AN: Holy cow. So many reviews in one night! How do you do it, reviewers? Thank you! Especially, super big thanks to those who give me thoughtful analysis of what's working and what's not - you guys RULE!

Also, extra-special super-ultra thanks to senbo-sama, who decided to make me the happiest dork around by making THIS: (http:/senbo-sama(dot)deviantart(dot)com/art/I-M-IN-A-MEETING-180830902)

Thank you! I love you! Lemons!

Women, all around him, were giggling.

It was like some kind of nightmare. The only thing that could have made it more like a nightmare was if he had forgotten to wear clothes.

Zuko stood in the midst of his lounge, pink-cheeked and surrounded by clusters of female nobles and dignitaries who all sat daintily on mats, sipping tea and watching him. He was supposed to find the next woman on his list, but she somehow eluded him.

Iroh and Yoshu moved around the room with pots of steaming tea and plates of almond cookies, both wearing the same accursed, happy-to-serve smile. Just when Zuko had begun to think that the next woman had chosen not to attend, his uncle glided past behind him.

"By the door, nephew."

The Fire Lord frowned as he made his way across the sitting area. Somehow, Iroh had memorized the order of candidates… though there didn't seem to be any logic behind that order, as far as Zuko could tell. The old man must have put a lot of thought into this.

"Thank you for attending my tea party, Lady Lo Kang. Would it please you to come with me so that we may talk more privately?" The scripted words made Zuko's mouth feel sour. This was so stupid…

"Of course, Fire Lord Zuko." The noblewoman blushed prettily and covered her tiny smile with her fingertips, but her eyes were cunning. Zuko fought back the urge to scowl. This was the same woman who had flicked tuber bits at Katara just last night, who had been so blatantly rude…

If Zuko had been in charge, she would not have been invited to the tea party. Actually, there wouldn't even be a tea party…

"This way, Lady Lo Kang."

He led her from the main sitting area to a small, round table near the windows. The room was divided by a paper screen, making this area somewhat secluded. The table was just big enough to hold a plate of cookies and, on either side, there was a mat for sitting. Zuko held out a hand to indicate that the noblewoman should have a seat before stepping around the table and sitting as well.

He looked at her, his back rigid and expression stern, and asked the first of Iroh's stupid questions. "If you were a tree, what sort of tree would you be?"

Lady Lo Kang blinked at him, seemingly unfazed, and whipped out a paper fan to flutter below her face. "I would be a graceful cherry-willow and spend the rest of my days in the Fire Lord's garden."

"That's fascinating. What sort of activities do you enjoy?"

"I like to host dinner parties with distinguished guests and ensure that each visitor receives only the best hospitality. I also enjoy poetry, dancing, and…" Her lips curled upward at their corners and her tone became ever-so-slightly sultry. "…long, mineral oil massages."

Zuko blinked. He couldn't really do anything to stop the mental image. It was just… there. He cleared his throat, cast his narrowed eyes to one side, and pressed on. "The Fire Lady has many responsibilities, including the upholding of social justice for the people of the Fire Nation. What measures would you take to perform that duty?" His eyes napped back onto the noblewoman.

Now, it was Lady Lo Kang's turn to blink. "I… I suppose I would… start a soup kitchen?"

"That may feed some of the hungry. What would you do for all of the female workers who have been pushed out of their jobs after the return of the soldiers?"

"I… would…" The fan stopped fluttering and a furrow came between her brows. "The Fire Lady deals with that sort of thing?"

"Yes. Next question. What is your favorite color?"

She stared at him for a second, then shrugged. "Purple."

Zuko smirked. This was the only good part about this whole, stupid affair. "I'm sorry, Lady Lo Kang, but I don't think we're compatible. Please return to the sitting area and enjoy another cup of tea before you take your leave."

Her face pinched into a tiny frown and, as she hurriedly rose, she hissed, "Your tea tastes like pond water, anyway."

Zuko raised a benevolent hand. "All compliments may be paid to tea server Yoshu."

She huffed and stalked away. They didn't all leave that angry… Actually, a lot more went with disillusioned expressions on their faces that made Zuko wonder whether the tea party was just an exercise in futility. He wasn't sure whether they lost interest because of the mundane setting, the stupid questions, or the opportunity to get a good look at his scar…

He could have solved two out of three problems by holding this function in the throne room – the wall of fire would have thrown him into shadow and added an element of excitement that seemed to be lacking, here… Of course, the questions would still be stupid.

Zuko sighed and took a moment to rub the back of his neck. It had gotten stiffer as the day wore on. During the two meetings between lunch and this… fiasco, he had had to constantly fight the urge to squirm in an effort to put an end to the throb of strained muscle.

The fact that the tea party had already lasted longer than the hour Iroh had estimated was a source of increasing frustration to Zuko. He had already had to miss a meeting with the second-tier Ba Sing Se nobles for the afternoon – though most had expressed some appreciation of the effort he was making to find a wife.

With a sigh, the Fire Lord pulled the scrap of paper from beneath his sitting mat and scanned down to the next name. His eyes widened slightly. Had she even come?

After tucking the list back under his mat, Zuko rose and strode back to the dwindling group of women, eyes searching. It took a moment, but he found her off to one side, kneeling in Water Tribe fashion and watching him over the rim of her cup. Really, it was surprising that he hadn't noticed her – she was the only woman present in blue. Maybe she had arrived late.

With a smile tugging one corner of his mouth, Zuko approached the waterbender. "Thank you for attending my tea party, Master Katara. Would it please you to come with me so that we may talk more privately?"

"Sounds good." Katara swiftly set her mostly-full cup aside and rose to her feet with the sort of smooth grace that was typical of her bending style. She didn't look especially happy but, as he led her back behind the screen, Zuko couldn't help the tiny smile creeping across his face. If she was here, she must still be thinking about marrying him…

He gestured to her sitting mat and watched her sink to the floor. She still wasn't smiling. His stomach sank with her.

…unless she had come to tell him 'no.'

Yellow eyes wide, Zuko took his own seat and met Katara's gaze. She waited a moment, then raised an eyebrow. "Aren't you supposed to ask me questions or something?"

"Oh. Uh, right…" Zuko cleared his throat and looked down at the plate of cookies. In a voice made quiet by embarrassment, he asked, "If you were a tree, what sort of tree would you be?"

There was a moment of silence, followed by a soft snort of laughter. He looked up. Katara was half-smiling at him and leaning forward slightly as if expecting him to let her in on the joke. "Seriously? You've asked all these women that question?"

Zuko frowned. "Uncle said that it would give me an idea of how well each candidate thought on her feet."

With a final, soft chuckle, the waterbender sat back and shrugged. "Alright… I guess I'll play along with that…" She squinted and turned her eyes upward in thought. "I would be… a peach-orange tree, like the ones that grow along the streams near Omashu. They give a lot of fruit and I would want to be the sort of tree that fed a lot of travelers."

The firebender nodded, smirking. "Leave it to you to feed a bunch of strangers. Next question. What sort of activities do you enjoy?"

"Helping people." Katara raised a challenging eyebrow and crossed her arms. "I like to practice my bending, though not so much with an audience. I like to dress up, sometimes…" A secretive smile tugged at one corner of her mouth. "I like going out at night."

Zuko's heart did a little jump. He held her eyes for a long moment. Did… did that mean…?

"Next question." She snagged a cookie from the plate between them. The way her mouth opened while she looked him in the eye made his blood heat. The edge of the cookie slid between her lips. Zuko stared.

"Uhm… The Fire Lady has lots of responsibilities… like… social justice. How would you do that?"

Her brow furrowed as she chewed. "How would I encourage social justice?"

Zuko rubbed his eyes with one hand. "Yeah."

"Well… to solve a problem, you have to know what the problem is. In my village, we meet regularly to discuss issues of importance to everyone – I guess I would bring that principal here and start with regular audiences with citizens who have complaints." She took another bite of cookie and shrugged. "That's how I'd do it, anyway."

Zuko turned his gaze to the table in an effort to ignore her lips. If he came off as stupid, she probably wouldn't be interested in trying to run a country with him… "To an extent, we do that already. Local magistrates hear complaints weekly and write reports for the Fire Lady… or they did, when there was a Fire Lady…" He waved a hand to dismiss the subject. "How would you help the female workers who lost their jobs when the soldiers returned from overseas?"

Katara's eyes had widened for an instant at his casual mention of his mother but, assumedly deciding that this wasn't the time to ask, she shrugged. "Create more jobs? When the men returned to the village, we didn't have a problem with dividing the work because we immediately started building. Everyone had something to do." She narrowed her eyes. "Actually, I might start by hiring a committee to clean the alleys in this city. They're gross – and I don't just mean a little dusty."

"Funds are short."

"Then maybe someone else should hire the committee…" Katara's smirk made the meaning clear; 'someone' owed the city money. 'Someone' could afford to be a philanthropist.

Zuko smirked in answer. "What's your favorite color?"

Katara rolled her eyes. "Blue."

"Marry me?"

"Still thinking about it." She snatched another cookie and trained a suspicious eye on him. "What happened to your face?"

Zuko's shoulders slumped slightly and his hand automatically shot to his bruised cheek. "I, uh…"

A war was raging in the firebender's mind, punctuated by explosive realizations. Firstly, he did not want to admit to having lost his temper and fought with Katara's father, because she would probably think he lacked self-control. Also, confessions were embarrassing.

Secondly, with the rumor already spread through most of the palace, it wouldn't be long before she found out anyway and, if he didn't tell her now, she would think he was being deceptive when she finally figured it out.

Thirdly, if he told her exactly what happened and that Hakoda had really been the one who started it, she might think he was making excuses or complaining in hopes of some sort of retribution.

"I… accidentally bumped into your father."

Katara frowned. "With your face?"

"Well…" He looked down and rubbed his neck again. "Other things, too, really. I guess it wasn't exactly an accident. I kind of… might have lost my temper and… I guess he kind of did, too… and we might have… gotten carried away." He glanced up at her. She still looked skeptical, so he looked back down at the cookies and opened his mouth to go on.

"You could just say my dad beat you up, you know."

"He didn't beat me up!" Zuko's eyes narrowed and shot up to assess Katara's expression, which was dry and unimpressed. Realizing that the volume of his voice had exceeded the level appropriate for discretion, he glanced at the screen and went on more quietly, though irritation was still obvious in his tone. "You already knew – why ask me?"

"I wanted to see if you'd give me a straight answer." She raised an eyebrow, looking a little irritated herself. "Good job," she said, sarcastically.

He crossed his arms. "Well, getting baited into a fistfight isn't exactly the kind of thing I enjoy owning up to."

"Embarrassed? You should be."

"Yeah, actually – I am." Zuko scowled, then took a deep breath and looked down, once again rubbing his neck. "I don't know how that kind of thing is viewed in the Water Tribes, but the Fire Nation duels in the Agni Kai – other fights are considered uncivilized. When word gets out that the Fire Lord was in a fistfight with the ruler of another country – and, worse, lost – I'd ordinarily be a laughing stock among my people."

Katara's frown had vanished. Now, her eyes were wide with concern. She tilted her head slightly with a question. "Ordinarily?"

"It's… a little different, since Chief Hakoda is your father." Zuko met the waterbender's eyes and offered a half-shrug. "It'll look like he forbade me to court you and I lost all reason and attacked him… which… to my people, would actually come across as pretty romantic."

Realization spread over her face and she nodded slowly. "Ah… the broken-hearted Fire Lord fights for his love? Your uncle mentioned something about that. Of course…" Her face took on a thoughtful expression. "It wouldn't look as good if I refused to marry you after all that."

Zuko swallowed and offered up a sheepish smile. "Yeah… I guess it wouldn't…"

Katara looked at him for a long moment, then frowned thoughtfully. "I'm not so sure that I like your plan."

His smile faded. "What's wrong with it?"

"Mostly, it's the sordid affair bit…" The waterbender waved a hand, shrugging. "I mean… if I did decide to marry you and became Fire Lady…" She squinted skyward as if trying to envision it. "…I'm not sure that I want to be remembered throughout Fire Nation history as Fire Lady Katara, who got caught fooling around in the corridors."

Zuko blinked, taken aback. This hadn't really occurred to him… but that wasn't necessarily a bad thing; after all, if she was looking this closely for flaws in his plan, that must mean she was running out of reasons to say 'no.'

He smiled hopefully and spoke in a low tone. "We wouldn't have to be too obvious about it. I mean… we could just-"

"Fire Lord Zuko?"

Iroh peered around the edge of the screen behind Katara and Zuko's hopeful smile faded. The old man was obviously trying not to grin as hard as he wanted to. "If you have finished asking Master Katara the questions, perhaps it is time to move on to the next candidate." His eyes closed against the force of his smile, fully unleashed. "After all, the afternoon is short and there are so many ladies left to-"

"Alright, Uncle… just… one minute?"

Iroh nodded and withdrew. Katara smirked a little as she took one more cookie from the plate. "So many ladies for Fire Lord Zuko…"

He frowned, not sure what she was implying.

The smirk faded as she held her blue eyes on him, and then was replaced with a brighter sort of smile. "We're having a Water Tribe celebration dinner for Sokka and Suki tonight and that kind of thing usually lasts until pretty late. I'll come to you, after. While you're waiting, you can think of an answer to my question." She rose smoothly to her feet. "Apart from the politics and all the obvious, practical reasons – why do you want me, Zuko?"

The firebender blinked. Katara took a bite of cookie and, with a little wave, walked around the screen and out of his line of sight.

For a long moment, Zuko sat on his mat, staring at the place where she had stood. Then, Iroh's face reappeared. The Fire Lord sighed and climbed to his feet.

"Many ladies… right."

The rest of the tea party was torture, as was to be expected.

After, Zuko attended other meetings, other kinds of discussions. He sat in on a talk between delegates from Earth Kingdom port towns and some significant Water Tribe traders, listening and offering the Fire Nation navy as protection against pirates.

As he said the words, formal and sophisticated but bearing that same meaning, he thought about Katara.

When the meetings were over for the night, he ate dinner alone in his room while reading over summarized financial reports, trying to pick a good target for the evening… but his mind was soaked, saturated with Katara. Eventually, he sent the remains of his rice and dragon-chicken away, had his papers filed back in their places, and allowed his attendants to remove the mantle from his shoulders.

It had seemed so heavy a year ago. He had thought he would never be able to truly carry it as proudly as he should. But, his stomach had healed and his strength had returned. Now, he hardly felt the difference, as if he had always carried that little extra weight.

"Fire Lord Zuko," inquired Lin, bowing by the door. "Have you any other need?"

Zuko frowned, tilted his head. Pain shot through his neck. "A hot bath, I think."

"It will be drawn immediately, Fire Lord Zuko." She bowed again, then glided from the room.

His attendants accompanied him to the royal spa, undressed him. It had taken a much longer time to get used to this again after his exile than it had taken for him to stop being polite. He had been thirteen the last time people had waited on him at his bath. When he came back, almost four years older, having near-strangers take off his clothes had been… uncomfortable, to say the least. For a long time, he had refused it.

Then, Lin set him straight.

Members of the royal family did not waste their energy on such trivial matters as dressing or undressing. They did not shave their own faces or tie up their own hair and they definitely didn't walk outside of the palace. They allowed their subjects to do these things for them, as a show of mutual acceptance of the natural order of things.

As hands peeled the last layer of fabric from his shoulders, Zuko wondered how Katara would feel about that. He had eventually worked out a truce with Lin; he allowed himself to be catered to in most regards, but his underclothes were his to deal with as he chose, one of her few concessions. Would the waterbender be willing to make such a compromise?

As he sank into the hot water of his bath and his neck began to relax, he thought of her strength, her resilience. He thought of her unflinching commitment to justice and goodness. He thought of her eyes.

When hands began washing him, he opened his own eyes and thought of financial reports, the seven rules of diplomacy, the thirty-two mandates of Fire Nation Protocol. It had taken a very long time for Lin to brow-beat him into this.

Alone in his room again, Zuko sat down on the edge of his bed and shut his eyes. It was fairly early, still, and Katara had said that Water Tribe celebrations usually lasted a while. He could sleep…

…but Zuko did not feel like sleeping.

He did as he was not supposed to do and untied his sash, dropping the silk sleep shirt behind him on the coverlet. He drove his fingers through his own damp hair and down both sides of his still-sore neck with a heavy touch, erasing the memory of gentle scrubbing.

…why do you want me, Zuko?

He wondered how leaders in the Southern Water Tribe bathed. Did Katara secret herself in an ice-block room and peel away her thick furs with her own slender fingers? He imagined so. He imagined she knelt beside a bowl of hot water and crushed liquid from the wash towel in her own hand, trailed the wet cloth across her own skin. He could barely remember how that skin had looked when it was wet with seawater; glistening and such a lovely shade of brown…

Zuko sighed. His sleep pants were tight against his crotch. This was not a good way to approach Katara's question.

Now that he had become aroused, though, it would be much more difficult to stop than to simply finish. Easier to focus, after…

He leaned back on one arm and let his opposite hand glide down the smooth expanse of his chest and over the hardening flesh between his thighs. The silk over his bulge was hot to the touch and only grew hotter as he lightly traced his fingers against it. This wasn't the desperate inferno he felt when his dreams teased him awake; it was a slow, building heat.

When his eyes closed, he immediately remembered that cookie, pressing between her lips. Her flesh had yielded slightly as it sank inside. Then, he had wanted to kiss away the crumbs that lingered…

Now, Zuko wondered if the Southern Water Tribe practiced fellatio. He wondered what it might feel like to have those lips press to the tip of his cock, whether she would stare into his eyes the way she had as she ate that cookie…

His hand rubbed firmly against his fully-erect organ and he released a low growl.

From the side of the room where the secret door let out into the hall, he heard a tiny sound, like an in-drawn breath. It was so quiet that he could have just as easily not heard it…

…which was why Zuko did not open his eyes when he realized that Katara had come early.

AN: *is naughty writer, indeed!* I know it's really cruel to cut you off here... but just think of it as something extra-special to look forward to tomorrow. ;)