In Isolation

by JHLZ.NTL

Prequel to Lives Forgotten. Lin Beifong vowed her children would never be neglected. No matter how busy she became, she would not make the same mistakes as her mother and grandparents. Yet somehow, like herself, Lin's children must grow up without their father, and like Toph, within the boundaries of a secluded estate far away from the city, in isolation.

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"Mom, why can't I practice knife-throwing with Aunt Zumi?" three year old Xiaoyu asked climbing into her mother's lap while HuiFan was sparring her brothers and JieXue practiced with Izumi who corrected her arm positioning and throw technique with her hands and feet.

"When you can get a sandbag in a bucket from twenty feet away, I will put a knife in your hand, but until then, stop asking," Lin answered firmly. "Other people's safety matters too, you know." Xiaoyu sighed and picked up her pile of little sandbags and walked over to the line her mother made in the stone floor and looked at the stone bucket placed twenty feet across the room. She tossed one bean back and over shot the bucket bu four feet. Then was under by three. She stomped her foot. No tremors. Still no bending. Little Xiaoyu wiped tears of frustration away from her eyes and tried again while Lin watched with Kang in her lap, fiddling with a figurine of sorts.

If Lin were Toph, Xiaoyu would be scolded for tearbending and told to toughen up or else she will be in for a very hard life. But Lin was not Toph. She would let her children cry. She would let them be children.

It is okay. She is only three. She has time.