A/N: As you know, it's SH Month in Tumblr! One of my favorite AUs made it on the list, so I wanted to share this here as well. I don't expect a big response, but I hope the few that haven't read it enjoy it :D

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When he encounters her again after seventy-nine years of silence, his eyes blink once to reassure him they aren't being deceived.

Her hair has been cut, stands of blue fanning over her shoulders. Her clothes have changed along with the era. The yukatas and frayed kimonos she used to don are swapped for a modern outfit under the bakery's red apron. Aside from those small, almost insignificant factors, Hyuuga Hinata has stayed the same.

Youthful.

Beautiful.

Unforgettable.

Those translucent eyes that reveal her heritage abruptly look up, her senses keen as she whirls around to face his direction.

The sound of chattering humans on the sidewalk wane. He can only center on the sight of her open mouth, startled eyes, and stiff frame through the store's large window.

Almost imperceptibly, his head bows in a polite nod.

The woman's expression loosens up slightly. When she manages to nod in return, it's done with visible effort.

Her client -who has remained ignored during the quiet exchange- demands her attention, tapping one of the store's patisserie displays emphatically.

As swiftly as she notices him, she's forced to look away.

By the time she's done taking the customer's order, the mysterious figure watching her through the glass has vanished.

.XXX.

When the sun lowers over the hills and casts shadows down the valley, her long shift at the shop comes to a close. Hinata steps outside, her thick coat, woolen gloves, and heavy scarf a mere costume that enables her to blend with the Norwegian population.

White eyes scan the street as she begins to walk, her nose tentatively sniffing the air for traces of the supernatural. The cold air and piled snow are no help in her quest.

She expects as much. It's one of the reasons why she has made this place her home, after all; the heavy snow is capable of keeping bloodhounds and the Night Society from easily tracking her down by scent alone. Although for the nocturnal world, she has long since met her end, it's never a bad idea to be cautious.

It makes her wonder how he ended up here, of all places.

It's uncertain whether he stayed in town, or moved on, deciding to grant her anonymity.

For reasons she doesn't wish to acknowledge, both choices bring a tad of apprehension into her chilled heart.

She glances at the darkening sky, contemplating her own alternatives for a long moment.

At last, and with an uncertainty that refuses to disappear, she resolves to go home.

If he's around, observing from a distance, and dares to follow, then the situation will be out of her hands. She knows, from experience, that once Uchiha Sasuke makes up his mind, nothing and no one can hope to sway it.

All doubts of his whereabouts are cleared when she catches sight of a tall figure outside her dwelling.

Fingers clench into tense fists and her feet halt.

He stands at the foot of the steps that lead to the small porch, his hands shoved into the depths of his coat.

He wears no scarf and his dress pants look light, far too thin to be worn by a human in this weather. She doesn't need to look down to see that his shoes are no better.

He fails to turn as she approaches, but he doesn't need to for his voice to reach. "Hinata."

It's only her name, and yet...her chest tightens at the low masculine voice.

The last time she heard it, it was mingled with chaos and the scent of vampiric blood. His last words to her had urged her to flee, to leave the mansion of her nightmares and get lost in a place where no one would find her, not even him, who had feasted on her blood since his childhood.

Sharp black eyes finally turn, regarding her with an unreadable countenance.

"...Sasuke-sama." The honorific spills before she can stop it.

A hollow chuckle meets her ears. "Why refer to me as such? This isn't Japan and the Uchiha are no longer your masters."

Of course she's aware. Of course she is, painfully so. But with him here, before her, with lips lifted slightly in a melancholic smirk, Hinata comes to realize that the years that have passed -almost a lifetime by human standards- become meaningless in his presence.

The life of servitude under his clan are days she'd rather forget and bury with the passage of time, but events of such grim nature aren't easy to dismiss.

They have, against her wishes, marked and made her what she is today.

"How did you find my address?"

He shrugs. "The snow made it difficult, but I'm persistent. Remembering your fragrance so well tilted the balance in my favor."

It's inevitable for the evening to proceed without touching such sensitive subjects, this she knows, but thinks that discussing them in the open is hardly adequate.

"Won't you invite me in?" he continues, signaling towards the cottage.

Hinata hesitates, a bit startled, utterly unprepared despite her earlier stance.

The slight smirk dissolves as he sobers. "You don't have to, but there are things I want you to answer, and they're best discussed privately."

Efficient. Decisive. Ruthless. Those are some of the many ways in which she remembers him. It's no surprise he's thinking along the same lines that she is.

The latter of the three, however, seems to be absent. Otherwise, he wouldn't have asked to be let in; the Sasuke she knew would have barged in without a second thought and made himself at home while he waited.

Hinata closes her eyes for a brief instance, hoping not to regret her decision later.

She steps past him, digging for the keys in her pocket as she takes the stairs. WIth a hollow click in the mechanism, she unlocks the thick wooden door.

The entrance creaks as she pushes her way in and nods at him to enter, any welcoming words dry on her tongue.

He does, silently. A draft of icy air invites itself in as well, and Hinata makes to lock up again.

The door has barely shut when she feels him moving. Her breath hitches and she tries to move- tries to run-

"Stay still." A large, cold hand has already imprisoned both of her wrists, long fingers seizing them just below the place where her gloves end. His body forces her back against the door and one of his legs wraps around an ankle, keeping her immobile.

"Sa-Sasuke-sama-"

"Sasuke's fine," he murmurs, securing his hold. His eyes have turned glacial, his mouth a thin line, brows furrowed.

"Sasuke," she hisses, her fear making her defensive. "What are you doing?" Her attempts at breaking free go almost unnoticed.

Has her strength already declined this much? She frowns at the alarming notion but quickly wipes the expression from her face.

Instinct tells her not to show her vulnerabilities, and so she tries not to.

Internally, however, she curses her situation and the stupidity that lead to it. The moment they crossed paths in town, she should have gone the other way and never looked back. Wasn't that what he wanted in the first place?

So why has he come here?

.XXX.

He smells it on her skin, on her hair, in her house.

It's a faint scent, but for someone that used to drink her blood daily, it's also a scent that is difficult to ignore.

Sasuke studies her for a long moment.

Itachi once told him that as a human, Hinata's features were like soft porcelain, creamy and tender-looking. When she was turned from gifted human to vampire by his clan, the white of her skin had almost gleamed with renewed vigor.

Now, an ashen tint powders her complexion. He's a born vampire and knows little about the physiology of made ones, not to mention a made one like her, but if he has to guess, her strange coloration goes beyond improper feeding practices.

"L-Let me go."

He looks unfazed by her resistance. "At first glance, you looked the same. The shade of your eyes. The curves of your body. The color of your hair...all familiar." His free hand pushes a stray lock behind her ear, lingering. "Nothing seemed out of order."

Clasping the end of her scarf, he unwinds it, easily disposing of it. It falls to the floor, simply and soundlessly. In its place, his index finger brushes her right carotid artery, feeling it pulse very, very faintly.

Hinata stiffens.

Despite the tales, vampires (even made ones) still need a heart to work their circulation. Hers hardly pumps now, feeling lethargic underneath his probing digit.

"Back in town, when I saw you, I thought about turning the other way," he admits. "For a second, I considered withdrawing from the life you were creating for yourself. I once cut my bond with you. I was ready to do so again. But...I smelled something strange. Something that disturbed me."

He pauses, waiting for her to explain herself.

She doesn't.

"Something inside you smells of disease, Hinata, as if you're sick. Your skin and your strength," his foot moves, and he chooses to reposition his knee just between her legs, "they're factors of health. Health you have no need for. Yet, you're in a weakened state and it shows."

She presses herself closer to the door, wishing she could melt into it and disappear once and for all.

"You wish to break free from me at this moment, don't you? The old you wouldn't have any issues doing so."

"...the old me wasn't allowed to refuse the young master's orders and whims."

He chuckles lightly. "That's not what the old you," he stresses, "said to me the last time I bedded you."

If he was attempting to get a reaction, he succeeds.

Her eyes flare and her lips press together, battling between indignation and embarrassment. Apparently, that bashful side of her still lives and breathes. A part of him is glad.

"That was almost a century ago," she finally whispers.

Sasuke begs to differ. "Not quite. It was less than seventy-nine years. I remember it well. The night before Itachi massacred everyone, you were willingly spending time in my chambers, chanting my name as I pleased you."

If her cheeks could flush, they would have burned her to chars by now. "D-Don't say that so easily."

He arches an eyebrow. "Isn't that what happened? Will you deny both of us were there, enjoying ourselves in ways the law of my clan forbid? You were to be my source of blood, but I-"

He stops. He does so suddenly, she's left reeling for a second.

He sighs again, this time as if a great burden has settled over his shoulders. "It doesn't matter. The point is, your essence," his head lowers, curving around her neck, "is dim, as if you are about to disappear. When I said it was difficult to find this place, I meant it. You haven't been feeding properly, have you."

It's not a question.

Hinata refuses to look him in the eye.

"Your low blood consumption isn't the only problem, is it?" He rises to his full height, scrutinizing her from a higher point. "Hinata," he says, "care to tell me exactly what you've done to yourself?"

"...It doesn't concern you, does it?" she eventually speaks, her voice soft and emotionless. "You'll depart tonight or tomorrow as if you hadn't just stepped into existence, and I'll be left behind, discarded like last time. Telling you anything is useless. "

His grip on her hands isn't as tight as it initially was. "You were better off without the Uchiha, without me. I only had one chance to set you free from a world you never chose and a servitude that humiliated you in ways that you -the descendant of a goddess- should have never faced."

She understands. She does, really, but how to get rid of the pain that wants to overwhelm her at the mere whisper of his voice? At the sight of his immortal face?

How to erase decades of solitude and hardship because she'd forgotten how to live like a human?

How to admit she wandered from country to country, in search of the piece she knew was missing, only to be met with emptiness?

How could he have forced her to live without him so brusquely?

"When I saw you standing in front of the bakery," she confesses, "I wanted it to be an illusion, a fragment of a memory. Anything that could tell me that you weren't real. Because I knew that if you were there, in the flesh, solid and close by, a part of me would saunter after you and search for a connection you had already severed."

She bites her lip, hard, hoping that the slight sting can ground her to the reality that keeps her frayed self together.

"So, if you wonder about my eating habits, don't. If you worry about how I'm doing, tell yourself you once did your best for me, I won't blame you." She shakes her head. " I shouldn't blame you. The world has most likely forgotten the offspring of the goddess Kaguya that supposedly perished along with the Uchiha. It's time you do the same."

She swallows with difficulty, her frame trembling against her best efforts at keeping a firm front.

"Be on your way, and don't glance back when you do." If he did, it would destroy her.

She hopes he'll agree, release her, and set off. Perhaps he'll return to whatever place it is he's staying at, or board a plane and never set foot in Norway.

"No."

It's a low growl, one full of fury and hopelessness and indignation, frustration and passion.

"Wh-"

"Did you think I would say 'yes, you're right' and actually follow through?" his eyes are flames, enraged deeply, burning with a turmoil that threatens to devour her whole. "Don't be an idiot. Did you think I wanted to let you go that day my family was killed by my own brother? No," he spits. " Fuck no! But I knew, I knew the moment Itachi let us escape that it was your chance to leave the world my clan had chained you to. The Night Society would assume that Itachi, in his excuse to obtain power, would have killed you first, the only made-vampire with potent blood."

His hand abandons her wrists and take one of her shoulders, almost shaking her with his anger.

"I didn't want to look for you afterwards. If I had, and managed to find you, I would enchain you again, just like my clan had done years before I was even born. I would have never let you leave my side, not even if you asked me to. I wanted you to know freedom, and have a taste of normalcy even if it meant I couldn't be with you. I wanted you to have a fresh start in some other land, away from Japan where every vampire house knew of the power of your blood."

Tears streak down her face. They feel foreign and strangely warm as they descend down her cheeks and get lost into the depressions of her collar.

All the hurt, and confusion, and helplessness she once felt and held onto comes crashing down, a giant catastrophic wave of sorrow and wrath and darkness that has eaten at her heart for the longest of times.

"How can you say that?" she demands, eyes screwed shut in a frail attempt to retain tears. "You didn't give me the freedom to choose you. You, by yourself, decided for me!"

The sentence affects him more than she thought it would.

Air hisses through clenched teeth, and it's like someone cuts the puppet strings holding him up. He falls to his knees, dragging her with him.

"Why would you do that?" The earlier ire and explosion of emotions seem to have drained him. He looks tired and purposeless. "Why would you ever choose me?"

"...because," she responds after a deep pause, "you treasured me the way no one, not even in my time as a human, ever did. When I was given to you after you were born, you were never unkind. You made excuses for me when I failed to finish a task; you were even punished by your father several times. When it was Winter Solstice and your entire clan demanded my blood, you would sneak into my room afterward and let me feed from you when I was too weak to get up. You would erase their bites off my skin, time and time again, year after year."

She wants to touch him. She wants to skim her fingers through his hair and press him to her bosom and keep him from making that heartbreaking face ever again.

"Look at me, Sasuke." With a slowness that pains her, she gets rid of her gloves and her hands finally settle on the cold skin of his cheeks. A shock runs through her system, as well as his, for he looks up sharply, the crimson eyes his clan inherited him replacing black.

"...Was I a fool for leaving you? For forcing you to go?"

Her eyes, feeling weary, regard him solemnly. "Yes. You were a fool, and I was a fool. You chose to let me go against my wishes and I should have told you that despite everything, the moments I spent with you in that house were the most memorable. I never blamed you for the cruelty of your clan. Not once."

"...Were you upset?"

Her orbs soften. "Very."

An uneven sigh. "Did you hate me?"

"For a while…" she discloses. "I wondered if you had used me. If everything between us had meant nothing to you when it meant everything to me." Her thumb caresses the skin underneath, having missed it.

She has him so close after all these years and it aches.

"But you know, I still worried about you and how you were handling the death of your family. Would you be able to forgive Itachi-sama? Would you understand his reasoning for doing what he did? Would you see him again?" She shakes her head. "I was too busy worrying and hurting to truly hate you. I...could never haven done it."

He says nothing, choosing to quietly lean into her gentle touch.

She allows him, her breath coming in a quiver when she exhales.

Sasuke.

Sasuke is here.

He's here now.

The hole in her chest feels smaller already.

The peace only lasts a moment.

The next thing she knows, he's raising a long fingernail to his own neck and cutting a long line that runs from below his ear to near his clavicle.

She gulps at the sight of red flowing from his arteries. The flow is coming fast, already staining his white dress shirt. He'd sliced too deeply.

Her eyes are wide, invisible pupils dilating with a hunger she hasn't felt in decades. "Wh-What is the meaning of this? Sasuke…"

"Drink," he says shortly. "You haven't fed. It's the least I can do."

Against her better judgment, she licks her lips, her gaze glued to his throat. Hinata has suddenly become aware of the depth of her thirst, and it frightens her. "But…"

In her state of chronically going without, she would drink too much.

Would she be able to stop?

"Think of it as my first step in amending my mistake. Drink how much you want." His smirk has returned, but it carries a softer edge that makes it seem less insolent.

How could the vampire in her waste such pure and strong blood? Her gums are aching, her fangs (which haven't been used in the last two decades) slowly make their appearance. She doesn't have to look into a mirror to know her eyes have turned a metallic silver.

"Drink."

She does.

Her arms circle his neck, legs promptly parting to straddle his hips.

His breath glitches audibly, causing a flicker of something hot to build below her navel. It takes her a moment -in her current life of abstinence- to pin it down, and when she does, the slight tremor on her limbs ceases because...

What they are doing is familiar. This position, this embrace, the intoxicating smell of blood hanging in the air, their bodies pressed close, tongue gathering up the spilled red of vital fluids...they've done this so many times already.

And yet, she's not tired of it.

She could never be tired of it.

Finding a rhythm and falling into it comes naturally. Her mouth flattens completely against the side of his neck, sucking a little slower, a little deeper. Her thighs squeeze together, her back arching as her hands bring him closer, closer, closer still.

Sasuke curses softly. Not in pain. Not in anger. "Hinata."

Her name sounds like bliss.

When her fangs sink into his flesh, a guttural growl leaves his lips.

"Yes, yes. Just like that," he shivers, one hand cradling her head, sinking in her hair, the other impatiently tugging at her jacket.

He wants it off. He wants it off now.

The sound of buttons striking the floor violently goes unnoticed. He cares too little and Hinata won't realize he ruined her favorite coat until weeks from now, when they finally contemplate the idea of getting dressed again.

The buttonless item of clothing pools at her side. Her shirt follows with a rip in the middle and her brassier is undone with precise speed.

His palms immediately take their places and any other sections of skin he can reach. The undersides of her breasts are as soft as he remembers, the dip of her waist tantalizing, the width of her hips pressing against him a dream.

Her own fingers become uneasy, twitching to graze his own naked flesh.

With vigorous effort, she retracts her teeth, missing the rich and thick flavor of him instantly.

Sasuke adjusts her on his lap, breathing somewhat heavily. "Done so soon?"

Her hands ascend to the top of his head, bringing his forehead to touch hers. "If...I drink anymore, I won't have the confidence -the willpower- to stop."

"I'm not a human," he reminds her, eyes closing, looking absolutely dazed but pleased.

Hinata regards him fondly. "I know, but...I haven't drank in more than twenty years, Sasuke."

The crimson of his irises has faded, but the shock that the confession brings makes them flash.

"Were you trying to drive yourself mad?!" he demands.

"...Perhaps."

He stares at her in disbelief. "...if you weren't a descendent of Kaguya…" he trails off.

She sighs and finishes for him. "I would have met insanity years ago, yes."

A sudden thought then crosses his mind. "Blood wasn't the only thing you abstained from, was it?" The underside of his thumb runs over the tip of a breast. He gives it a slight pinch and watches her squirm with hooded eyes.

"Sa-Sasuke-sama." Old habits die hard, and he doesn't bother to correct her about the honorific again. He'll do so sometime later, but as for now...

"Where's your bedroom?" he murmurs, the vibrations of sound reverting against her collarbone as he nips it.

Hinata tugs at the hair at the nape of his neck, gasping when one of his hands cups her sex through her pants. "U-upstairs."

He kisses her then, hard and firm. He has missed seventy-nine years of her presence, of her voice, lips, and body. Distantly, he hopes that the owner of the bakery where Hinata works won't mind losing one employee overnight. After all, one night won't be enough to make up for the lost time, nor a whole day, or week, or month. Hinata won't be able to leave the bed for a while, this much he knows.

A whimper resounds in his ears as the female vampire in his arms opens her mouth, welcoming him inside. He doesn't hesitate to accept.

They kiss fiercely, not leaving a spot uncaressed, and he can taste his own blood on her tongue. The canines that had retracted after she drank from him begin to enlarge once again. His own throb with his intense arousal, begging for release as well. Sasuke, though, keeps them in check.

Tonight, he won't drink a single drop from her. Tonight, she'll drink from him and have her fill and be pleasured until her voice runs out and her muscles refuse to move.

They make it to the second floor after a while among stumbles and lustful grunts and hungry kisses, leaving a trail of clothes, shoes, and undergarments in their wake.

The bed in her room isn't as spacious as the ones they once happened to share, but it's big enough for two and to be honest, nothing would have deterred Sasuke at this point.

He places her on the mattress, not breaking the kiss. Slowly, he inclines her back on it and bites her lip. She makes a sound he seldom had the opportunity to hear in the past despite their moments together; it's pitched and breathless, ever so soft and ecstatic.

It sends shivers down his spine.

More. More.

He bites again, hoping to elicit another.

"Sasuke-sam- oh," she sighs shakily instead, but Sasuke isn't disappointed. He has all the time in the world to work her up to it.

"Hinata…"

She makes a slow, questioning sound, arms curled around him, hair fanning on the white, thick quilt.

He braces their weight on his elbows and scoots them over. "You should drink more-" His sentence is cut short by insistent lips that won't be denied. The urge to quench any unsated carnal passions is powerful and who is he to resist?

They stay on the bed, bodies curved against each other, leaving no possible gaps if necessary; they've been apart for too long and nothing is going to keep them from being as close as they physically can. The room is soon filled with trembling whispers, panting, and breathless cries. The unmistakable fragrance of desire hangs heavily in the air.

When his fingers cause her first climax of the night, the scent of death that lingered on her skin begins to be less.

When she's stretched and wet and pulsing, he enters her. Slowly. Carefully. Asks her if it's alright, and if he can move.

He's treating it like it's their first time but Hinata doesn't complain or laugh or comment. A soft and tender Sasuke wasn't a strange sight to behold in the bedroom but outside of it.

It's there in that cottage in Norway seventy-nine years later that she's reassured that this side of him existed and that it wasn't just a misplaced memory.

As her hips buck and he moans her name against her lips, he knows that by tomorrow, that unwelcoming scent that haunted his thoughts will be all but gone.

He'll make sure of it because once Uchiha Sasuke makes up his mind, nothing and no one can hope to sway it.

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XXX

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A/N: Please review!

8.11.19