"Those who win become kings, those who fail, thieves."
The Khatun Traitors
Azula loved the unforgiving dry heat, but did not love the idea of dying from thirst.
"Why are we running?" she asked softly. She spoke from the corner of her lip because she did not want her moderately sized legion of loyal and bloodthirsty traitors to hear her hesitance. They had believed in what she believed. They had to trust her even though she was the opposite of trustworthy.
Her brother replied, "We're not. We're hiding."
"That's worse," she hissed at her husband.
He did not have much to say to that, but she was staring at him, awaiting an answer.
Zuko said at last, "We don't need to get stuck between father and the Kishiko. You were the one who suggested letting them thin themselves out."
"I wasn't thinking Si Wong Desert when I said that," Azula snapped. She closed her eyes in attempt to keep the sand out, but it did not help. "Maybe a nice beach somewhere?"
"Do you want to turn back?" Zuko offered as if it were an option. Azula felt an angry acid eating away at her; he was not easy to travel alongside.
"No. We don't have much of a choice," Azula said with full knowledge that her word was law.
"You had the choice to stay," Zuko said. He always said that and she was tired of it.
As she always replied, "I wanted to leave as much as you did. Don't flatter yourself."
Zuko looked her up and down. Sibling rivalry died hard. However, the ring that was once on her finger melted easily.
"Do you have a plan for what happens when we can't hide?" he asked, his voice half-lost in the coarse wind.
Azula smirked. "Oh, I have a plan. I'm sending a messenger hawk to collect a favor."
"From her, right?" Zuko did not like the fire burning his insides. Ty Lee was too kind and naïve to hate, but he hated how Azula was around her. They would destroy each other and take him with them. Azula said he was just jealous. Azula always lies.
"Yes," Azula said. She watched her brother's sour expression with pleasure.
"What exactly does she owe you for again?" he coldly demanded.
"Nothing. She's just generous," Azula mocked, her smirk consuming more of her face now. She was very pretty to her husband when she was not looking at him like that.
"You've never told me. What if we die of thirst?" Zuko sardonically replied.
"Fine. She owes me for five gold pieces, three years ago," Azula explained. She was honest about that debt.
Zuko's eyebrows shot up. "That's impressive. You've been collecting way more than that's worth."
"I know. But she might as well own Caldera, and we can never go back there." Azula nearly shivered at the thought of what Azulon would do to them. It would not be as bad as Ozai, but they were traitors to him as well.
"You have been promising a lot of people that they'll one day return to the homeland." The homeland was a joke, but Azula could talk it up to be something other than ghost towns and burnt forests.
"You may or may not have noticed, but I am a liar."
Her smirk faded as the sand stung her eyes.
The Kishiko Tribals
Far away from the Si Wong Desert, a funeral had just ended.
"He was supposed to lead us," said Katara to her brother. She was not crying, but her voice was tight with the emotion surging through her veins. Tonight was the worst of her entire life.
Her father was just buried. Stones stacked over earth. The bodies didn't freeze in the Scorched Land like they did in the South Pole. Therefore, the funeral felt wrong. Sokka did not seem as bothered; he led it, even though Bato laid the cairns.
"I'm going to get help for the fight," Sokka said, as if he had a right to even suggest leaving.
"No. Who leads us? Me? I don't … It's not my war." Katara knew her arguing was silly and she would have to take up the mantle, but it was supposed to be Sokka's burden, not hers.
"It wasn't dad's war either," Sokka snapped. "Or Gran-Gran's before him. Fire Lord Sozin started it and it's nobody's but his."
"Where'd you go anyway? Who will you find a week before we reach the Ires?"
"I'm going to the Horitsu. General Iroh helped dad in the past," Sokka said as if it were a visit for tea. Katara loathed his overconfidence, especially when it could get him killed. He was all she had left.
Katara crossed her arms. "He helped dad defend Horitsu land. Huge difference."
"It's our only option," Sokka said.
"No. You're always going on and on about how our people are descended from great warriors when you defend your stupid ponytail!"
"It's not stupid, and that's just talk. We're descended from great warriors about as much as that Khatun Princess is descended from dragons. We say that stuff because it makes people feel hopeful. You know about that. You're so preachy we can't even have tea without you going into—"
"I believe the things I say about hope."
"Then inspire people with them. I'm giving the command to you, Katara. I don't know if I'm coming back and I want you to have it." He started walking away, as if ashamed of his own words.
Katara wanted to thank him, but she despised the gift.
She was a good leader. She got all the kids to play the games she wanted. Once, she organized an entire play just by talking about it. Yet, she was not the kind of person who wanted to lead people to death. She preferred standing back, learning to heal, learning to divert the pain of war.
So much for that.
So much for time for mourning.
There was time only for scrounging up enough morale to face the Ires.
The Ires Legion
Among gold tents, "Don't. Move," dryly said the teenage girl with her knife pressed to the throat of a boy who could not be more than ten.
"Let me go! Let me go!" He whined, despite being in the clutches of someone with several tattoos up the length of her arm. They signified battles won, and people much stronger than him slain. "Let me go! You're being awful!"
She released him and a smirk flickered on her face for a brief moment. It had faded by the time he turned to look at her, touching his neck defensively.
"Well, that was your test. You're not going to ride with them."
"That wasn't fair!"
"Oh, yeah, because tribals are going to knock loudly and give you warning before they slit your throat."
"You're lying. You just don't want me to go," whined the young boy.
"I don't want you to die. There's a difference. You don't have a name yet, much less the ability to kill people swinging clubs at you. Ice blades are worse than my darts," Mai said, but he was clearly not listening. "Maybe they'll get distracted and ruffle your hair instead of killing you."
"That's not funny. I'm not a child."
"Yes, you are, and I'm making this decision. You don't get to argue," Mai said. The boy did not want to listen to her, but she was the General and she got to choose which little girls and boys had to go fight and die for a hunk of cloth and a small gold crown.
"Is there a problem here?" drawled June, the most obnoxious soldier Mai has had the displeasure of working alongside.
Mai straightened her back and steeled her amber eyes. "No. My little brother is just going to go home and get ready for bed."
"The sun isn't even setting yet!" he exclaimed.
"I know. But you are very sleepy and that's why you're saying such ridiculous things."
If looks could kill. He did leave, after analyzing the two very intimidating women who were a full head taller than him.
"I was handling that," Mai said.
"I know. I didn't come to help you restrain that kid; I came to tell you that there's an urgent last minute meeting I'm not invited to, but I'm supposed to tell you about. As your – what is it I am? – lieutenant. Now, that's the word."
Mai left without another word. She never trained with June; June was older than her and wasn't born and raised in the Ires Legion like Mai was. June was a bounty hunter who saw riches in warfare and somehow claimed them.
June was assigned to work directly under Mai.
Mai wanted to slit the throats of whoever decided that was a good idea.
"She'll argue with you. That's a good thing. Having someone who doesn't protest allows you to make poor choices, having someone who protests allows you to make the best choices," said Ozai.
Mai did not like arguments. Mai did not like most anything, but she liked people bowing and obeying her commands.
She turned back around and went to go find the war room tent.
The Horitsu Militia
She was their best soldier.
She was also barely thirteen.
Yet, the age was not the problem. Most kids went to war by that age. The problem was that she knew she was their best soldier and squeezed everything she could possibly get out of that fact. Toph had a reputation of a maverick that no one could stop, because they needed her too much.
When she was young, she was born into a wealthy family. She hated them. When their city was sacked by the Ires Legion, the Horitsu Militia came to the rescue. Toph took out as many of the legion jerks as she could. . . and a couple of the jerks from her city too. When they saw what she could do despite her not being able to see it, they enlisted her within seconds.
She was bored, sparring with little interest in the match.
"Oi!" Jet's voice went away. "Oh, sorry, Toph. I thought you were Li. Must be the, uh, manly look you've got going on."
Toph spat before wiping her lip with her hand. "Oh, come on. Li couldn't have been fighting as good as me on his best day."
"Yeah, yeah. How often do you get mistaken for a man, Toph?" drawled Jet, because of course he was going to try to look big in front of his friends.
She did not hesitate to answer, "How often do you?"
The others in the room laughed, the Boulder's guffaw the loudest. Toph was fighting him, and he could see her casual smirk. She liked the feeling of his racing heartbeat.
"Chief wants you to see him," Jet explained through clenched teeth.
"Well, he's out of luck," Toph jabbed proudly.
More laughter followed her comment. She glowed but did not smile.
"He said it was important. Some Tribal just showed up on an ostrich-horse and he needs you," Jet said.
Toph shrugged and stepped down from the dirty sparring ring.
It sounded interesting enough.
The Khatun Traitors
Far across the sea in a gilded brothel, Ty Lee read the letter twice.
It certainly was not blunt, but it still stabbed like a sword when she read carefully. That might have been the opposite of bunt but she was no wordsmith. She just knew that it was every kind of treason to be doing this, yet… she was going to do it.
"Is it important?" asked her second in command. The poor girl had such high expectations and Ty Lee wished she could make a perfect world for the naiveté. Optimism, unfortunately, only went so far in a world at war.
"No," Ty Lee lied. "I just have to go think for a few… hours. Yeah, hours. You're in charge 'til I'm back. And stop putting up those flowers; it's super bad luck this time of year. And doesn't match at all."
"Yes, of course," chimed her eager assistant.
She was considering something very drastic, and very stupid. Ty Lee stopped doing stupid things as soon as Azula betrayed traitors and Ty Lee was left in the dust. Here, in the smoggy cities of the faded, pathetic Fire Nation. At least she had nice clothes and decent soap.
Those two comforts would be lost to her if she did what she was contemplating.
Going not only to the Scorched Lands, but into the Si Wong Desert with a fleet of barbarians led by the traitor princess and prince was very inadvisable. Yet, Azula was not doing this again. Ty Lee was not just blindly enabling what would amount to suicide for her princess. Her lady. Her first love when they both were still part of the Legion.
Ty Lee crumpled the letter in her sweaty hand and wondered what she was supposed to do.
That afternoon, she learned what she was supposed to do by Fire Lord Azulon. He was not a powerful man, not like his father was. He had Caldera and a few cities of the Fire Nation that hadn't been dried up and abandoned by war.
I am the Lord of Ghosts, not Fire, he told her once, long ago.
"This is the perfect opportunity," Azulon rasped to the girl kneeling before his throne. "My grandchildren have the rightful claim to the throne, but everyone wishes to rule the world. They concern me. I would give you anything you asked if you were to observe them on my behalf."
"You'd want me to spy, your highness?" Ty Lee asked, her eyes to the floor.
"Yes. Yes, I do," Azulon said.
Ty Lee loved Azula, and she had always loved Azula. She would do anything for that girl. . . yet Ty Lee had been just as hardened by the years. Her desires overwhelmed her love. Azula did use her far too often and it would not be like spying for the Ires.
She accepted Azulon's offer, and he secured her safe passage to the Scorched Lands.
Ty Lee thought about cartwheels and first kisses, even though she knew Azula saw her as a tile in her game.
Maybe, however, Azula had not forgotten.
Ty Lee was an optimist, even in times as dark as these.
The Kishiko Tribals
Katara did not like the honor bestowed upon her. She had no qualms about swearing her allegiance to protecting her people – and she was a strong enough bender to earn the title – but she knew that protecting them would mean killing others.
She finished her pledge breathlessly. She was certain she forgot to breathe while reciting, kneeling before a Water Sage. He gently poured the chilly water over her, and she could feel centuries of war dripping onto her head, clotting in her hair.
It was her war now.
She warmed herself by the campfire after the drinking and eating ended. They went from a funeral to a celebration of Katara too quickly. It felt wrong, but Katara partook all she could in the party. Her people deserved to have fun, to dance, to enjoy each other before the rapidly approaching battle with the Ires Legion.
Only Yue sat beside her.
"Do you think the Avatar is out there?" Katara asked Yue. She received an awkward smile in response; it was the expression of someone who pitied her for having hope. "They could be. We don't know."
"You're right," Yue said honestly. There was the possibility of a living, breathing Avatar who merely was in no position to save the world. Or perhaps the Avatar did not want to save them – perhaps they were doomed because of their own actions and they deserved to fight this war.
No, Yue did not think that. Or at least, she tried not to think that.
"Maybe we should look," Katara said.
"A lot of people have."
"I'm not a lot of people." Katara stood and walked away.
She could feel all eyes in the camp focused on her, their new leader, as she walked to her tent.
The Khatun Traitors
"She said no, didn't she?" Zuko asked, sitting down in front of the fire beside Azula.
Her gaze was fixated on the letter and the campfire kept sparking blue. He once would have never gone to her when she was angry, but he was long past feeling fear. That was why she liked him.
"She did as I said. But she also said that she is coming to join us."
"Ty Lee couldn't survive here after three years being pampered and pretty in Caldera."
"Probably not. I do not believe I am changing her mind."
"Do you admit defeat?" Zuko asked.
Azula was thrown off by his comment, but she caught herself. "No. Yes. I am strong enough to admit defeat, if the situation required it." This situation, in her opinion, did not require it.
"You always say you're never defeated."
"I am never defeated. I can lose battles but I will not lose my willpower to win the war."
"You're really worth having on my side."
"You're on my side."
"No, this is my army."
"I talked them into fighting for you. I doubt you could do the same."
"You're good at lying; I'm good at finding evidence to support my claims."
"The best leaders are intelligent people who have endured awful experiences and are completely amoral. I have three out of three and you have one out of three."
"I'd rather be abandoned because of who I am than followed for who I'm not."
"I know, I know. You're the paragon of kings. I can sell that."
"So, what are you going to do about that letter?"
Azula examined it before dropping it into the fire. It popped loudly as it burnt to ashes and disappeared.
"That won't stop her from coming, you know?" Zuko said.
She did not give him an answer as she left him by the flames.
After he ate, he wandered back towards his tent. He was easily distracted and his eyes were drawn to every single fire, every single soldier. His ears perked up and took in scraps of conversation, mostly violent boasting.
Once he was inside of the center violet-stained tent of the encampment on the edge of the Si Wong, his gaze rested on a map. It had been scribbled on too many times and was discolored from age. The reason it still hung was because it was the most accurate one that could be found.
Most maps were decorated with the old world. A world untouched by the fires of Sozin's Comet. Things had changed since then. Some cities were gone; others had been built. Cartography was not exactly a common or lucrative practice.
This one was decent.
He walked to it and looked at the markers of the Horitsu. Iroh was with them, if any of the rumors were grounded in fact. Zuko had much to say to a man who enabled him to rebel and leave the Legion that would devour him.
When he pulled himself away from it and walked through another fabric flap, he saw her pretending to sleep. Or maybe trying to sleep; he had no clue which. All he knew was that she was going to be beyond troubled due to the many matters that she had to deal with.
Prince Zuko fought the urge to poke her, which was inappropriately tempting, and went to go put his broadswords away and undress.
"Do you want me to turn the candles out so that we won't burn alive?"
She was silent and unmoving for a moment. "I won't burn alive. I can't burn alive. Perhaps you can, with that scar…"
"I'm turning them out," he said, not bothering with her. She was too confident about fire. He was told he was good at firebending, and he could still feel the scorching pain and smell burnt flesh when he was reminded. He waved a hand. The candles died. "What are you hiding? You're not thrown off by anything as small as Ty Lee or a desert."
She did not respond easily to that. "I don't have to tell you anything I don't want to tell you."
"So, you're hiding it from me? Or do you just not trust me?"
"Both."
Zuko sighed. She was difficult and he was not in the mood for a challenge when he had the desert laid out before him.
"Zuko," Azula said softly, sparking concern within him. Perhaps he should not have asked. "Father got what he wanted."
Zuko grunted. "Why are you never specific?"
He fumbled with the weathered ties on his shirt.
"Why did he make us marry?" Azula sat up and Zuko rolled his eyes. It was very much like her to make this into a speech.
"Because he's obsessed with power."
Azula pushed her point away momentarily. "Are we not?" she inquired. Her interest in his answer was genuine.
"I don't know." Zuko shrugged.
Azula stared at him through the shroud of shadows. "How did he think marrying us to each other could give him power?"
Zuko rubbed his forehead and managed to get his shirt off. He did not have the patience for this – until he realized she was being vague due to the fact she could not say it aloud. She felt uncomfortable with the words so she tried to pry them out of him.
She succeeded.
"You are both cryptic. . . and pregnant," said Zuko as he sat down at the foot of their bed. The furs tickled his hand as he toyed with them.
"Yes to both of those," Azula said. "We have the winning tile now. He thought he had claim to the crown because he had a daughter. . . and a son to marry her to. But it's not his now. It's ours and we can rally people around it."
"Fire people," Zuko added. It did not change Azula's mind on the matter. He sighed. "That is a better gambit than anybody else seems to have. Unless someone produces the Avatar out of thin air, you have—we have—this."
"I forgot it was your worst fear," Azula chided.
"No. It's not. It was a fear and it was a fear that had good reason behind it. We should sleep. You especially, given this. . . condition," Zuko said.
She agreed with him, but they both knew that they would not be sleeping well tonight.