Hyuuga Hinata sighed as she lowered herself into her bath. Of course, the temperature was perfect; her slaves had learned under threat of the lash how to properly prepare it for her. At first, the two had resisted, but now they served her so well she had to create excuses to punish them.
The Emperor could have simply turned them into Blanks or altered them more subtly, of course, but it had pleased him to grant her request not to alter the minds of the pair of personal slaves he had granted her, only to force them to obey her commands. That, and the Hyuuga family's cursed seal, had been enough to break them.
"Do you require anything else, Hinata-dono?" her sister Hanabi asked softly as she knelt beside the bath. Hinata smiled as she glanced at the younger girl - though not as young as she should have been, as the Emperor had aged her to sixteen years old. Hanabi shivered in fear at Hinata's expression, and in response the smile widened.
"You should be eager to serve," Hinata said chidingly, "not afraid." With but a thought, she activated the cursed seal on her sister's forehead for an instant.
Hanabi managed not to topple over from the brief pain. "I am sorry, Hinata-dono."
"You are to have no food until tomorrow evening," Hinata decided, "and no sleep. You will clean my chambers from top to bottom, then report to the palace maids for further duties if more time remains."
"As you command," Hanabi said, "I will obey."
Hinata nodded. "You will," she agreed. "Dismissed."
Hanabi rose and left silently to begin her work, but Hinata's attention had already wandered. She sighed once more, as her thoughts wandered back to the raid earlier in the day...
Hinata stood frozen for almost a full second as she stared at the unexpected sight of Uzumaki Naruto. One of the rebels, a former Sound ninja from the forehead protector her hid on his person, tried to take advantage of her distraction, but Hinata's Byakugan warned her in time. With a single blow, she shattered the rebel's heart, then turned back to Naruto.
She didn't think he recognized her, his face twisted with rage as he created dozens of clones. A Kaiten defeated their charge, disrupting the clones and sending Naruto flying through a thin wall. Before she could follow him, a Sand ninja interposed himself. "Run, boy," he had said to Naruto as the blond boy rose. "You can't fight her. Help the others escape."
"But, Baki-san," Naruto began to protest, only to be silenced by a snarl from the Sand ninja. When it looked like he still wouldn't obey, Baki created a clone behind the boy, easily lifting him and racing off.
Hinata had not been idle while the two had conversed, studying the Sand ninja - a powerful jounin, she had judged, too powerful to ignore, and his name had confirmed that. The guards were beginning to break into the building, and she had taken a moment to snap out an order. "They're running! Head after them, and I want the blond kid alive!"
"You knew him, then?" Baki asked, not moving to stop the guards as they moved further into the rebel hideout. He paused, then added, "You were at the Chuunin Exams. Hinata, I believe."
Hinata nodded. "Correct." She hesitated, then added, "I suppose you're unwilling to surrender."
"Of course," Baki replied. He shook his head. "I didn't expect one of the Emperor's Brides."
"It was foolish of you to try to establish a foothold in the capital," Hinata replied. "Out in the provinces, you might have been a tolerable nuisance. But my Master had to respond in force to this as soon as you were discovered."
Baki shrugged. "Come then, slave. Let's see if what your owner has granted you is a match for real, earned skill."
In the end, it had been more than a match, though the sacrifice of five rebels who doubled back had allowed a sixth to escape with Baki's unconscious body.
A knock on the door of Hinata's bath chamber shook her from her reverie. "Enter," she snapped, and Neji slipped into the room. He quickly knelt, his eyes respectfully averted from his mistress's form. He had not been aged, making him younger than Hinata or Hanabi, but the Emperor had not left him wholly unaltered. Where the Master PC had granted Hinata power to match the once-legendary Sannin, it had stolen her cousin's strength and skill, leaving him unable to master even the simplest of ninja arts.
"I beg forgiveness," he said smoothly, "but there is a message from the Emperor."
Hinata stood instantly, stepping from the bath. She stretched out her hand, and Neji offered her a towel, which she quickly set to using. "What is it?" she asked.
"He wishes you to begin interrogation of prisoner immediately," he said, his gaze still averted. "I took the liberty of laying out fresh clothes."
Hinata wasn't able to resist smirking, to see her once-proud cousin reduced to this. He hated her and himself for it, she knew, but that only made his servitude all the sweeter. "You have done well."
"Thank you, Hinata-dono," Neji forced himself to answer.
Hinata just nodded and left him. Less than a half hour later, she was in the dungeons of the Imperial palace, looking at her subject for the evening. As the one responsible for the capture, it was her privilege to interrogate the prisoner. She should have been more specific with her orders, she thought, but her Master had been pleased, so it worked out for the best.
Temari spat at Hinata's feet. "I won't tell you anything," she said boldly, her gaze as proud as if it was Hinata who was nude and suspended by chains in the center of a prison cell.
Hinata shook her head. "You will," she promised. "Even if you could resist me, the Emperor could have you begging to betray your comrades in an instant."
"Why doesn't he?" Temari asked. "Why go through this farce, then?"
Hinata caressed Temari's cheek, careful to keep her fingers clear of the other kunoichi's teeth. "For pleasure," she said, "and to determine in what capacity you will serve our Emperor."
"Your Emperor," Temari said, "not mine."
Hinata smiled. "That will change," she said. "That will change." She paused. "Do resist, though. If you prove weak, you'll just become another Blank in an army harem, and that would be a terrible waste of potential."
See other episodes by Aaron Nowack
(Posted Mon, 05 Nov 2007 05:29)
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