Well, wow.
You guys just whipped right past my benchmark didn't you? For all of you and all the encouragement you've offered me during the course of this: Five pages:)
Furthermore, AzureAquarius got my magic review, but she and I agreed that maybe someone else should get it instead, so to be fair (or as fair as I can be) and given the circumstances I thought long and hard about what to do in terms of passing it on to someone else. So I figured we'll double the celebration for 300 reviews. So whomever gets THAT review (unless you're not signed in/you already know what happens.) will get the spoiler, if you want it.
Though if anyone can figure out a way for me to get into contact privately with people who aren't signed in I would love to be able to include them in this contest thing as well.
But wait! There's more! I was thinking maybe in honor of the 300th review I should do a Zutara cake...I love baking and I've wanted to experiment with decorating for a while now and this would be a grand excuse. Hopefully I won't muck it up horribly and I will be posting pictures (even if I can't share it with all of you...!) and even if my decorating skills prove lacking I'm certain my family will be grateful. Woe is me the day I let them find out I'm a good cook. Now they seem to want retribution for the years I ate their cooking as a child.
Katara was well enough to receive visitors, and probably to even be released from the healers' wing but there was always a group of women ranging in age from newly married to hair as white as snow surrounding her. From what Toph told Sokka they scolded and praised in in equal parts for her bravery during the battle.
As soon as she'd woken up and managed to stay awake for more than a few minutes at a time Sokka had enlisted Toph's help in sneaking into her rooms.
He'd sat up with her half the night while Toph pretended to be interested in what might have caused her blindness. She didn't mind it too terribly. The women were very kind and spoiled her in a way completely unlike what her parents had done. They asked her endless questions and offered her strange treats made of thick and heavy bread. When they did things for her it wasn't like the help that the others gave her—they just pitched in—but when they did everything for her it wasn't because they thought she was incapable, it was because they wanted to thank her and knew no other way. It was strange and she found herself smiling more than she would admit to Sokka.
Besides, having him owe her one was far more interesting.
Sokka and Katara talked in hushed voices through most of the night. At first Sokka had been furious and ready to berate her. She was not supposed to risk her life for him, he wouldn't allow it! But when he'd seen the smile on her face and felt her tremble as she hugged him he had recalled—of all things—Zuko's words.
He tried, slowly, to put himself in Katara's shoes and knew he would have done the same. And he would not want to hear from her that he shouldn't have. So he hugged her back and smiled into her hair—those weren't tears, her hair was a mess and it was getting in his eyes—and thanked her from the bottom of his heart.
"I was worried about you." He told her solemnly as he pulled away.
"You're my big brother." She sighed, reaching up to ruffle his hair. He'd not tied it back in a while and the edges were growing raggedy. On that note though, he had very much liked Bato's hair when they met him, and he was a proper man of the tribe now. "You have to worry about me." He laughed with her and took a seat on the edge of her bed.
"You have to get better soon." He said with a rueful laugh. "Aang is getting antsy and you're the only one who knows how to deal with him when he gets like that."
"Iroh is rather good at it."
"Oh!" Sokka gushed over-dramatically, "Iroh has been busy with Zuko, who's acting weird too."
"Do you know what's wrong with them?" Sokka and she shared a long look filled with a hundred things left unsaid. "Okay, okay, sorry I asked." She said in between laughing. "How are you and Toph doing?" She could have bit her traitorous tongue for a moment but while he was—she had to admit—very good with strategies, he wasn't often so perceptive when it came to the feelings of others and their motivations.
Either way he did not seem to notice her slip and launched into an explanation of how he was ready to go. "I don't like staying in one place so long, especially when Ozai knows where we are."
"I'm sorry." She looked down at her knees and toyed with the edge of the blanket.
"I didn't mean that." He corrected himself quickly. "And Toph won't leave that island she made for hardly anything. Though I can't blame her for that. She's ready to get back on land I think." There was a look in his eyes for just a moment that Katara was tempted to call wistful.
Not out loud of course.
"Did anyone tell you?" He asked, suddenly grasping up her hands and grinning with excitement.
"I saw the island, that's where Aang brought me to help you. It is very impressive though."
"No!" He shook his head. "About Zuko! Man I wish I could have seen that. Even Azula turned tail and ran. He's got white fire. Like in that fairy tale Iroh told us!" Sokka started launching into the story, apparently unaware that she had been there.
She had thought, when she regained consciousness, that it had been a dream. She had dreamed quite a bit while she was asleep. Mostly dreams about her mother. But she had just assumed that Zuko coming to her rescue and being even more powerful than his prodigy sister—Zuko did not tend to exaggerate and if he called her a prodigy Katara could not imagine how powerful Azula really was—with flames as white as the sun.
"I had heard something." She admitted softly, glancing up through her bangs. Unmarried women of the Water Tribe weren't meant to wear their hair loose in front of others—even brothers once they weren't children—but after all the battles she had been through since joining Aang it was the furthest thing from her mind.
"He's..." Sokka struggled to talk and Katara waited. It was like on Kyoshi when he asked for the help of the women fighters. He knew it was the right thing to do, but it was difficult with a stubborn streak as wide as the world was vast. "He's not that bad a guy." Katara smiled softly and Sokka wondered if she was aware of how much she looked like their mother when she did that.
"Awww, does Sokka have a new friend?" She teased, cracking into a smile before she could finish speaking. Sokka pouted for a moment before the both of them burst into laughter.
"I mean it Katara!" He said, still breathless from giggling. "I know I was really against him in the beginning and maybe it's just because Iroh is so nice...but he isn't that bad."
"Sokka I'm the one who brought him back into the group, you're the one who tried to beat him senseless. You don't need to tell me." She told him with that same smile that made her look so much like their mother it hurt a little.
"All I'm saying is that he's not that bad." Generally Sokka did say occasional things before he'd thought them through. But when he repeated it, it meant it was something to consider.
"What do you mean?" She asked, a bit taken aback but the strangely serious turn the conversation had taken.
"You..." Sokka searched for the words he wanted and a phrasing that would keep her from trying to fight him in her current condition. The nurses said that miraculously Katara had retained her bending powers, but that she should let them rest all the same. "You look at him."
"I...look at him?"
"Well, yeah. Not like you look at me, or Toph or even Aang. It's different." He insisted, wishing he knew how to get his point across. He'd had such good intentions when he started to speak.
"Different?"
"All I'm saying is that...that he's not that bad, you know, just in case." Katara stared at him for a moment as he mind struggled to comprehend what her brother was saying to her. And then for a moment she could only manage the occasional indignant squawk.
"Are you implying that I like him?"
"You get the same look you did around Jet." Sokka regretted saying that the moment it was out of his mouth and wished he could take it back.
"You are! You're implying that I like Zuko." Her voice dropped so low that Sokka had to strain to hear it even though he was close enough to see the small scar on her chin from when they were children and she tripped, her chin cracking so hard against the ice that Sokka had been certain she'd killed herself. "I don't." She hissed at last, and Sokka didn't say anything. He just regarded her with a look she knew too well, that look of 'If you say so.'
"If you did, it wouldn't matter to me." He whispered, giving her another hug as he stood. "And now I have to leave, because if they catch me here..." he didn't finish his sentence, just shivered comically and shot her a soft look before darting away.
Katara was tired, but she lay awake until dawn replaying the conversation in her head over and over again.
Now she was better and she almost dreaded returning to normal life. Things had become strange suddenly and Katara was no longer sure how to be the voice of reason, when she wasn't even sure how to deal with the numerous problems in her own life.
By the time she extracted herself from the many goodbyes and assured the last of the women that they simply didn't have the space as they traveled to take all their gifts—no matter how nice it would be to have so many extra blankets, coats, dresses and ribbons—the sun was high in the sky and Appa was almost completely ready to go.
She saw Iroh first and he instantly enveloped her in a hug that smelled of soot and tea leaves. What was strange was that after all they had been through with Iroh and Zuko the smell of soot no longer instantly transported her to the day the Fire Nation raided her village and killed her mother.
Now, it was almost comforting with only a distant pang of regret.
"It is good to see you so well!" Iroh chuckled heartily, holding her at arm's length and inspecting her.
"The healers here were too kind to me." She said.
"They admire you." She blushed and didn't respond. "I must admit I like it here." Iroh plowed on, seeming to sense her discomfort. "But it will be nice to be back in warm weather. My joints seem to be getting older so much faster than the rest of me." Katara laughed with him this time and they walked together to find where Aang was feeding Appa the last of his breakfast and Sokka was arranging their supplies.
"I don't see why I'm the only one doing any work around here!"
"Twinkletoes is feeding Appa and I can't see. You really expect a poor little blind girl to help you?" Her voice took on that soft and quivering note it held when she spoke around her parents.
"But Sokka!" Iroh intervened, "You are doing such a fine job by yourself! Why would you need any help?" Preening at the praise Sokka finished quickly and without complaint. Katara smiled, partly at Sokka, but mostly because even if she were confused and lost in her own thoughts Iroh was there to help mellow everyone out too, and he was very good at it.
He'd dealt with Zuko after all.
She spun when she realized there was someone behind her and for the first time since he'd saved her she and Zuko stared at each other.
There was a moment where she didn't know what to do and then Zuko had stormed past her without a word and she was left staring after him. She didn't know whether she should be grateful for time to consider her conflicting emotions, or hurt that he didn't even ask how she was.
Katara finally settled on both and made sure to sit as far from him as possible when they took their seats in Appa's saddle.
She ended up between Iroh and some of the supplies that had overflowed from the small space at the very back of the saddle. That happened with so many extra bedrolls and food. Water was no problem so long as they were over the ocean. Katara and Aang could use their waterbending to remove the salt from the ocean water—and fish on occasion though that was far more difficult since the fish scattered at the sight of Appa.
"Toph was brilliant enough to make a prison of stone that neither Mai nor Ty Lee will be able to get out of. Azula escaped but having them in custody is a great victory against the Fire Nation." Iroh explained. Katara was always mildly jealous at how he could sound so serious and still so cheerful at the same time. "Once we reach Ba Sing Se we'll send some Earthbenders to fetch them and bring them into proper custody. There is no reason they should be left in the Northern Water Capital when so many of their fine warriors are gone."
He also explained that Arnook's men had found the date of the comet's return. They had a little more than two seasons to drum up troops to fight from the Earth Kingdom and then amass and prepare for battle. Iroh knew of a large area unused and without a proper patrol at the edge of the Fire Nation Capital. "The Great Salt Flats." He called them. "In Sozin's time traitors would be set loose in them to go mad with heat. With tents to protect against the sun and plenty of water we will have the advantage of surprise. Waterbenders and Earthbenders will greatly help to that end." He explained easily, pointing out the flats on the frayed map they had.
It was one of the rare times when the others were reminded that Iroh was a great general, not just a kindly old man brimming with advice.
Erica -- it's grand to meet a new reviewer and I'm glad you like it so much as that! Your reviews left me smiling and giggling for days so I'm really looking forward to hearing more from you. And now I'm really determined to stick to my Friday deadline too:)
Shard -- Don't tell anyone...but I'm really, really looking forward to that as well.
AlinaAlone -- I'm glad you liked the story about Ursa, it was really fun to come up with I have to admit!
alphabeticalescape -- I'm being completely honest when I say it's a huge honor you think my chapters are flowy and complex. It's certainly a quality I've been trying for. As for the Zutara...well, we'll just have to see. There is an awful lot of story left...