In the afternoon, it was dark. Katara sat in her unlit room for a moment, soaking in the darkness. It would take some getting used to - the Northern winter seemed deeper and colder than the Southern - but she would acclimate. It's what she did.
It would take some time to get used to all the new people.
But she would.
The prince was friendlier than she expected. She had imagined a man who walked away from his family to pursue political advantage by being adopted into the Head Chief's family. Instead, Amaqjuaq - but only Amaq to his friends - was an orphan of war heroes. A Spiritualist who wanted to reinvigorate the spiritual practices of the poles and was more egalitarian than any other male she had met in the North Pole.
Katara was already falling into an easy friendship with the prince, which frustrated her. She knew how it looked.
He had admitted to as much when they had been walking one afternoon after Bending exercise.
"I want to apologize Katara." Amaq murmured as he offered his arm. Katara took it, but glanced at the others as they walked ahead of them.
"For what?" She asked and they started toward the Palace.
"For everything my parents are going to do to us." He replied and smiled wryly at her.
Malina was also, unexpected.
It was difficult to meet the adult girlfriend of one's father while also an adult. Katara could see how Malina struggled, caught between parental authority and adult peer. It didn't help that Malina was basically a transplant - she had spent all of her adult life in the Earth Kingdom studying architecture - and had never been married, nor had children of her own. Katara imagined that Malina would have always been nervous no matter what age she had met Hakoda's children.
There were new teachers; Master Kupun taught her law while they went over the wildly different charters the various tribes from the South Pole had submitted to be included in their new constitution. Healer Nukilik was an old friend of Gran-Gran's, and she knew how to tell if a person was a Bender and for what element using her own bending. She could even tell the gender and bending ability of a baby still in their mother's womb.
"Seventy years I've been doing this, and I haven't been wrong once. One couple thought I was wrong, but I told them, he was just beer poured into a water pitcher! The boy, Sillia, finally showed them after he did his ice dodging." Nukilik chuckled. "Nice boy Sillia, though his wife is a silly fish."
If Katara had thought the healing hut was beneath her when she first visited, she found it completely different after becoming a Master. She was having to learn internal anatomy, how to feel the "rightness" of her own organs by noting the "wrongness" in others.
It was a lot, more than she had thought she would be doing, and it kept her busy.
It had only been a week since she arrived in the North Pole and she had only seen Aang at meals and the military drills.
Not that he didn't call on her. Every single day.
"Katara, let's go ice skating!"
"Hey Katara, want to go visit the Spirit Oasis with me?"
"I was thinking of eating at one of the restaurants in the city, want to come?"
"Katara…"
"Katara?"
"Katara!"
He was a blast of water that sprayed constantly. She could deflect him, and Amaq was being more helpful about interceding now that he knew about the two of them, but it was exhausting.
Because while she deflected, practiced, learned, interacted with one hand, the other was cupped to her chest. Protecting one, small, flickering flame.
Katara lightly touched her fingers to her chest, and felt the restrictive pain under it.
"Zuko." She whispered. It was all she allowed herself. Unable to write him again, Katara just felt sick thinking about him. Thinking about what had happened.
This morning, Arnook had given them the informal announcement that he was accepting a Fire Nation delegation at the end of the month. The Minister of Interior Affairs would be arriving after the national mourning period for Azula ended. It would not be Iroh then, and Katara felt pained at what she knew was going to be some xenophobic elitist who would remind her exactly why she could never be with Zuko.
"OH!" The exclaim was made in surprise but amplified by fright. "Master Katara, I didn't know you were home! Let me light the lamps for you." A maid - how did they have a maid? - rushed to a lamp and Katara could hear the rocky clatter of flint. Embers flashed in the darkness, briefly illuminating random patches of the maid's hands. Finally, the wick in the whale oil lamps lit and a greasy light lit up a wide arch from the wall.
Not wanting to awkwardly loom over the young woman, Katara went to her small writing desk and pulled off her mittens. She grabbed the writing box as she heard more scratching from the flint and slowly, the room lightened.
"I was coming to bring your mail, would you like it now Katara?" The maid asked as she approached the desk.
"Yes please. Anything interesting?"
"Nara Pilipaappak is inviting you and your brother over to dinner." The maid said as she handed Katara a small stack of letters. Katara furrowed her brow as she took them, thinking. In the South Pole, and specifically in her village, there were only so many people so names were easy to remember. Here, it was easier to find someone with the same name, so kin-surnames were often used.
"Nara Pili-" Katara cut herself off as she remembered, hitting the desk sharply with the edge of the letters. "Pilip's mother." The maid smiled and Katara turned back in her seat, placing the letters down. "Thank you."
From the corner of her eye, she saw the woman bow slightly before leaving.
So many things to get used to.