With years of practice, Kuvira had conditioned herself to block out much of her early childhood, but she recalled that many of the elders in her village had revered the spirits in the clumsy way of those without real knowledge. In the foggy periphery of memory stood a grandmother gone too soon, with hands perpetually coated in flour and an everlasting supply of sweet cakes wrapped in banana leaves tucked into the pockets of a worn apron.
When crops did not grow and aid did not come, this grandmother had dotted the windowsills with offerings for the spirits of the fields and roads and rain. When her mother yelled and Kuvira cried and cracks ran up the back wall in the kitchen until it crumbled and fell away, she held her close and told her parents to rebuild in wood and speak softly. She had then lit incense to invite the spirits of patience, home improvements, and affordable earthbending teachers; needless to say none of them ever arrived.
Kuvira had thought then that spirits were omniscient, omnipotent things, far beyond the scope of human understanding—but now she knew that they could have their asses kicked, same as anyone.
The first time, they had been frightening—a legion of bloated, bruise-colored animal shapes descending on the Zaofu Valley. But as they took punishment, they shrank and receded until they were forced to flee. Kuvira tried not to think of what dear grandmother would say if she were around to see her slicing through them with metal sheets. She liked to believe that she would just be happy she'd stopped causing seismic shifts every time something upset her.
At any rate, fewer spirits came the second time, and fewer still the third. Now—with the exception of a rare stray—they tended to give the whole valley a wide berth, as though they had all discussed the matter and decided the metal city wasn't worth the effort.
It had been well over a week since their scouts spotted any strange activity when the security tower radios picked up a distress signal from a town a few hours away. Although she had not been the captain on duty at the time of the call, Kuvira had been asked to relay the news to Suyin because much of the force still subscribed to the myth that the matriarch actually listened to her.
If Kuvira had been anything like her grandmother, who believed in signs and benevolent spirits—and who saw Kuvira's intense influence over her element as neither curse nor commodity, but the palm of destiny reaching down to tap her on the shoulder—she might have just lit a candle and hoped for the best.
But alas, Kuvira had seen more of the world than her grandmother ever got to, enough to know that the only thing that might end human suffering was human effort. So, on her day off, when she was supposed to be lounging around in sweats and listening to her phonograph, she got up and got dressed and prepared to fight an uphill battle.
When she reached the estate a bit after noon, the Beifongs were in the middle of breakfast. Su was still in her pajamas, as were Huan and the twins. They slept late, as the idle rich were wont to do.
"Oh, Kuvira," the matriarch said, smiling despite her apparent surprise. "Come sit. I'll have them bring out some more tea."
Almost instantly, the household staff appeared with a pot of tea and an array of dishes, and Kuvira was waved over to a seat near the head of the table, just to Suyin's left.
Once Kuvira had sat down, Su leaned over to put a crepe stuffed with herbs and lobstercrab on her plate. "I remember you always loved these," she said in a lilting voice. Then, quieter, "What happened?"
"More spirits," Kuvira replied, low enough that no one else would hear.
"Where?"
"A town about two hours out. They radioed for help."
"Are they moving towards Zaofu?"
"Hey, what are you two whispering about?" Wing asked from the other end of the table. "A secret mission?"
"If there's a secret mission, we so want in this time," Wei added between bites of a steamed bun. "Same goes for a secret meeting. You even told the King of Omashu we'd be invited to the next one."
"Secret mission? Secret meeting?" Su repeated, wearing her best bewildered expression. Kuvira saw Opal roll her eyes a bit at the performance. "I so love your imagination, boys. No, we were just discussing the dance recital. We're heading to the studio right after breakfast. You're welcome to join us if you'd like."
"No, thanks," they said in unison before launching into a discussion of the rules of their new metalbending game. Kuvira couldn't help but smile in the face of their chaotic energy. She missed very few things about living at the estate, but the twins were two of them.
After a few more minutes of food and pleasant conversation, Su tapped Kuvira's knee under the table, then murmured something about getting to the studio before the rest of the troupe arrived, and they quickly took their leave.
"I thought they knew about the spirits," Kuvira said once they were in the hall and out of earshot.
Su shook her head. "Better not to worry them," she said. "My husband and Opal got so worked up last time."
"You did lose a lot of blood, Su," Kuvira pointed out.
She remembered the details of that night viscerally, erecting an earth shelter in the valley to stem the bleeding as the last of the spirits were dispersing. Then inside, Opal fluffing Su's pillows and Baatar Sr. holding her hand while the healers did their work. Kuvira had only been given half a moment to watch the tender moment unfold before she'd been sent back to work—to give new orders to the guards, brief the civilians, preside over the city's reopening. An instrument of war was not needed at her bedside.
"Don't you start too," the matriarch said as they rounded a corner into the estate's artistic wing. "I expect more from you; you've had enough medical training to know it wasn't serious. Besides, I've been much closer to death than that."
"The pirate ship?"
"And the Terra Triad. And the twins—have your kids one at a time if you can help it."
"Duly noted."
Kuvira had heard the stories many times before—the friend who took an Agni Kai's fire blast for her during a turf war, the mother who broke her own code of ethics to keep her out of jail, the husband who built an airship and tracked down the master waterbender Katara to deliver the twins despite his debilitating fear of heights. To be Suyin Beifong was to be cherished by everyone who'd ever met you, to the point that being loved so much became tedious. Despite all of her years of training, that was the one trick her protege had never quite been able to pick up from her.
When they entered the studio, Su bent the doors closed behind them and took a seat on one of the steel flower petals that made up the set. Kuvira shook her head at the sight of a grown woman in a silk robe, lounging in an oversized flower like some contented fire-butterfly, and then sighed and sat cross-legged on the petal across from her.
"So, where exactly are these spirits?"
"About two hours northeast in Shanji," Kuvira said, already anticipating her mentor's response.
"That would be Governor Liang's territory," Su said. "His family built a new mansion on Kyoshi last summer. And his people are calling us for help?"
"It's an isolated region," Kuvira said. "Their radios probably aren't strong enough to reach Shanji's capital. And we are a lot closer, geographically."
Su shook her head. "We have state boundaries for a reason, Kuvira. You don't see me asking Liang to do any favors for Zaofu."
"He isn't the one asking, his people are," Kuvira reasoned. "That region has virtually no earthbenders to speak of. They'll be destroyed if we don't help."
"They should ask their own governor for help, or barring that, their queen; they are still her subjects to some sad extent."
"The queen is useless. She doesn't even have troops stationed anywhere near here, but we—"
"We cannot be seen to send Metal Clan troops into another state. You know that."
Kuvira took a deep breath, reigning in her temper as she'd been taught all those years ago. Solutions came through rationality. Control. "Of course. Not in any official capacity. But what if a few of us were to go in plain clothes, as private citizens of the Earth Kingdom?"
Suyin regarded her with a long look. "Can't you just enjoy your day off like a normal person? Go on a date or something?"
Leave a sweet cake by the window and hope things get better? For better or for worse, she would never be able to do that.
"Do I have your blessing?"
Suyin sighed, relenting. "Go, if you're going, you and whoever else wants to. Just make sure anyone on duty gets coverage."
Kuvira bent herself down from the petal, making sure not to smile too wide and annoy her further. "Thank you."
"Just make sure you know what you're doing," the matriarch said. "These kinds of efforts have a tendency to spiral out of control."
As she made her way out of the estate, Kuvira was already planning the logistics of the mission in her head.
The message she sent out on the security force channel was brief—the operation's nature, the hour of departure, a call for volunteers. She had expected four or five people at most to come along, the adventure seekers and those who would do anything under the sun to get out of a night shift. But by the time she was ready to take off from the hangar, over twenty guards had assembled.
Kuvira blinked a few times as she looked at them, from the newest rookie, Hong-Li, to old Lu, who had been on the force since she was a child.
"I did say this is voluntary?" she asked, though she knew she hadn't misspoke.
"You did," said Shan, one of the lieutenants who oversaw security in the Platinum District. "We came because we're with you, captain."
It was a new experience, this kind of unwavering support. Kuvira wasn't quite sure what to do with it. "Good. Let's move out."