9. Returning from Darkness

The first thing that came from the coldness of nothingness was some sort of rocking motion, which was later exchanged for steadiness and feeling of hard surface underneath (there was underneath?). He felt pins and needles all over his body (he had a body?), but mostly somewhere up on the right. There were hands on him, touching him and moving. He did not like it. Not at all. But he couldn't move an inch on his own. He would have cried out for them to stop, but his lips would not move (he had a face?). Then suddenly, he was floating. Floating in the emptiness again with somebody watching him. The presence was as if just behind him – hiding from him. But he knew it was there.

When all of the movement stilled and he was laying on the cold hard surface again, the coldness and nothingness started to return. The senses were abandoning him again. Only the sense for cold stayed. The coldness came from outside, but from inside as well. He couldn't remember what is warmth or any other feeling beside cold. And something was telling him that it was going to stay this way. Forever?

It was the feeling of pin and needles what brought him out of the emptiness the next time. There was the hard surface again, but something soft put over him as well. The darkness and nothingness was pulling on him, but this time he decided to put on a fight. He caught himself on the edges of consciousness and pulled – pulled and pulled until he started to get glimpses of sensations from his other senses.

He felt the smell of straw and clay, but also heard the cracking of fire. He was also slightly shaking. But why was he still cold? He shouldn't be. He was never cold. He was a firebender, wasn't he? Where was his fire?

With a rising panic, he finally managed to lift his eyelids and swiftly sat up.

"Hey! You're up!" The surprised voice came from beside him. But he paid no attention and was scrambling his way from the trap of blankets his limbs were caught in.

"Don't panic! You'll just get more tangled!"

He was held down to the ground, firmly but not forcefully, only to be met by a pair of blue eyes and pale white face. And that did not help him from panicking at all.

"Calm down! Okay?" This time the voice sounded softer, as well as the look in the eyes. Finally, he stopped trashing and the grip on his shoulders loosened. The pale-faced woman smiled approvingly.

"Fine. Now don't move. I'll lift your head and you will drink this tea. If you understand, just nod once." He did, but he didn't want to drink anything from that pale-faced woman. But she was already lifting his head up and putting a cup to his lips. First, he tried to resist, but he was too exhausted to put up any fight and his mouth felt like a desert as well. He opened his lips and let the warm fluid in. It was so strange and sweet tasting that he coughed up the whole gulp.

"I'm sorry! I never did this." The woman said guiltily and pulled the cup away. "I'll try slower." This time he was prepared for the taste and gulped down the whole cup.

She eased his head back down carefully and stood up. "I'll get our healer. Just wait a minute."

She hurried away quickly. He tried to call on her, but only raspy sounds came from his throat, which still felt, even after drinking, dry and stiff. He didn't even know what he wanted to call after her. Probably just wanted to grasp himself to something living, if she was even real and living – all green and white faced.

He was left alone, the surroundings swaying and shifting. The fireplace was the only thing that he could really recognize. It was close, glowing and warming. He wanted to get closer, because it was still cold inside of him.

Why was the fire out? Why was it out of him instead of inside? He has to put it back inside. The warmth. The familiar. To drive out the strange thing inside.

Suki ran out into the night and headed towards the local healer's house. She was supposed to get Taska, even if she was most probably asleep already.

Luckily, it wasn't far away, but Suki couldn't help herself but ran anyway. Her hands shook when she knocked on the front door loudly. Caring or guarding people in severe health conditions wasn't her thing. She was on the edge during her whole guarding duty. And when the boy finally woke up after two days of unconsciousness, she even messed up the single thing she was supposed to do – to make him drink a single cup of honeyed tea. After all, she wasn't a nurse, but a warrior.

She knocked three times already and was ready to walk into the house, when healer Taska finally came out.

"I'm here, Suki. So he regained consciousness?" asked the elder lady while hurrying back to hut where their patient/prisoner was kept.

"Yes, I guess. But he seems to act feverish. He wanted to stand up, but I stopped him."

"Did you make him drink?"

"Yes, I did. Although he coughed some of it back up," said Suki guiltily.

"That's okay. We'll make him drink more."

Suki let the healer enter first, but was called in immediately by her sudden scream.

"Suki! Quickly! Help me!"

The scarred boy's face was just inches away from the fire and he was just about to put his hand straight into the flames.

"Stop! Get away from there!" Healer Taska caught his arm just in time and Suki yanked back into a safer distance from the fireplace. He put up some resistance against being held back, but Suki made sure he won't escape her grip. Given his condition, he soon stopped resisting completely and his limbs gave out. He was left shivering on the floor.

"Help me get him back under the covers." Both of them had to use all their strength to lift the young man's body and pull him just a few inches and into the covers.

Healer Taska was then finally able to attend him properly and Suki was still holding him in a case he would attempt anything foolish again.

"Do you hear me boy?" the healer asked him while she was checking his temperature with both of her hands. She tried to guide his unfocused gaze on her face and she repeated the question, but there wasn't any response. He was still trying to look into the fire and seemed unfazed by the happenings around and with him.

"I don't understand." Suki looked on the older woman whose face filled with worry. "What's wrong?"

"I thought, he would have a fever, but his skin is still cold on touch." She then lifted the boy's tunic a bit, to check the temperature of his core body.

She shook her head. "He's still too cold. Not dead cold as he was when you brought him, but still not warm enough."

Suki slowly let go of him. He didn't seem to be responding to any of healer Taska's ministrations and was probably again on the brink of consciousness. What was going on with this strange man? As if washed up on shore after the storm of the decade wouldn't be enough mysterious, now he was even acting strangely.

"After two days of being held in warm, his body should be warmed up. Actually, fever would be expected, not the opposite." She put a warm wet cloth over his forehead and only wetted his lips because the boy was already falling asleep again.

„Suki, please, find again somebody to help us. We should probably prepare another warm bath for him."

Zuko woke up to the feeling of full bladder. He really had to get up from his futon and go, but why was it so hard to move? His limbs didn't want to listen. It took all his effort to at least open his eyes. The shock, however, gave him all the energy he needed for sitting up.

The room he was lying in was completely unfamiliar to him. Why wasn't he in his cabin? On his ship?

Zuko looked around and a movement by his side startled him.

"You're up again!" A strange woman in a traditional make-up, which gave off a rather fierce look, was kneeling beside his bedside.

"Hope you don't feel like burning yourself again."

"Wha…" Zuko wanted to ask what was she talking about, but ended in coughing fit. His throat felt dry as if he wasn't speaking for days.

"You don't have to speak. Drink first." The strange woman with a white face was offering him a steaming cup. He shook his head in refusal, still coughing.

"But you have to. You're dehydrated. You're haven't drunk in at least two days." She seemed to be pretty urgent, what only made him a bit paranoid.

"Need – cough – just – cough – bathroom," he tried to brush her off, because his bladder probably wouldn't take a single drop of fluid more.

"Oh- okay," she said and averted her eyes embarrassed.

There was an awkward moment, when none of them spoke, only Zuko tried to stop his coughing and tried to stand up.

"I'll help you." She offered him a hand, but he ignored it and tried on his own.

What was going on? What was he doing in this strange place? It looked like a worn down peasant's hut. And who was this strange woman anyway? On a closer look, he recognized that what she was wearing was some form of traditional warrior kimono. It had armor plates and at her side, what he assumed, were two metal fans. He would believe that it was all just some kind of formal clothing, nothing but traditional, if it wasn't for her posture of a trained warrior – her straight back, arms showing strength, her eyes observing him scrutinizing. Zuko was already determined not to give her anything. Why was he even guarded by some warrior woman? And why was he on land? Where was his ship? His Uncle?

When he attempted to stand up from under the covers, a shiver ran down his spine. Actually, he felt unusually cold.

Cold.

Dark.

A blue face.

It all finally came back and he slumped back on the straw mattress.

The female offered her hand again. "Let me help you. You're too weak."

This time he had to take a moment to recollect himself. He remembered. The Water Tribe ship and the burn. The pain in his shoulder felt like a stab with a hot dagger right to the heart. He remembered the Water Tribe men trying helping him, but then the world turned into a swaying mess. That was until he fell into the darkness. And it was too much. The memories didn't make much sense. His head hurt as well as the burn on his shoulder. But this time the burn hurt differently. It was more like a tingling kind of sensation, not hot anymore, but more like cold. Icy cold sending chills down his spine, making him shivering.

"If you can't go outside, I can bring you a chamber pot," a silent, slightly embarrassed, voice pulled him out of the dark memories.

"I'm fine," he quickly dismissed the option and stood up on wobbly and still shaking legs. The woman gave him a coat, which he gratefully took.

"It's this way," the woman guided him outside of the hut to a wooden booth, which served as a latrine.

"I'll wait here," she said in front of the door.

"Ehm…. I don't need company."

"Actually, you do. Officially, you're our prisoner. I need to stand guard."

"Oh," Zuko didn't intended to prolong the awkward situation and did his business.

On the way back to the hut, Zuko tried to assess his situation. It looked like he was taken prisoner in some village in Earth Kingdom, most likely, somewhere close to the shore. They must have found him washed up on the beach. How was he even able to survive? He remembered that there was a storm and they were in the middle of the sea. The happenings before his awakening were too much shrouded in mystery to his liking. He never had problems with remembering or understanding his memories. They were all blurry and didn't make much sense anyway.

And on top of it, he was held by some villagers and was too weak to even attempt an escape. The short walk took more of his energy than expected. He got back under covers without taking off the given coat, as the tunic he was now wearing didn't seem nearly enough to his shivering body. The young woman fortunately didn't seem to mind.

"You should drink the tea now. It will warm you up from the inside." She was handing him the drink again. Zuko tried to guess, if there was a hidden meaning behind the act. Was she expecting him to refuse and use firebending to warm himself? After the same mistake on the Water Tribe ship, he was not going to fall for it and took the drink.

The young woman, however, still noticed his hesitation. "You know, we wouldn't have spent two days of bringing you back from the dead, if we were to poison you in the second you come to."

It really was just a tea. A tea with an extensive portion of honey.

"If I asked you, would you actually tell me your name?" asked the woman after she let him sip through the half of the cup.

And so starts the interrogation, thought Zuko. And just as it was on the Water Tribe, Zuko was ready to give her exactly nothing. He couldn't know what would the warrior woman's reaction, or the villagers to that matter, would be. Guessing, the village was in Earth Kingdom, they would definitely stop being friendly the minute they would find out his identity.

"Where am I?" Zuko ignored the woman's question.

"Does giving me your name depend on where you are?"

She definitely knew what questions she should ask.

"Maybe," Zuko was not going to give her any lead. He knew he would have to be careful, even with remaining silent, as it was in the case of the interrogation on the Water Tribe.

"I'm Lee," he added, as if his earlier answer wasn't serious. But the eyes of the woman (since they were the only place where Zuko could look for any expressions, with the make-up distorting her features) said that she was not convinced with the name which came first to his mind.

"So, Lee, do you remember anything from the past two days?"

"No, nothing at all." She was starting with easier questions. He didn't even have to lie.

"Not that it really matters," she murmured more to herself, than to him.

"Well, you said it yourself. I did almost die," he snapped back.

She didn't back off, however. "Then, Lee, how about the days prior?" She was repeating the fake name with an overdone emphasis, clearly not believing it was real. "How did you end up in that near-death condition? Did your ship got shipwrecked in the storm?"

Somehow, the atmosphere in the room got quickly a lot thicker. The friendly young woman changed into the fierce cold warrior, just as her make-up suggested.

"Was it a Fire Nation ship?"

Her blue eyes were piercing him. Zuko had problem to come up with an answer, actually any answer. Even the truth somehow didn't seem convincing enough right now to make her believe.

Luckily, he was spared of a reply, as the front door opened and an old woman and two other green-dressed and similarly-painted warrior women walked in. Did the village have only female warriors? Where there even men?

"Suki, you should have called for me immediately he woke up," the old woman said gently.

"Healer Taska, I'm sorry." The fierceness was completely lost from her voice.

"I hope you were not interrogating the patient. I said no questionings until he's recovered."

The woman looked away a bit guiltily. Zuko was just glad that he will have more time to come up with a convincing story of how he got to this place. It would be good to learn where is actually this place.

"I only wanted to make sure he's no threat to village."

"In this condition, he's surely not." The old woman put on the ground some food and medicines and the warrior woman moved away.

"Suki, we've come to replace you. You should go rest," said the taller warrior girl. With her voice sounding really young, Zuko observed that she had to be only a girl, not really older than him.

"But, I wanted to…"

"Captain Hideko's order," said the other female warrior.

Suki hung her head, but before she would walk out the door, she shot him a cold glare. Zuko knew that there was a promise for future questions and it will be hard to make the answers pleasing. But for now, he was saved.

"You know, you should thank healer Taska. She saved your life." That was the last thing she said before she left and the room stayed in an awkward silence.

"We'll be outside," said finally the shorter girl, leaving if anything happens unsaid.

Zuko was left alone with the older healer woman. He imagined he could probably overpower her even in this state, but the thought only made him feeling guilty.

"I should say thanks… probably," he broke the silence and he cursed himself for being this awkward.

"You're welcome. Although, I did help you, but the one you should be thanking is Suki, the girl who left. She found you on the beach after the storm barely breathing. And together with the girls, they brought you here," said the woman while she was squashing some herbs into the porridge she brought.

"You should eat this while its warm. I added some spices into it, so that it makes you even warmer. And also to make it more edible," she smiled and handed him the bowl full of some shapeless mass.

"Also, try to forgive her. She's just trying to do her job – as a Kyoshi warrior, she must protect the village from outsiders, especially the suspicious ones like you." She winked at him to make clear that she didn't mean it badly. But what caught Zuko's attention was the mentioning of Kyoshi. So he was on Kyoshi Island. That made sense. The sea, they were sailing across, was between the Earth Kingdom mainland and Kyoshi Island. But even then, the distance from the ship to any land must have been many miles.

"I would say that she is actually quite concerned about you." Zuko couldn't hold back a scoff. "No, really. She stayed by your side most of time. I had to literally pull her out of here to make her rest." That was probably, because she felt suspicious of him and didn't want to let him out of her sight, thought Zuko.

"She even helped giving you warm baths." Zuko choked on the porridge and coughed so bad that the healer had to thump on his back.

"Suki is a girl with a big sense of responsibility." Like that should somehow comfort him.

"Anyway, how are you feeling? I see you're still shivering," she said stating the obvious. The shiver he woke up with hasn't faded even slightest.

"Can I?" the woman asked suggesting that she would like to check his temperature. Zuko did not really appreciate the idea of letting anyone touch his face, but since he's been out for two days during which they've done Agni knows what to him already, he let the healer check the temperature on his forehead and temples.

"I've felt cold ever since I woke up and I can't get warm. What's wrong with me?"

"Well…truthfully, I don't really know what's the problem. Suki and the girls found you on the beach in a state of an extreme hypothermia. You were truly lucky, I don't know how long, till you would be dead."

She let that sank in and then continued: "We gave you warm bath immediately to get your body temperature up, but you still wouldn't wake up. Then tonight you did, but you still weren't completely there. Do you remember anything from the last night?"

Zuko shook his head. He had no idea. He hoped it wasn't anything compromising.

"When I came, you were trying to touch the fire in that fireplace bare-handedly."

Zuko couldn't stop the shock from appearing on his face. She wouldn't assume… would she?

"Luckily we pulled you away before you would harm yourself. You felt cold, so your mind, not working properly, thought you could warm up a little bit."

"Yeah, probably that was it," Zuko almost sighed with relief, when he heard the woman's assumption. It would be bad, if she assumed that what he did had anything with him being a firebender. But he really did not remember any of the things she described. But the girl from earlier did mention something about him burning himself.

"I was really afraid, that you damaged your mind in that freezing water, but now I see that you will recover probably with no consequences. The last bath must have really helped," she said encouragingly. "But on the other hand, I still don't understand why are you not warming up completely. After two days you should have normal body heat, if not fever from catching cold. It really is curious. It could be even dangerous. Fever is a natural reaction of your body to fighting sickness. This way the recovering could be slowed down."

It really was weird. He felt really out of touch with his inner fire, although he didn't try to kindle it actively. Just not until he will be alone to at least spark up a little something inside. But it will have to wait, then maybe he finally will be able to get warm. This state was really unnatural for him and it started to frustrate him.

"Until then I recommend staying in bed, near the fire and eating warm food. The girls will bring it to you regularly."

"The girls?"

"Like I said, the Kyoshi warriors, they are female only. I think you heard from Suki, that they cannot let you outside, until they will question you and deem you innocent."

"Innocent of what?" asked Zuko annoyed of being accused of things he did not do. He was passed out the whole time he was on the island. He did not firebend to be put under any charge.

"Innocent of trespassing or of being a spy for the Fire Nation."

"I did not trespass intentionally."

"You probably did not, but you still could be a spy. The mask you were wearing was pretty suspicious."

"My mask? Where is it? And my clothes?"

"They are on the table. There," she pointed to a desk in the back part of the hut. "Don't worry. They are all there. But we had to dry them first."

For a while, she let him eat his porridge, but Zuko noticed that she looked like she really wanted to ask something. When their eyes met, the woman finally decided to ask.

"Would you mind if I asked about your scar?"

Zuko almost choked on his food the second time. "What?" His hand involuntarily moved up to his face before he could stop it.

"No…Not the one on your face… the one on your back," the woman hurried to add. "It is really unusual. I've never seen anything like it."

"It's just a burn mark. There is nothing unusual about it."

"I wouldn't say it looks normal…"

"It's just a burn mark." He said it with a tone that clearly said that this is a topic he won't speak to her about. The woman, however, didn't look really indignant or insulted by his dismissal, she excepted the answer with a small smile.

"Then I will let you rest for a while and come check on you later. In the evening, I'll send for hot water. You should take warm baths every day. At least for a week." She collected her things and left him on his own. He heard her saying her goodbyes to the guards outside.

After a few minutes of still being on guard for some unexpected visit, Zuko finally relaxed. The warrior women stayed outside as well, so he could enjoy a bit of privacy. After the woman's questioning the scar on his shoulder he felt an urge to check on it. Honestly, it felt different and the fact that he could actually feel it could meant…

He pulled down the coat and the tunic from his shoulder and the view made him gulp in shock. "What is…?" Zuko looked around the single-room hut to find a mirror to take a better look on the once flaming-red burn on his shoulder, but there wasn't any. Except now the burn turned pale white, almost blueish. And the white-blue tissue spread on his skin forming a deformed star shape.

He touched the skin there. It felt smooth, but dead-cold to his fingers. Like if the cold in his body stemmed from this very place.

What happened to him exactly on that stormy night? He got himself into a big mess. He was away from his ship, sick and taken prisoner in some forgotten village with something weird happening to the mysterious burn. What could possibly go worse?

He had to stop looking on the thing on his shoulder and take back the coat, as chills were running up his spine again. Suddenly he was very aware of the coldness of his body and moving closer to the fireplace helped little. He decided to reach his inner fire after all, just warm himself up a bit, because the weird feeling of cold started to be unbearable.

Except, there was nothing to reach.