Zuko's search brought him to a small village that had once belonged to the Fire Nation.
He stood out side the walls, the red flag that had once waved in the sky gone, a new green flag now dancing in the sky. It greeted visitors in warmth, a way that the red flag had never done for the people of this town.
The Fire Lord crouched and leap up, scaling the wall and grappling onto the stone ledge. He scampered halfway down the other side of the wall and jumped down, landing gracefully on his feet. He had dropped underneath a clothing line, a pair of green pants tickling Zuko's nose.
He stayed behind the line of clothing, masking his presence as a few towns people wandered by. He felt jitters run through his body - a feeling that the Fire Lord had not felt for a very long time. He peeked around a fluffy pink towel, his hand shaking like the first day he had blocked the lightening attack his father had used against him.
He scanned quickly, his scar showing; it was a mark that few people did not recognize. Fewer still knew how Zuko had received the mark so long ago.
Zuko pulled his hood further down his forehead, the shadow covering his red scar. A girl and boy past him, their hands clutched together, their eyes and ears oblivious to their surroundings.
The Fire Lord sneaked out from behind the towel as the couple turned around a bend in the street, the street now bare.
He dismissed the idea of snatching up the pink towel as he left and keeping it for later in case he did not find a place to sleep. A younger Zuko would have nabbed the towel without a second thought (perhaps three seconds because it was pink), however the new Zuko - Fire Lord Zuko - banished the thought. He now had enough money to support five towns, and starting his new position as Fire Lord would not go so well if word got around that he was a laundry thief.
Pausing to laugh at himself, Zuko imagined the names his people would cal him and how Aang and most assuredly Sokka would never let him live them down.
The Fired Lord's grin grew at the thought of his friends, a term that he had not truly understood two years ago.
He wondered how Aang was doing handling the Fire people as their lord took a short sabbatical.
There was a short tug in his heart as he thought of Mai back home, but Zuko continued forward beyond the layers of laundry into the heart of the Earth bending town.
Zuko walked to a tiny tea house reminiscent of the one his uncle owned. Days of serving tea in blessed peace circled through Zuko's mind. It had been the most relaxing time of Zuko's life, and the smell of tea brewing away still comforted the Fire Lord. Now his servants eyed him strangely if he tired to brew and pour them tea.
Pleasant thoughts drifted way as he entered the tea shop, his stomach fluttering and jumping like butterfly-grasshoppers going from branch to branch.
His heart thumped like Earth benders doing their annual dance to the gods as he spotted an older woman with her hair tied back in a bun. Years of worry and sorrow were etched into the woman's face in tiny wrinkles around her lips and eyes. But to Zuko she looked like the most beautiful woman in the world.
Zuko's heart could not stop its drumming as he approached the woman, his hand reaching out.
"Mother." He said.
The woman looked up, the tray of tea in her hands wobbling. She let it drop as Zuko put his hands on her arms, tea trickling from the tea pot like the tears falling from her eyes.
Like Iroh had taken Zuko to his chest in a fierce hug long ago, his mother grabbed Zuko into an embrace, tears sinking into his hood.
His heart finally finding peace, Zuko cried into the scent of chai tea and soft green clothing, his own name being whispered with love into his ear.
