Zuko

I wake up, as usual, with Katara snuggled up close to me. Her long, flowing, dark hair acting as a pillow for my cheek as her chocolate skin caresses me and gives me a thrill I couldn't ever imagine having before with Mai, or anyone else. Katara looks truly peaceful in her sleep. She sighs contentedly and tries to get closer, but she is unsuccessful, us being as close as we could possibly be already.

She stirs and her eyes slowly open. She looks up drowsily at me.

"How long have you been up?" she asks me.

"Not long," I tell her.

The sun is just peeking through the curtained windows, giving the room a faint sort of lighting that illuminates Katara's dark skin in just the right way. I'm almost taken aback at the sight of it.

"I'm so glad you said yes," I tell her. "More than you know."

She cups my face in her hands and kisses me tenderly before replying. "You're not the only one who's happy. Never in my life, before the recent years, did I think that I would marry the Crown Prince of the nation that took my mother. But so much has happened. So much tragedy and hurt, but that's all behind us. And now I'm the wife of one of the most powerful men in the world. Not to mention one of the sexiest."

I'm kind of shocked to hear such a phrase come out of her mouth, but I grin at her devilishly after recovering from the short, initial shock. "As are you, Lady Katara. If not sexier."

She giggles and a light blush appears on her face. "Is that right, Fire Lord, Zuko?"

"Most certainly," I say.

When I lean over her Katara starts giggling like crazy as I kiss her neck and exposed collarbone. I kiss where her heart is and press my ear to it, feeling grateful that she didn't let Azula stop it from beating during one of their many battles with one another.

"I love you," I murmur against her skin.

"I love you, too," Katara says.

"And do you know what else?" I ask.

"What?"

"You're not getting off that easily. I've still got ultimate power over you," I murmur with a devilish smirk on my face, knowing that both of those actions will ruffle her feathers.

"Oh really?" Katara challenges. She flips us over so she's straddling my hips before I can stop her. I can't hold back a groan of ecstasy. "I take that little noise you just made as a noise of surrender."

I flip us back over and pin her below me so she's almost completely immobile. "Not so fast."

I let my breath tickle Katara's ear before I gently nibble on the small ruby embedded in the lobe. I then follow up that action by licking and kissing just below it and making my way across the expanse of skin below her jaw. The whole time she's shivering and whimpering in pleasure.

"Zuko," she breathes.

"Yes, my love?" I ask innocently.

"Stop… teasing me," she barely gets out.

I am just about to respond when the door bursts open.

"Get off my sister!" I hear Sokka exclaims.

"Sokka, what are you doing here?!" Katara asks with a glare at her brother.

"I wanted to let you know breakfast was ready," he says, returning the glare Katara's giving her to both her and me. "Just hurry and get dressed. We're waiting for you."

Sokka leaves the room and with a sigh, we both get up out of our position in bed and get dressed. We make our way down to the room set up for our friends and I when we want to get together and eat. I don't know what Katara's thinking, but if her thoughts are of any similarity to mine, she's hoping and praying to the spirits above that Sokka didn't tell everybody about the position he caught us in.

He must not have, because when Katara and I enter the room and I shut the door behind us, everyone greets us with smiles and warm greetings. Toph being the exception as always, considering it's rare for her to show any sort of warmth towards anyone at least in public.

But it's when I notice Suki give Katara a wink, that I realize my assumption was wrong.

"Sokka that big blabbermouth," Katara whispers angrily in my ear.

"He's not gonna hear the end of it is he?" I whisper back.

"Not anytime soon," she says.

She makes sure she glares at Sokka when she says that. Sokka must be hearing the conversation because he gulps and scoots closer to Suki who looks to be stifling a laugh at the whole situation.

"What's going on?" Aang asks, being the blissfully unaware one of the group.

"Snoozles caught Sparky and Sugar Queen going at it," Toph says bluntly.

Toph must sense Katara's furiousness and my annoyance because she laughs, clearly amused at what she just said.

"It was a romantic moment I have every right to share with my wife," I say, surprising myself at the level of calmness in my voice. "We were not 'going at it'."

"Then what else do you call it?" Toph asks us with a smirk.

"I really don't know…" I try to continue my thought, but Toph interrupts me.

"Exactly," she says smugly.

"Now, Toph, Zuko and Katara have a right to show their affections in the privacy of their bedroom," Uncle Iroh begins. I send him a look of gratitude, but then he winks at me before smirking and chuckling. "It was just an unfortunate coincidence that the brother of the bride had to walk in on it."

The whole table breaks out into fits of laughter. At first, Katara and I aren't laughing, but eventually, we join in with our friends and my uncle, realizing the humor in the situation.

"But come on, Toph," Katara says as the laughter slowly dies down. "It's not like you and Aang haven't done anything like that."

Toph scoffs. "Are you kidding? Twinkle Toes? He barely has the nerve to kiss me let alone do much more."

That does it. We all start laughing again, even harder than before. Aang blushes, a deep crimson coloring his face.

"Sorry. I thought I was respecting your boundaries," he says.

"Boundaries?" Toph asks with heavy skepticism in her voice. "You think I have boundaries? Aang, we've been together for two and a half years! I want more than just the kissing, and the cuddling, and the handholding. Throw me a bone, here!"

We're all shocked at Toph's outburst, especially considering she used his real name, which only happens once in a blue moon. Katara, me, and the rest of the group, including my uncle, are stifling hysterical laughter at the couple.

"Fine!" Aang exclaims. He stands up in blind rage and in the process knocks over the chair he was sitting in. "When we get to Ba Sing Se, I'm going to jump your bones so hard you won't know what hit you!"

"That is an antique!" Uncle Iroh chastises with a glare at the young airbender.

Toph and Aang continue their argument, unfazed by my uncle's remark about the overturned chair.

"Are you kidding?! I don't know what's going to hit me now! I'm blind, you idiot."

"Spirits!" Aang shouts. "Okay then, I'm going to screw you so hard into the ground the city will need a team of giant mole rats to dig you out!"

That shuts us all up immediately. Toph laughs.

"That's more like it," Toph says with a smug smirk at her seething boyfriend before giving him a hard punch to the arm, knocking him to the ground in the process. "Love you."

"Women! Sheesh!" Aang says as he gets up, rights his chair, and sits down with a pout.

There's a long pause of awkward silence before Suki speaks up. "Well, now that we got that settled. Let's eat, then we'll pack our things and go to Ember Island. General Iroh, you are more than welcome to join us."

"No, thank you," he says. "You kids need to have fun. Enjoy your time off before it goes away. Because trust me, I know from experience that good times can disappear as quickly as they came."

"Well, the offer is still on the table if you change your mind before we go," Suki says politely.

The awkwardness in the room slowly starts to dissipate as we continue our meal with quiet conversation. I thank Agni silently that the weirdness is fading as I take a bite of rice.

A Few Hours Later

Appa lands on Ember Island what looks to be a short walk away from my family's old beach house. Aang tells the bison to stay put, and his pet lemur rides on his shoulder as we leave the bison to munch on whatever vegetation there is in the vicinity where we left him. We reach the house shortly afterward. When we are within seeing range of the beach, Suki takes off running, stripping to her swimming attire in the process.

Sokka quickly follows suit, then Katara yips and hollers gleefully as she runs after her brother. I laugh at the obnoxiousness unfurling amongst our group of friends while I sprint after Katara and mimic my wife, brother-in-law and future sister-in-law by stripping down to nothing save for my swimwear. My swimwear, just as everyone else in the group, consisted of what I wore underneath my clothes; which for me was just a pair of red shorts that came up to about mid-thigh.

For Katara, though, what she wore to swim was totally different. She was in her underbindings of course, but something about her dressed like that struck a chord in me that it never did before I fell for her. Even before that, there was something about her that entranced me; even when I didn't know it.

"Hey, Katara! Wanna spar?" Aang asks joyfully once he's in his swimwear and in the water with her, Suki, Sokka, Toph, and I.

"I dunno. I might end up kicking your ass so hard you'll run away with your tail between your legs," Katara jabs with a laugh.

Not often do I hear words like that come out of her mouth. Then again, she can't really use them anyway now that she has to help run a country and act like a normal, civilized human being. Civilized she is, but normal she most certainly isn't. And I wouldn't have my waterbender any other way.

"Doubt it!" Aang teases, breaking me out of my thoughts. "I'm the Avatar! I'm a master of all four elements!"

"But you're with me, so you can't use all four elements! Only water!" Katara retorts. "Plus, you're looking at someone who can gather water from plants, trees, and even the air!"

"So?" her opponent asks her.

"Alright, Avatar. Since you think you're so big and bad, I accept your offer. Everyone, watch and learn as Master Katara teaches the almighty avatar about messing with a world-renown waterbender," Katara boasts.

We all get out of the water and sit next to one another before the fight begins. When Katara and Aang see that we are all out of range of getting hurt, they begin their duel. Aang makes the first attack; creating a large water whip and flinging it at Katara. She effectively dodges the blow and strikes back with a giant wave. Aang creates a water bubble around himself to act as a shield from the attack.

As I watch the two benders, I can't help but worry for Katara. I know she is very powerful. I've seen her in action, and I know she can handle herself. She is my wife, I guess. So you can't blame me for worrying. Aang is the least of my worries, though, seeing as he is the Avatar and can defend himself pretty damn well.

I continue to watch them, Katara especially. She is graceful and lithe with every movement she makes as she bends the salt water. Her beauty is extraordinary, though, when she's bending. She's beautiful when she isn't, of course, but when she does it's like she's a goddess. I don't deserve her. She's so kind and amazing and perfect. If only I hadn't betrayed her trust back in Ba Sing Se, I think to myself. Maybe then she would have trusted me sooner. Maybe then the Avatar wouldn't have been killed by Azula. But then I remember it was her healing hands that with the help of the special spirit water from the North Pole that brought him back to life from the death sentence Azula gave him.

"Had enough?" Katara asks, being the second person today to break me out of my thoughts.

Aang has red lines scattered across his arms and chest, and even one across his forehead. He also looks exhausted, but he replies with a stubborn "no."

"Alright then," Katara says with a shrug.

She summons a rather large water whip to cover her dominant arm before making it curl around one of the young Avatar's legs.

"Uh oh," is all Aang can say before Katara tosses him high up into the air with a grin.

We all watch in awe as he falls back into the water, only to be caught halfway down by Katara's water whip and thrown far out into the water.

Sokka is the first to vocalize what we are all thinking, save for Toph, who is cackling and rolling around in the sand like a madwoman. "Katara, what have you done?!"

She laughs a bit at her brother's question, and I can only question the sanity of my spouse for a fraction of a second before Aang comes swimming back up to shore.

"I'm okay!" Aang says, climbing out of the water and collapsing on the beach.

It was obvious to everyone he used his airbending to swim that fast. But that didn't make any of us any less concerned, once again, save for Toph, who instead of laughing was now just smirking. We all rush over to a panting Aang, who is lying face first in the sand.

"I think that was a bit of overkill, Katara," Sokka says, turning him over so he can breathe.

"Not really," Aang said. "At least she didn't go easy on me this time."

"No, I didn't," Katara says, coming up to us and examining the scene. "I kept the thought that I could heal Aang in mind the entire time, unlike the other duels and practice sessions he and I had," she explains. "So I thought I'd rough him up a bit just to do as I said I would do. I said I would teach him a lesson, and I did." She finishes by crossing her arms over her chest and smirking.

Everyone looks at the smug waterbender in shock at what just transpired, me included. Hell, even Toph, who is blind, is in a state of shock at what she's sensing from Katara.

"Fine! I lose!" Aang says, us jumping a little bit at his sudden ability to speak. "The least you could do is heal me after the ass kicking you gave me."

"Deal, my young pupil," Katara says with a respectful bow.

"I'm not a pupil to anybody anymore!" Aang protests. Katara, Toph, and I all glare down at the fallen airbender with raised eyebrows and readied fists. "Fine! I'm a pupil to you three!"

Katara smirks and helps him up. "Come on, everyone. It looks like it might rain soon."

We all head to the house as Katara's prediction comes true, and by the time we're all inside it has started to pour.