AN: Sorry for the late update but happy Fourth! Here's the second to last installment. =) Thanks to my reviewers, you guys are great!

Disclaimer: Don't own it.

3. A Sudden Slip

Hard labor outweighed the fruits they reaped. Courts and council meetings were all day affairs and unhappy citizens were lined up at the gilded palace door by the crack of dawn, every dawn. She got the sense that he never quite got a handle on how to deal with said crowds. Raw and almighty never stood up too well with plainly trivial. Poverty was something the lord once knew but a distant past meant little to poverty in the present. He wasonly human, after all, not a diplomatic god or merciless figurehead; both of which seemed to be common assumptions of the former prince.

He manned the front lines with admirable persistence, though, never leaving his palace where a new kind of war raged, a war he had adopted with the old one's demise. It was him against the world these days but no doubt, the power fed his hungry soul. His eyes said everything through the phony void. To the common man, there may have been ferocity in his fervid stare, or extreme desire, extreme exhaustion. But she had an unsavory gift to see straight through, beyond those amber pools. She saw doubt. She saw fear, fear of succumbing to doubt. She saw concentration, callous as stone, to let go of fear. And at last she saw, she understood where her own blind trust blossomed. It wasn't blind at all.

She was sent away frequently to aid in fending off rebellions, to heal wounded, to do the things that required skills he lacked. Because he knew that power came in gentle eyed, fiercely passionate packages. Settling matters between feuding relations became her specialty. She was good with words that carried heavy connotations of motivation and assurance that "the world is doing great!" She didn't believe in half the things she preached these days and that hurt, it stung. She came to miss the front lines of the Fire Lord's war and it wasn't long before she found herself wandering back again when the words blistered.

His regal office was empty of advisors when she made a point to go visit. He was too entranced in the desk of scrolls, the scratch of quills to pay her more than a glance and a raised finger to signal for her to wait. She spoke first, stating the obvious to be sure it got through. "I came back," she said.

He nodded. "I was informed. Thank you for your services." His quill hand paused, the ink blotting through white parchment. "If it isn't the kind of work you prefer, you aren't obliged to stay. I never expected you to."

"They don't need someone to lie to them."

"I know," he said, "But it's what they want to hear and I have to give them what they want."

Maybe he had a point. Maybe he was dead wrong. "I shouldn't keep you from your work," she said and left. Either way, there was no sense in arguing yet. She'd figure out a new way to occupy herself in his country. The capitol was a change in pace, but it could be for the better.

And with time, she learned about belonging and how she wasn't quite up to the challenge of it yet. Total dedication to one place, one cause. It meant you had to choose. Just one. Back when times were "simpler," she was needed by her beautiful unconventional family. She belonged to them and that inspired her. But now… now she couldn't attend wedding rehearsals and planning sessions for her brother and his fiancé and couldn't say 'yes' to Aang when he built up the nerve to ask her for help in his peace spreading quest. Was that wrong? Zuko never asked her to stay. He made a point to make sure she never felt tied down to the palace and politics. And still, she felt that this was belonging. In a twisted, unjustifiable way, she belonged.

At least his ways were slightly more justifiable; someone's had to be. The Fire Lord accomplished what the Fire Lord had to accomplish, no matter the lengths he had to reach or the sacrifices he had to make. The Fire Lord did not fall short. He did not rest until the task was complete. They were all lucky he was on their side. Despite his belief he had it all under control, or maybe an aggressive desire to, the youth couldn't take on the world single handedly everyday.

One day in particular. The usual practiced spark of sobriety and, what he liked to call, experience quivered and died in his eyes. Covered up by something darker, something like anger. And it showed. His people saw it, each one that lined up to file a complaint or inform him of the hunger and poverty that gripped their homes. His rough voice echoed through the hall and his snappy refusal sent people scrambling out the door. She caught the tiniest flicker of orange blaze from his curled fists and couldn't let it go by unmentioned.

"Zuko," she said, voice hushed, a firm cold hand clasped on his forearm, "Your uncle wants to see you privately. In your quarters." A little lie would help more than hurt.

"If he has something to say to me, tell him he can come down here and say it!" His voice boomed; a shiver spread over the crowd. She only gripped his arm harder, glared deeper, until his pulsing veins relaxed in defeat. A mutual respect still rested between them, despite everything. He wrenched his arm out of her fingers and stormed off in silence. It worked in the end. He never came back and Iroh filled the empty seat. Just for one day. His only day off.

The next day he told her she should leave, go home. But she still felt needed so she would stay. For now, at least, she would stay.

Conversations were clipped and short, always strictly business and safely distant. She could never quite pinpoint what they were afraid of but she waited, silently, patiently, for anything at all. And she climbed her way up from "motivational" speaker of doubtful Earth Kingdom cities to discussing treaties and sitting in during council meetings. She was the quickest to point out flaws in the Fire Lord's ideas and he was shortest when temper was concerned. They all wondered why he let her stay; speaking out was a crime, a punishable offence. But of course, he knew that all too well.

Yes, the true front lines were a dangerous place but the meetings ended with success. There was progress in their politics.

One of her oldest arguments with him came to a silencing close late in the year. It was a matter unspoken of since letter writing days but words no longer sufficed. It was by her own hand that Azula shrank into the other world, the void. They said it had been quick, precise… flawless. But then, no one expected any less of her. Certainly, there would be no room for failure in her final act and of course they all should have known that her fate was never in their hands at all.

She was there when the messenger came, the one with the beady eyes and detached discretion. He smirked as he read the scroll. She watched Zuko, the way his eyes didn't seem to flicker, the way the straight line of his lips did not so much as twitch. "Azula died long ago," was all he said. The way his voice did not falter or waver. It was just like that night, long ago, only this time he looked away. There was nothing left to see. And she, she only left, hoping that somewhere deep down, he still had the heart left to care. She was family, his sister.

They were not to mourn. The Fire Lord made no proclamations, he passed no laws but they were not to mourn. There were times when it was expected of him to be open and kind with his people. Other times, he was to have an iron fist. This time he was to be closed and cold to show his people that this was not a loss, that this was a victory, a step closer to something better. He was quite good at closed and cold, how he had changed, but she bought a bouquet of white roses all the same to keep a dream alive. He stood tall in his crimson robes, towering over a gnarled stone. She glanced at him once, for glances were all that they shared, and laid the roses before the lonely grave. Stark white against gray; he merely nodded a weak assent. The act wasn't for herself but for a little girl in hopes that she was one before she was a monster. By his eyes, the hope thrived.

And time passed, it flew like time was never meant to fly. Those years, back when they were the heroes, seemed a lifetime away. If she allowed herself to stop and marvel at them, she may have convinced herself it was all a dream; a nightmare, maybe. Or quite possibly, it wasn't that far off at all, maybe she just hadn't woken yet.

And he, he was changing. He never really stayed the same for too long. It was in his blood, she guessed. Always afraid of molding into a picture of his ancestors, never wanting to stray too far from home. Same story, just with new twists and an ugly sense of irony. And yet, he was never deceitful to himself. She saw it the most when he trained, which was little and sporadic these days. His private training area was so rarely used, she took the liberty of bestowing it herself.

"You aren't supposed to be here," he said, stoic. The water between her elongate arms did not falter.

"Do you plan to kick me out?" She faced him, water twisting about her wrists.

He paused, as if contemplating it but only shook his head. "No," he said and took his stance on the other side of the room. This wasn't a business affair, after all. They didn't have to fight like the stubborn children that still flourished within them both. It was odd for her to see him as he was, stripped of crimson robes with only baggy training wear, hair down and muting his eyes. His stubborn child glowed but its only words were in the language of licking flames on metal walls. She tore away, focusing on her own, flexible, fluid element.

"You got the letter, then?" she asked after long minutes of separate drills and forms. She glanced over her shoulder as his flames suffocated to nothing.

"What?" A single word, demand, with the hint of anger that always seemed to loom at the edge of his voice these days. She sighed.

"Aang won't be there," she said just soft enough that he would listen, "He wants you to be his best man."

"I already told him I couldn't make it. I told him I was sorry." His voice was firm, apathetic. She remembered when he used to care.

"I know," she said and shook her head slowly, "but you can't decline. You never decline when an Earth Kingdom noble invites you to lunch. Sokka's your friend, not your political acquaintance." She spat the last words, barely noticing the way her element glided back and forth, back and forth, waiting between her fingers.

"That's different and you know it!" His best argument. It was a pity. "This discussion is over." The flames burst out of coiled fists. Instantly, the swelling torrent flowed about his wrist, wrapping it in an icy glaze. The spark in his eye spoke words he'd never dare use on her but she heard it all. He probably thought she knew when to stop.

The ice crumbled, receding to the floor. "Don't do this." But she had already begun.

With a flick of her wrist, the shattered ice was liquid again, a whip slicing through air, a weapon. He blocked the blow with a quick, practiced rush of flames. No more drills and planned routines. This was almost real. Blow after blow, they sparred, each one stronger, each one a surprise. Once or twice he was able to break through her defenses, his fire dancing below her chin, tantalizing and smirking. Control. She ducked and twisted out of its grasp, sending a tide his way. Its icy fingers thrust about him, encasing his body in a crystal prison. Power. He broke through with heated breaths and stomped through the shallow pool. A flick of her fingers and the floor was ice. He stumbled and she was there, her element forming cuffs around his wrists and ankles, pinned to the metal wall. "You're rusty," she said. He snarled, a sound she hadn't heard in a long time. A good challenge was what he needed. He forgot so quickly, this was her fight.

With muscles flexed and fists tight, he broke free, the ice exploding in lethal shards around them and then his arms were at his sides, his head bowed dejectedly. Unmoving. She stood before him panting, her stance rigid, her skin and hair raw with moisture. Expectant, always expectant. "This is over," he said, resolute, as he turned away. She hated that he held back. Her hand was at his arm in an instant.

"No," she said. The arguably traitorous acts and numerous accounts of misconduct she had managed to commit against the Fire Lord in the radically short amount of time meant nothing to her. She didn't believe he had it in him to break the faith. She couldn't believe in him if he did. "It's just one day. For Sokka."

His arm went limp. No attempt at struggle. His eyes looked old and tired and longing for something gone wayward. He wriggled out of her clasped fingers indifferently and his hollow footsteps echoed in the metal room, mingling with the ragged sound of her breaths.

At the door he paused, hesitating. "Thank you," he said, detached, "for the spar."

It was a step.