Chapter 12

Altan has always loved mornings. In the desert where he grew up, the morning cool was treasured: a time to water the turtle-camels, a time to pack up the tent poles and wrap them in oil cloth, a time to admire the stars glimmering through the grey blanket of dawn. As a child Altan loved the feel of sand running cool and soft through his fingers. The smell of his grandmother's lamb and bread stew filled the air while sky-eels wailed far overhead.

But the mornings were also a time of waiting. Of watching the horizon. Of listening for a shrill whistle that meant the dark figures approaching were Altan's mother and her raiding party, not Fire Nation soldiers. In the desert there is nowhere to run. So every morning Altan and his grandmother sipped their stew and listened. The morning is where fates are decided. And not by Altan.

As Altan loads his sleeping pack into Temurin's wagon, he can't help but scan the plains horizon. Tall grasses leeched of color stretch endlessly to the east, north, and south. To the east rise tall, lumpy mountains sticking straight up to the sky. Yet even when Altan strains his eyes, no dark specks ride towards them. Altan tightens a strap on the wagon's tarp cover. The war is over. The Avatar won.

But Altan and his clan lost.

A blast of orange fire explodes through the quiet. Instinctively, Altan hits the ground. But when he dares to look up, he immediately feels deeply foolish.

Nekana stands in the tall grasses with palms smoking. Quick as lightning, she drops into a crouch and releases two blasts of fire. She rises again and draws a fiery arch with her left foot. Then her right. Even though it's frigid, Nekana wears a sleeveless red shirt. Her right upper arm is wrapped in bandages, but it doesn't seem to impede her mobility at all as she cycles through a series of complex firebending forms.

"She is something, isn't she?" Temurin glances up from fastening a harness on the ostrich-horse. Altan quickly scrambles up from his prone position.

"Ah…yes," he agrees awkwardly.

"I don't know her that well," Temurin says. "But I know you even less."

Altan can't think of anything to say to this, so he focuses on brushing the sod from the back of his pants.

"Nekana is a very special person," Temurin continues. "She's strong, but she's been through a lot."

"Everyone in the Colonies has been through something."

"That's true." Temurin pats the ostrich-horses's flank. "But I get the feeling that Nekana has had it worse than most."

"What are you saying?"

"I'm saying be careful, Altan. Don't be an asshole."

"Why would I-"

Something bright flue flares in Altan's peripheral vision. Nekana swears loudly.

"What was that?" Altan mutters.

Temurin's eyes, already thin, narrow even further.

"Like I said, Altan. Be careful."

Nekana practices firebending until the sky is pale pink. Unlike the Fire Nation soldiers Altan has seen before, Nekana manipulates fire like the flames are an extension of her body, weaving and bending the fire like water, brimming with a power Altan has always wished he had.

When she finishes her workout, Nekana plants a kiss on the corner of Altan's mouth.

"Where did you learn to bend like that?" Altan asks in wonder.

"I don't want to give you nightmares," she grins wickedly.

"You couldn't possibly."

Yet when they kiss, Altan can't tell if the thrill in his stomach is fear or desire.

Surely together they can chase away the nightmares.

Azula walks towards Bahasa with a spring in her step. Temurin says it's only a six-hour journey to the city and—to Azula's deep amusement—forces Jirou to ride in the back of the wagon because 'you only see Bahasa for the first time once.' Altan walks behind the wagon to keep Jirou company. The arrangement works well enough for Azula. She can look back and see Altan anytime she wants, but their separation makes talking impossible.

"Jirou is really too old for you to order him around like this," Azula tells Temurin dryly an hour into the journey. She glances back at the wagon and sees Jirou's legs kicking pointlessly against the wood.

"He's only twelve," says Temurin, lowering his voice. "Let him be a child for a little longer."

"I wasn't a child at age twelve," snaps Azula. At twelve, she was already Crown Princess: accompanying her father to the battlefront, honing her fighting skills, and advising Ozai on battle plans. Even Zuko was given his own command at thirteen, even if it was a futile mission to find the Avatar. If Jirou had been raised in the Fire Nation Royal Palace, he'd have been an adult for years.

"Weak," sneers a familiar voice in the back of her mind.

Azula shakes her head.

"Well, I want Jirou to have it easier than I had. Or you had, Nekana," Temurin is saying. Then he smiles and bumps her shoulder unexpectedly with his.

"Besides, you have to admit, this view is worth the wait," he grins, gesturing to the mountains in front of them.

Azula sighs. Over a month of travel with peasants and criminals has taught her to overlook Temurin's presumption. So instead of taking Temurin's arm off she looks out at the scene before them, which really does look more like a painting than a real place. Stony crags of mountains stretch up straight in abrupt, unscalable peaks, the rocks covered in a furry green that looks like moss but must be trees. Misty clouds hang unnaturally around the tops of the irregular mountains, adding to the air of unreality. At the base of the stone forest, Azula can just barely seek a tiny dark speck that must be the city of Bahasa.

"It is beautiful," Azula concedes. She squints. "The rocks look like toes."

"Toes?" Temurin snorts. He turns so he's walking backwards and facing her. His eyes widen in mock horror, bright green against his suntanned face. "Kana, I'm showing you one of the most gorgeous places in the world, and you think it looks like toes?"

"What did you call me?" says Azula in disbelief. "Did you just shorten my name?"

Temurin shrugs and falls back to walk beside her.

"You are forbidden from calling me that ever again," orders Azula. She fixes Temurin with her most threatening glare, the one that made the head of the Dai Li agents tremble in his expensive boots. But the older man must be too stupid to be scared, because he meets her eyes almost arrogantly.

"You don't like it?" he asks nonchalantly.

Azula shakes her head and laughs. Temurin may be relatively intelligent for a peasant. He may even have a sort of business savvy. But when it comes to preserving his own life, he's clearly an idiot.

"Why are you so cheerful?" she demands. He doesn't have a whole lot to be happy about—an angry ex-wife, a daughter who probably hates him, and a load of unsold yapian in his wagon.

"I've made a decision," says Temurin.

"Oh?"

"Talking with you made me realize-" Temurin pauses. "I need to talk to my wife—my former wife—in person. We have to work out our daughter's future. So after Bahasa, I want to go south to Qima."

"Are you planning to sell yapian in your hometown?"

"What? No!" Temurin replies defensively. "My daughter lives there!"

Azula doesn't see how selling in Bahasa differs from selling in Qima, but maybe she's missing out on some finer aspect of morality.

"I'll come with you to Qima—"

"Thank you—"

"If you tell me honestly: who does that woman Mila work for?"

Temurin wears a sour expression. "Can't you just leave it?"

"No."

"I don't care about politics," Temurin hedges.

Azula widens her eyes and deploys her most innocent expression. "It would be such a pity if you were waylaid on your way to Qima and you didn't have a guard. What would your daughter think?"

"Don't try to manipulate me."

"It's not 'trying' if it works."

"It isn't becoming, Kana."

"Who gives you the right to say what 'becomes me'?" Azula sneers, more than a little annoyed he's brushing her off. "You Earth Kingdom men and your superiority, no wonder your culture is centuries behind—"

"Is everything all right up there?" Altan shouts.

"Fine!" Azula and Temurin yell in unison.

Azula stews in silence. Patience.

"I don't want to walk into Bahasa without knowing what I'm facing," she finally says. "You may be apolitical. But I'm not. I can't be. Everyone who sees me knows I'm Fire Nation."

"I don't think you'll be in danger with my colleagues," Temurin says uneasily.

"Are you certain?"

Temurin thinks for nearly a full minute. Azula can practically see the gears turning as Temurin weighs the factors and possible dangers to himself. Azula doesn't delude herself that Temurin actually cares about her safety.

Finally, he speaks.

"Mila and I both work for a group with ties to the Earth Kingdom. You know what I do. I don't know what Mila does specifically, but she's a bender and a fighter. Her associate, Yu-chen, runs a brothel in Bahasa. But I definitely didn't know Mila was involved with bandits."

"Based on Mila's attack on New Azulon, it seems your 'group' wants to provoke another war."

"I don't want any trouble," Temurin says edgily.

"When you play with fire, trouble comes to you," Azula warns.

"Well, that's why I have you."

"Do you really trust me to protect you?" Azula asks, surprised.

Temurin blinks like it's a stupid question. "Of course I trust you, Kana. You've saved my life twice."

Azula gently pets the thick feathers of the ostrich-horse's neck. To her surprise, it doesn't protest.

"Your confidence is touching, Temurin. But even I can't protect you from all-out war."

The crags of Bahasa loom larger. The mists grow thicker. And one by one, buildings begin to appear from the fog: buildings at the foot of rocks, buildings carved into stone like caves, even a watchtower perched atop a high cliff. A river snakes around the city from north to south.

"Bahasa," says Temurin, almost grimly. "The first city to fall to the Fire Nation. The river jewel of the Colonies."