Chapter Text
~Madara~
“You look pissed off, brother,” Izuna informed Madara conversationally.
“I’m not pissed off,” Madara said automatically, “that’s just my face.” Normally it was the truth. His face was contorted into a permanent scowl that made him look like he was angry at the world all the time.
“Alright,” Izuna hedged, “you sound pissed off.”
“I’m not pissed off,” Madara repeated again, “that’s just my voice.”
“Quit bullsh*tting me,” Izuna snapped, apparently getting irritated with Madara's responses. “I’m trying to be concerned, and you’re making it really hard to care.”
“Then don’t care,” Madara told him. “Get your fat nose out of my business and go and drool over that whorish woman that you’ve been pathetically fawning over the past month.”
Izuna hissed dramatically as he clutched a hand over his heart, as though he was wounded. “That really hurts, brother. You should be nicer to me. You never know what sort of mental scarring might happen with my family being so horrible to me.”
Madara turned and looked at him with an unimpressed look. His brother was such a drama queen. “The only mental scarring you have happened from our parents repeatedly dropping you on your head when you were younger.”
Izuna snorted and shook his head at Madara's barb, not even offended by it. Why was it so hard to insult his younger brother? “Can’t fawn over her…she dumped me last night. Said that I wasn’t ready enough for commitment.”
Forgetting about his grouchiness for a few moments, Madara turned and looked at his younger brother in surprise. He actually felt a pang of sadness toward him along with quite a bit of confusion. “And what did you say to her?”
“I told her that her saying that was rich, considering that she was the one that was f*cking half of the on-duty guards behind my back,” Izuna shrugged. “Didn’t like her much, anyway. I want a woman with class.”
“Any woman with class isn’t going to put up with your sorry ass,” Madara informed him mournfully. He wanted nieces and nephews, and it seemed that Izuna was doing everything in his power to repel decent women. It was hard enough to find women of their kind that were decent, anyway. Most of them were so old that they didn’t care about things such as propriety anymore, which was the problem with Izuna’s latest attempt. They wanted marriage only by name.
“I know,” Izuna sighed.
They were standing in the armory of the Uchiha compound. Madara had been looking over a few of the relic weapons that had been passed down through the generations when Izuna had walked up, desperately trying to take his mind off the problem at hand. His brother had actually been a rather nice distraction.
“So,” Izuna said, changing the subject back to its original course, making Madara immediately take back his last thought. “Are you going to tell me what’s bothering you, or not?”
“I’m just frustrated,” Madara relented. “We don’t have enough food to do us for the upcoming winter, and father won’t allow me to go out on a hunt to get some more game.”
“You know that he won’t allow you for good reason,” Izuna informed him. “The Senju are out in the forest, and they hunt our kind. He doesn’t want to see you get hurt.”
“They used to hunt our kind,” Madara snapped. “And I won’t get hurt, even if one of them did decide to attack me. I’m the strongest warrior of the Uchiha bloodline! I can take care of myself.”
“That’s not what I’m worried about, son,” Madara flinched and spun around to see his father standing behind both brothers. He had shoulder-length dark hair that was rumpled by the roaring wind outside. His coat was covered by snow, which meant that he had just walked in at the very end of his and Izuna’s conversation. His dark eyes bored into Madara, making the younger feel as though his soul was being watched. “I’m aware that you can take care of yourself against nearly any Senju that is out there. My largest worry is that we’re simply too late. Winter has come early this year, and the first blizzard is almost upon us. You wouldn’t be able to go and hunt before it hits.”
“I’ve hunted in blizzards before,” Madara argued. “The storm is still over a week away according to our clan’s experts. I can make it back with more food before then. We might still be cutting things thin, but it won’t be as bad.”
His father, Tajima Uchiha, shook his head. “You’re my heir, Madara. I cannot risk you like that. No matter how strong you are, it doesn’t take any more or any less skill to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. You need to be here in a shelter when it hits.”
“As heir,” Madara said, looking at his father and straightening up as much as he could, “it is my duty to the people here to make sure that they were sufficiently provided for in the case of a natural disaster. I will not go against your orders, father, but I beg you to reconsider and let me go. I need to do this for my clan!”
“Very well,” Tajima said. “You and two others will go.”
“Awesome!” Izuna yelled, jumping in the air and waving his hands around in a fanatical fashion. “I want to go! Choose me, Madara!”
“No,” Tajima cut in immediately. “You’re the only two sons that have survived into adulthood. At least one of you will be staying here where your safety is guaranteed.”
Izuna immediately wilted, but he did not argue. His enter body slumped slightly, but it was almost a resigned pose, as though he knew that there was no fighting against Tajima on this. Madara could understand the man’s fear. He had already lost his wife and three of his sons. Madara felt bad about asking his father to let him go out on a dangerous run for supplies, but he would do it anyway. The clan came first at times like these.
“Get ready to head out, Kagami and Hikaku will join you,” Tajima said. Madara had to fight back the urge to roll his eyes at his father’s commanding air. He wanted to ask his father if Kagami or Hikaku had a choice in whether to go or not, but he decided that pushing his luck in that fashion wasn’t the wisest choice that he could make.
“Thank you, father,” Madara said formally, bowing. “I will go and inform my cousins and we can get out of here as soon as possible.”
Izuna remained silent as Tajima nodded his head in approval. Madara then turned around and exited the small building and went back out into the snowy dirt streets, pulling his jacket a bit tighter around himself as the freezing wind cut him to the bone.
Kagami and Hikaku probably weren’t going to be thrilled by the news, but Madara was certain that they would get over it. It wasn’t very often that they were able to shift into wolves and stretch their legs anymore.
~Tobirama~
It was getting cold. Tobirama could feel the freezing winds through his cloak as he stood atop the trees and looked down at the forest ground below. The sun was gone, and darkness had taken over. If he had been a mortal, he was certain that he would have been unable to so much as see his hand in front of his face. Thanks to his preternatural blood, however, his sight was sharp enough to make out the finer blades of grass that grew in patches on the beaten path fifty feet below.
“Are you certain that we’re in the right spot?” Tobirama inquired, turning to look at his cousin. Toka Senju was standing on a limb of the tree next to his. A bow was in her hand as she looked down at the ground as well.
“Yuki said that he saw a vampire near the old cabin that was just off from the mortal trail,” she said. “He has no reason to lie. Children aren’t supposed to be this far away from our village, so he’s in a lot of trouble right now for his actions.”
“As far as I know, Yuki has never seen a vampire before,” Tobirama said. “How would he even know what to look for to say that it was one? It was probably just a mortal that spooked him. They’ve been traveling through here often, trying to get past before the blizzard starts.”
“He was genuinely scared, Tobirama,” Toka said.
She sounded uneasy and for good reason. It had been many decades since a vampire dared to set foot in their forest. They were horrible creatures. Selfish, power-hungry, and pure evil. They were the only preternatural species alive that didn’t have a place in the supernatural summit that happened every year that was supposed to promote peace throughout the creatures that roamed the earth. It was a strained peace, but it had stopped full-blown war from breaking out since its installation.
“I don’t sense anything off right now,” Tobirama said. He sniffed the air, and only smelled the presence of their elven clan a few miles off. “Come on,” he said. “Let’s split up and see if we can find anything else. A vampire, if they were to come into this forest at all, probably wouldn’t be stupid enough to stay on the trail.”
“Do you think that splitting up is a good idea?” Toka questioned. “Vampires are really powerful, after all.”
The odds of there actually being a vampire prowling the forest were indescribably low. If they were desperate enough to come inside, it meant that they were in trouble or wounded. Either way, the wouldn’t pose much of a threat. He figured that Toka was a bit too much like Tobirama’s elder brother to be swayed with such logic, so he just nodded and said, “You’re plenty strong enough and I am too. If we come up to any issues, I’m certain that we can handle it just fine on our own.”
“Alright,” Toka said, accepting the simple explanation a lot more readily than she would have the longer one. “I’ll go left and you go right?”
“Sounds good to me,” Tobirama replied before he turned away from his cousin and jumped to the next tree. He quickly began climbing down, craving the protective barrier from the wind that the trees created. As soon as his feet silently hit the ground, he looked around for as far as he eyes could see in the pitch darkness and saw nothing out of place. The only sounds that he could hear came from small rodents that were scampering around on the forest floor.
He bounded through the forest, making sure to keep himself alert for anything that was out of place. Everything was calm and normal for a few minutes, but he smelled something off just on the outer range of his senses, to his right just as he passed through a small clearing with a frozen stream. His bow and quiver of arrows were sitting on his back and it was a comforting presence. He absently gripped the hilt of his sword for a moment, assuring himself that it was there as well before he turned and took off toward the disturbance.
As he got closer, he slowed down from his run to a slow walk and stopped after a few steps as he realized something very important. He was smelling something that wasn’t of the same species as him, but it certainly wasn’t a vampire. It was much too wild, and there was nothing seductive about it.
“What the hell are mutts doing in the forest at a time like this?” Tobirama muttered to himself. Part of him was tempted to turn around and leave them to whatever it was that they were doing. There was only one pack of wolves that would normally come into this forest, and it was the Uchiha dogs. The last thing that he wanted was an encounter with any of them. They were the most uncivilized and rude group of people that he had ever had the displeasure of meeting.
I need to go and check it out, he though resignedly. They might be the people that scared Yuki. If that was the case, then there would be hell to pay for him being out in this miserable cold for absolutely nothing.
He sighed and started running again. He supposed that it was better that he found them than Toka. She had no filter at all. She would have probably started a brawl with them, and the repercussions of that would be horrible. The relationship between the Uchiha and the Senju was strained at best, and it wouldn’t take much for a war to break out.
He would be able to get things settled so much more smoothly as long as Madara Uchiha wasn’t in the group.
It was like thinking his name conjured the other man into existence. Tobirama heard running feet that sounded a lot like animal’s feet. A moment later, three large wolves busted into view. The front one was all black, his mouth twisted into a menacing snarl. There was another one that had brown hair just behind him and a bit further back was a smaller one with kinky, curly black fir. All of them were growling angrily at him. Tobirama instinctively took a couple of steps back and pulled out a bow with an arrow, notched the projectile and pointed it directly at the jugular of the front wolf.
Tobirama remained silent for a moment, listening to the menacing growls of the filthy dogs as he stood with his arrow pulled back, ready to fire.
“Name yourselves,” he finally commanded. “State your business in the Elven Forest!”
The snarl of the front wolf got even louder before it was gone. Tobirama heard a low pop and smoke. A moment later, a very naked man and very familiar man was standing in front of him. Embarrassed by the lack of propriety on his part, Tobirama immediately looked at Madara's face, refusing to look anywhere else, because he refused to let him know how uncomfortable that he was. “Hikaku! Kagami!” the leader’s loud, deep voice called. “Stand down. It’s just a prick.”
The snarls immediately stopped and there were two more pops. Another man and a teenager both appeared, just as naked as the initial man. “What do you want, Senju Why didn’t you send your idiotic brother out here instead?”
“Hashirama is the newest head of our clan,” Tobirama informed Madara coldly. “He has no time for such trivial duties, such as patrolling for idiots and mutts.”
“Who do you think you’re calling mutts?!” the younger of the trio demanded. He had the same, curly hair as his wolf’s mane did. He scowled at Tobirama angrily, but before he could say anything else, Madara cut him off.
“Ignore his comment, Kagami,” Madara commanded. He turned around and looked at Tobirama. “Is there anything else that you need? We were kind of in the middle of something when you so rudely barged upon us.”
“State your business here,” Tobirama replied coolly. “I believe that I already asked you for that.”
“I believe that our business here is none of your concern,” Madara returned, crossing his arms over his bare chest defiantly. Tobirama absently wondered how the other man could hold so much pride and dignity in his stance while he was in such a state of undress. “The last time I checked, the treaties stated that while you may live in these woods, the Senju are not sole owners of the goods found here. It is well within my rights to be here, and I don’t have to answer to you.”
“State your business,” Tobirama repeated, the patience completely falling out of his voice when he spoke this time around. “It’s not a request based on laws or treaties. I’m telling you to tell me what you’re doing out here, and the answer will determine whether I hurt you or not.”
Madara raised a challenging eyebrow at this. “Really, Senju? You think that you’d actually be able to hurt me? I don’t think that you understand what you’re implying. I would tear you apart in a fight.”
“I don’t care about your arrogance,” Tobirama told him. “Just state your business so that I can go on with my life.”
“We were out here hunting,” Madara replied dryly. “Is that alright with you.”
“Were you further northwest in the forest at any time?” Tobirama inquired, pressing on, ignoring the sarcastic question.
“No,” Madara informed him. “We haven’t been here for very long and we haven’t had the chance to get any further.”
Tobirama narrowed his eyes. He couldn’t sense any lies coming from the other man, but that didn’t mean much anyway. Then again, he didn’t see why Madara would lie about something so trivial as scaring a small child either. He figured that the best course of action would simply be to ask him about it.
“Did you scare a small elven child?” Tobirama asked. “Tell me the truth.”
Madara looked at Tobirama blankly, clearly not impressed at all by the question. “We have maybe a week before the blizzard hits. Do you really think that we have the time or the inclination to scare an elf brat? I have better things to do than that. If that’s all you’re going to waste our time on, then we’ll be going.”
That was an obvious no. Tobirama wanted to ask him again but decided against it. “Fine,” he said. “Go an put some clothes on, shameless dogs.”
“No problem, albino freak,” Madara replied, turning away from him. The others followed his lead and transformed simultaneously. They were gone, out of Tobirama’s sight within the next couple of seconds.
“Bastards,” Tobirama muttered to himself. He shook his head and turned back around. Snow was covering the pathway that he was on from the little flurries that had happened when winter had made its way in. He frowned as he saw footprints…human footprints. Madara Uchiha hunted in his wolf form, and he was certain that the others in his group were doing the same thing. The elves didn’t come out this far often. Tobirama was probably the first person to be this close to the edge of the wood for weeks. That meant that there was someone else in the forest with them.
Tobirama cursed and quickly took off, following the footprints. They were pointed in the same general direction that the werewolves had gone. It was veering off slightly, just enough to assume that whoever was out there was near where Madara and the others had settled in, but they were far enough away for them to not be noticed. It might be a coincidence, but Tobirama didn’t think that it was. Whoever was out there was after the Uchihas.
The forest was thinner than Tobirama was accustomed to and he felt exposed. “What are you doing out here? Are you following us now?” Madara questioned. Tobirama turned around and looked at the newly clothed Uchiha with an angry glare.
“Quiet!” Tobirama hissed at him.
Madara looked as though he wanted to argue, but he must have noticed the look on Tobirama’s face, because he remained quiet. His defiant frown turned to one of confusion as he looked around, apparently not sensing anything out of the ordinary. As good as most werewolves’ sense of smell was, Tobirama had been born with a very sensitive nose that let him sniff out anything for a couple of miles around him. His sense of smell was so acute that he would pinpoint not only which species, but individuals of the species when he got close enough.
“What is it?” Madara murmured.
Tobirama’s stomach sank as he inhaled deeply through his nose and smelled the seductive stench that he’d only come across once before. That one encounter had earned him three nasty scars that tore across his face, and he wasn’t keen on experiencing that sort of torture ever again.
“Vampire,” he whispered. “It’s pretty far off, but it’s here.” Of all times for a child to know what it was talking about, this was one time he wished that the youth was just stupid.
“Are you certain?” Madara asked wearily.
“I wish that I wasn’t,” Tobirama admitted, “but yes, I’m certain.”
“What direction?”
Tobirama pointed in the direction just off from Madara's camp. Tobirama could smell the other two wolves there, and neither of them seemed to be worried. Madara must have known that it was Tobirama when he went out to look.
“Let’s go,” Madara said. He shed his jacket and pulled his shirt off, dropping them unceremoniously in the snow. When he put his hands on his pants, Tobirama looked away. Part of him wanted to snap at Madara to not be so presumptuous, but he held his tongue. Only a fool would try to go after a vampire on their own, and Tobirama didn’t fancy himself an idiot.
He heard the low pop and saw the smoke. When he turned back around, a massive black wolf was standing next to him. The man’s animal form looked mean and ferocious. As much as Tobirama hated to admit it, he was glad to have him there. Madara was a formidable fighter, and would help him out if things turned south, which they probably would.
The wolf moved his head in an obvious gesture for Tobirama to lead the way. Tobirama took in a deep breath to calm himself before he took off, running in the direction of the monster.
