day 1: hands
Theirs is a story of hands, of give and take, of summer skies wrapped around a wrist and eternity held in the press of a palm, and each exchange builds towards his sacrifice from the start, and her surrender:
Zuko always gives: a slice of hand through the air and his fire lashes out at her. Lies. Hate. Hurt. That is how they touch, but only in the beginning. Katara counters with the true grace of a Moon child; there is perfect ebb and flow in her anger, her hate, her determination—go jump in the river. Zuko threatens her with false pretenses, hides behind a gash of fearsome red scar, and eagerly laps up whatever fear she can spare, like a fire gone wild. Fear is good; fear he can use—it is always a trade, after all. Beggars can't be choosers: peasant or prince, children of war are forever starving. Zuko doesn't know much, but he knows that.
There is an in-between, that one would be likely to overlook for it is mundane and quite a small-scale happening, but large in significance: it is morning when the sky burns, and Prince Zuko ends up with a blue necklace in his hand—and thinks of salt water trails against bronze skin. The harsh angles of his face thaw a little, but are still a far cry from the seamless, scarless surface his thumb rests again.
There is change—Katara still never gives; she loses pieces of herself. A dropped pendant, a shared glance, a hitched breath—but it is not until their next meeting, under green-hued caves—a safe place, a neutral place—when she ends up cradling his face in her palm, owning a part of him he's never allowed anyone to before, that it becomes clear, definite... (tangible). His face, a prince's face, a warrior's face, a boy's face. In that moment, Katara knows terror and heartache like she never has, like she knows she won't even remember later. But this particular exchange is of a particularly strange nature, an actual touch, so vastly different from the touch of waterwhips with fireballs or that shared by day and night at dawn(—but still somehow the exact same). Things thaw and shatter underneath this touch, no longer the easy black and white, the enemy and the friend—trembling lips against her thumb, this is the most generous she's ever seen him, the most foolish, what is he doing.
But it is later, much later, after the smoke and the crackle of electricity that proves everything a lie, a false trade, (but still very much not the last exchange one would expect it to be, given the ugliness of his betrayal or the limitlessness of her anger and hurt) the ice in her solidifies to a crystal. It is almost, almost a safety precaution, but his breath clings to her fingertips still and she thinks, warning, it's a warning. His had been rage, a wildfire chasing into her dreams, but hers will be fury. Hers would be inescapable. Unbreakable.
The next time he comes, he is broken. (And it is not necessarily her he wants something from. The thought makes her seethe for a moment; ask me, she wants to say.) She should see the break in him like it has always been there, of course—like she does behind closed lids—but Katara is stubborn and proud and furious. She threatens, she is cruel, and for the first time she gives. Gives him a taste of the scorn he used to wear like armour back in the day, observes his shame and humiliation in satisfaction, cringes at the weight in her stomach, holds her tongue for a while, and reverts to the same routine over breakfast each day. Old habits die hard though, even for a water child, and she finds herself losing again—losing to him. Bigger things than she used to, pieces of herself: compassion, trust, desire, dreams. Forgiveness is lost via an unusually gentle press of an earthenware bowl of rice into his awaiting palm, trust via the clasp of her arms around his frame after he gives her her mother's killer—and he doesn't even know it. (Her fury is still in place though, chipping away, and all efforts to thaw it completely would still fall flat, save for time's. One day soon, she'd let it go, she swears, but then—)
But then.
He gives her his life, without so much of a here, Katara, this is for you—and it's too much, it's all too much, don't Zuko, I can't Zuko, not without you Zuko—
She is probably a little too slow, a little too late, but Katara has finally learned how he does it. The giving.
She eases life back into him with a glove of her water—hands, why does it always come back to hands?—and she catches his fingers, and then later, much later, as he moves over her and presses butterfly kisses to her jawline, she holds his gaze and brings his palm up to meld against the pendant that lies against the hollow of her throat.
The first and last piece of her armour is off in a second, and she lays before him completely naked.