Disclaimer: I don't own AtLA.
AN: I'm mostly going to be referring to a Team Avatar as an Avatar's retinue or an entourage. The Avatar is the automatic doyen(ne) of the group, with the rest being sworn to them as sort of vassals/advisors, referred to as vassals or varlets who can act as the Avatar's plenipotentiaries. Their lovers/spouses (and I headcanon all Avatars being bisexual given that they've been both men and women and probably don't particularly care about gender) are called the "Blessed Consort" while their children are "Blessed Daughter/Son".
A doyen(ne) is defined by the Webster dictionary as:
a: the senior member of a body or group
b: a person considered to be knowledgeable or uniquely skilled because of long experience in some field of endeavour (very fitting description of the Avatar)
While vassals are
1: a person under the protection of a feudal lord to whom he has vowed homage and fealty: a feudal tenant
2: one in a subservient or subordinate position
A varlet is a synonym for a vassal or a knight's page according to the thesaurus.
Also, the Avatar is called things such as Tulku (IRL is a Tibetan Buddhist Lama who has consciously willed themself to be reborn to continue their Bodhisattva vow)/Satguru (IRL a Hindu title meaning "True Guru", a guru being a divine figure in multiple religions including Hinduism and Buddhism)/Dalai Lama (IRL the title of the Buddist leader who reincarnates)/Lamane (IRL meaning "master of the land", leader of the now extinct Serer religion)/etc
Also, just read TheLightDancer's 'By Fire and Water, By Earth and Air' series on AO3. It's on the second book now, and is absolutely amazing. Any fan of AtLA should definitely read it, because it does an amazing portrayal of the spirits, a realistic but not unreadable portrayal of the 100 Years War, and the Avatar. I read the whole series twice in three/four days. Couldn't tear myself away and had to re-read it afterwards because once was not close to enough.
Read, enjoy and review!
Chapter Three
The Return of the Avatar 1
Ember Island, Fire Nation:
"I can fly us down to the beach," Anji offered after taking a second to absorb Azula and Zuko's explanation. "It'll be faster than any speed of running." Any grief or shock had disappeared from her expression. Her face was hard as stone and tone grim with determination. Her grey eyes seemed far older than thirteen, or even a hundred and thirteen, years. Azula could feel the other girl's power rolling off her, yet she instinctively sensed that what she could perceive was only the slightest taste of what Anji could do.
Were it not for the coming attack, she'd have paid more attention, or else put the pieces together. As it was, she barely noticed, too distracted with fear for her defenceless village and fearing that someone had sold her out and trying to suppress the memories of the last raid on her people, and the lethal consequences of it.
"Please," Zuko accepted Anji's offer desperately. "We have to get down there!"
"We won't survive another attack," Azula predicted bleakly, staring down at the village. "All the warriors are gone. We have no way to fight them off."
She could see people rushing from the soon-to-be destroyed houses, and a large metal ship cutting through the sea at unnatural speeds, heading straight for the beach on a large wave. Dread clogged her throat and memories of two limp bodies, surrounded by pools of blood redder than her mother's dresses, danced before her vision.
"You won't have to," Anji promised, a look of intractable resolve in her eyes. Azula hoped whatever the other girl was planning worked, because otherwise her village was doomed. It was strange, given they had only just met and under such strange circumstances, yet something in Anji's manner and tone made it natural to trust her and her ability to save them.
Thinking of this in the back of her mind, Azula again felt as if there was something she was missing, but she was too frightened and worried for her neighbours to figure it out. The other girl snapped her staff and it turned into a glider. Under other circumstances, they'd have been awed.
"Hold on to me as firmly as you can," Anji directed them as she angled it in preparation for take-off. They each gripped an arm as tightly as they could. In the back of her mind, Azula was surprised by the corded muscles she felt beneath Anji's robe. Did the other girl do anything except for training? Azula spent most of her time either training her firebending as best she could from the katas her father had taught her before he and Mother were murdered or else with her knife, but she didn't have muscles or calluses like Anji did.
Anji took off and soared for the beach, where the villagers were gathering to face the approaching enemy rather than stay inside and wait to be beaten before they were forcibly dragged from their houses, or else left to die from the water and debris when the waterbenders flooded the place. Azula screwed her eyes shut and clutched at the other girl's arm with all her strength to keep from falling to her death.
Though, when she considered it, a death from falling from a massive height would be a far kinder fate than the one the Coalition would give her if they learned that she was a firebender. Azula stiffened her spine and lifted her chin defiantly as they swooped down to land on the beach. Her parents hadn't shown any fear towards the firebenders and the pain and death they rained down on the world, and neither would she.
Zuko's heart pounded loudly in his ears as they landed on the beach. Some of the village children whispered in shock and awe at the sight of Anji's flying, but only the youngest. Everyone else noted that she had Zuko and his sister with her, and focused on the approaching Coalition that was the real threat.
"Zuko, Azula, are you alright?" Li asked tensely, striding up to join them with Lo at her side. She and her sister acted as leaders of the village, being the eldest remaining and the most knowledgeable, having been the granddaughters of a Fire Sage who had been an apprentice in the days of Avatar Kuruk who had taught them all that he knew. Anji was surveying the villagers, an indecipherable look in her grey eyes as her gaze lingered on injuries borne by the former soldiers who'd been too badly wounded to remain on the front and were thus sent home. "We saw the eruption and feared the worst. I see you have brought a friend."
"We're fine," Zuko assured the twins quickly.
"This is Anji," Azula introduced hurriedly. "She's a-an airbender."
"No one has seen an airbender in a hundred years," Lo commented, glancing at Anji with a strange expression. "And now one appears with the Water Coalition soldiers on her heels. One favoured by Agni, at that."
"And even more spirits, besides," Li finished, staring at Anji, who bowed her head solemnly.
"Agni is a loving spirit," she said evenly. "He favours many mortals and fellow spirits alike."
"Indeed, but he loves some more than others," Li insisted. The rest of the villagers looked as bewildered as Zuko felt.
But there was no time for them to continue the discussion, or for Zuko to understand the undercurrents of the conversation the twins and Anji both clearly communicated to one another. The ship had docked, and a gangplank thudded onto the sand, sending small puffs into the air before a short warrior with a helmet shaped like a wolf's head, full silver armour denoting him as a member of the High Family and a spear with a white tooth-like point, led a procession of fellow soldiers down the plank.
Zuko tried to judge the number of soldiers, feeling his hands clench into fists when he lost count around thirty. Whatever the count, it was definitely more than the entire village population put together, counting the toddlers and stooped elders.
"Where is he?" The leader demanded after marching up to stand a short distance away. Zuko felt his heart stop. Did the Coalition learn that there was still a firebender on the island? Were they here for his sister?
"Wh, where's who?" Azula demanded, a faint quiver in her defiant tone. If she wasn't Zuko's sister, he wouldn't have recognized it.
"The Avatar, stupid girl!" The voice cracked slightly, the way that came with puberty, and Zuko felt a flash of disbelief. Was this person a teenager, like him? The suspicion was confirmed when the other boy removed his helmet, showing tanned skin, ice-blue eyes and a scar marring the face of the waterbender, who was probably Azula's age at most.
"He'd be about this age," the Coalition royal went on, voice furious as he roughly grabbed Li's arm and dragged her forward. Lo cried and stepped forward after her sister, one hand raised. It increased Zuko's fear. He had never seen either sister lose their stoic composure before. "Master of the Four Elements, the Bridge Between Worlds. Sound familiar?"
"The Avatar's been gone over a century!" Zuko protested desperately.
"Let her go, she's just an old woman!" Azula added. "How pathetic are you, attacking a defenceless old woman who needs a stick to walk when it's cold?!"
"Don't lie to me!" The waterbender spat furiously shoving Li to the ground. Lo and Keto, a man in his mid-forties who'd lost his right leg to the war and returned home as a consequence, hastily helped her back into the huddle of visitors. "I saw the light! I know he's here!" He waved a hand and a large wave surged up. Several children started to sob. "If you don't hand the Avatar over to me right this instant, I will flood this whole island!"
"She, actually." Anji didn't shout, in fact she spoke rather softly, but her voice drew everyone's attention as she stepped forward. Her expression was solemn, her head high and shoulders set with all the regality and natural authority of an empress.
"What?" The prince stared at her in bewilderment. Anji raised both her hands. A swirl of air came into existence above her left palm, while a flame flickered in her right. She stared the prince down steadily and calmly as she proclaimed herself the most powerful person in existence.
The twins fell to their knees and bowed their heads, and most of the other villagers, save for Zuko and Azula themselves, copied the act, adults tugging the children into obeisance despite the young ones' lack of comprehension as to what they were witnessing. The Coalition soldiers levelled their weapons or raised their hands, moisture in the air hardening into ice weapons that hovered in the air, aimed at the unconcerned girl, who gave them a blatantly dismissive look.
"But she's just a kid," Zuko mumbled to himself, even as the pieces fell into place.
Airbenders were figures of legend now, that was true, but no story his mother or uncle ever told him had mentioned them having the ability to seal themselves in volcanos and survive for a hundred years, nor did it speak of them glowing. On the other hand, the stories of Avatars were full of people performing feats that should have been impossible. Avatar Roku had stopped and suppressed a volcanic eruption. Avatar Szeto had ended a decade long famine, and those were just two of the feats performed by the last two Fire Avatars, never mind the feats of the rest before and after them.
Compared to some things past Avatars were said to have done, surviving a century encased in rock didn't seem difficult.
Zuko bit back a hysterical laugh as he realized that the world had been debating the fate of the Avatar for ten decades now, hundreds of thousands of expeditions had been undertaken by both sides, every sage since the war's beginning had tried to reach the spirits to locate the Avatar, and it turned out that all along she'd been right in the centre of the Fire Nation.
"You're the Avatar?" The waterbender said in shock. "But you're a little girl! My whole life training, two years of searching the globe, and it turns out that the Avatar is a little girl?"
Anji tilted her head to the side, raising an eyebrow. "Is it my being a girl this time, or my being fourteen that's your problem?"
The water prince sputtered, then shook his head. "Never mind," unsheathing his spear and pointing at her as a whip of water swirled around his fist. "I am Prince Kaito of the Water Coalition. My father, Hakoda, Emperor of the World and High Chief of the Water Coalition, has ordered me to deliver you to him, whatever the cost."
"Then I have an offer," Anji replied calmly, making no shift into a fighting stance. "You want me alone, yes? These people," she waved at them. "They are of no interest to you."
The boy shot them a disdainful sneer. "Obviously," he scoffed. "Why would I care about a bunch of useless peasants not fit to lick my boots clean? They belong in the ash they're so fond of."
His arrogance faltered for half a second when Anji's eyes narrowed. "Take care, Prince. I have been of the Fire Nation as much as the others," she warned coolly in a surprisingly intimidating tone for such a delicate girl before continuing. "If you swear by the spirits, by the souls of your ancestors, to leave them be in exchange, then I vow, I will surrender to you without a fight."
The boy narrowed his cold gaze at her doubtfully. "You're just going to hand yourself over as my prisoner?" He demanded. "Just like that? No fight, nothing? You're going to surrender for the sake of some worthless peasants?"
Anji frowned at him, a rather terrifying look despite her sweet face, but nodded. "Surrender? Yes, but for some worthless peasants, as you call them? No. They're not worthless, not in the slightest. Avatars have sacrificed themselves for far less worthy causes than the lives of these people."
Zuko was startled by the utter selflessness of the statement, and how sincere it was. Guilt twisted his chest. He wanted to say or do something to help, but something kept him from speaking. Cowardice, he supposed. The same fear that kept him obedient that terrible day when his mother told him to hide and his father promised everything would be okay and half an hour later they found their bodies in bloody pools in the living room.
"Anji, you can't," Azula pleaded. She'd always been braver than him.
"Don't worry about me, Azula," Anji assured her. "Check on Appa for me, would you? He'll be upset otherwise."
"Typical womanly softheartedness," the boy scoffed disdainfully. "I'd expected more from an Avatar. I suppose stories and legends are always exaggerated."
"Do you agree?" Anji asked evenly, ignoring the mockery. Azula snarled at the prince wordlessly, but something had passed between her and Anji silently when their gazes met, and she acquiesced to the Avatar's desire, bowing her head defeatedly. Zuko felt as if he were hovering outside of his body, plans forming in his mind as he watched the Protector of the World offer herself up to monsters to protect his tiny village.
"I agree," the prince gave a curt nod. "By Anningan's name, no harm will come to the people on this island from my men and I so long as you surrender to me."
Anji stepped forward and, at the prince's gesture, was surrounded by several large warriors. One moved his hands and the moisture in the air solidified into a set of handcuffs tying Anji's wrists together tightly behind her back. Another levelled the point of his spear at her unprotected back, ready to thrust it through her chest with a second's notice. For all their condescending attitudes towards women, they were taking Anji seriously.
No doubt even they felt the power contained within her, and feared it being unleashed on them.
The villagers stared after them solemnly and helplessly, clambering back to their feet with difficulty, as the newly returned Avatar was escorted onto the ship.
Zuko didn't bother to wait for the ship to be out of sight. The instant the gangplank was pulled back onboard, he was turning to race for the house where he and his sister had been born and raised, and had lived alone in together since their uncle left for the front in the Earth Kingdom.
All-powerful Avatar born a century ago or not, Anji was physically younger than his baby sister's age. She had just offered herself up as a sacrifice to people whose hearts were as cold and merciless as the icy Poles they inhabited, to protect his village, people she didn't know and had no real reason to care about.
He had to help her.