V2.10
The Dance
We were docked again at a relatively well-off Earth Kingdom-turned-Fire Nation colony. The men had plenty of shore leave while the ship restocked and was repaired by a professional mechanic that cost Zuko a lot of money. In the end, though, the engine was running better than usual and all of the men were in great spirits.
I tried to pretend that they weren't in great spirits because of the local brothel, but that would have been deluding myself. I could hear them laughing and cajoling with one another on the docks as they left and even more drunkenly when they came back to sleep it off.
There was nothing I really wanted in the town. Iroh gave me anything I would ever want and Zuko was on land—therefore, there was nothing I needed. Still, I needed to stretch my legs. I threw on a pair of Zuko's workout pants (which I liked more than the fancy pants that Iroh bought me) and a baggy tunic of Iroh's. I threw my hair back in a braid, grabbed my walking stick, and hit the town.
It was a bustling little merchant town filled with mostly middle- to high-class citizens. I noticed that men and women were clustered in little groups all around the docks and throughout the town. Never once did I see any mingling except between older couples. I found it strange but brushed it off—after all, I'd been out in the wilderness for a few years and who was I to question social protocol? I just didn't talk to anyone and that was fine.
I passed a bookstore and took a few steps back to peer into it. Scrolls upon scrolls were lined up across the walls, with dozens of shelves in the middle of the room. I couldn't even see anyone inside because of all of the shelves.
Remembering that Zuko liked Firebending scrolls, I stepped inside and started looking around. Everything was extremely nice and expensive. Not too expensive that I couldn't purchase it with what Iroh had given me, but enough to realize that even the bookshelves were intricately designed and that the signs over the sections were made out of pure gold.
"Can I help you, boy?" a snooty woman at a desk on the left said. I jumped and turned to see a girl about my age with fancy clothing and a strange updo staring me down with contempt. I was used to Zuko's open hatred of me, but I didn't need it from this girl. I flushed when I realized that she'd mistaken me for a boy. "Oh, my bad...you're a girl. Not very obvious though."
I bristled and twirled my walking stick irately. A few hoity-toity patrons had turned to stare at me openly or behind expensive fans. "You're being rather rude to a potential customer, you know."
She did the once-over to me. I didn't realize that that kind of look actually existed until I felt the scrutiny of her gaze judging me from my feet wraps to my braid. "I don't believe that you can afford anything in this store. Please leave."
I deliberated on raising my stick and beating her over the head with it. Instead, I smiled softly and said, "Of course. Obviously I don't belong here."
"No," she said with a large, fake smile. "You really don't."
Zuko
He looked over the list in front of him, ignoring the cries of the marketplace around him. He had to have enough supplies to keep from stopping for quite a while—all of the stopping, while giving him insight into where the Avatar was, was making him lose precious time.
Zuko looked up to the merchant and said, "Add three more barrels of salted cuttlefish." One of the crewmen next to him groaned, so he shot out a glare at the man. "Is this a problem, Lieutenant?"
"N-no sir," he said nervously, his eyes darting back and forth. A small bead of sweat made its way between his brows. "W-we just have been eating salted cuttlefish for weeks, and I-I—"
"You'll eat what I get you!" Zuko yelled at the man who instantly saluted in fear and grabbed one of the barrels to take back to the ship. The man looked as though he had wet himself. Zuko turned back to his list, only to see that he'd burned the paper. He sighed and shook the ashes from his hand. "Someone get me a new inventory list!"
As he was waiting on one of his men to get him a new list, he saw a familiar braid of black storming past him. Her face was red, not from anger, he noticed, but from embarrassment. Her eyes were glassy and her lips were pursed in a way that he'd never seen before.
He grasped Emiko's arm as she passed. She smelled like jasmine tea and the soap that they used to clean their clothes. "Hey, where are you going?"
"Back to the ship where I belong," she sniffed as she tugged away from him. He didn't let go, instead pulling her to face him. She refused to look anywhere except away. "Let m-me go."
"What happened?" he demanded, putting both of his hands on her shoulders. He shook her a little and gripped her tighter when she didn't answer. "I asked you a question!"
She finally looked up to him and the look in her eyes made him furious and concerned at the same time. Concerned because it looked as though she'd been crying. Furious because he wanted to squish whatever had made her feel that way. He'd promised her that he would protect her and he planned on following through with it. "I was kicked out of a store because of the way I looked."
Zuko blinked a few times and let his hands drop. He looked her up and down, noticing that she had wrapped her feet rather than wear the many shoes Iroh had gotten her. She was wearing a pair of his pants again, which irked him but could be dealt with at a later time. A large tunic of Iroh's covered her (small) curves and her braid was messy and unkempt.
All in all, a normal look for her.
"This is how you always look," he said.
Emiko laughed short and wry, rolling her eyes and cocking her jaw in irritation. "Yeah, well, turns out I'm not good enough for this town. I'm just going back to the ship, alright?"
Before she could leave, he grabbed her again. "What shop?"
She stared down at where his hand had grasped her wrist. "It was a book—you know, I'm getting tired of you manhandling me." He didn't even have time to reply before she used one of the tricks he'd shown her in training. She twisted her arm toward his thumb and forefinger and wrenched it out of his grip, using her other hand to jab at the pressure point in his wrist. He cursed at her but she hadn't left. "I can take care of myself. I'm tired of you saving me all the time, alright? I owe enough to you and Iroh."
He was quiet for a moment as he looked between both of her eyes, which had dried up in the few minutes they'd been standing there. "So, what," he said between his teeth as he massaged his sore wrist, "you're just going to cry about it?"
"No!" she said with a flushed face. "I mean...I don't know. I'll figure something out." With that, she turned with such a force that he was hit with her braid.
He yelled after her, "That wrist hold break was weak!"
Emiko simply yelled back, "It worked, didn't it?"
oOo
He decided that he was working with idiots about an hour later. Half of his crew was out boozing and whoring and having a great time, while the other half was hung over and loitering. His list had gotten to him, alright, but it had been drawn rather than written. He wasn't sure what he was supposed to get for his ship and he really thought that he needed a quartermaster to do all of this work for him.
"This is pointless!" he growled, throwing his hands in the air. This scared a few of the merchants around him but he didn't care as he put a hand to his head. "Agni, I need a drink."
Zuko left his post and just made his way through the town. When he and Iroh had scouted the place, he'd found a great little hole to get drunk in. Not that he'd indulged himself like that in a while, but, with the way everything had been going so far—from losing the Avatar to his ship malfunctioning to Emiko bothering the Koh out of him—he realized that he needed the distraction.
He found himself walking past many rich shops filled with jewelery, clothing, books, and furniture. He realized that Emiko could have been kicked out of any of them—most were filled with the kinds of people that would look down on someone like her. It actually made him mad the longer he thought about it.
Emiko was strong-willed and stubborn, but she wasn't a street urchin or a thief. She had the money and the clothes to buy nice things, but she chose not to. His chest hurt when he thought about the glassy-eyed look she'd had when she went back to the ship.
He passed by a bookstore and realized that that was the kind of store she said she'd been kicked out of. The hurt in his chest turned to fury when he saw the snobby cashier behind the desk and the hoity-toity, high-class people that he was used to seeing at the palace milling about the store. He made a split-second decision and stormed in.
The cashier was pretty, he supposed, in that snobbish way he was really annoyed with at the moment. She had big, brown doe eyes and her hair was done in the fashionable Fire Nation way he was used to seeing. She smiled at him the second he entered, probably noting his expensive clothing. "Hello, welcome to Kinokuniya Bookstore. My name is Mika. Please let me know if there is anything you need, handsome!" Her clothes were cut well and she knew that she was pretty and well-off and she wanted him to know that. It made his blood boil.
He wanted to knock her down a peg. "Did you kick out a young girl earlier?"
She blinked and looked at him again, this time a little nervously. "I'm not sure what you—"
"About this high," he said through clenched teeth, waving his hand about to the middle of his chest where Emiko's head hit. "Black hair in a messy braid, bright yellow eyes, pale skin. Wearing a potato sack and foot wraps."
Mika's eyes darted back and forth nervously as she played with a braid in her hair. "W-well, yes, I did. She was making the customers nervous and she did not appear to be able to afford anything in this store. I didn't want her to steal anything so I asked her to leave."
He grit his teeth and, without thinking, said, "Unlike you, she doesn't like to appear ostentatious. Being Prince Zuko's girlfriend gives her enough social standing. I'd think you would know who she and I both are."
The white lie was enough to put some fear in her bones, so he didn't mind using it. Her eyes widened and she started stammering and a small sweat beaded up on her upper lip and forehead. "O-oh Spirits, I am so sorry, Prince Zuko! I had no idea that the street urch—that the girl was your significant other! P-please, I meant no harm—"
Zuko was about to throw a few more wrenches into her pegs, but a small voice spoke up behind him. "I told you that I didn't need you to fight my battles."
He turned around, expecting to see Emiko, but saw a beautiful lady instead. Her hair was up in traditional Fire Nation poofs with golden jewelery hanging from each side in beads. White makeup made her face even paler than normal with black eyeliner adorning each eyelid. Pale pink blush made her cheekbones stand out and bright red lipstick had been painted on her lips.
She was wearing a traditional Fire Nation robe of red and pale gold, like her eyes, with small silken shoes on her dainty feet. A wide sash pulled tight around her waist, giving her a figure. Her hands were stuck between her sleeves and she stood as if she were wealthy like most of the people in the room.
"Emiko?" he asked, flushing as he realized that a) she looked amazing and b) she heard him say that she was his girlfriend. "You, ah...I thought you were on the ship!"
"I was," she conceded with a nod of her head. It made the jewelery in her hair tinkle and showed that she also had shoved a fire lilly up there.
"What are you doing here?" he asked with a slightly higher-pitched voice than he normally used. He hoped that she had missed the whole "girlfriend" argument. "What are you wearing? What—"
She nudged him in the stomach a little too hard. "You talk to much sometimes. Why don't we go get something to drink? This place is a little too high-strung for me." She put her arm through his and pulled him along, outside the bookstore, and down toward the little hole-in-the-wall bar he'd been wanting to go to.
As soon as they got far enough away, he noticed that she was biting her lip. A light of amusement was in her eyes. "So...girlfriend, huh?"
"Oh shut up!" He pushed her arm off of him and stalked away.
"Wait, Zuko, I'm only teasing!" She grabbed his hand and pulled him back, smiling up to him in a way that he hadn't seen before. "I thought it was sweet."
"Well, the cashier was pompous and that store was way over-priced anyway." He threw his nose up and tried to pretend that he'd been doing it for himself, but he knew that she could see straight through it. "Besides, she thought that you would steal something. How ridiculous is that?"
She bit her lip and hummed, "Uh-huh." She did that when she was nervous.
He cupped her cheek and used his thumb to stop her from doing that. He hadn't been able to take his eyes off of those lips or the way that the liner on her eyes made them look bigger. "Stop it. Your makeup looks...nice." He instantly dropped his hand and frowned. He preferred her without the makeup, but it was different and actually looked good. He never thought that she could fit in with his kind of people, but he'd walked right past her in the store without even recognizing her.
"Thanks...I don't look like I'd steal anything now, though, do I?" she asked with a sly smile on those red lips, which were marred by the scrape her teeth had left. He stared at her lips for a little too long before realizing that she was holding a scroll up in her hands, waving it in his face.
He realized that she had stolen the scroll! "Emiko! What in Koh's name did you do?!"
She put a finger to his lips and looked left and right to make sure that no one had heard him. "Shhh! I took it in reparations for the way she made me feel earlier. And I just wanted to see that I could do it."
Zuko stared at her for a moment, her soft finger still pressed against his lips, and then he felt a laugh bubbling in his chest. He let it come to the surface and couldn't help himself. After all of that, from her disguise to his intervening, she'd just gone back to get revenge! The little girl in front of him was a devious little minx, but she looked so pretty and innocent that he couldn't help but laugh. "Mika didn't stand a chance, did she?"
Emiko was smiling wide and laughing too as she slid the scroll back up her wide sleeves and shook her head. "You know what's even funnier? I was going to buy it when I first went in. Then she made me feel like vermin. So...payback has never felt sweeter."
The prince shook his head, a smile still on his face, and put a hand on Emiko's shoulder to lead her down the street again. "Let's go. Drinks on me."
Emiko
The bar was a squat, one story rectangle building that looked rather nondescript considering the establishments it was surrounded by. Still, music was coming from inside and I smelled food. My stomach growled and I blushed, glad that my makeup hid it.
Zuko took my arm as we got closer. I was momentarily taken away by the relaxed and easy-going look he had on his face. I realized then that that was the first time I'd heard him laugh. I really liked it and the smile he kept on his face. It made him seem younger and human.
He led me inside and I kept thinking about how he'd gone back to avenge me. This wasn't like him saving my life, or even saving me—he'd been looking out for me. He had even made up a stupid white lie to intimidate the girl. She looked like she was about to pee her pants! Even though it had been cruel, I only kept thinking how sweet it had been. Zuko wasn't sweet. But he had promised to protect me...and I didn't know how I felt about it anymore.
We opened the door to the bar. I took my eyes away from the well-muscled arm that held mine and looked at the decor. A single room with a large bar against the right wall greeted us. In the middle was a good-sized dance floor, and on the left side of the room were chairs and seats for guests to sit at. It looked as though the place served food, which was where the smell had been coming from. The back wall was all window, and in the middle of it was a glass door.
My head turned around and back to Zuko, and I saw that he was staring at me. I felt the heat rush up into my face as I noticed that everyone was staring at me. Well I guess that they were technically staring at both of us.
Most of the crew had taken their leave at this bar and they looked at us curiously. We were a strange couple in the bar—most were courtesans and sailors, not princes and their escorts. Zuko looked a little lost, so I grabbed his hand—then at least he looked shocked—and walked with him until we sat at a spot at a table in the corner.
"Now I feel like I don't belong here," I groaned as I looked around to see that any and all of the girls in the bar were either bar wenches or...well, 'ladies of the night.'
Zuko chuckled into the fire whiskey that had been brought before him. I'd only gotten a small fruity drink from the same waitress and I glared at it. "There's a poetry club next door, if you're interested."
I was sure that the blush on my face showed through the makeup. "That's not funny, Zuko."
"No? Well, that drink is."
I grabbed the drink from his hand and downed it in three gulps. The cup gave a high-pitched clank as it hit the table. I slid my fruity drink toward him and raised an eyebrow. "All yours. I'm not a fruity drink kinda girl."
He looked a little surprised but ignored the drink. "No...you definitely aren't. You're different from any girl I've ever met."
I snorted in laughter and waved the bar wench over. "Fire whiskey, four. Two for me and two for him, we need 'em." She looked surprised but did as I asked. I turned back to the prince and said, "You need to get out of your castle more often, Prince Zuko. There are a lot of different kinds of girls out there besides your rich heiresses."
"I know that," he snapped, suddenly back to his usual surly self. "Most girls are normal, unlike you!" Thankfully at that point, the waitress had brought the new drinks over and we both had something to hide the awkwardness in.
After downing a drink, I stood up and pushed my chair back. "Well then, if I'm so different, I don't belong here, either." I threw a gold coin on the table to pay for my half. A small feeling of disappointment landed in me as I readied to leave. That was before a hand landed on my shoulder.
"Well, if it isn't an old friend."
I looked up out of sheer curiosity. Though curiosity did kill the cat-hawk. A dangerously-beautiful woman stood there with long, straight black hair that covered part of her face and was partially held up by a top knot. A pleasant smile adorned her maroon-painted lips and her brown eyes were lined in black.
"Jun?" I asked carefully. This was a bounty hunter my father had used on me before, but, at the time, I'd been a Freedom Fighter. The Freedom Fighters and Jun had a deal—that, as long as she left us alone, we'd help capture Fire Nation fugitives for her. We made her a lot of money and, in return, we kept our freedom. "What are you doing here?"
She shrugged and said, "Same-old, same-old. Catching bounties, drinking, trashing places. Leaving a trail of broken hearts. You still with that group of kids?"
I had to tread carefully with her. I could see the greed behind her eyes—she knew how much I would pay out if brought back to my father alive. Zuko, behind me, could see that I had gone rigid. He tried to say something and stand, but I held my hand back at him. I didn't want him getting into this.
"Once a Freedom Fighter, always a Freedom Fighter," I said. A drop of sweat trickled down between my shoulder blades.
She smirked and gave me a pound on the back. "Well, it looks like you're loaded! How about you buy me a drink and I pretend I don't know how much of a bounty is on your head."
Zuko
He watched warily as the woman, Jun, took Emiko to the bar. Emiko paid for quite a few drinks for the two of them as they sat and talked amicably, if not a little stiffly. He kept an eye on them for a while, drinking and observing the patrons of the bar for what seemed like a long while.
There was a group of his men at the bar, drinking and having a good time. He hated to admit it, but Zuko was glad that his crew had a day off. They worked hard and (usually) didn't question his authority. They deserved more than a dishonored captain and more than a search for the Avatar.
On the dance floor, there were a few couples dancing to a raunchy jig that the band was playing. Most of the women were bar wenches or courtesans, but the men were obviously having a good time. Behind them, he could see a group of shady-looking men that eyed some of the women with a disgusting rage, as if they wanted to not only sleep with them, but hurt them as well.
Suddenly a group of women surrounded him. He really didn't notice them at first, and he concentrated on people-watching and his fire whiskey. He was on his…which glass was it? He didn't know, he really couldn't think at the moment. Every time he took a sip, a wench was by his side to fill it back up.
Now he noticed the women. Most were completely hideous compared to the radiance of Emiko's beauty, which—
Whoa, where did that come from? he asked himself as he tried to fend off the women.
One, a rather chunky woman who was wearing something too revealing for someone half her size, with so much makeup on that twenty women could've worn it, looked at him as if he were a pastry ready to eat. "Hello, my prince, haven't you grown up to be handsome?" She fluttered her eyelashes sickeningly.
Another, one who he couldn't even see past a huge mole on her overly large nose, crowded near him. "Well, aren't you a cutie. I've never seen you before, but I'd like to get to know you."
Then there was one that almost took his breath away. She was to his shoulder in height, with big brown doe eyes and shiny brown hair in a bun behind her head. She had the softest skin and the softest face of anyone he had ever seen.
But strangely, she wasn't as beautiful as the one he had brought.
"Prince Zuko," she said meekly, gazing up under full lashes, "would you dance with me? I would be honored." She curtsied like a woman with a good background was supposed to do, and she didn't meet his eyes, either. What was unfortunate was that he couldn't tell if she was a courtesan or not.
Suddenly the group of women was pushed apart, and Emiko stood in between them. Her hair was a little disheveled, but it only made her look better. She'd taken it down, making it fall in waves behind her back, down to her round, wide backside. He realized that he liked this dress on her quite a bit. Her hips were accentuated especially and he longed to grab them and pull them closer.
"Sorry, ladies," she said as she got close to him and wrapped her arm through his. She smelled of jasmine tea again, fresh and innocent. "This man is mine."
Emiko
"Looks like your boyfriend has some night-offers," Jun said after her third drink. We'd been talking hesitantly about each other, leaving out important details and mostly making small talk, which didn't seem like her at all. We were sizing each other up to see if it was worth the risk of taking the other on.
"What?" I asked, turning my head to see Zuko being surrounded by women. A furious blush came to my cheeks as anger bubbled in my chest. The sudden strong feeling caught me off guard, making me confused because this was Zuko. "He's not my boyfriend."
Jun snorted into her drink and looked at me with a wry eye. The other was hidden behind her hair. "Yeah, and I'm from the North Pole. You two are so wound up that it makes me sexually frustrated."
I blushed and put down my drink. My face was extremely hot and my lips were getting tingly—a sign that I had had a few too many. "I'm not—"
"Don't even, Red." How does she know my Freedom Fighter name? "No excuses. Go over there and get your man before he disappears upstairs with one of those girls. The small one's even kinda cute."
Picturing Zuko taking one of those girls upstairs and ravaging her made my breath hitch—both in embarrassment and in jealousy. He deserved better than some courtesan in a bar's brothel. I turned back to Jun and said, "You sure you're not gonna try to take me in tonight?"
"Not tonight, Red," she said simply, one eye peering up at me. "You're worth a hefty sum, but you're also surrounded by allies and I'm not quite sure I could beat you. Last time you almost took my head off. Your hand-to-hand combat sucks dick—"
"Hey!"
"—but you're a great bender and strategist. And you know how to find someone's weak points."
Jun was a lot like Iroh in the fact that she could read people with ease. It kind of scared me, actually, and I was glad that I didn't have to fight her then. Finding her weak points while intoxicated didn't seem like a great battle plan. "Thanks, I think."
"It's a compliment. Now go get 'im before I take him and ravage him myself."
I stood up, confident and ready, but I stumbled a little bit. I couldn't blush anymore at that point and I started taking down my hair as I walked over to the group. I had no idea what I was going to say, but my intoxicated mind thought it was a good idea to let my hair down. More casual that way.
I pushed my way through the group and wound my arm through Zuko's, saying, "Sorry, ladies. This man is mine."
He was going to protest, but I pressed myself closer, hoping that he got the message He took his arm from mine and suddenly wrapped it around my waist. The heated smell of fire whiskey assaulted my nose—how much had he had to drink since I'd left? I gave him a good stomp on the foot, not that my little silk slipper did anything to his armored shoe.
"She's absolutely right, ladies. I'm sorry, but I must leave with my date." I elbowed him harshly in the ribs but he simply turned to me and suddenly bowed. "Would you honor me with a dance?"
"M-me?" I asked in wonder, my voice somewhat panicked. My eyes widened and I bit my lower lip, gnawing it between my teeth like I did when I was nervous. I hadn't meant that he'd actually have to dance with me!
He grinned evilly and took my arm, leading me out to the dance floor. "B-but I can't dance!" I cried as I tried to pull away.
Zuko took my hand, pulled it up in the air, spun me, and then caught and dipped my body. His strong hands held me close and made me feel safe, even when my head was dangling over the ground. "Its all in the leading," he whispered in my ear when he brought me back up. I wrapped my arms around his neck, which I found to be muscular, while he rested those large hands on my hips, making a hot blush run up my neck to fill my cheeks.
Wolf whistles and cat calls made their ways to my ears, and I looked down in embarrassment and shame. I wasn't like the ladies there. I wasn't going to give myself up and...and...
"Hey," Zuko said softly, lifting my chin with one finger. My eyes met his and I knew that tears were filling them. I wouldn't cry in front of him. Especially not since he had that kind, caring look in his eyes. "What's wrong?"
I grit my teeth, frustrated again. I didn't belong next door, at the 'poetry club,' as Zuko had said, and I didn't belong in any of the stores. I didn't belong in that bar, either. The only woman who wasn't willing to give herself away in there was Jun, and I doubted even that as she scrutinized the men with an eaglehawk eye. "I'm not...like them."
Zuko's eyes flickered to the women who had propositioned him. They cooed and whistled to him, waving him back over. Before he could say anything, I stuffed my head in his shoulder and stayed there from embarrassment.
One of his hands came up and cupped the back of my head and his rough, warm lips landed under my ear. "Obviously. Thanks for saving me from them."
I was sure that my entire face was red, so I didn't look up, even if it was covered in makeup to hide it. "Well, I couldn't let you..."
"What?" he asked softly again. His lips trailed from the top of my ear down. A small shiver ran its way down my back and a heat slowly built in my abdomen. This wasn't the alcohol's heat, either. His hard, muscular body was pushed so close to mine that I wondered if he would notice my trembling.
Suddenly he spun me out. As soon as I was out of his arms, the Prince instantly pulled me back. It made me lose my breath as his beautiful topaz eyes turned three shades darker. His arms were wrapped around me tightly and I was completely up against his Firebending-toned body. He had leaned forwards, his lips right beside me ear, and he was paused there. His nose skimmed my ear. "Are you...jealous?" he murmured, his breath against my skin making me short of breath.
The lights then darkened, making him an outline against the candlelight. A very large, very intimidating outline. I shivered from his cool, calloused touch. "I-I just...no! I..."
My voice was lost in the sudden start of new music. It was slow and intimate, and I found myself forgetting about what I was going to say.
Zuko kissed my shoulder through the fabric, his rough lips lingering, his breath creating goose bumps from my jaw to down my arm. "Hmm…"
"A-and I wasn't…really…"
The lights dimmed even more, and suddenly all I could see were his dark topaz eyes. They came closer, along with the cold of his body, and his lips kissed under my jaw. One of his hands slid down my hip, the other sliding up my waist to hold against my back. I shook my head and tried to think straight, but it was kind of hard to do. He was looking at me like I was something to…eat. "Zuko…what are you…?"
And then his lips were slowly pushed against mine. My blood boiled as his hot, rough lips moved against mine. I tried not to think like a teenage girl as he kissed me, but as a teenage girl, I knew how it was when I got kissed by a guy for the first time. Not that he was my first kiss, but...wow, I couldn't think straight.
He pulled me to him gently, parting my lips with his. His kiss was intoxicating, his lips so rough and wonderful that I could have wept. I vaguely felt his hands moving to pull my hips closer, but I couldn't think past anything but his lips. I then knew why it was so easy to get carried away. I let my hands rest on his chest, not thinking about anything else but him, welcoming the feeling of him, his lips, against me.
There were no other dancers on the floor. We were all alone in our own little world, holding each other close, kissing with a slow, strong emotion… I didn't know if we were even dancing anymore, or just swaying back and forth, or just standing there. And truthfully, I didn't care.
"Emiko…" he whispered against my lips, his breath hot against mine. And then I slowly pulled away. We were both breathing heavily now, warily looking into each other's eyes.
His were beautiful. Bright, topaz eyes surrounded by and surrounding pitch black circles. They stood out against the dark as I ran my fingertips over his shoulder, down the side of his chest where his heart was beating erratically.
As those lips returned heatedly, I took in one deep breath of surprise, maybe to calm my nerves before they were jumbled up again. My hands moved upwards to feel the muscles in his neck, to his jaw that was attached to mine. I let my fingers caress his face, memorizing every feature. He had strong cheekbones, his good eye very well set. His neck was strong, stronger than I ever would have guessed from his slighter build.
What are you doing? my brain was asking, melting in the intimacy of our embrace. Part of me was so excited about this that it was jumping for joy, but the other part was frowning deeply, sensing some kind of foreboding danger.
I pulled away, not able to meet his eyes, looking at his shoulder instead of looking at him directly. His lips then found the next best thing and started kissing my neck, my jaw, and I couldn't take it without feeling as if I were being used. I wasn't like the women in there. And Spirits, there were some of Zuko's men in that bar! So I untangled myself from his arms and I turned my back to him. I bit my lower lip to keep away the tears, and wrapped my arms around my waist to keep from shuddering at my own reckless abandon. "I-I'm sorry," I apologized quickly, trying to get the kiss out of my mind. "I-I shouldn't have d-done that."
I strode quickly out to the balcony behind the glass doors at the back of the bar. Even in the peace and quiet, I couldn't help but scold myself. Why had I kissed the Prince of the Fire Nation? No, not the Prince, but Zuko? I mean, come on, it wasn't even that intimate! Well, the music was nice…and the candles…the planes of his face were nicely set off by them—
I sighed and looked out onto the garden. It was beautiful, the nighttime flowers opening their buds to the bright moonlight. I looked up to the moon and silently asked it the one question I always had. Why do you hate me?
When I closed my eyes, the golden moon was suddenly full, a bright yellow light cascading down. It duplicated, and suddenly one large crater filled the center of the moons. And then they were put into a face. His eyes were luscious gold pools that I wanted to swim in, but why was he in the moon? I looked back up at it and sighed, thinking about the way his heartbeat rushed faster when he kissed me, and—
I shook my head and decided to head back to the boat. If I was seeing double, then I'd really gone overboard with the whiskey. I went back inside to see that most of the patrons had either left or gone upstairs with their girls for the night. I looked around for Zuko and saw that he was sitting back at our table, on another glass of whiskey.
Suddenly Zuko got up. He stumbled across the ground, holding his head as if in pain. He slowly but surely made his way to me. Despite my mixed feelings, I hurried to meet him half-way. "Are you okay?" I asked softly, trying to look away from his lips.
He wrapped his arm around my shoulder and lost his balance for a moment. He leaned most of his weight on me, then looked down on me with dazed eyes and slurred, "Yes, I'm fine." But he wasn't. He reeked entirely of alcohol and was using my body as a weight to keep from falling.
Ugh, this is great. I get to carry the drunk home. Shouldn't this be reversed? "Come on, Zuko, let's sit you down for a few minutes and then we'll see if you can walk without falling on your face."
He pulled away and stood there defiantly. "I-I'm fine. I swear."
"No, sit down." I pushed his shoulders to try and turn him off balance, but Zuko was actually a pretty sensible drunk. Point one for the drunk.
He grabbed my shoulders to steady himself again and smiled triumphantly. "See? I told you that I can stand."
"I didn't say stand, I said walk without falling on your face."
"I'm fine."
"No, you're stammering and slurring and—oh just come on already! Lets go before you draw anymore attention to yourself."
"Y'know," Zuko said as he leaned against me and we slowly made our way out the door. The cool air seemed to sober both of us up just a little bit. "You're not that bad, Emiko."
I scoffed and leaned a little more into him. I said that it was subconscious, but the feel of his arm around me and his muscular waist against my side made me want to push him up against the nearest wall and kiss the Spirit world out of him. Instead, I said, "Let's just hear sober Zuko say that."
"I am sober!" he half-yelled, half-stumbled, and I caught him. Not really, though. I tripped over his feet and ended up landing on his lap and he landed on the sidewalk. His hands alighted around my hips and I clung to his shoulders.
"You were saying?"
"I had a little."
We both laughed and leaned against the other, just reveling in our shared drunkenness. I put my forehead to his and smiled, looking into those beautiful topaz eyes. Our laughter trickled down until we were just staring at each other. It was intimate and a little scary.
I glanced down at his lips and saw that they were smudged a little with red. This made me laugh again as I picked his chin up and used my kimono's sleeve to wipe it off. "You, ah, have some paint on your lips..."
"You don't say." I didn't have time to react before he put a hand behind my head and pulled me to him. I gasped, opening up my lips to him, and he took advantage as he gently lined my lower lip with his tongue.
He tasted amazing. I couldn't help but fall into his kiss, pulling his body closer to mine and clenching my thighs together to keep the heat-filled sensation at their apex away. My body was warming up again—once again, not the alcohol—and I moaned into the prince's mouth.
It wasn't hurried, as it had been earlier. Instead, Zuko was softly kissing me, building it up, as if he wanted to map me out. He tugged on my hair a little, making me tilt my chin up, and he started to line my jaw and neck with slow, sensual kisses. My breathing was getting heavy and my head was spinning. His free hand ran down my back and around my waist, settling on my lower abdomen where all the heat was building.
I cupped his face and ran my thumb over his cheekbone. Kissing Zuko hadn't turned out the way I'd thought it would. Rather than me kissing him, he'd gone the extra mile to kiss me. Rather than thinking that I would completely hate it, I found myself becoming addicted to him. I felt uplifted and free and just a little naughty.
My thumb suddenly skimmed over his scar and he pulled away from me. He was breathing hard, too, and his eyes were two shades darker than normal. But now I saw a little bit of fear hidden in those dark orbs. "We, ah...we should get back to the ship."
My eyebrows drew together in concern, but I didn't question him. Instead I got off of his lap and offered him my hand. He didn't take it. "Zuko..."
"I don't want to talk about it right now," he said.
I nodded and followed closely behind him until we reached the ship. I grabbed his hand and stopped him before he could board. "I'm not going to apologize."
He took a deep breath, eyes closed, before he turned to me. He pulled a small handkerchief out of his pocket and gently brushed one side, then the other of my face. When he pulled back the black cloth I could see that it held all of the white powder that had been on my face. "Good. I wouldn't expect you to." He placed his knuckles under my chin and made me look up at him. "You aren't going to speak of this."
I frowned. Half of the crew probably saw this, so... "I wasn't going to, Zuko. But we should—"
His voice got dangerously low as he said, "I don't want to talk about it."
The next morning, Zuko wasn't at our practice spot to train. Not the morning after that, or the morning after that, either. I hung my head but kept training on my own. I don't need him, anyway.