Chapter Fourteen
The palace was in a state of chaos. From her bed, Katara heard stories from her brother, from Toph, and from Iroh, that Zuko was on a rampage. He'd succeeded in terrifying the maids, the cooks, the guards and half of them could barely be in the same room as he was. The other half that could were immediately dismissed. Katara wasn't so sure about the wisdom of that move, but she wasn't going to be the one to talk him out of it. Iroh had tried and gotten thrown out of Zuko's study as a consequence.
Someone had gotten close enough to threaten the life of someone close to the Fire Lord and the Fire Palace quaked with fear. There were whispers that they hadn't seen Zuko that angry before—which was saying a lot. Katara knew where all the anger was coming from: fear. If someone had gotten close enough to get to her, that meant they could have gotten close enough to get to his children and that was what was making Zuko want to turn everything around him into ash.
Still weak, she wasn't able to be much help and ever since she'd woken up, he hadn't come back in to see her. So much for her nurse. However, Toph was proving to be good company as was Sokka, and they brought in the children when Katara was feeling strong enough for it. Maiko and Toph were getting along as warrior women tended to and Lu Zuo didn't let go of Katara, screaming as if he was being killed when it was time for him to go. She wanted to keep them close so she could make sure they were alright, but Sokka assured her that half the Fire Nation army was outside the family wing, being led by Iroh—the only person Zuko trusted to watch over his family.
Azula, from what Katara had heard, was investigating every single person who had passed through the palace with a suspicious blemish on their records. It was time consuming work and kept her away. If she managed to find a good suspect, then her time wasn't wasted, but if she didn't, it at least got her away from the palace and Zuko had one less person to watch out for, Katara guessed.
Her body was slow to recover but within the next week, she was able to spend the entire day out of bed, though she was sitting for most of it. Sokka was right about her needing sun and leaning against a tree, she sat next to the turtle-duck pond, her face tilted up to catch the rays that managed to sneak past the approaching clouds. She could smell rain in the air and welcomed it. The mixture of rain and sun was appropriate and made her feel alive and rejuvenated her in a way.
Idly, she began to bend the water in front of her. The stream in her control swirled and twisted in mid-air, errant drops hitting her cheeks, but she made no move to wipe them away. As water moved and danced, power she'd forgotten about sang through her veins. For a week she'd been lying helpless in her bed. For a week, she'd relied on others to bring her news and information. In the process, she realized she'd been neglecting her gifts and had forgotten who she was. She was a Waterbending Master, one of the most powerful in the world, and she wasn't going to let some faceless coward take her down. She had stood up against the armies of the Fire Nation before she'd even turned sixteen. She'd let all this get to her head, this strange situation in an unfamiliar place that had too many bad memories. She'd made her peace with it in parts, had found a friend in an enemy, but somehow she'd forgotten the most important part of her.
She'd gotten soft.
Getting to her feet, Katara got into proper stance. Taking steady, measured breaths, she let her instincts take the lead. Wading into the water, she gently cleared the pond of turtle-ducks with a few flicks of water and began to move with the gentle push and pull the breeze was causing on the water's glassy surface. Moving with it, she pushed harder and pulled with more force until the water was splashing onto the grass around it. Her arms began to sway and bend to a rhythm only she knew. Her stance was fluid, her hands and wrists orchestrating a powerful symphony that had her hidden behind a furious concert of battling streams of water that almost emptied the pond.
Rain began to fall in fat drops and she added the falling water to her masterpiece. As water became a cyclone around her, raindrops were being visibly pulled into the swirl and it looked as though the Waterbender was sucking power out of Mother Nature herself. Loose strands of thick chocolate brown hair whipped around her face, but she paid them no mind as she pushed the water up, up as high as she could reach in a stunning display of harmony as the streams twisted together to form a pillar.
Rain fell on her upturned face and she opened her mouth, letting the cool drops fall on her tongue and down her throat. She flung her arms downward and the water followed, parting to either side of her, but where force should have had it rushing out of the pond, into the grass, she lifted her arms at the elbow, and used that force to form the curves of a sphere with herself in the center. Pressing her hands together, she let out a breath of mist, freezing the water around her. The cold was a like a healing balm on her skin and she allowed herself a smile. She took a deep breath and the pool of water at her feet climbed upwards to cover her from head to toe. She began to glow as she used the water to heal herself, to wash away the remaining poison from her body and as she exhaled, the light began to recede. When she breathed in again, the water slid away from her.
With the next breath, Katara pushed her hands palms down, in a finishing stance. The sphere melted away with a serenity that was reflected on her face and the pond was once again still. With dry feet, Katara got out of the pond, a peaceful smile on her face. She started back for her rooms and through the heavy fall of rain, she thought she saw a blur of red somewhere ahead of her, but it quickly disappeared.
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Katara knocked on the door of the Fire Lord's study. She could hear him moving inside and there was a beat of silence before he bid her to enter. He was sitting behind his desk, a brush in his hand and looked to be halfway through writing some orders. In the particular moment, he didn't look to be the same Fire Lord reported to be in the middle of a rampage, but there was a feverish gleam to his eyes that reminded her of his dogged pursuit of the Avatar all those years ago. Alarm bells went off in her head. He didn't looked surprised to see her but there was a wariness on his face that hadn't been there for a while. She wondered what brought that on.
"We've been missing our conversations," she said slowly, suddenly feeling stupid for coming, but she'd felt energized after her afternoon and needed to see him, a plan having formed in her mind.
"I think Uncle would forgive us for skipping a few," Zuko said, visibly battling to keep his tone cool. "Come on in. Why are you standing at the doorway for?"
"I don't know."
She entered and her eyes immediately went to the fireplace, noting that the cushions had been replaced with dark blue cushions trimmed with scarlet. He followed her gaze.
"Tea stains," he said simply. "Have a seat. How are you feeling?'
"Better," she said, settling herself down.
He didn't move to join her, but he leaned back in his seat and turned towards her.
"You look better," he said. "I take it you're ready to pursue whoever did this to you."
There was a tightness in his expression that she didn't like. She did want to discuss the current state of affairs, but she needed him to be able to think and not just react, which is what she suspected he'd been doing. Despite Sokka's belief in the contrary, Zuko was a skilled tactician and from what she'd seen, he was capable of navigating through the twisted relationships and unholy alliances in his court...if he was thinking clearly. Iroh couldn't get through to him, hadn't been able to for years, but Katara had never tried before and with the fate of the Fire Nation resting on her shoulders, she would do whatever was necessary to keep his head on straight.
"That's right, but first thing's first."
"You're impossible," he breathed, but she saw the tell-tale quirk to his lips that meant he was trying hard not to smile. "Alright. I whispered 'Dad' in Maiko's ear for weeks so that it would be her first word."
Katara laughed. "Really?"
"Yes."
"Did it work?"
"No. Your turn."
"I'll kill for the people I love."
He stared at her.
"I knew that," he said quietly.
"I'm scared for the children, Zuko."
He looked out the window where the half moon lit up a sky dotted with a million stars. Katara stood up and put a hand on the back of his chair. He spared her a brief glance, and though he kept his attention to the view outside the window, she knew everything inside him was listening to her.
"Tell me what to do and I'll do it," she said. "This can't happen to anyone else. You're under attack and you brought me here to protect your throne, so let me protect it."
"You're a powerful bender, Katara. I wouldn't hide you away," he said evenly.
"With Sokka and Toph here, you have more help."
He made a face. "I don't trust them so much."
"Trust me," she said. "We'll find an end to this."
He looked at her. "I do trust you."
Her hand slid from the chair to rest on his shoulder. "Thank you for that."
He slid a gaze sideways at her hand, gave her a curt nod.
"Now," she said, moving to the window sill and sitting down on it. "Tell me everything you know about this coward."
"We know that it was someone who has full access to the palace and knows his or her way around," he said mechanically. "A person who can blend in with the staff and who has seen the guard schedule or studied it, because no one saw anything out of the ordinary that night. Someone who has ties to my enemies and managed to get past the personnel sweep I did of the palace after the last time someone tried to have me killed."
"What about the poison? What do you know about it?"
"Standard royalty killing poison," he answered almost off-handedly. "The doctor recognized it right away which was fortunate because there was so much of it in your system."
"Standard poison?" Katara repeated incredulously.
"I've gotten a dose of it once or twice," he said, sounding bemused.
"What is this place?" she said shaking her head.
"It is what it is," Zuko said. "It also makes it impossible to track down where the poison came from because most of its ingredients are common household herbs, but there are one or two that can be tracked if one knew where to look."
"Who do you have looking?" Katara asked.
Zuko hesitated.
"Azula," Katara guessed. "Are you looking at her?"
"Always. I have people I trust implicitly looking into her and her men," Zuko said, sounding insulted that Katara even asked.
"But you have nothing yet," she sighed.
"I'd have started off with that if I had something," he replied defensively.
"No, no," Katara said, waving a hand at him. "I know you're doing what you can. I'm just...did you consider an Earth Kingdom assassin? After all, the Earth Kingdom will find itself the odd man out when we make this alliance permanent."
"We should put that on the invitations," he muttered. "And yes, Toph has been using her contacts to see if there's been any suspicious activity between Fire Nation citizens and Earth Kingdom subjects. There's been nothing yet, but we're looking. I'll be the first to admit that our options are very limited. We're dealing with someone who can creep in the darkness and move like the shadows."
"Sounds familiar," Katara said in a low voice, eyeing him.
"I haven't been the Blue Spirit in a long time," he said, brow furrowed.
"You said yourself that our options are limited. A sure way to catch this criminal is in the act but with routines and so many people coming in and out of this place, it's easy to blend in. You need someone who's always watching, someone who knows the routines better and can spot the changes."
The look Zuko was giving her was calculating, judging and she wanted to look away from those eyes that seemed to see too much. He laced his fingers together and rested his hands on his stomach, considering her proposal.
"Who's to say this person is coming back?" he asked.
She gave him a look. "Call it intuition, but since I'm not dead, I'm going to guess that he or she will be back to try to finish the job. Wouldn't you? It's been a week and we've come up with nothing which is tantamount to hanging a sign outside the palace saying, 'Oh, please come in. We can't stop you.'"
Zuko glared at her and Katara bit her lip contritely.
"Anyway, the coward isn't stupid," she continued. "They'll be back. As the Blue Spirit, you can watch at night. In the daytime, Toph can take over. You know she can read the vibrations without much concentration. All she has to do is learn the routine. Between the two of you, we'll be able to discover something that'll lead us to whoever did this."
"If I didn't need sleep..." he began.
"I'll take over your duties," she said. "At least in the morning. I'll push the papers, I'll learn what it is that you have to do. Uncle can help me the first few times until I get the hang of it. We'll just move all the meetings you need to make an appearance in to the afternoon."
"Do you realize what you're asking me?" he said disbelievingly. "There are some things that only the Fire Lord should know."
"Then you'll have to trust me not to look."
"I said I trusted you, Katara, but that trust has limits."
"Not for this, Zuko. Not with the lives of your children at stake."
"Don't use my children like bargaining chips," he said, the fire in the fireplace sparking.
"I'm not. This isn't some fight for power. I don't want your throne but someone does. I'm offering you my help. Take it. Please."
"If you let me down, I will destroy you," he said fiercely. "If you turn anything that you find against me, I will destroy everything that love, Katara and we're going to find ourselves on opposite sides again. Don't test me."
"I wouldn't expect anything less," she said solemnly.
He pushed his chair back and reached underneath his desk, pulling out a heavy brown scabbard. With a smooth, practiced movement, he slung it over his shoulder, the hilts of his double swords within easy reach. He didn't have to bother changing, his dark gray tunic and pants would blend in with the shadows perfectly.
"You've been up all day," she protested, but wasn't surprised.
"Then staying up all night with be a nice symmetry," he said. "Goodnight, Katara."
"Zuko...be careful."
He patted the scabbard.
"It's not me you should be worried about," he said, and then he was gone.