That Ship Has Sailed
Katara felt the waves drag her ship towards their destination where a single lantern swayed in the night breeze, the only sign of welcome on the black seas. She paced restlessly with her hands clasped behind her back and her thoughts swirling inside her head. All was quiet on the ship except for the wind whistling through the sails and the creaking of the ropes. The men were asleep now, assured that their mistress would see them safely into port, and though they were right and the skies were clear of storm clouds, the captain could not bring herself to close her eyes and rest.
She both dreaded and longed for this meeting. Her heart ached at the thought of laying eyes on him again after so long. It swelled within her chest until she thought it might burst with the conflicted emotions that churned inside of her. So much to say that would not be said. So much to do that would be left undone. It was as it always had been and as it always would be as far as she could tell. How long had her life been set on this course? Twelve years since she had first stepped off her ice floe in the Southern Pole and taken command of a pirate ship that had found its way into those distant waters. That life now seemed like a dream to her. How had she ever been that young, wide-eyed child in her home-spun parka and her hair bound in loops and a braid? It seemed impossible now compared to the hardened woman she had become in those long years.
She shook her head. It did no good to dwell on the past and things that might have been, but sometimes she could not help herself though she knew all too well the futility of such a venture. Seeing no other course of action, she took a seat on her small, rumpled bed and uncorked a bottle of fire whiskey pilfered from their last raid. Pouring it into a small, square glass she took a sip and savored the one luxury she allowed herself. She rarely kept anything for herself whenever they took a ship. Most of the cargo they unloaded at docks along the Earth Kingdom and Southern Water Tribe to the villagers who needed it far more desperately than she did.
Katara passed those long hours until they reached the docks in the silent darkness with only her thoughts and the liquor to keep her company. By the time she could sense their destination approaching, her head was swimming and her muscles were warm and loose from the drink. Easing gracefully to her feet, she made her way up to the deck and urged her crew awake to drop anchor and tie down the ship so that her guest could board The Painted Lady.
With the orders were given and her commands carried out, the captain turned on her heel and returned below decks to her small room in the hold where she waited for his presence.
He came silently and without being announced as she knew he would. Only a swift knock on her door alerted her to his arrival, and she stumbled to stand and let him in. The figure standing in her doorway was tall and slim and dressed in a fine black cloak that concealed any clue as to his identity, but she didn't need to see anymore than the breadth of his shoulders or the way he carried himself so rigidly to know who it was. He had never been able to hide himself from her.
The woman gestured for him to take a seat at the small table nailed down in the corner of the room and took the chair opposite his. When she offered him a cup of whiskey, he nodded graciously and held the glass between his long, white fingers, spinning it in indecision.
At last, he huffed and threw back the hood of his cloak to reveal a face all pale, aristocratic angles only marred by the tell-tale scar imprinted across his left eye. Zuko had aged well despite the heavy burden he constantly carried on his shoulders, a cross he had born since the age of eighteen.
"To what do I owe the pleasure of the Fire Lord's company?" she asked sweetly before taking a sip and struggling not to grimace as the alcohol blazed a trail of fire down her throat and into her belly.
He scowled at her and took a swig as if bracing himself for their conversation. "You know why. The same reason why I call upon you every time."
"Hmm, I might, but the real question is, Your Majesty, do you?" Oh yes, she knew why he was supposedly here, but that wasn't the real reason. It never was.
"How many times have I told you, Katara, don't call me that?" he said irritably as he pressed his thumb and forefinger to the bridge of his narrow nose.
"And why shouldn't I? You are the Fire Lord after all. You never let me forget it during our little meetings."
"It's not the same, and you know it. It is bad enough that I have to hear it from everyone else, but not from you too. Never from you." His look turned thoughtful as he stared into the bottom of his glass and drained its contents. With an agitated gesture, he signaled for more, and she obliged him. The Fire Lord was in a blacker mood than usual, and that was saying something indeed.
"I and everyone else only address you by your proper title. Where is the fault in that? After all, I am nothing but a lowly pirate, my lord," she teased, enjoying the way his cheeks flushed crimson.
"You are anything but," he stammered as he attempted to regain his composure. "You are the most powerful and feared brigand on the ocean right now, and that is exactly the problem."
Sighing, she stood and turned her back to him to refill her own glass. "You know that the last ship I took belonged to a councilman who was double crossing you, don't you? He was selling information to those rebels you've been trying to crush for the past three and a half years."
"I did." He answered grudgingly.
"And?"
"And I still needed him. A turn-coat he might have been, but his support was crucial if I ever hope to sway the others to my side of things. You don't know how much you've set me back thanks to that last little stunt of yours," he said through his teeth.
Katara didn't need to turn around to be able to picture that expression of finely controlled rage and frustration twisting his beautiful features. His eyes would be narrowed and the skin of his scar would be stretched taut. His mouth would be thinned into a vicious slash with his chin jutting out stubbornly. When she did at last face him again, he was exactly as she had pictured him. "So you would continue to allow this man to betray you for what? Just to buy yourself a few more false allies who would stab you in the back as soon as they could? You let these men go free while they commit treason and crimes against your people." She was angry now just at the thought of it. That ship had been harassing islander villagers out of their last few coins. They were bullies. They were cowards. They were worse than any pirates she had ever met or commanded. She took a seat as her fury seethed inside of her and slammed her drink down on the tabletop, making the contents slosh over the sides and onto her knuckles.
"It isn't that simple. Not everything is black and white."
"Sometimes it is," she stated, crossing one leg over the other.
Another weary sigh escaped him as he pressed his palms flat against the splintered surface. It was almost a pleading gesture. "They are pressuring me to issue harsher punishments to people like you, Tara. No more fines and slaps on the wrist. They want to see heads roll. They want to see blood spilled, your blood in particular. You have cost them too much for them to sit idly by any longer."
She took a long draught before answering and surging to her feet again, pacing swiftly from one end of the tiny room to the other. "And what do you expect me to do?" she yelled, throwing her hands into the air, "To just stop? To turn a blind eye like you? Those people need me, Zuko. They have no one else."
"You can't save everyone," he said sadly, and he seemed to age ten years before her eyes in that moment. Suddenly, he looked far more like his uncle than his father as the frantic lamplight played across the creases on his brow and around his good eye that hadn't been there a few years ago.
She stilled and took in a deep gasp of air, struggling not to shudder at the unnamed thing that broke apart inside of her chest. "That doesn't mean I shouldn't try," she replied softly, thinking back on the brother she had left behind all those years ago. Sokka had died in the war before she had ever gotten to see him again. He had died as a warrior like he had always wanted, like their father before him, but he was still dead and nothing she did would ever bring him back.
"I'm not saying you shouldn't try, but maybe it's time . . . to give this up. You've done enough. You've given up enough of yourself for these people already. You don't have to do it anymore," he whispered.
"No," she said stonily as she set her glass down and stared at him. "That's not an option. It has never been an option for me."
"Don't you want a family? Children? A husband?" he asked as he looked up into her face, silently begging her to say that she would give up the only thing in her life that made her want to wake up in the morning.
Katara took an unsteady step forward, feeling the full effects of the drink now as she boldly leaned forward and cupped his noble face between her chapped and callused hands. She ran a thumb over the rough ridges of his scar, reveling in the feel of the tough skin beneath the pad of her finger. It was such a contrast to the rest of his smooth, moon-pale skin. "I did once," she breathed, "but that ship has long since sailed."
Then, she closed the space between them and sealed his mouth with hers. Zuko gave a contented murmur as her tongue darted along his bottom lip. His hands reached up and buried themselves in her unbound hair, his fingers knotting in her waves. She slid bonelessly into his lap without a thought and wrapped the crook of her elbow around his neck, drawing him closer to her. One hand untangled itself from her curls and glided over her shoulder to the small of her back. Pressing two warm fingertips into her tensed muscles, he drew small circles and felt her relax against him.
Managing to draw her mouth away from his, she asked, "What will you do?"
He blinked and shook his head slowly. "I don't know," the Fire Lord replied, still rubbing his fingers over her skin in a circular motion.
"Well, it doesn't matter. What will be will be. Let's talk of it no more," she stated and kissed him again before he could sputter out an answer.
His mouth hungrily answered hers and moved from her lips to her ear and down her neck to her collarbone. Katara gave a sigh of pleasure and came to her feet as he stood. His strong hands roved her bare skin as they snuck their way beneath her tunic and his fingers plucked at the bindings around her breasts. With fumbling fingers, she undid the clasp of his cloak and let it fall in a pool of darkness to the floor.
Without hesitation, Zuko undid the sash of her shirt and kissed the exposed skin of her slender shoulders as she slowly and carefully stepped backwards towards the thin mattress that served as her bed. They shed the rest of their clothing quickly and messily, leaving them in a scattered heap as he pressed her back against the wall.
His eyes shone golden in the dim light of the single candle left burning and his fingers gripped the smooth skin of her hip. The pirate ran a hand through his black hair and felt the strands fall freely against her palm. It was odd to realize that it wasn't bound in the topknot he normally wore but fell past his shoulders. Right now, he wasn't the Fire Lord despite how she had addressed him earlier. He was Zuko, and he was hers. Tomorrow morning when the sun crested the horizon he would leave her ship and go back to being a king as if nothing had happened between the two of them, but tonight, he was just the boy she had fallen for as a girl who had not known that you shouldn't love something you could never keep.
Thank you for reading! Please let me know what you thought of it.