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(push)

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It takes a surprisingly long time for her to realize that something's been missing from her life, and even longer to swallow her pride to do something about it.

"Care to explain why I had to waste my time with meditation to see you?" Azula asks tetchily.

Toph actually laughs, loud and uncivilized, but strangely faint. The translucent hand on her shoulder is definitely less solid than before.

"It's cute how backwards you've got it. You haven't asked for me in a while. Guess you don't need me to hold your hand anymore," she says, grinning. Her voice blurs into echoes, as if she's beginning to be subsumed by her previous lives. "Except you're going the wrong direction. Ba Sing Se's nice this time of year."

Something like panic coils in her stomach. Azula forces the words out of her tightening throat. "You're leaving?"

(her cloak vanishes into the palace shadows)

Her expression turns ... not quite soft, but the grin turns into something that's almost a scowl. "Idiot. You're never gonna get rid of me."

"What about Mother?"

This time it's almost certainly a scowl. Her eyes vanish sullenly under her fringe. "Trust me, you don't need her, either."

.

.

"It's too dangerous for an old man like me in the Fire Nation," Iroh says gently.

Zuko stays calm with an effort. "Uncle ..."

"I know you will do well," he says, voice dropping to seriousness. "You have a heart for the Fire Nation like none I've ever seen."

"But I can't—"

Zuko doesn't know how to express the squirming discomfort he feels in hiding, or the look on Lanzi's face when he's said something naive.

If you leave, I don't know if I can still act with honor—

"I said you would do well. I did not say it would be easy," Iroh warns, hand on his nephew's shoulder. His eyes glint without their usual friendliness. "This is a Court war, nephew."

and you're giving me permission, aren't you?

Zuko swallows. "What ... what are you going to do?"

"Maybe I'll start a tea shop!"

"You mean you're going to gather the Order of the White Lotus."

"Hm. I keep forgetting you know about that."

.

.

Iroh's parting gift is a box of the finest ginseng oolong tea leaves in the Fire Nation.

Zuko has learned enough by now to know that it's not for him.

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.

Azula steps off Appa's back in a paved court in the middle of the Palace complex: not far enough to mix with the rabble, but not close enough to infringe on the Earth King's domain.

She's so confident she's appropriately judged the proximity allotted a foreign power that the stone cuffs that snap around her wrists come as a complete surprise.

"No one's allowed through the palace walls," a severe-looking woman in a green uniform says. Behind her stand troops in the same flowing clothes and round hats. She doesn't make any other moves, but she doesn't back down, either. Azula turns with icy dignity.

"Release me. This is no way to treat your Avatar."

Azula catches something in the woman's hard face, like a jolt of recognition, but she doesn't change her stance. "I'm sorry, but my city's security depends on order. I won't make an exception for you."

I don't know if you can be trusted, Azula parses, and adjusts her approach accordingly.

"I understand, but I intend to speak to a representative of the king as soon as possible. If the Palace is off-limits, I would be happy to arrange something else."

"I'm sure the Grand Secretariat would be interested in an audience," she says, still wary. "I'll notify him immediately, but there may be a delay. The Ministry of Culture will arrange hospitality."

Direct access to power, Azula notes silently. She dips her head with respect. "Azula, Avatar and ex-Princess of the Fire Nation," she says, making her renounciation clear.

The stone cuffs slip apologetically from her wrists and reform around the woman's fingers. She inclines her head in return.

"Dai Li Agent Lin Beifong."

.

.

"We need to control the Home Guard if we want the Capitol," Zuko says, offering Toza a steaming teacup. "Removing Yao wasn't enough."

The old man pauses to enjoy the aroma before taking a sip. "Ginseng oolong. How did you know it was my favorite?"

"Lucky guess," he says, unamused. His own tea sits untouched by his side. "I want you to bring a few men in for interrogation."

.

.

Lieutenant Shen stands rigidly outside the interrogation room as the high general calls him in.

"Why didn't you destroy the Eastern Air Temple?"

"There was no need, sir. Nothing but ghosts in those ruins."

"I didn't take you for a superstitious man, Lieutenant."

When he doesn't respond, the high general says, "Your men have told me some ... interesting stories. Care to elaborate?"

"Not particularly."

"That wasn't a suggestion," he says humorlessly. "Tell me what the Avatar and Prince Zuko wanted with you."

His mouth goes dry. He sees the execution at his doorstep, and regrets everything.

No. He regrets nothing.

"They told me the truth," he says, heart racing. "Everything we've done ... the Fire Lord ... I was tired of destroying things. I turned away."

The high general smiles. "The consequence of treason is death."

"This was my responsibility, and mine alone," he says, making one last effort. "Let my men not suffer for my mistake."

He turns away, hands clasped lightly behind his back. Almost casually, he says, "It's fortunate that you'll only be charged with incompetence."

Shen blinks and almost makes the mistake of speaking, but the high general continues.

"Foolish of you, to mistake an insurrectionist's forgery for a genuine order from your commanding officer."

"High General Toza, I don't understand—"

"You'll be demoted and reassigned to a minor command role in the Home Guard," he says. "The men who persisted in defending your mistake will join you."

I see. His pulse pounds in his throat.

"Do you accept?" Toza asks, finally looking him in the eyes.

His teachers would tell him to reject this treason, whatever the consequence. To rebel against the Royal Family ...

... but he said Prince Zuko, didn't he?

"Yes, sir."

Toza smiles like a sated wolf bat. Shen doesn't try his luck by asking about the men who turned on him.

.

.

Katara's practicing the eel hound form when the door slides open with a rustle of paper.

"Hello."

Despite herself, she flinches. The sinuous water breaks and falls back into its jug.

"Azula, what is it?"

She doesn't respond, but steps lightly into the room on bare feet, the green dress ill-suited to her pale features.

The Ministry of Culture's misjudged her size, because Azula always gives the impression of being bigger than she is. The silk hangs awkwardly from her frame, and she looks like a child caught trying on her mother's clothes. Katara can't help the soft smile that comes to her lips.

Azula's fingers latch around her wrist, nails pressing into the skin. Her grip is light, only meant to hold.

Katara feels something cold rush down her spine. The dark brown pattern on the oversized sleeve isn't embroidery, it's blood. Somehow it's obvious it's someone else's.

(I took care of him.)

"Don't leave me," Azula says, almost pleading.

Her nails cut into the soft skin of the underside of Katara's wrist as she tries to twist away.

"You're my ..." For a moment her focus wanders, puzzled, then lands on Katara's face with frightening intensity. "You're mine."

There are bony fingers around her throat as Azula's gleaming golden eyes draw close. Her pale skin is freckled by a spray of red droplets.

"I won't let you leave me," she hisses.

Blood drips slowly down Katara's neck and soaks the front of her dress.

"Stay?" Azula asks.

She whispers, "Yes," and hates the cowardly tremor in her voice, but fighting back has never seemed a worse idea.

Satisfaction glints in her uncanny eyes. "Good," Azula croons, wiping away the blood with the pad of her thumb.

.

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Katara wakes up screaming.

.

.

They watch each other across the fireplace like coiled serpents.

"You didn't bring your friends, I see," Long Feng says.

"They're unimportant." Azula leans forward, the green light throwing her features into sharp relief. "I have information that will end the war this summer. One way or another."

"Is that so?" he asks in a casual tone belied by the dilation of his pupils. "Do share."

"An exchange," she replies. "I'm looking for a teacher. Who is the greatest earthbender in the world?"

"I am."

Azula tilts her head. "Do you really believe that?"

He doesn't reply.

"I can tell when people lie to me," she says, watching his face. "I'm not blind."

Ah. There it is.

.

.

The concentration it takes just to summon a wispy image of the blind woman is almost disheartening. Azula lets the starlight figure dissipate so that she can focus on her voice.

"Tell me about Long Feng."

Azula catches hazy flashes of memory as they pass through Toph's mind. "Clever kid. Too clever."

"Should I be worried?"

"Not as clever as you," Toph says, the grin evident in her tone. "Just watch your step. He's completely loyal to Ba Sing Se. You can't fake that kind of emotion. Not to me."

(Ba Sing Se will be fine. We need soldiers on the front. Quit your whining.)

(Avatar, I'm begging you.)

Azula wades out of the memory and seizes the fraying thread of her connection to Toph. "Your daughter."

The roil of emotion that pulses over her makes her stomach turn. Azula's mouth thins to a white line when she realizes.

"You abandoned her."

Guilt burns like acid in her throat. "I had to go back to the war. Just for a few years. She was safe."

"She would have been safer with you."

The voice hesitates. "I lied when I said I wasn't afraid of anything. You don't understand. I couldn't have taken her with me."

"You left," she hisses, furious for no reason.

"I regret it more than anything," Toph says, before Azula lets her voice vanish into the ether.

.

.

"I've been assigned as your earthbending teacher," Lin says, not looking especially thrilled.

An expression of surprise crosses Azula's face. "Strange. I would have thought ..."

The woman's eyes narrow. "Not good enough for you?"

"Please. You're the greatest earthbender in the world," she says, giving her voice a half-remembered brazen lilt.

Lin twitches.

"Don't call me that."

.

.

High General Toza isn't surprised by the shadow in his office, but the low, tightly-controlled quality of his voice is new.

"You sent the others to the eastern front, then?"

He smirks. "Rewarded for their loyalty and cowardice with a chance to win glory against the finest warriors of Earth Kingdom. Idiots. They'll be slaughtered."

(But the 41st are entirely new recruits. How do you expect them to defeat a powerful Earth Kingdom battalion?)

(What better to use as bait than—)

"Fresh meat," Zuko echoes.

"Precisely. We can't have them spreading rumors."

"Of course," he says quietly. He pauses before he asks, "You've ensured it, then?"

"No mistake."

"Good."

Unconsciously fingering his scar, he sweeps out without another word.

.

.

At the Boiling Rock, a dozen guards inexplicably leave. Rumor has it, a clerical error up in the Warden's office sent out their pensions ten years early.

Either way, their replacements are fresh off the boring part of the war front, full of tall tales and boasting. They've obviously been sent home because of some embarassing failure, so no one takes their stories seriously.

As if some half-rate soldiers could ever meet the Avatar in person and live to tell the tale.

(Everyone knows about Colonel Shinu.)

.

.

Katara dreams of snow, and a day not quite cold enough to freeze the tear tracks on her face.

"Katara, please," Hakoda's voice says, his face an amorphous shadow haloed by the sun. "You'll have Gran-Gran and Sokka and—"

"I don't want them, I want you!" she screams, voice cracking.

Gran-Gran's arms latch tight around her. Her thrashing feet dig ineffectual trenches in the snow, but Gran-Gran still won't let go.

"I need you to be strong."

"Don't leave me, Daddy," she begs, letting her voice drop to a pathetic tremble. Hiccuping sobs wrack her body as she stops struggling.

It doesn't work. Hakoda presses a kiss to her wet cheeks and turns to leave.

Not again, she thinks. Never again.

She suddenly twists around in Gran-Gran's loosening grip and hits hard at the pressure points, just as Ty Lee showed her. The old woman stumbles and falls, but Katara's already tearing herself away.

Hakoda stands impossibly tall, his features shadowed.

The perfect solution comes to her like a flash of lightning. Katara reaches out a hand and listens to the roar of blood pulsing through her father's body.

"I won't let you leave me."

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