Chapter II: Shadow

What seems to be shadow,

May yet lie in light,

While the glint of an arrow,

May yet stay in flight.

"A word with you, General Hang."

The noble turned slowly, elegantly, befitting his station. And when he saw who his visitor was, an ironic smirk draped the edge of his mouth. Carefully folding his arms into his sleeves, he stood straight and unbending beneath his heavy robe. "How may I assist you, Chief Advisor Hui?"

The old man glided towards the General and the window behind him. Sunlight streaked through, both illuminating the Fire Nation Capitol below and casting some of its sleek red structures and sharp golden edges in shadow. "What is your stance on the refugees, Hang?"

So formalities were to be dispensed quickly. What's the old lynx-fox up to now? The General raised an edged eyebrow and decided to play anyway. "Do you mean personally, or as a representative of my rather... relevant portfolio?"

Hui joined him side by side, and the two men stared out at the city below. "Are you saying that the two differ?"

Hang did not turn to face him, only brooded with a sort of casual aloofness. Below, the commoners were milling, a sea of red amongst the grey streets. He wondered which ones were new to the city and its hotbed of politics and dead ends. "We are at... peace now," he shrugged languidly, ironically. The words tasted like iron on his tongue. "If bandits are the worst problem we face, then I'm sure it's a matter for Sheng and not I where the refugees flee."

"I've talked to Sheng," Hui's voice was measured, soft, giving nothing away. "The influx of people is making his job much more difficult."

Hang felt something in him tense. "I'd imagine it would," he said outwardly. But inside, something was beginning to spin. I paid off my debt to him with the asinine information he wanted. What does he want now? And what does Hui have to do with this?

The Chief Advisor smiled softly. The action, and the benign glow it cast around the old man's face, did nothing to quell Hang's rising paranoia. "You have always had a fine eye for assessing the situation, General. I merely ask for your opinion on this now to enlighten me."

You mean you want to know how I'll stand when the meeting comes around. Hang licked his lips and stroked his fingertips against the underside of his sleeves. The soft, silky material was very different to the ceremonial armour he once donned, but this didn't feel like any less of a battlefield. What did he say again in the last meeting? Ah yes. Providing shelter. "In the current circumstances, I do not see how we can turn them away," he spoke slowly, measuredly, clinically. "They are after all our people. And with the fractures of the war's end..." a war we should have won, "... we would be inviting peril to split our own citizen's safety like that." Is a rebellion what you want, old man? Or are you trying to prevent it? What do you want from me?

Hui shifted. "So you think that we should take the risk that there will be not enough food for Autumn? Or change our trade policies to import more and strain our already strained economy? Will problems like these not also invite peril?"

The words could have sounded accusing out of anyone else's mouth, but Hang counterintuitively relaxed. So perhaps the Chief Advisor was merely sounding things out, as he had often done with him in the old days. Before things had changed... he had changed. Hang's movement to relax became a multidimensional grimace.

"Peril appears to be invited on all sides," he finally said laconically. Good, good. That's good. Keep up the facade, don't think about the next hour, don't think about the need. "But I do believe that the lesser immediate evil is to give them shelter. We've had news of only a fourth wave, and nothing after that, correct?"

At Hui's placid nod, he forged on. "Then according to the calculations brought to us by Duong, they will fill up the remainder of the city's limits." He cast an eye down at the vista before him - the crowded Fire Nation Marketplace, the twisting alleys behind the grandness of the nobel houses. A packed, bulging city emerging from a war. Perhaps this is a relevant matter for my portfolio. But then again, he'd known it always had been. "We will be strained."

Hui followed his gaze, looking down at the Fire Nation commoners below. Hang wondered what he saw in them. "Or perhaps not," he said quietly. "You know as well as I do the existence of the empty barracks. What do you think of my suggestion?"

It took Hang only a second to remember exactly what Hui was talking about. Outside the walls of the Capitol, crude garrisons had sprung up in anticipation of guarding the walls from the Avatar's attack. There would be room enough for refugees in their current abandoned state, and it would certainly lessen the tension of a city packed to its limits. Nevertheless, it also put them outside the protection of the Capitol's gates, and the consummate battle tactician in him instinctively rebelled at that thought. What would be worse, a city packed to its limits or a demoralising slaughter of our citizens on our doorstep in the event of an invasion? Both would look terrible on the traitor prince, that's for certain. I wonder...

He blinked. Hui was still regarding him, and he had to solidly shift himself out of the mindset of the General. Remember, we're at peace. The thought rolled around like a mockery in his mind. It had only been after the Avatar had defeated Ozai, after all, that he'd seriously begun worrying about an attack on the Fire Nation Capitol itself. The day of the Black Sun hadn't even counted - his and Princess Azula's execution of that had been near flawless.

But now?

"There is a risk with every decision we make," he said neutrally, but inside he suddenly felt tired. Very, very tired. And jumpy at the same time. Hang recognised the feeling and cursed, brushing his fingers along the underside of his robes again to calm himself. Soon, very soon...

He abruptly pulled himself together when he realised just how scrutinising Hui's gaze was. Hang managed to stop himself from paling underneath his already ghostly pallor by sheer will and experience alone. Hui smiled.

"Thank you, my friend," he said softly. "You know as always I value your opinion."

Hang eyed him warily as the Chief Advisor turned to move. Surely that can't be it? He must have more up his sleeve.

But then it seemed he didn't. Hui glided back towards the corridor leading into the wings of the Palace, and Hang's tense muscles twitched all the way beneath the pool of arrogance surrounding him. Every step that the Chief Advisor took away seemed to loosen the nerves in his arms. Perhaps it was what it seemed. Perhaps things were over...

Hui stopped, regarded him, and Hang's heart sank at the relentlessness of that gaze.

"I know you are a man of your habits, General."

Hang froze, and this time no amount of self-control, no amount of years spent in the Fire Nation courts and as Minister to Ozai, could prevent what little colour he had from draining from his cheeks. He knows? He knows? Dammit, what did Sheng tell him?!

Hui paused, as if he hadn't noticed the effect he'd had. And then his face softened. "Do try to take care of yourself. The Fire Nation needs you."

And then he turned and finally left. Left, leaving Hang's head spinning and his suddenly nerveless fingers clutching at the windowsill.

Somewhere in the same wing of the expansive Fire Nation Palace, the ever-present fire snapped in the corner of Fire Lord Zuko's study room. Outside, the morning was clear, fresh, and already hot - the sun burning down from its ascent to the precipice of the sky. But between the four youths, the air was cool, the burden of their passing pressing down on them like cold stone.

Recollecting her senses, Mai was the first to speak again. "Even if things in the other lands are going badly, we have other things to worry about," she said brusquely. Shen Li was the only one who caught her slight hesitation before she shifted her eyes to him. "That's enough from us. Have you found any leads on who tried to kill Zuko yet?"

The guard captain shifted his stance, just enough so that the shadow of one arm brushed against the other. The effect was subtle, but clear. "Am I to add spymaster to my already impressive portfolio?" He said it lightly, but the way their eyes locked told her well enough what he thought. "As far as I know, my father has been the one dealing with it."

"Yes, he is," Zuko affirmed. "But since he hasn't reported anything to me yet, I'm afraid nothing has been found."

At that, Mai raised yet another eyebrow. Out of the corner of her gaze, she wasn't half surprised to see her suspicion mirrored on Shen Li's face. It's like you think in sync, a nasty little voice in the back of her mind commented drolly. What are you going to do next? Start swooning every time he's near?

Luckily, Zuko's cough distracted everyone's attention from the sudden angry flush in Mai's pale cheeks. "Okay fine, so maybe something has been found but I'm not sure. I... I haven't really had the time to go to the Tower yet, despite meaning to." The Fire Lord sighed and rolled his shoulders. "What with riots happening every two days... if I went to the Tower it's likely I wouldn't be back until sunset."

Across from her, Katara's water-blue eyes narrowed. "So you're telling me that you have the person who tried to kill you locked up, as well as the leaders of the riots, and you haven't figured out yet how to deal with the people stirring up against you?"

The Fire Lord almost threw his hands up in exasperation. Mai clinically noted that he looked more frazzled than she'd seen him last. More animated. She wondered whether that was due to his grueling readaptation to Court ways in the last few days or whether it was because of the present company.

"It's not as if I can do everything myself here, you know!" he shook his head, irony dripping from his caustic smile. "I think our family has had enough of madness. No. I know how important this stuff is, but I have to delegate."

Mai spoke before she could stop herself. Not that she would have. There had been many a time she'd said something unsavoury to Azula's ear, knowing the very real and present threat that she might get singed for it. Now she had no such fear. "So you've delegated it to General Sheng. You know, the same man who allowed the assassin to slip through security in the first place?"

She almost regretted it, almost, when a heavy weight sank down on his features. Zuko slowly sat back, looking inordinately tired.

"If I can't trust my Ministers," he muttered, "Then who am I supposed to trust?"

It sounded half like he was talking to himself - as if he'd forgotten everyone else was in the room. But Mai frowned anyway.

"No-one," she answered roughly, before anyone else could. What was wrong with him? Trust? That was laughable in the Fire Nation Court, even amongst your own family members. She refused to acknowledge the little voice in the back of her mind. Funny how you trusted him. Almost. And now you almost trust her too... are you getting soft? "Are you insane, Zuko? What's gotten into you?"

She ignored the sharp reprimand in her voice, and the way it made made him recoil, just a little, before he straightened and the distance sloughed away. "I don't need a lecture, Mai."

"Maybe you do." The room was suddenly warm. She felt Shen Li's gaze on her, his dark eyes strangely knowing, and Mai slowly curled her fingers into fists underneath her sleeves. "You want to trust your Ministers, the men that advised your Father?"

Zuko levelled his glance at her, and she stiffened under the combined force of both of them. "I need to trust someone," he said raspily. "If I'm going to get this nation back on its feet, I can't do it alone."

He paused, and something fell away from his face to reveal calculated determination underneath. "If I learned anything from my time travelling with Avatar, it might just be that."

Mai opened her mouth to reply and shut it. Anger was beginning to bubble up in her stomach now, at both of them, and she refused to let it dictate her words. Instead, she subsided, kept her face straight and pale, and focused on Katara as a distraction. To tell the truth, she was also surprised the girl had stayed silent for so long, just watching and listening. From the way her eyes were darting back and forth so obviously, from the slight indentation on her lip, from the expressions that chased themselves openly across her face, Mai wondered if the waterbender knew she was out of her depth.

And then, of course, she opened her mouth and Mai remembered she had to stop being surprised.

"How bad exactly are things with your Ministers?" Katara asked carefully. "You said earlier that none of them are outwardly revolting, right?"

Zuko pulled a face. "No," he said grudgingly. "But there have been plenty of power politics nonetheless. Most of the Ministers represent portfolios that will necessarily come into conflict with each other because we don't have enough money to fund everyone. Not to mention, there are a few individuals who have made it worse. The Minister for War, General Hang, has been openly disrespectful. My Minister of Security, General Sheng, hasn't been much better."

Zuko's eyes flicked to Shen Li. "No offence."

At Katara's questioning look, the guard captain shrugged easily behind his shuttered face. "He's my father," he explained neutrally.

Mai's eyes narrowed as she remembered. How did you even forget? she questioned herself irately. Above all, his family is one of the highest in the Nation. That means he's an accomplished political player in his own right, not just an... interesting conundrum. "In that case, do you know anything about how his investigation is progressing?"

Shen Li turned to look at her sharply. It was only a second faster than a reasonable shift of attention would have been, but it was more than enough to intensify Mai's suspicions. "It's not exactly something one discusses over the dinner table," he said, his voice light yet again. "So no, not exactly."

You're not exactly someone I should trust with anything, and yet you're standing in the Fire Lord's inner sanctum and I've sworn to follow him. Mai was about to utter the words, or at least something like them, when Katara stepped it.

"Come on, this isn't helping anyone," the waterbender offered her hands palm up in placation. "What if... I don't know. The problem is that we need to find out who or what was behind the assassination and the riots, right? And if they were connected? Yet you're also unsure about your Minister."

Mai let the breath die in her throat and reaffirmed her own iron control. Shen Li relaxed slightly. Zuko nodded. Katara continued.

"Then why don't I go investigate for you?" she asked. "That way I can help speed up the process, as well as keep an eye for any discrepancies of this General Sheng."

She paused self-consciously when all of their eyes fell on her. "What? It's not as if I'm doing anything else at the moment. I..." something indescribable rushed from her face. "Everyone else is doing their bit. Even Sokka."

Zuko swallowed. "It's not that," he said hesitantly. "It's just that..."

"You're a waterbender, Lady Katara," Shen Li said carefully. "These are not the people who remembered how you saved their lives on the day of Sozin's comet, nor the villagers you've helped. These are people who want Zuko dead, and therefore would prefer you dead too. Not to mention the sentiments running hot amidst the city at the moment. It will be difficult for you to find out anything alone."

Mai counted internally to ten. "But she won't be alone, will she?"

The question hung in the air like a knife, or perhaps a spray of wires. Shen Li tensed, his features unreadable. Katara turned to her with a surprised but not unwelcoming smile. Zuko seemed to visibly relax, until he was just a proud, noble youth with a crown in his hair.

"You... the both of you have already done so much when you didn't have to," he seemed amazed, shook his head like a man waking out of a dream. "Thank you."

Katara made an unladylike noise at the back of her throat. "Oh Zuko, don't be ridiculous."

Her blue eyes were wide and unprotected, and so Mai could see the warmth leaking out of them. "You're not the only one in this. We all are, and you know you can trust us."

Mai looked at the waterbender silently and agreed. But then when her gaze slid back to the other occupant in the room, she paused.

Despite his relaxed posture and easy smile, Mai could see the slight ridges of tense muscle, strain in his neck. Something was off about him. She could sense it. And she thought that maybe Katara's us might need a little redefining.

Toph ploughed through stone and mortar like they were dust.

It didn't particularly matter - certainly not to her, that the bricks and shuddering foundations that blocked and barred her way were both towering over her and aflame. She merely shoved her bare, calloused feet down, one after the other, and felt the earth mould to her will underneath her. One by one, the buildings that were collapsing were shored up, and she smiled grimly as she made her way through the streets. Whoever had planned this hadn't counted on her. The greatest Earthbender in the world. It showed.

Behind her, she could feel the presence of Aang. The normal lightness of his step was grounded by his short, punctuated pauses as he too reached into the earth and brought up stone - as supports, to put out the fire, to serve as a wall.

But in the five minutes since they'd landed, things had changed. Toph could already feel the disjointed heartbeat of Ba Sing Se begin to slow, begin to return to its own organised chaos. Sure, there were people still fighting, houses still burning, but it wasn't just the Avatar and his earthbending teacher trying to contain the flame and save people. In good, common sense Earth Kingdom fashion, the majority of the people affected had already located water, had shored up their houses, had joined efforts to beat down the flames, and she felt an unacknowledged sense of pride well up within her.

A sense of pride accompanied by one of practicality. Toph pursed her lips and sent earth rolling over another wave of flame, feeling the wet sod underneath the torn up flagstones meet the fire with a hiss of steam. "Twinkletoes! I think it's time to leave it to the locals and head to the more important stuff."

The reverberations of his surprise travelled through her skin, and she felt the earth he was carrying falter. "Huh?"

Toph loudly sighed, blowing the stone-dust off her fringe. "The worst is over. We've got better things to do than make sure more houses don't fall down. You know, like find out who did this in the first place before the trail gets cold."

She could almost sense the movement of his eyelashes as he blinked. Or rather, she just knew he was doing it in the sudden nervousness of his stance. His balance shifted, and then shifted uncertainly again. "We can do that later, can't we? People are still fighting..."

She felt him hesitate and knew they couldn't afford it. "They're going to fight anyway, Twinkletoes!" she firmed her own stance, digging herself into her element as she placed her hands on her hips. For the Avatar, she thought with a sense of affectionate disgust, You really can be a dunderhead sometimes. "If not today, then tomorrow, and the day after, and the day after that. And what's more, they're going to keep fighting until we hold the peace long enough for them to get it through their thick skulls that the more they fight, the more people die, and the worse it gets. And to do that, we need to find out who's trying to screw this up in the first place!"

She felt the waver, and then the sweet taste of success at the sensation of him firming and stepping in resolve. "Okay then."

Finding someone to lead them there was surprisingly easy. Not two minutes after the agreement, Aang's pace began to quicken. When she realised it was in the direction of what felt like a rhino and a lion-wolf tussling, she kicked up a surfboard of stone and surged ahead.

Still, Aang got there first. And in the seconds between his arriving and hers, the tremors of the ground and her ability to read them lessened somewhat by the fact she was skating forwards on an outcrop of rock, the rhino-like Earthbending soldier and the firebender somehow ended up on opposite ends of the street. Toph shook away the bangs that had gotten into her eyes and surmised that Aang must have blown them apart. And true to form, he was talking already when Toph got close enough to finally listen in. "... Commander, uh, Makoto, right?"

The firebender stiffened in surprise. "Yes, Avatar. You remember me?"

"Of course!" Aang seemed to relax infinitesimally, and Toph relaxed with him. She'd heard that voice before, and now she could place it to a name, she remembered a steady leader, one of Zuko's soldiers helping in the rebuilding process. "We saw you when we came to oversee some of the work."

"The work," Makoto spat, his voice bitter. "All undone now."

Before anyone else had a chance to reply, the rhino stepped forwards. "Thanks to you firebenders!" he clenched his fists, and Toph felt the rock being ripped from the earth once more. Just as instinctively, she tore them from his grip and sent them back down again. He jumped in surprise, and Aang squeezed into the brief reprieve.

"Enough," he said flatly, and Toph could taste the power surging from him. "Let's not go jumping to conclusions."

"Jumping?!" the earthbender clearly wasn't impressed. In a way, Toph couldn't blame him. Sweat rose from his skin like mug after a monsoon rain, and wet dust clung to its passing. This man, before he'd gotten caught in a tussle with the wrong firebender, had likely just fought for and lost his home. "What other possibility is there? Fire, destruction, and a whole troop of firebenders. The maths is easy when..."

"I think you forgot pissed off citizens, nobles, or even Earthbending soldiers," Toph interrupted darkly, crossing her hands over her arms. Even if this man had just lost his home, she wasn't going to tolerate idiocy when it was leading to so much bloodshed. "Besides, what kind of idiot Firebender would light a fire when they're surrounded by an entire city of Earthbenders?"

"Who else but a firebender would cause this... this abomination?!"

There was a gruff rasp. "None of my people would have done such a thing. Not only would it have been against Fire Lord Zuko's orders, it would have been dishonourable."

"Pah, honour! Where was your precious honour when your demon princess cut down our..."

Aang stepped in again. "Look, what's important to find out now is who or what started this." He turned to the firebender. "Makoto, can you tell us where the fire started?"

The Commander answered immediately, his words weighed down with tiredness. "It started in the Upper Ring at first, or at least that was where I saw it first. But within seconds it spread, and then another fire was lit in the Middle and then the Lower Rings."

Toph could almost feel his shoulders slump. "From what I've heard, all of them were started in the houses both Fire Nation and Earth Kingdom soldiers were working together to rebuild."

"Take us to the Upper Ring house, then."

The three of them turned to go, when a heavy footstep followed. "I'm coming too," the earthbender said, his voice brooking no opposition. Toph recognised at the edge of his tone a dark sort of sadism, one born of suffering and the bile of hatred. "I want to be there when you try to explain away your sins."

Makoto didn't bother to deign him with an answer. Instead, they began moving quickly through the tottering streets. Before long, Toph felt the smoother surface of the Upper Rings beneath her soles, and she surged forwards in the familiar terrain.

"Wait!"

She stopped in surprise, and thought the others must have as well. "Twinkletoes?"

He hesitated, and then blurted it out. "The fire," he shifted his weight to gesture. "It's made the stones hot here. Nothing to us because we've got shoes on, but you, Toph..."

Toph raised her eyebrow. "It's not as if I haven't just ploughed through what feels like most of Ba Sing Se, Twinkletoes."

"No, it's different here," he shook his head. "The stone's almost... melted. Maybe the flame burnt hottest at its source."

It took her a few seconds to understand, and then her heart warmed. Whether in irritation or gratitude, she wasn't sure. But then it didn't matter. The fact was, Twinkletoes had actually thought about it. An absurdly warm glow coursed through her chest for a moment, and then was dashed.

"Then we shall go ahead," the clear tramp of heavy boots moved forwards. Scowling, Toph wriggled her bare toes against the hot stone. She hadn't realised how uncomfortably warm the rock had been getting until her attention was brought to it, but now that she did, she chafed at the knowledge she'd have to wait.

Surprisingly, though, she felt only the barest flicker of hesitation before Aang stayed put. Again, something in her relaxed a little. He was stood close to her, side by side, waiting with her. If the air hadn't been so heavy with smoke, she was sure she could have felt him through the air too.

As it was, she felt the tramp of the boots coming back before he registered it. She surged forwards eagerly, not caring about the uncomfortable warmth against her soles. "Well?"

There was a pregnant pause, and then the Commander's voice seemed to come from further away, the vibrations thinned by the debris scattered around them. "We found the house." He paused again, and continued grimly. "Or at least one of the places the fire started."

Something about the way he said it told her that that wasn't the only problem. Toph frowned and tried to ignore the sinking feeling in her gut. "What's wrong?"

Makoto's heartbeat quickened, and then dropped. "No traces of oil," he said flatly. "No traces of ignition or fireworks."

Aang spoke before she managed to, but his question was the same. "What does that mean?" he asked, his voice small and childlike next to the commander's gruffness. Toph suddenly remembered the span of years, and how much and how little she had really seen.

And although he had asked Makoto, she felt the earthbender move, and heard the almost satisfied drip in his tone.

"It means whoever lit the fire was a firebender." There was a rustle of thick material as he crossed his arms over his chest. "Simply put? It means war."

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A/N I - What can I say? I was absolutely - happily - gobsmacked by the amazing reviews you've given me. From dear old faces to new ones, it's good to see you again. :D I must admit, it took me a lot longer to get to Arc II than I'd hoped, but knowing that you are here, giving me feedback and making me the writer I am today, as well as enjoying this work along with me makes every second worth it.

Thanks again, and I only hope Arc II lives up to your expectations. :D

-Shadowhawke