DISCLAIMER: I do not own Avatar the Last Airbender
CHAPTER 28
We left the Southern Air Temple immediately after we met little Kazuma, and were hiking back down the mountain. The cool air seemed to warm as we approached the roaring sea below.
"So, where are we going in the Earth Kingdom?" asked Arra, as she lightly skipped down the rocky terrain.
"Well, we certainly won't start where we left off. The closer we get to Ba Sing Se, the better. Let's just pray that we won't have to cross the Si Wong Desert." I answered.
The Si Wong Desert was the most desolate place in the Earth Kingdom, covering miles with hot, never ending sand. The Avatar and his friends had to cross it, and almost lost their lives doing so. Agni willing, we would be more fortunate on our journey.
We finally reached the bottom of the mountain, and boarded our small ship. It certainly seemed more crowded with two new people on board. The next time we hit the water, we would need to steal a larger ship.
Arra had no experience in sailing, since Appa had been her form of travel for all of her life, and she was rather fascinated by how everything worked. In one of her random burst of energy, she concluded that the ship was sailing too slow, and it would take us forever to get to the Earth Kingdom. Not heeding our warnings, she sent a huge gust of air into our one principle sail, and sent us flying over the sea, bouncing like a stone on a lake. Airbenders could be awfully handy in a tight spot, but they never really knew when to keep their amazing bending powers to themselves. Or, at least, Arra didn't.
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Katara watched from the highest perch of the Temple as the small fishing ship took off across the sea. She couldn't help but smile as she watched her daughter use her strength and power to help her friends. She was so much like her father in that way. But, for some reason, she felt this growing pit of worry form in her stomach, and she couldn't shake it. Kazuma gripped the front of her shirt, as he rested on her hip. He could feel his mother's worry, and started to fuss.
"Shh, shh now my love. All will be well." she said to calm him down. She just wished she could do the same for herself.
She walked a short distance to find her husband seated under an awning, deep in meditation. The wind ruffled his thick robes, but his body was rigid and strong. Katara smiled as she watched the man before her. It felt like it was yesterday that they were both children fighting for something beyond their years. Now, they were old enough to fight for such a cause, but their child rode off instead.
"What's wrong, Katara?" asked Aang, his back still turned. Aang knew when his wife was agitated, her ora radiated it. He knew that she purposefully didn't say anything since he was in meditation, but she didn't yet realize that just her prescence attracted his attention.
He heard a loud sigh come from the bearer of his children, and he smiled, now used to such a sigh.
"Tell me not to worry, Aang. Tell me that this anxious feeling that aches me isn't real."
"I'm afraid I can't do that, my love. Only you can decide what your soul wishes to feel. But, I can tell you what I think." He turned around to face her, and the wise monk faded away to show her kind husband. "She'll be fine. And so will Sonziah and Cinrae. Just think of what we went through, and we were so much younger than they were. Cinrae is just about an adult, and Sonziah and Arra are older and more powerful. Then, let's not forget the Earth Kingdom archer, who Cinrae has taken to very quickly. What ever path they take, it will work out just fine." He smiled a wide, toothy smile that lit up they sky.
Katara looked into the deep grey eyes of her young son, and he smiled up at her with the same innocence.
"You're right, I'm worrying too much, as usual. They'll find Zuko Jr. quickly, and be home before we know it. We have more pressing issues at hand, anyway. Any word on Azula?" Aang sighed and faced back out towards the wide Patola Mountain Range that was hidden under a thick overcast.
"No word. Zuko has concluded that she is certainly not in the Fire Nation, and the Spirit World isn't helping any. We'll just have to wait until she makes her move, when she makes one, if she makes one."
Ifshe makes one. That word was way too unorganized to use to even predict what Azula would do. Whatever it was, it was preplanned. Everything was.
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The warm sun touched her skin, and immediately filled her soul. The smell of the distant woods reached her nose almost instantly, and the leaves tickled her cheek. She loved the Earth Kingdom. Everysince she was a child, she loved it more than anywhere else, even her homeland, the Fire Nation. It was only right that she spent her young adult hood, and, hopefully, the rest of her life there.
The inhabitants of Kyoshi were just beginning to wake, but Ty Lee had been up for hours. The Kyoshi Warriors were trained to live on no more than four hours of sleep a night, but she was naturally an early riser. A small group of elderly women walked by her, chatting between themselves on the morning's gossip. They stopped, and bowed to her in respect, and she smiled, and bowed back. The Kyoshi Warriors were treated with so much respect in Kyoshi, some would consider them to be royalty. The fact that she was Fire Nation made little to no difference to them. She couldn't help but smile brightly as she greeted another morning in the one place where she finally belonged.
The day was opening like a play to the stage, and Ty Lee decided that now would be as good a time as any to eat breakfast. She bent back, and lifted herself onto her hands in a hand stand, and brought her feet down to the ground, and rose her torso to where she was in an upright position. Her long braid bounced from left to right as she skipped up the hill to her small cabin.
It was quaint, with nothing but a small bed, a large chest, a table with two stools, and a small vanity, but it felt like home. Lady Suki, her commanding officer, said that she had the freedom to do whatever she wished with her room, since she deserved it, but she wished to uphold the traditions of the Kyoshi Warriors, and live with barely anything. Besides, she had a summer home on Ember Island, courtesy of Fire Lord Zuko and Fire Lady Mai, a royal sweet in the Ice Palace of the Southern Water Tribe, courtesy of Cheif Sokka and Lady Suki, her own wing in the Southern Air Temple, courtesy of the Avatar and Lady Katara, and a small apartment in Ba Sing Se, courtesy of Iroh with which to do whatever she wanted. If she wanted a place to express herself, she had plenty of places to go to.
The sun filtered through the large window, creating a small crevice of light that went straight through her room, casting a series of shadows in the room. She sat down at the small vanity, and prepared to start the long process of putting on her Kyoshi makeup before getting food, lightly humming to herself.
"You've done pretty well for a circus runaway."
Ty Lee dropped her makeup brush, and sat frozen and shocked as she stared into the mirror. In any other situation, she would have drawn out one of her fans and faced the intruder quickly, and calmly. But, this time, she knew who it was, and she was far too scared to even breath.
A long, lanky figure emerged from the shadows like a ghost in the night. Her long, dark hair hung around her face like a veil, but her bright, wild golden eyes could clearly be seen. A long time ago, those eyes were sure, precise, deadly, but now, that same deadliness was there, but the calmness and precision was gone. She wore what remained of a long, white dress, and her feet were bare. She looked like she had just been through hell.
"Azula." Ty Lee breathed. Her voice came out shaky, and unsure.
"You always did like to play dress up, didn't you Ty. Now, you're living a life where you can play as much as you like." said Azula, mockery dripping from her voice.
"What are you doing here?" asked Ty Lee, still hoping that this was all just a really bad dream. Azula crossed over to Ty Lee's small bed, and sat down, crossing her legs elegantly.
"Oh, don't tell me you're not happy to see me. I traveled so far, and went through so much trouble to get here." She punctuated the last word by running her long nail along the wood of the four post bed.
"Answer my question." said Ty Lee, turning fully around to face her once best friend. Even Azula seemed surprised at the dramatic change in Ty Lee's attitude. That bubbly little girl was gone, and a warrior emerged. Azula smiled one of her signature sideways smiles, and studied her nails carefully.
"You're right. What need do we have for small talk? We never have the time. I'm here to ask you a single question."
Ty Lee turned fully around, and sat stiff and straight, staring directly at the former princess.
"How would you like to rule the world?" A devilish smile played on the face of the aging prodigy. Ty Lee sighed, and turned back to face the mirror, realizing that her friend was long gone.
"Go back to the Fire Nation, Azula. I've finally found my home, and I don't plan on giving it up for anyone, especially you."
"Oh please, how naive can you be?" Ty Lee jumped at the sudden burst of anger that came from Azula. "I have a plan that was not even noticed by my father. Join me, and soon, the world will be ours, completely. You have heard of Allansar, right?"
Ty Lee turned back around, her eyes wide with disbelief.
"Allansar is a myth, a fairy tale! It doesn't exist, Azula!"
"Have you ever looked? When we were children, we always believed in seeing things with our own eyes, even a place such as Allansar. And I've found it, Ty Lee, by Agni, I've found it!" There was a wild, insane look in Azula's eyes that alerted Ty Lee to the madness within. Her best friend, her idol, was gone forever.
"You're insane. Go home. Please, go home." Ty Lee turned her back on her friend once again, and began to reapply her makeup. Azula stared at the back of her head, the body shaking from anger and disbelief. She couldn't believe that she was being betrayed again.
She leaned her head down to where it was parallel with Ty Lee's, and she stared into the mirror, looking into Ty Lee's large, frightened eyes.
"Fine. Send me away after all I've done for you. If it wasn't for me recruiting you, you could have never betrayed me, and would never be here, fighting for these Earth Kingdom peasants. When I come back to this world at the head of the greatest army of all time, you will not be spared, and you will die along with everyone else."
Ty Lee closed her eyes, holding back the tears, and when she opened them again, Azula was gone. She didn't even sound the alarm to alert the other Kyoshi Warriors. It wouldn't matter. Azula had made it this far without being caught, and her luck wasn't about to change now.
She thought that her past was finally behind her, locked away in the mountains of the Fire Nation. But, as usual, it came at her with a driving force from the depths of time. She didn't even bother trying to put on her makeup again. She rested her head on her arms, and didn't even notice the tears as they ran down her cheeks, dripping off of the edge of her chin.
After eighteen years of peace, and happiness, she would be forced to fight once again.
-888-
Arra's blast of air covered most of the distance, and within a day we docked in a fairly new port that used to be a mining town. We had to quickly ditch the ship and disappear, because the local dock police were still searching for the ship we stole. Hopefully, the fisherman would get his ship back in the same condition he left it in.
With a new objective in mind, we would travel east until we reached the great city of Ba Sing Se. I have to admit, things were different since it wasn't just Manek and I, anymore. Our money disappeared quicker, and our food rations lessened. Feeding four is alot harder than feeding two.
"Why don't you have any arrows?" I asked Arra once as we sat around a camp fire somewhere in the woods. " I mean, you are an airbending master, right?" She smiled, and uncovered her wrist to reveal a blue cross with arrows at each end.
"My mom wouldn't allow my father to shave off all my hair to apply the tattoos. So, he came up with this objective. It's not as flashy as the full body tattoos, but, it gets the point across." I nodded, and ran my hand over the small tattoo. Even with her ancestors long gone, their memory still shone through her.
"We haven't seen Benny and the Jets lately (A/N: I know, technically, that line makes no sense for this story, but I had a sudden urge to put it in somewhere). I wonder where they are." said Manek, referring to the Rough Rhinos and the assassin. I snorted, and flexed the fire with my bending.
"Wherever they are, they're following us. They always appear at the most random times. Who knows, they could erupt through the forest now."
We all sat quietly, waiting for an arrow to wiz through the air, or a bomb to explode near by, but, to our relief, nothing happened.
"Ow! Manek, don't think so loudly, please." said Arra, massaging her temples. She could shut off the mind reading at will, but sometimes, when she let it wander, other people's thoughts ended up in her head.
"Oh, sorry Arra. I'll just learn to tone down my thoughts, you know, if that's possible." said Manek with his usual sarcasm. So far, he and Arra hadn't formed the best of relationships. Well, it was really Manek who was having the issues. So far he had been soaked, winded, and unceremoniously mind read. Whenever Arra sneezed, he went flying, and usually landed in some body of water.
There was also this one time where Manek was thinking some very...inappropriate thoughts in the late hours of the night, and ended up waking Arra. She screamed, exclaiming how thoughts like that needed to be kept locked away in the deepest crevices of the mind, and saved for the girl he was thinking of. We all had a good laugh, even Sonziah, and Manek refrained from speaking for a day.
Sonziah was the cousin who seemed to be forming a friendship with Manek, believe it or not. They both had a dry sense of sarcasm, even though Sonziah used hers to just speak her mind, not make someone laugh. Whenever we stopped in a village, they would stand around looking miserable while Arra and I scanned the carts in the market. But, even in her coldness, she couldn't help but glance at a shiny hair piece, or a nice silk kimono. She was a girl, after all.
Word of Zuko had grown thicker since Manek and I had left the Earth Kingdom, and was now one of the main topics in a number of conversations. Many spoke of how they had let the Fire Nation Prince stay in their homes, and how courteous he was. They never expected him to be so kind, or to help as much as he did. I smiled when they would recount their tales to me, and picture my brother being the prince that he was. When questioned about where he was headed, they all answered the same thing. Ba Sing Se.
So, we were heading in the right direction, and, so far, the Rough Rhinos and the assassin hadn't made any special appearances. Maybe this "quest" would come to an end soon. If only destiny had the same idea.
A/N: Azula has returned!!! I intended to save her introduction into the series until the second instalment, but, this was an excellent moment to give Ty Lee her special appearance, and throw Azula in there, too.
