan too heavy for delicate limbs?”
“Chauvinist pig.”
“Uptight b—” Temari glares again, and he corrects, “busybody.”
“Last I checked, this uptight busybody has saved your ass on more than one occasion. You should be bowing to me in gratitude.”
“You’d like that wouldn’t you? Someone to stroke your ego.”
“You only want a woman around to stroke your ego and your—” The timer rings, the lentils done soaking. She assembles the whole soup, pouring the broth into the pot, covering it with a lid. Temari turns to him once more. She takes a breath to finish the sentence, but Shikamaru covers her mouth with his hand.
“Be quiet,” he orders, “so I can kiss you.”
She obeys. His fingers curl into her hair, hers into the hem of his shirt. Temari savors every ounce of it, letting it linger, before muttering, “Overrated. But I do love you all the same.”
He pulls back just a little, gazing into her eyes. His have taken on a new, soft kind of shimmer. Shikamaru grins. “You do?”
She scoffs. “Of course I do. Idiot.”
The timer rings again. Temari grabs a spoon from the drawer, dipping it into the broth. Once it’s a bit cooler, she holds it up for Shikamaru to try. He gives his assessment: surprise wrought upon his features. “Woah,” he says, “that’s good.”
Temari suddenly remembers something about this exchange, one that hadn’t hit her until now, a flashbulb of memory. Mom made this soup with her, and would tell her the tale that went along with it, about a boy and a girl and what the soup meant as they shared it after starving on a mission in the desert. “Would you say you feel satisfied?” she queries.
“Uh. Very?” he answers.
“That does it then.”
“Does what?”
“Well, the soup still has to sit a bit longer, but by every rule we have on the practice in the Hidden Sand…” She grins. “We’re married now.”
Despite swallowing the broth, he manages to choke, “What?”
“In the Sand, the ceremony for marriage is private and brief,” Temari explains. “One partner cooks and the other expresses satisfaction with the meal. The cooking is the promise to provide for the family. The satisfaction is the promise to cherish each others’ efforts. From then on, the couple can declare themselves married, if they wish.”
Shikamaru huffs a laugh. “You’re messing with me.”
“On the contrary.” She shuts the lid of the pot once again, gazing up at him. Her brow arches in challenge. “You’d better go home and speak to your elders, Lord Nara. My side of the equation is complete.”
At the realization that she’d overheard his conversation with her brothers, Shikamaru flushes. She laughs at the sight. Suddenly, he reaches up and pinches both of her cheeks—retribution for eavesdropping. For a second, she’s stunned. Then she laughs even harder. A snort slips out, quite un-royal. “Meddlesome woman,” he grumbles, but a grin lights up his whole face.
“Stop—” Temari slaps his hands away. “It.”
“You really want to?” he asks.
“What?”
“…Marry…me?”
“Well, you’re not the first to ask,” she jests, “but sure. Number two will suit just fine.”
Shikamaru sighs, then laughs, then kisses her again. In a single moment, she witnesses the beginning of an echo, a reverberation that will exist for the rest of her life—the sound of him, always by her side.