Archive of Our Own

The slap seems to ring out in the hollow silence. Itachi feels the sting but knows better than to raise his hand to his face: it would be interpreted as a sign of weakness, and he cannot afford to show any more weakness.

“You are a disgrace,” his father tells him, in the same tone that one might use to comment on the weather.

Itachi says nothing. Standing in this house, in this study, staring down the barrel of Fugaku’s disappointment—it’s as if he has gone back in time. Like in the Wells novel. He is eight years old again, or younger, before he learned how to be perfect. Before he became his father’s ideal son.

He’d almost forgotten how it felt to have that withering look directed at him.

“Well?” Fugaku demands. “Do you have anything at all to say for yourself?”

Nothing he says will help, so Itachi stays silent. His father’s face darkens.

“You will explain yourself,” he says in a low, hard tone. “Do you have any idea of the damage you’ve done?”

Itachi nods; here, at least, he knows his lines. “The reputation of our family will suffer.”

“That’s true. But that is not all.” Fugaku’s hands clench briefly before they loosen. “Izumi’s father called on me earlier, before you arrived. Somehow the news of your folly had already reached him.”

A cold feeling settles in Itachi’s stomach. His father is still talking.

“Fortunately Izumo is a friend, one who won’t be spreading any damaging rumors. But that is to be the extent of our relationship. Nothing I said could convince him to offer his daughter’s hand to a humiliated former sheriff.”

“Then the wedding is off,” Itachi says. He needs to hear the words.

“It is off,” Fugaku confirms bitterly. “You made certain of that. It was difficult enough to begin with, talking Izumo into sending the girl out that far west. Now that she would not even be able to count on your protection, he would not be moved. All of our preparations on that score have gone to waste.”

Itachi is still listening, but a part of his mind is still settling into the realization that he will not be getting married, at least not immediately. He ruthlessly suppresses any outward signs of relief.

Fugaku ends his lecture with a frustrated sigh. He waves Itachi off.

“Your things are in your old room. Go there until I’ve decided what to do with you.”

That’s a lie, Itachi thinks dispassionately: his father would not have bothered calling him back here without first deciding on some appropriate atonement. This latest order is merely an excuse to let Itachi stew in his own silence.

But there’s no point in arguing, and in any case he has nowhere else to go. He obeys.

.

His room is the same as it ever was, kept clean more out of habit, he suspects, than any thought that he might one day come home. Standing there and looking at his bed against the wall, his luggage piled neatly beside the heavy wooden door, Itachi has a sensation of déjà vu.

His father used to lock him in this room when he was young, before he learned his role. Any transgression would result in long hours of staring at these walls until he had memorized every crack in the paint. His school friends would no doubt have joked that it was better than being beaten, but Itachi had hated it then and he hates it now—the feeling of being caged.

Nothing here has changed. Nothing except for him.

But then, he muses, lowering himself mechanically onto the spotless bedsheets, has he really changed all that much? He feels as if he is a boy again, a child who obeys orders without question.

Except for the small matter of releasing wanted criminals.

The thought brings some reassurance with it. He is not his father’s creature any longer; Shisui, wherever he is, is living proof that Itachi has a mind of his own.

Even if he, too, couldn’t trust Itachi enough to let him make his own choices.

A near-smile is knocked from his face before he’d even realized it was there, and at that moment the door to his bedroom is thrown open with such force that it smacks into the wall.

Sasuke gapes as if he’s not sure whether to believe his eyes.

Itachi does smile then, and with genuine warmth. Here is someone who will not grudge him his return.

“Hello, little brother.”

“Itachi, you—” Sasuke is clearly conflicted. Itachi understands; it’s been months since they last saw one another, but these are hardly the best circumstances for a reunion.

“Father said you were coming back,” he says at last. “I didn’t believe him.”

“And why not?” Itachi is pleased that he manages to keep the bitterness from his voice. “You know as well as I that whatever our father says he will do, it is as good as done.”

“He said—”

Sasuke cuts himself off again. He takes a moment to close the door behind him before he continues, and Itachi has a sinking feeling he knows where this is going.

“He said a prisoner escaped on your watch,” Sasuke says, fire in his eyes now. “Please tell me it wasn’t that idiot.”

Itachi has nothing to defend himself with. Sasuke’s expression twists.

“That piece of shit,” he says with venom. “I knew he’d pull something like this, I fucking knew he’d take advantage of—”

“It was not like that,” Itachi says quietly.

His brother scowls. “Then what was it like? Because from where I’m standing it looks like he used you to save his own skin—and don’t fucking try to convince me that he just happened to escape on his own, because you would never let that happen.”

It would almost be easier, Itachi thinks with a twinge of fondness, if Sasuke didn’t idolize him so much. As it is, it’s impossible for him to believe that his brother could have made such a mistake. Even if their father has had no trouble accepting it.

He sighs. Sasuke already knows part of the story; it will do no harm for him to hear the rest.

He tells his brother the whole sordid thing, reliving it in his mind as he’s barely had the chance to since it all happened. In the immediate aftermath there had been so much confusion, not to mention the inconvenience of a concussion. It had been Hana who found him half-conscious on the floor of the cell—and Itachi has a contentious relationship with God, but he still said a prayer of gratitude that it had been her and not one of his deputies—and from there the pieces had fallen quickly into place. Shisui had followed Itachi’s original plan, with one distinct alteration.

Now they can’t say you let me go.

The last words he’d heard before sinking into blackness. Even now remembering them makes Itachi’s hands clench into fists.

But no anger seeps into his tone as he continues the story. He tells Sasuke of the days after, the confusion and then the suspicion, which was at least better than the looks of dismissal from people who’d believed he was smarter, stronger, better than this. He talks about his choice to appoint Hana his chief deputy, how quickly she seemed to have gained the trust that had taken Itachi a year and more to earn.

But hadn’t that been what Shisui tried to tell him from the first? Itachi had never been one of them and he never would be, and that single fact had dictated things from the moment he set foot in that town. If Hana were to make a mistake, she would at least have a lifetime of familiarity with the others to fall back on. Itachi had nothing.

He is not bitter, he reminds himself. His status as an outsider was simply a fact, one that he should never have forgotten.

Then he tells Sasuke of receiving the expected summons from their father, a whistle to an obedient dog. He tells him of the long journey home, and that is more or less the end of it.

(There are things he doesn’t tell his brother, of course. Itachi doesn’t tell him how he cared for Flicker when the horse was returned to the stable, bereft of his master and miserable for it. He doesn’t tell Sasuke of the last few strings he pulled to get his deputy Aaron offered a better-paying position in another town.

He doesn’t tell him that he felt no guilt at all for the bribery. What kind of lawman did that make him? He’d wondered at the time, but it’s a moot point now that it seems he may never be a lawman again.)

When he finishes, Sasuke looks only marginally less murderous.

“And you’re okay with all this?” he asks, sounding deeply skeptical.

He is right to be. Itachi has had little time to sort through his own feelings on everything that’s happened, but most of what’s there when he examines them is just…anger. A dull and ultimately pointless anger towards someone he isn’t entirely sure deserves it.

Now they can’t say you let me go.

In retrospect, Itachi thinks, he probably should have seen that coming. Shisui always did like to have the last word.

“Can I shoot him?”

Sasuke’s words are effective at breaking Itachi out of his thoughts. He blinks. His brother’s face is earnest.

“No, Sasuke,” he says after a moment. “You are a lawyer. You will not be shooting anyone.”

“I’m not a lawyer yet,” Sasuke corrects him. “And anyway, give me some credit. I would aim for somewhere that wasn’t lethal. Call it revenge for last time; I still haven’t forgiven him for being the reason I slept in handcuffs.”

Itachi huffs a laugh. Sasuke is trying to distract him, he knows, and the kindness of the gesture does help. Even if it is expressed in the form of potential violence.

“It is good to see you again,” he says, because that might be the one good thing that comes out of this mess.

Sasuke pinks a little, but he smiles nonetheless.

“You too. Welcome home, Itachi.”

.

The sounds of the city at night are no longer familiar to him.

Rather, Itachi thinks, staring up at the unremarkable ceiling, another set of sounds had become more familiar to him—noises made by the hardy insects that had made the town their home, the last of the drunks at Anko’s saloon dragging themselves to their houses, the soothing howl of a desert wind. Itachi had been awake for all of it. He had never slept overmuch as sheriff, but any tiredness the next day had always felt oddly satisfying—a mark of a job well and thoroughly done. He was proud to be the last one asleep, working at his desk with his ears pricked for any sound of a disturbance in the town. His town.

Here there is nothing to stay awake for, no responsibility whatsoever on his shoulders, and yet Itachi feels more on edge than he ever did in his office.

Settling back into the old rhythms here would feel like a failure, as if Itachi were resigning himself to accepting all the former patterns of his life. So he doesn’t. He lies in bed and finds new cracks in the plaster and he doesn’t sleep.

He imagines sleep would elude him anyway. Itachi grew used to a certain amount of physical labor in his former position; lacking that he feels restless, as if something more needs to be accomplished before he earns a night’s rest.

It is boredom, ultimately, that has him flinging the sheets off his body and crossing his bedroom in the dark. And a sudden sense of claustrophobia that prompts him to open the door and creep out into the hall.

He does not light a candle to carry with him. The housekeeper has surely gone to sleep by now, so Itachi is in no danger of frightening anyone, and in any case he finds he likes the idea of passing the night unnoticed. Like a ghost in his own home.

But is it still truly his home? Itachi muses as his feet wander down the hall.

His presence in this house has never felt more conditional than it currently does. He does not know what to make of his father’s disgust, his subsequent silence—does he expect Itachi to take the initiative and determine a way to be forgiven, or does he merely want his elder son to disappear into the background while he deals with other concerns?

Itachi weighs the possibilities with an equilibrium born of navigating his father’s varied moods his whole life. Whatever it is Fugaku wants, he will be given some hint with time, surely. Surely he did not give up everything to return to a life of silence.

A creak of the floorboards has him whirling; instinct has him, absurdly, reaching for a pistol that is no longer there—and experience keeps his voice measured when he glimpses a silhouette outlined at the other end of the black hallway.

“Who is there?”

The figure pauses as if startled. And then it creeps closer, hands outstretched. Itachi’s heart has begun to bang against his ribcage and he is opening his mouth to speak a warning when the figure passes by a window, moonlight illuminating a familiar face.

Itachi lets out a sharp breath.

“Mother,” he says.

Mikoto Uchiha’s smile is shaky. She reaches for him, eyes wet as she cups his face with cool hands.

“Itachi,” she whispers. “It’s so good to see you home.”

His eyes are stinging. Itachi blinks the sensation away.

“I’m sorry,” he murmurs, guilt pricking at the words. “I should have come to see you as soon as I returned.”

“Yes, you should have,” she replies with a bit of her old fire. “But I forgive you. You’ve had a long journey.” She drops her hands down to hold his. “I was sorry to hear about your engagement. Izumi seemed like a sweet girl.”

“I never met her,” Itachi says, carefully neutral. “But I hope the news did not bring her too much pain.”

Truly, he thinks Izumi has dodged a bullet. Much of Itachi’s relief at their lack of imminent nuptials is selfish, yes, but there is some relief on her behalf as well.

If they had married, Itachi would have always been lying to her. Regardless of whether he’s ever seen her face, he knows she deserves better than that.

Mikoto raises one slim eyebrow.

“You don’t sound especially pained,” she says. “Though I suppose that’s to be expected if you’ve never met her yourself.”

“What about you, Mother?” Itachi asks, unsubtly changing the subject. “How are you feeling?”

She shrugs delicately. “As well as I ever am. You know your father—he has a parade of doctors and apothecaries in my room every month. Some of what they prescribe even works, for a little while at least.”

“That’s good,” he says quietly, but her expression is unreadable.

“Yes,” is all Mikoto says. “It is.”

To his surprise her voice is free of bitterness.

His mother has been ill since Sasuke was young. Nobody—not one of the many experts his father has hired—has ever been able to tell them exactly what is wrong with her, nor when it will ultimately kill her, but they have all been clear on that point: it will kill her eventually.

It’s something to do with the lungs, apparently, and to prevent any further contamination thereof it had been suggested years ago that Mikoto be kept largely to her own rooms. Nowadays it is rare that she feels strong enough to venture out without a housekeeper to help her.

“I will be home for a while,” Itachi tells her, “so I will be able to—”

He stops, frustrated with himself. He will be able to what, exactly? There is nothing he can do to help his mother, least of all when she has always been so cheerfully self-sufficient. She does not need him.

Mikoto’s face softens, suddenly, as if she knows what he is thinking.

“Yes,” she says again, gently. “We’ll be seeing a lot more of one another, won’t we?” Her eyes are warm. “I’ve missed you. We all have.”

He is not certain he believes her, but Itachi smiles for his mother all the same.

“I have missed you too.”

.

His father’s first order of business seems to be to drive Itachi mad with boredom, so partially to spite him, partially because he cannot bring himself not to, Itachi begins writing letters to Hana Inuzuka.

They are all business, asking after the town and its people and how things have settled down, whether the deputies are deferring to her authority. He dithers endlessly over the inclusion of a postscript asking after Flicker before finally deciding to leave it in.

It takes time for her replies to come, but they do come, brief and unsentimental and informative. In a way Hana’s bluntness is comforting: it feels like the town in a nutshell, and that is more welcome to Itachi than he cares to admit. From her words he gleans that the town has settled back into its routine. No major problems, she writes more than once, and though Itachi is a little nettled that apparently all it took was his leaving for things to calm down, that is ultimately a relief.

Of course, Hana’s utter lack of need for his help or advice leaves Itachi with very little to do. For the first few weeks he barely leaves his room except for meals, which are eaten across the table from Fugaku and Sasuke, who remains unnaturally quiet in the presence of their father. His brother is studying hard enough that Itachi doesn’t feel right about soliciting him for any further company.

So he struggles to remember what, exactly, he used to do with his free time. Certainly he never had too much of it—Itachi remembers much of his days being occupied with studies, as Sasuke’s now are—but after trying to run a town that seemed determined to burn itself down if left to its own devices for more than a moment, going back to his old life is proving difficult.

Itachi is not used to being useless.

He takes to lingering in the family library, where no one else tends to linger anymore. His father is too busy with campaigning to read for pleasure, so certainly there is little chance of them running into each other.

At first he intends to pore over some of the dryer political treatises Fugaku has collected—at least those would take up considerable time—but instead Itachi is immediately drawn to the old copy of Le Morte d’Arthur that had belonged to his grandfather.

Slowly, he pulls the book from its shelf. As a child he used to drag their housekeeper Uruchi over to fetch the volume from its high place, until someone (his mother, most likely) decided to have it moved permanently to a lower shelf. It had always been his favorite book in the library; he’s reread it countless times over the years, and even now its worn brown cover smells like home.

That day passes more easily than the others. Itachi sits in the dusty armchair by the window and reads Malory’s words until there is too little light left to see by.

.

He’s not surprised when his father tells him to stop writing to Hana, but that doesn’t make the whole thing any less frustrating.

“I need to be aware of what’s happening,” he says, trying to keep his voice level.

“And why is that?” Fugaku asks, flatly. “It’s not as if you’re the sheriff anymore. Or did you think you would waltz back and pick up where you left off?” He holds up a hand for silence when Itachi opens his mouth. “You don’t need to trouble yourself with such things anymore. If you can take any joy from your abject failure, let it be that you were freed from that miserable place sooner rather than later.”

His father’s obvious disdain for the town stings, almost as much as his disdain for Itachi himself. Itachi tries again.

“I selected Hana Inuzuka as my replacement,” he says. “It is my duty to offer—”

Fugaku glares. “Your duty was to keep the peace there,” he snaps. “Your duty was to then come home and marry Izumo’s daughter, to look after her needs and those of the family. You failed to do any of those things. What do you presume to know about duty?”

Itachi bites the inside of his mouth to keep from saying something he might regret, something that might break his tenuous relationship with his father beyond repair—if things haven’t reached that point already. He bites down hard and says nothing.

Fugaku takes his silence for assent. “I’ll hear no more about these letters. You have your own affairs to worry about.”

What affairs, Father? He wants to ask the question badly, but Fugaku is gone before he can unclench his jaw.

When he does finally manage it, Itachi tastes blood.

.

Later that night he reflects on the conversation from beginning to end, turning it over for ways he could have navigated it better. His mind snags on that one word: affairs.

Itachi’s old paranoia fixates on it. You have your own affairs to worry about. Had that been a pointed choice of words? Does his father know more about the circumstances of Shisui’s escape than he’s letting on? Is he intentionally stoking Itachi’s uncertainty to further punish him?

Itachi barely considers the idea before dismissing it as unlikely. His father is calculating, yes, and he has never been a warm parent, but neither has he ever seemed Machiavellian or especially cruel. If Fugaku had learned something about his son having an actual affair with a criminal—or any man—Itachi has no doubt he would know about it immediately, and in no uncertain terms.

These are the thought processes that have kept him safe all his life. Itachi has always been used to a certain undercurrent of fear—fear of discovery, fear of the watchful eye of God or his father, and there had been a time where the two had seemed like one and the same.

For a while, though, those worries had been quieted somewhat. Itachi tries not to think about the cause, but deep down he knows exactly where it started: when he entered his office to process his first arrest as sheriff and met a petty thief with the darkest eyes he’s ever seen.

.

Strictly speaking, he muses, picking listlessly at his breakfast, his father hasn’t outright forbidden him from leaving the house. At least not in so many words.

What he has done, however, is firmly deny every attempt Itachi has made so far. When he offered to pay Izumo a visit and apologize to Izumi in person, Fugaku had refused him. When he had suggested making himself useful at his old university it had been the same result. Likewise when he asked about accompanying Sasuke to school.

At one point, with a sinking feeling of resignation, he had offered to help with the family accounts.

“Surely, with your campaign begun in earnest, you have better things to occupy your time,” he had said, trying not to sound desperate.

Fugaku’s only response had been a glare and stony silence.

Itachi is at a loss. It is difficult to negotiate when the other party refuses to so much as sit at the table. His father had implied that he had some sort of plan for Itachi’s future, disgraced as he was, but Itachi has been home now for over two months, and such a thing has yet to materialize. He is forced to assume that Fugaku’s “plan” consists of waiting for Itachi to snap from the monotony and beg his father’s forgiveness, offering his eternal and unquestioning servitude in the process. (It’s possible that prolonged time alone with his thoughts has made Itachi slightly maudlin.)

He supposes it is possible for him to simply leave. Walk out of his father’s house with the clothes on his back and little else, march bravely into the unknown. But any future beyond that horizon line is hazy, blurred images in shades of grey, and the thought of having nothing at all to show for his choice is…harrowing.

Habits have formed so quickly; his body has already accepted the routine of an emptier life. Before he realizes it, Itachi’s feet have taken him from the dining room to the library while his mind spun around in circles.

He sighs quietly and contemplates the day stretched out before him. Recently he’s begun the project of reorganizing the library, since he spends half his time there anyway and nobody seems to know how the books are catalogued any longer. He is trying to remember where he’d left off last time—but then a new voice breaks the stultifying silence of his family home. Itachi hears a bark of unfamiliar laughter and is curious enough for any distraction that he follows the sound.

He walks down the long hallway until he reaches the second study, the one that used to belong to Itachi by default when all he did was prepare for exams. Sasuke has taken it over in his absence and he typically doesn’t make a sound. Intrigued, Itachi knocks on the door.

“Come in,” his brother calls, his voice muffled slightly by the wood grain. Itachi opens the door.

Sasuke is sitting in his usual seat at the desk, piles of books and papers stacked around him. The visitor, Itachi observes, has dragged a heavy armchair over from the opposite end of the room, apparently for the purpose of sharing the desk. He turns around at Itachi’s entrance, blue eyes bright and curious under a mop of blond hair.

The detail nudges something in Itachi’s memory, but he has no time to dwell on it. The stranger beams as if Itachi is an old friend.

“The famous brother, right?” he says, bouncing out of the armchair to shake Itachi’s hand. “Sasuke never shuts up about you, so I was expecting someone about ten feet tall.”

Itachi catches a mutinous look on his brother’s face, but he returns the handshake with a wry smile.

“I am sorry to disappoint,” he says.

The visitor grins. “No worries. I figured he had to be exaggerating some of it.”

“Naruto,” Sasuke growls.

“What? I’m just being friendly.”

Sasuke sighs like the weight of the world is on his shoulders. “Naruto, my brother Itachi. Itachi, this is the current bane of my existence—”

“He means best friend,” the visitor cuts in cheerfully. “Naruto Uzumaki. Nice t’meet you, finally.”

“Nice to meet you as well,” Itachi replies, trying to remember whether the name Uzumaki had shown up on any of his father’s donor lists. “Are you also studying for the bar?”

“In theory,” Sasuke mutters, but Naruto is unfazed.

“Sure am! I’m gonna be a bigshot lawyer, help people who’re down on their luck.”

He sounds so sincere that it almost feels like a prank. Itachi glances sideways at his brother, who pulls a face.

“He has this bright idea that he can take hard-luck cases pro bono and still be able to feed himself,” Sasuke says, sounding slightly less irritated than his expression would suggest.

Naruto shrugs. “No point knowing how to work the law if you’re not gonna use it to help the people who don't.”

“You can’t live off idealism,” Sasuke points out.

“Yeah, and that’s why I’ve got you,” Naruto says, grinning.

Sasuke scoffs. “You’ve got nothing. As if I’m going to risk my reputation dragging you out of the ruins of your bad choices.”

“Aw, c’mon.” Naruto nudges his arm. “You talk a lot of shit but we both know there’s a heart buried in there somewhere. Somewhere really deep down.” He’s still smirking with the confidence of someone who’s already won an argument. “You’re not just gonna leave me to rot in a ditch somewhere.”

“Don’t count on it,” Sasuke says, but it doesn’t sound very heated.

Itachi, who has been watching the exchange like a spectator at a tennis match, begins to feel as if they’ve forgotten he is still in the room. Naruto is saying something else and putting a friendly arm around Sasuke’s shoulders, while Sasuke, for all he maintains a stream of acerbic commentary, doesn’t make any move to shrug him off. For a moment Itachi is simply impressed that his brother has managed to befriend someone so impervious to Sasuke’s sharp personality.

Then he remembers, abruptly, his brother’s parting words at the end of his one eventful visit to Itachi’s town:

I have someone back home.

Ah, Itachi thinks.

It makes more sense now: Naruto’s easy way with his brother, the streak of fondness Sasuke seems to be burying under a performance of annoyance. Itachi watches them talking, sees the laugh that finally breaks free of Sasuke’s mouth and the smile on Naruto’s face at having caused it.

He is so happy for his brother.

But suddenly Itachi feels cold.

He makes his exit quietly, bad manners or no. It hardly matters; neither of them appears to notice him leaving.

.

The moon is high outside his bedroom window and Itachi can’t sleep.

That’s not too surprising, he supposes. He still hasn't been able to shake his newfound insomnia; perhaps it is simply too hard to become tired out by idleness when he is used to running a town, staying up half the night doing paperwork and fighting not to become distracted by—

No. Itachi stands up and crosses his room for lack of anything else to do. He sits at his desk and lights a candle, which is a mistake, because the resulting ambiance is far too similar to the place he used to sit on those long nights, Shisui cajoling him from his cell, doing his best to ensure that Itachi didn’t get any of his work done.

For some reason it’s been harder to keep a lock on his memories since Naruto’s visit. Perhaps there is some indefinable quality to him that brings someone else to mind, or perhaps—and Itachi feels a deep pull of self-loathing at the thought—perhaps he is simply envious of the obvious warmth he and Sasuke share.

Determined to distract himself, hopefully to exhaustion, Itachi pulls out a sheet of paper and pulls the stopper from his inkwell. His father may well prevent him from writing to Hana directly, but his diligence will have to ebb sometime, and at the very least Itachi can draft letters so that he remembers what he wanted to ask about.

The pen is in his hand. His mind is blank.

After a long moment he lays the pen down. Itachi has never been especially skilled at lying to himself; better by far to accept inconvenient truths as quickly as possible, and thereby limit the damage they could cause.

He knows there is only one person he would write to now, and that person is far beyond his reach.

Itachi leans forward on his elbows, puts his head in his hands and tries to keep his breathing even. It does little to calm the groundswell of anger but it is better than nothing.

Anger is all he has left. The alternatives are—what, exactly? Heartbreak? Apathy? He can’t afford either one; they would incapacitate him, and Itachi needs to remain capable. He needs to find a way out of an untenable situation.

But to what end?

He can still be an asset to his father. If he puts his mind to it Itachi knows he can slowly work his way back into Fugaku’s good graces—but with those graces come more expectations, marriage and children and perhaps even a political career of his own, naturally backing up his father’s every move.

The only alternative to that is rebellion, pure and simple.

Itachi’s mind churns. He knows he cannot stay in this limbo forever; it will drive him mad long before it ever troubles his father’s nebulous conscience. And he knows, deep down, that the time for being the model son has passed. He has decisively broken that mold. He is not certain he would even want to cram himself back into it.

He is angry with Shisui for that as well. He is angry with Shisui for many things, fair and otherwise.

Because Itachi knows he would not have broken that mold by himself. Shisui had put the cracks in place, offered him a hand when Itachi thought to wrench himself free. Shisui had seen Itachi as he was, not the perfect family scion but flawed and confused and yes, afraid of the monumental task in front of him, and Shisui had reached for him anyway. He had believed in Itachi’s ability to do some good with what he was handed. To rise to the occasion.

At least, Itachi had thought so. Before Shisui had ultimately chosen to take matters into his own hands.

Now they can’t say you let me go.

Itachi’s hands clench in his hair. The pressure on his scalp is a welcome distraction, but it’s not enough to pull his thoughts away entirely.

This is good, he tells himself. It’s better to focus on the anger. This burning, useless anger that he can’t do anything with, but it’s still better than remembering other things, like—

(I didn’t do anything with that guy they caught me with, so awkwardly earnest, like it was of paramount importance that Itachi understand that one fact—)

(I was always gonna end up dead here one way or another, when Itachi considered hitting him again, and then the awe on Shisui’s face when Itachi had kissed him instead—)

Itachi closes his eyes but it makes no difference. He cannot unsee the images in his mind.

(His hands are full of dark curls, dusty from riding; his eyes are drawn to a grinning mouth—not the sarcastic smirk that makes people want to punch Shisui in the face, but a real smile, rare and precious as water in the desert, and it makes Itachi think of kissing him long before he actually does—)

Something catches in his throat.

(You ever think we coulda made it work?)

Enough.

There are tears on his face. He lets go of his hair and reaches up to brush them away, but more follow. He is angry with Shisui for this too, Itachi thinks bitterly. It’s absurd that one careless person could cause him this much damage. Shisui wriggled under his armor so easily, and Itachi hates him for it.

But he loves him for it too—is still very much in love with him for it—and that is one inconvenient truth more dangerous than all of the others combined.

It is so much simpler to be angry. It is also so much harder then it should be when Shisui is not here, a solid presence to be angry at. If he were here they would undoubtedly fight, as they had the night before everything ended, and one or both of them would be bloodied before rage simmered into something…else.

Faced with the cold fact of Shisui’s absence, Itachi has little to focus on other the fact that he misses him.

He will allow himself this one weakness, he thinks, strangling a sob against his fist. Only this once will he give in to the cavernous pit of other feelings that surround and bolster his anger.

And tomorrow he will decide on a plan, rather than drifting with this miserable current. He will find his footing as he always does.

But tonight he breaks—here, where there is no one to reach for him through iron bars.

.

He rises the next morning ready for a fight, but ends up spending much of the day at loose ends: his father has gone to do some early campaigning and Sasuke is at school, so the house is emptier than usual. Itachi resolves to make use of his solitude and writes another letter to Hana in defiance; he sends it with the post long before anyone else returns home.

Still he is left with some hours to spend before the confrontation. His mother is resting. The house is already clean top to bottom, and in any case Uruchi would glower if Itachi attempted to infringe on her duties, so that occupation is out. Eventually he returns to the library and resumes his project of decoding its arcane cataloging system. He’s made little progress by the time the sun begins to go down.

Soon, he thinks, his father will return.

He resolves to be serenely prepared when that happens. He will be the picture of filial loyalty and reasoned logic, and one or the other of those things will bring Fugaku around. At the very least Itachi will gain a better idea of where he stands.

He is waiting in Fugaku’s office when his father finally arrives.

Fugaku pauses briefly in the doorframe, but his expression doesn’t change as he crosses the room to his desk.

“I want to speak to you, Father,” Itachi says in a tone of schooled neutrality.

“When I wish to speak to you I will send for you,” his father replies, sitting and shuffling his papers around.

“And yet,” Itachi says, “the fact remains that you haven’t sent for me since I returned from my post. It’s been months now.”

His father puts on his spectacles and selects a paper to read. “Then surely it must follow that I have nothing to say to you.”

The bluntness of dismissal should not have the power to hurt him anymore, and yet. Itachi knows the sting of it is intended as a distraction and refuses to allow it to work as such.

“If you don't wish to speak to me,” he presses, feeling as if he’s trying to force himself through a brick wall, “and you don’t wish to look at me, I am forced to wonder why you summoned me home at all.”

“I should think that was obvious. I brought you home to spare this family further embarrassment.”

Pain is a distraction. Itachi forces his tone to remain even. “Surely it is no less embarrassing to have a perfectly able son locked up beneath your roof.”

“On the contrary,” Fugaku replies, still not looking at him, “very few people know that my eldest has come home. As I’ve said before, Izumo is not a man to spread rumors. For the time being it serves if people believe you are still fulfilling your duties as sheriff.”

The picture begins to gain clarity. Itachi almost laughs. “Then you still plan to use my position as leverage for your campaign.”

Fugaku looks up at that. His expression is stony.

“No,” he says. “I will say nothing at all about you or your position, or my enemies would look into the matter and rightfully call me a liar. But if people should assume that my son remains an upstanding citizen, doing his duty to a lawless people—well, that is hardly my concern.”

“I see.” Itachi barely hears himself; it is as if he’s speaking from one end of a very long tunnel. “Then it is in your best interests to ensure that I remain buried here.”

His father makes a noise of disdain. “I didn’t raise you to be dramatic, Itachi. That’s enough.”

“That was the extent of your plan,” Itachi continues, heedless, all the fury of these long months bubbling to the surface. “Bring me back so that I cannot possibly do your image any further damage, and keep me indoors so that no one can question my presence. I was a fool to ever think otherwise.”

“I said that’s enough—”

“You would lock me away as another one of your embarrassments,” Itachi says, bitterness dripping from every syllable. “Just like you did to Mother.”

The sound of a heavy thud hits him a moment before the realization that Fugaku has stood up from his desk, so quickly that he upended the heavy chair behind it, and though his father has rarely struck him with any force Itachi meets his eyes and wonders.

Fugaku’s voice, when it comes, is low and dangerous.

“Do not speak about your mother like that,” he says.

It is not what Itachi expected. He blinks.

“Insulting Mother was not my intention.”

“You’ll forgive me if I no longer care what your intentions are.” Fugaku’s scowl deepens. “You expect me to believe that a petty criminal from that backwater town managed to outfight you? Outwit you?” His fists clench in the wood grain. “If you told me the truth I might be able to reconsider your situation.”

Itachi stills, suddenly aware that he is on dangerous ground.

“I don’t know what you mean,” he says.

His father is unmoved. “Don’t play the fool with me. I didn’t raise you for that either.”

Then what did you raise me for, Father?

His mind races. While a small part of him is gratified that his father doesn’t believe him to be completely incompetent, Itachi knows there is no victory to be won here. Even if he no longer cared about Shisui, they are tied to one another by the manner of his leaving, if nothing else. That will always remain an inconvenient truth.

And in any case, Itachi knows himself. He will not betray someone else in order to save his own skin.

He doesn’t break Fugaku’s gaze.

“I am sorry to have disappointed you, Father,” he says quietly. “Please know that I never intended to do so.”

Fugaku closes his eyes for a moment. Itachi wonders if it is pain that crosses his father’s face—but then Fugaku’s eyes are on his again, sharp and hard as flint. Unforgiving.

“I dislike repeating myself,” he says coldly. “But I will do so, so listen carefully this time: your intentions are worthless to me. All I see are the results of the poor choices you have made. You have failed utterly in your duties to your position and to your family, and I am ashamed to call you my son.”

He was not prepared to hear the words said out loud. For a moment Itachi doesn’t remember how to breathe.

His father doesn’t wait for him to steady himself. His gaze has already dropped back down to his papers, the connection between them severed. “You may leave.”

There is nothing he can say. Itachi wonders distantly if he was condemned, in his father’s eyes, from the moment he came home.

He leaves.

.

The library is the closest thing to a place of refuge he has in this house, so Itachi spends the night there, burning through candles. At first he had intended to recommit himself to cataloging, but his mind churned and churned until all focus deserted him. Even the normally soothing words of Malory can’t seem to reach whatever has broken inside of him.

Desperate for any kind of distraction, Itachi chooses a different volume at random. He squints in the dim light at the leatherbound cover: it is a compendium of Greek tragedies. He almost wants to laugh.

But the stories inside are new, or at least he hasn’t read them in so long that they feel new to him, so Itachi sits on the floor and reads the words and feels the tension in his shoulders ease slowly, one inch at a time.

It’s a large volume, large enough that Itachi imagines it would be difficult to lift over his head without dropping. The back half is devoted to a translation of Homer’s Iliad, which he hasn’t read since his school days. Somehow the story feels more engaging to him now than it ever did back then. Before he knows it hours have passed, most of the night if the sickly light outside is anything to go by, but Itachi remains absorbed in descriptions of the funeral of Patroclus, Achilles’ grief.

It strikes him that their relationship reads as something more than simple friendship, or even a bond of brotherhood. When Achilles cuts off his hair in mourning, something inside of Itachi aches with recognition.

“Itachi?”

He jumps at the sound of his name—and immediately winces at the consequences of spending the night hunched over on a hard floor. Every single muscle in his body is sore.

“Mother,” he says, trying not to sound pained.

Mikoto raises an eyebrow as she looks over her firstborn, getting to his feet as slowly and painfully as an old man.

“You’ll miss breakfast if you stay in here much longer,” is what she says, gently chiding. “I hear you haven’t been eating much.”

“I am not hungry,” Itachi says, standing at last. “I will tell Uruchi I do not need a plate this morning.”

“Don’t ruin your health, Itachi,” his mother says softly.

Guilt pricks at him again. Still, the thought of facing his father over the breakfast table—Fugaku going through the meal while pretending his elder son does not exist—makes his stomach roil. He wonders whether he would be able to keep food down in any case. He says nothing.

Mikoto sighs. “Would it change your mind if I were to tell you that your father has already left for the day? He’s meeting with a potential patron for the campaign.”

It is embarrassing, the sense of relief that fills him at the knowledge. As well as the fact that his mother knew it would happen. Itachi finds he cannot meet her eyes.

“I’ve wondered,” she says after a moment. “Since Izumo’s daughter is no longer an option, has your father mentioned anything about finding a wife for you elsewhere?”

For a moment Itachi has the strange sensation of a noose tightening around his neck. The thought comes with stark clarity:

This will always be your path if you stay in this house.

“No,” he says. “He has not.”

Mikoto frowns.

“Go on and sit down properly,” she says. “You don’t look well.”

Itachi shakes his head. “You should sit, Mother.”

That earns him a disapproving eyebrow again. “I have more than enough time to sit when I’m in my rooms all day. You may be grown, Itachi, but I am still your mother. Sit.”

Unable to formulate any kind of argument for that, Itachi obeys. The armchair is, unsurprisingly, far more comfortable than the floor had been.

His mother continues as if there had been no pause in the conversation. “You don’t have the face of a man who is excited to marry,” she says. “Does the idea displease you?”

He shakes his head—the thought of marriage itself, commitment and steadiness, has never been an unpleasant one. At least in theory.

Mikoto hums thoughtfully. “Then is it because you’re in love with someone already?”

Itachi goes very still.

“I have never expected to marry for love,” he says, careful.

“Why not?” Mikoto replies. “I did.”

Itachi looks up sharply. His mother is watching him.

“You didn’t know that, did you?” she asks.

He is surprised into honesty. “No.”

His mother’s smile is tinged with sadness. “I suppose you wouldn’t.” She sighs. “He used to be softer, you know—though you’ll find that even harder to believe. And even so, your father is not a cruel man. Things do weigh on him, Itachi. Even if he doesn’t show it.”

Her eyes are knowing. Itachi wonders how much his father has told her about their last conversation.

“I do not believe him to be heartless,” he says quietly. “But I can no longer be the son he wants. I—” The words are strange to say out loud. “I do not think I want to be.”

Mikoto’s fingers press suddenly to her forehead, and for a horrible moment Itachi wonders if he has made his mother cry. When she lowers her hand, however, her expression is calm.

“You are my son too,” she says. “And all I have ever wanted—for you and your brother—is for you to live a life that you can be proud of.” That sad smile again. “I know your father and I agreed on that point, once.”

Itachi’s throat is tight.

“I have never wanted to cause you pain,” he says. You, or Izumi, or even Father.

His mother doesn’t answer at first.

Finally, she says, “Did you know that when the doctors began coming to see me, when I first got sick, they wanted to have me put away?”

Itachi blinks. His brain is sluggish from the sleepless night, and his mother must notice because she clarifies: “They wanted to put me in an asylum. For the good of the rest of the family, they said, and so that your father could remarry if he were so inclined.”

He stares, appalled into silence. Mikoto smiles.

“Your father refused, of course,” she continues. “Threw them all out, in one case literally! He threatened to have charges brought on all of them if they ever so much as insinuated such a thing again. Wouldn’t you know it—none of them ever did.”

It seems so out of alignment with what Itachi knows of his father—but then, looking back, he does remember a commotion around the time his mother’s illness first started. He’d known none of the details at the time, preoccupied with his baby brother and not yet fully aware that the change in his mother’s constitution was a permanent one.

A gentle press to his arm jerks him out of his thoughts. His mother’s smile is clear, now, of whatever has been weighing it down.

“That devotion is why I married him,” she says. “As your mother, I only hope that the people you choose to surround yourself with are as devoted to you.”

Itachi is saved from trying to respond when Uruchi’s frantic voice comes floating down the hall.

“Madam? Madam, where are you?”

His mother sighs with the air of a misbehaving child caught out at last. Itachi raises his eyebrows.

“You snuck out of your room again?” he asks.

Mikoto’s black eyes glitter with mischief.

“I hardly give Uruchi any trouble, enfeebled as I am,” she says lightly. “Sometimes it’s nice to give her something to do.”

She squeezes his shoulder while Itachi is still digesting that.

“We’ll talk more, my love,” she says. Then, dryly, “It’s not as if you don’t know where to find me!”

.

It must be somewhere around four in the morning. As usual, he is in bed but not asleep.

For once Itachi finds his mind is not roiling. He isn’t sure if this is the result of his conversation with his mother, or of one too many nights spent sleepless, but he is finally able to think in straight lines. And with those thoughts comes clarity.

The first conclusion he comes to is this: He is no longer needed in this house.

His mother’s health may or may not be improving, and in either case Itachi is no doctor to make a difference in the outcome. His little brother is a man grown now, with a life and a love of his own, and he no longer needs Itachi’s protection—or his sleeves to tug on, Itachi thinks fondly. Both miss him when he is gone, and both live their lives regardless. He would have it no other way.

The second: His relationship with his father exists now as the thinnest of threads, awaiting only the slightest movement to cut it away entirely.

That one is more painful to acknowledge, but Itachi accepts it nonetheless. It is no less painful than the knowledge that he has spent his life trying to be precisely what his father wanted, only to be tossed aside at the first misstep.

There are worse fathers to have, certainly. Fugaku has kept them fed and clothed and well educated, found Itachi and Sasuke both positions that, in his eyes, neither of them have been appropriately grateful for. Somewhere deep down, Itachi does believe his father loves them.

But that thought only lends sharpness another unfortunate truth, which is that Itachi has not felt like a son in a long time. Merely a blunt object to be used and then discarded when he no longer served his purpose.

The two conclusions necessarily suggest a third, which is this: if he remains here, if he submits to his father’s plans and renders himself invisible for the hope of a reprieve, then Itachi will be complicit in burying himself alive. He will marry whomever his father chooses. He will follow whatever career path is next laid out for him. He will forever be a well-trained dog.

Itachi knows, with bone-deep certainty, that he would rather die.

But intentions matter for little now, as his father has been so fond of reminding him. Itachi must make do with actions. It isn’t enough to run away; he needs someplace to run to.

It should feel like a more difficult choice than it does. With Itachi’s education, experience and relevant skills, he could market himself almost anywhere. He is reasonably confident that he could mold himself into anything—but then what would be the point of leaving? What good is there in exchanging one mold for another?

There is one option that keeps nagging at him. And it’s the most foolish possible choice, so Itachi rubs at his eyes until he sees stars and tries to pretend he hasn’t decided already.

This time he will go to his father and he will have a plan, not just his hopes. He will have leverage to bring Fugaku to the negotiating table. Now he only needs to choose his words, and choose them carefully.

He gets out of bed with the intent to pace a while, decide on the exact details of what he will say to his father and how, but somewhere between his bedroom door and the pale moonlit hallway Itachi changes his mind. Instead he looks for someone he knows he’ll find—someone, he thinks wryly, who may have given him these insomniac tendencies to begin with.

His mother is in her sitting room with the door open, humming to herself as she pokes at a piece of embroidery. There’s only one candle on the table beside her, but he can still make out her smile when she sees who is visiting.

“What is it, my love?” she asks.

Itachi takes a breath.

“Mother,” he says, “will you cut my hair?”

Mikoto blinks, once, before she sets her needle down. She picks her sewing scissors up instead.

His mother asks no questions and Itachi loves her for it. He closes his eyes as she works, snipping and cutting until his hair barely touches his shoulders, until the carpet and their feet are both covered with long black strands.

When it is finished, Mikoto offers him her mirror. Itachi takes it.

He looks different, somehow, beyond the physical change. More certain of himself.

Perhaps he is only seeing what he wishes to see. But when he turns back to his mother, Mikoto is looking at him with an expression he can’t quite interpret—caught somewhere between grief and pride.

“It suits you well,” she says.

Itachi reaches up to finger the new length, suddenly self-conscious. “It feels lighter.”

Mikoto laughs a little. “It would, wouldn’t it? You’ve been carrying all that weight around for years.”

He lets the words soak in for a moment before he speaks again.

“I’ve decided what I want to do.”

She nods. “That’s good. I was afraid you were going to let yourself suffocate here.”

Itachi doesn’t have it in him anymore to be startled by his mother’s sharp insight. Sickly or no, she has always seen through him as no one else has.

“I want you to know,” he says, “that what I choose is not meant to hurt you.”

Mikoto touches his face, and her hands are gentle but her voice is firm.

“Even if it does hurt, you have to stand by it,” she says. “A life lived only for others is a life not lived at all. I want you to remember that. I want you to find whatever it is that you want, and hold on to it.”

The thought comes unbidden, startling in its certainty: I already know what I want.

And on its heels comes the understanding that Itachi will follow that certainty, all the way to whatever end. It will be a lodestone pointing home. This time he will be the one to choose where his duty lies.

.

The morning is crisp and clear, and his father looks up when Itachi enters his study. It is disheartening to see Fugaku’s face harden so quickly when he sees his eldest son, but Itachi was expecting it, so it does not pain him.

The two of them haven’t spoken since the last time they were in this room.

Fugaku looks down at his correspondence again, reading glasses perched on his nose.

“I assume you’ve come to apologize for your folly,” he says.

Itachi’s spine is straight. His voice is calm.

“No,” he says. “I have not.”

He thinks his father pauses. “Then we can have nothing to say to one another.”

Itachi steps further into the room, seats himself in the chair across the desk without waiting for permission. It’s more than he would normally have dared; he sees Fugaku twitch.

“I haven’t come to argue,” Itachi says. “I’ve come to negotiate.”

As expected, that catches his father’s attention. Fugaku gives up the pretense of paperwork and looks Itachi in the eye.

“And what exactly are we negotiating?” he asks. “More to the point, what do you believe you possess that I want?”

“My obedience.” Itachi says it without flinching. “Total and unquestioning. I will remain under your roof for the duration of your campaign. I will give you no further trouble on that count, and I won’t attempt to communicate with any of my former contacts either.”

Fugaku’s face is impassive, but he leans forward. “Presumably you want something in return.”

“I do.” He keeps his tone mild. “As you yourself have implied, I am now of little use to you as a marriage prospect or a campaign slogan. When you have achieved your office you will not need me any longer. So my proposal is this: when the campaign is finished, so are we.”

A small victory: a flash of real surprise crosses his father’s face.

“Your proposal is vague,” Fugaku says after a moment.

“Then let me be clear,” Itachi says. “When the votes have been counted, I will leave this house. I do not expect your approval or your support. I do not expect you to look for me or to contact me afterwards.” This is the difficult part, but he manages to say it without wavering. “Nor do I want you to.”

His father is staring at him now, openly shocked. Itachi empathizes; he can barely believe the words that have just come out of his mouth, and a part of him ingrained from childhood is screaming at him to fall to his knees, beg for mercy, beg for this whole conversation to be forgotten.

But Itachi holds firm. Their relationship has become a frayed, threadbare thing that does neither of them any good. Itachi is simply cutting the last threads himself, rather than letting them linger.

“Do you understand all that that entails?” Fugaku says at length. His eyes are hard. “That I will not bend and offer you assistance when your choices leave you penniless somewhere?”

I know better than to think you will ever bend, Father, Itachi thinks, almost sadly.

All he says is, “I am aware.”

“And you still wish to make these your conditions?”

“I do.”

Abruptly, Fugaku sits back in his chair. “Then it is agreed. There is nothing more to discuss.”

Itachi feels almost lightheaded. It seems impossible that this has happened so easily.

He is disowned. The idea would have been a horror to him, once.

His body goes through the motions while his mind reels. He stands, pushes his chair back politely, and turns his back to leave the study. His hand is on the doorknob when Fugaku speaks again.

“Wait.”

Itachi freezes. No. It was too easy after all.

He turns around, but the look on his father’s face is not what he would have expected. He looks exhausted, setting his reading glasses aside to rub at the bridge of his nose. He looks old.

“Tell me the truth,” Fugaku says, but it sounds too weary to be a real command. “What happened before I called you back? How did that boy truly escape?”

Itachi’s stomach clenches at the derision in that one word. So his father had known it was Shisui who escaped all along. No doubt that had added to his rage—the two of them had a long mutual antipathy.

But it makes no difference in the end, he knows. The fact of Shisui’s identity is merely salt in a wound that was festering to begin with.

He wonders if his father would be more or less furious if he knew the tangled truth of the matter: that Itachi had had every intention of letting Shisui go, only for Shisui to free himself. That Shisui had destroyed Itachi’s reputation for the sake of protecting him, however misguided that protection might have been.

He will never know.

“It was my own negligence,” Itachi says without blinking. “Please do not afford others credit for my failures.”

He would have expected a fight, but Fugaku seems to be fresh out at the moment.

“And what will you do after you have left this house?” is all he asks.

“I do not have an exact plan yet,” Itachi says (a lie—his father has never broken his word before, but Itachi is unwilling to risk it). “But I will live a life that I can be proud of.”

He catches only a glimpse of Fugaku’s startled face before Itachi closes the door between them.

.

That night he sleeps soundly for the first time in months.

.

Sasuke doesn’t even bother knocking. Itachi supposes he should consider himself fortunate that his little brother doesn’t kick the door down.

“Is it true?” he demands.

Itachi doesn’t pretend to misunderstand. “It is.”

Sasuke’s face falls. He runs a hand over his mouth.

“Father told me this morning,” he says, sounding stunned.

Guilt, again. Itachi winces.

“I am sorry,” he says. “I never meant for everything to fall on you.”

Sasuke scowls at him.

“Don’t start,” he snaps. “I don’t want you apologizing for shit when you—” He stops, makes certain the door is shut, and lowers his voice slightly. “You should’ve stood up to him years ago. Don’t ruin this by worrying about me, for God’s sake.”

The sentiment is a kind one, but Itachi is still the elder brother and he has to ask. “Will you be all right?”

Sasuke rolls his eyes. “I’m not you,” he says. “We both know I’ll make my promises to Father and then do whatever I want anyway. Next year I’ll take the bar and then I won’t have to pretend I agree with everything he does.”

Itachi nods, thoughtful. Sasuke might well be able to thrive in this situation in a way Itachi never could. And he has already begun to form his own circle of influence, which will help immensely. Speaking of which…

“How is Naruto?” he asks mildly.

Sasuke’s glare deepens, though it does little to distract from the fact that he’s gone slightly pink.

“A pain in my ass,” he mutters. “As always.”

“He seems good for you,” Itachi says.

“You sound like a grandmother,” Sasuke complains, but Itachi just smiles.

Men of their station have long been expected to have a wife in one hand and a mistress in the other, but for all his faults, their father has never been anything but wholeheartedly loyal to their mother. Itachi knows he is his father’s son in that, if nothing else. He suspects Sasuke is as well.

So it seems Fugaku will have an equally difficult time marrying Sasuke off. Itachi almost regrets that he will not be here to witness it.

The thought is sobering. Sasuke must sense the change in mood.

“Mother will miss you,” he says quietly. “And—so will I.”

“I know,” Itachi murmurs. He ruffles Sasuke’s hair and barely gets a token protest. “But I hope you will write to me when things are settled, both of you, and tell me about your lives.”

His brother makes a choked sound. “You’d better write back sometimes, or I’ll come over there and kick your ass myself.”

“I will. I promise.” Then the rest of the statement registers, and Itachi blinks. “Over where?”

Sasuke sniffs and looks up at him again. His expression has reverted back to annoyance.

“You’re going back there, aren’t you?” he says. “That nightmare of a town. I think you’re insane, personally, but you fought Father for the right to make your own choices, so I’m not going to judge—that is where you’re headed, right?” Sasuke frowns. “I assumed it was.”

He finds he doesn’t need to ask how his brother came to that conclusion. Itachi himself had barely thought twice about it; the world is wide, and maybe he could go anywhere, but there is only one place that showed him he had what it took to survive, showed him that he could be someone without living under his father’s thumb. Harsh and unyielding and home.

There is only one place that has a hook in his heart—one place, and one person. Despite Itachi’s often-contentious relationship with both, that much has not changed.

“I am,” he says. “I’m going back.”

The words feel almost like a portent.

Someday not too far off, when his father’s campaign is over, Itachi will ask his mother to cut his hair again. He will hold her close, and hug his little brother despite his protests. Perhaps he will even thank his father for all that Fugaku has done for him.

And then he will leave this house and return to another place that’s only ever grudgingly accepted him. But Itachi believes there is still work to be done there, still the possibility that he could make something for himself. If such a possibility does not exist, then he will create one. He knows where his duty lies now.

Itachi has burned his old life to ashes. Now all that remains to be seen is what can be built from the rubble.

.

The sun goes down slowly. Sasuke is back to his books, and his mother has insisted that he join her later for some tea, and his father has not left his study. Itachi sits at the desk in his room, taking in his surroundings as if they are new to him. He is resigned to the fact that he will spend an inordinate amount of time staring at these walls in the coming months.

The paper in front of him is blank, the pen in his hand dry. He’s assembled writing implements out of habit, too used to working when he’s sitting at a desk, and now he has nothing to write. By his own word he’s forbidden to send letters.

But, Itachi concedes after a moment, he is not forbidden from writing them. Certainly not when the intended recipient has vanished into thin air, so there is no danger of Itachi being tempted to break his promise.

There are still other dangers. He does not want Shisui to be there when he goes back; there would be too much risk in it, and yet…surely people’s memories of half-proven crimes can’t be too long. Surely Shisui’s town will welcome home its prodigal son, given enough time.

Itachi will be there regardless. And if Shisui does come home Itachi will punch him or kiss him, whichever makes more sense at the time. He will have to see. There is still so much anger to wade through.

In the meantime, there are words inside of him that need someplace to go. Itachi is tired of keeping all of them in. And unsent letters—even ones filled with bitterness and inconvenient truths in equal measure—cannot harm either of them now.

There are words he will hold onto, out of the foolish hope that one day they will see each other again. The rest will keep him occupied until the day he leaves this place forever.

Itachi pulls the stopper from the inkwell. He wets his pen and puts it to the paper.

Shisui—