Rei of Nishiyama
Nishiyama, one of the oldest Fire Nation Colonies, 74 AG
Fact: My first memory is the sight of some boy's back as he walks away from me - chin up, back straight, steps as steady as a heartbeat.
Memory: Beat beat. Beat beat. Beat-
Fact: I live in Nishiyama, probably the second town the Fire Nation conquered when they first set out to colonize the Earth Kingdoms. We've straddled the line between Fire and Earth for nearly a century, instisting staunchly that we were one of the other. Something was bound to bend.
Fact: My Uncle Ayumu has been sick for as long as I can remember. I don't know where my parents and Aunt Ume get the money to pay his medical bills.
Fact: I've dreamt of an airbender who lives in the Fire Nation (chin up, eyes dancing, always moving) for what I'm sure is longer. Her name is Akane, and she tells me incredible tales about the spirits she meets, tells me about the world, tells me about myself. When I grow older, I sometimes think I should hate her for it.
Memory: ("You're not fire," she tells me as we climb the volcano.
"What?"
"You're not fire," she says, pausing and waving the hand that isn't holding onto the rock of the mountainside."You don't walk like fire."
"If I'm no fire, then what am I?" I ask, and she frowns at me.
"That's for you to find out.")
Fact: When I'm four, I stomp a foot, screaming. I don't remember why. I just remember the way rocks flew out of the ground, remember the way my mother's face goes pale, remember the visit to Agni's shrine the very next day. They don't let me play with Shu any more.
Fact: When I'm four, my father starts taking me out to the forest. Supposedly it's so that we can collect herbs for the doctor so Uncle Ayumu's medicine is less expensive. When we're deep enough, my father teaches me how to dance as I move the earth. I asked him once why he wasn't teaching me how to fight. He asked me, Why destroy when you can create?
Fact: When I'm six, Akane tells me that her whole island is plotting to overthrow the Fire Lord. At first it's just a slip. I keep asking. Afterwards, she tells me I'm too curious for my own sake.
Fact: When I was eight, my teacher has us write and mail letters to relatives we don't live with. When I go home to ask my parents, they reluctantly tell me about my cousin Nuan, who went to work at the Fire Lord's palace (chin up, back straight, steps as steady as a heartbeat. They don't tell me that.).
Memory: . . . they say you're working to help Uncle Ayumu. Thank you. Well, he's your father so maybe I don't need to say that, sorry. He's a bit of a grouch, but they put him on new medicine lately, and I think he's been doing better because he told me more about you than the others. I don't really remember you, but I think - never mind . . .
Fact: Nuan writes back. He has beautiful calligraphy, and the bottom right corner of his letter has a painting of Honoiro's volcano. Aunt Ume and Uncle Ayumu cry when they see it. (He tells me that he's the personal servant to Prince Lu Ten. I don't tell them that.)
Fact: Akane (chin up, eyes dancing, always moving) laughs when I tell her who my cousin is. When I ask why, later, she tells me it was laughter or tears, and she'd rather laugh. She tells me rather calmly, we have plans to kill him you know. If we ever need to control Prince Lu Ten, we'll go after Nuan.
Fact: We keep writing.
Memory: Sit down, pull out paper, pull out inkwell, unseal inkwell, pull out brush, dip brush, write, wait to dry, seal with candle wax, take it to the post office, watch it get thrown into a basket full of other letters.
Fact: When I'm ten, the price of Uncle Ayumu's medication increases, and the I don't know how they pay turns into desperate we can't pay like this. My father takes out a loan, but it's not enough. I start going around town, doing odd jobs for money. I become a familiar face, and soon the police turn a blind eye when they see me out working when I'm supposed to be in school. Everyone one the town knows exactly what's happening. My father takes out more loans.
Fact: Just before I turn eleven, Uncle Ayumu has a series of good days. He manages to stand, and with Aunt Ume's help, limps outside to sit in the sun.
Face: On my birthday, I wake to Aunt Ume's scream. She woke up next to him, his skin room temperature.
Memory: There's a Fire Sage talking about Agni and loss as we scatter ashes to wind over the river, and all I can think is that I don't want to be cremated. It takes effort at the moment not to shift and shift and sink myself into the earth until I feel solid until I feel like I have something to stand on to prop myself up against. I tell my mother, later. She doesn't grow pale anymore, just resigned. She says, yes, of course. My father sends me out to the forest on my own. The doctor pays us for the herbs now.
Fact: The debt collectors come calling. Even though I've dropped out of school entirely, my odd jobs aren't paying enough. I would have stopped writing Nuan to save postage long ago, if my father hadn't gotten an odd look in his eye when I mentioned it, and told me I didn't need to think about that. I know what he's thinking - that if nothing else, he can give me this. Postage isn't expensive.
Fact: I can earthbend. We're near enough to Earth Rumble 9 that I can easily catch a ride there and back, even in the middle of the night. My first night fighting, I get more beat up than I bargained for, but the pay is as good as I could have wanted.
Fact: Akane hates it. I show up late to the dream that night, my black eye already beginning to show, and she flutters around me. Her lips are thin, but she doesn't say a word, just tells me how to treat each and every one of my injuries.
Memory: ("If this is what it takes-" I tell Akane, silent Akane, no laugh in sight. "If this is what it takes-"
"If this is what it takes, you'll do it until forever. I know, you stupid rock," she mutters. Her head in on my stomach as we both stare at the sky. "I know.")
Fact: When I return, cautiously, I have fans. I'm a girl, and girls don't fight in the Earth Kingdoms, but this isn't proper Earth society, it's been Fire too for almost a century, and who doesn't like the underdog? I'm escorted up to see the manager, who tries to talk me into signing a contract. Only Nuan's words in the back of my head keep me from accepting right away. I take a copy of the contract home afterwards to study it with my parent's help. I find several things I know I shouldn't sign away - but we need the money desperately.
Fact: In my dreams, Akane's lips thin as she listens to me list conditions, and she asks for the the first time - what if I sent money? She tells me - school isn't that important, fighting isn't important, your name on the other hand . . . If he knows who you are, he has your future, even beyond the contract. It would be a moment of truth. Does she really exist? Is the impossible real - are there airbenders still alive, living within the Fire Nation?
Memory: My father plays the drum for me to dance to in the woods, and earth flies into the air around me.
Fact: I'm an earthbender, from firebending blood. The impossible has already happened. I tell her not to anyways.
Fact: The manager is happy when I (chin up, back straight, steps as steady as a drum beat) offer him the signed contract after my fight. There's blood dripping out of my nose as he signs on the bottom line and files it away. I think, hazily, as he hands me my signing bonus and tonight's money, that I should be lying down. Not sleeping - though gods, I feel so tired. Where is your home? someone asks. I shake my head. Where is your home?
Memory: (I blink at Akane (chin up, eyes dancing, always moving). She's saying something. She sounds worried. Her eyes don't dance. I try to smile for her, ignoring the cracking blood on my lip.
"It's okay," I tell her. "But I need to wake up. There's something - I need to wake up."
"Then wake up." She says something else, "- just come back to me, okay? Come back.")
Fact: I'm less confused when I wake up. Or - no that's wrong. When I wake up, I can focus. I'm home in my bed. I can hear my parents arguing with each other over whether they should get the doctor. The hissing of their voices makes my head pound, and I let out an involuntary groan.
Fact: They don't go to the doctor. My starting bonus goes to pay off one of the loans my father took out, and I spend the week in bed, my headache slowly dying down.
Fact: I don't tell Nuan.
Memory: (Akane pulls me into a hug when I fall asleep again.
"I was so worried," she mumbles into my shoulder as she holds me close and tight.)
Fact: I'm still dizzy when I fight again. I stumble at just the right time, and manage punch my opponent in the gut. It takes a long moment to understand what's happening when the crowd cheers. I'm taken out fairly easily in the second fight, but the manager hands me a bonus for winning my first fight.
Fact: The debts my family has to pay off are many, but Earth Rumble 9 pays well. I'm fifteen when the last of the loans are paid off. With the sudden lack of debt, the family seems to have so much more money. The latest contract I signed with Earth Rumble doesn't finish for a year so I need to keep fighting, but I no longer need to take the odd jobs around town anymore just to help make ends meet.
Fact: With nothing else to do during the day, I return to school under the watchful eyes of the police officers. I missed five years of school, so I get put into a class with the eleven-year old kids. I walk in there (chin up, back straight, steps as steady as a drum beat) and ignore the whispers.
Memory: ("School isn't that important if you need to do something else to live," Akane tells me as she shows me how to cast a fishing net. "But if you can, then take it. Learn everything you can - take advantage of everything free that you're given.")
Fact: I'm seventeen, ready to be free of Earth Rumble 9, stopping to say goodbye to the manager on my way out when he smiles. You're not leaving, he says. Shadows loom behind me, the two top fighters blocking my path to the door as the manager slides a contract towards me and sits back, smiling. You make far too much profit for me to let you go.
Fact: He knows who I am. Where I live. Who my parents are. All he has to do is snap his fingers, and . . .
Fact: He has my mom here, terrified, and I'm nowhere near his best fighter. I'm nowhere near good enough to get myself free, but I would have tried. With my mother as leverage . . .
Memory: (I glare at the manager as he taps the contract on his desk, an inkwell and brush already set out for me to use.
"Why do you want me so badly?" I ask through gritted teeth as I pick up the brush. "I only win about half the time."
"You said it yourself, once. People like to cheer for the underdog," the manager says calmly. "And with you, they even have a chance of winning. Sign the contract."
If I sign it, he won't let me go. If I sign it, he'll have a right to me, a right to demand that I fight, a right to use my name. If I sign it, it's legal.
My mother makes a sound behind me.
If I don't sign, they might break her fingers one at a time. I grit my teeth and set the brush to paper.)
Fact: Akane isn't surprised. There's nothing for her to fuss over tonight, so we sit together on the roof of my home with blankets, looking up at the stars. (I don't tell Nuan.)
Fact: I keep fighting. My family doesn't have the money to run, and I can survive. I stick around after delivering herbs to the doctor one day, and he asks me if I still need an apprenticeship. Tells me I already know the herbs better than any other idiot kid around here. Compliments my steady hands. It's another contract signed, but it feels good to help people.
Fact: I sign again at nineteen. My father's terrified panting echoing in the dead air of the manager's office.
Memory: ("Let me tell you a story," Akane says one day. She's looking over some papers she won't let me see - probably war reports her island stole in their quest to weaken the Fire Nation.
"Once, a boy sold his future to help his father. He didn't mean to sell all of it, but he sold his name too, and that was enough to leash him."
"I'm a girl."
"It wasn't about you, stupid, it was about your cousin. Think for a moment, they're not about to let the personal servant of their prince go quit whenever he wants to."
"And yet you still have plans to kill him."
"Yes, but this is war, Rei. It's not about him.")
Fact: I receive only one letter from Nuan after I turn twenty. It explains, shortly, that he's being sent off to fight at the front line. That he won't have consistent access to messengers. It doesn't say that he won't write again. After the first month without a reply, I hire a hawk. It returns without a reply, but I know he's not dead. He can't be dead. They'd tell us right? (There are water stains in the margins. One two, one two, one- blurring the ink where they bleed too close.)
Fact: Apparently I'm good for more than just my steady hands and my ability to recognise herbs, even though I was apprenticed a couple years late. Tu the doctor started making me ask the questions and diagnosing the patients. He stays in the room watching, occasionally offering up a comment or prompting me to ask further, but unless I have no idea what's happening or I get something wrong, he doesn't say a word. After a month, he starts sending me home with his books and instructions to memorize this page or that section
Fact: Akane is amused and relieved when I tell her. I was worried when you left school, she says. You needed the money, but you can't fight and do odd jobs forever.
Memory: (Tu the doctor grumbles and laughs as we go through his books while the office is empty of patients.
"It tells you to use leeches?" he asks incredulously. "Seriously? Let me see that!"
He hunches over the book in the light coming in through the open window, squinting, then hands it back to me with a huff. "Wow. Kid, that's another mistake. Don't use leeches. I can't think of any situation where they actually help."
"Alright. The next thing is willow bark."
". . . What's it say it's good for?"
"Headaches. I've seen you make willow bark tea you know."
"Yeah, that's right. Hey, first thing in this book!")
Fact: I don't sign at twenty one. Wait - sorry, I should backup a bit.
Fact: Three months after my twenty first birthday, I open the front door in the morning to find a pile of rags. No. Not rags.
Memory: (I nudge the pile of rags and it groans, rolling over to reveal a face.
"Rei?" it asks.
Later, at the kitchen table, hands wrapped around a mug of hot tea, freshly washed and in an old set of his father's clothes (shoulders hunched, back bowed, fingers fluttering like a bird's wings), Nuan just sort of stares at me. (When he'd followed me in, he'd wandered. There was no one two, one two, one- of feet on the floor.)
"Sometimes, I thought you weren't real," he says. And, "Agni, you're so tall."
"Why'd you come back?"
His face crumples and he slumps forward even further. "It's my fault. I wasn't there to protect him because I was trying to protect myself."
"What happened?"
Slowly, hesitantly, "I'm an earthbender."
Chin up, back straight, steps as steady as a heartbeat - that probably should have been a sign. I huff, then laugh. I can't stop laughing. Nuan watches me with wonder, like he's never seen anyone laugh before. I stop laughing.)
Fact: I bring Nuan with me to Tu the doctor. My long lost cousin showing up at my door isn't good enough of a reason to miss work - especially since I'm apprenticed to a doctor. I push him into a seat at the clinic and check him under Tu the doctor's watchful eyes.
Fact: He's not malnourished. There's nothing wrong with him physically. But something about him makes my skin itch. It's not his body, and it's not his eyes on me, watching in wonder. I tell Tu the doctor this while we're in the back room, and he hums. Then because he knows too much; When's the last time he bent?
Fact: I knew something was wrong, but I didn't see it. I didn't want to - you don't just not bend.
Memory: (I want to yell at him because he keeps refusing and refusing - and Tu the doctor gave voice to the possibility, but I didn't believe him. I didn't want to believe him.
Nuan's just shaking his head, over and over again, his arms pulled tight to his sides, and I just stand there. I just watch him.
This is my cousin. He's older than me. (He's supposed to be stronger. Supposed to be chin up, back straight, steps as steady as a heartbeat. Not . . . not this.)
I stare blankly at his clothes. His father's clothes, Uncle Ayumu's clothes. The shirt's a nice bright red, shading towards orange. It was Uncle Ayumu's favorite shirt, the one he wore on his good days, when he could walk on his own. He was wearing it when Tu the doctor told us there was nothing else he could do.
My lips tighten.)
Fact: I drag him home. He didn't bend that day, and in the end, it's not like I can really make him. Aunt Ume goes pale when she sees him. It isn't until she whispers Uncle Ayumu's name that I look back and realize . . .
Fact: I can't remember Uncle Ayumu without grey hair and stress lines, but if I had, I imagine he would have looked much like Nuan does. Aunt Ume starts crying, and Nuan, still overwhelmed from the woods, starts crying, and I end up with both of them clinging to me and two wet shoulders after a long, heart stopping moment where I don't know what to do, Agni, what do I do?
Fact: My parents are - thankfully - not as emotional. My father cries a bit, but they're silent tears as he helps my mother make dinner. Aunt Ume sits silent and pale at the table, going over our money and budgeting, occasionally glancing over at Nuan where he's huddled in the corner. I sit next to him as I mend clothes - the only odd job I'd kept after the loans were paid off. My skin still itches.
Fact: Akane is thoughtful when I tell her, then annoyed. She kicks the ground, sending a visible ripple of wind flying away from us, then insists on getting a piggyback ride. I don't mind. We're about the same size, but she doesn't really feel that heavy. I want to come to you, she mumbles into my hair. But I'm not allowed to leave the island for my own safety. I want to tell her to leave anyways so that I can see her, so I can see that I'm not crazy for knowing her, but I remember the story she told me about Nuan. She's just as trapped by her bending as I am by contracts and threats, but at least I chose this.
Memory: (The itching on my skin from the knowledge that Nuan is refusing to bend drives me out into the woods more than usual. Tu runs out of herbs for me to collect after the first day, so I take to gathering firewood as an excuse instead.
Nuan follows me into the forest on the fourth day. I ignore him as I make my way through the forest until we're deep enough in that no one should come across us. He watches as I set down the straps for collecting the fire wood and move towards the center of the clearing. I close my eyes and set my feet. When I start to bend, the movements are slow.
Slow and steady, I lift the earth around me. I can hear Nuan's breath hitch from the edge of the clearing, but I ignore it. I take my steps (chin up, back straight-) to the remembered sound of the (steps as steady as a) drum beat, and I turn slowly, step by step wandering.
This isn't like fighting in the arena. This is how I learned to bend, not as a show of aggression, but as a dance. My father doesn't come out to play for me as I do this anymore, but that's alright because the sound of my feet on the earth is enough to set the rhythm for my ears.
The sound of another set of feet scuffing the ground makes me open my eyes a little. Nuan is watching me carefully, trying to mimic the way I'm moving. Small rocks swirl around his feet with his jerky movement tension practically bleeds off of him as his movements slowly become a little smoother, his feet more rhythmic.
He doesn't move to the same beat - or even really move much at all - but he's bending.)
Fact: I don't sign on as a gladiator for the Earth Rumble at 21. The manager makes a mistake when he chooses my hostage because I know the Nuan can fight. There's a hand on his shoulder, and the two strongest fighters are there, but in the four years since the manager first told me I was going to sign again, I'd gotten better. Not good enough to fight both of the best fighters alone - even one on one was a bit of a gamble. But. But.
Fact: Nuan is a soldier (when our eyes meet, his back straightens), and Tu the doctor recommended a village to the east where I would be able to train as a doctor under a colleague of his, and all of my family's possessions are packed in preparation for the move. I don't sign at 21.
Fact: Akane grows radiant when she hears, and it feels like I haven't seen her this way in forever, all chin up, eyes dancing, always moving. I hadn't realized how much she worried until the worry was gone, and she was spinning around me, laughing.
Memory: (The cart rocks back and forth slightly. I'm going over the medical books that Tu the doctor sent with us, for lack of anything better to do. My lips twist as I read the all of my notes in the margins. Almost every single entry is marked up or blotted out entirely, with various notes as to the actual uses of the herb.
Beside me, Nuan is running his fingers over the beads I'd sewn into his sleeves, his lips moving silently as he repeat his prayer.
"Do you . . ." I trail off, glancing up to where Aunt Ume and my parents are sitting on the driver's bench. "Do you dream of anyone?"
Nuan pauses, his fingers lingering on his sleeve as he looks up at me, his eyes wary. "What do you mean?"
"There's this girl I dream of, every night," I tell him. I almost expect him to tease me about a crush the way I had when he'd started sending me letter after letter littered with information about one of the other servants at the palace, but if anything, he only grows even more still. "I don't know her when - she only exists in my dreams -"
"But she's more important to you than anything, isn't she?" Nuan asks, frowning at his sleeve. I feel frozen because I hadn't wanted to put it into words, but . . . if I had to choose between her and my family . . . Nuan sighs, and brings his knees up so that he can put his forehead on them. "It happens. You're the third person I've known.")
Fact: Tu the doctor's friend Chao the doctor is more than a little bit insane. No, not insane, she declared me a doctor, so I can't just say things like that anymore. Chao the doctor is eccentric. After about a week of watching me work, she cackled and told me that Tu the doctor must be going senile because I was a perfectly competent doctor in my own right.
Fact: Nuan left about a week after that. I tried to tell him that he didn't have to leave, but he insisted that he was a danger to be close to. He set off towards the south at first light with everything I could get him to take, and a sizable bag of wound treating herbs with written instructions. He still wasn't okay, not in any way, shape, or form . . . but I wasn't about to trap him here. So I let him go (chin up, back straighter, and maybe his steps falter, but he starts again).
Fact: On my twenty second birthday, I shoulder my own pack and leave the village. Chao the doctor told me I could do more good on the move, in a way that she just wasn't able to anymore. She has me swear an oath before I leave. Her eyes are unusually serious as she recites the oath for me entirely first so I know what I'm agreeing to, then line by line for me to swear. The first line is do no harm, and the others are important, but . . . I won't ever fight like I did in the Earth Rumble. I won't ever fight again except to protect, but I hadn't planned to. I've had my fill of fighting for money. I set off to the south (chin up, back straight, steps as steady as a heart beat).