A/N: Though I ought to be working on my in-progress stories, this fic just wrote itself after I watched an episode that mentioned the Siege of the North. I realized I was annoyed that the show pretended nobody died when the ocean spirit did its magic water routine, and thus this fic is born. (Also because Iroh gives good advice and makes good tea.)
Practically everyone Zuko met during his banishment thought that he hunted the Avatar simply because he was the big baddie who went bump in the night because he was from the Fire Nation. A few select people were privy to the information regarding the origin of Zuko's banishment, and those people were absolutely certain that he was after the Avatar so he could go home and reclaim his birthright. Maybe that was true at one point – after all, he was banished at a young age, and a little boy wanted to go home. After a while, he finally admitted to himself that it just wasn't home without his mother there. And after a while, he really didn't want to hunt the Avatar any more, but he still had to try to see if he could win his father's approval because his father was still family.
Then the North Pole happened.
He had never seen so many lives wiped out at once. For all the Fire Nation's sins, the men and women on those boats were innocent, at least in this conflict. They hadn't even had a chance to fight for their survival. A lot of them were probably conscripts, since the Navy wasn't about to send its better soldiers off to a frozen wasteland that had previously been considered impenetrable. And now hundreds, maybe thousands of them were dead in a matter of minutes.
Uncle had told him repeatedly that a man needs his rest but he couldn't stay still, he kept hunting the Avatar, because if the Avatar ever decided to attack the Fire Nation directly, he could kill tens of thousands without blinking an eye. The Water Tribe harlot certainly seemed keen on the idea, considering some of the poisonous vitriol she had spat at him in the past, and he had seen how adoringly the Avatar looked at her.
He had finally found some small measure of peace in Ba Sing Se, but now, as he watched the Avatar walk past his uncle's tea shop, he felt the cold stirring of anger once again. He ignored his uncle's questioning look as he threw down his towel and marched outside. He followed the Avatar for a little while, waiting until the crowd had thickened enough that nobody noticed the boy with the arrow tattoos, and then he lunged. They found themselves in a side alley, the Avatar's back against the wall with Zuko's forearm held against his throat.
"Zuko!" The airbender's eyes widened in alarm, reminding Zuko of a time long ago and a voice asking if we knew each other back then, do you think we could have been friends too? and the look of betrayal on the Avatar's face when a blast of fire answered no.
He regretted letting the Avatar loose. Even letting Zhao get the glory would have been better than leaving the airbender to his own devices to kill so many at the Siege of the North.
"Zuko, look, you don't have to do this. I don't want to fight you."
"Like you didn't want to fight at the North Pole?" he snarled.
The Avatar actually had the gall to look confused. "I didn't want to fight you there either. And I gave you a ride on Appa so you wouldn't freeze in that cave!"
"This isn't about me!" Zuko all but yelled. "You killed people there!"
"No I didn't!" the Avatar protested.
"So all those people drowned on their own, I suppose?"
The Avatar looked horrified. "I didn't – The ocean spirit–" The arm across his throat pressed harder and cut him off.
"Nephew!" called Iroh, running up. He had a way of hurrying – he got there only moments after Zuko, after all – without seeming to be in a hurry. "I was worried when you left so suddenly, and I was rather hoping that you would not be getting into trouble," he said in a good-humored but disapproving tone.
"There's no trouble here, Uncle."
"I think the young man in front of you might disagree. Perhaps we could desist and share a calming pot of tea instead?" The words were mild, but Iroh locked stares with his nephew and Zuko could feel the weight of the older man's experience and gravity.
He held out for a moment, his arm continuing to press into the Avatar's throat while he stared at his uncle in a silent battle of wills, until both his gaze and his arm dropped.
The Avatar started to dash away, but one look at Iroh assured him that he would not get very far if he tried.
So, several minutes later, the three of them were sitting uncomfortably around a table in the back of the tea house, where none of the patrons would be able to hear or see them.
"Now, Avatar, would you be averse to some jasmine tea? I find it incredibly soothing," Iroh said in the usual jolly tone he had when he was discussing tea.
The airbender glanced at Zuko in a slight panic, not finding any reassurance in the prince's scowl. "Sure," he said in confusion. "And could you please call me Aang? It's my name, you know." This last was evidently directed at Zuko.
Iroh busied himself with making tea, and the silence stretched until he was done pouring, Zuko glaring at the airbender sitting across from him, who was cowering back into his seat.
"Now Aang, what brings you here on this fine day?"
The airbender took a careful sip of his tea, smiling widely at the taste, before instantly calming in the face of the tense situation. "I'm looking for Appa, my bison. Have you seen him? He got taken by the sandbenders and I haven't seen him since and I'm getting really worried and–"
"There are bigger things to worry about," Zuko snapped. Smoke was starting to curl out of his hands, which he realized he had clenched into fists. Uncle stared at him, so he glared and took a sip of his tea and surprisingly did feel somewhat calmer. He still didn't believe in his uncle's insistence on tea being the answer to life's problems, but maybe it was more helpful than he gave it credit for.
"Aang, what has my nephew told you so far about his more recent troubles with you?"
"That I killed people," he responded in a small voice, sounding absolutely miserable. "I didn't mean to, the ocean spirit took over and I didn't realize it was killing anyone." He sounded so small and horrified that Zuko had trouble reconciling this version of the Avatar with the glowing monster that had attacked the ships at the North Pole.
"The spirits of the dead don't care about your intentions! It doesn't help to tell them that you killed them by accident!" Zuko didn't want to have this outburst in front of his uncle, but he had thought that Jee and his crew were among the dead for so long, and he still had nightmares about reaching out for Zhao, only it wasn't always Zhao in his dreams. He saw his uncle, and his crew, and sometimes his mother being dragged away by the ocean spirit while he stood there helpless. What was to stop him from doing the same thing to the innocents of the Fire Nation?
Iroh frowned, seeing Aang nearly in tears, but continued gravely. "I'm afraid that my nephew has a point, no matter how indelicately put. If those men and women are dead because of an accident where you lost control, what is to stop it from happening again?"
Aang really did start crying, sobs shaking his thin frame. He put his feet up on the chair and hugged his knees close to him as though they could protect him from something. "I didn't know, I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry."
Iroh placed a hand on the boy's shoulder, just resting it there for a moment until the sobs had abated. "What you can do is learn to control the spirits and remember that not everyone is part of this conflict. I cannot dissuade you from fighting against my brother, because he has lost sight of the balance of the world, but you must remember that the Fire Lord is not synonymous with the Fire Nation, so that when you fight there are no innocents involved."
Zuko looked away, remembering the cause of an Agni Kai and a banishment. Many times his uncle had told him that it wasn't his fault. Maybe he understood.
This sobbing boy couldn't possibly be the same as the glowing monster that had killed so many. He was small and scared and shaking. Zuko finally looked at him properly, at this twelve-year-old kid who was somehow supposed to save the rest of the world from the evil Fire Nation. He saw a pacifist who was afraid of his powers, a boy playing with things he didn't understand, a child under pressure to do the impossible.
No more words were exchanged. Somehow Aang understood that he was free to go, and Zuko understood that it was okay to let him leave. And when Aang reached the house where his friends were staying he was unusually pensive, but though he was quiet he exuded the sort of wisdom that only comes after a great epiphany. And the next time that Katara had a spiteful comment about the Fire Nation, he frowned and told her a tale of a tea shop.
After Aang had left, Zuko and his uncle sat for a while and slowly sipped their tea. When the bison mysteriously reappeared several days later, Iroh gave his nephew a knowing smile. And when Azula attacked the Avatar, Zuko thought not of the Avatar, but of Aang, and of how the Fire Nation and the Fire Lord were not synonymous. And when the Fire Lord was defeated long after, though the world was still searching for peace, Zuko and Aang made a trip to the North Pole and pray for the spirits of the dead, so that they too could find peace.
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