As soon as Kuvira stepped through the door to her apartment after rehearsal, she was greeted by the sight of Huan reading a magazine with his feet up on her couch. She grinned a bit and dropped her dance bag by the door on her way over to him.
When she first gave Huan and his brother, Baatar, spare keys to her place, she hadn't anticipated the extent to which they would make the third-floor walk-up their refuge. In the beginning the apartment had been threadbare, furnished with only the most basic necessities. It wasn't like Kuvira needed much. Between the security force, the dance troupe, and the endless stream of odd jobs she ended up doing for Suyin, she often came home just to sleep. But the brothers had slowly filled the space with decorative art and hanging lights and houseplants—only succulents, of course, because anything less hardy would have died on her watch long ago.
"To what do I owe the honor?" she asked, taking a seat on the arm of the couch. "Twins mess up another one of your sculptures?"
"Probably," he said. "I haven't checked in a while. We've been stuck dealing with all of mom's presents."
Kuvira gave a snorting laugh. "Looks like King Yudai is willing to put it all on the line this time."
"He's not the only one." Just then, Huan drew a small black box out of one of his pockets and handed it to her. "This came for you today. From Yusei ," the artist told her, eyebrows raised for emphasis.
Kuvira blanched at the mention of his name—a visceral reminder of the last time she'd let go of her professionalism—even before unboxing the necklace.
"Two years ago, I asked you if you hooked up with someone in Omashu, and you lied to my face."
"Come on, Huan—"
"You were the first person I told after Teo Tan," he pointed out. "We're supposed to be friends."
"We are," Kuvira said. "I just wanted to forget about it after. Su chewed me out so bad after Aiwei snitched and—"
"Wait, my mother got mad at you for fooling around?" Huan asked incredulously.
Kuvira had to bite the inside of her lip to keep from laughing. "No, she got mad at me for fooling around when I wasn't on birth control."
She shook her head, remembering the stern lecture on being careful and safeguarding her future that was followed immediately by raunchy stories about her mentor's torrid love affairs on her pirate ship and in her sandbender commune—let alone what she had done with King Yudai himself.
"Yeah, that tracks," Huan said. "So what are you going to do now? Opal's hoping to Yangchen that your prince proposes and whisks you back to Omashu."
Kuvira rolled her eyes at this. "Tell her not to hold her breath."
"Why?" Huan asked. "You're finally ready to unpack your feelings for my brother?"
Wow. He was pulling no punches today. If Kuvira had known this would be the end result, she would've just told him back when it happened.
"You know what, my guard shift is starting in an hour." She hopped off the arm of the chair and padded towards her bedroom. "There's beer in the fridge. Let yourself out whenever."
"Let yourself feel," he called to her as she slammed the door shut, "preferably before your ex lands in Zaofu."
Kuvira reopened the door for just long enough to say, "He's not my ex," and then firmly closed it again.
The negotiations lasted long into the evening on that first day of the conference, and throughout the talks, Kuvira would periodically notice the king's son appraising her with eyes the color of malachite.
She fixed her gaze on the map that they'd raised on the stone surface, trying to remain focused on the conversation.
"We still contend that the best way to cement our alliance would be to join the Beifong family with the royal line of Omashu," a bespectacled minister from the visiting delegation reasoned. The old man sat to the king's left, dressed in heavy purple robes despite the warm weather.
"As we've stated many times before," Aiwei replied in an even tone, "Opal's hand is not on the table."
King Yudai turned to Suyin then. "I know you believe your daughter is too young to marry."
"She is."
"Then perhaps we can cement the alliance with these two instead," he said, gesturing to Yusei and Kuvira herself. "They're older, and I know my son at least would be amenable."
Kuvira went completely still, holding her breath as her mentor mulled her fate over. Su would never sell her precious only daughter for the sake of a political alliance—but a ward who had come from nothing, enjoying a privileged life on grace and borrowed time, was a different matter entirely.
"That would be pointless," Su said finally. "Yusei isn't your heir."
"And that one isn't even your child," the king replied. "Will you not meet us halfway?"
"This is getting us nowhere," Su said with a huff. "Alliances by marriage are outdated and unnecessary. I already gave you my word that we would be united in the secession."
"Just as you gave me your word that we would wed," the king fired back. "And then you ran."
"Honestly," Su said, dragging out each syllable of the word. "That was over twenty-five years ago!"
"It isn't personal, Suyin. I bear you no ill will over the past, but Omashu must have certainty this time."
"Exactly what part of you harping on my dumping you when we were kids isn't personal, Yudai?"
The whole room went silent and stone faced, as though Koh the Face-Stealer were in their midst, while monarch and matriarch stared each other down. Finally, Aiwei cleared his throat.
"Perhaps we should take a recess," the advisor said. "Reconvene in the morning?
After the members of both delegations assented, the assembled began to disperse, following the smell of roasting pork and grilled elephant koi wafting up from the kitchens. Kuvira was considering grabbing a bite to eat herself, when Su tapped her arm and then led her to a corner for a private word.
"I want you to work out models for what our defense plans could look like without Omashu," she said.
"You think they'll actually back out?" Kuvira asked.
"No, but the possibility of unilateral action from Zaofu will get them to fall in line," Su explained. "In matters like these it's important to project strength; remember that." The matriarch then cut eyes to where Yusei leaned against the doorway, waiting. "Also, use him. Find out where his father really stands."
"Got it."
"And Kuvira," her mentor said, her voice taking on a serious tone.
She sighed. "Yes, Su?"
"You may feel like I ruined something for you back there, but you have to trust me when I say you don't want to be married this young, not even to a king's son. Life has so much more in store for you than that." With that the matriarch went down to dinner, leaving Kuvira alone with the prince.
"It's been a while, lieutenant." Yusei got to her in only four strides. He had been tall when she had known him, but now Kuvira had to tilt her head up to meet his gaze.
"Captain now," she said, smirking.
"Captain Kuvira." He smiled at her. "It suits you. I wonder, though—"
"If I'd kick your ass again in a rematch?" Kuvira asked.
"If you still taste like plum wine and moonpeach," he said, and then bent down to kiss her—once, twice. "You're blushing, captain."
"I'm at work," Kuvira said, turning back towards the map to stop herself from slipping up. She darted her tongue across her lower lip when he couldn't see, just to taste him again.
"You were at work last time too, if I remember correctly." Yusei too turned to the map, his hand brushing against the side of hers. The brief touch sent tingles running up her arm like a glancing blow from a lightning bender.
"Yes, and you nearly got me fired," she said.
"That woman would never fire you. I'd wager she values you over her own children."
"Is that how it looks?" Kuvira made an unconvinced noise at the back of her throat. "What do you think about all of this, anyway?"
"The plan? It will make us richer. I served a tour with the United Forces last year," he said. "Without Ba Sing Se and the Earth Queen holding us back, our states could prosper like Republic City."
Kuvira rolled her eyes. "Republic City? Where all the richest citizens are the descendants of Fire Nation colonizers?"
"You can't really think that," Yusei said. "He's locked up now after all of that with the Equalists, but Hiroshi Sato started out with nothing."
"Nothing but a name that had once meant something back in Caldera. He wouldn't have gotten investors any other way."
"You're probably right," he conceded. "But such views have fallen out of fashion, especially in the United Republic. The people there see themselves as a nation apart."
"No one can be apart from history," she said firmly.
"We can only try." Yusei drew a flask from his pocket and took a drink, then handed it over to her. "Your views on the United Republic are fascinating, captain, but what's really bothering you?"
Kuvira looked again at the stone table, trailing her fingers over the regions just beyond the limits of Zaofu. "If we leave the Earth Kingdom, the poor are going suffer more."
"Yes, of course, but they are the queen's problem by law."
"If the Earth Queen isn't fit to rule us, she's not fit to rule anyone," Kuvira said.
"So you want a revolution?"
"I want the same thing as you and Su and your father," she told him. "I just want it for our entire nation. Don't you?"
"I suppose so, in theory," he said, looking entirely unmoved by her ideals. "But I doubt my father or your matriarch would find it worth the trouble. I have to say, I understand their point of view."
Kuvira only sighed, wondering why she'd held out any hope that he would understand. He was a good distraction, but he'd never know her—not in any way that mattered. "I should finish these plans for Su."
"Always so serious, captain." Yusei leaned down and kissed her cheek. "Find me later in the guesthouse?"
"Yeah, maybe," she said, her eyes already back on the model Earth Kingdom.
By the time Kuvira was finished with the alternate plans and accompanying reports, the evening had long passed and the domes were up. She was making her way sluggishly towards the entrance of the estate, trying to remember who was manning the domes and whether she'd be able to take the Beifongs' private tram back downtown when she saw Baatar emerging from his father's workshop. The engineer regarded her with a warm smile.
"Hey, Kuvira."
"Hey," she replied, yawning a bit.
"Long day?" he asked.
Kuvira nodded. "Longer one tomorrow."
"You weren't at dinner," he said, and she was surprised he had noticed; most of the visiting delegation would have been in the dining room that evening. "Did you eat?"
"I'll make something when I get home," Kuvira said, waving off the hint of concern in his expression. Truthfully, the very idea of taking out pots and pans seemed unlikely in the extreme, but she knew he'd only worry otherwise.
Baatar gave her a look. "Going off of precedent, you'll probably drink half a beer and then fall asleep in your uniform."
"Uncalled for," she said, crossing her arms.
"Come on. Let's get some food in you."
Baatar led Kuvira down a familiar route of long halls and back staircases that led into the kitchens, where they had often gone on childhood expeditions in search of ice pops and moonpeach tarts. Kuvira was more than surprised when he started taking out actual ingredients. She sat up on a counter top, watching as he folded dumplings with the ingredients left over from the evening's feast.
"Since when do you know how to cook?"
"I wouldn't say I can cook," he told her as he put oil to frying pan and let it heat up. "I know how to make exactly three things. It was just enough to keep myself alive in Ba Sing Se."
"What was it like over there?" Although they had exchanged a few letters during the year he spent at the university, she had never really asked before—at least not in person.
"Well, the food was great," he said; of course that was where his mind went first. "You remember that tea shop I wrote about in my letters?"
Kuvira shook her head, laughing a bit. "How could I forget? Four pages about the jasmine alone."
"And every line of it was necessary. I think you may have liked the oolong better, though," he said. "It all depends on the—"
"Was there a point to this tangent, Baatar?" Kuvira tried her best to pin him under a judging stare, but the smile tugging at her lips undermined it.
He flushed a bit. "Right. Well, I found out that the first owner was actually Lord Zuko's uncle."
"The Dragon of the West had a tea shop in Ba Sing Se of all places?"
"Worked there until the day he died, apparently," Baatar said. "That's the thing about that city. It's so big. No one knows who you are; no one cares. The only thing you're known for is whatever you choose to do with yourself and whether you do it well."
He handed her a plate of fried dumplings then, plump and filled with pork and chives.
"And what were you known for? Lopsided jiaozi?" she asked, chuckling a bit.
"You're the worst, you know?" he said, smiling despite himself. "But no. I was one of the power guys."
"It is entirely too late at night for me to have to guess what that means," she said between mouthfuls of dumpling and vinegar dip that tasted way better than she'd dared to hope.
"A few of my friends and I were helping this professor tap power lines to give electricity to people living in the lower ring."
"That sounds super illegal," Kuvira said.
"It was," he said. "But the rates they were charging people to get on that primitive power grid were criminal."
"Uh-huh," Kuvira said, with no inkling of what made a grid better or worse. "You're lucky you weren't carted off by the Dai Li."
"Well, my professor was after a few months. He disappeared one day right after lectures, and no one saw him since," he told her with grief coloring his features. "We were all talking about whether we should keep going, and then a few days later an airship came in the middle of the night and brought me back to Zaofu. Did you know my mother has spies in the capital?"
"I did," Kuvira said. "And thank the spirits for them. You would not do well in prison."
"You're probably right about that, but honestly I think what we were doing was worth it."
"Really?" she asked.
"I mean it's inconceivable that in the largest city in the Earth Kingdom, there are tens of thousands of people living without electricity and running water. Someone had to do something."
"You wanted to stay." The realization sent a spark of something fluttering beneath her rib cage.
"I would have if anyone had asked my opinion, but you know how things go around here," he said, shaking his head. "I probably sound crazy."
"You don't," Kuvira said. "You're making more sense to me than anyone has in a long time."