We left the old man crying on the ground. He was pathetic and sad and alone, but I didn't feel any pity for him. How could I? He deserved everything he'd gotten.

Terrible images of him and my mother and the man I'd blood-bended filled my head as I tried to sleep, exhaustion finally catching up with me in the back of Appa's saddle.

I could see what would have happened, I'd wanted to happen, if I hadn't stopped the spikes. For a moment, I wished I had done it; I was ashamed to have my hands clean of this monster's blood.

And again I could see the look on my father's face as he pulled back the curtain and began howling and sobbing. It was so scary to see the strongest and bravest man I'd ever known break down.

Even Bato was crying as he restrained me and Sokka, still too small to break out of his grip, too small to see our mother's body. But I saw anyway, when the wind started throwing a tantrum too, horrifying and black and not my mother. I couldn't remember anything except screaming and thrashing against Bato until the next morning, when her body had been wrapped and blessed and released into the ocean. Gran-Gran fastened something around my neck, smooth and soft and heavy in the front.

"You need to be strong, Katara," she had said, wiping the tears from my cheeks. "You need to be strong for Daddy. If he sees you crying, then he will remember to be sad and he can't be strong for you and Sokka."

But even with justice available right in front of me, a flick of my wrist away from me, I couldn't do it. So much for strength.

"You must think I'm weak," I grumbled to Zuko, who was steering Appa. I sat up, not bothering with trying to sleep anymore, and leaned over the edge of the saddle to run my hands through Appa's fur. "Poor little Katara can't even kill a monster. I'm pathetic."

"I don't think you're weak," he said loftily, not looking away from the horizon. "I'm starting to think that Aang was right –maybe this was better than killing him. I mean –do you feel any better?"

Oh, great. Zuko wants to know how I feel. I bit my tongue, holding back my sarcasm –it was time to accept it: Zuko wasn't the enemy.

"Honestly? I don't feel any better. My mother's still dead at his hands and he's still walking around."

"It didn't help to confront him?" He still didn't bother turning around to face me, so intent on keeping Appa going the right way as if Appa needed directing, so I leaned against the saddle and we sat back to back.

"I guess it did. I mean, he's not just some nameless killer anymore. He's human and can be beaten just like the rest of us."

"That's what I've been thinking would have happened; I mean, I didn't have to kill my father to humanize him."

Zuko was always talking about his dad, but up until this point, if I had cared at all which I absolutely had not I had pushed it from my mind. Or, I realized with a twist in my stomach, I had made some scathing comment about it.

"What's your deal with your dad anyway?"

Now, he turned around and I met his raised eyebrows –well, eyebrow- with and expectant expression.

"You haven't heard?"

"The world doesn't revolve around you, Princey."

He blushed and looked back forward.

"Toph knew," he muttered, "she asked to touch my scar."

What did Zuko's scar have to do with the Fire Lord?

"Toph's a noble, Zuko. She's been educated to know all the world's nobility. Don't worry, Toph won't tell. I heard her yelling at Sokka and Aang. She said it's none of their business and that you'll tell them when you wanted to."

"Oh," he almost smiled. "They can know –I thought everyone knew. I've been called out by an Earth Kingdom… commoner before."

I rolled my eyes; "commoner" isn't any better than "peasant," idiot.

"Well, obviously Aang, Sokka, and I have been stuck in our respective blocks of ice," I closed my eyes and took a breath. I tried to speak empathetically. "Come on, Zuko. What happened?"

"I was thirteen and forced my way into a war meeting and I spoke out of turn. That was an act of disrespect and to learn my lesson, I had to fight him in an Agni Kai."

"Zuko, that's horrible." I couldn't stop myself; even though I wasn't particularly fond of Zuko and I had no idea what an Agni Kai was, I knew that being forced to fight his father was terrible.

"I didn't do it. I couldn't fight him –he was my father. He saw that as weak, so as punishment, he burned my face and told me I was banished until I captured the Avatar."

"But, when you were thirteen," I thought out loud and did the math in my head, "that must have been –what? Three or four years ago."

"Yeah; I got that."

I brushed off his sarcasm. "Aang would have still been in the iceberg then. No one had seen him for a hundred years…"

"I know."

I turned back around and pulled my knees to my chest, trying to compress away the empty feeling in my stomach.

His dad had given him that scar? I had always thought that he'd done something stupid and gotten himself hurt. I felt overwhelmed just hearing the story; poor Zuko, never thought I'd say that to have lived it.

I wasn't going to cry. I wasn't. I shouldn't have felt guilty for being so mean to him, he betrayed us before, he could have hurt Aang but I did. I was a horrible person, but so was he. Well, we could be horrible people together.

Or we could be good people together. Maybe we could change; I could be nicer (like Aang had been asking the whole time) and, well, Zuko had already changed. I'd just been ignoring it.

Maybe after the war was over, I could share my family with Zuko. I thought back over the past week and remembered; Zuko and my dad talking weapons and philosophy, Zuko carrying Toph around on his back at her command, pretending to be grumpy but not quite hiding his smile, Zuko caving in and doing the Dragon Dance please-oh-please-just-one-more-time-Sifu-Hotman, Sokka leaning over and clapping Zuko on the back, grinning and offering to share his dinner because I had "dropped" the rest on the ground before Zuko could get any. I was already sharing my family with Zuko.

"Hey, Zuko?" I said softly and I think I startled him; he must have thought I was asleep.

"Yeah, Katara?"

"I'm sorry."

He didn't ask for what or do anything but nod and almost smile before turning around. I was nearly asleep when he finally spoke.

"Thanks. Me too."

"I know."