The connection
For a time, it seemed as though Naruto would recover. His appetite increased. He got out of bed for longer and longer periods of time; he asked Hyuuga to take him into the maze where he sat for over an hour, staring at the rose bushes, at the statues of the raven and the wolf.
He seemed at peace there, and for a time, Hyuuga hoped he had accepted the fact that Sasuke was gone. ‘Now,’ he thought, ‘now the blond will turn to me and we can begin our life together.’
But it was not to be.
For no apparent reason, Naruto went into a decline that came on rapidly, without warning. As the days passed, he grew ever weaker. Kakashi and his siblings came, bringing sweet treats to tempt his appetite, plying him with hot tea, smiling with forced gaiety as they told him of Hinata's pregnancy, hoping that the thought of a new life would bring Naruto back from the depths of his despair.
But it was all in vain. Naruto looked at them through eyes devoid of life even as he assured them he would be better soon.
Hyuuga summoned his family physician, but the man only shook his head, declaring there was nothing physically wrong with the blond. Kakashi summoned the village priest, who laid his hands upon Naruto's head, then turned away, promising he would light a candle and offer prayers for the welfare of Naruto’s soul.
"He's willing himself to die." Kakashi stood beside Naruto's bed, staring down into Naruto's pale face.
Hyuuga nodded. "I fear you are right." He cursed softly, wondering if Sasuke had foreseen such a thing happening when he took his leave.
"It's all that monster's fault," Kakashi said bitterly. "He's put a curse on him."
Hyuuga started to object. He didn't believe in magic, white or black. He thought of all the rumours he had heard about Sasuke, the gossip, the speculation. Once, he had laughed it all aside.
There were no such things as monsters who stalked the night, draining the life's blood out of others. But then he looked at Naruto's pale face, at the dark shadows beneath his eyes, the hollows in his cheeks, and wondered if the rumours might not be true, after all.
He sat by the bed, holding Naruto’s hand, while Kakashi urged Naruto to drink a little tea, felt his hatred grow until it became a living thing within him as he saw the empty look in Naruto's once bright eyes. He heard him whisper Sasuke's name, his voice barely audible, before he fell back on the pillows.
Kakashi turned away from the bed, hiding his shimmering eyes.
Iruka materialised out of the shadows. For a moment, he watched Kakashi and then, needing to provide comfort, he stepped forward and took Kakashi into his arms. For a moment, Kakashi stood stiff in his embrace, and then he sobbed quietly into Iruka’s shoulder.
Hyuuga felt his throat thicken as he listened to Kakashi quiet sobs for Naruto.
He lifted Naruto's hand to his lips and kissed his palm, afraid, deep in his heart, that he would never recover. "Damn you, Sasuke," he muttered. "I hope your soul is burning in Hell."
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Sasuke woke with the setting sun. Staring into the crypt's darkness, he remembered how he had gone seeking death and how, when it had been within his grasp, he had discovered he wanted very much to live.
He had been hovering on the brink of oblivion when his skin began to tighten. Near the edge of eternity, he had smelled the coming dawn, had heard Naruto's voice, growing ever weaker, echoing in his mind, begging him not to leave, and he had known that, if he died, Naruto would die, too. It was a burden too heavy to bear. He had been ready to end his own life, but he could not take the blond’s, not when he had hardly lived at all.
With a strength of will he hadn't known he possessed, he had dragged himself toward the crypt in which he now lay. The door had been partly open, and he had squeezed in through the narrow crack. The rusty hinges had creaked loudly, shrieking like a soul in torment, as he pulled the door closed behind him and then, breathing heavily, his nostrils filling with the musty odour of old death, he had crawled into a corner and fallen into a deep, deep sleep.
How many suns had set since he took refuge here, he wondered. Ten? Twenty? He had lost count.
His stomach churned with disgust as he looked at the small furry bodies of mice and rats that littered the floor of the tomb. And yet their blood, repulsive though it might be, had kept him alive—that and his ever growing need to see Naruto again.
The blond was dying. Sasuke could feel his vitality ebbing along with his will to survive, and he knew that he was to blame. They were linked together by the blood they shared. But, unlike him, Naruto was subject to the weakness of the flesh.
Orochimaru, help me…
Sasuke smiled faintly. Orochimaru looked nothing like the vampires of legend. A dapper man, with a thin moustache and refined features. A man who knew what he was and accepted it.
To be vampire is not for the weak, Orochimaru had once told him. Eternity can be very tiring if one does not keep oneself amused. You must keep up with the world, or you will drown in the past.You can be a monster, preying off the life's blood of others, or not. The choice is up to you...
With an effort, he rose to his feet, ran a hand through his hair, settled his cloak around his shoulders.
Tonight, for the first time since he had sought death, he would hunt the streets of the city. And then he would go to Naruto and beg for his forgiveness.
If he was not too late.
.
.
.
The spires of Castle Uchiha loomed before him, shrouded, as always, in a thick, swirling grey mist. Dark clouds hung low in the sky, promising a storm before the night was through.
For a time, he rested in the changing shadows.
Earlier, he had hunted the streets of the village, but in vain. For the first time in four hundred years, his powers had failed him. Desperate for sustenance, he had taken nourishment from a scrawny goat he had found tied behind one of the cottages.
Too weak to make use of his preternatural powers, he had made his way, step by slow step, up the long winding road to the top of Fire Mountain, what little strength he had obtained from the goat expended by the time he reached the summit.
Closing his eyes, he rested his head against the damp stone wall of the castle. For a moment, he contemplated going out into the fields and killing one of the sheep, but the urge to see Naruto, to see for himself that he still lived, was more compelling than his hunger.
Pushing away from the wall, he made his way up the steps to the castle door. It opened at his touch.
He stood in the dark hallway, his senses probing the rooms. Iruka was in the kitchen. Naruto was upstairs. He drew in a deep breath, and Naruto’s scent wrapped around him, as warm and familiar and comforting as the folds of his cloak.
And then he heard voices. Hyuuga's. Kakashi's. A man's voice he did not recognize.
On silent feet, he climbed the stairs, padded noiselessly down the dimly lit corridor to the chamber Naruto had used before he had moved into his tower room.
He paused outside the door. He felt a knifelike stab of disappointment that Naruto no longer slept in his bed in the tower room, and with it a surge of gratitude that he had not revealed his resting place to others.
Kakashi's voice was laced with sorrow.
"They can do no more for him there than we are doing here," said the unknown man. "It could be dangerous to move him especially with the storm coming. If he's not better by tomorrow night, I'll bleed him again."
Bleed him! Muttering an oath, Sasuke put his hand on the latch and opened the door.
All conversation came to an abrupt halt as he entered the chamber. He took it all in at a glance: Kakashi standing on one side of the bed; Hyuuga and a man Sasuke assumed was a physician standing near the foot of the bed.
Sasuke crossed the floor, his attention focused on Naruto. The stink of garlic, believed to aid in healing and to ward off evil spirits, stung his nostrils as he drew near the bed. It was believed to ward off vampires, too, he mused, but nothing would keep him from Naruto’s side.
Naruto lay as still as death, his face as pale as the linen beneath his head. Blond hair was spread across the pillow like a splash of sunlight. There were purple shadows under his eyes; his cheeks looked hollow. A strong scent of blood rose from a covered bowl on the table beside the bed.
Naruto's blood, still warm. His stomach clenched in pain as the hunger rose within him.
"It's him!" Kakashi growled. "He's the one who's done this to Naruto.”
The physician placed his hand on Kakashi's shoulder in an attempt to calm him...
Kakashi shook off the doctor's hand, clenching his fists and moving between Sasuke and the bed. “Be gone from here!"
Too late, Sasuke realized that Hyuuga had moved behind him. He started to turn, felt a crushing blow to the back of his skull as the viscount struck him over the head with the fireplace poker. He grunted as he fell to his knees.
Dropping the poker, Hyuuga rushed forward and wrestled him to the floor, holding him immobile with the doctor's aid.
Knowing it was futile, Sasuke struggled against the viscount's grip. Lips drawn back in a feral snarl, he cursed viciously as his vision began to blur, then grow dim, until there was nothing but darkness, an endless swirling darkness that carried him away into oblivion.