Tula and Channa began to spend more time together, and although they didn't talk much, they found comfort in each other's presence. Tula thought it was nice to have another girl her age to spend time with; it was a first for her.
Channa was from Yu Dao, an old Fire Nation colony to the West. Her mother had been a wealthy businesswoman, and her father was a miner. She hated the Fire Nation. That was all Tula knew.
Tula was learning smithing. She took on more and responsibility with the Freedom Fighters. She trained often with Jet and occasionally with Channa and with Smellerbee. Tula was busy, so she was happy.
"Root yourself to the ground!" Smellerbee barked. "I'm going to come at you, and you need to keep your stance."
This was difficult for an airbender. She wasn't keen on giving up her only advantage.
But nonetheless Tula lowered her hands to her sides and took a strong stance. The small girl ran at her, and it took all Tula had to keep her ground. Smellerbee practically threw herself at Tula, and although Tula tried to remain steady, she wobbled back a few feet, winded.
"Spits, Blondie, it's not that hard. Look, I want you to kick me."
"Kick you?"
"Yeah, right in the stomach."
Tula had no desire to hurt her friend. She easily had twenty pounds on Smellerbee.
"Come on, Blondie," she said. "I'll be fine."
So she did it. She flew at Smellerbee, her leg outstretched, and upon impact, the scrawny girl didn't budge. Tula fell to the ground, but Smellerbee stayed up. There were cracks in the earth beneath her.
"How did you do that?" Tula looked up at her, bewildered. "Are you a god? Am I in the presence of a deity right now?"
Smellerbee rolled her eyes, and Tula laughed at her annoyed expression.
"If your core is strong, the energy goes through you instead of—You just have to stand and take it."
Tula spent the next hour getting pummeled by Smellerbee. Her entire torso was sore, but now she felt like she could handle anything. She was high on the ache of effort and the adrenaline of friendly competition.
All those years in hiding, this is what I've been missing.
She walked through the forest, sunlight beaming on her freckled shoulders. It didn't feel like wartime; it felt like paradise.
She picked lychee nuts as she strolled. As she bent over, she felt a presence behind her. It was utterly silent. Her breath caught in her throat. She turned slowly.
The lion cat stood there, its gaze fixed on Tula. Its eyes were the lightest she'd ever seen—the blue of the sky. It wasn't very big, no larger than her, and aside from its mane, it resembled a large version of an ordinary housecat. It's fur was short, with a golden sheen, a similar color to her own hair.
The lion cat cocked its head at Tula. It turned and began to walk away. She followed, of course. They strayed from the trodden path and ventured somewhere Tula had never been before. They walked through the forest for about an hour when finally they came to the ruins of a building. At first, Tula thought it must have been a home destroyed during the war, but upon closer inspection, she saw that the ruin looked natural. The stone had slowly crumbled—not been intentionally wrecked. Moss and reddish-brown vines wrapped around the base of the structure.
The lion cat stepped up onto what once was the stone floor. As Tula looked at the stones beneath her, she noticed an intricate pattern created by rounded stones.
This building was something special.
She followed the pattern with her eyes, and it led her to a pair of bare feet—stone bare feet. There was a statue of a monk—well a man in monk's robes. He had a head of hair and no arrow on his forehead. He was armless, and chunks had fallen from the back of his head. Still, Tula decided that this must have been a temple of sorts, probably hundreds of years old.
"Why did you bring me here?" She turned to the lion cat.
It gazed at her imploringly. She knelt down in front of it, in a sign of surrender.
"I'm not dangerous."
She outstretched her hand for the lion cat to smell. It raised a paw. Tula's hand and the creatures touched lightly, and the entire forest seemed to be flooded with light.
As Tula regained her sight, she saw that it was no longer the lion cat that was in front of her. The woman, the one she'd seen flying, knelt there, with her palm touching Tula's. Their hands were exactly the same size. Their hair, although different lengths, was the same hue of honey blond. The woman was certainly older than her, and her face was prettier—more symmetrical and angular. She had no freckles, and her eyes were big and brown. Still there was an undeniable resemblance between them.
Tula understood. This woman was Senge. This woman was her great-grandmother.
She had only known her for a couple years, and she had been old and unhinged. And she was not an airbender.
If she had been, how could she have survived?
But Tula had seen this woman fly unassisted, and even regular airbenders couldn't do that.
She's a spirit, you dunce! She doesn't have to obey the laws of the natural world.
Tula couldn't believe that of all of the possible identities she'd imagined for this woman, her great-grandmother had never been one of them.
As realization courses through Tula, Senge stood. She grasped Tula's hand. Her eyes told Tula she had something to show her.
The Spirit World.
Senge's hand was solid, surprisingly. It felt more real than anything Tula had ever held before. She closed Tula's eyes gently, with two fingers, and Tula felt her arm tugged upward. Her heels left the ground, then her toes broke contact.
She felt a rush of excitement, and it took all of her will to keep her eyes shut. She felt herself engulfed in warmth. It was wonderful.
But the warmth began to prickle. Then it burned.
Is this normal?
A shock of pain forced her eyes open. Flames, all around her. Crackling. Dancing. Laughing. And then she was falling.
She hit the stone with a thud. Her vision blazed red, but the flames subsided. Thankfully, she hadn't been burned. Four Fire Nation soldiers encircled her.
"Let us take you back to camp, and we'll...uh...spare you," one said.
Tula stood to her feet, feebly. She regained her composure.
"Let me go." She gritted her teeth. "And I'll spare you."
For a second, she saw fear cross the eyes of one of the soldiers, but soon enough they began to laugh.
Shit. I can't possible take four firebenders.
"Alright then."
A whoosh of flames flew at her face. She ducked. In a cloud of ash, she crawled out of the ruins, fumbling for her hook swords. She used them to swing from a low-hanging branch, and she kicked a soldier in the head, sending him to the ground. She sprung at another, aiming a sword at his throat, but the realization of how young he was—likely 17, Channa's age, caused her to redirect her blow to his shoulder.
Blood seeped through his uniform just as another bender shot flames at her. Her eyes stung and she felt as if she couldn't breathe.
The soldiers circled up, sending flames her way from seemingly every angle. She jumped and dodged and ducked. She was getting tired. She was getting desperate.
In horror, she watched as they worked together to create something that looked like a whirlwind of flames. They built it up, flames circling around them, rings of fire stacking. It would wipe out yards of forest in each direction.
There's no getting away.
As the heat grew, Tula began to cry. She had failed. This was the end of the air nomads. She had been too weak to survive.
She shut her eyes and keeled over. All she felt, all she knew was the sear of flames rushing in her direction.
But they didn't come. She looked at the soldiers and saw that their shock matched hers. They were enclosed in a thick sheet of glass. She realized, upon seeing the sand that lay on the ground, that they'd blown it themselves. A young man dressed in tan robes with a scarf of sorts covering his nose and mouth stood there, conjuring the sand back into a pouch at his hip.
The soldiers saw him, too. They erupted with fury. They began to attempt to break the glass.
Tula got up, looking at the sandbender.
"You saved me," she said, still dazed.
"I did not do this for you," the man scoffed. "They took my opium."
The two of them looked back at the soldiers in their giant glass vial. It was pulsing with heat, the glass was bubbling.
"Shit!" Tula cried.
But the flames stopped.
They're out of oxygen, Tula realized.
The men began to choke. Their eyes popped out of their sockets. Their legs gave way. It was awful. Tula was reminded brutally of that night a few years back when she'd caused another to meet the same fate.
We're letting them die.
This was what war looked like.
Tula hit the ground once again.