The Ember Island Lighthouse

~History~

Living in the Age of the Warlords, Fire Lord Ranpu was notable for expanding the power of the Fire Sages and beginning the first steps towards uniting the modern Fire Nation. While the Warlords themselves kept up a constant state of conflict with each other, Lord Ranpu used his influence to create neutral avenues of communication between the people of the Fire Islands, most importantly guaranteeing trade. He offered martial artist Firebender Sages as guards for any merchant vessel traveling between the islands, and personally funded free ports at the most prominent landings. One of many related projects was the construction of badly needed lighthouses, as the Warlords had at various points torn down any such existing structures.

The biggest was the lighthouse on Ember Island. It was also the first.

Ember Island itself had a varied history, but a stable one, mostly due to its proximity to the Fire Sage's seat of power, Miao Island (later 'Capital Island'). At the time of the Warlords, it was a haven for refugees, and with Fire Lord Ranpu's support, it was quickly built into a neutral meeting ground. As trade between the Fire Islands intensified, Ember Island grew into a giant bazaar, where the wealthy came to relax and shop. There is evidence that some of the Warlords even used the island as a vacation spot, traveling there in secret and staying in secluded manors.

The first of the lighthouse's caretakers was an older Firebender couple who had fled from Warlord Qinzhuo's attack on Chung-Ling. They had helped organize their fellow refugees, and when Fire Lord Ranpu himself came to lay the first stone of the lighthouse's construction, he asked them to live in the structure once it was completed, and to make sure that the light would always shine for the brave sailors who traveled between the Lands of Fire.

Their names were Haiyuan and Shuishou, and by the time they died, they were the poorest people on Ember Island.


~Rumor~

"So," Arata asked, "can you tell me happened to the previous caretaker? Most everyone else won't talk about it."

The child servant dropped the chest she had been dragging towards the lighthouse and turned to stare. "You haven't heard?"

"I wouldn't be asking if I knew." Arata frowned in what he meant to be a stern manner before continuing. "And be careful with that. The wood is old. Older than me."

Ignoring the chest, the kid said, "The last caretaker died."

"Yes, I know that much, but-"

"They say he put rocks in his pockets and jumped off the top of the lighthouse."

"...what?"

The kid turned to look at the top of the structure, but quickly averted her gaze back towards Arata. "He was a mean old man," she whispered, "and was always complaining about how he didn't get no respect for working the lighthouse. Said even the servants here lived better than he did."

Arata scratched his head. "So he killed himself?"

"Not a'cause of that. My mom told me that when he was young, he fell in love with a rich girl from the other side of the island, but she was promised to a one of her father's friends. The old caretaker thought he could get her to come live with him, but she wouldn't talk to him. Turned out she really loved the guy she was supposed to marry, but the caretaker didn't believe she could be happy with someone older than her, and thought she just wanted the money. So he kept coming around, and they told him to go away and not come back. One night, he followed them out to a play, and on the way home, he killed them with a shovel and chopped up the bodies."

Arata considered that tale, but the only comment he could think of was, "Why would the caretaker of a lighthouse have a shovel? It's all rocks around here."

The girl crossed her arms. "I dunno, that's the story. He killed them with the shovel and dumped their chopped up bodies in the water right over there. 'xcept they came back as ghosts, and haunted him his whole life. Getting the beacon to go on and off, making noises like other people were in the lighthouse, showing faces in the dark. They say the ghosts screamed in old caretaker's dreams. His hair was gray when he was still young, and they never left the whole time he got old. So last week, he finally got so insane from it all that he put rocks in his pockets and jumped. Same spot of water where he dumped the bodies."

Arata laughed in the daylight and refreshing sea breeze, and said, "So, I guess the lighthouse is still haunted."

"I dunno," the servant girl shrugged. "Maybe. Or maybe the ghosts are happy now that he's dead and went to Agni's Skies."

Arata rolled his eyes, and hefted another bag to bring into his new home. "Nice story. If I find the shovel, I'll let you have it for a silver piece. Now come on, bring that chest inside if you want your coins. There aren't any ghosts in Agni's daylight."

Later, it turned out that the stairs of the lighthouse liked to creak by themselves in the dark of the night. Arata had trouble getting to sleep.


~Insanity~

Mayor Dengtuzi and Kinnitanik of the North arrived together at the Ember Island Lighthouse just as the sun was setting. The Mayor hammered on the door with his fist while he smiled at the Waterbender beside him. "This lighthouse is the oldest in the Fire Nation. Note the inscription above the door, here. It was a famous line from the speech Fire Lord Ranpu gave when he laid the first stone of its construction."

Kinnitanik looked up at the characters carved into the stone. "Better to light a candle than curse the darkness," she read.

Dengtuzi nodded. "It's now a rather famous adage, here in the Fire Nation. As long as we're here, the caretaker, Chunu, should be getting ready to the light the lantern. I'm sure he'll be happy to give a tour of this cherished piece of Fire Nation history to such an important visiting dignitary. If he answers the door anytime soon. I'm sure it will be the perfect ending to your day, hm?"

Kinnitanik stiffly ran a hand through her long dark hair and gave a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes. "This has been a wonderful day, exploring the Fire Nation's busiest island. With you. Leading me to what you consider its best features. All day. With not a moment to myself."

Dengtuzi grinned broadly and puffed his chest out a little. This was a very delicate operation, because there was significantly more of his belly than his chest, and puffing one independently of the other took lots of practice. Even more impressive was that he was able to do this while maintaining a knocking motion with his fist, although that seemed to have pushed his brain to its limits. As a result, he completely missed that the lighthouse's front door had finally opened.

Kinnitanik put a hand to her mouth and gasped, "Mayor! His face!"

Dengtuzi turned to see that he had been knocking on the lighthouse caretaker's face for the past few seconds. "Ah, dreadfully sorry, Chunu." He smoothly moved his hands behind his back.

The younger man blinked, and gently rubbed his sore nose. "No problem, Mayor. It was never a very nice nose, anyway. Is there something I can do for you?"

Mayor Dengtuzi motioned theatrically at the woman beside him. "This is Kinnitanik of the Northern Water Tribe. She's a Master Waterbender, and has come to the Fire Nation to negotiate for her tribe in regards to some trade agreements. Of course, while she was here in the Land of the Risen Sun, she simply had to see Ember Island."

Chunu smiled at the tourist in blue, and bowed formally. "Welcome to our beautiful home, Master... Kinni... Kinnita... um..."

"Kinnitanik," the Waterbender said, a small smile on her own face as well. "It's okay, it's not a common name in the Water Tribe, either. It means 'dark hair,' you know." She again ran a hand through her long tresses, and setting the obsidian hair shining in the sun. Even in the Fire Nation, such deep shading would have been exceptional.

Dengtuzi's eyes lingered on the sight of the woman, before he turned back to Chunu. "I promised her a look inside the lighthouse. Perhaps we can watch you light the lantern? Or..." Dengtuzi's grin grew as he had what passed for a clever moment. "It would be nice if you let Kinnitanik light the lantern herself."

Chunu blanched, his face whitening, although in the light of the setting sun it looked like it became more orange. "Uh... well, you see," he stammered, "there's a... well, it's a tradition..."

Dengtuzi frowned. "Get to the point."

"Well, this tradition, it... well, I guess it's more of a... curse."

"A curse," Dengtuzi repeated.

"Yes." Chunu licked his lips, and lowered his gaze. "Foreigners are... well, they say that any foreigner who lights the lantern will be cursed by the Spirits of the seas here. They honor the lighthouse as the property of the Fire Nation, and so it is forever bound to the blood of our people. Sir."

"Chunu, so help me, if you don't let her-"

"It's all right," Kinnitanik interrupted, "I'm happy to respect your culture and traditions. The Northern Water Tribe is very big on tradition, itself, you know."

Dengtuzi's jaw worked for a bit, but eventually he nodded in sullen agreement. "Very well. But we can still watch the lighting, can't we?"

Chunu nodded eagerly. "Come on in. I was just about to do it."

The trio entered the lighthouse and immediately began scaling the stairs. Chunu and Kinnitanik managed the long climb without difficult, but Dengtuzi was panting for breath by the time they reached the Lantern Room. "Ah, my feet," he groaned as ascended the last step. The fat mayor kicked off his sandals and then picked one up to use as a fan. "So, Chunu, are you sure about this curse... ?"

"Positive," the caretaker said. "Now, back up a little. This will flare a bit. Oh, Lady Dark Hair, please take a step to your right. You don't want to be blinded by the beacon." Satisfied with everyone's position, Chunu took a deep breath, fixed his body into a Firebending stance, and then snapped his hands outward in the direction of the lantern. The colza oil within, made from the seeds of wild cabbage, was caressed by a thin wave of flames that appeared out of thin air, and then ignited with a burst of fire. A wave of heat pulsed outward from the sudden blaze, passing over its small audience.

Two intense beams of light leaped out from the lantern. Kinnitanik's hair reflected the ambient illumination like the still waters of a shallow pond.

Chunu smiled at the sight. "Here, come on down a level, and I'll show you how I set the gears so that the lantern will rotate." The other two politely turned to face him, and it was then that all three came to a surprising realization.

The sandal in Dengtuzi's hand was on fire.

"Uh oh," said Chunu.

"AHHHHH!" said Dengtuzi.

"Oh my!" said Kinnitanik.

"AHHHHH!" said Dengtuzi again. Then he dropped the slipper to the floor. The wooden floor. The fire eased its way off the slipper and began working across the Lantern Room.

"AHHHHH!" said Chunu, apparently feeling the need to join in the fun.

"I'll get it!" said Kinnitanik. She then took a stance of her own, and waved her arms toward the increasingly burning patch of floor.

Nothing happened. Chunu and Dengtuzi looked up at her in alarm.

"Wait for it," Kinnitanik said, her black hair shining with spots of reflected red from the blaze. Three seconds later, a wave of salt water appeared outside the glass walls, flying upward and throwing itself on top of the lighthouse. When the water hit, it soaked its way into the Lantern Room. The result was very much like getting pounded by a highly focused tidal wave. The glass walls shook, and the fires were all drenched.

And so, even though they weren't on fire in the first place, were Chunu and Dengtuzi.

Kinnitanik put her hands to her mouth, suppressing a giggle. "Oops."

Chunu looked at his mayor, shrugged, and said, "Well, I guess we learned something."

"And what, pray tell, is that?" Dripping wet, Dengtuzi did not look like he was in a learning mood.

Nevertheless, Chunu grinned. "Wetter to light a sandal than to curse the dark tress."


~Destiny~

Admiral Kim Ti of the Fire Navy stood in the Lantern Room of Ember Island's lighthouse and watched the enemy fleet on the sunlit horizon. "Spyglass," she hissed.

Lieutenant Jomeru immediately produced the requested telescope and handed it over, then quickly moved to the writing desk set up on the floor right beside the giant lantern. He was a good soldier, and Kim Ti had been quite diligent in making sure he knew that time was going to be of the essence. The reign of the Fire Lord might depend their actions here.

"It's a sizable force," the admiral said, gazing at the ships. There was no need to say anything more than that, although the words failed to convey the cold dread growing in her stomach. "Hard to say from just this once glance, but I'd weigh that the earlier estimates of one thousands ships were not inaccurate."

Jomeru wrote that down without commenting.

Kim Ti focused the spyglass on the largest ship in the cluster, the one leading the rest southward around Ember Island's coast. "The lead vessel looks like a schooner, three masts, but there are structures on the deck that appear to be chimneys. Wait... yes, I see the sidewheel. It's one of the Warlord's charred steamships! The rest of the fleet... I see siege ships, and coastal fighters. And... yes, many troop carriers. There's..."

The admiral lowered the spyglass, and looked to her subordinate. "There's enough for an invasion."

Jomeru paled, his brush held frozen over his paper. "How bad?" he squeaked.

"Enough to invade. Enough to win. The Fire Lord has to withdraw herself and her army from Miao Island. Note in the letter that this is my personal evaluation."

The lieutenant quickly returned to his writing.

Kim Ti herself walked away from the view, her back straight and her steps crisp despite the crushing despair and anxiety she felt, passing outside the Lantern Room to the railed walkway around it. A cluster of Messenger Hawks, military trained, were perched on the metal railing, but the admiral only had eyes for one. The bird was bigger than the rest, and its feathers shone with an unusually bright shade of red. Kim Ti untied its leg, and let the hawk climb up onto her arm. "Fly fast," she whispered to it. "Fly true. The Fire Lord and her army are depending on your word. Fail, or arrive late, and their last stand will be both brave and completely worthless."

Jomeru brought over the first copy of the letter. Kim Ti took it with a grateful node and slid it into the tube on the hawk's back. "Do your duty," she said, and raised her arm to send it away.

As the bird flew off in the same direction as the enemy fleet, the admiral led her subordinate back into the lighthouse. "And we will do ours, lieutenant. Copies of this report need to go out to all the other admirals. If the rebel Warlords succeed in overthrowing the Fire Lord, at least we can reunite the nation in her name. And even if our message arrives in time for her to escape, we'll still have to help her take back Miao Island."

A year later, Kim Ti was one of the officers standing behind the Fire Lord in Caldera City when Miao was renamed and the Capital re-established.


~Beacon~

Roku had no idea where he was. As a freshly realized Avatar, this would not be very good for his reputation, if anyone learned about it. Fortunately, the dragon underneath him seemed surer of its position. Together, Roku and Fang flew through the night, rushing to the Capital Island of the Fire Nation.

It had been twelve years since Roku had seen his friends, and he was eager to get back to them.

Too eager, perhaps. Otherwise, he might have realized the problems with flying through the night. Namely, the lack of light to see by.

Clutching Fang's giant head a little tighter, Roku shut his eyes and thought of home. When he left the Fire Nation to train as the Avatar, he had been only sixteen. Prince Sozin had been his only real friend, but there had been a girl, Ta Min, who was very nice. They had talked some, but thanks to his shyness, most of what he knew about her came from extensive long range observation. They were both nobles in the Capital, and the social scene was every bit as busy as the political side of life. Sozin's father, the Fire Lord, was the one of the first undisputed rulers of a united Fire Nation, and that was cause for both much work and much celebration.

That man had died, while Roku was training. Sozin would be Fire Lord, now.

And Roku was the Avatar.

Things changed, time passed. Perhaps Ta Min was married and raising children. She could have even left the Fire Nation. It certainly wouldn't be a betrayal, on her part. She couldn't know that Roku thought highly of her, not the way he had always wound up frozen with awkwardness whenever she was near.

But now Roku was the Avatar. And with the power to command storms, infernos, and mountains came the self-confidence to talk to a pretty, kind-hearted girl. The right kind of bitter work paid off in more ways than one, and did wonders for your perspective.

Now Roku just had to get back home, Preferably without flying in circles all night. He opened his eyes, and once more let his gaze try to pierce through the darkness. To his surprise, he succeeded. The endless field of dark clouds and black water was broken by a color in the distance. No, not a color. A light. A massive, bright light that was fighting against the dead of night.

Roku smiled when he realized what it was.

He didn't need to say anything to Fang. The dragon sensed Roku's attention moving outward, and turned in accordance with the slight pressure that was being applied to his horns. Wings flapped to win altitude, and a slight dive increased their speed through the air. In no time at all, the dragon and the Avatar were circling above the Ember Island Lighthouse.

Roku had many fond memories of the place. While the Capital had grown more populated as the social heart of a peaceful Fire Nation, it had siphoned off much of the traffic and trade that used to flow to Ember Island, leaving the latter as primarily a vacation spot for the noble class. Roku's family owned property not far from the island's lighthouse, and the huge beams of light were in the background of all his nighttime memories. He and Sozin had hiked there, once, when they were boys, and the caretaker had let them climb all the steps to the very top. As Roku grew up, many things had changed about Ember Island, but its lighthouse was always the same. Its shape was constant, and no matter how tall Roku grew, the lighthouse was always a spear that scraped the heavens.

Even looking down at it now from the sky, with the power to call forth lava and tidal waves and tornadoes and claws of rock from the sea floor, it still had an imposing presence. Its light was still a comforting beacon in the darkness.

Knowing exactly where he was, and what direction his home was in, Roku sat back and enjoyed the rest of his trip.


~Relic~

Fire Lord Azulon was not aware of the warm night air, the taste of the salty sea on every breath, or his wife modeling a scandalous new swimsuit for him. This was because he had ledgers in front of him, as well as an abacus. Partially. More significantly, it was all because the young man wasn't quite right in the head.

"And look," the Princess Ilah cooed, "it completely exposes my ankles and forearms!"

Azulon gave a grunt that might, at some levels of society, be interpreted as an acknowledgement. Advanced simian societies, perhaps, but societies all the same.

"Don't you think my bathing suit is hot?" Ilah tried batting her eyelashes at her husband, which had never worked before but was still a favorite maneuver for how easy it was. It only took one small muscle for each eyelid.

Azulon finally looked up, and met his wife's gaze. He tried, at that moment, to remember why he married her. After several unsuccessful moments, he decided to take a partial victory and instead chose to remember that her father was General Shouri, and that he conquered and destroyed Taku early in the war. "I cannot recall a moment when I was more inflamed with desire for you," he eventually said. That was completely true.

Ilah made a sound halfway between saying, "Oh, thank you, Lord Husband," and going, "Oooooooooh!" She tottered off to the balcony, and looked down at the moonlit beach below. "We should get out of this stuff old house, Azu-zu. Go for a night swim!"

Azulon gave another simian grunt. This was a lot more impressive than it sounds, because Azulon had never so much as seen a monkey in his entire life. There was a lot that Azulon had never seen, but paperwork was most definitely not included. Finished with his current reading material, he shuffled the page to the back of the pile and licked his lips at the sight of a brand new army of numbers.

"Azu-zu, are there sharks in these waters? I think I recall hearing about sharks near Ember Island. Either that or Shu Jing. Or was it ostropus? I don't think I even like the taste of ostropus."

Azulon didn't even dignify that with a grunt. Instead he clicked his abacus, and frowned. Frowning used more muscles than smiling, and much more than blinking, but that was okay. Frowning was his preferred exercise routine. He only kept up with his Firebending because he could kill people with it, whereas he had yet to fatally frown at anyone. "This is completely ridiculous," he called to Ilah.

"Come to think of it, I don't think I like the taste of shark, either."

"And all this going into municipal maintenance," Azulon continued. "Do you know much the Fire Nation could be saving if we didn't have to pay for roads and public buildings and the Home Guard? We could be spending a lot more on the military if it weren't for all the citizens. Pay for that giant metal exploding gate I want to put on the entrance to the Capital's bay. What do the common people have jobs for if I have to pay to fix their roads for them?"

"Oh," Ilah called back from the balcony, "you should build a road from the palace back home right to here. Then I could keep my new bathing suit at home, get dressed in the palace, and walk over here to Ember Island when I want to swim! Oh, but then everyone would see my ankles."

Azulon was a patient person. You had to be to conquer the world, or do mathematics. This latest statement, though, had penetrated his simian-grunting defenses and assaulted his common sense with intent to kill. So at this latest statement from his wife, he jumped up and turned to glare fire-daggers at her. "You stupid wind-buffalo! How can you walk to Ember Island IF IT IS AN ISLAND?"

She stared at him in surprise, still standing on the balcony with the wind ruffling her hair and the rays of the Ember Island Lighthouse panning through the darkness behind her. "Oh, Azu-zu," she said, putting a hand to her mouth with disbelief. "You're completely correct. And if I swim here, then no one will see my ankles! Oh, how wonderful. Father was right, you are the most brilliant Fire Lord we've ever had. Please do build that road, then, underwater."

Azulon didn't respond. He had stopped listening right after the first 'Oh' and was staring past his wife. "That lighthouse," he murmured. "I wonder how much we spend on it. No one sails on this side of the island any more." He was back at his portable desk in an instant, scanning his ledgers and working his abacus like his wife worked her eyelids.

Ten minutes and sixteen sums later, an official order was signed by Fire Lord Azulon to decommission one hundred lighthouses throughout the Fire Nation, foremost the one on Ember Island.


~Symbol~

"As far as the local make-out points go, at least this one is out of the wind," Mai drawled.

Zuko blushed. "I didn't bring you up here so that we can make-out." Seeing his girlfriend's almost-expression, he added, "Not just to make-out." He snaked one arm around Mai's waist, and raised the other to summon a small flame. The warm light illuminated only a small space around them, but it would be enough for them to see by as they climbed the stairs. "Have you been inside the lighthouse before?"

Mai shook her head, and shifted her stance to lean a bit more against Zuko as they stepped.

"Lu Ten- you know, my cousin- brought me here when I was a boy," Zuko continued. "He was interested in it because it was part of some military history, but I don't remember the details. I was more excited by the idea of this grand tower sitting here unused by anyone." Zuko looked up into the darkness stretching above, and then back down. Shadow had once again claimed the ground floor while he wasn't paying attention. "Now it just looks dead," he muttered.

"Dead isn't bad," Mai whispered back.

Zuko turned a skeptical look towards her.

She raised a challenging eyebrow. "Well, think about it. If it weren't dead, we wouldn't get to be alone here. There would be soldiers, or lifeguards, or lantern people or someone here to annoy us. And if it were a part of the local social scene, we'd be up to our eyeballs in frisky teenagers."

"Frisky?"

"What?"

Zuko felt a smile twist his face. "Did you just call us frisky?"

Mai stopped, and considered. "Noooo," she eventually said. "We may be here to make-out, but we're not frisky. We will both be very laid back and angst-ridden about whatever romantic encounters we have here. Friskiness is for people like Ty Lee, who don't know how to relax."

Zuko nodded as they continued back up the stairs. "Sounds about right to me."

They reached the top shortly, and Zuko let the flame in his hand die away. Up here, in the Lantern Room, the moonlight passed through the glass walls unimpeded. Mai gave the setting a quick, analytical look before turning her whole attention back to Zuko. "I suppose it's a bit late to ask, now that we're here," she said, "but why was this place abandoned? It wasn't for structural problems, was it?"

Zuko shook his head. "My grandfather did it as part of a series of Reforms. The old was swept away, so that our Glorious Path could continue unimpeded. Lu Ten said that a lot of people were upset about the Fire Nation losing a part of its cherished history, but it was all just useless sentimentality, so nothing came of it."

"Typical," Mai grunted.

"What?"

"You build something, it does everything you want, but then new toys come along and all of the sudden your lighthouse is surplus." Mai turned to look around again, this time focusing beyond the glass walls and onto the sea outside. She produced a knife from somewhere in her summer wear and began twisting it around her fingers. "And people will somehow have the gall to be offended when it falls over onto a fishing yacht and kills a vacationing admiral."

Zuko sighed. "This place is depressing."

"Everywhere is depressing."

"Good point."

Mai turned back to face him again. "Didn't you say something about making out before?"

"Yes."

"Good."


~Death~

The people of Ember Island learned about Fire Lord Zuko's crowning the day after the event itself. That very night, they burned him in effigy. A week later, the local council met and decided that they wouldn't be sending taxes to the Capital, and any collectors who came around would be hung. Afterward, a few of council members went drinking, and the night ended with the group using ex-Minister Quapao's secret stash of blasting jelly to blow up the Ember Island Lighthouse in a vague display of protest. Historians would eventually seize on this act as a colorful fact to include in textbooks about Fire Lord Zuko's early reign.

After the explosion, Quapao and his friends retired to his Haiyuan Shuishou vacation estate, named for a pair of his ancestors who had lived on Ember Island long ago.


~Memory~

"She didn't even need to take a step. Amae merely leaned forward into the night sky, and suddenly the still air was in horrifying motion around her. She saw the sea, and the rocks that its waves battered relentlessly for countless ages, rush toward her, but it was for such a brief amount of time that her mind simply didn't have the opportunity to comprehend it. She died before she even fully made the decision to end her own life.

"Her family never knew that the only marker of their daughter's watery grave was the Fire Nation's oldest standing lighthouse. In truth, they scarcely would have cared.

"And so Amae's story ends, as Fire ends in Ashes.

"Well? What do you think, Sokka?"

"...okay, Mai, it's great that you're trying new hobbies. Seriously, good for you. And, you know, your story isn't incomprehensible or anything. It's a little lacking in Warrior Heroes, and a plot, and meat, but it makes sense. But, really, what makes you think I'd be interested in hearing a made-up tale about a lonely girl who jumps off a lighthouse because her parents won't let her cut all her hair off?"

"...I can't believe I ever thought we could be friends."

"...sorry? So much for world peace and getting along."

END