When he was 8, he drew a picture of something he'd seen on a tapestry and told everyone he wanted one. His tutors smiled and told him he was too old to be delving into such fantasies, the servants pursed their lips and told him the picture was very nice and his mother had sat him down and told him that the dragons were gone.

He frowned and his mother said he could get another pet one day. So he smiled and asked what pet, because he didn't want to upset her more.

He didn't ask for a dragon again, but sometimes he would look up to the sky and wish.

A few years later, he wished for something else. It was more attainable, more realistic and there were many ways to reach the goal, but this only made the shame burn greater when he could not fulfill it.

He wished for his father's praise.

If only he had known that this was one wish the spirits never heard. Perhaps it was for the better, perhaps it was essential in the greater scheme of things, a bramble he had to pass in order to reach the path on the other side. Perhaps, but if that analogy were true, he would have been able to step around it.

No, he cannot think like that. The memories, the pain, the struggle he lives with is tolerable, but the second his suffering loses meaning it become unbearable.

When he had been banished, the burdens had weighed heavily, but he had a purpose. If you had asked him what that purpose was when he was thirteen and sporting that ridiculous ponytail, he would have answered something close to "ridding the Fire Nation of its greatest enemy, the Avatar, and restoring honor to my name ".

If you questioned him on why he had hounded the Avatar, now, he would say "I just wanted to go home".

This was a wish where he had lost patience in fate and destiny and the "mystical life blood" that uncle spews about and took matters into his own hands. And it worked. He sailed home as reigning hero with the one person he calls family in chains.

Perhaps this was another bramble that needed to be tackled. He learned that questioning uncle will never be in your best interests.

Home, with his father's praise and a kingdom to his name, all the things he saw sweet turned bitter. A bed in the Fire Nation, but it was not the place he called home; the Firelord's acclaim, but not a father's love.

So he left, but his dreams were still the same. He would find his home, rebuild it if need be, and he had another father's love worth pursuing.

Looking at himself now, he seems to have fulfilled both. There are days though, like today, where he looks back and sees only resentment. Years and years of bitterness and only now the fruit begins to reap. He questions if it was worth it.

Then he looks around, and convinces himself. The world has thrown the worst of its loads on his path, but it has always conspired for his victory.

He takes his time, strolling leisurely to his next appointment, with little Druk scampering by his side. The mighty beast, not as noble as you might imagine when tottering like a pompous ostrich-horse, was growing. He measured as thick as his arm and twice as long from snout to the tip of his fur lined tail.

The dragon claws at a tapestry and he hastens to preserve the age old heirloom. He scans the cloth for damage, eyes tracing the red and gold outline of the snake-like being etched within the seams.

Druk slithers away when his scoffs morph into shoulder shaking laughter.

He'd read in scrolls from far off lands about genies who were bound to grant your wishes, but made it their game to never give exactly what you ask for. Whatever spirits had granted his wishes, were crueler.

Yes, the world took his dreams to heart, but they would never miss a chance to screw with him.

And call him ungrateful, but he never took the time to look up at the sky and say thank you.

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AN: Druk is a Zuko's dragon in Legend of Korra for those who may not know.

This was short, just an exercise, and just a way to tell anyone who follows me I am still here. Just a little slow. Also on this note, I'd also like to say that I really want, almost need, someone to partner up with me. I need someone to stir me to write things, someone to hear out ideas. And this could go both ways, you could throw ideas at me. I just need someone, as a beta, as a reader, as a writer buddy or something because right now I have no idea if the stories on my flashdrive will make any sense to anyone other than me.

Anyway, hats off to you, my fine reader, and may I say, you look dashing today. *in the distance: hey, that rhymed* Until next time.