10
Shrouded now in utter darkness, I lit a flame. Before I could make out my surroundings, a shrill sound filled my ears and my fire flickered out. When I got it going again, I understood the shriek had come from a man, huddled a few feet away.
"Please. I didn't do anything!"
In the limited light, I saw that he was middle-aged with the body of a laborer, stooped and thin. I searched the small space and found that we were alone.
"Tell me what happened. I'm not here for you."
The man cowered still. This was the reason I never used my bending around people, even seven years after the war ended. Fire still meant the same thing to Earth Kingdom citizens that it had during the war.
"I promise. I'm just trying to find someone. Have you seen a young man, black hair, big scar?"
"I, I don't know anything. Please, let me go."
"I'm not with whoever put us down here." I gestured around the dark space. We weren't entirely closed in. A small opening fed us fresh air, and a faint light emanated from its gap. "Were you staying in the inn?" I pointed to the wall of earth above us.
Finally, the man seemed to relax. He looked me over again. "Yes, I, I run the inn." He swallowed hard and fixated on the flame I held. "That big earthbender guy just walked in, didn't say a word, and sent me flying down here."
"And was there anyone else? Anyone else they took?"
The man nodded, still shaking. I pulled my waterskin out and offered it to him. He gulped it down.
"There was a boy like you mentioned. Nasty burn on his face. He was down here with me for a while, but they took him away."
"Through there?" I asked, nodding toward the small opening in the otherwise earthen cave.
Again, he nodded.
"These men, the giant and the waterbender, did they say anything when they took him away?"
Here the man shook his head and handed the empty waterskin back.
"They were silent the whole time. It was a different one that came and took him. Had one evil smile. Creepy guys."
In the new silence that filled the damp air, I considered the possibilities. The bandits could have known Zuko's identity and sought to ransom him, or to bring justice against him for something he did during the war. Perhaps they were common criminals, wholly unaware of who their captive was. Either way, I considered it a blessing to share the same captor.
An hour passed. Maybe two. Still, the light from that opening never dampened. I assumed it was a lantern, a catacomb or underground tunnel running through the city. The man drifted into sleep, snored so loud the walls vibrated, and I had begun to tire, too.
Then, the walls truly rumbled and I extinguished my light. A pane of dirt lowered, my cellmate awoke, and we watched as a silhouetted figure approached. I debated between lunging at the figure and overpowering them, hoping that they might lead me to their co-conspirators, or playing the coward and letting them take me wherever they pleased.
Before I could decide, the figure summoned a fire with their palm and held out the light to show our faces. The figure was a slim young man, long black hair, broad eyes.
"What the hell," I heard myself say.
"Well," Hui said. "I should've known you were the woman following after him."
'Hui, what is going on?"
I stood and my cellmate hid behind me. I lit my own fire, a threat, a reminder that we had both been given the same gift by our father.
"I'm sorry, Su Yi. I won't be taking you with me."
"Hui, just tell me—," but before I could finish, Hui shot a ball of fire toward my face. I dodged him and went straight for the stomach. He never had good balance, and so I tackled him and pinned his arms. His fire had caught my hair, and I blew their blackened ends away from my face. This pose, it reminded me of our days on the ship, practicing our bending. We never had any formal training, and our father had prohibited it, and still, we would try our best to master the basics. He had been stronger than me back then, but the years had reversed our roles.
"Tell me where he is." He fought against me, but couldn't break free.
I felt I was on the brink of breaking him when I heard a whistle in the air. A rock soared out of the darkness and hit me square in the chest. I landed straight on my back and the wind was knocked out of me. As I gasped for air, I saw the burly earthbender step over me and grab the old man. Hui got up and stood over me, that smirk always stretching over his face.
"I always knew you would end up destroying yourself, but siding with that traitor?"
Hui had never been a loyalist before. He had hated the Fire Nation, Ozai, just as much as I had. None of his words made sense.
I thought of pleading with him, appealing to our common upbringing, but a coldness reflecting in his eyes told me that cause was lost. And so I twisted my legs, leapt to my feet, and blasted him with a stream of fire. He fell back, and I ran for the earthbender, toward answers, toward Zuko, I hoped, until I felt a searing pain stretch across my scalp.
Hui wrapped his hand around my hair and tugged me back. The force of it sent me falling, but before I hit the ground, I kicked an arc of flames, met my palms to the earth and pushed off, slashing another line of flames toward his chest. With unexpected force, Hui evaded my blasts, grabbed me by the shoulders, and threw me against the wall so that my head hit and everything faded out before I even met the earth.
I awoke some time later, utterly alone in that dark, dank tunnel.
