It felt as if he had been floating in an ocean for thousands of years; each wave washing over his body, ebbing away any pain, easing every inch of his mind. It felt neither good nor bad, it just felt natural. The waters weren't warm or cool, but they were ever present, flowing around his body. Suddenly a jolt slammed through his body, bringing him into a state of awareness. How long had he been in this ocean? Another jolt hit him, electrifying every inch of his being. He began to panic as the waves in his ocean began to beat down on him, each one crashing against his body with another shock of pain. The gentle sea he had been floating in was turning into a typhoon, the waters threating to consume him in pain. It was dark, he couldn't tell, maybe this wasn't an ocean after all.
Another jolt hit him, harder this time, causing him to cry out, and suddenly he opened his eyes. He knew right away that he wasn't in an ocean; he could feel the supple roundness of something supporting his head. A hand gently rested on his chest, right above the source of his pain. Even with eyes open, his vision didn't come into focus at first; a figure above him blurred in and out of his vision before finally, after blinking a few times, the girl came into full focus.
The first thing he noticed about her was the gash on her cheek. It looked fresh, the blood still fairly bright on her brown skin even though it had clotted and was beginning to dry. Then he noticed her eyes; bright turquoise, alarmingly beautiful too. He reached up to touch her, wondering if this was real or if, like his ocean, it was a creation of his mind to deal with the pain. He watched her flinch back slightly, moving her hand from his chest down to the ground beside her, and so he lowered his as well.
Suddenly from a short distance away he heard a familiar voice calling him.
"Desna, my brother, it appears as though this Southern peasant has mended your wounds."
"Eska?" he mumbled, trying to sit up but feeling another shooting pain pierce through his chest.
"M-maybe you should wait…" the Southern girl mumbled. "I don't think I've done enough."
She was looking down at her lap, and had taken Desna's movement as a prompt and moved her thigh back under the rest of her body. The girl looked uncomfortable, like there was more she wanted to say but was holding back, not sure if she should speak or not.
Eska spoke instead. "You said that you could heal my brother, so why have you not done all that you could do? Perhaps you are not as skilled as you believe yourself to be." Her words were meant harshly, a slap in the face for any bender confident in their abilities. He expected the girl to shrink back, to apologize to Eska for being incompetent. Instead he saw her neck snap up, her face shifting from uncomfortable to impassioned.
"Republic City wasn't built in a day! Quit being so pampered, not everyone is going to hand you every single thing you want, when you want. These things take time!"
Desna's face openly portrayed his shock; he had never heard anyone talk to his sister that way. Not even their father, who at times could be downright condescending. His sister however, kept her face expressionless as usual, facing the girl's intense glower with disinterest.
"Besides," the girl added, shuffling towards the small fire on the other side of the room, "his body is wounded severely. The energy comes from the Spirit World, the only way I could heal him in one shot would be if I had Spirit Water, which I do not. So don't complain."
"It is impossible that my brother's injuries were sustained in the Spirit World. I am unsure of what you are speaking of."
Desna watched as the Southern Tribe girl used her bare hands to place fat around the edge of a flame and then wiped her hands on moss on the wall, all the while ignoring his sister. Finally she spoke, turning her head toward Eska, her clean hand swiping strands of brown hair from her face.
"I didn't ask you to tell me what happened, all I'm saying is I can sense where the energy came from. I basically saw how it happened."
Eska made a sound like she was about to interject but the girl continued, "Like I said, you don't have to fess up to what happened or why you were in the Spirit World with your dad, I'm sure the Avatar and everyone else is going to figure it out soon enough, all I'm saying is that your brother is going to need more healing than the average Warrior. So why don't you lie yourself down by the fire and rest or something while I work? I'm sure you'll need your strength for whatever nasty plot your dad is cooking up."
Her tone near the end was venomous, as if she wished her words could cut through both he and Eska. He watched her stand suddenly and move to the mouth of the cave where she bent water from the snow to rinse the fat off her hands. She stood there for a moment, crossing her arms across her chest and he noticed she was only wearing a shirt; blue, and completely strapless, covering only her wrappings and down to where her pants hugged her hips. He realized the strange parka Eska was wearing on the other side of the cave must be hers. But why had she given it up? It was impossible that Eska would have gotten cold. After a moment he realized he was laying on both his robe and Eska's beneath it. The girl had given Eska her parka so that she could use hers as a make-shift stretcher.
He continued to keep silent, his eyes flashing from the Southern Tribe girl near the mouth of the cave to his twin, who was settling down to sleep by the fire, as the girl had suggested. Perhaps he too should lay back and rest.
He hadn't said a word the whole time. And his rude sister, questioning her abilities? Ha! Maybe if the two of them hadn't been sneaking around in the Spirit World with their daddy, Desna would be fine and her 'inadequate' healing abilities wouldn't be needed. She was brooding by the mouth of the cave but she could feel eyes fixed on her back. Assuming it was Eska she turned her head over her shoulder only to see Eska's eyes closed, settled down by the fire. It must be Desna then, she thought. She was surprised, but she didn't look at him. He hadn't even thanked her, or stood up for her; without her he wouldn't even be conscious!
Minutes passed. She listened to the fire snap as it consumed the tiger seal fat. It was warm in the cave but Kiiata was standing at the mouth of it and the wind was raising goose bumps on her flesh. She was beginning to regret trading parkas with Eska but moving to the fire would mean being near the girl who had spent the first moments of her brother's consciousness complaining that she was incompetent. Just then, she thought she heard a voice. The wind was loud in her ears but she was could have sworn… She strained, but only heard Eska's breathing falling evenly; she was asleep. Slowly Kiiata turned, her eyes focusing on the boy she had just healed.
Desna was watching her, his face showed no emotion, like his sister's. She knew it was him that spoke, so she crossed her arms over her chest and waited for him to repeat what he had said. They stared at each other for a few moments, neither one of them willing to break the gaze; someone had to give in and speak first but Kiiata wasn't about to let it be her. Finally Desna sighed.
"It appears that you are cold," he pointed out.
"I'm fine," she said despite the feeling of the wind biting at the exposed skin of her back. She pulled her shoulders up higher, trying to will her body into warming itself somehow. She heard Desna sigh again.
The girl was ridiculous! He could see the goose bumps covering every inch of exposed skin. But for some reason she stood as far away from the fire as possible and refused to come an inch closer. As he watched her he noticed her fighting off shiver after shiver; her dark skin jittering almost imperceptibly. Foolish and stubborn, this girl! What was it with Southern Tribe women? His cousin Korra was the same. Always needing to prove something. He wondered what it would take to get the foolish girl in here.
He started raising himself up using his elbows. It seemed easy enough until he was about half-way into a sitting position and then the pain rippled through his body causing him to grunt. Finally the girl moved back into the cave.
"You're going to hurt yourself! Are you dumb?" she asked, clearly annoyed. She tensed her hands into fists, squeezing them for moment, before letting go with a sigh. She knew what he was up to.
"Lay back again," she said kneeling beside him and placing her knee back beneath his head for support.
He watched her bend water from the entrance of the cave. As she pressed her hands to the wound on his chest he saw her brown skin of her cheeks deepen in color. He didn't have long to contemplate it's meaning before a sharp pain knocked the breath from him. It wasn't as strong as before and as the moments dragged on and her hands continued to move around his chest the pain eased into a dull ache.
"It will scar," she told him.
"So will that," he responded pointing to the gash on her face.
She paused for a moment then, raising one hand to her cheek as if she had almost forgotten about the mark that Eska had put there, no doubt.
"It's fine," she said, going back to moving her hands and bending the water on his chest.
Desna watched her, trying to get her to meet his eyes, but she was clearly avoiding them. He wondered if it upset her that she was going to have a scar on her face. Or, perhaps she was regretting having helped him. Or both, since one had likely led to the other.
"I'm not aware of your title," he said suddenly, awkwardly failing to ease her train of though.
"My…my title?" she replied, blinking in confusion.
"Your name," Desna clarified.
"Oh, my name is Kiiata," she answered, suddenly shy, her turquoise eyes watching her hands on his chest.
She couldn't look at him. At his stupid eyes or his stupid face. Even looking at the muscles of his stupid chest was making her blush. And he wanted to know her name? She was screaming internally; she wanted to drag him right out into the storm and throw ice darts at him. See how he likes scars on his pretty face. His stupid pretty face. Why was she even being like this? His father started a civil war with her Tribe, and now he was cooking up some dastardly plot in the Spirit World. And she is sitting here in a cave blushing when she touched Desna's chest. Desna! The heir to the chieftain who will likely continue this civil war should anything happen to Unalaq!
She could feel him watching her still and her brows knit tightly together while she tried to avoid looking back at him. Finally she gave up and broke the awkward silence; bringing up a topic she shouldn't even be curious about.
"So… I bet this scar will drive the Northern Tribe girls wild," she said delicately.
"I am not sure why I would want to drive a girl feral," he responded, and she thought she almost saw a hint of a smile on his lips. Was he being sarcastic with her?
"Oh?" she said playing along. "Are you already betrothed?
"No. My sister was, though I believe that the Avatar has stolen the boy from her."
"I would too," she mumbled with a laugh. Desna stared at her.
"I mean, I've seen that Earthbender guy that your sister would traipse around with. He's pretty handsome. Muscular and all that."
"And is that the type of..." he paused as if searching for the right words, "man that you would…involve yourself with?"
She laughed shaking her head and raising a finger to point at the gash on her cheek. "I don't think your sister would appreciate that."
Suddenly and unexpectedly Desna laughed. It was a strange sound, not a laugh she expected; it was higher pitched and much more awkward sounding but somehow that made sense. The shock of the sound and the smile on Desna's face was enough to cause Kiiata's eyes to grow wide, her hands stopped moving the water across his chest, instead coming to rest right above the wound where she could feel the strange laughter emanating from.
Then, as suddenly as his strange laughter had started, it stopped. It was as if he had realized that he had betrayed his emotions. She was still looking at him wide eyed though, and then she threw her head back and laughed a full, true laugh. She wasn't sure if it was the shock of hearing his strange laugh or the shock of his laughter and smile in general, and then suddenly he was laughing with her. It was awkward, which made it seem even funnier, and the sound of his laugh was oddly contagious. Finally when they had both settled down to a giggle Kiiata looked down at Desna only to realize her hands were still gently resting on his chest. Blushing and looking away she folded them and placed them in her lap. She looked back up, meeting his eyes, when she felt Desna's hand touching her cheek where the gash was.