disclaimer. atla & its associated content are property of bryke, i am just a cheap but earnest knockoff.
author's notes. well. that took a lot longer than i anticipated - there were days where i'd just write and delete and write and delete, over and over again. going back to the narrative's "normal" pace after four straight chapters of high intensity was difficult, but we do need to return to some more rising action/worldbuilding/character-developing before we can truly hit the story's main conflict... which is not necessarily a bad thing but certainly not as much fun to write as the really dramatic, action-packed, fast-paced, compelling parts. but oh well. you take the ups with the downs.
speaking of ups...thank you SO MUCH to everyone who's been following! i am absolutely humbled and grateful for the overwhelming response i've gotten over the last few chapters - so once again, thank you for taking the time to let me know what you think! it is one of the best parts of writing this thing. please do keep it up! you are all awesome.
without further ado, i give you...
southern lights
chapter xiv. thought and conspiracy
i can feel the ice begin to crack
and then there were signs but chances
burning through me
"will you fade"/ love spirals downward
They are summoned just before the crack of dawn the next morning.
"Remind me to kill the jerk who decided that this was an acceptable time to wake us up," Toph grumbles, fighting a yawn as she trudges alongside Katara to the clearing by the river where they do their cross-training exercises.
"Remind you?" Katara mutters savagely in reply, rubbing at her tired eyes blearily. In her other hand, she holds a lantern to light the way. "I'll help you."
Though they are no strangers to early mornings, of late their training schedules have been pushed later into the day, to accommodate for the longer and cooler nights of the changing season. Thus, it was to the chagrin of both girls that they awoke that morning much earlier than expected to a sky full of stars, a brisk night wind, and the abrupt rapping on the door jolting them from slumber and informing them of an early training session.
When they arrive at the clearing, they find Aang and Zuko similarly disheveled.
"Surprise wake-up for you too, huh?" Toph remarks to them.
"No kidding," Aang groans. His protuberant grey eyes are creased and puffy. "I used to love waking up at the crack of dawn back when I lived with the monks. But that was a long time ago. I'm all out of practice."
Zuko just nods at the two of them in acknowledgment, seemingly too tired to speak at all.
Katara feels a jolt in her stomach as his eyes pass over her, and she forces herself to smile at him and nod back as she sets her lantern down.
He drops his gaze and resumes scrutinizing the tips of his toes with renewed interest.
With some effort, she makes herself pay attention to the conversation unfolding between Toph and Aang, feeling the heat rise slowly to her face.
Give it some time, she tells the uncertain part inside of her that is still, somehow, unconvinced. You spent so much time hating him. Of course it won't feel normal just yet.
She doesn't know what she was expecting, to be honest.
"Good morning," says a voice from behind the four of them, and they snap to attention almost immediately.
Standing before them are Jeong-Jeong and General Iroh, both clad warmly in thick black cloaks. Neither holds a lantern in the dim morning light – instead, a plume of bright yellow flame hovering over Jeong-Jeong's open palm illuminates their lined faces.
The four of them bow in unison.
"No need for that!" General Iroh exclaims, with a little laugh. He waves his hand gently, and torches surrounding the perimeter of the clearing spring to life. "At ease."
They comply.
"You must be wondering why I have summoned you all here so early in the morning," General Iroh begins at leisure.
"This was his idea?" Toph hisses under her breath.
"Still planning on killing him?" Katara mutters wryly. "I don't think that'd work out so well."
"So I guess you're not helping then."
"Nope. Sorry."
General Iroh clears his throat politely. Katara and Toph fall silent instantly.
"Thank you. I know, it is early for all of us," he continues mildly. "But the day of a General is busy, to say the least, and I am most intrigued by the stories my good friend Jeong-Jeong has told me of your progress."
"The General would like to see a small demonstration of your abilities," Jeong-Jeong says to them. "As he is the man who originally conceived of the idea of the Avatar project, I feel that this much is owed him."
Katara's jaw drops.
Team Avatar was Crown Prince Iroh's idea all along?
She doesn't know what to make of it. The ambition behind their cross-training had always seemed simple to her – to add a new bending power, the likes of which the world had never known, to the arsenal of the Fire Empire's army.
But Iroh – the Crown Prince and General of the Empire's army – had struck her as a man more interested in building bridges, rather than burning them. Why on earth would he have dreamt up this idea?
What is he up to?
Katara has no time to nurse her misgivings, however, as Jeong-Jeong has the four of them take up one of each corner of the rectangular arena. He instructs them to spar in a melee, similar to last time, for a period of fifteen minutes.
"Bending only," he warns. "No direct hits, no hand-to-hand contact. And try not to kill each other," this directed at Katara, wearily, "just this once."
But to Jeong-Jeong's surprise, he needn't have bothered airing his qualms about the nature of their team dynamic.
This time, the four of them take and yield ground in a disciplined fashion. The restriction against actual physical contact means that none of them are able to get too close to each other, but each holds their own remarkably well.
In contrast to her usual style, Toph adopts a more defensive style of earthbending, focusing more on deflecting the attacks rather than getting under her opponents' feet.
Aang, on the other hand, is trying his best to channel more aggression into his movements. When met by fire and water alike, he focuses on holding his ground and putting up a strong offense, rather than dodging and weaving as he is inclined to do.
As far as Katara is concerned, she is neither defensive nor offensive. In the blink of an eye, she is able to change the nature of her movements, from a shielding wall of water to a multi-pronged water whip lashing out. She supposes her bending has always had this natural advantage of versatility, and for the first time since Pakku has she reveled in it. The water is an extension of her, the water is part of her, and here, in the throes of what could be called a friendly sparring match, she remembers just how much she loves being a waterbender.
Strangely enough, it is Zuko who falls first. He fights with his usual stamina but he appears somewhat distracted. The flames he bends at them are redder in colour than usual, and move without the same finesse or control. He puts up a strong fight against Katara and her giant wave, but in turn fails to notice the rolling boulder Toph sends in his direction, which knocks him off his feet and decisively to the ground.
"Whoops," Toph says, a little abashedly.
"That will be all for now," Jeong-Jeong calls out, holding up a hand to stem the fighting. He looks somewhat surprised. "That was well done. All of you."
General Iroh claps slowly. His face gives nothing away, except his eyes are thoughtful and slightly triumphant.
"I commend you on your work here, Jeong-Jeong," he says to his friend warmly. "These four young benders, working past their differences and against the inclinations of their bending? That cannot have been easy."
"You could say that again," Jeong-Jeong mutters under his breath.
"Now I see four individuals with such a natural rhythm and flow, such instinctive understanding of each others' movements, and yet…" Iroh falters momentarily, composing himself before he continues, "Yet I see airbenders fighting like earthbenders, and earthbenders fighting like waterbenders, and waterbenders fighting like firebenders. It is most incredible. You should all be very proud of yourselves. Never before in the history of our people, as far as I am aware, has such an exercise in cooperation been attempted between our four races. That it is turning out to be a greater success than I dared to hope fills me with anticipation for what else you will discover."
Cooperation?
Katara scarcely believes her ears, and yet, the undisguised earnestness in Iroh's face tells her otherwise.
He thinks having Team Avatar will bring us closer together, she realizes, her heart pounding, he doesn't think of us as a weapon at all.
And she'd felt it, hadn't she? On the arena, sparring with Toph and Aang and Zuko, testing the limits of her bending without trying to hurt anyone, and without being hurt in turn, she'd been reminded that her bending is so much more than just a weapon.
And if that's the case, then…
"Though there is something that I have not yet seen, that I would very much like to witness with my own eyes, if possible," Iroh continues, and he turns his eyes toward first his nephew, and then, slowly, toward Katara.
"Jeong-Jeong tells me that you two somehow managed to fuse your bending," he says softly, and his tone has changed to one of wonder. "Do you remember how you did it?"
Katara's face flushes red as she remembers. It had barely been a week ago, but to her, it feels much longer than that. Truth be told, she had barely been paying attention during that fight, her mind preoccupied by Jet and the Dai Li, that to her, the memory of it feels surreal, like a dream.
From the deepening colour of Zuko's face, she gathers that he is probably in a similar boat.
Neither of them speak.
"Well?" Iroh turns to Zuko expectantly.
Zuko shrugs.
"I have no idea what happened," he confesses. "We didn't do it on purpose or anything. It was – kind of an accident."
"Happy accidents often make for the greatest discoveries," Iroh says to him, enthusiastically.
"I wouldn't call it a happy accident, exactly," Zuko mumbles under his breath.
"If I may ask - what happened during this accident?" Iroh presses. "Something out of the ordinary must have occurred, something specific, to trigger such an event."
Zuko shakes his head.
"I don't know," he answers, somewhat helplessly. "I wasn't really thinking at the time – it all happened so fast –"
"That's right," Katara speaks up, and Zuko looks surprised that she is lending her voice to his. "It did happen really quickly. I don't remember much of it, but I must have been acting on pure instinct." She shrugs too. "I wasn't paying much attention either."
"But I was," Jeong-Jeong says in his deep voice. "I'll tell you what I saw, General. I had the four of them fighting in a simple melee, one such as this. At a certain point in the fight, Sifu Toph had engaged both Prince Zuko and Sifu Katara in a two-fronted assault. Due to her use of seismic sense, both Zuko and Katara realized that aerial offensives were most effective at evading detection. They united their abilities to stay afloat in the air, General." His voice goes quiet with reverence. "I saw a firebender and a waterbender moving, thinking, breathing as though they were one."
Understanding dawns on General Iroh's face as he contemplates Jeong-Jeong's words.
"You are saying that before they accidentally fused their bending," he says to Jeong-Jeong slowly, "they achieved perfect synchronization?"
"It appeared so," Jeong-Jeong agrees. "Perhaps this was in itself unprecedented. For when else would a firebender and waterbender have worked closely enough to fight with such an understanding of each others' movements?"
"Perhaps," Iroh muses, stroking his beard. "Perhaps that is all. Or perhaps there is more to it that meets the eye."
He faces the four of them.
Behind him, the sky begins to glow with the first morning light.
"It is time for a lesson. Please, take a seat."
Katara, Toph, Aang, and Zuko are seated in a row at the edge of the clearing. They are all cross-legged, straight-backed, fists pressed together in their lap, as though readying themselves for meditation.
In a way, Katara supposes they are.
Across from them stands General Iroh, who by now has removed his thick black cloak. Today he is not wearing his military regalia, but instead has opted for a far more comfortable brown robe. Beside him, Jeong-Jeong sits on a flat-topped boulder, his face unreadable.
"Tell me," Iroh says, assuming a neutral stance. "What is bending?"
Is this a trick question?
Katara quickly turns her head to the side. To her relief, she sees Toph and Zuko wearing similarly befuddled expressions, while Aang frowns in concentration.
Oh good. I'm not the only one confused by this.
"By bending," Aang begins tentatively, "do you mean the definition of bending, like the act of it?"
"I mean exactly what I say, Sifu Aang," Iroh replies gently, his face creasing into a serene smile. "What is bending?"
"Bending is –" Aang stutters a bit, before finding his footing and resuming, "bending is controlling the elements."
"Yes," Iroh nods, "but what is that? What causes bending?"
"Uh…" Aang falters, thinking quickly before answering, "well, the bender causes bending, right? With their body, with their mind –"
"Yes," Iroh presses, "but how?"
Somewhere beside them, Katara hears Zuko groan.
Aang is finally at a loss for words.
"I don't think I know, sir," he says meekly.
"Hm." Iroh's eyes sweep over the rest of them. "Does anyone else want to take a guess?" He meets Katara's gaze a second before she is able to look away. "Katara, what about you? What do you think bending is?"
"Uh…" Katara hesitates, thinking hard. After all, Aang wasn't wrong, not exactly, but his answer had certainly been limited. She thinks of her healing, and how it is like her bending, and at the same time different, before she opens her mouth to answer. "I think bending…has more to do with the flow of energy in your body? And outside your body?"
Iroh beams at her.
"Spoken like a true waterbender. My old friend Pakku certainly trained you well."
He regards all of them, before lifting his hands to roughly the level of his navel.
"Katara is essentially correct. Bending –" and here he inhales deeply, "is the harnessing of the energy all around us, by the pathways within our own bodies and minds."
He begins to move his hands, slowly, in strange, opposing, circular motions.
"There is a reason all the bending masters practice meditation and spiritual training. When we are at one with the world around us, that is when, as benders, we are at our most powerful. That is when the energy from all around us can flow within us, undisturbed."
"Huh," Toph mutters, her tone halfway between a snort and a sigh.
Katara is inclined to agree. Though meditation had been a regular part of her training with Pakku, she has always found it irritating and abandoned the practice after coming here.
"All energy is a balance of yin and yang," Iroh explains, his hands still moving steadily. Light blue sparks trail from his fingertips, and yet he appears to not notice them. "Light and dark. Positive and negative. How do I know this? Because when the energy falls out of balance, and yin and yang become separated –"
He lunges forward, pointing skyward.
And a great bolt of lightning, bright blue and scalding to the touch, flows up the length of his arms and erupts from his fingertips.
Katara's breath catches in her throat as she fights the urge to scramble backwards, in fear. Lightning is a fearsome thing to control. She never knew that firebenders had the power to manipulate lightning as well.
"Lightning. The cold-blooded fire." Iroh relaxes back to a neutral stance, his hands now clasped together in front of him. "Or, the result of separated energies crashing back together to restore balance."
A short silence follows his words, before Zuko speaks up.
"That's very well and good, Uncle," he points out uncertainly, "but what does that have to do with the bending fusion we saw earlier?"
Iroh takes a deep breath, and sweeps the four of them with his thoughtful, amber gaze.
"I have a theory," he says slowly, "only a theory, you understand, but one that I am interested to test – and in fact, have been testing gradually, with your help. I believe that the four types of bending are more similar than we realize, divided only by the illusion of separation. Once upon a time, with the existence of the Avatar, we had the ability to control multiple elements at once – but now that has been lost from us, and the old divisions stronger and more insurmountable than ever before. How else to account for that, but that the bending of different elements is just the harnessing of different energies all around us? And that somehow, over the years, we have lost that versatility?"
Iroh shrugs helplessly.
"And so I thought: what if we tried again? What if, by bringing together four different benders, equal in age, talent, temperament, and ambition – we could learn, once again, that what divides us is very much unimportant, compared to what unites us? What if, instead of four benders fighting against each other, we had them fighting with each other, in harmony? You have seen enough of each other's bending to recognize the similarities to your own, faint as they are? I see you observing and applying lessons from other styles of bending and applying them to your own, whether unconsciously or deliberately, to increasing effect. How can that be possible – how can a waterbender or an airbender use the breathing technique of a firebender and experience the same effect, if the different forms of bending are not related somehow in some fundamental manner?"
All this time, Katara thinks to herself, heart pounding slowly, I was worried we were being used as a weapon, the strongest weapon the Fire Empire had ever seen.
And meanwhile, General Iroh just thought of us as some sort of warped science experiment.
She doesn't know whether she wants to laugh or cry.
"And if we take this supposition as true," Iroh continues earnestly, his lined face radiant with a new, undisguised glow of excitement, "that the four types of bending are just different parts of a single whole, then can we not apply the same laws of energy to bending itself? That, like yin and yang, when different bending energies are separated and then reunited at once, like we see with lightning, might not something unexpected happen?"
He turns his gaze to Zuko, and then to Katara, in quiet triumph.
"For example – fire and water? Two elements so diametrically opposed to each other, yet always seeking balance." He holds out one hand, and then the other, as though to demonstrate. "Water, an element of negative jin, always flowing, seeking to fill empty spaces, to nourish and heal, to cool and soothe. Fire, an element of positive jin, constantly moving to create emptiness, to heat and illuminate and innovate. What better example of yin and yang than these two? And yet –" he begins to make the circular motions with either hand again, as though to generate lightning, but not actually doing so, "water extinguishes the weaker flame, fire in enough quantity will vaporize water, and what is created by either of these but steam?"
Instead of pointing his fingers upward, as he would to generate lightning, Iroh clasps his hands together in front of him.
"You think that because Katara and I were bending in synchronization," Zuko says slowly, disbelievingly, "our bending fused because our energies somehow interacted?"
"Not just because of your synchronization," Iroh explains, holding up a finger. "Though I suspect that played a critical role. Remember how we create lightning, Prince Zuko. The energy of firebending, the energy that surrounds us, is first separated into positive and negative energy. Once separated, they seek to join together again. It is the joining of separate, opposite, but equal energies within the body of a firebender that generates lightning. Similarly, I believe that certain combinations of bending – or benders, for that matter – will lend themselves more naturally to such patterns. Fire and water, for example, is a perfect example. When you and Sifu Katara fused your bending, it was not just your movements that were synchronized. Jeong-Jeong said your breathing and your minds were also as one. And, more telling, both you and Katara said that your minds were empty, devoid of thought or emotion. This is also something that we require when creating lightning – peace and calm of mind, a complete surrender to the energy surrounding us. You became more than just a firebender fighting alongside a waterbender. The two of you became vessels, the humble guides of a new union of energy, one that has never been seen before."
He turns his eager eyes to the rest of them, positively beaming now.
"It seems like there is a whole word of discovery ahead of us. And for my part, I will stay here, as long as necessary, to help you achieve all the possibilities lying in wait."
Feel the push and pull within him, Katara tells herself patiently, as sweat beads on her brow and her fingers begin to cramp. Water is water.
It is early afternoon and she is back in the healing tent, seated beside Chan's comatose form, hands gloved in glowing water. Across the room, waiting for instructions is the old woman Jia. She wears a smock over her medic's robe, and a concerned expression.
"Is there anything I can do for you?" she asks softly at one point, as Katara withdraws her hands and lets out a frustrated sigh.
"I don't know," Katara mumbles, her shoulders slumping. She massages her hands forcefully, trying to force the cramps out of them. She can raise rivers and turn them into ferocious, all-consuming maelstroms of destruction, but a single block in the healing process and she is but a frustrated novice all over again.
And for all intents and purposes, when it comes to healing, she is. She's never had a master teach her how to heal, not the way Pakku had taught her how to bend. Everything she's learned, she's had to figure out on her own, or face the consequences of her failures.
How could it be otherwise? Waterbending itself has been taboo for the last ten years or so of her life. But healing? That sacred practice that the firebenders had envied and coveted and tried to possess for their own, long before they tried to wipe out evidence of its existence by rounding up all known healers and killing them? It is no surprise that she has little more than a rudimentary grasp of the subject. There is nobody left to teach her.
Nobody except….
No, Katara tells herself firmly, shivering a little. No, I can't go back to her. Not for this. Especially not for this. If his wounds don't kill him, she certainly will.
Her stomach turns and a brief wave of nausea comes over her.
"You're not feeling well," Jia observes, and for the first time since Katara has sat down, she approaches her and rests a bony hand on her shoulder. "Why don't you take a little break?"
"I don't need a break," Katara protests, but her hands fall into her lap all the same. "I need to figure out what it is that's confusing me. I'm stuck, and I don't know why."
Fresh wounds are easy. No matter how deep or how severe, it's just a single point of entry. Stop the bleeding, let the flesh knit over, heal.
Burns are more difficult. So many humours. Blood. Pus. Scars. Flesh. Infection. Everything in between. Various levels of damage to determine. Clear the pus. Don't stop the blood from flowing, it helps to clear the wound. Calm the flesh, let it knit. Test the muscle and the sinew, until they work again. When the infection is over and the pus is gone, then stop the bleeding and let the scars form. Heal.
Broken bones are hardest of all. Clean breaks are relatively straightforward. Align the ends, let them fuse. Draw blood to the area to purify. Heal.
But shattered bones? Broken in multiple places? Splintered? How do you find all the pieces? The whole human body is water, but how do you find something that small? And draw it back to the right place? And fuse it? Such a long process. How can you heal that?
She wishes it were the full moon. At such a time, her bending is at its zenith, drawn by the proximity of the moon and its pull on her chi. But the full moon is not for another week. Chan doesn't look like he is going to hold out for that long.
"What is it about this boy's injuries that confuses you so?" Jia asks her. "Compared to what you have healed in the past, how are they different?"
"I don't know, I –" Katara's voice catches in her throat as she looks down at him, in mounting horror. "I thought I could fix this. I thought…"
Her voice trails off.
"He's going to die," she says, the panicked realization hitting her abruptly, like a jolt to the spine. "He's going to die and it's all my fault."
Jia is silent and still for a minute, before she speaks again.
"What is he going to die from?" Her voice is calm and unwavering.
Katara lets out a laugh, cynical and dark.
"Do you really want to know?" she asks skeptically. "Okay. Let me run a list by you. Assuming the water in his lungs doesn't get him first, his ribs are broken into a bunch of tiny pieces, which is making it hard for him to breathe properly – partly because it hurts too much and partly because I think his lungs are being punctured somewhere – there's too much water and I can't tell for sure. But if I can't tell what's going on inside him, how am I supposed to fix it? Oh, and if I ever figure that out, his jaw and nose are broken too, but those are the easy bits."
"I see," Jia nods. "Taken together, it sounds like a daunting task."
"You can say that again." Katara shakes her head violently, raking her fingers through her hair, across her scalp.
"But, individually," Jia continues pointedly, fixing Katara with her bright, beady eyes, "it is not so bad? If you know to prioritize."
"I've been trying," Katara complains, her cheeks glowing red now. "It's not working."
"That's because you're setting yourself up for failure," Jia says briskly. "You're focusing on the hardest part, the things that you cannot see or sense or hope to fix, without removing the lesser hurdles from your path. The broken nose and jaw, the water in the lungs, these are simple for you on their own, are they not?"
"Well – yes, but –" Katara stammers breathlessly, " – but they're not important! Not compared to the damage in his ribs!"
"Yes, but they too are causing him pain, are they not?" Jia counters steadily. "By prolonging his pain, are you not allowing his body's state to deteriorate even further? True, addressing the breaks in nose and jaw will not save his life, but it may make him more comfortable, make it easier to draw the water forth from his lungs, which may buy you some more time. It may be easier to diagnose the damage once the excess water is gone." The old woman flashes her a quick, gently reassuring smile. "And, you may also find that repairing one or two small things first will return to you the confidence that you need to heal him for good."
Katara gapes at Jia.
"That was…very sensible," she says at last, clearing her throat and raising her hands into position again. "Thank you very much for your advice, Jia."
Jia nods her head slowly and walks back to her usual spot on the other side of the room.
By the time Katara leaves the tent for the day, Chan's face has already lost a bit of its pallor.
She has just finished dinner and is returning back to her room with Toph when a stern, square-jawed officer intercepts her.
"A message from General Iroh," he says to her curtly, handing over a roll of parchment sealed with red wax and the flame insignia of the Fire Empire.
Katara nods her thanks, feeling her curiosity mount as the unsmiling soldier turns around and walks away.
"What was that about?" Toph inquires, crossing her arms across her chest as Katara holds the scroll out in front of her.
"I don't exactly know," Katara admits, looking around her. "Here, hold my torch, would you? Let's see what the General wants."
Toph obliges, holding out her hand to hold the flaming wooden torch high enough for Katara to get a good view as she peels off the thick, waxy red seal and unfurls the parchment scroll.
"It says," Katara frowns as she reads the message, written precisely and carefully in a calligraphic hand, "Dear Katara. Please stop by my quarters after dinner. I would greatly enjoy a cup of tea and a game of pai sho. Relay the message on to Toph also. Your most esteemed General Iroh."
Toph's brow furrows in confusion.
"All that secrecy over tea and an old people's chess game?" she complains. "And here I was hoping for something exciting."
"It is a little odd," Katara comments, feeling a stirring of unease tug at her stomach. "Why wouldn't the General just ask us earlier today during practice?"
"Maybe he didn't want to make anyone feel left out?" Toph suggests, as Katara rolls the scroll back up and tucks it into the pocket of her robe.
"Maybe," Katara replies with a shrug, taking the torch back from Toph. "But who would be left out? I can't imagine he would invite us and not Aang or his own nephew."
Her suspicions are confirmed as, some time later, she and Toph hesitantly find themselves outside Iroh's grand pavilion and are ushered inside by none other than the General himself.
"Please, seat yourselves anywhere," he insists, holding the door for them and gesturing to the room within.
Katara recognizes it as the room her sentencing had been in, just the day prior. It has been only a day since she met General Iroh, she reflects, but the time that has passed since then feels much longer.
The large rectangular table has been cleared away, she notices. In its stead is a smaller, round wooden table, and set on top of it is a nondescript, checkered board. There are five comfortable-looking chairs arranged around the table. Aang and Zuko occupy two of them. Aang appears politely confused, while Zuko looks downright nervous.
The two girls shrug and seat themselves at the table. Moments later, General Iroh is pulling a pot of tea out from where it hangs in the roaring fireplace, and pouring out cups for each of them.
"Jasmine for tonight, I thought," he tells them, his eyes twinkling. "Such a warm, pleasing aroma."
Katara can hardly protest, so she quietly takes the cup in her hand, by the rim where the scalding liquid hasn't transferred its heat, and blows gingerly at the steaming surface of the clear brown tea.
A cloud of fragrance, smoky and floral and sweet, wafts into her face.
"Thank you," Aang says with a smile, before taking a cautious sip from his cup.
Katara decides to follow suit. The tea is not quite as sweet as it smells, but she still prefers it to the pungency of the ginseng tea she'd tried yesterday.
"How is it?" Iroh asks him, his broad face still creased in a warm smile. "Do you like it?"
"It's good, Uncle," Zuko says quietly.
"It's delicious," Aang chimes in, his eyes sparkling. "How do you brew it so well? I always thought tea was supposed to be bitter, but there isn't the slightest bit of it here –"
"Bitter?" The smile slides off of Iroh's face. Instead, he looks absolutely affronted. "Tea is not supposed to be bitter. What a waste of leaves, they must have been scalded, what a dreadful loss…"
He shakes his head and replaces the kettle on the mantel above the fireplace, before collecting himself and sitting down at the table with them.
"Who here is familiar with the game of pai sho?" he asks innocently, withdrawing a small brown cloth bag from somewhere within his robe's sleeve.
Toph and Zuko let out a groan, simultaneously.
"I will assume that like my nephew, you too are not a fan, Sifu Toph?" Iroh points out, with a hint of mirth detectable in his voice.
"You could say that again," Toph declares, shaking her head. "It's such a boring game when you can't exactly see what's going on, you know."
"It's not that I'm not a fan," Katara hears Zuko sigh under his breath, as he rests his chin on top of his steepled fingers, "I could just go longer without having to play it again, that's all."
"And you? Sifu Aang? Katara?" Iroh turns to face them, his face touched with an inquisitive sort of hope. "Are either of you familiar with the game? Or, like your fellow companions, are you lost causes as well?"
"Uh…" Aang falters, casting a sidelong glance at Toph's disgusted face, "well…I don't mind it, exactly…"
"Well, that's a start," Iroh says happily, before turning to look at Katara expectantly.
Katara shrugs.
"Master Pakku showed me how to play it," she offers nonchalantly. "I never really liked it, but that's because I could never win against him. I'm sure I'd like it if I thought I could be good at it."
"A most perceptive answer, Sifu Katara," Iroh tells her warmly. "I will be happy to show you the finer intricacies of the game, if you are willing to learn." His eyes glitter keenly in the firelight, and Katara fights a shiver. "I have always said that pai sho is not just a game."
Somewhere beside her, Zuko groans again.
General Iroh hums a quiet tune under his breath as he upends the cloth bag in his hand over the pai sho board in front of them. Small round tiles clatter against the weathered wooden surface, tumbling and rolling around noisily.
"As pai sho is traditionally a two-player game," Iroh intones, picking up a tile inscribed with a white flower, "let us start by dividing ourselves into groups. I will use the light pieces. The rest of you can use the dark ones."
Katara blinks in surprise.
"You want to play against all four of us?" she repeats, not sure if she has heard him correctly.
Iroh nods, focusing on separating the light and dark tiles into two piles before him.
"I think that should be a fair match," he explains, with a swift wink of the eye
"No it won't," Zuko mutters, and this time his voice is audible to everyone. "We don't stand a chance against him."
It is an hour past sunset and by now, the board is set with several tiles, alternating light and dark, red and white. General Iroh's face is serenely unperturbed, while across from him, his four opponents have worked themselves into sweaty frustration.
"I think we should use the snapdragon," Aang says, reaching for a dark tile inked with a dark red five-petaled flower seated on a yellow square. "It's clashing, and we need to move it before he captures us –"
"But then that opens up that space for him," Zuko protests, pointing at a neighbouring light tile inscribed with a red flower. "And he has a mum, he can arrange it there –"
"It's a sacrifice we have to make," Aang insists. "We can always recoup a harmonization later on, but if we lose our dragon –"
"Just smash him with a rock," Toph interrupts in a bored voice, her sightless eyes glazed over as she lazily swirls her teacup. "Rocks crush flowers, right?"
"Toph, the way the board's set up, it would only crush our flowers," Zuko tells her in a pained voice.
Toph shrugs.
"Well, how was I supposed to know?" She waves a hand in front of her face sardonically. "It was worth a shot."
"I think you're forgetting something, Aang," Katara points out, seemingly unaware of the conversation unfolding around her. Her face is solemn as her eyes rove the board. "If he gets to harmonize with his chrysanthemum next turn, he can use his white lotus." She points at the benign white tile, sitting in one of the triangular red ports bordering the corners of the playing board.
"So?" Aang asks. "The white lotus can't move far in a turn. It isn't near enough to any of us to make a threat."
"Not if you move our snapdragon to evade his chrysanthemum," Katara says slowly, pointing at the piece that Aang so desperately wants to move. "Our movements are constrained now because General Iroh's boxed off these corners of the board, so we have to move where he can reach us with the lotus. And you know what that means."
She points at the arrangement of the various light and dark tiles on the board, and draws imaginary lines with her finger to connect them together.
"Game over," Aang realizes, horrified.
"How does he do this every time?" Zuko bursts out, exasperated. "Always with that twice-damned lotus!"
The faintest of smiles is playing across General Iroh's mouth, but he says nothing in response to Katara's strategizing.
"He's been planning this from the beginning," Katara explains, scanning the board carefully, thoughtfully. "Master Pakku used to play the same way. I always thought he was just going easy on me, but it was just to lure me into a false sense of security. In the end he'd always use the white lotus gambit to win. It's clever, but there is a way around it."
"Really?" Aang fixes her with his big grey eyes. "How?"
"You'll have to trust me for now," Katara says to him. "Can you do that?"
"Yes," Zuko says sharply, glaring at Aang. "Yes, he can."
The young monk recoils and nods sheepishly.
"Okay." Katara takes a deep breath, before she places her hand on a dark tile and moves it four spaces over to where General Iroh's offending piece lies.
"I capture General Iroh's chrysanthemum here," she says, "and because of its position, it harmonizes with our snapdragon here."
"That is correct," General Iroh says, nodding his head as Katara picks his tile off of the board and sets it aside.
"I'm not finished yet." She then reaches for a tile sitting on the table. "Because of our harmonization, I'm going to go and," she triumphantly places it on a triangular port, closest to the light-coloured tiles, "plant an orchid."
She senses the collective jaws dropping around her.
"Well," General Iroh muses, his eyes widening as he stares at the board with renewed interest. "Well-played, Sifu Katara." He strokes at his pointed beard thoughtfully. "Yes, the orchid, with its speed and aggression, is usually quite a good foil to the lotus."
"So you give up?" Katara asks excitedly.
Iroh lets out a laugh.
"I never give up," he proclaims defiantly. "Though I might suggest a little break for now."
"Oh thank goodness," Toph sighs. "I thought that was going to go on forever."
"A break? What for?" Zuko queries, a frown crossing his face.
Iroh holds a hand up to silence his nephew, before turning his gaze on Toph.
"Sifu Toph. Is anyone still about outside?" he asks suddenly, his voice changing abruptly.
Toph looks confused by the question, but closes her eyes and focuses for a moment.
"No," she says at last, "no, everyone's back in their quarters, freshening up, bolting the doors, changing for bed, that sort of thing."
Katara gets the sense, just before Iroh begins to speak, that they are about to find out the real reason Iroh has gathered them here, pai sho lesson be damned.
"In that case," Iroh continues, and his voice is much quieter now, quiet and solemn, "I would raise a subject with you all that I know to be of utmost secrecy. I did not dare speak of it before, not even in front of my good friend Jeong-Jeong." He sighs, before fixing each of them with his steady amber gaze. "Last week, you intercepted a man sent to assassinate my nephew. I am told that you have preserved his body down by the river."
Katara feels her blood run cold, but Iroh's abrupt change of topic doesn't surprise her as much as his innocuous invitation earlier in the night had. She is only surprised that he hasn't brought it up sooner.
"I would like to examine the body," Iroh finishes, and by now, his face is so forbidding that Katara can hardly reconcile it with the genial, smiling man against whom they'd played pai sho just moments ago. "If you would take me to where it lies and exhume it for me."
In no time at all, they have returned to the riverbank, some distance away from the army base. The night is dark, but not one of them dares to light a torch. They rely on the faint sliver of moon in the sky, and Toph's seismic sense, to guide their way.
Sometimes, Katara doesn't know how they would manage without the blind earthbender. She confidently leads them quietly, unseen, to the very spot where they had buried the body a little over a week earlier. A sharp twist and pull of her fists and the earth before her opens up, yielding the dead man's body to the surface.
Katara has had some time to process his death, some time to come to terms with it. This time, when she sets her eyes on Jet's lifeless body, a great sadness settles over her, but the rage has ebbed.
"By the spirits of Ran and Shaw," General Iroh murmurs under his breath, bowing his head at the sight of the body. "Let me risk a little more light."
He kneels down onto the ground, beside Jet's form, and conjures the smallest orb of fire in his left hand.
"So young," he laments, and there is a great sadness in his choked voice, "so young to have died in such a troubled way."
He reaches out to gently touch the dead boy's forehead, and then over his eyes, before his hand drifts down lower to rest on the hilt of the dagger that still protrudes from his chest.
"This is it, then?" Iroh asks heavily. "This is the blade that killed him?"
Katara feels helpless as it all comes back to her. But Toph and Zuko, who had witnessed it all, nod resolutely.
"It came out of nowhere," Toph says in a low voice, so serious it barely even sounds like her at all. "So quickly and quietly that we didn't even notice it until we heard the body fall."
She shakes her head, her face darkening at the memory of it.
"Toph is right," Zuko continues with the explanation. "By the time we noticed that he had been killed, whoever it was that threw the knife already had a good head start on us. We pursued him through the building, but he disappeared the minute he got out the front door." The bitterness in his voice is thinly veiled. "Aang says he saw him, lingering outside my door, in the hallway, dressed as one of our own soldiers."
"Did you?" Iroh inquires, turning to face Aang.
Aang bobs his head shortly.
"Just for a split second," he explains. "I saw someone – I didn't recognize them or make out their face or anything – only that they were wearing a uniform, and then they took off the second some giant commotion happened in Zuko's room." He turns a nervous glance in Zuko's direction. "I assume that was when you discovered the body."
"But you didn't see this person throw the knife," Iroh emphasizes.
"I didn't see much at all," Aang confesses, scratching at the back of his head. "It's possible that I saw him right after he threw the knife. He didn't stick around very long at all."
"I don't think there is any doubt in Uncle's mind that anyone else threw the knife?" Zuko cuts in, and there is a definite question in his voice as he looks at General Iroh. "It could hardly have been any of us, and it is implausible that anyone else would have been in the area to do it."
"No," General Iroh says, and his voice is clouded with darkness, "no, you are probably right. I am just reviewing the facts, in case you may have missed something."
"What about the Dai Li?" Zuko asks, and Katara glances at him sharply as he presses ahead boldly. "Uncle, have you heard from Long Feng recently?"
General Iroh stops at that, and turns to fix his nephew with a piercing stare.
"What about them?" he asks, taken aback. "They have been stalwart supporters of our family ever since the time of your great-grandfather, Prince Zuko. Why would you name them in connection to this – this most unsavoury incident?"
Zuko falters, trying to think of something to say. He turns his head to look at Katara, a question in his eyes.
Katara sighs, and decides to speak. There is no use in protecting a dead man now. But by speaking, perhaps she can give his life meaning.
"Because just before Jet was murdered," she says, her voice shaking a little, "he spoke to me."
General Iroh fixes his full attention on her now. She doesn't flinch.
"As you are well aware by now," she continues, "Jet is – was - an acquaintance of mine, back from my days in New Ozai."
"The freedom fighter," General Iroh comments. His tone is flat and his face is unreadable.
"Yes," Katara nods her head. "Yes, he was involved with the resistance movement there."
"And you were not," Iroh points out, his eyebrows raised.
"Only so far as my acquaintance with him went," Katara explains, fighting to keep her voice calm in spite of the pounding of her heart. "Jet looked out for me. He kept me safe in a terrible place. Whatever he did, I – I can't forget that."
The look in Iroh's eyes is not suspicious, only sad.
"I would accompany him in New Ozai, to a lot of his meetings," she goes on, unwilling to let herself be interrupted again. "I saw some things that you would probably find unbelievable, especially if you didn't really see what happened with Jet after he tried to kill Zuko –"
"Please, try me," General Iroh challenges her. "This is the second instance in the past few months that I have heard of an attack on the royal family being traced back to that resistance in New Ozai. At this moment, I think I am ready to believe anything."
Katara's eyes widen, and she is not the only one who appears shocked by the revelation. Toph's head has snapped to attention, and Aang's eyebrows have shot up. Only Zuko appears unfazed.
"What do you mean, the second instance?" Toph asks suspiciously. "Are you saying that this has happened before?"
"Let Katara tell her story first," General Iroh says calmly, "and then I will tell you mine."
Heart pounding in her chest, Katara swallows to clear her throat before she launches into her story.
She tells him about the strange abductions during her time in New Ozai, the disappearances and reappearances of various freedom fighters, and their troubling links to the Dai Li. She tells him about Lake Laogai, the underwater headquarters of the group, and their ongoing attempts to control insurgents in the area using hypnosis and coded sleeper agents. Finally, she tells him about Jet and his abrupt awakening from his trance following her use of the code phrase.
"He told me that he was the only one of the freedom fighters left," she finishes, her voice anxious and her stomach churning as she remembers the memories she'd pulled from his mind, sinister, unsettling, alien, "that the Dai Li had gotten to all of them, one by one. He said that they're all under their control now, sleeper agents waiting to be used for whatever ends Long Feng deems appropriate. Jet was the only one who was troublesome – they kept on having to find him and recapture him and put him under, over and over again. But everyone else –" Longshot and Pipsqueak and Smellerbee and the rest, all of them, " – everyone else is gone."
General Iroh is silent for so long, Katara doesn't know whether he believes her or not.
"Quite a tale," he breathes at last. "And he told you all of this?"
"A lot of it he told," Katara replies, her voice growing remote. "Some of it, I saw in his mind. When I was trying to heal him, just before he was killed."
Iroh's eyes are wide now, and he is very still as he contemplates her words.
"Uncle," Zuko speaks up in his hoarse voice, "I know it sounds a little crazy. But Toph and I were there when she broke him out of his trance – there is no other way to explain the change that came over him. We heard him tell his story to Katara. You have to believe her."
"And him, too," Toph says firmly, nodding at Jet's dead body with a tilt of her head. "I can always tell when someone's lying – or not being entirely truthful. The body has a physically stressful reaction to that, and I could feel him as he was talking to Katara. He was telling the truth." A pause. "Or, at least he thought he was."
"I believe you." General Iroh's pronouncement is flat and without hesitation as he slowly, smoothly gets back to his feet. "I believe that you are all sincere, and that you regard this tale as a very real possibility to account for this man's actions."
"But you don't believe that the Dai Li is behind this," Zuko points out bluntly. "You think that's a whole bunch of nonsense."
General Iroh shakes his head.
"I would not dismiss this claim as nonsense," he explains gently. "But you must understand, it is an extraordinary accusation. And while I find it most troubling, I for one, will require more proof before I am able to act on these tidings."
It was no more than Katara had expected. Still, she thinks to herself, her heart sinking in her chest, at least he was nice about it.
"What about the knife?" Aang ventures hesitantly, pointing to the enameled green hilt sticking out of Jet's chest. "There could be clues based on the craftsmanship, like where it was made or who it belonged to."
"The guy who killed Jet wouldn't be stupid enough to use a knife with his name on it, Twinkletoes," Toph points out witheringly.
"Probably not," Aang admits, somewhat sheepishly, and yet his face is still alight with some earnestness. "But there could be other information. If it's an expensive knife, for example, it could suggest that it belonged to a noble or someone wealthy."
"Or someone who stole it from someone noble or wealthy," Zuko counters, his voice dark.
Aang shrugs.
"Then you have someone reputable missing an expensive knife, who might have information about the thief. Either way, some information is better than none. Right, General?"
"Correct," Iroh acknowledges. Without a word, he wraps a hand around the hilt of the knife and, with a firm motion, yanks it free.
Katara tries not to stare at the bloody hole gaping in Jet's chest.
"Hm," Iroh muses, wiping the blade clean with the remains of Jet's dark clothing before holding it up close to his face. He squints, bringing the firelight in his palm closer to illuminate the weapon.
"Made in Earth Kingdom," he reads out loud.
Toph lets out a giant snort.
"Well that was helpful," she remarks dryly, rolling her eyes. "Real helpful."
"Actually," General Iroh interjects, his face alert now, "it was. Look."
He holds the knife out for them to see.
Katara is able to read the inscription, carved faintly into the base of the blade.
"I don't get it," she says, confused.
"Me neither," Aang agrees, scratching his head. "What are we supposed to be looking at?"
"It says Earth Kingdom," Zuko realizes. "According to the trade agreements we made with the Earth Kingdom nearly a century ago, they were no longer permitted to refer to themselves as the Earth Kingdom. All of their products would have to be labeled according to the city they were made in. Made in Ba Sing Se, or Made in Omashu, or –"
"Precisely, Prince Zuko," Iroh says, nodding. "So either we have a rogue weapons manufacturer in the earth colonies violating our trade agreements…or this knife predates Sozin's conquest of the Earth Kingdom and is a relic of the palace of Ba Sing Se."
"Is that possible?" Zuko asks skeptically. "What're the chances of that?"
"I cannot say," Iroh mutters, scanning the length and breadth of the knife with a critical eye. "I am no expert in these matters. However, if our assassin is indeed a member of the Dai Li, headquartered in Ba Sing Se alongside Long Feng…the likelihood of coincidence grows slimmer." He sighs, before closing his eyes and looking away. "There is much that troubles me about this, and more still that I do not understand. I must think, before I act next."
"You said that this had happened before," Toph speaks up sharply. Her posture is combative, and her arms are crossed defensively across her chest. "Sweetness told you her story. We gave you proof of it. Now it's your turn. You have to tell us your story, Grandpa."
"Grandpa?" General Iroh echoes, raising an eyebrow.
Aang and Katara let out a sigh.
"It means she likes you, Uncle," Zuko explains in a deadpan voice. "Ridiculous nicknames are just one way Toph shows her affection for people."
"I see," Iroh says, and his voice still suggests that he is taken aback by her level of familiarity. He casts it off easily enough as he takes a deep breath. "I do not have to remind you that what I am about to say cannot leave the five of us. It is a matter of national security and, the more I think about it, also a matter of personal safety for Zuko and myself."
The air is fraught with tension as General Iroh strokes his beard with his right hand, wondering where to begin and how much to tell.
"Four months ago," he begins, "someone tried to assassinate Fire Emperor Azulon."
"What?" Katara blurts out, unable to believe her ears.
"You're kidding," Toph exclaims incredulously, quite beside herself.
"I am not kidding," Iroh replies wearily, and in the flickering firelight, his lined features make him look older than he is. "The perpetrator used a deadly poison – it was only at the last minute that my father's life was saved."
"Is he okay?" Aang ventures to ask, his face full of concern.
Iroh shakes his head sadly.
"He lives, but at great personal cost. He lost the use of body and speech. He can never bend again, never walk, nor talk, nothing."
"How come we've never heard of this before?" Katara demands, her voice shaking. "If Fire Emperor Azulon is in such awful shape, and for some time now, wouldn't – wouldn't people know about it? Wouldn't people freak out about it?"
Katara knows what such incidents mean for peace and stability. Once a ruler's grasp on power seems fragile, everything depends on succession.
And Azulon, as far as she knows, has always intended for Iroh to be his heir. But now that he is not in a position to enforce his will –
She shivers.
"Yes, Katara," Iroh acquiesces, and she can see thoughts of a similar nature reflected in his eyes, "the people would indeed be alarmed if they found out. There would be uproar and uncertainty and rebellion after rebellion, perhaps even a debate over the succession of the throne." He sighs. "That is why my younger brother has elected to demonstrate a united front between my father, myself, and him, while keeping his condition a secret of national importance. If word were to get out, it would spell disaster for the empire."
"How did you know that the resistance was behind the assassination attempt?" Aang asks. "Did you manage to catch the poisoner in the act or something, did he confess?"
"I did not arrive on the scene until a week after the events had occurred," Iroh explains. "By then, the chief healer in the royal palace had been apprehended, on charges that his family was connected to the resistance in New Ozai. The link seemed tenuous to me, at best. But at his trial, he confessed to the crime and was found guilty of attempted regicide. Regrettably, he is – no longer around to plead his case."
"That makes no sense," Katara says quietly, and she cannot stop herself from trembling now. "I knew the people in the resistance, General, all of them, and they were just a bunch of kids. They could never pull off something with that kind of reach, that level of magnitude. Not without help."
"You yourself alleged that they have all been turned over to the custody of the Dai Li," General Iroh returns gently. "Might that not have been the help they needed? If the Dai Li are indeed involved, and if they are engaging in illicit hypnosis programs to enact their agenda, it is not so difficult to envision that this unfortunate healer, through whatever spurious family connection and no fault of his own, wound up caught in something much greater than himself."
"Katara did say that the Dai Li would use their sleeper agents to perform tasks that they wanted, without regard for the consequences," Zuko points out. "Why would they bother preserving one agent caught in the act when they have an entire resistance organization, brainwashed and ready to do their bidding, ready to die for them without them even knowing it?"
There is a terrible look on General Iroh's face now, a mixture of pity and horror and fury all rolled into one. Katara had thought him harmless at first, a benign soul suited to the appreciation of fine arts and tea. But now, for the first time since meeting him, she is able to perceive the iron in him, the fire and steel that would make him a terrifying foe on the battlefield.
"If this is true," he pronounces in a voice like the thrust of a knife, "if the Dai Li has been engaging in acts of sedition and duplicity against the throne of our empire – that too by unscrupulously gambling with the lives of innocents – then they have made themselves a deadly enemy. I find these allegations disturbing and against the nature of everything this empire stands for, and I will not rest until I get to the bottom of this. If the Dai Li are involved – well – then, the next time they think to send an agent of theirs after someone else in my family, they will not find it so easy." His amber eyes blaze in the night. "I too have informants within the Earth territories and resources at my disposal. I will do what I can to protect my family, and my country, from these treasonous creatures that pretend to be our allies."
He turns his gaze downward, to stare at Jet's dead body one last time. His fingers grip the green-hilted knife very tightly, before he tucks it away into the sleeve of his robe.
"Thank you very much for showing me this," he says softly to the four of them, and he sounds like a completely different man now – older, sadder, quieter. "But this boy has known turmoil for far too long now. Let us lay him to rest now. May he find the peace that was taken from him in life."
Wordlessly, Toph clenches her hands into fists and pulls sharply at the air in front of her.
Once again, Jet's body disappears back into the earth.
There is a deep silence among the five of them, a silence tinged with sadness for the moments past and apprehension for the moments to come.
"Now," General Iroh says briskly, breaking the spell with a shake of his head and a falsely-bright smile, "who would like to finish that game of pai sho?"
The four of them groan in unison.
author's notes. with regards to the game of pai sho as it appears in the chapter: i sort of took the general idea of the game as it was portrayed on the show and cobbled it together with the rules from online pai sho tournaments [yes...there are online pai sho tournaments, according to google. never let it be said that a lack of research stopped this girl from making the story as accurate as possible] in an effort to make the game appear challenging, somewhat boring [explaining why old people seem to love it so much], and still retaining the real-world strategic relevance that iroh kept stressing. i can't guarantee if this weird end result is exactly what bryke had in mind, but i tried. :/
the next chapter is a direct continuation and will resume more or less where this ends.
love it? hate it? let me know!