Chapter Text
The village market was in full swing by the time Kakashi made it by mid afternoon.
Kakashi ambled through the crowd with two of his dogs at his feet, the crowd parting before him. The fear in the civilian’s gazes did nothing to him, and he took a sardonic humor in how they made his path easier to travel for him. The mask and one eye visible do a lot of his work for him.
Goroku and Bisuke sniffed the grounds around them, their tongues hanging out in the humid heat of the coastal town. Merchants called out their wares and haggled their prices with customers. Kakashi made a few stops of his own, admiring a piece of jewelry or strand of fabric that catches his eye.
Bisuke lets out a low yip of attention. Kakashi glances down to the dog and over at the direction his snout pointed. He sees a pair of burly men with swords strapped to their waists corner a street merchant. They both wear their hair tied low on their necks, their yukatas grey and purple in the colors of the Sound Village.
Kakashi pays for his yakitori and munches on the chicken as he makes his way up the crowded street towards them, his ears naturally sensitive enough to catch their voices only after two steps forward, the dogs disappearing from his side at a twitch of his fingers.
“Delivery came in? ” one of the men. Scarred lip.
“B-boat got in this morning, Haru-sama, sir.” The merchant stutters out. Bingo. His last lead mentioned a Haru as a a supply runner for the human trafficking ring he’d been tracking.
“Better have. Heard we got a big catch this time around. Pure as gold.” Another burly man. Hmm... Chipped Ear, Kakashi decides to call him. They share a sinister laugh (how original) before pushing the merchant to the side, sending him crashing into a cart of cabbages, sending the round vegetables rolling on the ground.
Knowing his dogs were already tailing their lead, Kakashi takes the time to help the merchant bring the cabbages back onto the cart. The merchant is still shook up from his encounter with the gang-boys, and his hands shake so bad he drops a cabbage. Kakashi catches it before it could hit the ground.
“A-ah, thank you, Samurai-sama. Thank you,” the merchant anxiously bows to him.
“Ma, don’t bother with the ‘-sama.’ it’s no trouble, no trouble at all. Anything to help...those thugs looked like they were giving you some trouble.” The merchant freezes at the words before continuing his task of organizing the cabbages.
“Thank you, Samurai-san. A cabbage for the road?”
Kakashi leaves him before replying, a hand waving behind him, following the trail of the two armed thugs instead. He weaves between the wooden buildings and shops before the land opens up to a beach, the dirt giving way to sand and cattail grasses.
He looks around and spots Shiba poking out from the trees on one side and follows him. Eventually, a loud voice yelling out over a crowd of people reaches his ears. He continues forward, slouching in his kimono and hakama, his geta crunching seashells under foot, sweat absorbing into the cloth of his mask.
The trees break apart and reveal the illegal slave market. Kakashi’s eyes flit around over the cover of his book and counts twenty-two people in the vicinity, five of them bound in various chains and ropes near a raised platform in the center of the crowd. He sees the two thugs from earlier behind the imprisoned slaves, casting their whips and forcing them up on the pallets to be auctioned.
Kakashi sees four other Sound samurai to the left, all nicely standing together just waiting for him to stroll up and slice their heads off in an easy kill. Perfect. He picks up a small movement behind the lined up slaves, all chained together at the necks, and sees the small form of Pakkun in position, three others hiding in the tree line behind him.
Kakashi surreptitiously makes his way into the crowd, making sure to jingle his coin purse as he tucks away his book into his inner robes.
He has one hand on his sword at the ready. The Sound samurai are tense but not suspicious, eyes glancing around them to keep an eye out, but patiently letting the market continue. Kakashi is just about ready to give the signal to strike, when a loud, inhumane snarl catches his attention, along with an uproar in the crowd.
On the raised center platform, a man falls to his knees as he is pushed on. Kakashi feels his entire body shudder and warm at the sight of the most beautiful creature he has ever set his eyes upon: the man is of darkend, caramel skin, with a scar running along the tops of his cheeks and the bridge of his nose. His lips are pulled back in a fearsome show of sharpened canines, his teeth red from the blood running down from his broken nose. He is wearing a torn set of blue and white ceremonial robes, the fabric dirtied in muck and blood, wet from the sea, and hanging off of his shoulders. Beautiful, Kakashi thinks, stunned, his gut twisting and sinking low.
He feels like everything slowed down around him just to meet those eyes. Is this love at first sight? Is this what those authors always wrote about, poets serenaded about, and now Kakashi himself is experiencing it?
He must have been picked up in the Water tribes, Kakashi thinks fainty. The man snaps his teeth when a slave-master comes to grip his chin, but cries out when he is painfully whipped into a forced submission. The captor yanks the man by his hair, a long, dark auburn that reaches all the way down his back and thighs, and spins him around to show the crowd the tattoos running along his spine.
Kakashi watches, stunned. Those are dragon clan tattoos. Kakashi’s heart beats loudly in his ears. That’s a dragon!
The world rushes quickly in at the sound of a dog bark-- Uhei. He whips his sword out and blocks the Sound samurai, a woman, as she tries to catch him unawares.
“Hatake Kakashi,” she growls at him, her teeth grinning menacingly. “Heard you were coming by. You’re not getting away this time.” Kakashi grunts from his defensive stance and pushes her back. She jumps farther back, keeping her distance as her partners fall in a circle around him.
The crowd disperses in fearsome cries as the four Sound Samurai surround him, their swords drawn. Kakashi hears the prisoners being hauled away behind him, their struggles loud against their captors. Kakashi makes the split-second decision and changes tactics.
Generations of the Hatake clan once lived in peace with dragons--many of them bonded in blood, battle, and even love. There was no way Kakashi would stand-by and watch as a damned dragon was sold and treated as a slave, not when they were practically extinct . While Kakashi was far and long removed from his ancestral lands, he couldn't find it in himself to ignore the surge of protectiveness that rose in him at the sight of him, and it doubled at the sight of his tattoos.
He whistles sharpy and immediately his dogs break out from the trees to attack. The Sound swordsmen are distracted enough for Kakashi to release two hidden knives into their throats, killing them almost instantly in a short spurt of blood.
He runs forward and pierces the stomach of the grey-haired samurai with his sword, bringing the blade up to ensure his death. The man coughs up blood before Kakashi kicks him off with the flat of his foot, spinning to block and perry the woman’s strike against his backside. Her blade digs into his shoulder, and Kakashi clenches his jaw at the sharp bite of pain.
He focuses his chakra and lets it climb through his blade, satisfactory watching as lightning arches out rapidly and into his enemy, sending her body in spasms on the ground, effectively paralyzing her. Kakashi spins at the sound of one of his dogs yelping in pain.
The slave handler barely has time to think before Kakashi has his sword slicing across his neck. The dogs continue to bark away from the auction site and towards the shore, where the remaining three slave handlers are making their way to a sail boat.
Oh no you don’t. Kakashi closes the distance between them in seconds on just his two feet. One of the handlers sees him and panics, driving his own sword across one of the prisoner’s necks, the other following suit. “No!” Kakashi yells. They obviously had been ordered to kill them if the auction was compromised, not wanting to leave live witnesses.
The dragon is fighting against the shackles and golden ropes wrapped around him, the last one alive. Kakashi watches, amazed, as the gorgeous man shoots up from his kneeling position in the shallow waters and latches onto the man’s neck with his teeth, his shackled hands at his shoulders, his fingers curled like claws where they dig into skin. The man releases a choked sound as the dragon rips his throat out with his own teeth, a loud squelching sound tearing across the space between him and Kakashi.
Kakashi slows down just feet away from the massacre, the boat limply rocking on the water behind him, anchored to the shore.
The chained man spits out the blood and meat as he brings his gaze up to Kakashi in a threatening glare, his lips pulled back from his bloodied teeth in a snarl.
Up this close, Kakashi finds the man to be even more beautiful than before, despite the gruesome act. More likely even in light of it. The man’s skin is dark and smooth, characteristic of the natives of the Water Tribes. His ceremonial robes give away a noble position--the silks well woven with the embodiment of scales and clouds but torn and ruined by physical abuse and a hardened journey.
Kakashi takes in all the details in minute moments, his dogs coming around him in a slow circle, not quite threatening but weary of the stranger. Kakashi takes in the man’s bruised and bloodied wrists and ankles, the whip marks that peek just over his shoulders. He notes the man’s trembling frame, indicating him to be in great pain.
Kakashi slowly lowers his sword and relaxes his stance, sheathing the blade before untying it from his waist and tossing it onto the sand, mindful of the rising tide. He crouches into the surf, the water reaching mid-thigh as he puts his weight back on his heels and raises his palms up in surrender.
“I don’t mean you any harm,” he tells him. He feels half the pack break off from behind him to set up a wide perimeter. By the sounds of it, they have a scant few minutes before the local authorities arrive, and Kakashi still has to collect his bounty. The man narrows his eyes suspiciously before yelping in pain as a large wave crashes into him, knocking off his balance. Kakashi darts forward to catch him before he falls under the water. The man gasps against his chest, trembling, before his eyes roll into the back of his head and he loses consciousness.
Kakashi swiftly takes care of the chains, his index and middle finger held tightly with a glow of chakra sharpening around them to form a small chakra-blade, cutting them with ease. The gold cord, however, must be magically enforced--it does not give way. The way it grows intangible through his hands provides further evidence to the fact. Kakashi thinks that might be why the man wasn’t able to take to his scales, knowing a fully grown dragon was capable of taking every man down that had held him captive with ease. At least he can now carry the man to safety. Kakashi maneuvers the dragon’s form onto his shoulders and starts to make his way back to the auction site.
The dogs have already bound the Sound samurai with their jaws, and Kakashi sends a prayer to his ancestors for signing the family contract with the Hidden Cloud of Dogs generations ago in a moment of gratitude. The woman is still paralyzed, and her eyes dart around her in fear. “Just need the heads. Uhei, the scroll?”
“You got it, boss!” Uhei barks as she pulls out the storage scroll from her pouch. Kakashi stands forward and, after adjusting his hold on the man on his shoulders, releases his sword and cuts her head clean off.
“Pack it up. We’re leaving early.”
They make their way to the main land through the wood, not stopping until they are miles away, the dogs working to cover the tracks of their trail.
When they reach his safe house--and abandoned witch’s hut--Kakashi kicks the door open and lays the humanoid dragon on the straw cot down on his frontside, knowing the whip marks to be still to fresh to lie on. The man is flushed and sweaty with fever, but the color on his cheeks do nothing to lessen the dragon’s beauty. Kakashi carefully brushes the long hair to the side, and sympathetically winces at the marks that have grown infected, no stranger to the cruel bite of a whip.
Kakashi heads out into the garden behind the hut to collect the herbs for a healing poultice. He pats on the dogs as they run beside him, making their way around the small clearing to make clamp, a small collection of wood for the fire already knee high.
He has three nights before the bounty is due. Kakashi doesn’t think the dragon will wake in that time, but it’s better not to take the chance. “Uhei,” he snaps his fingers to call the dog. He crouches down when she runs up to him and scratches her underjaw. “Make the delivery. Don’t forget to collect in full.”
“Can Urushi come with me this time? Goruko got us in trouble stealing sausages at the last village!”
“Hey! I was trying to make sure we weren’t going to starve to death!”
“Shaddap you mutt!”
“Takes one to know one!”
“Enough,” Kakashi sighs. Usually, he would take humor in their antics, but the night is growing cold, and he is losing precious daylight. “Hurry. I’ll expect you tomorrow for lunch. Bring the standard supplies.”
“Got it, boss!” Uhei and Urushi bark before scattering. Kakashi pumps out two large bucketfuls of water and fills the trough for the dogs. He fills two more before bringing it inside the hut, where he can see the dragon has begun to shiver again.
Kakashi works to kindle a fire in the hearth before beginning to make a poultice from the herbs. If he times it right, he should still be able to arrive in Tea Country by the next full moon still twenty days away. He opens a bottle of sake and takes a swig, gulping it down and relishing its burn.
His gaze crosses back over to the dragon again, entranced. He wonders if his guest would travel with him. At the very least, he can offer safe passage back to the Water Tribes after he finishes his business in Tea Country.
Until then, Kakashi is glad to honor the spirits of his clan and nurse the dragon back to health. It is the least he could do.
----
When his father was alive, and still in good health, before the ooze of self-destruction seeped into his every pore, he told Kakashi stories.
Hatake Sakumo told his beloved son tales of their family history. The Hatake were once a great and powerful clan, known to all across the lands of Japan. They were fierce with their swords and swift on their feet, their family lines blessed with the blood of the great dog demon, the Great Inu, which endowed the Hatake with preternatural senses and skill.
It was said that once, long ago, their ancestor Hatake Hitori had made the first contract with the dog demon’s hellhounds, creating a tradition passed down from generation to generation, bonded in blood and spirit.
“Bonded?” a young Kakashi asked, aged by four years. He is sitting at the low table before the hearth with his father, the house long grown cold and empty of other inhabitants for years now.
Sakumo smiled softly at his son, his eyes unfocused. “Yes, my son. This bond would allow you to create a band of brotherhood. You would rely on them as they would you, never leaving your side and fighting strong in your battles.”
“Hm,” Kakashi hummed, curious. “Can you only bond with a dog?”
Sakumo lifted his eyebrows, surprised where he shouldn’t really have been, knowing his son to be as inquisitive as his mother once was, before her untimely death. “Well, at the beginning, before the great samurai Hitori, when the Hatake were still a nomadic people, we did not walk the lands as we do today.”
Kakashi looked up from his calligraphy. Didn’t walk the lands? What did he mean? “What do you mean? How would you cross the great rivers, or the mountains, or swamps, if not with your two feet?”
“Well,” Sakumo leaned in real close, bringing over a sheet of canvas that he’d had hiding under a scroll. “Before we came together under Hitori, we roamed freely in the skies.”
“The skies?”
“Yes, child, the skies. Before we settled here, in the Grasslands, we roamed the clouds, bonded to the once great Dragon Clans of Fire.” Sakumo held up the painting of a great dragon, it’s body serpentine and red, it’s horns threatening and mouth gaped open to spew out a massive flame.
Kakashi tried his best to keep his usually stoic face in place, but could not help the widening of his eyes or the sight drop of his mouth. “Dragons? But they’ve been gone for years!”
“This was well before the genocides, when the lands lived in peace with another. This magic, you see, that allows us to create our bonds, to strengthen our packs, were first given to use by the fire dragon of the East Winds. The dragons have a way to bond with another like no other--they can link their minds.” At this, Sakumo grew quiet and forlorn. Kakashi recognized the look from when his father would lay down in his room for days, unseeing and not speaking to him no matter how hard Kakashi tried to get his attention.
“Many Hatake were chosen to bond with the dragons, traveling the skies and over the seas wherever they saw fit. It was harmonious, peaceful. Legend says that Hitori’s great grandmother, Wakumi, paired with the great fire dragon Zuko, and together they gifted our family with the Call of Lightning, the first instance of a True Bond.”
“A true bond, father?”
Sakumo brought his eyes back to his son. “A gift from the dragons--a complete bonding of mind, body, heart, and soul. No truer compatibility exists. Soulmates, some would say. The energies exchanged are of legend, god-like in it’s power and severity, as well in it’s gentleness. But, as legends go, none have existed since. And the dragon genocides cost lives on the Hatake clans, as well, which is why Hitori-sama went through such lengths to bring our family back to its full potential.”
Kakashi ruminates over all the information swirling in his head. It was a lot! “Will I ever get to see a dragon, father?”
Sakumo chuckled and ruffled his son’s hair, standing and straightening out his hakama. “If you were so lucky. One could only hope some of them survived those wars, just as we have. If you ever do, Kakashi--it is your duty to help in whatever way you can. We owe the dragon tribes a great debt for what they blessed our lines with. Now! It’s time for dinner. Pack up your things and clear the table.”
As they ate their dinner and got ready for bed, Kakashi could not stop thinking about the tales his father told. He had been familiar with the great Hitori-sama, and he had even gotten to know his father’s own hellhound personally, a great, big, large wolf that looked more demon than a dog named White Fang. But dragons? It seems almost unbelievable, but his father never lies to him.
As he stares out the window of his room and into the pale moon resting in the sky, Kakashi feels a sense of great pride and awe at the thought of his ancestors once roaming with dragons. He thinks of his ancestor Wakumi who shared a true-bond with a dragon that allowed her to call down lightning from the sky.
His eyes begin to drift and flutter shut, the sounds of the soft breeze lulling him to sleep. In his dreams, he pictures himself on a dragon, riding through the sky across mountain tops, laughing as the lightning tickles his feet, the blue scales under him a comforting heat in the cool clouds.
------
Kakashi wakes up to the feeling of a knife against his throat.
He smells the scents of his dogs all around him and is immediately comforted, if a bit confused. Why hadn’t they warned him of danger? He blinks his eyes open to see the humanoid form of the dragon snarling menacingly at him, his teeth bared and bloody. He’s even more beautiful up close, with his full attention on Kakashi. He glances around from his bedroll next to the fire and sees his pack watching the scene with varying looks of interest, mostly none.
“Don’t move,” the man growls at him. His voice is accented in a water tribal lilt, familiar enough to identify the country but not the island. Kakashi wonder’s exactly what dialect the man must use for it to be so unfamiliar to Kakashi. “Who are you? Why did you bring me here?”
Goruko walks up the man and licks the hand that holds the knife to Kakashi’s throat. The man doesn’t even bat an eye. “Well?” It’s dark, still. The glowing embers of the dying fire illuminate the man’s face, making him more fearsome and ethereal.
“My name is Hatake Kakashi. I mean you no harm,” Kakashi tries to say it as calmly as possible, careful not to move or else he’d nick his neck on the blade.
The answer seems to surprise the man, his grip loosening and his eyebrows rising for just a moment before he pulls himself down closer to Kakashi’s face, practically nose to nose. Kakashi feels his heart rate increase at their proximity, and his nose is assaulted with the heavy stench of healing herbs, aloe, and burnt sage that has him fiercely wondering what the man actually smelled like under it all.
The dragon brings his face down to the juncture of Kakashi’s neck, and sniffs at his skin, taking a long, deep inhale right under his ear, tickling the hairs at the nape of his neck. It is all Kakashi can do to repress the shiver that attempts to travel across his body.
He is unprepared, however, for the lick up the cartilage of his ear, and therefore can hardly help his undignified yelp and flinch at the sensation. The dogs bark in laughter all around them. The dragon pulls away and sits back on his heels where he is kneeling beside Kakashi’s bedroll, bemused.
Kakashi sits up and wipes at the wet spot on his neck. “Oi,” he grumbles. “Quit it!” He waves a hand over the barking peanut gallery. The dogs take no head and instead crowd around the dragon, nipping at his torn robes and licking any exposed skin.
“Show me your clan mark,” the dragon commands. Kakashi looks up to him and sees now that the man must still be in a great deal of pain, his body flushed and slightly sweaty despite the chill of the night, his limbs trembling.
Kakashi fights back his indignation at revealing such an intimate thing. He reminds himself that this man is actually a dragon , probably the last of his kind or close to it, and he had just been taken by a stranger after being kidnapped by slave traffickers. Kakashi had also seen his already, when he had been pulled to the platform. He has the ground to distrust Kakashi, so Kakashi bites back his sigh and pushes his robes to the side, revealing his clan mark on his right pectoral, the ink blue and stark against his pale skin, unfaded despite its age.
The sight of it relaxes the dragon, and Kakashi watches as his body deflates, his eyes blinking away sudden tears. The dogs around start to whimper in sympathy, and the man raises a tanned hand to rub their heads and ears, all of them, one by one. Kakashi feels a strange fondness at the gesture.
“I showed you my mark and gave you my name. Won’t you do the same?” Kakashi asks him tentatively. He slowly rises out of his bedroll, crouching low and making way to kindle the fire to grow, hightendly aware of the pair of golden eyes watching his every movement.
The dragon raises a hand in an attempt to brush his hair over his neck, but aborts it with a sharp wince and a sharp hiss of breath. Kakashi stands from his crouch and crosses the few feet between them, the dogs rusting out of the way so he can kneel opposite the man, who watches him with furrowed brows and nostrils flared, tense again.
Kakashi makes sure to broadcast every one of his movements as he slowly reaches up to gently tug the man’s long, dark hair in a soft twist, bringing it around to rest on his right shoulder and down his front, pooling in his lap like russet ink. When Kakashi meets his eyes again, he feels an unknown heat stir in his belly. The dragon’s eyes are heavy and dark, piercing him to the earth beneath him.
After a moment's silence, Kakashi finally finds his voice. “I brought you here to heal after--”
“Why?” the man interrupts, his eyes narrowed. He still clutches the knife in his hand.
“I was at the auction to stop it. When I saw you, on the platform...I saw your marks. It would be remiss of me to ignore the calling of my clan.” The man flinches when Kakashi speaks of the platform, and looks away into the dark of the forest.
“You really are a Hatake, then, to be so familiar to know...”
“I wouldn’t say familiar...” Kakashi trails off. How is he to explain his childhood obsession with everything to do with the legends of his clan? Stories seemingly so great and full of wonder they seemed just that: stories? “My father once told me the stories of the Fire Tribes and the Skywalkers. I recognized the marks from a scroll.”
Silence envelops them again, the only sound being the crackling of the fire and the soft snores of the dogs having fallen asleep around them. Before Kakashi could break it, the other man beat him to it by letting out a thick, wet sob.
Kakashi flinches at the sound, his heart breaking when the man seems to fold into himself but stops when it obviously pulls on the wounds on his back, causing his tears to come faster. Kakashi feels himself want to comfort him, somehow, but isn’t even sure he would be welcomed, a stranger to this man. And even before that, what does he think he’s doing? He’s never been one to comfort anyone besides his dogs. The last person he’d given any sort of comfort has been dead and buried for a long time now, a stab wound running through her chest and back.
Still, the dragon’s cries are painful and something in Kakashi reciprocates. He feels his own aura become affected, a despair seeping into his natural energy so deeply he wonders if it had anything to do with the fact the other man was a dragon.
The pack wakes up and all crawl close to the other man, snuggling up to his body in a show of warm support. The man cries so hard and for so long that he ends up falling asleep against Bull, the dog’s large frame more than enough support to hold the lithe, weakened figure. It was easy to tell the other man was underweight, likely from malnutrition. Kakashi tried his best to feed him water whilst he slept, but didn’t think he’d be able to spoon anything into him while his back was still so injured.
Kakashi waits a few more minutes to make sure the other man was truly asleep before cradling his body to his chest and taking careful steps back into the hut to lay him face down on the cot again. Goruko sets the knife the man had been carrying down by his hand and then settles on the straw mat below him.
Kakashi gently pulls the man’s hair over to the side where it wouldn’t get caught in his wounds, and sets to make a fresh poultice again. Luckily, the infection seems to have sweated itself out, and the whip-wounds have started to scab over evenly. He, not for the first time, wishes he had his sister by his side and not buried in the abandoned plot of his ancestral lands. He pushes the thought away.
He sets the dogs to bring in a fresh bucket of water to boil over the hearth fire of the cot. He relights the sage bundle, setting it in the abalone shell under the dragon’s cot. Soon, the water is transferred to a new pot, cooled, and he is ready to redress the wounds of the man’s back.
Kakashi ties his sleeves back and uses a stray band of cloth to hold the hair back from his face before beginning. He works methodically, making sure not to jostle or reopen any of the wounds knowing the scabs were still delicate and not quite strong enough to withstand much pressure. The back is a dark expanse of beautifully tanned skin under the cruel map of the whip marks. Kakashi can see that some of them were on their way to healing before the new ones marked his body at the slave auction, and he can do almost nothing to stop the rage that crests over him at the idea of someone hurting this creature before him.
When all the wounds have been cleaned and dried with a fresh cloth, Kakashi reaches over for the mortar and begins to slowly spread the concoction onto the wounds. The evening is quiet, and Kakashi loses himself to the mechanics of it. When he is about halfway done, he catches the eyes of the dragon staring at him. It’s the first time he’d woken while Kakashi had started dressing his back, and Kakashi feels himself flush, suddenly aware of how intimate his position is. He is no healer, and has not had much experience being on this side of the cot. What he knows has been passed to him by watching his sister, Rin, over the years before her death.
Kakashi pauses, wondering now if he should stop. He leans back on his heels and waits for some indication from the man below him. He watches as the dragon’s eyes begin to lose their golden glow, their heat, and die out into a dull brown before his eyelids slowly shut and he turns his head in the other direction.
Kakashi waits for a moment before slowly continuing.
--------
It goes on like this for five days.
With each passing day, the dragon stays awake for longer periods of time. His wounds begin to heal enough for him to have more movement and control of his body, but he spends his waking hours quiet and distant, his aura radiating pain, regret, and despair. Kakashi hasn’t ever been attuned to another’s chakra so acutely before, and has trouble himself deflecting the emotions. He has not spoken since that first night, and still has yet to give his name.
On the fifth day, Kakashi is walking back to the campsite from a perimeter check with two rabbits strung across his back for skinning when he hears it.
It’s a high pitch whistle of some kind, the melody wafting through the trees in long, somber measures. Kakashi drops the rabbits by the fire sight and follows the sound behind the hut and through the gardens. When the trees break, he finds the dragon kneeled at the side of the small stream.
He is still in his human form, something Kakashi thinks is maybe related to the golden ropes tied around his wrists and ankles. He looks incredibly sad. His hair is tied into a loose braid and pools in the grass next to him. His robes are still stained, if cleaned, and engulf him-- they are at least three sizes too big on him. The shoulder of one side falls with his movements, exposing the skin of his collarbones and shoulder. He is holding two leaves up to his lips, the source of the whistling sound--a leaf flute, much like what a geisha might use.
Kakashi watches, enraptured. Even the pack are not immune to his melody, all calmly laying on the grasses surrounding him, ears trained on the music. Everything in him is wound tight to the man before him: the shine of his hair in the sun--oily and tousled, but beautiful all the same--the tan of his skin, the small width of his wrists. Kakashi shifts thoughtlessly and the crunch of a twig beneath his foot causes the music to stop abruptly as the dragon jolts his head to the side towords him.
Kakashi raises his hands up in a placating gesture. “Ah, sorry, Tatsu-sama, I was drawn by your melody. Didn’t mean to startle you.”
The man, or as Kakashi has started mentally calling him, Tatsu, stares at him before barking out a laugh, a hand coming up to cover his face. Kakashi blinks in surprise. He hasn’t heard anything from Tatsu but silence and pain.
“T-tatsu-sama? I don’t think I’ve ever...”
“Well, what am I to call you if you wont give me your name?” Kakashi lightheartedly teases. Well. He hopes it’s lighthearted. He knows he can have trouble emoting on voice alone, paired with his mask and closed eye, he understands that his delivery isn’t his best skill at times.
The dragon sobers at the thought, pursing his lips at him, his eyes serious. “The last man I gave my name sold me like a piece of meat. How will you fair, I wonder?”
“I would never dishonor my family name with such an act,” Kakashi responds almost reflexively, appalled. He really wouldn’t. He may have accumulated many regrets in his lifetime, and the Hatake name has many smudges on its ledger, but he would never harm a dragon, especially one so obviously hurt and weakened. He never even thought he’d ever meet one--meeting one like this almost feels like a childhood dream come true. He only wishes it were under better circumstances.
Tatsu scoffs at him in disbelief. Kakashi makes his way over to sit by him, leaving a respectable distance between them. He toes off his sandals and peels off his socks to lay his feet in the stream. Thankfully, the dogs are quick to come to his defense.
“Boss would never hurt you!”
“He took an oath--to protect and serve!”
“Yeah! He gives the best belly rubs!”
“And he’s been helping you heal!”
“Yeah! And he hasn’t created that poultice since--”
“Alright! Alright,” Kakashi stops them from getting too rowdy, uncomfortable with them giving his personal life details away in such a way. He sighs. “I really wouldn’t harm you. I did take an oath of protection under the Fire Lord. And even before all that, I owe you much more for the blessings bestowed upon my family from yours.”
The other man turns away, petting Goruko who had climbed onto his lap. He peers at Kakashi through the side of his golden eye from under his long, dark eyelashes. Kakashi’s heart skips a few beats.
“You have a strong bond with your hounds...where is the rest of your clan?”
Strangely, Kakashi is compelled to respond to the question honestly. Usually, such statements send a deep pang through his heart. But looking at the other man, Kakashi wants nothing but to give him his most true self. Maybe it was because Kakashi knew he was a dragon. Kakashi is quick to turn that thought over, however, as he thinks it maybe has less to do with his species than it has to do with the man sitting before him.
“It’s just me, now.” The dogs all bow their heads and let out a small whimper, Bisuke a soft howl. They feel the shared sorrow at the loss of their pack members lost to the years and wars, the fighting to survive. Kakashi reaches a hand over to pet Pakkun, who always gravitates to his side. He notices how the other man tracks the movement, then as he turns slowly around to watch the other dogs.
Tatsu says it so softly, so quietly, that Kakashi sure any other normal man would have missed it.
Kakashi is no normal man.
“It’s just me, too,” he says, twirling his leaf flutes. It’s quiet between them, now, but it is a companionable quiet--charged not with tension but a deep empathy.
As they rest there by the stream, listening to the quiet bubbling of the water, Kakashi leans back to rest his head on his hands, elbows out. It’s a nice day. He pulls out his book from his pocket and begins to read through the haikus he’s had memorized for years.
After a while, Tatsu starts playing his leaf whistle again. The notes still carry a sadness in their melody, but not as heavy as before. It’s nice.
-------
The next week passes in a comfortable peace.
Each morning, they wake at daybreak. They share a breakfast. Tatsu turns out to be quite proficient with a blade, and takes over skinning and pelting their game. Kakashi cooks the rice and soups.
The afternoons vary, usually including a nap on Tatsu’s part and a perimeter sweep on Kakashi’s. The area is fairly secluded and far from any main roads, but it would be in bad form to slack on his duty on this. He also makes it a point to check or reset any traps for new kills.
Sometimes, they will stroll to the stream and sit together, like the first time, saying nothing but feeling everything. Kakashi can’t shake the incredible awareness he has for Tatsu--he barely has to focus his energy to feel the other man, to know where he is. And by the way Tatsu always manages to find him without the dog’s help, no matter how deep or off the path in the forest he may be in, Kakashi thinks maybe he’s not the only one.
The words they exchange are few and far in between, mainly used for greetings, directions, or simple questions. Tatsu doesn’t seem to want much for conversation, but does enjoy learning of the pack. He greets them all by name, now, and Kakashi has caught the faded edges of conversations Tatsu holds with them on more than one occasion.
Kakashi spends a couple of these afternoons whittling. The look of surprise on Tatsu’s scarred face was well worth the hours and splinters it took to whittle a palm-sized comb, the edges rounded and sanded down to fit smoothly in his hand.
Kakashi watched Tatsu comb through his hair with a heavy weight in his chest one afternoon, hummingbirds flying in his stomach. Tatsu’s half-lidded golden eyes kept contact with Kakashi’s steel grey with every strand made anew.
The evenings are spent sharing a quiet meal and sharpening his blades. He gives Tatsu a proper blade to hold, instead of the medical scalpel he had salvaged from the hut and wielded as a knife. He also goes through his katas to maintain his physical stamina and reflexes. There is also something about going through his stances under the growing moonlight that grounds Kakashi in his reality, keeping him connected with the energies around him.
If Kakashi needed any proof that he was not alone in feeling the growing, heavy atmosphere between them, the dark look that Tatsu had on his face when Kakashi looked up from sheathing his katana, sweaty and panting for breath, would be enough to convince him. That afternoon left Kakashi hungry for days.
By the end of the week, Kakashi tells Tatsu of his impending travel to one of the nearby villages in Tea Country. At first, Tatsu seemed to just shut down at the news. Worriedly, Kakashi assured him he would only be gone three days, and the dogs could stay behind with Tatsu. This seems to reassure Tatsu, and three days until the full moon Kakashi heads out, Tatsu’s worried face etched in his memory. Tatsu’s hair had been pulled into a low bun with the comb Kakashi whittled pinning it in place.
Kakashi makes it to the village that same night, the only establishment open being the inn and bar. He skips the bar and rents a room. The next morning he goes into the village square for the market day and makes his rounds of supplies, throwing in some extras when he catches sight of them.
After dinner he goes to the inn.
The air is thick with opium and tobacco. There is a small stage where three geisha play their traditional guitars. Lamps line the ceiling and walls in small bursts of warm red glows. He makes his way to the back corner’s private suite and ducks inside.
“Kakashi-kun! Finally!” Jiraiya is waving his hand at him to sit down.
“Jiraiya-sama,” Kakashi nods to him. “Trust you are as well as ever?”
“Well, how’s a man not fine with such beautiful bodies around to admire?” He leers as he peaks through the curtain to look out at the stage.
Kakashi pours himself a cup of sake and throws it back before pouring another. “News?”
“Hmm,” Jiraiya sips at his own cup. “Those four you took care of are nothing but scratches. They were, however, the main ones for that region, so good for that. No leads yet...but there’s been a lot of chatter about the one-eyed man taking a slave for himself.” Jiraiya peers at him. “Never took you for one to own slaves.”
Kakashi rolls his eyes. “I don’t own him. He’s not my slave.”
“Ho? A ‘he’ is he? How interesting...My, my, Kashi-kun, if I didn’t know better I’d say you finally grew some balls and went and got a piece of ass for yourself!”
Kakashi is normally one to be baited so easily, but Jiraiya’s words remind him of Tatsu’s face when Kakashi caught him staring as he finished his moonlit practice, and it sends a heat across his face and ears. His mask may hide his blushing cheeks, but it does nothing for the tips of his ears.
Jiraiya bursts out laughing, sake flying out his nose. “Oh the gods! Thank you for hearing my prayers and accepting my offerings! Look at this boy! Oh, gods!” Kakashi does his best to refrain himself from killing him, his mind mapping out at least twenty-three ways he could make Jiraiya’s death a reality.
“Oh, hoo, hoo, hoo,” Jiraiya wipes a tear from his face. “Wow. I was mostly kidding. Your face! He really must be something else~” he sings.
Kakashi ignores him. “Know of any curse breakers? I’ve got a rope magically protected from anything I’ve got.”
Jiraiya thinks about it for a moment, chewing his bite of food. “I know a weaponsmith that might be able to help. Worked a couple times with him, good stuff. But he’s invitation only. I’ll send word when I get contact.”
They finished their meal and exchanged their goodbyes outside of the bar. “I’ll meet you on the next full moon. If that weaponsmith gives the okay, I’ll send a bird. Watch your back, Kakashi, these slavers don’t take kindly to their products being stolen.”
“He’s not a goddamn product,” Kakashi growls out, annoyed and slightly inebriated.
Jiraiya covers his surprise with a quick smile and a pat to the shoulder. “Of course. See you, kid.”
Back in the inn, Kakashi tries his best to sleep but it proves unfruitful. Jiraiya’s warning echoes through his head and his anxiety rises at the thought of Tatsu in danger at the hut. Kakashi has lived there on and off for years. Never has he had any trouble with bandits or any other enemies. Still, he cannot quell the thrum of anxiety that runs through him, and in the late hours of the night, he packs his things and leaves.
He is glad to have followed his instincts when, after hours of traveling at a fast, chakra-boosted pace, Kakashi hears loud, vicious barking and yelling in the distance.
Kakashi immediately drops his pack from his back and sprints, bursting through the trees with his sword drawn and deadly killing intent leaping out from his pores. He manages to kill two men in surprise before he turns to block a blade to his neck. He smells blood, fear, and anger in the air, permeating everything in a sickly tint.
He pivots and runs his blade across the man’s throat and spins to run behind the hut where he can hear the dogs barking. Kakashi crouches behind the garden shed to take in the scene before him. Out of the eight dogs he’d left behind, he sees only three-- Bull, Shiba, and Guroko--surrounding Tatsu, growling to fend off the three armed bandits circling them.
Kakashi tightens his grip and darts, his eye widening when suddenly Tatsu stands tall and his eyes begin to glow yellow, his aura thickening and rising around him in a curl of yellow flames, the long braid of his hair floating up with the wind beginning to gust around him. Just as quick as it starts it’s gone when a black crackle of electricity sparks out from the golden cords wrapped around Tatsu’s wrists and ankles, engulfing him in what looks like a painful seizure before his eyes roll back and he drops.
Kakashi reaches him just in time to catch him before he hits the ground, his sword held high as he crouches in the dirt. He sends out a warning growl at the bandits, letting some of his youkai energy leek through his aura.
At that same moment, the growls of the rest of the pack sound out from the trees surrounding them, echoing Kakashi’s own. He tightens his arm around Tatsu, whose body was limp but still quaking with spasms. The bandits are bigger idiots than they look, because one comes forward with his blade aimed towards Kakashi’s neck. Kakashi twists his wrists and impales the man right through the neck and uses the momentum to twist his body to get the second one. The third yells out as the dogs clamp on his body, bringing him down and tearing his limbs.
It’s all over in seconds.
Kakashi drops his sword and frets over Tatsu’s prone body. He looks pale, ashen, and Kakashi can only see the whites of his eyes when he tries to open a lid. Kakashi grabs at the golden cord--it looks like it's one long piece that had been wrapped around his limbs with no knot in sight to pull. Kakashi tries to cut it again with his chakra blade, to no avail. Not even a spark of that black lightning appears. From what Kakashi saw, it seems to be keeping Tatsu from accessing any of his dragon energy, hurting him when he’d tried to call it.
Tatsu wakes up with a startled gasp as Kakashi is laying him down on the cot inside the hut minutes later. Kakashi catches his wrists as he punches out, shushing him. “Tatsu-sama, Tatsu--it’s me, it’s Kakashi, it’s alright,” he tells him.
Tatsu stares at him with wide eyes as he slowly releases the tension in his body, his wrists going limp in Kakashi’s grip. “Kakashi-san,” he breathes out. Kakashi helps him lay back down, brushing the hair from his face, clenching his hand into a fist when he notices his fingers shaking. The adrenaline still pumps powerfully through his veins because those men--and Tatsu had been-- if Kakashi hadn’t left the inn early--
He’s pulled out of the red haze of his thoughts at the feeling of Tatsu’s hand on his masked jaw, his thumb over the scar of his left eye. Kakashi realizes then that his eye had been open, and the red haze wasn’t entirely in his thoughts. He quickly shuts it, leaning into the hand involuntarily.
A painful shiver takes over Tatsu again then, and Kakashi watches helplessly as Tatsu’s mouth clamps down so hard that blood leaks out from where he must have bit his tongue. Kakashi wipes it off. “Are you injured?” he asks him.
Tatsu takes a moment before replying. “No...sore. I just...with these bonds, I’ll never be free,” he finishes with a whisper, his eyes blurry with tears and shame.
“I found a curse breaker. I think he might be able to help you,” Kakashi prays to the heavens that Jiraiya will work quickly and they’ll be able to head out to break these cursed bonds that so obviously cause Tatsu great pain.
Tatsu looks momentarily surprised. “You...you found someone that can break these bonds?”
“I went to the village to meet an old sensei. He says he knows of someone that can help. His bird should be arriving soon with more information.” Uhei and Shiba walk in the hut in that moment, holding Kakashi’s pack he’d abandoned in the forest to shed weight. “Sa, bring it here. Thank you. Did you get them all?”
Uhei barks. “Seven of them. No scents leaving. One still alive and waiting.”
“Not for long,” Shiba growls.
“Leave him to me. Take care of the others. Get the others to do a full sweep. Uhei, grab Bisuke and check the traps as you go.”
“Got it, boss!” they chorus.
Tatsu is sitting up in the cot when Kakashi turns back to him with his pack. Kakashi hands him a canteen of water, which Tatsu drinks gratefully. Kakashi uses his distraction to pull out the supplies he’d bought from the village and lays them on the cot beside Tatsu.
When he gets up to leave after starting a small fire in the hearth, he’s stopped by a grip on the sleeve of his haori. He turns back to see Tatsu looking down at Kakashi’s feet, his head dipped low and hiding his face. “Will you stay?” he hears Tatsu ask him, his hand clenching.
Kakashi feels something in his chest tighten along with the return of a hummingbird in his belly. He gently grabs Tatsu’s hand and lifts his chin with the other until he can look him in his honey eyes. “Of course, Tatsu-sama.”
Tatsu squeezes his hand before releasing it, his fingers shaking slightly as he moves a loose strand of hair behind his ears. “My name...my name is Iruka, Kakashi-san. Umino Iruka.”
Kakashi can’t stop the smile that twitches up on his lips, and doesn’t even try to. “Of course, Iruka-sama.” His smile turns into a grin when Tatsu--no, Iruka-- lets out a breathless chuckle.
“Just ‘Iruka’ is fine.” Iruka smiles a small smile up at Kakashi, the corners of his eyes crinkling just a bit, the scar across his face serving only to make him more endearing. Kakashi’s hand moves from Iruka’s chin to his jaw, rubbing his thumb softly on the soft skin there. His stomach clenches when Iruka closes his eyes to lean into it.
“Get some rest, alright? I won’t let anything happen to you.”
As Iruka sleeps that night, Kakashi settles himself onto the floor next to him, his bedroll fitting just barely in the small space of the hut. The information he’d gotten from the last bandit before he killed him had been worrisome--they’d been hired to attack, waiting until he’d left his little cottage for the village. Their intel was tight enough that if Kakashi hadn’t given into his paranoia and left that inn early, they most certainly would have killed or captured Iruka. Kakashi will not let that happen. Never.
He will protect Iruka with his life