three for a girl
Indra-that-was-Madara was still aching when he returned to his mother in the wide dark water with the shinning mirror, shaking his head at her worried look, too tired and unwilling to talk with the bright flame of Tobirama’s young hope burning in his chest, “The next one mother.” He grated out, “And tell other-Mother to chill about Tobirama or I won’t talk to her, I won’t hear criticism of him; not right now. Not-“ not when he knew how Tobirama had wanted him, not when he would have to defend his soulmate rather than being allowed his emotion, not when he was still wrestling with how he felt about everything, “-not now.” Konohanasakuya's face was tight and her kimono was falling white chrysanthemum on Uchiha indigo but she said nothing as she waved at the mirror which fogged up and then reveled a woman; small and Hatake pale with lavender eyes, her chin tipped up proudly and her eyes intent in her delicate face. She was petite and not very tall, but she was also beautiful and regal in a wolfish way; a hard sort of kindness in her eyes and somehow merciless, unbending, her hair was a lovely silvery color and gathered back in a construction of intricate braids that looked both military and feminine and Madara swallowed hard at the sharp planes of her face. What was vulpine and angular in Tobirama was delicate and sharp on her and Madara could see where Tobirama had gotten his looks and lither build though not his height (kami, Senju babies were big, he had seen Mito’s daughter, how had she-?).
"This is Rhiannon Senju” his mother said softly “she was….she was a woman born in the wrong time and with too much pain, too much pride, her sons were born and raised to rule – Hashirama is as much her child as his father’s, and Tobirama….he never wanted to rule, never wanted a crown no matter how his mother wanted to give him one. She was a woman caged by her situation and broken by it in then end, broken in jagged edges when she chose Butsuma and the Senju over a farmer soulmate. She never wanted her children to have soulmates, she never wanted her child, her little albino white wolf to be bound the way she felt she was to a woman her pride couldn’t accept. She was a great woman, the Wild Queen, but not – not a good one perhaps.” It clearly hurt Konohanasakuya to look at the other woman and Madara frowned, his stomach clenching, “Why didn’t she end up like you after having Hashirama?” he asked slowly and Konohanasakuya shrugged, “I don’t know, she had one astral soul and one kami built soul and yet….her ears are closed, her skin covered from touch-“ (and that was true, her leather and fur covered every inch over her skin but her face, even her neck was covered in mesh) “-and maybe the kami simply couldn’t reach her – or maybe they didn’t want to, maybe she chose blindness, maybe she does know, I have never spoken with her but I know she has a shard; she is his mother after all even with their fraught relationship a piece of him would be called to her.”
Madara bit back a curse, of course, of course even his mother wasn’t the safety and comfort Tobirama deserved. Of course. He should have known, “Well,” he said crisply, “better get a move on then.” He nodded to his mother and stepped through, mission blacks and mesh armor melting into a Hōgo Sugata (no hat, no shinobi would wear that fucking hat) with an overlayer of dark Uchiha indigo and an under layer of silver embroidered with lotus (this was not a woman to wear anything but formal clothing with). “Lady Senju” Madara murmured, his fringe falling darkly over his eye and his sharingan casting a red glow over his face and the markings of Indra under his eyes in Tobirama’s scarlet. She slowly raised her eyes to him, face still and unsurprised as she examined him and he did the same with her (regal and proud and hungry and – refusing to regret), “Lord Indra” ah, so that was how this was going, “sit” he raised a brow and stood waiting long enough that something uncomfortable flickered over her face before he took the seat opposite her, unsurprised that two cups of tea had already been poured to get around the power play of who would do that.
She waved a graceful hand at the tea and Madara lifted a cup, his long dark, dark red nails gleaming in the stormy light through the windows, sipping slowly at the tea and turning the flavor over on his tongue (a good blend) as he watched her with his one visible eye. Finally he set it down and leaned forward, his hair sweeping forward over his shoulders like a dark cloak of feathers (or wings), “So Lady Senju, I think you have an idea of why I am here.” He murmured, low as the thunder that rolled in the distance. Rhiannon’s eyes narrowed slightly and she sipped her own tea, “My son” good “Hashirama” wait “you made peace with him in your life Indra, he was born to rule and he did and so did you, you found your balance, there is nothing you can want from me unless you wanted more than life gave you. Does it help to know your own child will be your successor some day? That your line will dominate the future of the Five countries and one day marry mine to rule over all?” this….was not what Madara had expected, what – Madara’s red eyes narrowed on the regal woman; he didn’t understand what was going on here and – unless….
"Tell me, my Lady, when you died having carried and Astral soul and one of the kami made souls, who met you at the gates of death? Who led you to the Pure Lands?” Madara asked, he had already guessed that his other mother had hijacked his mortal mother on her death for her to have stayed in the liminal places of death, where the water washed on all shores of places in death not just the Pure Lands. But….who had come for Rhiannon? The woman raised a silver brow, tilting her cup slightly in the light, “The Sage of Six Paths” she revealed finally; fuck, Madara hadn’t wanted to be right. “And he told you the story of Asura and I and your role in birthing Asura as Hashirama. So everything you know about the mortal world has come through that lens” no response but a slow sip of tea and a satisfied look in her pale eyes, “tell me, did you notice that Hashirama had a soulmate? The Sage didn’t as I recall and neither did Asura or I until this life when the kami got sick of it and made us soulmates, one of which you carried.” Her lips curled slightly, flashing sharp fang, “Soulmates.” She was too refined to spit but had she not been it would have been spat “They are nothing but a shackle, I saw what it did to bring a soulmate into a clan that didn’t want them with my mother and father, I had no interest in my own, they were beneath me and would have held me back. My sons- all of them- are above such things, Hashirama married a princess as he should have, Tobirama acted as befitted his raising and made sure that you had blood to carry on and marry Hashirama’s blood and rule all Five countries in time.” There was a burning fervor in her eyes that made Madara wonder; what happened to her that she had felt so powerless that this seemed like a fair reaction? What had she seen and felt that power and pride were all she had left to cling too and passed on to her sons?
Madara took a deep breath, spinning his cup to calm himself as slow drops of rain started to patter outside, “You think Tobirama did the right thing giving the bond to my wife so I would have children and they would rule. What of him, what of his fate?” he asked, measured and slow. Rhiannon shrugged elegantly with her hands, “He lives, he will have children, his blood will go on and it was his work that built the village, his blackmail that forced peace, his manipulation that evened the Uchiha and the Senju in power enough for peace to work,” (what!? Madara – hadn’t known about that last… yet another thing he never knew to thank his soulmate for) “he was raised to rule and he should have taken the chance when he was offered it to marry into Uzushio and he would have ruled there, but, he was weak and-“ a pause and flick of her eyes to him as thunder rumbled closer “-loyal. He chose to stay with those he owed his duty to, duty over power, his father’s influence perhaps.” No, no that wasn’t Butsuma, that was Tobirama, down to the bone, but – had his soulmate refused safety and rule and people that valued him because- in part- of Madara? Had he still hoped (wanted) then?
Kami he didn’t even know where to go from here, how to get through to her when she was so shutdown; a bit lost Madara leaned back on one hand, swirling his teacup with the hand resting on his upraised knee. An indolent posture that had Rhiannon sending a sharp glace at his leg as he looked around; the room was large and lavish and had everything a person could want but…empty. There was no sign of her younger sons, of her husband or soulmate or friends or even summons, the dead of whom should be able to get here from the spirit realm; she was alone, alone with her tea and her silence and the rain passing over, alone with her ambition and – he glanced at her, her safety and her pride. Perhaps that was all she needed, perhaps once her children’s children’s children had taken over all of the Five countries she would let herself reincarnate, but it wouldn’t happen anytime soon, not to her, unbending in this silver place. It sent something cold down his spine and he wondered if the Sage had anything to do with that, with the one person that could have looked for Tobirama didn’t know and might not care if she did; but perhaps Madara was attributing more to him than he should, perhaps the Sage was just a casual influence meeting the mother that died first and bore the favorite son.
Either way, this wasn’t why Madara was here, he was here to find Tobirama’s feather and leave, not psychoanalyze his mother, red eyes flicked back to her, “So Tobirama wanted to get rid of his soulbond? He was working on it for a long time and chose to give it away in a clear mind?” there was a tiny hesitation, one someone without the Sharingan would have missed and yet Madara didn’t. “He first acted on it at fourteen” (he – he had wanted it gone then?) “when he stole the stone to anchor it. He…wanted it is perhaps too much, but he knew what was best.” Something…something didn’t add up here, something that Madara was missing and his eyes narrowed again as thunder boomed over their heads, “And a clear mind when he gave it up?” Madara asked smoothly sipping at his tea and the Lady’s mouth twisted minutely, “I wouldn’t go that far, Butsuma” anger, raw burning anger “that son of a whore, oath breaker, he – he sealed Tobirama, I know little of it but – enough, enough to know that Tobirama’s mind after that date was perhaps never truly clear.” It was a concession to tell him that and her anger at her husband burned with all the passion she had lacked till now, even as worry pierced Madara to the core; what did that mean?!
A slow breath to keep himself, calm, he would investigate both events, for now where would the feather be and how did he get it? He wanted to leave (he didn’t understand anymore, Tobirama’s past only grew more and more confusing the further he investigated it; had Tobirama even wanted him at the end? Madara had thought so but maybe not, maybe he was wrong and the child’s love had died sooner and left only the duty and obsession of a Center). “Lady Senju, given what you have told me I think my argument with Asura is done” (he still wanted to sock Hashirama for his treatment of his brother but that was different) “just one more thing and I will leave you to your…peace” a regal nod “I misplaced something in another life and lost it in death, tell me, have you seen a feather? Pearl white and peacock blue and like and owl’s?” here eyes narrowed but recognition flashed in them and there was a tiny flicker of movement to the wedding tansu, “I might have, why, what is it other than a pretty trinket?” Did – did she really not know? Was she so closed down that she couldn’t even understand the soul of her son? Madara pulled a lazy smile onto his lips and set down his cup, flicking his fingers absently as he stood, “Nothing of great import, I will find it elsewhere, maybe it was in life….” the threat of Madara returning to the mortal world early made the woman’s eyes bow wide, clearly aware that her hopes of the untied countries under her blood would never happen with Indra’s soul walking the world and bound by its nature to be drawn to power no matter what.
“Ah” Rhiannon said, also rising, “now that I think on it I might have such an item that came to me a bit ago on the wind,” she turned the tansu and slid open a thin drawer, pulling out the feather that glowed far less than the others had, ragged around the edges with lack of care and love. “here. A gift.” Madara forced his lips into a thin, blade sharp smile as he bowed and held out his hands for the feather, braced for the emotion in the feather so it wouldn’t show on his face to this strange, locked away woman, “My thanks Lady Senju” he purred, biting his cheek bloody to hide his response as the feather landed in his hands (the barbs, ragged and sharp and broken and lodging under his nail, the feel of Tobirama’s duty, the duty that carried him his whole life no matter the cost and how raged it became; and under that, the shaft of his adoration, the one selfishness that he gave himself that helped him go on, the simple existence of Madara in his range that he would never let go of, not even for safety on Uzushio’s warm shores. How could those white sands be as warm as Madara’s chakra, how could the sea breeze comfort him as much as Madara’s honesty, how could the smile of those people match the nearness of his soulmate?). (Tobirama hadn’t wanted to leave, not then anyway, hadn’t wanted to lose, not yet anyway, so why-?)
Slowly as he could around his aching bones Madara stood folding the feather into his skin to drop to the bottom of his ribs, listless as a lost feather hiding in the shadows; “Good day Lady Senju, thank you for the tea.” The words were a bit strained but Madara didn’t linger to listen to what she had to stay, falling back to the liminal waters, clothing melting to blacks and mesh though his hair stayed down and the marks under his eyes stayed – at least from what he could see in his reflection from where he was on his hand and knees as he tried to get used to carrying Tobirama’s duty; so much heavier than his hope or his devotion.