"We should go back." Neji said for the millionth time in the span of an hour.
Hinata would have smiled at him reassuringly, even if she didn't feel as such, just to calm his nerves. She would have if Neji didn't follow his statement, with another one.
"You haven't thought this through."
He earned a cold stare instead.
"I am certain that I have." She told him.
They had abandoned the horses a few hours back. Traveling by foot would stall them, a precious time might be lost, yet it gave them cover. And she needed that cover now more than anything.
"The Uchihas will think you are a traitor. They will hunt you down." Neji said again.
"It's fine." She said and it really was not. Everything she was trying to build, would shutter instead, if she was unsuccessful.
"They are probably on our trail now. They surely have already informed him. Your husband."
"Good. It means he is alive." She said with her back on Neji. He must have been. He was. He would return.
"Hinata.." Neji tried again and she turned around.
"You said I should flee." She told him.
"You aren't fleeing now. You are going straight to your doom."
"You said you would help me." She shook away the fear. "You promised you would. Is this another one of your promises that you won't be able to keep?"
It was harsh and Neji was still here. Accompanying her to her silly plan, to her death. But she needed encouragement, support, she needed Neji to tell her that she had a chance.
"I'm sorry." He said and the words were foreign in his mouth. "I should have acted sooner. Before all this."
She softened.
"You are now."
"No." He said and his face was cold again. A Hyuga. "No. I didn't tell you all these so you walk back there. Turn around. Go back. Tell them I tricked you." He said and his face was Neji at the age of twelve, tending the wounds at her back.
"Trust me Neji. That is all I am asking." She said quietly.
"I do trust you. I think you are..."
"You don't." She smiled, a faint and sad smile. "You don't and I need you to."
"Does he trust you? When all this is over, will he trust you?" He asked and it was an absurd question. Perhaps it was to ensure her safety after.
"He does." She said to ease the frown on his face.
"So why are you here? And not with him at the battle?"
Because Sasuke needed someone trustworthy to stay behind. Someone he could trust to pull the strings, make choices, someone who could fight if it came to it.
"Because he is scared." She said instead. It was the most truthful one.
"So he can be scared and I can't?" Neji asked, hurt, angry.
Then he shook his head, before Hinata could answer.
"You should have fled." He said and walked bypassing her.
_____
"You haven't thought this through." He said as the sun started disappearing from the sky.
"It was a rush decision. We were taught not to take decisions as such. That is what makes us strong. That is how your father will win."
She let him have his lectures. Frequent and different every time. She let him, because he didn't have any other way to express his worry. She let him, because they moved towards their destination and he was not stopping her.
He was partially right. Hinata knew. She hasn't given much thought to it, before she proposed her plan to her cousin.
And he was mainly wrong. When she had first thought about it, it wasn't a plan, just a fleeting feeling, that came again and again after that.
Observing the wrongs, staying behind, not owing a decision she had made many, many months before, was never an option. If she hadn't agreed to marry Sasuke, if she had let Hanabi leave, if she had stayed.
She was expecting her sister to act in the way she would have acted in her place. She was expecting to fix the wrongs, that Hinata thought needed fixing, she had placed her fate in someone else's hands.
"Yes. It's not the Hyuga way." She responded to Neji, to herself.
She got up. Resting for long wasn't an option. Sasuke was in danger.
"Hinata-sama.." Neji said and she prepared for another lecture. "Win." He said and even if his face didn't reveal anything, Hinata thought he was pleading.
____
The rest of the road was quiet. Neji frowned, halted sometimes and then he began again. Hinata didn't stop. She didn't wavered. It was not the time for that. Perhaps afterwards, she would regret it. Perhaps in the aftermath of her actions it would be another wrong decision.
Yet now, Hiashi Hyuga had wrapped everything around his fingers in one move.
Perhaps it needed one more to change that.
The weather was chilly when the first trees appeared. The night before she wondered how much had passed since the last night she had felt cold.
The Uchiha grounds were hot, radiant, restless. Like their people. Like him.
She couldn't say, she didn't like her land. The land here, that was never hers. As she walked further and the trees piled one next to another, she wished she could have shown him that. The evergreen and the water. The sparkling snow in the winter. She wished, she had given the chance to see them, to appreciate their beauty more than a hasty look before her training, a night wonder after the lesson Ko gave her.
She cried when Ko had died. Silent tears, hasty in the late night, covered, alone. He was nice to her, decent, he wasn't yelling, only disapproving a few times.
She smiled. How low her expectations had been.
"This is your last chance." Neji spoke.
"The land, our land could have been beautiful, don't you think?" Hinata asked instead.
Neji's white eyes turned to her.
"Will you make it beautiful Neji?"
It seemed as he would raise his hand, even his forehead relaxed.
He stayed silent for a moment, still.
"I promise." He said eventually.
"Good." Hinata nodded and hid with her palm the sun that blocked her view.
The compound appeared in the distance.
_____
They were stopped long before they reached their destination. Guards appeared in their white attire that blend perfectly with the winter snow. Yet now it was summer and Hinata could spot them from afar. She knew where to look.
They stopped and waited, they weren't a thread, they shouldn't appear as one. Upon reaching close and seeing Neji's face, they let them pass.
She watched the thin line that his lips transformed into. As of now, Neji became a traitor. Officially and undeniably.
She felt bad with his discomfort, she felt bad because she was the cause of it.
There was a subtle noise, movements she thought, as the gates appeared.
They were preparing for battle. They were preparing to come to her. She beat them to it. If the circumstances were different, she would have smiled.
Even now, with soldiers and horses moving around, the place was quiet. It was remarkable. And it was unsettling.
Hinata stood behind Neji, her head lowered, her sword at her back, covered slightly by her hair. The sword and her face. Timid, weak, nonthreatening.
If she was another, Ino Yamanaka perhaps, she could speak and hide under layers of words, of gestures. If she was another, she could have find another solution. But she was not and this was all she had.
Neji talked to a guard quietly, almost silent as they all were, as she once was.
The man must have left, she didn't see, she couldn't hear his movement.
But when her father appeared, she knew. Even if she wasn't looking. The deafening silence spoke volumes.
"I have returned." Neji said and from her corner of her eyes, she saw him on his knee. She bowed too after that.
"You have finally returned." Her father spoke and she was sure he was addressing to her.
She raised her gaze and looked at him. Perhaps it was too early, because his look was deadly, or perhaps it didn't matter. It had always been like that.
"You will be reprimanded for your behaviour." He said.
The soldiers had stopped their preparations. The elders stood behind him.
"But for now, for the next months, you will just stay in your room." He said.
You will be safe, as long as the heir is in your belly. You will just exist. You did one thing right, at least. Hinata heard.
"I am not pregnant." She said as she rose to her feet. She was almost thrilled with the shake in his features.
Someone ran and Hanabi appeared. She looked at her for a moment, confused and uncertain. Hinata turn her eyes away. She shouldn't look at her sister right now.
The time seemed to have frozen at the steps that led to the house. Then Hiashi Hyuga moved, took a step, walked at her direction.
"What did you say?" He asked. Her father didn't yell, he didn't have to. His tone of death was enough.
"I am not pregnant." She repeated and turned to Neji.
"I'm sorry. I lied." She said.
He was horrified. Angry. Scared. So much that it was visible. It needed not to be. Neji should appear neutral. There was no other way to ensure his safety.
She turned to her father again. No-one was looking at Neji.
"Why are you here?" He asked. "You came with informations, I presume."
You came to atone for you failures. You came back crawling for forgiveness.
"I don't have any." She said and he took another step.
"Lock her up." He said coldly.
She felt stupid, perhaps her plan was indeed foolish, perhaps the weight of Hiashi Hyuga's gaze was crashing.
"I came to fight you." She said and she hid the tremble under the slight raise of her father lips. "To end this." She added.
"I have more pressing matters at hand." He dismissed her.
"Are you scared?" She asked as he was about to turn. "Afraid that I can win, I am more worthy than you."
When he looked at her his eyes were ice itself.
"I won against your current heir." She didn't look at Hanabi. "Perhaps you should have just resign. Winning a war is difficult when you are weak."
She could faint. She had prepared it all in her head, that and some more. She had prepared them, because Hiashi Hyuga was a cautious man. He waited and he planned until he stroke at the right time. He didn't let himself be provoked in meaningless fights. He had always his eyes on the great scheme of things.
He had just one flaw. Hinata.
Hinata with her great deal of flaws and weaknesses. Hinata who could never be more than a pebble under his feet. Hinata who he had let to come here, because he still believed that she was wrapped around his fingers.
She observed him. It seemed for a moment that he wouldn't fall on her trap. It seemed that he would order a soldier or ten to seize her. It was the right thing to do.
But he just couldn't. Hinata knew, when with a silent gesture, he asked for his sword.
He couldn't let her pass. Everything had to be a lesson when it came to her. Everything had to be dealt with cruelty. Perhaps she should have asked him long ago why he hated her so much. Perhaps it didn't matter.
She looked at Neji. He had things that needed to be done. She looked at him and walked away, towards her father.
"I am not married to Sasuke Uchiha." She said more loudly than she had ever spoken in here. "Our marriage is a fraud. He never touched me." An exhale.
"I was not appealing enough." She said and looked at her father. She was sure, she could trace a vein. His ever carefully plan shuttered under her words.
"I am not here as a part of that clan. I am not one of them in reality." She said again, just to be sure. "I just came to end it. As a Hyuga. As the once rightful heir."
Her father in his beige robes, with his hand on his hand, with the ability to stop her hands from working, stood in front of her.
"You will stay in the prison as a Hyuga then." He said. "You will die many years from now as one. You will submit in our punishment as one of our own."
Finally, Hinata thought and she moved her sword.
It was a shallow swing to test the waters, to make him think that she was still hesitant.
Her father barely moved. His eyes only on her. Don't be distracted, you will die.
It was craved on her skin, on her ears, inside her head.
He made a move, or twenty. Hinata had never looked at him as much as she did now, today. He was fine killing her, she thought, as the blood spilled from her cheeks.
Don't think about irrelevant things, you will die.
He had punched her in the stomach, she had winced and he had disapproved, as he always did.
Don't show that you are hurt, you will die.
She had landed some blows, with her hands, with her sword. She didn't know, if she was losing or winning. Only that Hiashi Hyuga's icy gaze remained on her, always, wherever she went.
Don't show any emotion, you will die.
He grabbed her hand, but she freed herself fast enough. He pierced her shoulder, a cry, a winced lip, they had been over this again and again and again.
Your kindness, it will kill you.
He pushed her down and she hit his legs. There was a breath that grasped, or more. If she had choose to take one more weapon, one that Sasuke preferred, perhaps it would have been easier. But this, this had to be done by the Hyuga way only.
She pushed her feet up and moved up to him.
Hesitation will kill you.
He was already up resilient as he was. He grabbed her neck, tight, tighter. A sword on her stomach.
She had promised to only raise her sword to protect. Was she protecting now? Was what she came to do worthy?
She chocked, but her fingers found their way on his arm. He misunderstood, he always did, thinking she was grasping for air.
She pressed, to the right, a little up, more pressure and his hand fell to the side.
He looked terrified.
Only for the cold stare to emerge, his sword at her stomach ready to pierce. She kicked it and it was her sword at his throat.
"I will make sure.." He said.
"Goodbye." Hinata said as she sliced his throat.
____
A yell was heard. A cry. She searched for the centre of the sound and found Hanabi with an open mouth, screaming.
It seemed as if she just now woke up. As if just moments ago, she was in a haze, a slumber, something in between.
Now everything felt sharper, too bright, too noisy. Perhaps it was Hanabi's cry.
Her sister ran to the lifeless body of their father.
Hiashi Hyuga was dead.
Hiashi Hyuga was dead.
He was dead.
And Hinata had killed him.
She had killed.
Now was not the time.
She brought Sasuke's gift closer to her body and ran in the opposite direction of her sister.
Everyone seemed to be still in the same hase she was previously in.
The elders, some shaken, some still, looked at her.
Always there to dictate, how the world should be formed.
"Listen.." Arrogant voices, even now.
Hinata was not here to listen. She had learnt by now, she had accepted, that some things are not to be discussed, sometimes words would not bring any good.
A limb that was poisoned should be cut.
It was a head, an arm and a head again. Proper bloodbath at the spotless stairs of the Hyuga household. Someone ran, but she was faster. Red against the white of the doors.
Thirteen kills, until Hinata was done.
She was at the floor when Hanabi found her. Red against the white of her eyes.
"Lock her up." She said and she tried to sound like a leader, like her father, hers only, never Hinata's, but she was not. Her voice held a slight tremble.
"Lock her up." She said again, higher this time, until someone took her sword away.
She couldn't find Neji anywhere, as they walked her away.
She hoped he had succeeded.