Zuko was just standing up and stretching after Hakoda had left their meeting, when Sokka stuck his head in the door. "There you are!" he said. "Dinner's on the table, and we're all waiting for you."

"Oh," said Zuko, feeling for the sun. It was low in the west. "Can you take these to my study?" he asked a passing servant he vaguely recognized.

"Of course, my lord," she said, accepting the papers.

"Thanks," said Zuko.

She gave Zuko a surprised look as she left, and Zuko remembered he wasn't really supposed to thank the servants for doing their job. Oh well, big deal. He would likely make worse mistakes before he got the hang of being Fire Lord.

Zuko followed Sokka to the small dining room, Sokka telling him excitedly about what had happened when Suki sparred with some of the Imperial Firebenders. It sounded like the guards had needed a lesson in humility when dealing with nonbenders. They'd always been prone to underestimating them. Zuko smiled, and his tense shoulders began to relax.

Then they were in the dining room, and all of the Gaang were there, as well as Mai and Ty Lee.

"Well look who's here," said Aang.

"Finally," said Mai. "You need to remember to eat, Zuko."

They all sat down, and the hubbub died away into the quiet sounds of people focused on eating. The food WAS good, though less spicy than Zuko typically preferred. The lightning had irritated his stomach as well as his lungs, according to Katara, and he needed to be careful what he ate.

As they began to slow down, Ty Lee asked Aang about the airbender technique where he got behind his opponent and shadowed their movements. Aang began to gesture excitedly as he explained, nearly knocking Suki's water glass over. She rescued it.

Zuko smiled but said little, feeling content but tired. Mai slipped her hand into his and smiled. "How have you been holding up?" she asked.

"Tired, but good," said Zuko. "There's a lot to do, and I'm still learning, but it feels like everything has been going in the right direction. What about you?"

"Nothing too exciting. My parents are proud of me for all the wrong reasons."

Zuko winced. "Ouch. Like when Dad thought I killed the Avatar."

"Sort of." She sighed. "At least they're not threatening to disown me anymore."

"They were going to disown you? Why? Boiling Rock?" He frowned. "I didn't know they did that."

"Yeah."

"Parents." He paused. "The War Minister just barely avoided calling me a foreign puppet yesterday,"

"They were never all going to like you, Zuko."

"Of course not, but he's in a position to make trouble."

"You could remove him."

"Yes, but who do I replace him with, and how do the others react? I can't rule a country with no ministers."

Mai shrugged.

"He'll stay for now at least. Maybe I can bring him round."

Then they were all distracted by Toph using metalbending to make the salt and paper shakers dance across the tabletop. Sokka flicked fire flakes at Toph, she threw some lettuce at him and it hit Aang... "Guys, stop, please," said Zuko. "Don't waste the food."

"Come on, Sparky. There's lots," said Toph, waving her hand at the table, which still had plenty of uneaten food.

"Ba Sing Se's in danger of famine, and we're going to be sending them food, but the harvest hasn't been great here either." Zuko looked at the food still sitting uneaten, some dishes completely untouched, in front of them. "I should probably suggest to the head cook that normal people don't eat this much, and make sure the untouched dishes are going to go to people who need it."

"Not enough food?" said Sokka, looking horrified.

"That's really bad," said Aang.

"You need to tell us stuff like this, Zuko!" said Katara. "Are you going to be able to keep everybody fed?"

"I'm meeting with the agriculture and fisheries ministers tomorrow. They're bringing proposals. I need to know more details from Uncle on what's going on in the Earth Kingdom, and if it's just Ba Sing Se, or if it's more widespread. It would also really help if someone was really in charge in there for me to coordinate with. I want to help, but I don't know if it's going to be enough."

"That's... it sounds like we need to go and find the Earth King." said Sokka.

"Yeah, he is at least supposed to be in charge," said Toph.

Suki frowned at this. "I should really stay with my warriors. Kiri and Mika are still recovering, and it's not like all of us would fit on Appa anyway. If that's ok with you, Zuko?" She gave Zuko an appraising look. "And I think it might be good if Zuko were not left completely on his own."

"Oh but he wouldn't be," said Ty Lee, as Mai gave Suki an unimpressed look.

"True, but wouldn't it be better if he had a bit more support than just the two of you?" said Suki.

Ty Lee brightened. "If you and the Kyoshi warriors stay, I can start teaching you chi blocking. That would be so fun!"

"I hate it, but Suki's right," said Sokka, steepling his fingers on the table. "All those top military brass aren't going to turn nice just because the War has ended. Someone's bound to hate Zuko's guts for going against Ozai and helping the Avatar." He turned to look directly at Suki, dropping his hands to the table. "Do you want me to stay, too?"

"You're still on crutches," said Suki. "How are you going to get on and off Appa if you go, let alone fight?"

"I can walk up or down his tail, and crutches work great for sneak attacks." said Sokka.

Toph snorted. "Only if you don't yell 'sneak attack' at the same time."

Sokka glared at her, then put his finger to his chin and frowned. "But you do have a point. Maybe I should stay here."

"Shouldn't you be asking Zuko that?" said Mai.

All eyes turned to Zuko. "If any of you want to stay, I'm happy to have you here," said Zuko. He swallowed hard. "But we all knew you couldn't stay here forever. There's too many places the Avatar is needed. It's just sooner than I would have liked. We need to find the Earth King and find out what's going on over there. I can't, so it's going to have to be Aang and at least some of the rest of you."

"Appa and I have to go," said Aang.

"I'll go too," said Toph. "The Earth Kingdom is my country, and Kuei is our missing idiot-King, after all."

Katara bit her lip. "If I'm going with Aang, you need to be under the care of a physician here, Zuko, and you need to actually listen to them. You're well enough you don't really need water healing anymore, but you can't be doing Firebending or sword katas, or... getting into Agni Kai with your ministers or anything like that. And you need to take regular breaks, and eat sensibly-"

"Yes mother," said Toph under her breath. Katara gave her a LOOK, but this had the predictable lack of effect on Toph.

"I'll stay," repeated Suki. "As will my warriors." She turned to Zuko. "You can consider us in your service from now until we leave."

"Thank you," said Zuko. "I really appreciate that."

As the party broke up, Mai stopped Zuko just outside the door. "Katara seems pretty worried about you," said Katara.

"Katara? Yeah, she does that to everyone." He rubbed the back of his neck. "and I did get shot full of lightning saving her life, so she is fussing."

"You know, most people would get out of the way when the lightning starts flying, not jump into it."

"And let Katara die?" Zuko asked. Surely Mai didn't...

"You could have died too!"

"I was trying to deflect it!" Zuko crossed his arms and leaned against the wall. "And she did heal me, so we're even there."

Mai shook her head. "Oh Zuko." She sounded almost like his mother when she said that. "Should I be worried?" She sounded exasperated.

"About what? I'm already mostly-healed." Zuko could tell he was missing something.

Mai rolled her eyes. "There's rumors she's your girlfriend. I'm guessing they're wrong, but..."

Zuko buried his face in his hands. So that's what this was about. "That stupid play! No, she is NOT my girlfriend. Why do people keep asking me that?" He took a couple of calming breaths. "Aang has the world's worst crush on her, and I think she likes him back. And" he felt rather hurt, "I wouldn't betray you like that, Mai. How could you think that?"

"I... just wanted to be sure," she said. "You did dump me and join the other side of the War. And she's pretty. People talk."

"Oh. Well, they're wrong. You don't need to worry, Mai. She's just a good friend." He held out a hand towards hers, but didn't actually touch it.

"That's good to know," said Mai, taking the hand and smiling slightly. "So tell me about this play."

"It's the Ember Island Players again. They made a play called The Boy in the Iceberg, and it's TERRIBLE." He waved his free hand for emphasis. "Aang's actor was very obviously a girl, they turned Toph into a giant man, Katara into a crybaby with a crush on me, Sokka into a food-obsessed idiot, Uncle into a fool - I was just an angry menace ALL the time, and..."