Water
The New Camp
"Have you been practicing your tent-setting skills recently?" Katara asked as she drove one of the corner stakes into the ground.
"Very funny, Katara."
She looked up to find Zuko scowling at her from the other side of the tent. "I'm being serious. I haven't had to jab you with a tent pole once so far."
Though he rolled his eyes and then looked sharply away, she was fairly convinced that he was a tiny bit pleased with himself. Just a tiny bit. And, quite possibly, trying to hide it from the others.
He wasn't actually that grumpy, she could tell that much. For one thing, he'd spent most of the day alone at the house while Katara did her work at the healing hut and the boys did—something. She wasn't sure what the boys had gotten up to, but Zuko was very well-rested, so they must have left him alone. For another, any time she caught him looking her way, there was something soft in his gaze. Very soft. Very not-grumpy. Very unusual for Zuko, but very pleasant at the same time.
"I think that you're just being a lot clearer than the last time I set up a tent with you."
"Or," she replied, moving to stake down the other corner, "Maybe you're actually listening this time. I'll have you know that I give excellent instructions."
"Excellent instructions if I was a mind reader," Zuko said, and Katara popped her head up just enough to stick out her tongue at him.
"You're both wrong," Sokka announced, marching over to them with the new sleeping bag jammed under his arm. When he was still several paces away, he stopped and gave the sleeping bag a great, arcing toss so that it sailed into the half-open flaps of the tent. "Zuko's terrible at following directions, and Katara's not always great at giving them."
"Hey!" Katara shot to her feet. "We're not done here, Sokka. Are you trying to knock the tent over?"
He rolled his eyes. "Obviously not. Have a little faith in my aim. If I wanted to knock something over, it would be knocked over."
Zuko scoffed. "Somehow I think that you might be overestimating yourself."
"You little—"
"You're smaller than me."
Sokka sputtered. "It's a figure of speech, idiot. Plus, I personally guarantee that it's not going to stay that way for long. Give me a year and I promise I'll be taller than you."
Off to the side, where Aang had been crouching in the snow to play with Momo, he looked up and frowned at the two of them. "I thought you two were going to stop bickering after yesterday."
"What?" Sokka said. He scoffed. "Never gonna happen."
"Because you'll argue with anything that moves," Katara said dryly, turning back to finish setting up the end of the tent that she'd been working on. They were nearly done now, and thankfully Sokka's aim had been good enough to not knock anything off balance.
"Speak for yourself," Sokka retorted. "I'm not the one who picks fights with firebenders and council members and starts prison riots and stuff. That's you."
"Well, I'm not the one who fights with Momo all the time. That's you. Right, Aang?"
"Yeah," Aang agreed. "But it's pretty funny to watch most of the time."
"Why do I get the feeling that the lemur always wins?" Zuko asked, wrestling the last tent pole on his end into place.
Yue giggled, and Sokka spun her way, making a mock-stricken expression. He dropped to his knees, clutching his chest. "Ouch! Your laugh is like a knife in my heart, Princess Yue."
"I'm very sorry," Yue said, still laughing. "The thought of anyone fighting with that sweet little lemur is just very funny."
"You haven't seen how he gets around lunchtime. That sweet little lemur is an absolute menace."
Aang raised an eyebrow. "You do realize that you're the only one Momo fights with, right? If you hadn't taken his fruit that one time, he'd be fine."
"I'm more concerned about that 'laughter like a knife' line," Katara inserted. "Where did you get that, Sokka? Have you been borrowing romance scrolls from Master Yugoda or something?"
"Hey!" Sokka flopped onto his rear and stuck his legs out in front of him. "I'm poetic as fuck, thank you very much."
Zuko scoffed in near unison with Katara, and when she glanced his way, Zuko turned bright red and looked away.
Sokka pouted. "I'd like to see the two of you try to do any better. It's not easy being a genius."
"And I'd like to see you help set up camp, but I guess none of us are getting what we want today." Katara checked the tent over one more time, then flashed Zuko a quick smile before returning to the broad, open space at the front of the tent. The place where she and Zuko had always sparred before.
They had, ultimately, decided that this was the best place, the safest place for Zuko's new camp. It was far enough from the city that he would remain out of sight, near enough to be within walking distance for all the others, near enough not to be a useful hunting spot for the Northern Tribe, not in the middle of a body of water, and open enough to afford Zuko plenty of ways to escape if he ended up needing to run.
And not that Katara was inclined to admit it with Sokka around, but the new arrangement would be extremely handy when it came to sparring. Maybe it was a tiny bit selfish, but that had definitely been one of her first considerations when she'd begun thinking of places for him to stay.
She couldn't help it. She liked sparring with him. She liked the extra practice, and the exertion and variety that came from fighting a firebender after all the well-trained but unimaginative boys in her waterbending class. She liked the release that came with expending all her energy in a fight, knowing that she and Zuko were evenly matched, and that they could both fight with all they had and come out on the other side, tired but whole.
And she liked the bit after they were through with sparring, and they sat down in the snow and just talked. The calm, the quiet, the warmth that she always felt in those moments was too good to give up.
Of course it was a bit strange to have the others here when this place had just been for the two of them so many nights before. Still, she supposed that she couldn't complain too much when she had every chance to come out to the snowy ridge and visit at night. Now it would just be a little easier for the others—Sokka and Yue in particular—to visit on their own if the need arose. Without the near-impassible ice walls, any of them could come and go as they pleased.
"Hmm. I'm still not sure how I feel about Zuko being out in the open like this," Sokka said. "'Cause—you know. Who knows what kind of trouble he's going to get us all into now that he can run all over the place whenever he wants."
"I was in your house last night and I didn't cause any problems," Zuko snapped, coming around the tent to stand closer to Katara. "What exactlydo you think I'm going to do way out here, other than not die the next time the waterbenders decide that they need more water for their wall?"
Sokka gave an exaggerated shrug. "I don't know, man. You wouldn't believe the kinds of trouble that these two get up to, and I know them," he said, gesturing to Katara and Aang at the same time. "You might—I don't know, try to domesticate a turtleseal and ride it down one of the canals or something."
Aang perked up. "Do you think that's possible? It sounds like a lot of fun."
"See?" Sokka said. "Exactly what I'm saying."
Katara rolled her eyes. She was willing to bet that Zuko would mostly use his newfound freedom to get out of the tent and practice his firebending more often. He wasn't stupid. Or not that stupid, at least when he knew where everyone else stood. He wasn't going to barge into the city without reason, and he wasn't going to run off and steal Appa, and he certainly wasn't going to sneak out and show the rest of the firebenders the way into the city. She trusted him at least that far. Farther, even.
"Is there anything else you're going to need out here?" she asked rather than indulging Sokka's nonsense. Yue had managed to procure a tent and a sleeping bag from the armory to replace the ones that had been lost in the lake, along with a fresh tunic and trousers for Zuko. It wasn't much, but other than food—which they would have to restock regularly to keep it all from freezing solid—she wasn't sure that she could think of anything else he'd need out here. He had shelter. He had bedding. He had warm clothing, which had finally dried. And if he needed to defend himself—from wildlife or anything else, for that matter, he had his firebending.
Zuko shrugged. "I can't think of anything. Unless—if we ever hear from my uncle, I want to try writing back. I don't have any way to do that out here, but I suppose frozen ink wouldn't help much."
"Not very much," Katara agreed. "But as long as things don't get too crazy down in the city, we can take you back to the house for that. Or bring the writing supplies out here to you." Though sneaking Zuko out of the house this afternoon had been a bit of a production—Sokka and Yue were coming from the armory just as they'd left the house with Aang, which left them with one more person in their group than could be reasonably explained—no one had bothered to stop them. As long as it was just Katara and Zuko, though, she could pretend that he was just a slightly taller, slightly more muscular Sokka with his hood pulled all the way up.
She could feel Zuko watching her, and she was very aware of the pleasant softness in his gaze. He nodded.
"How soon do you think we'll hear something?" Yue asked. "The warriors' expedition will be back tomorrow, and I thought that surely we would have received word by now."
Zuko shrugged again. "Probably soon, if we're going to hear anything. Uncle is—I mean, I think he's really good about responding to letters. He did most of the correspondence on my ship. Mostly because nobody ever wanted to talk to me, but still. I think he's probably writing back."
At that, Katara's brow furrowed. "Is the hawk going to be able to find you out here? We did let her loose at the city wall. That's—that's a few miles from here."
"She should be able to. She's not supposed to land unless she hears a signal, so she'll probably circle that spot until I whistle for her." Zuko wrapped his arms around his chest and looked off in the direction of the city wall, almost as though he thought he could see over the ridge to where the fleet waited far, far off to the south.
"If he does write back," Yue said, "is there any chance that you would allow us to see the letter? I know it may be personal, but—"
Zuko gave a halfhearted shrug. "I doubt it'll be that personal. Knowing Uncle, the only reason he's taking so long to write back is he wants to cram in as many riddles as possible. It's probably going to take all of us to decipher it."
Katara couldn't argue with that. Although in hindsight, the general made almost perfect sense, he was always maddeningly cryptic in the moment. When he wrote them back, it would be more of the same. Tidbits that may as well have been written in another language mixed in with tea and Pai Sho metaphors that wouldn't make sense until weeks later.
"Lucky you've got me, then," Sokka said, puffing out his chest. "I'm a master at this kind of thing."
"Great," Zuko deadpanned. "I'll be sure that you're the last one to read it so that your so-called mastery doesn't throw off the rest of us."
"Hey! Is it really necessary to be a jerk all the time?"
"I don't know, but you did say that you were never going to stop arguing with me. I'm just making sure that I'm always prepared."
Sokka huffed. "That's really rude, you know."
Katara shook her head. "And I think that's our cue to leave before the bickering gets stupider than it is already." She grabbed Sokka by the elbow and started to pull him off toward the south, back toward the city.
"You know he started it, right?" Sokka asked, shuffling sideways. "He was being a jerk first."
"I really don't care who you think started it," Katara said, shoving Sokka a little ahead of her. "I just don't feel like listening to more of your nonsense at the moment."
Sokka grumbled and stopped in his tracks, but when Yue said a quick, polite goodbye and joined him, he seemed perfectly happy to trot off down the hill, holding Yue's arm in the most gentlemanlike manner he could muster. Aang jogged after them, and Katara was just about to follow when Zuko's voice stopped her in her tracks.
"Katara? I—um—" She turned back to find him staring just a little to the side, rubbing the back of his neck. "I just wanted to say—thanks. For—all of this." He gestured toward the tent. "I really wasn't expecting—"
She smiled. She remembered the look on his face this morning when Yue had arrived and Sokka asked why he hadn't left yet—the desperation, the loneliness in his eyes. The sad, lost look that had lingered as all four of them sat down for breakfast, then as she'd told him to stay at the house and get some sleep while she went off for a few hours' work in the healing hut.
She liked the expression he wore now much better. The softness, the gratitude, the relative certainty were all wonderfully comforting.
"Well, I didn't do much of this," she said. Really, she could only take credit for choosing the spot for his camp and helping to set the tent. Yue was the one who'd secured all of the supplies for him, not Katara. "But if it helps, you can always think of this as my first try at thanking you for last night." His eyes widened just a fraction, and she had a sudden impulse to hug him. Instead, she fought that impulse back and settled for reaching out and giving his hand a quick squeeze. "Thank you, Zuko."
He turned very faintly pink and rubbed the back of his neck again. "You're—you're welcome, Katara."
Katara wasn't happy about the way her first day back in waterbending lessons was going so far. Her bending was fine. Better than most of the boys, who'd all gotten lazy and unfocused during their break while Master Taqqiq was away. The problem was the lesson itself. She'd arrived at the middle arena just at the right time, taken a spot somewhere near the center of the group, made it through a cycle of warmup forms, and then, rather than matching them up for sparring matches like usual, Master Taqqiq had announced that the whole class needed to take a short trip to the uppermost arena.
Not to watch the advanced benders. Not to learn from the more experienced students and another waterbending teacher. No, they were going to the upper arena to listen to Master Pakku give a 'very important announcement'.
Which could hardly have been less exciting to Katara if they'd all gone out of their way to make this boring. She already knew what Pakku was going to tell them all. He was going to tell them that there was a Fire Nation fleet gathered around Kokkyo Island. He was going to tell them that the fleet was preparing for an attack on the North Pole, and that if they moved quickly and carefully, they could still ward off the worst of it before the fighting really began. What else could Pakku possibly be planning to say? Especially to a bunch of kids from waterbending classes. Pakku did probably know more about the fleet now than they had before, but those were the sorts of things that would go through the council, not directly to the kids.
Katara didn't want the information that they were planning to give the kids. She wanted to know the details, all the information that was going to be useful in fighting the Fire Nation. She wanted to find out how she could make this all turn out okay for all of them. And she wasn't sure that she was willing to wait for a letter from the general that may or may not ever come to get her hands on that information.
Still, she trailed along with the rest of the class and did her best to smile when Aang bounded over from the beginners' class and took a place beside her. As much as she wasn't looking forward to this—as much as she felt confident in predicting exactly what Pakku was going to tell them—Katara was beginning to feel a little nervous. Everything was becoming much more real now that the adults were back.
"I would wish you all a good morning," Pakku began, "but today, we have very little good news to share."
Katara did her best not to make a face. Yes, this was turning out to be exactly what she had expected. The only thing that really surprised her was the fact that most of the students—even the little ones—were listening.
For a few more long minutes, Pakku droned on without saying anything of any real substance. Saying enough to frighten the younger kids, but not much else. Which couldn't be helping anyone.
But he did, eventually, get around to the point and began explaining that a Fire Nation fleet was gathered to the south, and that all indications were that they intended to attach the Northern Tribe within a few more days or weeks. That they intended to ward off the firebenders before they made it to the walls, but that they may still reach the North Pole, and there may be fighting. Pakku explained that waterbending lessons would be shifting around a bit, that the beginners and intermediate students would all be trained by Master Taqqiq—on alternating days, not as a combined group—so that the remaining masters could focus their attention on working with the advanced students, who would be splitting their time between building up the city's defenses and training to help coordinate any possible evacuation efforts. From the sound of things, there was a large group of adult waterbenders working to obstruct the channels that would lead the fleet to the city, and another group was making the trek inland to one of the summer hunting camps.
They would, as far as she could tell, be broadening the pathways there to ensure that the whole tribe could make an efficient retreat if the Fire Nation fleet grew too close—and if they were forced to retreat, the waterbenders would follow behind everyone else to cover their tracks.
It was a good plan, Katara thought. Not the plan that she'd been hoping to hear—she wanted a better idea of what could be done before the fleet arrived so that they wouldn't need to evacuate the city—but it was probably wise to at least have a plan in case worse came to worse. At least there would be no one left behind, defenseless and at the mercy of the Fire Nation. And it was probably the nice, comforting sort of thing that would help the younger kids feel better about the impending attack. There was nothing for them to worry about if they knew that their families could simply pack up their belongings, take a short journey to camps that were already waiting a bit farther north, and return home again once the threat was gone.
That wasn't going to happen if she and the others had any say in the matter, of course. She just hoped that Pakku would get to the point and explain the battle plans sooner rather than later.
He didn't. Instead, Pakku made it as far as explaining that some of the students may see less of their parents and older siblings for a time while they spent more hours of the day assisting in the healing huts and working to prepare the city for the impending battle before stopping there, apparently satisfied that he'd shared everything relevant.
"If any of you have any further questions about what will be happening from this point onward," Pakku said in a tone that made it very clear that questions were absolutely not welcome, "your families should be able to provide any answers that you need. They will all be informed of what is happening as we learn more."
Don't bother me about this, Katara could imagine him saying. I don't like any of you well enough to talk to you, much less to care whether you're concerned about this.
"For now," Pakku finished. "I thank you all for your attention. I would like to ask that the advanced class stay for the normal duration of their lessons, but beginner and intermediate students may be dismissed. Tomorrow, Master Taqqiq will work with the beginners' class, and on the following day, intermediate lessons will resume."
What? Katara had gotten up early for this? She hadn't learned anything new—well, nothing that was actually useful, at least. Nothing that she couldn't have guessed on her own.
She lingered until the lower two classes had already reached the doorway. Maybe if she stuck to the back of the crowd of advanced students and did her best to blend in, she might be able to pick up something useful after all. Maybe Pakku would tell the advanced class more than he was willing to say in front of the lower two. Or, failing that, she might at least be able to watch some of their practice and pick up a few bits and pieces of advanced waterbending through observation. If nothing else, she could use a few new tricks in her sparring matches with Zuko. She could help ensure that they were both as prepared as possible for the impending battle. And if she could make it out of intermediate classes sooner, then she wouldn't be the least bit upset about it.
But she was only able to duck behind one of the taller boys for about a minute before she started getting odd looks, and Pakku caught sight of her as well. He, of course, didn't look the slightest bit amused and ordered one of the older boys to usher her out after the rest of her class.
Ugh. This wasn't fair. She'd been working more than hard enough to earn a chance to watch the advanced lessons. And she was one of the people who'd brought word of the Fire Nation fleet back to the North Pole in the first place. Really, they all should have been thanking her and offering up all the information they had on the fleet. It was only fair.
She stomped a little as she made her way out of the uppermost arena. She'd probably be best off if she went to the healing huts straightaway. If Pakku wasn't going to tell her anything more than what she already knew, then maybe Master Yugoda or Imiq had heard something that they could pass along instead. Yugoda was on the council, after all. Or she'd been invited to at least one council meeting—it was hard to know how all that stuff really worked. The Northern Tribe was so much different than the Southern Tribe. In any case, there was enough of a chance that heading toward the healing huts early seemed worthwhile.
Katara was just beginning to turn toward the healing huts when she heard voices from the opposite direction, closer to the intermediate arena. When she recognized them as Aang and Master Taqqiq, she paused, then edged backward by a few steps. She wasn't eavesdropping—not really eavesdropping, at least—but if she happened to overhear something important, then there was nothing wrong with that.
And it was at least possible that Taqqiq would have something important to tell Aang. Taqqiq had gone out with the reconnaissance team, after all, and Aang was the Avatar. It seemed possible that there might be something worthwhile in their conversation.
"As I'm sure you can imagine, Avatar Aang, I have spoken to Master Pakku quite a lot over the past several days."
"Yeah. I thought you guys were gone for a really long time. It would have been a lot faster if you all had gone on Appa. I did try to offer, but—"
"That's fine, Avatar Aang. Travel by water may be slower, but it allows us a great deal of control. We were able to make the journey without being spotted once. And that isn't what I wanted to discuss with you."
"Oh. So—then what is it?"
"Well, as I said, Master Pakku and I have spoken a lot. And it appears that you are approaching the end of your beginning lessons. I suggested, and Master Pakku agreed, that you might be ready to take the test to advance to intermediate lessons."
"Really? Whoa, that's so—"
"Provided," Master Taqqiq added, "that you've been practicing in your spare time, I don't see why you would have any trouble with the test. And I'm sure that you and Katara must have practiced together. You seem to be good friends, and I'm well aware of how hard she has been working."
Katara's pulse quickened, and she pulled away from the wall, then retreated down the street. She couldn't bring herself to listen in any longer. Her thoughts had turned muddled and messy in an instant, torn between pride in Aang's progress and annoyance that he was following so close behind her. Between worry that his lack of practice would trip him up and worry that that wouldn't slow him down at all.
Logically, she knew that there was no reason for her to worry. She was at the top of the intermediate waterbending class, and Aang hadn't even passed the test to leave the beginners' class yet. She'd gone far enough that there was no real reason for her to be jealous of Aang or to worry that he would overtake her. She'd proven over and over again that she was far more dedicated to her training than Aang ever would be.
Still, there was an unpleasant roiling sensation in the pit of her stomach when she thought about Aang joining her in intermediate lessons that wouldn't seem to go away no matter what she tried. The only thing she could really do at the moment was to put it as far from her mind as possible and hope that the unpleasant feeling would fade.
Being out here, at the top of the hill, in the small hollow where he and Katara had spent so much time training, in the daylight and on his own was weird. It wasn't that Zuko had enjoyed staying down in that stupid pit. He certainly hadn't, but he supposed that he had grown accustomed to it. He'd gotten used to the world feeling exceptionally small and sheltered. He'd gotten used to having a relatively fixed routine—waking up in the pit alone most days, being visited and annoyed by Sokka and Aang for a while around midday, having a few hours to himself, then seeing Katara in the evening. There hadn't been much else that he could have done in the pit. He could meditate back there. He could try to plan, he could sleep, and—that was pretty much it.
But out here, on the hill, where he could either watch the city shine a hundred different colors as the sunlight shifted overhead, or duck back behind the ridge to remain out of sight, there were almost too many options. He could firebend. He could take a walk around to explore more of the rolling landscape north of the city. He could do almost anything so long as he didn't get himself caught—or lost.
Not that he was going to complain about having options. It did make for a nice change after—everything. But from the sound of things, the reconnaissance mission had returned to the city last night, which meant that Katara's routine would be different, which meant that she might stop by when he wasn't expecting her arrival. And the last thing he wanted was to miss seeing her. Maybe it was a little ridiculous, but maybe there was nothing he could do to change that. Maybe he was ridiculous. All he knew for certain was that he didn't want to miss Katara when she found the time to visit.
He opted to fill most of his time with firebending practice. Admittedly, drilling his own forms alone was a little strange. Zuko had almost never been forced to, or had the opportunity to practice alone, and it made him feel a little unbalanced when he forgot to focus on his breathing and no one was there to critique him, to order him to start over from the beginning. He ran through his entire sequence uninterrupted for the first time he could remember, his form sloppy and his breathing unfocused, and when he reached the end, he started over again, this time paying closer attention to all the things that he usually neglected. This was almost certainly not the right way to practice, but Zuko didn't think that he minded that. It felt good to just get to the end of his sequence without needing to restart a hundred separate times, even if the whole thing was a disaster. Even if he wasn't getting any better at this, wasn't it worthwhile to just feel like he'd accomplished something for once?
Maybe. Or maybe he really was just an awful firebender, and this was his way of making himself feel better about the situation. It was hard to know for certain.
In any case, he did improve on his second cycle through his forms, and although he could still hear Uncle's voice in the back of his mind, telling him over and over again to focus on his breathing, to make certain that he wasn't just wildly swinging his limbs at the air, he thought that he might have earned an approving nod by the time that he was through.
Huh. Maybe he was actually getting better at this. Maybe he'd just needed a chance to warm up and remember what it felt like to practice individual forms again. It had, after all, been quite a long time since he'd trained properly. He'd been doing an absurd amount of bending since his arrival, what with moderating his own temperature and sparring with Katara, but he hadn't really focused on any individual forms since back before the explosion that had taken his ship. He'd missed this. As much as training had always frustrated him in the past, there was something refreshing about slowing down and stretching out his limbs to work through forms one at a time.
He liked the sparring better, of course. He couldn't deny the fact that the time he spent with her was by far his favorite thing about the North Pole, but stepping back from the strictly practical uses of his bending was still nice. If nothing else, refining his individual forms would probably improve his sparring abilities in the end.
Zuko reached the end of his second round of forms, a little breathless, and wiped his forehead with his sleeve before climbing to the top of the ridge to look out at the city for a little while. He did want to run through his forms once more, but a short break—just enough to catch his breath and to give his muscles a chance to relax—couldn't hurt anything.
He watched the sunlight drift toward the west, turning the domed roofs from brilliant bluish white to gold. The longer he was up here, the more that he got used to the stark simplicity of the place. It wasn't the bright, vivid land he'd grown up in, but the North Pole did have some appeal of its own. It was harsh, and somewhat unwelcoming from the outside, but the longer Zuko was around, the more he could see the coziness of the place.
Just as he'd begun to work up his resolve to leave the ridge and return to his bending, a dark speck in the distance caught his attention and Zuko froze in place. Shading his eyes, he squinted at it as the speck changed direction ever so slightly, apparently circling the city. His heart skipped. Uncle's message. Maybe it was finally here.
Zuko leapt to his feet, whistling frantically for the hawk. He could be wrong. There was every chance that it wasn't a messenger hawk at all. And if it was, he could very well be too far away for his whistling to be even remotely audible, but he still had to try. If there was even a chance that Uncle had written back, that Zuko could send out another message, a warning to Uncle and his old crew, then he had to do everything he could.
For what felt like a very long time, Zuko stood on the crest of the ridge, staring after the speck until he half convinced himself that there was nothing there at all. That what he'd interpreted as a bird was really just a fleck of something in his eye, or worse, a figment of his imagination. But then the fleck turned again, and as he watched, it grew larger, bit by bit, until he could make out the shape of wings, a head, and a tail.
That was it. That was the messenger hawk. It had to be, or this was by far the strangest coincidence that he could remember.
When the bird finally arrived, Zuko caught the message tube almost before she landed, and stroked her wings gratefully.
"Good birdie. You did such a good job finding your way here," he said. Heart racing, Zuko jogged back down the far side of the ridge, hawk balanced on one hand, the message tube clutched tight in the other.
He settled the hawk into the warmth of his tent, tossed a strip of jerky onto the sleeping bag for her to eat, then stepped back outside and sat in the fluffy snow along the northern side of the snowy hollow, fumbling with the message tube.
General Bujing;
Words cannot express my surprise upon receiving your letter yesterday, however, I must admit that I am grateful to hear from you. I am well, and I am pleased to hear that you are as well.
Zuko let the letter drop into his lap. He wasn't ready to read any farther than that. Evening—and Katara—couldn't come fast enough.
Author's Note:
Can you tell that it bothers me a little that in the show, Katara went from the first half of The Waterbending Scroll where she had Big Feelings about Aang suddenly being a better waterbender than her after 0.75 seconds of practice to suddenly being 100% okay with it so that her insecurities never had to be dealt with again? Because that bothers me. Probably more than a little. And I think that it's totally fair for those feelings to crop up at times and for her to struggle with managing them while the rest of the characters are busy not noticing how difficult this is for her.
I'll give her some resolution for those feelings. Someday...
But anyway. That's about all I have to say this time! I'll see you back here in two weeks, and in the meantime, reviews are always appreciated!
