Crown Prince Obito elopes with the blacksmith’s son. Madara hardly expects his day to get worse from there, but he forgot to factor in his ridiculous brother, his nephew’s cunning, and the return of a distractingly attractive sea god he’d really rather remain in his past. There's only one direction for things to go from there, and it’s definitely not up.

Before he follows, Shisui takes one more look out the cold glass, and shivers. He can hear the floe grinding against the surrounding ice, an eerie, disconcerting sound, like a massive beast growling in the darkness. The howl of the wind is a high, lonely counterpoint, a forsaken sound, and Shisui grits his teeth and forces himself to ignore it. He’ll get used to the sound someday. He won't have a choice.

The guards wave Sakumo in as soon as he tells them he’s carrying Konoha's tithe.

“Where are we even going?” Mikoto demands.

The creature chuckles, and as Genma watches his upper body shifts, changes. He loses the more monstrous features, and a moment later a blue-skinned man with a shark’s tail is hauling himself all the way up to sit on the bank, his tail still dangling in the water. “No one has to get hurt,” he says, and deliberately sets Genma's knife on the grass. “You unlocked my prison. I'm not going to eat the guy who helped me out.”

The path through the mire is narrow, barely visible against the dark water and grim-green of half-drowned paths, but Haku's feet don’t waver. He picks his way through, familiar and steady, and doesn’t take his eyes off the water.

There's something moving in the depths of the armory.

“Still breathing?” Madara asks, and the words are harsh in his throat.

There's no division between the forest and the citadel.

There's something in the water.

In the center of the spring is a listing signpost, one of several long since faded into incomprehensibility. If there were directions there, Tsume can't see any trace of them, but there's an angel perched atop the signpost, wide white wings sending feathers drifting across the breeze.

“There's something down there,” Tobirama says when he surfaces.

It’s a gateway, but he doesn’t seem to realize that.

“You would think they’d make it harder to break into their castle,” Mei huffs, and heaves the body of a guard into one of the empty rooms to sprawl with the others.