Author's notes: GAH this one was hard. I hope that it came out alright.

Truc was meditating with the kids again.

"Come on! Do it with us!" Dechen had begged, tugging on Yun's hand. Truc had joked that one day he was going to force him to join them. Yun had just smiled, even though the thought of meditating…or the memory of what had happened the last time…filled him with a cold dread.

It was a pity, really. He was seriously lacking in inner peace these days.

Instead, he had gotten into the habit of visiting Jamyang in the big tent during these sessions. She would always be working on some clothes or craft to sell in the towns that they visited. Most of the time the two of them sat in companionable silence. She had a very calming presence that put Yun at ease.

Today she was painting a thangka. "Sure there's nothing I can do to help?" he asked, watching as she methodically moved the paintbrush across the cotton.

"No. But I could teach you how to paint your own, if you'd like."

Yun only shrugged, watching as she worked. She was painting some sort of spirit-creature that he didn't recognize.

Jamyang began to hum, as she often did while she worked. Yun frowned. This particular song seemed familiar, but it took a long moment until, with a start, he suddenly placed the simple tune.

"Where did you learn that song?" he asked, as casually as he could.

"Hmm? My ayi used to sing it to me. Why?"

"No reason. It just…I've heard it before, where I'm from." He shrugged, forcing a grin. "Guess your ayi must have traveled around there at some point."

Jamyang smiled wanly. "Ayi never traveled. She lived in a village called Yongbao, near the fork in the Lonzeq River."

"Oh." Yun had never been there, but it was only a short trip from Makapu, so the musical overlap wasn't too surprising. He frowned again, then asked, "Sorry, I'm confused. Are we talking about an Air Nomad, or do you have family from the Earth Kingdom?"

"She wasn't my family by blood. She took me in after my family was killed by daofei. "

"...Oh," Yun said. Then, feeling that was insufficient, he added, "I'm sorry."

His mind wandered back to the Fifth Nation, and the slaves that he had seen on that iceberg. "Daofei," he murmured. "Someone needs to…"

He trailed off. To his own surprise, he felt a pang of guilt. He had to remind himself that Jamyang had been orphaned before he was born, and anyway…it was Kyoshi's job to fix the daofei problem. Not his.

"So does that mean you grew up there? In Yongbao?"

She nodded. "Until I was about eighteen. That's when our tribe passed through the area. I went out to see them...and a few weeks later, I decided to leave with them."

"Your tribe? I didn't know Air Nomads had those."

"They're not quite like the ones in the Earth Kingdom. They tend to be pretty loose; people join and leave them all the time. Truc grew up traveling with them, but he and I decided to go off on our own a few years after we were married. We joined them again for a few years, back before Aparna was born." She put down the paintbrush and blew gently on the thangka. "They'll be on Quidong Island, for Avatar Zerdan's festival."

"Is that why you're going? To join them again?"

"Not permanently. Just for a few days. Think of it as a family reunion."

She looked up at him and smiled softly. He smiled too, with a sense of relief. He had grown attached to this little Air Nomad family, and at least for now, he wanted to stay with them. A tribe of other Air Nomads would complicate that arrangement.

Jamyang hesitated. "That song is a lullaby," she observed.

The smile slipped from Yun's face as looked down at the floor. "Yeah. My mother used to sing it."

He didn't meet her eye, but he saw her nod, slowly, at the periphery of his vision.

"she died," he added bluntly. "A long time ago."

"I'm sorry."

"Yeah, well...now you know why you're stuck babysitting me." He tried to inject an ironic tone into his words, but the result was strained.

"Don't talk that way, Trishna," she said, and Yun was surprised by the firmness in her voice. "Look at me."

He looked up. Jamyang's dark eyes were kind but steely.

"Truc and I have come to care about you quite a bit in a short amount of time. And the kids love you. So don't imagine that you're burdening us." She paused. "As long as you're with us, you can consider yourself a part of this family. And whenever you decide to leave...you'll still be a part of this family, the same way that my ayi and our tribe are. Do you understand?"

"Alright. Thanks," he added stupidly.

She smiled again. Yun cleared his throat and stood up.

"Anyway...thanks for the talk. I'm going to bed."

"Alright. Goodnight."

"Yeah."

He headed out and scurried quickly into the tent that he shared with Norbu, sitting down on his bed and exhaling slowly.

He felt exhausted, more mentally than physically. It occurred to him that that was the first time that he had talked about his family in years. People had asked about them, sometimes, but Yun didn't have much to say, and less that he actually wanted to.

He suddenly thought about Kyoshi, who had been similarly tight-lipped about her own parents. Given her hatred of outlaws, Yun's personal theory was that they had been killed by daofei. And then she had been taken in by Kelsang. Like Jamyang's story in reverse.

He had always sort of wondered about that. The way that he understood it, Kelsang had met some random street kid in Yokoya and just decided to adopt her. Yun was kind of jealous about that. Nobody ever did that for him, until...Jianzhu...

He closed his eyes and clenched his fist. Then he laid down, still in his clothes and on top of his blanket.

Well...he had his own Kelsang now. A whole family of them. At least for a while. Until he figured out what to do long-term.

He listened to the silence of the night. Truc and the kids were still meditating. It would be a little while before Norbu came to bed.

Quietly, Yun began to hum, trying to remember that old lullaby, until he drifted off to sleep.