Hi everyone!
This is my first fanfiction EVER. I'm Italian, so English isn't my first language and I'm being very insecure. But, apparently, my brain just refuses to write in Italian. So... please be understanding!
This fanfic is another "what if" after the ending of the canon ATLA series. It's rated M (MA wannabe; nothing too fancy, but I don't want to restrain myself). So please no kids ^^ I'm writing as if Korra and the comics do not exist.
There will be smutty content. Explicit. But I really care about building a plausible plot and staying IC. I want to develop the characters and give who's reading an insight of ATLA's world...so there will be action, politics, love...anything I feel like writing. I don't want to spoiler it too much...This want to be a slow path. I think it will be a long story. Also, I won't be killing our babies. I love them too much! I'm trying to keep it realistic, so I did some historical research. The plot won't be just fluff and love. Also...my sense of humor is like Katara's. I guess I just cant' keep it funny.
You have been warned.
THE TITLE AND THE CHAPTERS MAY CHANGE because this story it's ONGOING. But I have the complete plot scheme written down, so I guess I WILL finish it sooner or later. The cover of the fanfic is a fan art that I did. That one it's also a wip, I will manage to paint it all one day...
A BIG THANK to everyone of my favourite fanfiction writer. Before I started my own, I read many and they have been an inspiration. Here's the list: Rhythm of the rain; The confrontational aproach; Another world of alchemy; Sparrowkeet Series; Confused; Once around the sun; Call me Katto; The king's pet or the king; His majesty prefers blue; Whose hearths are mountains; Dancing in the dark. I may be forgetting some...
Of course I do not own ATLA, just borrowing its universe.
One last thing: please, review a little. I don't care about how many will read and review this fic, but I need to know that someone is reading my story and I'm uploading more chapters for them. And thank you, Carolyn, for being my beta reader!
So...any Zutard like me out here that still hand't had enough fanfictions? :D
Chapter 1
Chapter 1
That evening was especially chilly. Of course, she was used to it. But it was in evenings like that one that she thought about the fire nation. She saw in her mind the sunny seashores, she felt the pleasant, almost excessive heat that used to endure all day and night. She remembered she was a little embarrassed, at first, about the amount of naked skin her fire nation clothes showed, but, after a while, after she had the time to notice that every other woman wore them casually and gracefully, she admitted they were very comfortable if compared to the heavy, hulking parka she wore in the South Pole.
Katara was looking toward the sea, half daydreaming, half thinking about her chores.
She had to go in the hut where the women were drying the last caught fish, she knew her waterbending was very much appreciated there.
But she was no longer the only waterbender in the south pole, now.
Since the ships from the northern water tribe had arrived there were a lot of waterbenders around -not girls, though. And for sure the northern tribesmen didn't help much with the food, aside when it was time to eat it. Apparently, traveling so far was a little bit inappropriate according to northern water tribe costumes. She even heard, from some of the boys, that it was a common belief that a woman could bring bad luck on a boat...and she wondered how her Gran Gran had traveled at her time. Had she faked herself a man...?
"Katara! Look at the lion seal I caught with dad!" Sokka was behind her, holding the great dead mammal from the tail. Her brother had grown up a lot.
Finally eating properly after the war, he was almost as tall as her dad. And he was now looking rather proud.
"That's great, Sokka. I'll take care of it from now." She replied with a smile.
"Will you make that amaaaazing seal stew tonight?" he asked, a hint of hope and delight in his voice.
"Sure I will, Sokka.".
She had really thought that her brother was just a glutton, in the past year, and of course he was, but lately she realized that he probably endured malnutrition, rather than gluttony, during the war. Aang was just a child then, and she just could not think about food when she was nervous. But her brother was in the middle of his growth and he probably had needed more than them. He was now so much taller and wider, and he had grown so quickly in the past few months that she guessed he really could have used more proper food in their travels with Aang.
Aang...how she missed him.
"Come on Katara, I'll escort you" Sokka said with a grin.
"Yeah... just because you are a gentleman. This has nothing to do with show off with the girls, I suppose..."
They started walking from the shores towards the city.
"Of course it's because I am a gentleman! -he looked rather offended- And besides, Suki should be here in a couple of weeks..." He smiled faintly, then grinned again once they reached the hut.
"Ladies, I think this mighty hunter has brought you a fair loot today"
Kuta, one of the older women, smiled to him cheerfully.
"Sokka, soon you are going to be a fine chief, just as your father.".
"But not nearly as modest as him..." another one said, and they giggled.
"And why should he be? He's Sokka, beloved of the moon, brave warrior during the battle of Sozin and the southern tribe sword master!".
Katara smiled, hearing the praises. They were true, but she suspected Huila had a little crush for her older brother.
"Please, ladies, please, I just came here to escort my sister, nothing more. I will now join my dad and the warriors. we are planning to build a new wall on the western side of the city. Not that we really need protection, now that the war's over...but since in a few months the fire nation representatives will be here, why not show off?"
With a wide grin on his face, and a more tender one for his sister, Sokka walked away.
Katara started to clean up an butcher the seal lion, proud of him.
But then, she felt a little stingy feeling in her stomach.
What Huila and Kuta said was true...he had really become a warrior. And his love for Yue, since it had been pure till the end, and so impossible and hearth breaking, had almost become a legend in both the Northern and the Southern Water Tribe. Despite the bitter resentment of Han, the Fire Nation and the Earth Kingdom were not the only ones to have a certain inclination for romantic tragedies and legends. Especially if two war heroes, as Yue and Sokka, were involved in the matter.
Plus, everyone knew he was smart. He and Perruk, one of the skilled Northern Tribe's waterbender, had planned together the whole city that was now under construction. Everyone looked up to him asking for advice and strategies, and...well, for sure he deserved it. Everyone look at him as the future chief, as it was right.
And yet...
No one actually asked her for advice or some kind of help different from drying the seaweeds and sea prunes or made some bruises fade away. She was the only southern waterbender, so there was no one she could really teach, and there was no one she could train with. She was not just known to be stronger than the other waterbenders, and she knew it. They would't fight her because she was a woman. Despite Pakku, who still respected her, it seemed that the strong patriarch rooted culture made impossible for her to have a sparring partner. When she had tried to join them, no one took her seriously. Of the few who tried to battle her, everyone seemed to go easy on her, just, apparently, so they could later say to the others that "I just let her win, she's such a sweet girl.". And she knew that, if they took her seriously , she would defeat them and they would just feel humiliated, so they just seemed to avoid the competition and resize her abilities. She heard from her father that some of them even expressed an interest in her, as a possible bride.
That she was, to them. A woman, a bride. The daughter of the chief. Maybe a valuable healer, and that was not such a rare thing in the Northern Water Tribe.
Definitly not a warrior.
Her former master, since his reunion with Gran Gran, had retired from teaching or fighting and choose just to help with the reconstruction.
And she was not going to complain to him about this. Or to complain at all.
What was the use of it?
For the bending, she could be patient and wait for Aang to return at least, she thought with a smile.
But under this feeling, there was another, a more subtle one.
She tried not to think about it, but, as she was cutting meat chunks, Huila's words echoed in her mind..."swordsman, beloved of the moon, southern tribe warrior..."
No one.
Just no one. Not even one person aside from her father asked her to tell tehm about the battle against the Fire Lord.
The Fire Lord. Former Fire Lord Azula.
Which she had defeated.
Saving current Fire Lord Zuko.
Not that she wanted to be praised or something...but yes, maybe it was not fair to not even be acknowledged. She wanted to be acknowledge for something else than a woman, a daughter, a sister.
That, she had always been.
But the travels of Aang were also hers, and those travels changed her.
One hand flowed from the meat tho the stomach, just above her navel.
Those travels changed her a lot. She wasn't even sure what she had become...but she was not just...
"KATARA! What in the world are you doing with that meat, for La's sake?"
Katara startled and looked at the table.
The meat in front of her was not just butchered, it was ripped apart in smashed, uneven pieces.
She blushed.
"I'm so sorry, Kuta, I got distracted. I think my cycle may be close now and my head is spinning a little." she lied.
"Oh, poor dear. Come on, go rest for a while.I know you'll come back and fix it better than I could!"
Her cycle was a recent new, she guessed her body had to catch up just as Sokka's, but she was learning quickly how to use "the curse" as an advantage.
She shook her head and started to work on the meat again.
The truth was, she probably got angry and didn't even notice she was.
But she could't let her nasty feeling got her so easily. She sighed.
She was the daughter of the head of the tribe.
She had to help her people and not be a self centered girl.
And, she thought with a smile, Aang, the Avatar, was her sweetheart.
What could she ask more?
She was home.
He was home.
And, Agni, he was about to hate it.
The paperwork on his desk was piling, and it was so much he was starting to be anxious just thinking about it. And it didn't matter how much he was strict with his schedule, the amount of work didn't even seem to be near diminishing.
Yet he couldn't ask his uncle to help him, since he thought the old man deserved to rest after the war and all, and he didn' have any counselors he trusted enough to help him. Well, besides Kui. But Kui was just one person. An he was the Fire Lord.
The Fire Court, he thought, was a nest of vipers.
Some of the nobles were faithful to him, or, to be honest, to Iroh, since no one really thought he had proved himself as a capable Fire Lord yet. But at least the were no enemies, and he had some support in his decisions. Someone really wanted peace, as he wanted.
But some others, he knew, just saw in him the banished prince, the one who ended a rightful wars for the greatest nation supremacy. And they, of course, disapproved of him in silence, from the shadows of the palace, dropping hints about his lack of expertise in apparently harmless talk.
Mai wouldn't help. She was smart enough, competent enough, but she just would't.
Of course, it was boring for her to do so.
She tried to help, once or twice, but she ended up losing her concentration and making him lose his.
In rather...pleasant ways, sure, but she wanted his attention constantly and sometimes he just had to work.
Zuko let his head fall back on his shoulders to stare at the ceiling of his office.
There was a huge mosaic, all in various tints of red, pale gold and dark brown, that represented the four nations, considerably out of proportions. The Fire Lord knew, and knew it by personal experience if not just by general culture, that the Earth Kingdom was much, very much larger than how it was depicted. His eyes followed the edges of the Earth Kingdom, and for a moment he allowed himself to close his eyes.
The Earth Kingdom...it had been so painful. When he was alone, travelling on a starving ostrich horse, probably just as famished as he was, he had thought that hunger was not such a bad thing. He could tell that his muscles were becoming thinner, smaller and smaller. A part of him, even if he didn't want to admit it, was beginning to welcome the hunger as a friend...it could have made him so slim that he would became invisible to the world. Just fading.
It had been so painful to live there, rejected by everyone, when he and his uncle were still exiles. He had felt so powerless, so useless for everyone, even himself. Like every action he would try to perform was destined to faliure, to end into nothingness. Like he was destined to fade into nothingness. Like he wasn't even supposed to be alive. And he had thought, back then, to end it. Just end this constant pain, disappointment, for he was a disappointment even for himself, to end it in a honorable manner. And, in joining the emptiness, be finally at peace.
Unaware of himself doing so, the right hand of the Fire Lord reached the opposite wrist. Of the many, oh so many scars he had, this one he had inflicted upon his own body. Just a pale, vertical line, that could now only remind him about how unbelievably stupid he had been at the time. He was in Ba Sing Se, in the tea shop he and his uncle worked in. He remembered how coldly had he pushed the blade of a knife on his skin , looking at the blood pouring, not feeling any pain, just like there was another person doing that.
He didn't even want to die. He didn't felt pity for his own condition.
He had just wanted to...fade.
To be gone.
Because it seemed like the right thing to be.
Because who could ever want him to exist, if his own father, the only parent he had left, didn't event want to be his father.
He definitely knew better, now. And he wasn't even too sure yet about why he had stopped himself that time.
Probably, because he remembered that he had things to do. He had to improve. He really had to improve at what he did, and what he was. If all he had to bee was Iroh nephew, then he had to be a better one. And he had to be a better firebender. A better swordsman.
And so, if he fought and fought well, that was still one thing he knew for sure he could be: better. He could always be better than he had been before.
He sighed and scowled, and let his head sink between his hands.
Ba Sing Se. The Earth Kingdom. King Kuei and the Dai Li. Dai Li...skilled, expert fighters, war veterans.
Damn, the war veterans. That reminded him of something.
The door of his office opened whitout notice, and Zuko saw the wide shoulders of an old man entering the room.
"Good evening, nephew. How are you doing?"
Iroh came into the room without being announced, as he probably requested to the guards outside.
He was carrying a large tray with both hands and, on it, a tea pot and some pastries.
"Fine, uncle. How did your evening go?"
"Ah, as it went just as I could wish for, my nephew. I went shopping with your...rather quiet and beautiful friend, Lady Mai. She has not the richest conversation, but she has quite a nice taste for fabric and hair ornaments."
"...uncle, why would you even care for hair ornaments?!"
"Beauty comes in many forms, my nephew, and the wise man does not despise any of them. Besides, look at this awesome color!" and with a wide grin he pulled out of his sleeve a golden pin, and almost threw it to Zuko's eyes, caught in the enthusiasm of his last purchase.
"It would look lovely with your eyes!"
"...uncle...I am not..." Zuko mumbled, he was about to say that the would not wear a hair pin, but then he couldn't suppress a smile. At least it was not uncommon for fire nation aristocracy to wear ornaments and jewels.
"Thank you, uncle. I'm sure it will.".
He gracefully took the pin and suddenly remembered that something was on his mind before his uncle joined him.
"Do you care for a cup of tea?" asked Iroh, even if he had already stared pouring the second one.
-No use, really- thought the Fire Lord, moving aside the authorization papers for the building of the new, big and hopefully international messenger hawk center.
Despite is mental muttering, the hot tea was a relief.
Iroh was quickly scanning the paperworks on the desk.
"I see, so the veterans are still asking for the land your father promised to them.".
Zuko was relieved by his uncle's interest. He didn't ask for it, but when the help came it was so much appreciated.
"Yes, they did. But the western governor of the Earth Kingdom insists he wants full control over the former colonies, and our people back in our land. But they worked there for years! In some cases for more than one generation. I'm not sure about this, but I think there are some mixed marriages. I can't just ask them to leave.". The temperature in the room seemed to raise just a little.
Iroh smiled, understandingly.
"So, let's see what can be done.".