Avatar: Shadows in the Mind - Chapter 10
Title: Shadows in the Mind
Summary: Five years after the war is over, the world is finally settling into an uneasy peace. When the Avatar and his friends disappear into a swamp in the southwest Earth Kingdom, they find themselves fighting not only for their lives but to prevent another way from breaking out.
Chapter Ten: Zuko picks a fight, Cai finds what he’s looking for, and Mai has a minor nervous breakdown.
Rating: Light T, for violence and blood.
A/N: I’m not sure how action packed this chapter is, but it is very important as far as the mental state of several of the characters goes. This would have been up much sooner, if I hadn’t been dragging my feet for so long to revise a couple sections that badly needed it.
Chapter 10 - In Puris Naturalibus
Zuko was angry.
Five years ago, when he’d made his journey from a determined, angry child to slightly more determined, slightly less angry, adult, an important part of his development had been growing up and being honest with himself about his true feelings and not just acting out in anger - at least, that’s what his uncle had insisted time and time again, and though his uncle was very wise, he also cried when he was particularly overwhelmed by the beauty of the china pattern of his tea set.
Well. If Zuko was to be honest with himself, he was embarrassed because Mai had killed the catfish gator. He might have acted bored during uncle’s lectures, but he strongly suspected that he was supposed to protect her instead of the other way around.
Actually, to be even more honest with himself, underneath the layer of anger, and the layer of embarrassment, was a thick layer of healthy confusion. The first time he had seen the exiled Mai in five years and she was helping him? She wasn’t angry at him for sending her away? He wasn’t angry at her for hunting him like some lousy dog in the first place?
And what really burned him, what really pissed him off, was that he suspected Mai not only knew his feelings but thought he was ridiculous and just didn’t care enough to bother knocking any sense into him. It angered him that she knew these things, it embarrassed him that she could read him that well, and it confused him that he was even giving a second thought to her thoughts, and there was that cycle again, and damnit, he was going to break every single one of Uncle’s tea sets if he ever got home.
So perhaps it was inevitable, that, as they worked their way through the swamp, he suddenly turned to her and barked, “So what are you doing here anyway?”
Mai didn’t react in the slightest to his harsh tone. “We were heading north and got lost in here.”
Zuko studied her for a moment, anticipating more information but remaining unsurprised when she volunteered none. “I’m surprised the three of you are still together.”
“Why would you be?” her tone was not defensive, as he had expected; it was almost curious, as if she was slightly bemused that he would think the three of them would go separate ways.
“I figured Azula would have ditched you a long time ago,” Zuko explained.
Her eyebrow twitched up for a moment, as if she wanted to look at him and wait patiently for him to pick up on the obvious thing he’d missed. “Azula needs us more than we need her.”
“Is that why you joined up with her before?” he shot at her.
Her face remained blank.
“Five years ago. During the war,” he prompted.
“Yes, Azula was really desperate for me and Ty Lee, what with the entire Fire Nation army, all their technology, and the Fire Lord’s blessing behind her.” Sarcasm. Sarcasm Zuko could work with; how long had he been acquainted with Sokka and Toph?
“That sure didn’t stop you,” he snapped.
“Look, have you ever been to Omashu? Of course I left when Azula and Ty Lee came for me. You would have too, if you’d been trapped there with your soul being sucked away like mine.”
“I wouldn’t know about that,” Zuko retorted, not noticing the rise in his voice. “I was too busy running away from you.”
Mai blinked for a minute, silent, and Zuko mentally congratulated himself on - well, he hadn’t won, exactly, but for some reason he felt better.
Then Mai said conversationally, “If I recall correctly, we spent more time chasing after the Avatar than you.”
That stopped him dead in his tracks. “You were sent after me.”
“At first,” she agreed. “But once Azula got the Avatar’s scent, she really focused on him.”
“But I helped train him in firebending! I was traveling with the Avatar!” If he were home, Iroh would pat him fondly on the shoulder and tell him to let it go. If he were with Toph, she would punch him in the shoulder and tell him to stop whining. But he was with Mai, and her response was to look at him, almost quizzically, and respond, “Yeah, that really helped Azula track you both at the same time. If it had come down to it, though, and Azula had been forced to choose between you and the Avatar, she would have taken the Avatar in a heartbeat.”
This was not what he had been planning on; Zuko admitted he’d been trying to pick a fight, but he hadn’t wanted to be put on the defensive - he’d wanted to break that stone face of hers and instead she had used it to crush him cruelly and efficiently.
The thing was that Mai was right. Azula would have chosen the Avatar over him if forced even though she’d been ordered to find Zuko. And now he wasn’t sure how to respond to Mai.
She broke the silence by asking, “So what are you doing in here?”
And then it all came rushing back to him - how could he have forgotten? “My uncle is very sick,” Zuko murmured, closing his eyes for a moment and feeling the guilt crawl through his body. “I was going home to be with him.”
There was a very tense moment, and then he heard Mai clear her throat awkwardly and mutter hesitantly, “I’m, uh, very sorry to hear that.”
Something inside him snapped at these words. Zuko faintly heard rushing in his ears as he rounded on her. “No you aren’t.” The words just spilled out of him, as if he’d been saving them up and he didn’t even know it. “You chased him around the Earth Kingdom and then the Fire Nation for months, taking cheap shots when you could, and then he was part of the group that sent you to live in exile in the first place. Tell me, Mai, what reason you could possibly have to be sorry that he is so gravely ill.”
Mai was quiet through his rant, and even now the only indication that she was surprised was a very slight raise of her eyebrows. She blinked for a moment before responding, “He was always very kind to Ty Lee and me.”
“Then you understand why I have to get home to him?” Zuko asked tightly.
She nodded and looked past him, as if searching for a break in the trees. “We should probably try to work our way west, instead of north, then.”
Zuko stopped. “We have been going west.”
Mai shook her head and pointed out the moss growing on the trees. “We’re going north. See?”
“Then we need to go west.” Zuko abruptly altered his course, and didn’t hesitate though Mai failed to follow.
“I wouldn’t,” she called after him.
“And why not?” Before the whole question could get out of his mouth, the ground underneath him faltered and he fell forward and with a loud squish received a mouthful of green slime.
Mai approached him from behind, up above him, safe on rock. “I was trying to tell you that the ground was unstable over there.”
Zuko let out a growl and pushed himself up, trying to right himself but only sinking knee deep into the muck. Mai looked at him, covered head to toe, and promptly showed the most emotion she’d expressed since she had first run into Zuko: blatant disgust, her eyes narrowed and lip curling.
“Well, if it makes you feel better, you don’t have to worry about getting any dirtier.”
***
Sokka blinked and rubbed his eyes, trying to make his body wake up as fast as his mind had. He'd been jerked from sleep by the scent of burned flesh on the wind and a sudden, intense feeling of vulnerability; the only thing he could think to compare it to was the time he'd lost a bet to Toph and been forced to streak through the Fire Lord's palace as forfeit.
He'd sat up, calling out and fumbling at his waist for his machete - and had felt surprised when he found it, neatly tucked away. He blinked at it dumbly, remembering that he had given it to Ty Lee when she'd woken up for watch - she was more than capable of protecting herself, but she was so fascinated with it that it didn't hurt to let her play with it while he was trying to sleep.
The earth rumbled beneath him, and as Toph's rock tent collapsed he realized that she and Sokka were the only ones still in camp - Ty Lee was gone, disappeared during the night. The earthbender's eyes were still closed and her hair was spiked out in every possible dimension.
"What's your problem?" she asked blearily. "Your heart is going nuts."
"Ty Lee's gone," he informed her, his ears straining to hear anything out of place and scouring the surrounding area for signs of a struggle - of which there were none.
Toph's feet twitched. "Huh. She is gone," she confirmed, tone completely disinterested. "So what?"
He looked at her and frowned, hands automatically settling at his hips. "You know, you really need to work on your intimacy issues."
Toph shrugged and finished dismantling her tent, letting the remains of the rock fall back into the earth. "By that you mean I should make friends with any former enemy I happen to find wandering around?"
"No!" Sokka protested. "This was... special circumstances." There was absolutely no reason for him to be feeling so defensive, and yet he felt the need to justify acting friendly with Ty Lee to Toph. "I mean... there's safety in numbers. I don't want anyone to get hurt here, whether or not I used to fight them."
Toph sighed in irritation and shifted again, stepping to her right and focusing on something in the distance. "Look," she said patronizingly. "There are two people moving directly north of us. One of them is definitely Ty Lee."
"You're sure?" He wouldn't put it past Toph to make something up just to pacify him.
She was ignoring him, currently concentrating on something else. "I think she's with Azula."
"How do you know?"
He could tell she was really annoyed with his doubt. "Because, the only other person who walks like the earth is barely holding them down is Aang, and Aang has no reason to be walking with a rigid person who walks like a man like Azula does."
Sokka rubbed his neck, feeling rather forlorn. "I can't believe she left us." Then, as often happened with Toph, he actually listened to what she had said, distracting himself from his previous train of thought. "Azula walks like a man? Really?"
"Are you kidding me?" Toph asked incredulously. "She walks like a man, talks like a man, wears men's clothing and a man's topknot. I could recognize her anywhere."
Toph always did this to him. He blinked at her blankly for as moment, contemplating this new information, and then blurted out his next question, "How do I walk?"
Toph tilted her head, tapping her chin thoughtfully. "It must be because you grew up in all that snow in the South Pole, but if it weren't for your height I wouldn't be able to immediately tell you and Katara apart." Her piece said, she turned her back on him and reached for her outer tunic, effectively ending the conversation.
Sokka scratched his head, not sure exactly who was being insulted - another common trait of Toph's - then sighed, allowing his shoulders to slump as he shook out his tunic and cleaned his boomerang, preparing for a new day and to continue moving through the swamp.
He was feeling distinctly melancholy; something that could be easily chalked up to the stress or exhaustion of their predicament but should probably be blamed upon the disappearance of Ty Lee. This was not how Sokka intended to start his day - although he wasn’t sure exactly what he was expecting, what with Ty Lee and him being former enemies and Toph making her enmity of Ty Lee clear, but the fact was that, after his initial hesitation, Sokka had started to trust Ty Lee and had felt more secure with her in front of him.
“Maybe we won’t find Azula at all,” she’d suggested when they had first met, and he, like an idiot, had actually entertained some half-hearted hope that she might actually be right. Sokka wasn’t sure what he’d been expecting, but it certainly wasn’t this.
There was a loud cough from behind him. He jumped, startled, then turned around to glance back at Toph. Her jaw was set, arms crossed, one foot tapping in irritation. He’d spaced off with one arm through his outer tunic, the rest of if bunched up around his neck. He flinched guiltily at the look on her face, remembered she couldn’t see it, and then hurriedly pulled his shirt over his head.
“Well! Are you ready to go?” he asked brightly. It was best not to dwell on the way he had expected things to turn out.
***
He put his feet up on his desk, relaxing in the little receiving room he had turned into a makeshift office while staying in Ba Sing Se.
The object of his attention was the small, still sealed piece of parchment that had driven Lord Zuko and the Avatar from the palace in the first place. Bumi still wasn’t sure how it had come into his possession, but the small message fascinated him endlessly - that such a little thing could have such a huge impact on the world, that an ordinary piece of parchment could plunge all the nations back into debilitating war. It was so absurd that it would have delighted Bumi if he weren’t responsible in part for one of the nations involved.
He was currently involved in an intense mental battle over whether or not to crack the seal and find out what made this message so important. On one hand, it was highly against the code of ethics to read a sealed message for someone else - and he was pretty sure, knowing Lord Zuko, that he wouldn’t take kindly to it. On the other hand, he really wanted to know what was written, and if it would help figure this situation out, then who would blame him?
“You’re being curious again,” Bumi could hear Bao’s voice arguing with him in his head. The nice thing about having Bao sent away was that Bumi no longer had to argue with him out loud - not that he did often, but Bao had an annoying habit of simply talking louder and repeating himself when Bumi was trying to ignore him and do what he wanted.
Before he could make up his mind either way, there was a knock on the door. Bumi dropped the message neatly in a drawer and locked it, and then called for the knocker to enter, thinking it was just the servants looking for laundry or something.
He was surprised when, instead of the servants, the master waterbender from the Northern Water Tribe walked through the door.
“Ah, Master Pakku,” Bumi greeted pleasantly. “What brings you to my humble quarters this early in the day?”
The waterbender did not exactly look happy to be there - then again, Bumi wasn’t sure he’d ever been happy to be anywhere, so he mentally shrugged and continued to give Pakku his brightest smile.
“This is some awful business going around, King Bumi,” Master Pakku said stiffly.
“Please, sit,” Bumi said, rising from his desk to take a seat with Pakku on the cushions that formed a little circle in the center of the room. There was a small tray with a cooling breakfast sitting on the table that separated them. With a wicked idea forming suddenly in Bumi’s mind, he gestured at the porcelain jug full of coffee. “Would you like something to drink? You haven’t tried any coffee in the manner that we drink it in Omashu, have you?”
Pakku blanched - he far preferred delicate teas to bitter coffees. “I’m not much of a coffee drinker-“
“Oh you must!” Bumi clapped his hands excitedly before reaching for one of the overturned cups. “It’s a world-renowned delicacy!” Aang would have been snorting openly at Bumi’s tone; Bao would have been frowning. Pakku just blinked in confusion and nodded his head gently. Bumi hurriedly filled his order, mixing up the coffee while murmuring about the “special blend of spices, found nowhere else in the world!” and proudly presented Pakku with a cup. Pakku looked at it warily before hesitantly taking it.
“Now tell me,” Bumi prodded, “what brings you to my quarters?” He sipped his own cup of coffee - black, with nothing added, which was the actual Omashu style.
“I’m concerned about this entire situation, King Bumi,” Master Pakku said stiffly. He brought the cup up to his lips and took a sip, then burst into hacking coughs.
“That’s an understatement, Master Pakku.” He frowned at the gasping waterbender. “Are you okay?”
“Does…” Pakku choked. “Does everyone in Omashu drink their coffee like this?”
“Well…” Bumi looked down at his own cup, almost abashedly. “We prefer it much stronger. I didn’t want to overwhelm you so I gave you a rather weak serving. Please,” he said, nodding. “Continue.”
“It’s just,” Pakku took another sip and couldn’t hide his sour face. If Bumi hadn’t already had years of practice perfecting his straight face, he would have laughed, long and loud, at the waterbender and his machismo, which prevented him from putting the cup down. “I cannot really talk to the king of Ba Sing Se about this. Have you seen him recently?”
Bumi felt the corners of his mouth tug up involuntarily. He had not seen the king of Ba Sing Se since breakfast the day before, though the rumor floating round the palace was that he had locked himself in one of the conference rooms, demanding answers from his pet bear.
“The Northern Water Tribe does not yet know about this situation, and I feel it is important that I return to them so that we can make necessary preparations, if it comes to that.”
“I would be surprised if some word hadn’t reached them, Master Pakku.” It was true; word had spread all through the Earth Kingdom overnight; he personally had already sent word to the Fire Nation regarding the Fire Lord; the fleeing merchants were sure to have carried word of the Avatar and the Companions as well. It was hard to imagine any corner of the globe being so far out of reach that they wouldn’t have heard such world-shattering news.
“We’re rather isolated and private, if you hadn’t noticed,” Pakku said awkwardly, and Bumi could concede the point, remembering Aang’s endless coaxing to pull the Water Tribes into negotiations.
Pakku took another sip of the coffee before shuddering and finally abandoning the cup, standing up and politely thanking Bumi. “Speaking of being private,” he said lightly, “Do not think no one has noticed that your second has disappeared from the palace. Master Bao? I do not know what he is sending you, but I hope you would not keep secrets when any information could be of utmost importance at this time.”
Bumi had nothing to respond, schooling his face into his most innocent look, and Master Pakku took his leave, bowing and leaving Bumi on his cushions to pick at the remains of his cold breakfast and at the three sealed messages that the servant had delivered on the tray with his food. As soon as the door clicked behind Pakku giggles bubbled up through his chest and burst out; he picked up Pakku’s cup and sniffed it, almost gagging. He was afraid that Pakku would consider cloves as a stretch as far as mixing them into one’s coffee, and yet he had drunken well over half the cup.
He was still laughing quietly to himself as he cracked the seals on his scrolls; messages from Bao and two other riders he had sent out. The two riders indicated that most of the trouble was in the north and on the western coasts, in the port towns. They both mentioned that refugees from both the Earth Kingdom and from the Fire Nation were fleeing south, where things were calmer and where there was little threat of any sort of attack, if the Fire Nation would be pressed to invade.
Bao’s message reported of disgruntled Fire Nation merchants in the south growing more violent against the Earth Kingdom and expressed the fear that they would soon resort to making some sort of strike against the Earth Kingdom.
A niggling doubt crept into Bumi’s mind, and unwilling to accept the possibility, Bumi entertained himself with the memory of the face Pakku had made as he choked on his coffee.
***
The air in the bar was thick with smoke. The bar he and Delun were currently seated in was crowded, smelly, and loud, and as he shifted in his scratchy woolen Earth Kingdom clothing, Cai reflected that he could not possibly be more uncomfortable.
Only the two of them had taken shore leave, attempting to search inconspicuously for the mysterious bounty hunter that General Iroh had insisted was the only one who could find Azula and Zuko. Cai wasn’t sure what had pushed the lady so far north - she usually stuck to the port towns outside of Omashu, according to the rumors, but he was grateful nonetheless. It was late on a moonless night, and Cai was positive she’d be making an appearance at any moment.
According to General Iroh, she was the type to command all attention in the room; therefore Cai was surprised when instead of making an entrance, she had simply appeared quietly at the bar.
Later he would wonder just how long she had been there, watching him and waiting to make her move. Either way, he did not notice her until she sent drinks over to him and Delun.
Her hair had been chopped short, but there was no denying the tattoos. Delun, already slightly drunk, crowed in delight at the free drink. Cai made eye contact with Jun and tipped his glass in thanks before taking a sip.
The next thing he knew, she was sitting at the table with them, quietly dealing a deck of cards.
“You’re not from around here,” she said conversationally, casually flipping a card between her fingers.
“Is it really that obvious?” Cai asked, tipping his glass and letting his drink slosh around.
“You look like you’d rather be anywhere else on the planet than in this bar. So,” she learned forward conspiratorially. “What are you looking for?”
“You,” Cai blurted. The part of his brain that was still thinking clearly was appalled at how he had spoken so bluntly.
Jun smiled at him, the edges of her mouth curling though her eyes remained narrowed. “Who are you looking for?”
Cai held up a finger; momentarily, it blurred into two before realigning properly. “First, the repayment of an old debt.” He nudged Delun, who whipped a heavy sack onto the table. Jun tugged open the string, whistling at the sight of the golden pieces inside.
“That’s a lot of gold.”
“The weight of General Iroh, to be precise.”
Jun laughed a low chuckle - Cai had a skittering, unnerving feeling that she knew far more than he did - and tucked the sack away in some hidden pocket. “You have my attention. Tell me, who are you looking for?”
Another nudge to Delun, who was leaning heavily against the table at this point, and a second sack was dropped onto the table. Jun eyed it warily, and Cai waved at her impatiently. “Open it.”
She did so, and found the hair piece and the mask that General Iroh had given to Cai before he had left. “And who do these belong to?”
“Oh you know,” Cai waved his hands at her again, tilting back dangerously in his chair. He was finding it harder and harder to connect words. “The Fire Lord and his… psychotic sister.” The word Cai had actually been looking for was “exiled.” He wasn’t sure where “psychotic” had come from.
Jun considered the two pieces before calmly retying the sack and returning to her deck of cards, placing the deck in the middle of the table.
“Cut the deck,” she instructed. Cai followed her directions. “I’m actually already working on an assignment, but I could be persuaded to abandon that.”
She picked a card and showed it to Cai, who had to squint his eyes to focus on it. The Jester of Fire. Next to him, Delun’s head hit the table with a dull thunk. Cai turned to him, but Jun didn’t spare a second glace, snapping her finger’s impatiently to keep Cai’s attention.
“Pick a card. If it’s higher than mine, I’ll take your bounty.”
Cai blinked at her stupidly. “What are you looking for now?”
Jun gave him a look of pure satisfaction. “You.”
Cai picked up a card, dropped it, and picked it up again. “Wha..?”
“Well,” Jun shrugged. “Any Fire Nation scum, actually. The bounty on you is quite high right now.” She pointed at his hand. “What’s your card?”
Cai looked down at his hand, but everything had gone blurry. There was the sensation of falling, then a crashing noise that sounded from a great distance, and then all he knew was darkness.
***
It was a mark of how she had been raised that, despite everything that had happened to her since she’d come into the swamp, being attacked by the vines and being separated from her friends and running into Zuko and helping him and being unsure of exactly what she was heading towards, the thought on the top of Mai’s mind was not nervousness or fear but overwhelming gratitude that she was not in the same clothes as Lord Zuko.
He was wet and dirty, and she was pretty sure if her clothes were in such a state she’d simply rip them off in frustration.
Not to mention that the loud squelching noise that preceded each of Zuko’s steps meant traveling anywhere quietly was an impossibility.
It was a far cry from the noble setting in which they’d both been raised, and though there were many things she’d forsaken from her childhood, hygiene and cleanliness was not one of them.
Finally, Mai could not bite her tongue a moment longer. “Why don’t you just use your firebending to dry off?” she asked, breaking the awkward silence that had fallen between them.
“Because,” he grumbled at her, “Every time I start to dry off-“
His words were cut off by loud cracking beneath them and the dry wood they’d been using to cross over the stagnant water groaned and gave way suddenly.
They both crashed into the water. It took Mai’s brain a moment to catch up with her body - the wood snagged her clothes and scratched her skin, and all she could think of was how uncomfortably warm the water was as she gagged and spit and tried to wipe her eyes.
Then she cleared her eyes - or opened them, she wasn’t sure if they’d been closed or not, and all that greeted her was red. She was in thick, dark, red blood, up to her waist. The smell of burnt flesh again graced her nostrils. Her clothes, once a dark green that blended well with Earth Kingdom crowds, were now a dark burgundy, rivulets running down her arms and drying in little pools at her fingertips and under her nails.
A hand traveled up and grasped the end of her ponytail - an unconscious habit from childhood - and squeezed before coming away with red, the crimson stuff seeping and sticking between her fingers.
It was in her hair.
Later, Mai would never be able to recall exactly what happened in the minutes that followed. She could have always asked Zuko, but both declined to talk about their experiences in the swamp, especially in front of each other.
What Mai did remember came in short bursts - her throat raw with shrieking, lunging through the bloody water, it swirling around her feet and legs and reaching for the bank, clawing at her hair and tunic, trying to get the blood off, retching and trying to hold her breath to get away from the stench, and the sound of splashing and very faint laughing that, much later, made Mai wonder if she’d been hearing things on the wind or if it was coming from the deep part of her brain that was still slightly sane.
Firm hands gripped her shoulders, forcing her down onto the bank. She screamed again, letting out some curses that would make Ty Lee’s hair curl and struck out, connecting solidly with hard flesh.
“Ow, you dumb-“ the next thing she felt was a hard stinging on her cheek. Mai blinked, shook her head, and looked wordlessly up at Zuko, was standing in front of her, still knee deep in the water and a heavy weight on her shoulders as he held her down up on the bank.
“What happened to you?” There was a distinct edge of panic in Zuko’s voice.
Mai blinked again and looked down. Her hands were clear. Her clothes, though soaking wet, were still green. The water Zuko was standing in was a murky brownish green color.
There was no red anywhere, except for Zuko’s clothes and the bright red handprint that was rapidly bruising on his lower jaw.
Mai turned abruptly and heaved again, but nothing came up, and all she could do was sit there for a moment, shaking. “I thought…” she trailed off, looking for the words - now that she had to explain what had happened, it seemed ludicrous. “Everything…”
Zuko looked at her intently, then climbed out of the water and settled next to her and started wringing out his hair. “You saw something?” he asked in a low voice. “I’ve seen things too. Something about this place… it makes you see things you’re afraid of.”
“You’ve seen-?” Mai asked hesitantly, not sure exactly what answer she wanted.
“My dad,” he explained, looking down at his boots. “And my mom.” He looked back up at Mai, eyes earnestly wide, as if not sure whether he was comforting her or himself. “None of it is real. It’s not easy to tell yourself that…”
“It felt real,” Mai said flatly, remembering the stickiness between her fingers. There was a reason she preferred the knives over hand-to-hand combat; it was possible to throw knives and clean them off later. There was absolutely no touching of someone else’s fluids or dirty body. It was a sterile branch of fighting - one clean cut and the fight was over.
“Either way,” Zuko stood up and looked around, as if trying to find a horizon to head towards through all the trees. “We need to get out of here.” He offered her his hand.
She gazed at it impassively. “What about Azula?”
“Listen, I won’t leave you here alone. I know what it’s like to be abandoned.” There was a harsh tightness to Zuko’s voice. “Let’s just get out of here, and then you can worry about Azula all you want. Right now you need to worry about yourself.”
Her eyes stayed on his open hand. Some subconscious part of her was probably aware of the big step it would mean, taking it and getting up with Zuko. What she said, however, with a hand going up to her cheek, was: “Did you hit me?”
The hand was withdrawn, flying to his hips, and Zuko frowned at her. “You hit me first.”
***
Chapter 11: Aut Vincere Aut Mori
Summary: Five years after the war is over, the world is finally settling into an uneasy peace. When the Avatar and his friends disappear into a swamp in the southwest Earth Kingdom, they find themselves fighting not only for their lives but to prevent another way from breaking out.
Chapter Ten: Zuko picks a fight, Cai finds what he’s looking for, and Mai has a minor nervous breakdown.
Rating: Light T, for violence and blood.
A/N: I’m not sure how action packed this chapter is, but it is very important as far as the mental state of several of the characters goes. This would have been up much sooner, if I hadn’t been dragging my feet for so long to revise a couple sections that badly needed it.
Chapter 10 - In Puris Naturalibus
Zuko was angry.
Five years ago, when he’d made his journey from a determined, angry child to slightly more determined, slightly less angry, adult, an important part of his development had been growing up and being honest with himself about his true feelings and not just acting out in anger - at least, that’s what his uncle had insisted time and time again, and though his uncle was very wise, he also cried when he was particularly overwhelmed by the beauty of the china pattern of his tea set.
Well. If Zuko was to be honest with himself, he was embarrassed because Mai had killed the catfish gator. He might have acted bored during uncle’s lectures, but he strongly suspected that he was supposed to protect her instead of the other way around.
Actually, to be even more honest with himself, underneath the layer of anger, and the layer of embarrassment, was a thick layer of healthy confusion. The first time he had seen the exiled Mai in five years and she was helping him? She wasn’t angry at him for sending her away? He wasn’t angry at her for hunting him like some lousy dog in the first place?
And what really burned him, what really pissed him off, was that he suspected Mai not only knew his feelings but thought he was ridiculous and just didn’t care enough to bother knocking any sense into him. It angered him that she knew these things, it embarrassed him that she could read him that well, and it confused him that he was even giving a second thought to her thoughts, and there was that cycle again, and damnit, he was going to break every single one of Uncle’s tea sets if he ever got home.
So perhaps it was inevitable, that, as they worked their way through the swamp, he suddenly turned to her and barked, “So what are you doing here anyway?”
Mai didn’t react in the slightest to his harsh tone. “We were heading north and got lost in here.”
Zuko studied her for a moment, anticipating more information but remaining unsurprised when she volunteered none. “I’m surprised the three of you are still together.”
“Why would you be?” her tone was not defensive, as he had expected; it was almost curious, as if she was slightly bemused that he would think the three of them would go separate ways.
“I figured Azula would have ditched you a long time ago,” Zuko explained.
Her eyebrow twitched up for a moment, as if she wanted to look at him and wait patiently for him to pick up on the obvious thing he’d missed. “Azula needs us more than we need her.”
“Is that why you joined up with her before?” he shot at her.
Her face remained blank.
“Five years ago. During the war,” he prompted.
“Yes, Azula was really desperate for me and Ty Lee, what with the entire Fire Nation army, all their technology, and the Fire Lord’s blessing behind her.” Sarcasm. Sarcasm Zuko could work with; how long had he been acquainted with Sokka and Toph?
“That sure didn’t stop you,” he snapped.
“Look, have you ever been to Omashu? Of course I left when Azula and Ty Lee came for me. You would have too, if you’d been trapped there with your soul being sucked away like mine.”
“I wouldn’t know about that,” Zuko retorted, not noticing the rise in his voice. “I was too busy running away from you.”
Mai blinked for a minute, silent, and Zuko mentally congratulated himself on - well, he hadn’t won, exactly, but for some reason he felt better.
Then Mai said conversationally, “If I recall correctly, we spent more time chasing after the Avatar than you.”
That stopped him dead in his tracks. “You were sent after me.”
“At first,” she agreed. “But once Azula got the Avatar’s scent, she really focused on him.”
“But I helped train him in firebending! I was traveling with the Avatar!” If he were home, Iroh would pat him fondly on the shoulder and tell him to let it go. If he were with Toph, she would punch him in the shoulder and tell him to stop whining. But he was with Mai, and her response was to look at him, almost quizzically, and respond, “Yeah, that really helped Azula track you both at the same time. If it had come down to it, though, and Azula had been forced to choose between you and the Avatar, she would have taken the Avatar in a heartbeat.”
This was not what he had been planning on; Zuko admitted he’d been trying to pick a fight, but he hadn’t wanted to be put on the defensive - he’d wanted to break that stone face of hers and instead she had used it to crush him cruelly and efficiently.
The thing was that Mai was right. Azula would have chosen the Avatar over him if forced even though she’d been ordered to find Zuko. And now he wasn’t sure how to respond to Mai.
She broke the silence by asking, “So what are you doing in here?”
And then it all came rushing back to him - how could he have forgotten? “My uncle is very sick,” Zuko murmured, closing his eyes for a moment and feeling the guilt crawl through his body. “I was going home to be with him.”
There was a very tense moment, and then he heard Mai clear her throat awkwardly and mutter hesitantly, “I’m, uh, very sorry to hear that.”
Something inside him snapped at these words. Zuko faintly heard rushing in his ears as he rounded on her. “No you aren’t.” The words just spilled out of him, as if he’d been saving them up and he didn’t even know it. “You chased him around the Earth Kingdom and then the Fire Nation for months, taking cheap shots when you could, and then he was part of the group that sent you to live in exile in the first place. Tell me, Mai, what reason you could possibly have to be sorry that he is so gravely ill.”
Mai was quiet through his rant, and even now the only indication that she was surprised was a very slight raise of her eyebrows. She blinked for a moment before responding, “He was always very kind to Ty Lee and me.”
“Then you understand why I have to get home to him?” Zuko asked tightly.
She nodded and looked past him, as if searching for a break in the trees. “We should probably try to work our way west, instead of north, then.”
Zuko stopped. “We have been going west.”
Mai shook her head and pointed out the moss growing on the trees. “We’re going north. See?”
“Then we need to go west.” Zuko abruptly altered his course, and didn’t hesitate though Mai failed to follow.
“I wouldn’t,” she called after him.
“And why not?” Before the whole question could get out of his mouth, the ground underneath him faltered and he fell forward and with a loud squish received a mouthful of green slime.
Mai approached him from behind, up above him, safe on rock. “I was trying to tell you that the ground was unstable over there.”
Zuko let out a growl and pushed himself up, trying to right himself but only sinking knee deep into the muck. Mai looked at him, covered head to toe, and promptly showed the most emotion she’d expressed since she had first run into Zuko: blatant disgust, her eyes narrowed and lip curling.
“Well, if it makes you feel better, you don’t have to worry about getting any dirtier.”
***
Sokka blinked and rubbed his eyes, trying to make his body wake up as fast as his mind had. He'd been jerked from sleep by the scent of burned flesh on the wind and a sudden, intense feeling of vulnerability; the only thing he could think to compare it to was the time he'd lost a bet to Toph and been forced to streak through the Fire Lord's palace as forfeit.
He'd sat up, calling out and fumbling at his waist for his machete - and had felt surprised when he found it, neatly tucked away. He blinked at it dumbly, remembering that he had given it to Ty Lee when she'd woken up for watch - she was more than capable of protecting herself, but she was so fascinated with it that it didn't hurt to let her play with it while he was trying to sleep.
The earth rumbled beneath him, and as Toph's rock tent collapsed he realized that she and Sokka were the only ones still in camp - Ty Lee was gone, disappeared during the night. The earthbender's eyes were still closed and her hair was spiked out in every possible dimension.
"What's your problem?" she asked blearily. "Your heart is going nuts."
"Ty Lee's gone," he informed her, his ears straining to hear anything out of place and scouring the surrounding area for signs of a struggle - of which there were none.
Toph's feet twitched. "Huh. She is gone," she confirmed, tone completely disinterested. "So what?"
He looked at her and frowned, hands automatically settling at his hips. "You know, you really need to work on your intimacy issues."
Toph shrugged and finished dismantling her tent, letting the remains of the rock fall back into the earth. "By that you mean I should make friends with any former enemy I happen to find wandering around?"
"No!" Sokka protested. "This was... special circumstances." There was absolutely no reason for him to be feeling so defensive, and yet he felt the need to justify acting friendly with Ty Lee to Toph. "I mean... there's safety in numbers. I don't want anyone to get hurt here, whether or not I used to fight them."
Toph sighed in irritation and shifted again, stepping to her right and focusing on something in the distance. "Look," she said patronizingly. "There are two people moving directly north of us. One of them is definitely Ty Lee."
"You're sure?" He wouldn't put it past Toph to make something up just to pacify him.
She was ignoring him, currently concentrating on something else. "I think she's with Azula."
"How do you know?"
He could tell she was really annoyed with his doubt. "Because, the only other person who walks like the earth is barely holding them down is Aang, and Aang has no reason to be walking with a rigid person who walks like a man like Azula does."
Sokka rubbed his neck, feeling rather forlorn. "I can't believe she left us." Then, as often happened with Toph, he actually listened to what she had said, distracting himself from his previous train of thought. "Azula walks like a man? Really?"
"Are you kidding me?" Toph asked incredulously. "She walks like a man, talks like a man, wears men's clothing and a man's topknot. I could recognize her anywhere."
Toph always did this to him. He blinked at her blankly for as moment, contemplating this new information, and then blurted out his next question, "How do I walk?"
Toph tilted her head, tapping her chin thoughtfully. "It must be because you grew up in all that snow in the South Pole, but if it weren't for your height I wouldn't be able to immediately tell you and Katara apart." Her piece said, she turned her back on him and reached for her outer tunic, effectively ending the conversation.
Sokka scratched his head, not sure exactly who was being insulted - another common trait of Toph's - then sighed, allowing his shoulders to slump as he shook out his tunic and cleaned his boomerang, preparing for a new day and to continue moving through the swamp.
He was feeling distinctly melancholy; something that could be easily chalked up to the stress or exhaustion of their predicament but should probably be blamed upon the disappearance of Ty Lee. This was not how Sokka intended to start his day - although he wasn’t sure exactly what he was expecting, what with Ty Lee and him being former enemies and Toph making her enmity of Ty Lee clear, but the fact was that, after his initial hesitation, Sokka had started to trust Ty Lee and had felt more secure with her in front of him.
“Maybe we won’t find Azula at all,” she’d suggested when they had first met, and he, like an idiot, had actually entertained some half-hearted hope that she might actually be right. Sokka wasn’t sure what he’d been expecting, but it certainly wasn’t this.
There was a loud cough from behind him. He jumped, startled, then turned around to glance back at Toph. Her jaw was set, arms crossed, one foot tapping in irritation. He’d spaced off with one arm through his outer tunic, the rest of if bunched up around his neck. He flinched guiltily at the look on her face, remembered she couldn’t see it, and then hurriedly pulled his shirt over his head.
“Well! Are you ready to go?” he asked brightly. It was best not to dwell on the way he had expected things to turn out.
***
He put his feet up on his desk, relaxing in the little receiving room he had turned into a makeshift office while staying in Ba Sing Se.
The object of his attention was the small, still sealed piece of parchment that had driven Lord Zuko and the Avatar from the palace in the first place. Bumi still wasn’t sure how it had come into his possession, but the small message fascinated him endlessly - that such a little thing could have such a huge impact on the world, that an ordinary piece of parchment could plunge all the nations back into debilitating war. It was so absurd that it would have delighted Bumi if he weren’t responsible in part for one of the nations involved.
He was currently involved in an intense mental battle over whether or not to crack the seal and find out what made this message so important. On one hand, it was highly against the code of ethics to read a sealed message for someone else - and he was pretty sure, knowing Lord Zuko, that he wouldn’t take kindly to it. On the other hand, he really wanted to know what was written, and if it would help figure this situation out, then who would blame him?
“You’re being curious again,” Bumi could hear Bao’s voice arguing with him in his head. The nice thing about having Bao sent away was that Bumi no longer had to argue with him out loud - not that he did often, but Bao had an annoying habit of simply talking louder and repeating himself when Bumi was trying to ignore him and do what he wanted.
Before he could make up his mind either way, there was a knock on the door. Bumi dropped the message neatly in a drawer and locked it, and then called for the knocker to enter, thinking it was just the servants looking for laundry or something.
He was surprised when, instead of the servants, the master waterbender from the Northern Water Tribe walked through the door.
“Ah, Master Pakku,” Bumi greeted pleasantly. “What brings you to my humble quarters this early in the day?”
The waterbender did not exactly look happy to be there - then again, Bumi wasn’t sure he’d ever been happy to be anywhere, so he mentally shrugged and continued to give Pakku his brightest smile.
“This is some awful business going around, King Bumi,” Master Pakku said stiffly.
“Please, sit,” Bumi said, rising from his desk to take a seat with Pakku on the cushions that formed a little circle in the center of the room. There was a small tray with a cooling breakfast sitting on the table that separated them. With a wicked idea forming suddenly in Bumi’s mind, he gestured at the porcelain jug full of coffee. “Would you like something to drink? You haven’t tried any coffee in the manner that we drink it in Omashu, have you?”
Pakku blanched - he far preferred delicate teas to bitter coffees. “I’m not much of a coffee drinker-“
“Oh you must!” Bumi clapped his hands excitedly before reaching for one of the overturned cups. “It’s a world-renowned delicacy!” Aang would have been snorting openly at Bumi’s tone; Bao would have been frowning. Pakku just blinked in confusion and nodded his head gently. Bumi hurriedly filled his order, mixing up the coffee while murmuring about the “special blend of spices, found nowhere else in the world!” and proudly presented Pakku with a cup. Pakku looked at it warily before hesitantly taking it.
“Now tell me,” Bumi prodded, “what brings you to my quarters?” He sipped his own cup of coffee - black, with nothing added, which was the actual Omashu style.
“I’m concerned about this entire situation, King Bumi,” Master Pakku said stiffly. He brought the cup up to his lips and took a sip, then burst into hacking coughs.
“That’s an understatement, Master Pakku.” He frowned at the gasping waterbender. “Are you okay?”
“Does…” Pakku choked. “Does everyone in Omashu drink their coffee like this?”
“Well…” Bumi looked down at his own cup, almost abashedly. “We prefer it much stronger. I didn’t want to overwhelm you so I gave you a rather weak serving. Please,” he said, nodding. “Continue.”
“It’s just,” Pakku took another sip and couldn’t hide his sour face. If Bumi hadn’t already had years of practice perfecting his straight face, he would have laughed, long and loud, at the waterbender and his machismo, which prevented him from putting the cup down. “I cannot really talk to the king of Ba Sing Se about this. Have you seen him recently?”
Bumi felt the corners of his mouth tug up involuntarily. He had not seen the king of Ba Sing Se since breakfast the day before, though the rumor floating round the palace was that he had locked himself in one of the conference rooms, demanding answers from his pet bear.
“The Northern Water Tribe does not yet know about this situation, and I feel it is important that I return to them so that we can make necessary preparations, if it comes to that.”
“I would be surprised if some word hadn’t reached them, Master Pakku.” It was true; word had spread all through the Earth Kingdom overnight; he personally had already sent word to the Fire Nation regarding the Fire Lord; the fleeing merchants were sure to have carried word of the Avatar and the Companions as well. It was hard to imagine any corner of the globe being so far out of reach that they wouldn’t have heard such world-shattering news.
“We’re rather isolated and private, if you hadn’t noticed,” Pakku said awkwardly, and Bumi could concede the point, remembering Aang’s endless coaxing to pull the Water Tribes into negotiations.
Pakku took another sip of the coffee before shuddering and finally abandoning the cup, standing up and politely thanking Bumi. “Speaking of being private,” he said lightly, “Do not think no one has noticed that your second has disappeared from the palace. Master Bao? I do not know what he is sending you, but I hope you would not keep secrets when any information could be of utmost importance at this time.”
Bumi had nothing to respond, schooling his face into his most innocent look, and Master Pakku took his leave, bowing and leaving Bumi on his cushions to pick at the remains of his cold breakfast and at the three sealed messages that the servant had delivered on the tray with his food. As soon as the door clicked behind Pakku giggles bubbled up through his chest and burst out; he picked up Pakku’s cup and sniffed it, almost gagging. He was afraid that Pakku would consider cloves as a stretch as far as mixing them into one’s coffee, and yet he had drunken well over half the cup.
He was still laughing quietly to himself as he cracked the seals on his scrolls; messages from Bao and two other riders he had sent out. The two riders indicated that most of the trouble was in the north and on the western coasts, in the port towns. They both mentioned that refugees from both the Earth Kingdom and from the Fire Nation were fleeing south, where things were calmer and where there was little threat of any sort of attack, if the Fire Nation would be pressed to invade.
Bao’s message reported of disgruntled Fire Nation merchants in the south growing more violent against the Earth Kingdom and expressed the fear that they would soon resort to making some sort of strike against the Earth Kingdom.
A niggling doubt crept into Bumi’s mind, and unwilling to accept the possibility, Bumi entertained himself with the memory of the face Pakku had made as he choked on his coffee.
***
The air in the bar was thick with smoke. The bar he and Delun were currently seated in was crowded, smelly, and loud, and as he shifted in his scratchy woolen Earth Kingdom clothing, Cai reflected that he could not possibly be more uncomfortable.
Only the two of them had taken shore leave, attempting to search inconspicuously for the mysterious bounty hunter that General Iroh had insisted was the only one who could find Azula and Zuko. Cai wasn’t sure what had pushed the lady so far north - she usually stuck to the port towns outside of Omashu, according to the rumors, but he was grateful nonetheless. It was late on a moonless night, and Cai was positive she’d be making an appearance at any moment.
According to General Iroh, she was the type to command all attention in the room; therefore Cai was surprised when instead of making an entrance, she had simply appeared quietly at the bar.
Later he would wonder just how long she had been there, watching him and waiting to make her move. Either way, he did not notice her until she sent drinks over to him and Delun.
Her hair had been chopped short, but there was no denying the tattoos. Delun, already slightly drunk, crowed in delight at the free drink. Cai made eye contact with Jun and tipped his glass in thanks before taking a sip.
The next thing he knew, she was sitting at the table with them, quietly dealing a deck of cards.
“You’re not from around here,” she said conversationally, casually flipping a card between her fingers.
“Is it really that obvious?” Cai asked, tipping his glass and letting his drink slosh around.
“You look like you’d rather be anywhere else on the planet than in this bar. So,” she learned forward conspiratorially. “What are you looking for?”
“You,” Cai blurted. The part of his brain that was still thinking clearly was appalled at how he had spoken so bluntly.
Jun smiled at him, the edges of her mouth curling though her eyes remained narrowed. “Who are you looking for?”
Cai held up a finger; momentarily, it blurred into two before realigning properly. “First, the repayment of an old debt.” He nudged Delun, who whipped a heavy sack onto the table. Jun tugged open the string, whistling at the sight of the golden pieces inside.
“That’s a lot of gold.”
“The weight of General Iroh, to be precise.”
Jun laughed a low chuckle - Cai had a skittering, unnerving feeling that she knew far more than he did - and tucked the sack away in some hidden pocket. “You have my attention. Tell me, who are you looking for?”
Another nudge to Delun, who was leaning heavily against the table at this point, and a second sack was dropped onto the table. Jun eyed it warily, and Cai waved at her impatiently. “Open it.”
She did so, and found the hair piece and the mask that General Iroh had given to Cai before he had left. “And who do these belong to?”
“Oh you know,” Cai waved his hands at her again, tilting back dangerously in his chair. He was finding it harder and harder to connect words. “The Fire Lord and his… psychotic sister.” The word Cai had actually been looking for was “exiled.” He wasn’t sure where “psychotic” had come from.
Jun considered the two pieces before calmly retying the sack and returning to her deck of cards, placing the deck in the middle of the table.
“Cut the deck,” she instructed. Cai followed her directions. “I’m actually already working on an assignment, but I could be persuaded to abandon that.”
She picked a card and showed it to Cai, who had to squint his eyes to focus on it. The Jester of Fire. Next to him, Delun’s head hit the table with a dull thunk. Cai turned to him, but Jun didn’t spare a second glace, snapping her finger’s impatiently to keep Cai’s attention.
“Pick a card. If it’s higher than mine, I’ll take your bounty.”
Cai blinked at her stupidly. “What are you looking for now?”
Jun gave him a look of pure satisfaction. “You.”
Cai picked up a card, dropped it, and picked it up again. “Wha..?”
“Well,” Jun shrugged. “Any Fire Nation scum, actually. The bounty on you is quite high right now.” She pointed at his hand. “What’s your card?”
Cai looked down at his hand, but everything had gone blurry. There was the sensation of falling, then a crashing noise that sounded from a great distance, and then all he knew was darkness.
***
It was a mark of how she had been raised that, despite everything that had happened to her since she’d come into the swamp, being attacked by the vines and being separated from her friends and running into Zuko and helping him and being unsure of exactly what she was heading towards, the thought on the top of Mai’s mind was not nervousness or fear but overwhelming gratitude that she was not in the same clothes as Lord Zuko.
He was wet and dirty, and she was pretty sure if her clothes were in such a state she’d simply rip them off in frustration.
Not to mention that the loud squelching noise that preceded each of Zuko’s steps meant traveling anywhere quietly was an impossibility.
It was a far cry from the noble setting in which they’d both been raised, and though there were many things she’d forsaken from her childhood, hygiene and cleanliness was not one of them.
Finally, Mai could not bite her tongue a moment longer. “Why don’t you just use your firebending to dry off?” she asked, breaking the awkward silence that had fallen between them.
“Because,” he grumbled at her, “Every time I start to dry off-“
His words were cut off by loud cracking beneath them and the dry wood they’d been using to cross over the stagnant water groaned and gave way suddenly.
They both crashed into the water. It took Mai’s brain a moment to catch up with her body - the wood snagged her clothes and scratched her skin, and all she could think of was how uncomfortably warm the water was as she gagged and spit and tried to wipe her eyes.
Then she cleared her eyes - or opened them, she wasn’t sure if they’d been closed or not, and all that greeted her was red. She was in thick, dark, red blood, up to her waist. The smell of burnt flesh again graced her nostrils. Her clothes, once a dark green that blended well with Earth Kingdom crowds, were now a dark burgundy, rivulets running down her arms and drying in little pools at her fingertips and under her nails.
A hand traveled up and grasped the end of her ponytail - an unconscious habit from childhood - and squeezed before coming away with red, the crimson stuff seeping and sticking between her fingers.
It was in her hair.
Later, Mai would never be able to recall exactly what happened in the minutes that followed. She could have always asked Zuko, but both declined to talk about their experiences in the swamp, especially in front of each other.
What Mai did remember came in short bursts - her throat raw with shrieking, lunging through the bloody water, it swirling around her feet and legs and reaching for the bank, clawing at her hair and tunic, trying to get the blood off, retching and trying to hold her breath to get away from the stench, and the sound of splashing and very faint laughing that, much later, made Mai wonder if she’d been hearing things on the wind or if it was coming from the deep part of her brain that was still slightly sane.
Firm hands gripped her shoulders, forcing her down onto the bank. She screamed again, letting out some curses that would make Ty Lee’s hair curl and struck out, connecting solidly with hard flesh.
“Ow, you dumb-“ the next thing she felt was a hard stinging on her cheek. Mai blinked, shook her head, and looked wordlessly up at Zuko, was standing in front of her, still knee deep in the water and a heavy weight on her shoulders as he held her down up on the bank.
“What happened to you?” There was a distinct edge of panic in Zuko’s voice.
Mai blinked again and looked down. Her hands were clear. Her clothes, though soaking wet, were still green. The water Zuko was standing in was a murky brownish green color.
There was no red anywhere, except for Zuko’s clothes and the bright red handprint that was rapidly bruising on his lower jaw.
Mai turned abruptly and heaved again, but nothing came up, and all she could do was sit there for a moment, shaking. “I thought…” she trailed off, looking for the words - now that she had to explain what had happened, it seemed ludicrous. “Everything…”
Zuko looked at her intently, then climbed out of the water and settled next to her and started wringing out his hair. “You saw something?” he asked in a low voice. “I’ve seen things too. Something about this place… it makes you see things you’re afraid of.”
“You’ve seen-?” Mai asked hesitantly, not sure exactly what answer she wanted.
“My dad,” he explained, looking down at his boots. “And my mom.” He looked back up at Mai, eyes earnestly wide, as if not sure whether he was comforting her or himself. “None of it is real. It’s not easy to tell yourself that…”
“It felt real,” Mai said flatly, remembering the stickiness between her fingers. There was a reason she preferred the knives over hand-to-hand combat; it was possible to throw knives and clean them off later. There was absolutely no touching of someone else’s fluids or dirty body. It was a sterile branch of fighting - one clean cut and the fight was over.
“Either way,” Zuko stood up and looked around, as if trying to find a horizon to head towards through all the trees. “We need to get out of here.” He offered her his hand.
She gazed at it impassively. “What about Azula?”
“Listen, I won’t leave you here alone. I know what it’s like to be abandoned.” There was a harsh tightness to Zuko’s voice. “Let’s just get out of here, and then you can worry about Azula all you want. Right now you need to worry about yourself.”
Her eyes stayed on his open hand. Some subconscious part of her was probably aware of the big step it would mean, taking it and getting up with Zuko. What she said, however, with a hand going up to her cheek, was: “Did you hit me?”
The hand was withdrawn, flying to his hips, and Zuko frowned at her. “You hit me first.”
***
Chapter 11: Aut Vincere Aut Mori