Earth of A Hundred Nations
Title: Earth of a Hundred Nations
Fandom: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Characters/Pairings: Avatar Toushi (OC), Xun (OC)
Rating: cool for kids
Length: ~1500 words
Notes: Part of my Team Toushi universe. More information can be found here. Takes place ~200 years postcanon. Toushi is the second Avatar after Aang. Suong is the Avatar directly after Aang.
Thanks to heyyoitsmj for the beta~
I'm at your back door
With the earth of a hundred nations in my skin
You won't recognize me
For the light in my eyes is strange
(Enough to Go By, Vienna Teng)
Her ship arrives in the late afternoon. Toushi steps off of the steel ramp into the damp heat of the harbor, the sea breeze blowing her bangs into her eyes. A royal procession is waiting for her, all draped with in thick layers of deep blood red and gold flowing robes. In the back of her mind, Toushi wonders how these people can stand to dress so heavily in such humidity. Even in her lightly colored linens, she can feel the sweat collecting in the small of her back.
***
Toushi never imagined the Fire Nation would feel so wet. She had hoped it wouldn’t be unlike the desert she still called home; that was more comparable to flames in Toushi’s mind. Dry, dry, heat that burned your skin. That was fire. Not this island, all covered in greenery, surrounded by water. The heat remained, but it was not like the Si Wong Desert: it choked up her throat instead of drying it, and her nose felt stuffy. She missed the sand dunes, the blue sky. (The sky here was so often swirling with late afternoon thunderstorms, lasting only an hour at most, but they baffled Toushi all the same.)
Desert nights were cold. Toushi would wrap herself in layers of blankets, next to her mother and father in their small tent. Through the small opening in the top of the canvas, she could see the stars, so clear, sparkling bands stretching across the dark sky.
But her parents aren’t here anymore; she can no longer call the desert her home. She belongs to the world, the sages told her, as they told so many Avatars before her. In her dreams, Avatar Suong reassures her, Avatar Aang offers advice. Nights in the Fire Nation are warm and damp, and Toushi kicks the blankets from her bed.
***
There is not much time to wallow about in self pity. Toushi throws herself headlong into her Firebending lessons; she sits and breathes and feels the sun on her face. She undoes the wrappings on her wrists and places her palms together. In and out: fire is life. The movements themselves are sharp, piercing, so different from the sweeping motion of sand across the desert plain, or the rooted feeling she feels in the earth below her bare feet.
She finds herself more aware of every element. There is moisture in the air.
***
Somehow, she is thrown into the midst of another family. Their food is foreign to her, their polite, reserved conversation around a carefully set table even more so. This is nobility, she thinks. She sips on a small cup of hot tea, and even that is unfamiliar, new. She’s not sure if she likes it.
“Do you think she could live with us? She’s the Avatar, Dad!” says the older daughter, Xun, through a bite of some spicy noodle that Toushi doesn’t know the name of. The younger son, Kenji, rolls his eyes.
“Of course, it would be an honor to host the Avatar,” says their father, and Xun’s smile stretches across her face.
She doesn’t really know this family, but Xun, the one who dragged her here in the first place, winks at her from across the table, and Toushi’s polite refusal catches in the back of her throat.
“It would be an honor to stay here,” she says, her voice dry. “And please, just call me Toushi.”
***
For months, Toushi doesn’t tell anyone what happened to her, why she’s aware of her identity at the age of fourteen. The Avatar is only supposed to be informed of their duties on their sixteenth birthday, this is common knowledge.
One day, the burden of her secret becomes too heavy to bear alone.
She tells Xun.
***
She tells Xun about her childhood, about her time spent in the cliffs on the outskirts of the desert, with her father. The rock was hot against her bare feet as he taught her the forms of Earthbending. The best sandbenders, he said, knew not only how to manipulate the loose, unpredictable sand that covered their desert home, but also the earth that held them firmly to the ground.
Her mother was the spiritual leader of the Hami Tribe. Almost every night, she told stories of the great spirits of the desert, of Wan Shi Tong and his library. Toushi was skeptical of most of her mother’s stories, but she would never say it aloud. The idea of a enormous library sunken completely into the desert sands seemed ridiculous to her.
(Later, Avatar Aang would laugh, and inform her that this myth was one that was very much true.)
Xun listens throughout the story, her legs crossed beneath her, rocking back and forth slightly. Toushi moves on to the part that she hasn’t spoken aloud to anyone.
***
It was almost a year ago, now. The tribes of the desert always had skirmishes, conflicts. Resources in the Si Wong were scarce, and it was in the middle of the dry season. The Hami Tribe was never known for its power. They were made up of only five or six different extended families.
Toushi never did find out what tribe the raiders were from. They came early in the morning, just as the first tendrils of green light were creeping along the border of the sky. She heard her father leave the tent, she heard shouting. Fear hit her, it rose in her throat.
Her father returned, blood trickling down his face. “Run away,” he said, “find somewhere safe.”
Toushi wanted to stay, she wanted to fight. She raised the sand around her, she hardened it in her hands.
Her mother dragged her back, out of the camp, towards the hills with the other women and children.
Toushi looked back.
Her father, face down in the sand. A faceless raider, standing over him.
***
“So, I went into the Avatar State,” Toushi says, staring down at her hands. “I’m not sure exactly what I did, but I ended up destroying the entire camp.”
She looks into Xun’s eyes, their bright gold color even more foreign to her now. Xun’s expression is unfathomable.
“A lot of people got hurt, and my dad was dead. A few weeks later, the sages got a hold of me. Apparently they have some sort of Avatar State detection ability.”
It’s the most she’s talked in months, the first time she’s ever told anyone the entire story. Xun reaches out, places her hand in Toushi’s.
“So, you came here.”
“Yeah,” says Toushi, and she can’t really say much else.
***
Not much changes after she tells Xun everything. Every afternoon they train with Sifu Yan, every evening Toushi listens to Xun argue with her brother over dinner. She becomes more accustomed to the spicy food, the humidity. Her firebending improves, and within months, she’s proficient enough to spar with Xun, and win.
“It’s just not fair, you’re the Avatar, you’re just naturally talented,” Xun whines from the grass after a particularly heated match.
Toushi smiles, the first time she’s had a positive reaction to her title. Xun smiles back up at her, she reaches her hand up towards Toushi. Her smile is all teeth and lips and crinkled eyes peeking out from behind straight bangs. Toushi grabs her hand and hoists her onto her feet.
“Next time, I’ll beat you. And then I’ll go down in Fire Nation history as The Girl Who Beat The Avatar That One Time.”
“Uh huh,” says Toushi, pulling the hair back from her eyes.
***
They take a break over the summer. Xun’s family owns a beach house on Ember Island. It’s not the biggest one in the long string of elegant summer homes, but it’s enough to make Toushi feel completely out of place. Kenji immediately holes himself up in his bedroom, until Xun drags him out and makes him read his books on the beach. He complains the entire time of the sun in his eyes, while Xun tries to coax Toushi into the water.
On, the beach, in her bathing suit that feels all too revealing (borrowed from Xun), Toushi swirls the dark black sand around her right hand. Xun’s calls from across the beach are almost too inviting, but hesitantly, she stands to join her friend in the waves. Kenji looks up from his book and pulls a face, one of those dissaproving looks he gives Toushi whenever she gives in to Xun’s requests. Toushi shrugs it off, adjusting the top of her bathing suit. It’s a little too big. Xun’s enthusiastic yelling is cut short as she’s pummeled by an enormous wave.
Toushi laughs, the sound still so dry over her lips.
She leaves footprints behind in the sand.
Fandom: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Characters/Pairings: Avatar Toushi (OC), Xun (OC)
Rating: cool for kids
Length: ~1500 words
Notes: Part of my Team Toushi universe. More information can be found here. Takes place ~200 years postcanon. Toushi is the second Avatar after Aang. Suong is the Avatar directly after Aang.
Thanks to heyyoitsmj for the beta~
I'm at your back door
With the earth of a hundred nations in my skin
You won't recognize me
For the light in my eyes is strange
(Enough to Go By, Vienna Teng)
Her ship arrives in the late afternoon. Toushi steps off of the steel ramp into the damp heat of the harbor, the sea breeze blowing her bangs into her eyes. A royal procession is waiting for her, all draped with in thick layers of deep blood red and gold flowing robes. In the back of her mind, Toushi wonders how these people can stand to dress so heavily in such humidity. Even in her lightly colored linens, she can feel the sweat collecting in the small of her back.
***
Toushi never imagined the Fire Nation would feel so wet. She had hoped it wouldn’t be unlike the desert she still called home; that was more comparable to flames in Toushi’s mind. Dry, dry, heat that burned your skin. That was fire. Not this island, all covered in greenery, surrounded by water. The heat remained, but it was not like the Si Wong Desert: it choked up her throat instead of drying it, and her nose felt stuffy. She missed the sand dunes, the blue sky. (The sky here was so often swirling with late afternoon thunderstorms, lasting only an hour at most, but they baffled Toushi all the same.)
Desert nights were cold. Toushi would wrap herself in layers of blankets, next to her mother and father in their small tent. Through the small opening in the top of the canvas, she could see the stars, so clear, sparkling bands stretching across the dark sky.
But her parents aren’t here anymore; she can no longer call the desert her home. She belongs to the world, the sages told her, as they told so many Avatars before her. In her dreams, Avatar Suong reassures her, Avatar Aang offers advice. Nights in the Fire Nation are warm and damp, and Toushi kicks the blankets from her bed.
***
There is not much time to wallow about in self pity. Toushi throws herself headlong into her Firebending lessons; she sits and breathes and feels the sun on her face. She undoes the wrappings on her wrists and places her palms together. In and out: fire is life. The movements themselves are sharp, piercing, so different from the sweeping motion of sand across the desert plain, or the rooted feeling she feels in the earth below her bare feet.
She finds herself more aware of every element. There is moisture in the air.
***
Somehow, she is thrown into the midst of another family. Their food is foreign to her, their polite, reserved conversation around a carefully set table even more so. This is nobility, she thinks. She sips on a small cup of hot tea, and even that is unfamiliar, new. She’s not sure if she likes it.
“Do you think she could live with us? She’s the Avatar, Dad!” says the older daughter, Xun, through a bite of some spicy noodle that Toushi doesn’t know the name of. The younger son, Kenji, rolls his eyes.
“Of course, it would be an honor to host the Avatar,” says their father, and Xun’s smile stretches across her face.
She doesn’t really know this family, but Xun, the one who dragged her here in the first place, winks at her from across the table, and Toushi’s polite refusal catches in the back of her throat.
“It would be an honor to stay here,” she says, her voice dry. “And please, just call me Toushi.”
***
For months, Toushi doesn’t tell anyone what happened to her, why she’s aware of her identity at the age of fourteen. The Avatar is only supposed to be informed of their duties on their sixteenth birthday, this is common knowledge.
One day, the burden of her secret becomes too heavy to bear alone.
She tells Xun.
***
She tells Xun about her childhood, about her time spent in the cliffs on the outskirts of the desert, with her father. The rock was hot against her bare feet as he taught her the forms of Earthbending. The best sandbenders, he said, knew not only how to manipulate the loose, unpredictable sand that covered their desert home, but also the earth that held them firmly to the ground.
Her mother was the spiritual leader of the Hami Tribe. Almost every night, she told stories of the great spirits of the desert, of Wan Shi Tong and his library. Toushi was skeptical of most of her mother’s stories, but she would never say it aloud. The idea of a enormous library sunken completely into the desert sands seemed ridiculous to her.
(Later, Avatar Aang would laugh, and inform her that this myth was one that was very much true.)
Xun listens throughout the story, her legs crossed beneath her, rocking back and forth slightly. Toushi moves on to the part that she hasn’t spoken aloud to anyone.
***
It was almost a year ago, now. The tribes of the desert always had skirmishes, conflicts. Resources in the Si Wong were scarce, and it was in the middle of the dry season. The Hami Tribe was never known for its power. They were made up of only five or six different extended families.
Toushi never did find out what tribe the raiders were from. They came early in the morning, just as the first tendrils of green light were creeping along the border of the sky. She heard her father leave the tent, she heard shouting. Fear hit her, it rose in her throat.
Her father returned, blood trickling down his face. “Run away,” he said, “find somewhere safe.”
Toushi wanted to stay, she wanted to fight. She raised the sand around her, she hardened it in her hands.
Her mother dragged her back, out of the camp, towards the hills with the other women and children.
Toushi looked back.
Her father, face down in the sand. A faceless raider, standing over him.
***
“So, I went into the Avatar State,” Toushi says, staring down at her hands. “I’m not sure exactly what I did, but I ended up destroying the entire camp.”
She looks into Xun’s eyes, their bright gold color even more foreign to her now. Xun’s expression is unfathomable.
“A lot of people got hurt, and my dad was dead. A few weeks later, the sages got a hold of me. Apparently they have some sort of Avatar State detection ability.”
It’s the most she’s talked in months, the first time she’s ever told anyone the entire story. Xun reaches out, places her hand in Toushi’s.
“So, you came here.”
“Yeah,” says Toushi, and she can’t really say much else.
***
Not much changes after she tells Xun everything. Every afternoon they train with Sifu Yan, every evening Toushi listens to Xun argue with her brother over dinner. She becomes more accustomed to the spicy food, the humidity. Her firebending improves, and within months, she’s proficient enough to spar with Xun, and win.
“It’s just not fair, you’re the Avatar, you’re just naturally talented,” Xun whines from the grass after a particularly heated match.
Toushi smiles, the first time she’s had a positive reaction to her title. Xun smiles back up at her, she reaches her hand up towards Toushi. Her smile is all teeth and lips and crinkled eyes peeking out from behind straight bangs. Toushi grabs her hand and hoists her onto her feet.
“Next time, I’ll beat you. And then I’ll go down in Fire Nation history as The Girl Who Beat The Avatar That One Time.”
“Uh huh,” says Toushi, pulling the hair back from her eyes.
***
They take a break over the summer. Xun’s family owns a beach house on Ember Island. It’s not the biggest one in the long string of elegant summer homes, but it’s enough to make Toushi feel completely out of place. Kenji immediately holes himself up in his bedroom, until Xun drags him out and makes him read his books on the beach. He complains the entire time of the sun in his eyes, while Xun tries to coax Toushi into the water.
On, the beach, in her bathing suit that feels all too revealing (borrowed from Xun), Toushi swirls the dark black sand around her right hand. Xun’s calls from across the beach are almost too inviting, but hesitantly, she stands to join her friend in the waves. Kenji looks up from his book and pulls a face, one of those dissaproving looks he gives Toushi whenever she gives in to Xun’s requests. Toushi shrugs it off, adjusting the top of her bathing suit. It’s a little too big. Xun’s enthusiastic yelling is cut short as she’s pummeled by an enormous wave.
Toushi laughs, the sound still so dry over her lips.
She leaves footprints behind in the sand.