Every one of them is alert and on edge, ready to fight. Beside him, Zuko hears the whisper of steel against steel and knows that Mai has at least half a dozen knives fanned out in her right hand. He holds out a hand as a silent entreaty to stand down, his palm hovering just in front of her abdomen. Zuko ignores the Avatar and the Water Tribe siblings and the tiny earthbender. He focuses his gaze on Uncle alone.
In his uncle's eyes, Zuko sees anxiety and weariness and not even the tiniest bit of hope. That hurts, but he knows that he deserves it after what he has done. Still, Uncle Iroh is the one who steps forward.
"Prince Zuko," he begins because, as Zuko has just realized, even when his uncle believes that there is no way to save him anymore, believes that Zuko will never become the man he hoped he could, Iroh still has to try. "Don't do this. You don't have to-"
His words are cut off when Zuko first inclines his head, and then bows at the waist before sinking to his knees in supplication.
"I apologize, Uncle. For everything," he says, voice steady as he can manage. "I was a fool."
The words of disbelief, protest, and confusion from the Avatar's party are incomprehensible noises to Zuko's ears as Uncle pulls him to his feet, embraces him, and holds him tightly.
---
It feels like days, but it ends up taking less than an hour for them to decide to let Zuko and Mai join them. Zuko spends the entire time sitting beside Mai on a large log a few yards away from the campsite proper. (She makes a face and eyes the log with distaste before sitting down beside him, and if the situation were any less dire he would smile to himself and think completely sickening and not-at-all-manful things that he would never admit to or say aloud; as it is, he just takes off his vest and lays it casually across the log as though he spontaneously decided it was too hot to wear. The corners of her mouth twitch upwards and the next half dozen beats of his heart are deafening.) Mai doesn't try to talk or discuss all of the many ways in which it will be all right no matter what, and Zuko appreciates it. It's out of their hands and they both know it. Trying to say anything else would just be making needless noise. They both appreciate the value of silence.
When it's all done, Uncle Iroh explains to them while the rest see to the preparations for the night as though nothing has happened. Uncle Iroh uses lots of words and phrases like "careful" and "diplomatic" and "best behavior" and Zuko wonders if Uncle will be their liason for the rest of this tenuous alliance. Zuko wonders if he will wander back and forth between two camps with a Great Divide between them because the Avatar and friends have already extended all the trust they have left.
Zuko agrees to everything. Mai says, "Whatever," but apparently Uncle remembers her well enough to understand. He leaves them with a smile and crosses the Divide again to see to the Avatar's firebending lesson for the night.
Mai rests a hand on Zuko's shoulder and kneads it softly with her nails in a manner that he has come to recognize as comforting. For a few moments, she leans into him, rests her head on his shoulder as well, and he can smell her hair. Then she rises and the absence of her presence right beside him is jarring.
"I'm going to go see if that stream we passed is remotely clean enough to be used for bathing," she says in that way of hers that indicates that the task being undertaken is the most unpleasant imaginable and doing it at all is her great concession to a unappreciative universe.
Zuko nods, but catches her hand before she moves away. She turns to look at him questioningly and suddenly he can't really remember what he was going to say or how he was going to say it. He wants to thank her for listening to him and leaving with him and staying with him. He wants to let her know how much it means that she is there. He wants it to sound eloquent, but simple, honest and undramatic, but he's not really much better with words than he's ever been. So, he stands up and kisses her instead.
Her body molds itself against his perfectly and her mouth is soft and warm. She slides her tongue along his bottom lip and Zuko cups her face in his hands. Mai's normally pale cheeks are tinged pink when they part and Zuko thinks that he is a few seconds away from exhaling a plume of smoke.
"Thank you," he manages, aware that he's leaning closer to her again without having willed himself to do so.
"You're welcome," she says. Her tone is the same as always, but the smile on her face is not and when she takes a step away, Zuko has to compensate quickly to keep from falling forward. "The stream," she reminds him and Zuko nods again and sits back down.
The fact that he is still watching Mai walk away is what keeps him from noticing the footsteps from the direction of the campsite until they're almost upon him. They're just a few steps away when he turns to look and sees that it is the Water Tribe girl- No. Katara. Yes, Katara, according to Uncle, and Zuko thinks that calling people by their names is probably part and parcel of diplomacy.
He doesn't get a chance to, however, because she speaks first.
"Is that why you joined us?" she asks directly.
"What are you talking about?" Zuko asks automatically, before he's even bothered to follow her line of sight to where Mai disappeared into the woods. Realization comes and he has no idea how to respond.
Katara seems undaunted and sits beside him, arms crossed over her chest. "Back in Ba Sing Se you could have joined us. You knew that your sister was crazy then too, but instead you-" She pauses and her jaw clenches and he wonders if she's going to just get up and walk away or even reach for that pouch of water she carries around. She does neither, however, just sits. Physically, she's not much farther away than Mai was, but it's clear that everything that happened in the crystal catacombs fills the space between them.
The silence is deeply uncomfortable and it's half in the hopes that she'll either say what she's there to say or leave him be that Zuko speaks.
"It's not just because of her," he begins haltingly. "My father- he's...wrong. And Uncle- I- I never should have-" Zuko pauses frustrated, hating her accusing eyes and those of her friends and the fact that he needs them and as such feels even the slightest inclination to explain himself to them. "There are a lot of reasons," he continues finally. "But Mai...she helped me. I- She...If Azula ever found out that her loyalties were with me, then..." he trails off.
Katara stares at him for a long moment, scrutinizing, but when she speaks again, her voice is not unkind.
"You wanted to protect someone you love." Zuko's sure his face is blazing hotter than the sun, but she doesn't give him a chance to respond before she continues, her eyes wandering over towards the campsite where Uncle Iroh is adjusting the Avatar's stance. "That's something we have in common."
It clicks into place then for Zuko. He'd never bothered to notice or care before, but suddenly it seems like the most obvious thing in the world, and the nearly palpable intensity of her lingering resentment makes a lot more sense now.
"I guess so," he responds.
"It's good," she says and she's looking at him again. Her voice is still even, but there's something different in her posture, something irrevocable, unrelenting, and cold. It almost feels like it's seeping into the air around them. "It's good because it means that you'll understand and believe me when I tell you that if you ever do anything to hurt Aang again, there will be no place that you and your girlfriend can hide from me."
She sweeps back towards the camp in a cloud of righteous fury before Zuko has a chance to respond. Of course, there is nothing that he really needed to say.
Mai returns a few minutes later, but he's not really listening as she lists the many failures of the nearby stream. He just holds her hand in his, runs his thumb across her knuckles, and knows that he will never let anything happen to her.
He understands and he believes. And, though he hopes it never comes to that, Katara had better be sure to do so as well.