ZW 2013 Day 5: Bound
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Knots
There's no time like an escape attempt to remind Zuko of his past.
"I'll save you from the pirates," he says, and Katara would give anything to be able to slap him.
Too bad she's being tied to a tree.
When he holds the necklace in front of her, she wants to slap him again, in part because it's her mother's necklace and what right to his dirty Fire Nation hands have to be soiling it, and in part because he's ruined any fantasy she might have had about a boy tying a necklace around her neck. "Go jump in the river," she spits, and he moves away from her, a smirk pulling the corner of his mouth upward.
He's enjoying this. He's enjoying it like the sadistic jerks all Fire Nation people are, and she hates him.
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He doesn't see her at the tea shop, and she thinks she's lucky she tore her eyes away and ran in time, before those gold-yellow spider cat eyes found her. It shouldn't surprise her the way it does; he's been tracking them for a full season now, and as the early spring has burned into late summer, she should have expected him to burn his way into Ba Sing Se. So much for impenetrable city. So he's here now, and of course she has to be the one to see him, to be the bearer of bad news.
Katara bursts in on the Kyoshi Warriors so quickly that she barely sees them. "Thank goodness you're here, Suki. Something terrible is going on. The Fire Nation has infiltrated the city, I just saw Prince Zuko and his uncle! We have to tell the Earth King right away!"
"Oh don't worry. I'll be sure to let him know."
The voice is cold. Katara stops in her tracks.
The leader moves too sinuously to be Suki, where Suki is light on her feet and quick, this girl is steady, measured, like a snake. And then the eyelids flick up, and the eyes looking back at Katara are the gold-yellow spider cat eyes she was running from.
When her chi has been blocked and she's sprawled on the floor, water streaming from the open pouch, Azula leans over her with that curling, vicious, deliberate smirk. "My, what a knot my brother has tied you in. I think it's time for a reunion."
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She nearly leaps at him when he tumbles into the cell, but he seems to feel undignified enough from his entrance. "Why did they throw you in here? Oh, wait, let me guess. It's a trap. So that when Aang shows up to help me, you can finally have him in your little Fire Nation clutches!"
He looks up at her, eyes tinted green by the glowing crystals, but says nothing.
It doesn't take long for him to snap back at her, and from there it doesn't take long for both of them to think of their mothers. She offers to heal him, and he closes his eyes with her hand resting lightly on his face. The chi beneath the scar resists her hand, but she pulls out the spirit water and works out the knots, one by one. When she finishes, he looks a little silly and she barely muffles a giggle. His skin is smooth, matching the other side, but he has no eyebrow and his hairline is uneven. The ear is still slightly misshapen, as if some of it had simply been burned away, and the skin over his face is more textured and a bit puffy. Just the same, it's an improvement.
Zuko opens his eyes tentatively. "Did it work?"
Katara grins. "Pretty much." She looks for a large enough crystal, then leads him to it.
The tears that slide down his face when he sees his reflection are nothing compared to the ones on her face when Azula pays them a visit. "The Avatar is dead." She says nothing else, except to order the Dai Li to remove them in shackles, bound together. "We'll let the Fire Lord have the pleasure of dealing with them." A beat. "I see you've given him a blank canvas again, Zuzu."
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She takes a little too much joy in what happens on their way back to the Fire Nation. Azula, eternally practical, had selected a ship with enough firepower and useless gilding to signify importance but not so much as to draw attention to her royalty. And what self-respecting group of pirates wouldn't attack a lone ship of a middling Fire Nation noble? That seems to be the rationale, anyway, when they storm the ship and throw little grenades in every corner. Happily, one of those corners is the door to Zuko and Katara's cell.
They make it out to the deck, where Azula is standing calmly, shooting lightning at any pirate who shows his face (and even some who turn tail and run). Uncle is nowhere to be seen, but Zuko likes to think he's back in Ba Sing Se worrying about him. Or so he's implied to Katara a few times. So she grabs his arm and pulls him over the side when Azula isn't looking, because even the omnipotent princess can't hold off a horde of pirates and keep her prisoners in line.
Zuko gives her a look that is one part terror and one part respect. "What are you doing?!"
"Don't worry, Zuko," she says as their feet hit the water and the area freezes around their feet. She pushes them away from the ship, speeding through the open sea. "I'll save you from the pirates."
Zuko hates her. She can see it in his face, especially now that his eyebrow is growing a little. She's enjoying it, though.
A/N: This was fun. Not what I planned, but I like it better anyway. Updates may come slower than they used to for a while. I'm working an extra job and planning a wedding so writing hasn't really been happening.
