"Shoot."
The arrow sliced through the air and towards the sky, reaching the zenith of its trajectory just as a bright jet of blue flame rolled over it, igniting the shaft and sending the now twisted metal tip spiraling to the ground. Two more followed just as the first turned to ash, flying opposite each other. Twin jets of flame flew out, one for each arrow. The first caught fire in a brief flash, falling after its predecessor, while the second continued to travel unscathed, the jet barely grazing it.
Zuko's fist snapped downward and sent out a plume of fire, scorching the grass around his feet.
Li lowered his bow and spoke lazily. "Something off today, my prince?"
Zuko grunted in response.
"You prodigies and your obscene expectations. Get it right the first time, and you think you've got it the rest, but then you slip up just once..."
"Shoot it again."
"Why? So you can prove that you can hit it? You don't have to prove anything to me. I've seen you do it plenty before."
"Just shoot one more arrow."
Li sighed and positioned his weapon, the sun gleaming off the polished tip of the arrow. He pulled back the string slowly and carefully, as though afraid it would snap at any point. Pausing briefly, he held the stance, pointing at some bare portion of the sky before parting his fingers and sending the bolt flying.
Zuko remained motionless, staring after the rapidly receding point, his chest rising and falling in a deep rhythm. He pulled in a sharp breath, exhaled, his eyes widening and then relaxing as a spot of bright blue light engulfed the dark fleck, flickered briefly, then vanished without trace.
Li stared at him. "What did you do?"
Zuko closed his eyes and brought his palms together, steadying the feeling across his skin. "It's something I've been experimenting with for a while. The essence of fire bending is the breath, its control and eventual transformation to energy as fire."
"I do remember that much. It made sense to me intuitively, so I went with it."
"That's also the problem. I remember when I was learning to control it, to create concentrated bursts, carry them over a long distance, manipulate them. No matter how complicated I made the flames in the end, it all started from the same place: the stomach, the movement of the energy from that chakra through the breath, and the eventual pushing of the energy away from you, but the instructors always emphasized a particular motion, a stance, and sweep of the arm or legs."
"I wasn't the best student, but even I know that the stances are the key to advancing beyond accidentally setting your sheets on fire during a nightmare."
"It's true, they are, and if you ever want to use bending in combat you have to master them, but there was nothing that should have prevented me from extending my energy beyond me without having to throw out my fist or leg. All it would require would be more concentration, placing all the energy at one very small point, and letting it expand. A point explosion."
"An explosion. You should have just said so." He turned attention back to the bow, examining it compulsively as he always did, making sure the length of fiber was taught enough, that there was no unnecessary strain on the end portions of wood.
"It's more complicated. You mentioned setting your sheets on fire during a nightmare? That's the first stage of what I'm talking about. You might thrash around a little in your sleep, or you could just be perfectly still, languishing in a nightmare." Walking or waking. "Either way, you can set something around you on fire. But the flame isn't hot, it's not controlled, and it's not sustained. It sputters and dies, rises then tumbles around weakly." A flailing heartbeat. Zuko watched Li for a reaction, and saw only vague curiosity, like he was listening to some technical lecture explaining the flight of an arrow or the sharpness of steel. The precision of the bow and its necessary patience had come easily to Li. He had a good eye, a steady hand and none of the hesitation that had damned other recruits to watch posts. He'd started at the Fire Nation Academy, where Chu had labeled him an "intolerable braggart, with more talent for speech than the blade." Li's response of drawing an arrow from over a hundred yards and knocking the sword cleanly from the hand of Chu's rising star of a pupil had only served to irk the man further; he'd been only too happy to surrender Li to the Yu Yan when they'd made their rounds for potential recruits. Li had been content with retaining the basic katas and breathing methods of the art.
Zuko sighed as Li turned to take another practice shot. Azula would have understood what he was talking about. There was hardly ever any need to explain something to her in detail more than once, unless the explanation was flawed to begin with, and then she could usually puzzle it out before its architect had a chance to refine his argument. Her memory was sharp and refined, polished. Zuko had had once commented that it was like the nails she groomed to obsession, never left alone to chip or bend for a moment. When they were children, she had corrected the logic of an instructor as he attempted to explain the method behind being able to draw the heat from water. It was a continuous process, a cycle of taking heat from the water and expelling it to some cooler location. He could do it, if he wanted, though he'd never thought seriously of it; it seemed trivial and uninteresting to him, and in all honesty he'd lacked the patience to duplicate a first success, but Azula came from a different stock of thought. In the realm of theory she might have been his match, but for father...It was never enough, was it? She would come back. Nearly a year. A solid year is what she'd said. "One year." Said as she'd raised a slender, pointed finger, giving the statement some physical grounding in his mind. It was a promise now. She'd made it, but it felt like he had to keep it. It had been his idea originally, made out of casual contemplation and uttered in the spirit of debate one night when they'd been playing Pai-Sho in the pale light of a new Summer's moon. Then each token on the board had become a piece of strategy, from broaching the idea to father, to weaving the illusion of death from thin air, to bending the Dai Li. One year. They'd made promises before, as children on the cusp of disaster, when mother had left and father had loomed larger than before.
Li's arrows, buzzing through the air, brought him away from unpleasant paths of memory. It was now well into the morning; he didn't need to look up to know that. They'd risen at the break of dawn, with no incident. Zuko had relieved his fast with sweetly seasoned fish, soaked with lemon and drawn out in three neat, large strips. It had become a ritual of his of late to eat fish, as though to remind himself that the fisheries were still full and healthy. He'd even made the journey to a few himself just to watch. Each time he'd seen the fisherman drag up nets ready to burst with large, dark fish. On one occasion the captain of the vessel he'd been on had even taken one fish in hand and deftly sliced it open, displaying the pale and bloodied flesh to the prince. "You can see it, right there. The blood soaks in and shows you it's firm and full and ripe. Then you can see its skin, dark and smooth, full bodied color, yes?" Zuko had only agreed; he knew little of what qualified a fish as acceptable for consumption, only that it was always best to handle one by the eyes when you were preparing it for a meal. In the end the same captain had offered him a selection of the best fish out of the catch to be prepared as a personal meal, just to set aside any lingering doubts he had. That offer had been declined in the end, and he'd left, feeling foolish, but assured enough to never request being on the ship as the catch was being made.
"Does Ryo realize that there are those of us who have things we'd rather do than stand around in the middle of a field all day?" Li had settled on the ground and was looking at the cloudless sky careening overheard.
"He said he'd be here before the sun reached its height. That won't happen for another hour." The note had requested only himself and Li, and the time table stretched through the whole of the morning. The arrows had been a distraction to vent his anxiety, something that usually had more formal outlets, but with Li, he didn't feel bending training was appropriate.
"How kind of him to leave us here for the whole morning."
"You had some time to practice with your arrows. You should be entertained enough."
"Oh, yes. Great fun, shooting at the open sky and playing game-master for you."
"He'll be here. It's been a while since we've seen him anyway."
"I feel anxious as a lover waiting for his high-born consort to rendezvous with him away from the prying eyes of her intolerant family."
"As though you'd bother to do that discretely."
"It would be more fun. Half the fun of an affair is operating under the duress of being caught. Without that it's just awkward lovemaking."
"Also something I'm sure you know about."
Li only smirked in response.
A breeze picked up and Zuko turned to face it. He felt that Ryo would approach from that direction, taking some winding path from the capital to its outskirts. His feeling was confirmed when, after his initial expectation had waned, he'd seen the man emerge from the trees, wearing a plain shirt with none of the embellishments or colors of his house, and a pair of boots that might have labeled him a runner or retainer for a minor land owner. His sun-touched skin lent credence to that suspicion, as did his hair, cut short and held back, growing to a symmetrical outcrop near the top of his head. He moved with a kind of diligence as he approached, each step a measured distance, shoulders still and steady. A messenger to the glance, dutiful and punctual, but forgotten as quickly as he'd arrived.
Zuko could feel a smile threatening to break his lips, but he kept his face steady. He could see through the cursory impression; only a blind man wouldn't be able to. Golden eyes marked him as a firebender. They were brighter than Li's, deeper in their metallic hue, the sunlight turning them into glinting coins. And he moved like a firebender, never breaking his root for any longer than he had to, always keeping a certain distance between each step, ready to break into a stance at a sharp moment.
He stopped in front of Zuko and bowed, his body inclining deeply, eyes seeing the ground.
"Prince Zuko." A soldier ready to take orders.
This time the smile did break, and more, Zuko heard himself begin to laugh, the sound rising through his throat and body.
Ryo looked up, his face as schooled as it had been when he'd appeared from the trees. But there were cracks, Zuko could see. The slight tightening of his eyes here, the way his shoulders seemed to have become all the more rigid.
"What did they do to you in the Earth Kingdom? Shove a sword up your ass?" It was Li who broke the silence, but Zuko's laughter that brought Ryo to a relaxed posture.
"Have I changed that much for the worst?" There was humor in his voice at least.
"No." Zuko shook his head, still smiling like a fool. "Not at all, Ryo, not at all." He clapped a hand on Ryo's shoulder, and was in turn brought into a strong embrace. Zuko was taken off guard, first by the gesture then its strength, though Ryo had always been strong, broad shouldered and muscled, easily outmatching any other academy member who went against him hand to hand.
When he was let go, he saw Ryo had again composed himself, and looked slightly embarrassed at his display. He cleared his throat. "In the Earth Kingdom, it's customary to embrace those you haven't seen in a long time. It's a gesture of affection reserved for the closest of friends, and for family."
"Do you have many friends and family in the Earth Kingdom?" Li moved towards them.
Ryo ignored the quip. He looked around. "But it's good to be home. I said prayers of thanks that I was taught even before I went off to the academy."
"Are things so bad on the front?" Zuko asked softly, though he knew the answers well enough.
"It's not just the fighting. You've both been to the Earth Kingdom, but never at its heart. It's vast and empty, and heat...there is certainly heat, but it's oppressive, like it's some living, malignant force trying to kill you. Nothing grows for miles on end. It's just harsh sand and bare rock. The perfect place for an earthbender, no doubt, but even without a battle..." He shook his head.
"You never saw the forests?" He'd remembered them, lush and verdant, ancient and engulfed in shadow and spirit.
Ryo's expression turned grim. "Oh yes, I saw the forests. And they were red. We fought there, being ambushed twice as we made our way towards Omashu. I'd decided to take the way through the forest because I thought it would be more difficult for them to manipulate the earth there. The forests are old, and the roots of the trees are deeply planted. I was right in that; they couldn't attack as quickly or as fiercely, and that gave us some advantage; we pushed them back both times, but not without loses." He was quiet for a moment, his eyes narrowing. "The worst happened at night. We made camp amongst the trees. It was cool and quiet. We were near a stream, and it was welcome relief after the heat of the desert. We didn't lite fires, just heated the air around us. I was on watch, and it was quiet, so quiet. I could hear any kind of rustle through the leaves, the shaking of branches as birds took off. And then it became cool. It was like water rolling along my skin. I saw shapes in the forest, a blot against a dark background, and I couldn't tell if they were just the trees at first, but then I heard something darting past the trunks."
Zuko frowned. "The earth benders ambushed you at night?"
"No. They were...wargs. They had the shapes of wolves, but larger, their jaws broader, and their coloring was wrong. They swept past our defense line. You remember lieutenant Jin?"
"He was below us in the academy by a year, if I remember. He wanted to join the navy, but ended up in a ground battalion."
Ryo's voice became lower, deeper. "He was directly past the barricade we'd set up. One of those things jumped onto him and knocked him down. Ripped out his throat with one bite, jerking its head back with enough force to fling his body. I'd climbed a tree to get a better vantage point; I must have been at least twenty feet above the ground. The droplets of blood still hit me."
"And the others?" Zuko's voice held an urgency that seemed to chill the air around him.
"Once Jin went down, the whole camp broke into chaos. There were three of them, and each took a man down by the time I'd sent my first strike against them. One large ball of fire. I immolated the one that had taken Jin, and the others backed away, slowed down. The men on the ground took the initiative and threw them back with fire and steel." Ryo paused and drew a long, curved dagger from his belt, the hilt made of polished, black bone, the edge a line of light in the sun. The flat of the blade was clean steel, smooth and cold.
"Not a dragon's tooth, but a claw." Li murmured, voice riding with the breeze.
Zuko recognized the weapon. Ryo's father had given it to him before he came to the academy, and it had made him the envy of more than a few young recruits. He'd been one of the few who could match Zuko his skill with it only inflaming their resentment until it had been knocked from his hand by a well-aimed arrow.
"I stabbed one of them with this, right above its heart. I hit bone, and the blade barely made a cut in it. If it had been any other kind of metal, it would have snapped under the strain."
Li was unmoved. "If these things were as big as you say..."
"It's true that the bones of normal wolves aren't thick or heavy enough to put up that kind of resistance, but I stabbed from the side. I only hit its rib cage. The blade wouldn't have cut cleanly through, but the hardness of the bone, and the things' thirst for blood. It wasn't a hunt, it was a slaughter."
Zuko didn't dwell on that for the moment. "How many did they kill?"
"Five, including Jin.. They feared fire. That's how we pushed them back. They took steel blow for blow, almost in stride. We had to keep fires burning for the night, fling it at them when they came too close."
Li's tongue clicked. "What about the earth benders? You say they ambushed you. Were they ever attacked?"
"They were tracking us during the night. We had signal fires for them, keeping those things away." He paused. "Their blood was cool. I didn't realize it until after the battle was finished, but when I touched a pool of it, it was cool, and far too fluid. It almost seemed to be vanishing, but not like water in the sun. It left no stain on the ground, and the body of the one I'd burned turned to dust and ash, vanishing as the breeze picked up. I swear, they were almost like spirits."
Zuko's eyes darted sharply. "Spirits? Coming to flesh?" His uncle had often spoken of the spirit world, how sometimes the barriers between two worlds thinned and both could touch the other without the aid of the Avatar. There had always been something off in those forests, like he was being watched by something with intelligence.
"I don't know." Ryo shook his head, his shoulders low. "We moved out of the forest slowly, weaving around to slow down the earth benders. I took any archers we had and told them to wait up in the trees, the benders a bit below them." He exhaled slowly and shook his head. "That was butcher's work."
He hadn't changed. Zuko realized, and the air lost the chill it had acquired. He loved Ryo for that, acknowledging the act for what it was.
"You paid them back in kind." Li had turned from them, and didn't see the brief glare that Zuko gave his back.
Ryo waved it off. "That isn't the main reason I requested to come back, or asked you here."
Li snorted. "How did you manage that, anyway?"
"My father still has some influence in the military, and at court."
That was understatement at its fullest, but Zuko let it pass. "You mean spirits and ambushes weren't enough to drive you back?"
Ryo gave a smile, but it vanished, as though he'd forgotten himself. He spoke softly. "No. That wasn't enough." He again produced something, this time from the inner pocket of his shirt. He held it out for Zuko and Li to see, a small, circular object resting in the palm of his hand.
"Do you recognize this?"
Carefully, as thought it might crumble, Zuko reached out and took the piece, holding it up to the light, twirling it between his fingers like his uncle had taught him to do with coins. A light brown border, a red blossom stamped into yellow. Flowers. Ryo had given a red flower, bloody and full. And I hadn't known what it meant. I'd taken it and I didn't know then. He turned it over and the design was duplicated. She'd always liked flowers of fire. They fell at the height of summer. I'll send them to you, I'd said. Promised. Another promise to keep. His fingers stopped moving, snapping the piece to a vertical position.
"This is a Pai-Sho tile, but I don't think I've seen one like this."
"Neither have I. My grandfather was a master of the game, always beat me since I was a boy, but this piece..."
Zuko closed his hand, fingers curling over the tile, shading his memory. "Where did you find it?"
"Jin's body. We were planning to do a fast burning, but we couldn't let the weapons go to waste, and Jin wasn't originally part of our regiment. He joined us, along with fifty other archers."
"There's a point, I assume?" Li might have been irritated, but he leaned forward and held himself tense all the same.
"Jin was nervous, terrified of something. He only approached me after he recognized me from the academy, saying that he had evidence of treachery against the Fire Nation, that he could trace it back to Commander Yen."
"I executed Yen two days ago. He died in Agni's gaze." And never faltered from it. It always saw through to the truth. Fire burns away cold and dead deceit. Said the Fire Sages while they sacked Roku's temple and decried his reincarnation.
"Did your father order that execution directly?"
"Who else has that authority?"
"Any commanding officer on the field, if he feels that treason has been committed."
"No...Yen was brought back here, interrogated in the Burning Tower, and then..." Zuko left the statement open.
Ryo was grinding his fist against the opposite palm. "And what did they find?"
"Nothing. But it didn't seem as though any extreme measures were applied to get him to talk." Uncle commented on that. There was no fear from him. Why did Uncle bother to come? He returns from the front just to watch a traitor have his head removed.
"It was a mundane affair," Li spoke quietly. "Only myself, Zuko, Chu and General Iroh. Few at court even knew what was happening."
Now Ryo's hands snapped open. "Your uncle...he came with you because it was your first time passing judgment?"
"So he said." Esteemed, Dragon of the West as he is.
No one spoke then. Only the wind gently bending the grass, high to the knee, made any sound. Then came the call of a bird, distant in the trees, followed by a sharp answer from closer on, then the sound of stiff, broad wings.
"I don't know why my uncle wanted to come with me. He watches me sometimes; I think it was his way of seeing what kind of a man I might grow into."
Ryo sighed, and it sounded like the cold hollow breeze from the trees. "It doesn't matter now. Yen is dead, Jin is dead, but whatever evidence he had, what it might have lead to, that's still alive, burning and festering." He looked at the sky. "And my father tells me that the Fire Lord has given permission to direct the bulk of the navy to the siege at the North. Is that also part of some large plot, ebbing our forces to one location so they can be betrayed and drown in black water?"
"Admiral Yu pushed for that decision. He wanted Zhao to command a portion of the fleet."
"Jin was Yu's uncle. No doubt the admiral will be grieved to learn of his nephew's demise."
Now he bears that weight. "Father is holding a festival to commemorate the march against Omashu and the commitment of our forces to the North. There will be representatives from all the great Houses in attendance, along with the members of the War Council. If Jin was correct, if Yen was involved in a larger scheme, we'll find the truth of this starting from there." His fingers uncurled and he stared at the red flower at its center, delicate and bright. It's like our game. One piece for each strategy, each player. But what part does this play? Had it been on their board the whole time, hidden in shadow? He shuddered, and felt cold at the height of summer.