They fly to the Western Air Temple and I hide in the woods above them. After everything I've put them through, I don't even know if they'll accept me. A frog nearby croaks at me, and I jump. "What should I say to them?" I ask.

It just looks at me as I rack my brain. I imitate Uncle; I imitate Azula. Nothing helps. Finally I just suck it up and walk down to them. I freeze when I actually see them, though. "Hi, Zuko here," I eventually say. Man, that sounds dumb.

They take a defensive stance. "What are you doing here?" the Avatar demands.

"I want to help you." I raise my hands in my best non-offensive way.

"What?!" they say in unison.

"I want to help. I can teach you firebending."

I see the Avatar hesitate, but Katara steps forward. "Get lost. We don't want your help. We know this is a trick."

"It's not a trick!"

She glares at me. "We aren't stupid."

"It's not a trick!" But I'm fighting a losing battle and I know it.

"Leave, Zuko," the Avatar says. "Now."

I try to argue, but Katara douses me with water. It's so forceful that I'm knocked on my back. "You heard him!"

So I leave, hanging my head. This isn't over.

Later that night I hear rustling in the bushes. Someone's out there. I hear a voice and automatically attack. A boulder flies up in front of me, and I automatically attack again. Who is that?

"Ouch!"

I look into the darkness, quickly locating the earthbender. Shoot. She's hurriedly crawling away; her feet are burned. I grab her shoulder. "Wait! Let me help you!"

"Get away from me!" She pushes me off and hurries away.

I fall back with a groan. Great. Good one, Zuko. Now they'll never accept you.

I spend the next day pacing and part of the night staring up at the full moon. Then I hear a crash from below, and Katara yell. What the- I hurry down the hill in time to see the assassin I had hired to find the Avatar attacking him and his friends. Well, this is one thing I can set right.

"I order you to stop," I say to the assassin.

He ignores me and shoots another fireball at the Avatar, narrowly missing the earthbender.

"I'll give you more money," I try again.

He pushes me off the cliff, but I manage to grab a vine and hoist myself up. I hide behind one of the pillars with the earthbender, who I pull out of harm's way.

"What are we going to do?" Katara's brother asks, clearly panicked. "He's getting closer!"

The Avatar looks up at the sky. "Katara, there's a full moon tonight!"

She looks up too. "Aang, you know how I feel about that."

"About what?" I ask. So what if it's a full moon? Her waterbending isn't stronger than the assassin's firebending.

"Katara, if you don't do it we're going to die," her brother says.

She takes a deep breath and stands. The assassin is on the same level as we are now, so I brace for impact. But none comes. His face contorts in pain; his arms go behind his head. Suddenly, he's on his knees, not attacking,

I look over at Katara, whose hands are moving. Wait. She's causing this? How?

"Aang bend a piece of rock into his third eye," Katara's brother says. "It kept him from attacking last time."

Two things happen. The Avatar hits the assassin with the stone, hitting Katara's arm in the process and breaking her hold. The assassin attacks before she can regain control, backfiring and throwing himself over the cliff. We watch him fall to his death in the light of the moon. Nobody speaks for a long time.

"What was that?" I ask Katara, breaking the silence.

"Bloodbending," her brother answers.

"Bloodbending?!" I'm sure I heard wrong.

"Blood is water," Katara says, not looking at me.

She's more powerful than I thought she was. She can manipulate people's bodies any way she pleases. She can hurt them, torture them even. I'm impressed and terrified at the same time.

Everyone's looking at me expectantly, so I clear my throat. "I've learned a lot about fire. While it is an essential element because it means life, it is also very dangerous and needs to be respected. Without respect, it can hurt people and be very destructive." I turn to the earthbender, who I realize is blind. "I apologize for burning you. It was an accident."

The Avatar has a thoughtful look on his face. "I never wanted to learn firebending after I burned Katara, but I know if I'm careful it won't happen again."He looks me in the eye. "I think you are supposed to be my firebending teacher."

"So I can stay?" I could kick myself for sounding eager.

"I have to ask my friends first."

Great. But I nod.

He turns to the earthbender first. "Toph, you're the one he burned. What do you think?"

She shrugs, swinging her legs. "Sure."

Score. He turns to Katara's brother. "Sokka?"

He regards me cautiously. "If you think it's right, then I trust your opinion."

Two down. He turns to the last person. "Katara?"

She doesn't answer, just looks at the ground with her arms crossed.

"Katara."

She doesn't even look in my direction. "I'm agreeing only because you need a firebending teacher."

We separate to get some sleep. After awhile, I hear a noise and look up to see Katara standing in my doorway. "You might have everyone else fooled, but you and I both know what happened the last time you claimed you 'changed.'" Her air quotes are fierce. "If you do anything to hurt Aang, you won't have to worry about your destiny. I will make sure your destiny ends right then and there. Permanently.

She turns and leaves, and I realize my heart is pounding. I'm angry, but also nervous. I saw what she's capable of tonight. She's probably more powerful than I am; destroying my destiny wouldn't take much effort. Great.

Aang and I start firebending training the next day. I show him different forms first, then tell him to make fire.

He looks nervous. "Can you demonstrate?"

"Sure." I take my stance to bend, but nothing happens. What…?

I try again and again, but I can only make little puffs of fire. "What is wrong with me?" I yell.

"The last one looked better," Aang says.

"Don't patronize me!"

I try more and more, but I can't. I fall to my knees with my head in my hands. This is so frustrating. I don't know what to do.

We join the others for dinner and relay the bad news. Katara snorts. "Isn't that ironic? You lose your bending now, when we need it, instead of months ago, when we wanted you to."

"Well, if I can't figure out where it went, we're in trouble," I retort, my anger spiking slightly.

Before Katara can respond, Toph speaks up. "You have to find the root of your bending."

We all look at her. "What?"

"I learned earthbending from badger moles. They're blind like me and move by feeling vibrations."

Aang smiles. "Airbenders learned from the sky bison." He looks at his sky bison. "Maybe I should take lessons from Appa."

Everyone laughs. "Firebenders learned from dragons," I say. "But they're extinct."

We eat, and I go to my room. I've been bending because of anger and rage for so long that I don't know how to do anything else. I look out into the courtyard and see Katara and Aang bending. Eventually, he leaves and she's on her own. Water swirls around her, around the pillars of the air temple, making beautiful patterns. The water turns into ice, then back into water, then she finally bends it back into the fountain.

Wow. I've never watched waterbending in a non-aggressive sense before. It's beautiful, stunning. The moves are fluid, like a dance. Now I understand Uncle's lightning redirection.

Uncle. I swallow hard. I hope he's okay.

I'm woken up by Sokka yelling. I rush to his room and see Katara bending over him. "Sokka, wake up. It's just a nightmare."

Toph and Aang are next to me as Sokka begins coming to. Without turning around, Katara says, "He's fine. Go back to bed."

Toph doesn't need to be told twice. Aang and I linger as Sokka holds onto Katara, tears streaming down his face.

"Aang, Zuko, go to bed." Her voice is firm. How did she know?

"What's wrong with him?" I ask Aang before we go into our rooms.

"He's been having nightmares since the invasion."

"Why?"

He sighs. "Because his and Katara's father died that day. He died saving some of their troops, and Katara's healing ability couldn't save him."

For some reason, I'm overcome with pity. They've lost both of their parents to the war now. I can't imagine how guilty Katara must feel.

We say good night, and I listen by the door of Sokka's room for a minute. "It's not your fault he died," I hear Katara say. "He wouldn't want you to keep blaming yourself."

"I can't help it." Sokka's voice is soft.

"You have to." I can hear what I've already identified as her mother voice. "Use that sorrow to make new plans. We're going to win this war."

"Thanks, Katara."

"Get some sleep."

I hear her stand and duck into my room. I see her wipe her face with her sleeve and turn away. Too much emotion for one night.

By morning, I know what to do about the firebending problem. Aang and I journey to the City of Sun Warriors, where the first firebenders lived. They're long gone now, but maybe we can learn from what they left behind. We stand in the middle of an elaborate temple with tons of dragon statues in various positions. I'm studying the ceiling when Aang suddenly says, "Zuko, dance with me?"

"What?" He's got to be crazy.

He motions to the statues. "Just do it."

So we do, posing like the statues until the ground starts rumbling beneath us. Great. Now what did we do? A pillar rises up from the center of the room, holding a shiny golden egg. I go over and pick the egg up, studying it.

"I don't think you should do that," Aang says.

Before I can respond, there's a loud popping sound, and Aang and I end up glued to the ceiling with sticky black goo. Aang sighs and reminds me again that I shouldn't have touched the egg. Thanks. Real helpful. Suddenly, the Sun Warriors appear above us. They scold us for trying to steal their treasure, but let us out of the goo. Aang bows respectfully. "I don't usually use this, but I'm the Avatar. I'm trying to learn firebending, so we came here to learn about the history."

The leader looks at us. "If you want to know firebending, you have to meet the masters. They will read every part of your soul. If they don't like what they see, they will destroy you on the spot!"

That makes me nervous. I can tell Aang is too. We're supposed to keep a piece of everlasting fire to present to the masters, but we both end up dropping it. As we stand back to back facing the caves of the masters, I'm terrified. What if we aren't good enough for them?

Two dragons exit the caves and fly around us. I'm suddenly taken back to Uncle saying he had killed the last dragon, ending the dragon hunting sport of the Fire Nation. An image appears in my head of Uncle receiving knowledge of the dragons, and I realize he lied to protect them. Aang and I perform the motions we learned in the temple with the dragons, and we are given knowledge. We bow to the Sun Warriors before we leave; they actually bow back.

Everyone's asleep by the time we get back to the air temple, though I hear Katara moving around in her room. She goes to talk to Aang, but I don't bother to eavesdrop. I just think about Uncle and hope he's okay.