Chapter 27: The Futures to Win
So fire will burn, ‘til it burns out its fuel,
Of conflict and hatred and futures to win,
What births from flame’s alchemy may live to rule,
And where the stream ends, the ocean begins,
Suki peered over the ship’s edge at the water beneath. The ocean churned and spilled around them, froth bubbling up from the depths and leaving a stream of white in their wake as they continued inexorably North. Above her, the sky roiled threateningly, grey clouds obscuring the blue. Unconsciously, she shivered and pulled her coat tighter around her.
It had been a day. A day since he finished his story, a day since the Water Tribe ship had arrived, a day since Sokka had seen her. And the time had given Suki plenty of moments to think, to piece together the previous gaps in her knowledge, the changes in him, and to dwell on the changes he was displaying now.
And the changes in her.
She shook her head at herself and leaned against the railings. “Oh Suki,” she whispered to the sea. Down below, her reflection was chased away by the foam and frozen in chunks of floating ice. “Look at you. Captain of the Kyoshi warriors, a war hero, a tessenjutsu master... and you’re aching over a boy.”
The words rung hollow in her mind. She wasn’t just all of that, and he wasn’t just a boy. He was Sokka. And when she’d first heard of his tryst with Yue in that awful play, she’d been amused if uncertain. The way it had been portrayed was just so hilariously badly acted and ridiculous. Not to mention they had had other, more pressing matters on their mind.
But now, after the end and in the face of her boyfriend’s growing distance, Suki took her knowledge of the real story and examined it carefully in her hands. She wasn’t sure what to think. Part of her was a little vengeful that he’d found someone else, even after she’d made her intentions clear with a kiss. And yet another part whispered that that kiss had never been the most serious, that she was just saying she liked him. She hadn’t meant to seal an engagement with it or anything! Logically, she didn’t have any sort of prior claim, she reluctantly concluded. And even if she had, she didn’t want to think about it that way.
No. If she was honest with herself, what bothered her was not that Sokka had met someone else. In all his travels, she would have hardly been surprised. Because ultimately, he was here with her now, and after the weeks together, the budding attraction had become something much more solid, more real. More of a something that she could happily commit to.
No. What bothered her was the last voice, the tiniest, most insidious whisper.
Are you the replacement?
Normally she would have brushed it off with a laugh. Her? The replacement? She was Suki of the Kyoshi warriors. She was the defender of her island. She was not a replacement.
And yet... he’d never told her. Not until she pushed. And he’d been so careful, and so distant, and there was something missing from his touch. Suki hugged her arms around her frame and stared down at the water, as if it might yield answers. Answers besides the most obvious one that had leapt into her mind when she’d seen how he’d stared at that girl, how he’d walked towards her, how he’d spoken...
You’re the replacement.
Suki’s fingers curled around the railing. No. No, that couldn’t be right. She was being silly. She was being an idiot. She was being unreasonable. She was belittling every special moment she and Sokka had ever shared, and there were a lot. The young Captain of the Kyoshi Warriors straightened and surveyed the ocean with a steely eye, her back stiff and proud. She was a replacement for nobody.
“Suki?”
She unclasped her fingers from the railing and turned before thinking. And the sight that greeted her shattered through all of her convictions. Sokka shifted in front of her, his eyes veiled and distant. In the darkened grey light of the threatening sky, there was almost a deadness to him, an inanition that weighted his body. The very sight was such a far cry from his normal laughing, open affection that she almost wavered then and there. He was standing two meters away from her, and yet the gulf seemed like an abyss.
Above them, the clouds gathered thicker. She swallowed. “Yes?”
“I just wanted to tell you to get ready. We’re almost there.”
Startled, Suki glanced up. Before, all of her had been focused upon him, upon the shape of him. But now she saw the background, and the sheer ice walls widened her eyes.
So this was the city. The city where he’d changed, where he’d found someone so beautiful and perfect that she shone. And with all her fears and worries crashing down on her, the words were out of her mouth before she thought.
“If you could choose, Sokka, would you choose me?”
The suddenness surprised both of them, and for a moment, the distance dropped from his eyes “Suki?”
Her hands reached out blindly behind her and clutched the railing for support. And then the words slid out again, thick as poison and sweet as desperation. “Would you? If you could choose, would you choose me?”
There were three movements. Three movements that raised her hopes, slung tight her nerves, and then dashed her heart to shreds. He gaped, he stared, and then he paused.
The pause was a moment too long.
Suki felt something seize within her, something cold, and for the first time ever she realised what it might mean to marry into the Water Tribe, to possibly live amongst ice. Her limbs felt like they couldn’t move, but she forced them to anyway. She wasn’t a warrior for nothing. Her head lifted high, her hands pushed herself off the railing and she walked forwards and then around him, steady and proud.
As she passed him, the last hopeful part of her glanced out the corner of her eye, wanting to see some sign. An upraised hand, a moving leg to block her path. But nothing came. He was frozen.
So be it. She inhaled the cold, freezing air of the North and spoke like frost in the wind.
“It’s over, Sokka.”
He said nothing. She walked away, each step feeling like she was stomping on her own heart. And five minutes later, like a man awaking out of some dream, Sokka reached out his hand to stop empty air.
8 8 8
6:00pm, Fire Nation Capitol, West Square
It had started out as a fun trip, to see a little of the capitol, to fill up the empty hours, and to distract themselves from their grief and displacement. And it had started all right. Lee hadn’t been able to believe his eyes. There was a maze of smaller streets, which ran like a warren beneath the shadow of the Palace and the great noble buildings. And while the streets themselves had been relatively clean and well-looking, there was a feeling of dankness about them, of hidden secrets and a blackness only hinted at. The contrast had been startling against the soaring architecture of the Palace beyond, and it hadn’t taken long for his mother to thin her lips and suggest taking a nicer route.
Pauzon had seemed only too eager to comply. Lee had walked between them both, noting their edginess and wondering why he was feeling edgy too. Perhaps it was just because it was so different, he thought to himself uncomfortably. So big. So busy.
And then a prickle had run along his neck as they walked into a grand square. Outwardly, it seemed magnificent. The ground was a paved mosaic, each individually painted and patterned tile joining up to create the familiar symbol of the Fire Nation. And yet this one was stylised... instead of being all black, there were flickers of orange and yellow near the tips of the painted flames. Combined with its size, the square made for an impressive sight. But then his eyes had raised, and he had seen a group of people gather near the bottom and block out the base of the fire, and the way they were talking seemed...
A few minutes later, the had broken out.
Now, he, Pauzon and Nioka stood frozen in the square as the group of men and women began yelling, began chanting. One man got up drunkenly on a park bench and began slurring obscenities. Lee felt his mother cover his ears, but the pressure wasn’t enough to drown out her words.
“Pauzon! How do we get out here quickly?”
The old farmer glanced around, his eyes sharp. “We can’t run,” he said in a low voice. “That may make us a target. But start moving, slowly.”
Lee felt his heart leap up into his throat. Not fifty meters away from them, a bottle smashed. Wine leaked out and drenched the painted tiles of the flame. They walked away as quickly as they could without looking like they were fleeing, not daring to glance back at the escalation behind. Lee shook with the force of it, his instincts whispering in his mind to run as fast as he could, and his reason weighing his muscles down with lead. What would happen if they didn’t get out in time? If it all exploded? He felt his mother’s hands unclasp from around his ears and snatch his fingers instead, holding on so tightly he thought they might break. As the shouting grew louder, he clutched tightly back.
And then the shouting reached a tidal roar, and the three couldn’t help but turn. And at the sight, Lee gasped.
“Mom, Mom! Is that the Fire Lord?”
But it was Pauzon who answered. The old farmer’s face was haggard, his face brooding and backlit against the street lamps. With a low hrrmph from deep within his throat, he sighed. “Yes, lad.”
Lee wrinkled his nose, trying to reconcile the image with the infamous ‘traitor prince’ and Lady Katara’s tale of his honour. What he saw was a scarred youth with a crown pinned at his topknot, with a spiral of flame gradually building below his feet to lift him up into the air and above the crowd. He stared in awe. He’d never seen such advanced firebending, such regality, such...
“He looks like he’s in control,” Nioka said uncertainly, her free hand clutching at her skirts. “But still, Pauzon... we have to get out of here. It’s not safe.”
Even as they started moving again, Lee craned his neck back in fascination. “Mom, why’s he so calm?”
Nioka’s eyes narrowed. “Maybe he doesn’t care,” she spat. “Whatever. I don’t care. We’re almost there, let’s just get out of here before we’re trampled!”
Pulled along by his mother, Lee took one last glance backwards, back to the scene from hell. With the size of the square, the shouting seemed quieter now, somehow outdone by the clear, compelling tones of the scarred young man with a crown. Lee watched as the Fire Lord stood on his pillar of flame, as he ordered the guards to use the flats of their blades and their fire to guide, not burn. He watched the throng mass around him, shouting and yelling, and at his even-handed response.
And as he turned back to step into safety, leaving the Fire Lord behind, Lee found himself whispering.
“Or maybe he does care,” he said quietly. “Maybe he cares a lot.”
8 8 8
8:43pm, Fire Nation Capitol, Fire Lord’s Private Study
To Uncle Iroh,
You once told me that the truth is nothing to be ashamed of. I hope that’s true, because I’m telling you the truth now. I feel... lost, Uncle. The nobles are wary, people are angry... I’m worried that some of my own Ministers are plotting against me. I’m not sure if I can do this... I don’t know what I can do. Even if I manage to achieve some sort of miracle and pull the Fire Nation back together, the rest of the world still hates us! I...
Please, Uncle. I need your help. What should I do?
8 8 8
Mai covered a yawn and stretched, feeling each muscle tighten and release. Somewhere close by, she could hear Katara moving around, the material from her bedroll rustling as she got up and out. Mai stretched out again, knowing that she should get up too, but the simple content of a well-deserved sleep kept her eyes closed and her form still.
Well, if she was honest with herself, it wasn’t just the well-deserved sleep keeping her in bed. Once she got up, she knew there would be nothing left between her and the Fire Nation but a few hours, and that thought was more daunting than it should have been. Despite the constant danger, the almost-death, the running, the fighting and the surviving that had been her life the last few days, there had also been a certain simple freedom to it. One that she knew would vanish as soon as she put her foot back in Court.
Actually it hasn’t been all simple here either, a whispering voice reminded her. Mai hid a scowl behind her closed lids and pushed away the thought, along with the image of the young man that had accompanied it. But she couldn’t push it away for long. After all, he was back in the Capitol as well, and that would mean she would have to face him and...
And so what? Mai unconsciously rolled up a little tighter in her bed. They’d talked. He’d been a good fighting partner. Together, they had completed their mission. There was nothing to it...
Except that there was something. The traitorous voice in her mind struck again. He held you, he searched for you, he came back. You can talk to him, you fought so well together, you tried to kill him and then threw whatever you had back in his face.
Mai let the frown curve her lips now, and she opened her eyes. The Fire Nation tundra stretched in front of her, vast and seemingly endless from her position on the ground. And yet she knew that it would end. Knew that it would lead her back to the city, and inevitably back to them. To the scheming courtiers. To her parents. To her ex. To the guard captain she doubted she’d be able to avoid, because they’d both promised to serve her ex.
For a moment, the thoughts were almost enough to make her wish that she could stay in bed forever. But that was just for a moment. With characteristic grace, Mai chose the next instant to slide silently from her bed and move, first into a crouch and then into standing straight up - her back arched, her posture as proud as a Fire Nation noblewoman.
Well so what. She had challenges and a screwed-up situation to get back to, but she was not herself for nothing. She had faced her childhood in the court of a mephitic, warring country and survived, albeit with the cost of forming a mask from her own flesh. But then with that mask, she had lasted for years at the Academy, as friend to the dangerous, unpredictable Fire Princess, as her parents’ daughter. And after that, she had endured the toxicity of her relationship with the Fire Prince, the soul-blackening grasp of prison, and the end of a century-old war, only to find that somewhere along the way, the mask had begun melding painfully back into her face.
Things had changed. Mai glanced once more across the landscape, and saw the far off spires of the Palace glitter in the distance. It would be a good few hours’ riding to whatever awaited them, but she’d be damned if she wasn’t ready to face it.
After all, she was Lady Mai.
And as her gaze drifted, landed on the waterbender by her pack, she allowed herself a small smile.
She was Lady Mai, and she was not alone.
8 8 8
Katara yawned and stretched. La, it felt so good! The sunshine warmed her cheek and skin as she reached out and felt her muscles tingle. Content, she climbed out of her bedroll and went looking for her pack, falling into the simple, casual routine of finding breakfast.
A routine that was frozen as soon as she remembered where they were heading.
Back. They were heading back. The fruit in her hand almost dropped as Katara sunk against her pack, the thoughts swirling in her mind. It hadn’t really been that long, now that she thought about it. Only nine days, a little over a week. And yet it had seemed much, much longer.
Katara felt older as she huddled, the apple clutched nervelessly in her fingers. It seemed like it had been centuries ago that she and Zuko had defeated Azula, that she and Aang had frozen the air between them, that she had left the Capitol and her friends behind to strike out for herself. And so much had changed to reflect that. Katara closed her eyes and remembered first Yue’s comforting glow, the Painted Lady’s enigmatic smile, and then finally, her mother’s shining love. She remembered the sating of the restlessness in her, the feeling that had almost engulfed her and then ebbed away as she found the place she’d been struggling for - between blood and water, warrior and healer, mother and Katara. She remembered the thrill of the fight, the firm knowledge and reassertion of her own destiny, and the finding of Mai.
The only question was, was it enough? Enough to settle the ache of the inner wound that had set her on this path in the first place? Katara worried her lip. Going back would mean seeing everyone again. Confronting the friends she’d left so suddenly without warning. Seeing the proof of her selfishness...
No. Katara straightened her shoulders and glared at the far-off horizon, as if it were an enemy to intimidate. No. She had needed this, and they were not going to make her feel guilty. She was stronger, more sure, more ready than she had ever been in her entire life to leap into her future with outstretched arms. She had seen too much and learnt too much in the past nine days to taint it, to taint herself. The mere assertion of it quietened her mind, and Katara found herself smiling proudly. She had walked away, but she was coming back now, armed with a firm knowledge of a threat in the Fire Nation and the knowledge that she could and would choose to help defeat it.
I will never turn my back on the people who need me
Thoughts settled, Katara glanced up just in time to see a shadow fall across her lap. Raising her head, she saw Mai’s thin figure standing in front of the sun, her perpetually bored expression looking almost determined in the light.
“Are you ready?” she rasped.
Are you ready?
Katara took a deep breath, and nodded. “Let’s go.”
8 8 8
On the sea, over a thousand miles away, Kata yawned, stretched, and then blinked in the darkness. Sometime during the night, the candle had burnt out, and deep in the belly of the ship, it was almost completely black. Stumbling, the old waterbender stood, trying to grope for the spark stones.
Schnikt!
There was a violent clack of stone across stone, and a light leapt to darkly illuminate the room. Kata jumped, and turned to see Hama looking at her. The other woman was smiling, and Kata blinked again.
“Hama?” she asked unsuredly. “What’s happening?”
Across from her, Hama smiled. “We’re here. I heard them talking up above.”
“But we’re still moving,” Kata looked confused. “In fact, it seems we’re moving more than ever...”
“Storm’s coming in,” Hama grinned this time, her teeth flashing dull in the candlelight. “The water’s agitated. But we’ll be docked by the time it hits.”
Kata’s breath caught in her throat. “Just like that? So quick?”
Hama nodded. “Just like that,” she repeated, and for some reason her voice had an echo of two rocks striking violently together. “We’re here, and now everything can finally begin.”
8 8 8
On the land, perhaps even further away, Kama yawned and stretched. The floor length windows of the suite let vast shafts of light brighten the room, illuminating everything in sight. Smiling gently, the old woman padded over to the table that had been set up, and the Pai Sho game that she’d been amusing herself with.
She’d been taught to play long ago. Pai Sho was a rare game in the Water Tribes, but it so happened that her father had been a trader who had brought an old set home. After painstakingly learning the rules, they’d moved on to figuring out the tiles, the strategies, the games one could play.
To be honest, it was something of a miracle that she still remembered after all this time. After everything. Kama lightly brushed one of the pieces and pushed away the darker memories, trying to focus on the lighter ones. Her father was often away, and her mother and Kata didn’t like the game. So she’d gotten used to playing with herself, to seeing the elaborate patterns she could legitimately make, the quick and deadly strategies that could annihilate an opponent with one move, turning a seemingly innocent board into a fatal trap. The smile faded from her face as she saw recognised the pattern she’d unconsciously moved it into now.
It was the middle form of the viper-snake’s gambit, so called because several vital points were attacked at once, just like disturbing a nest of viper-snakes could result in death by several causes. Unbidden, her thoughts drifted to the riot she’d heard of, and the difficulties sometimes whispered loud enough by the palace servants to be picked up by old ears.
She never thought she’d live to see the end of the war. And she never thought she’d be able to survive her own overwhelming bitterness. But now, clad in a simple gown, playing Pai Sho, and staying as a personal guest of the Fire Lord while she drew herself back into peace and waited, she couldn’t help but fear that it would all change again. That the near and surprising heaven she had found herself thrust into might degenerate once more into a hell.
Kama settled herself down on the chair and stared at the tiles. She was a simple woman, really. She just wanted to rest, to give herself time to fully dig herself out of the blackness that had swallowed most of her life. She had tried doing so under the hideous burden of hate and anger, but she was so tired she’d let her hold slip, and who could blame her? Not her sister. Not her people, and certainly not the person who she thought would be her ultimate murderer, the Fire Lord, who was now giving her a little something back. Something more than a bed to sleep in, a room to stay in and food to eat. Something a little more like hope and pride - the chance to meet the Southern Waterbender who had helped to end the war.
She sighed. If only Kata had thought of it that way. She couldn’t help but just wonder now where her sister was, what she was doing. She was probably almost at the North Pole. She’d certainly met up with Hama.
The thought sent a chill down her spine, and Kama blinked. Spots appeared, and then cleared away to reveal the middle stage of the viper-snake’s gambit again. The smooth tiles winked at her, beckoned, and Kama felt the same uncomfortable chill at the position even as she pushed her sister’s coldness to the back of her mind.
And then, frowning slightly and trying to remember the next move, Kama began to play.
8 8 8
“What do you want?”
“I want the world,” the man said. “I want you to take the third boat.”
“How is that any different?”
“It will allow you to be contacted, and to be used. I would hurry. It leaves soon.”
There wasn’t a day that went by that Feng didn’t remember the conversation or didn’t remember the way Hawk-eyes had smiled. But today, the memory struck him every time he took note of what he was doing, realised the position he’d worked himself and his men into.
Feng glanced up and straightened for a moment, taking a break from the heavy work to cast a sharp, surveying glance at his men. They had all remained disciplined and obediently close, looking all the world like the earthbending soldiers he had promised the Avatar and his blind teacher.
Feng’s normally stoic face soured. He still didn’t know how they had passed that test. He’d heard rumours that the little girl could tell truth from lies and was the most powerful earthbender in the world. If only a tenth of them were true, he and his team should have been discovered the moment he’d taken his first breath.
Only they hadn’t. Granted, it wasn’t exactly a lie - if you stretched it out, the Dai Li could be thought of as Earthbending soldiers. Still, it had been a stretch, and the moment that her sightless eyes had rested on him had been one of the longest moments of his life...
Feng shook himself with irritation and went back to work. In one swift move, he formed a solid brick from the crumbled masonry around them and stacked it onto the growing wall. What was he thinking? Here he was, a grown man and the esteemed leader of a highly trained force, and he was quailing in the memory of a little girl. No. The rumours were probably just rumours - stories spread to make the defeated Dai Li who’d faced the Avatar and his team look heroic instead of pathetic. He didn’t have time to waste on things like that, not when he had a greater worry.
They’d been in Ba Sing Se for three days now. The first, they had arrived late at night, the second they had spent mostly finding accommodation and laying low. Hawk-eyes hadn’t given any specifics about being ‘contacted’, after all. Feng had pragmatically given the Fire Nation lunatic one week, before planning to move out and melt into even further anonymity.
But it had only taken one day. The eve of the second night, a letter had arrived ordering them to present themselves before the Avatar and his teacher. And Feng had cursed behind his blank facade, before he had turned to his men and delivered the news. After all, hadn’t they run all this way to escape the Avatar and his reach?
Still, it wasn’t as if his team had ever personally faced the Avatar, and the memory of Hawk-eyes’ smile and the promise that the dream of Dai Li ascendance wasn’t necessarily over had been enough to let him take the plunge. He hadn’t thought it would lead to this, though.
Feng sealed the next brick with earthbending and moved on - boring, repetitious, draining work. Around him, he saw the same feeling written in his men’s eyes, and he wondered how long they would have to put up with this menial work. It was true that they were in a position of trust now, as part of the mixed team propping Ba Sing Se brick by brick back onto its feet. But as the future stretched into days in front of him, he wondered how long it would take before the promise would be fulfilled. Before they would be contacted again...
He needn’t have worried.
One moment, there was just the sound of crashing rock, of his men’s harsh breathing and his own throbbing pulse as he worked and thought and planned for survival. The next, the sound was overshadowed by mid-darkness as a figure stepped into the doorway, blocking out the street’s light.
The men, well-trained as they were, instantly froze and turned, the bricks they were forming balanced in the air and ready to be reshaped as deadly weapons at any moment. And for his part as their leader, Feng turned calmly to face the stranger.
Even though the man’s features were silhouetted blackly against the sun behind his head, Feng could instantly tell that it wasn’t Hawk-eyes. A small part of him was neither surprised, but as he looked closer, neither was it relieved. With his trained eyes, he noted a distinct cruelty to those haggard cheekbones, a cunning in the shadowed smirk. Although he was of average height, he stood with such lean and muscular finesse that his confidence virtually dripped off the walls and doused them all in sourness. But what disturbed Feng most was the slightly unhinged glint in his eyes, and the shiver that ran down his own spine as he saw it.
All of this he saw in seconds, but what took him a moment longer was the implicit message in the other’s arrogance. Finally, the man drew himself taller, eyes sweeping lazily across the room.
“Time to move out,” he drawled, and left.
The sudden rush of light back into the room was almost blinding. Feng blinked as his vision cleared, even as his thoughts remained in a tightly controlled whirl. So. It was beginning.
And as he focused, and saw his men looking at him in question, felt his mouth move around the monotone of “You heard him. Follow”... he only hoped the ending would be worth it.
8 8 8
To Zuko,
I have full faith, my dear nephew, that you are doing as best you can in the circumstances. I’m sorry I cannot be there with you now. All I can do is offer a suggestion.
Once, long ago, a young boy with turmoil in his heart attempted to create lightning, so that he might be greater empowered to build the world he wished. Now, a young man who has achieved much may find a lesson and a guide in mastering the last step of firebending.
Remember, it is in the separation of the balance of yin and yang, and then the force as they come back together that great energy can be harnessed. Remember that you are its humble servant. Perhaps it will help shed light on your situation.
Until then, keep your friends close, and do not be afraid.
- Iroh
Zuko let the scroll fall from his fingertips. It fluttered gently to the surface of his desk, and he left it there, staring at it like it might hold some answer.
Lightning. What did his Uncle mean? Why did it always have to be so cryptic?
Why did it all have to be so difficult? The young Fire Lord fell back into his chair and gazed at the ceiling. It too stubbornly withheld any answers it might have had. He scowled at it, out of spite, and his tired eyes wondered if the lines in the stone scowled back.
Another riot. He shook his head. Granted, he’d been more prepared for this one this time. A message from General Sheng after the meeting had warned him of fresh security information about a possible conflagration. At the thought of that, he scowled again. His Minister for Security had been surprisingly quick and efficient with the message, and his forces had been very good at cleaning up afterwards. He knew he should have been grateful, but the very strong sense of distrust that breathed down his neck every single time he saw the man felt stronger.
If only he could just step out of line, enough that Zuko could bring his fist down in all finality. If only Hang could as well. If only the riots could stop, the country would settle, the world would stop hating. If only, if only...
Zuko shook himself out of it. One step at a time. He couldn’t afford to slump into despair, he knew that. He just didn’t have the luxury. Straightening, he studied his uncle’s letter once again, trying to pinpoint exactly what the old man was trying to say. Even though he’d like to think that experience had steeped him in the art of decoding Iroh’s wisdom, he was still just as perplexed in the face of the latest one. How would lightning solve anything? That was a fighting technique. Sure, he could use it to fry his Ministers (he took a moment to indulge the brief fantasy) but that would just bring the entire nobility and Court structure down around his head.
Zuko’s regretful musings were broken by a knock. Starting, Zuko rose from his chair by instinct.
“Enter!” he called out tiredly, lifting his fingers up to massage the bridge of his nose. The familiar movement calmed him a little, so much that he didn’t even realise the settled power in the tone of his voice.
Somehow, he was not surprised when Shen Li strode in. But that didn’t mean he was prepared for what he had to say. The guard captain stopped only to bow, and before his head lifted up he was already speaking.
“Zuko! Lady Mai and Lady Katara have returned!”
For a moment, Zuko sat struck dumb. Shen Li saw it, and continued.
“The messenger just reached me from the gate - they want to come in to report. When should I tell them?”
The words dropped like game pieces on a board, and a strange sense of unearthliness crept over him, like purified life out of fire. Zuko shook his head. “Everything’s happening right now, isn’t it?” he asked quietly, staring at Iroh’s letter in front of him. “It’s all happening.”
He felt the guard captain’s gaze rest questioningly on him, and he looked up, straightened. The odd feeling rolled away from him like a flowing cloak, leaving a young, burnt Fire Lord in charge.
He took a deep breath, and exhaled. “Tell them to come here right away” he ordered. “There is much to attend to.”
Shen Li nodded, bowed quickly, and was off again. Faintly, Zuko could hear his boots slapping on the carpet outside, and hmmed to himself in approval. There was something, he told himself. There were allies, friends he could count on. There were those he could hold close, he could trust...
Unbidden, Zuko’s gaze drifted from his desk to the floor, the map, and the bloody soldiers that covered it. Yes, there were those he could trust. Now all he had to do was hope that together, they could engineer a miracle.
8 8 8
Aang found himself running down the mountain, away from the Air Temple, and back to the earth.
It was different, this time. Subtle, and yet markedly so. For one, he had to descend back down before he could get back to Appa. For two, this time Toph and Momo were waiting for him. But most importantly, this time he wasn’t running away, he was running to.
Aang snapped the glider closed. Some time along the way, as he’d ridden the gusts of winds upwards, he’d felt the undeniable heaviness of a storm begin to press down. Now as the wind whipped through his clothes and screamed in his ear, he knew that he wouldn’t be able to ride back down amidst the maelstrom.
With that in mind, he turned and saw the Guru already there. And things were already different. The aura of serenity around Pathik was still there, but noticeably lessened. And for once, he didn’t wait for Aang to approach and sit down, he spoke first.
“Aang! You must go back to Ba Sing Se.”
He didn’t ask, didn’t question, because somewhere inside him, he knew that Pathik wouldn’t have the answer. So instead, he settled for a confirmation.
“Something bad is happening, isn’t it?” he asked.
The Guru nodded. “Run, and listen to your soul.”
Aang felt the change, felt the strength radiate around him. His sandalled feet were a whir as they sprung off the ground, his descent quick, sure and fast as only an airbender Avatar could. Within moments, he sighted the bulk of his animal companion, and then he was there. Leaping high into his element and letting it carry him to Appa’s head, he grasped the reins.
“Appa, yip yip!”
The air bison rolled, and then lifted without a groan. Behind him, he heard a yelp of surprise.
“Twinkletoes? Dammit, tell me what’s happening now!”
Aang wound the reins around his fingers. “We’re going back,” he said, his voice strong and sure. “Something bad has happened, and we’re needed.”
For a moment, there was nothing but the whip of the wind. And then above them, the storm clouds were shattered with a thunderclap. The sound rolled ominously across the sky, speeding ahead of them towards the city of Ba Sing Se, and when it was over, he heard Toph speak again.
It was simple. Three words. “Are you ready?” she asked, and for some reason, the question made him close his eyes.
Three old men sitting around a blocky table. One old woman with her hands clawing at the rain. Two young girls dancing through blasts of fire, the first sleek with water and the other sharp as steel. A mask of blackened flesh that crumbled away to reveal a scar. The earth shifting beneath feet to crush someone’s bones to powder. The marching of soldiers feet over soil and rock, inexorable and deadly. The smell of smoke and burning. Fire. Earth. Water. A child screaming. Someone laughing...
This time, Aang felt a strange inexorableness well up in him alongside the sickening fear. True, he didn’t have all the answers. But he had some, and what he knew made him set his shoulders, raise his chin, open his eyes and stare straight into the face of the threatening horizon ahead.
“If I’m not ready,” he said flatly, “I will be.”
