A/N: You guyes have been so wonderful, taking the time to read and review. Thanks ever so much for all your love and praise. I'm so glad to know I'm not the only one still hung up on Zutara.

Brightest Nights or Darkest Days

By Kittenshift17

CHAPTER NINE

By nightfall, they were both tired and cranky. Zuko glared at the Water Bender he'd been coerced into travelling with. It had been many long hours since he'd pressed her into the wall before dawn and kissed her until his groin ached. It felt like it had been even longer since he'd had a decent sleep.

He was tried; he was cranky because the wind was picking up again and looked like it might force them back the way they'd come; and he was thinking about throttling the littler Water Bender. She flip-flopped between chattering animatedly, even when he didn't want to talk – something that reminded him a little too much of his Uncle – and being as cranky and volatile in her mood swings as Zuko himself.

He was cold and he was sick of plodding through the snow, even after Katara used her Bending to clear them a path. He wanted to go home. He wanted the security of his ship from before his crew had been confiscated and the ship blown up - before he'd been labelled a traitor. He wanted to warmth of the Palace in the Fire Nation from before he'd been banished. He wanted a warm bed on soft downy pillows and to not have to lug around enough furs and warm clothing to hang himself with.

Worst of all, he wanted the intoxicating feel of that chatty little Water Bender pressed against every inch of him until he couldn't tell where his body and his chi ended or where hers began. He wanted to crawl back into his sleeping bag and hold the little brat until he was warm and then he wanted to strangle her for being such a pain in the ass.

And that, he decided, was a problem. He shouldn't be this intrigued by her. It might have been a long time since he'd had a girlfriend and it might've been even longer since he'd laid a hand on a woman he didn't have to pay for the privilege - something he was extremely bitter over - but he shouldn't be this interested in the bloody Water Bender. Pretty or not, she was the enemy. Well, not the enemy, but she was working with the Avatar and if Zuko ever wanted to return home, he would have to capture or kill the Avatar to do it. He was thinking Katara wouldn't be too pleased with him for either option and so it simply wouldn't do to go getting attached.

"We should make camp," the annoying distraction said. Zuko did his level best to tear his eyes from her ass, which he'd been ogling as she walked in front of him to bend the snow out of their way.

"Here?" he asked sceptically, glancing around the area and seeing nothing but snow covered trees and boulders. "There's no cover. We need to find a cave or something. My tent isn't going to hold up against the wind if it picks up any more."

She smirked at him over her shoulder.

"Come with me," she said. Zuko watched her step off the road and away towards some of the trees. He wasn't in the mood for a demonstration or some argument about sleeping outdoors, even if there really wasn't another option.

"What are you doing?" he demanded.

"Just watch," she smiled. "You're about to get a lesson on Southern Water Tribe housing structures."

Zuko raised his only eyebrow, not at all liking the idea of whatever she might consider a house when she was some peasant from the bottom of the world. He watched in silence as she began to Water Bend, pulling the snow from the surrounding area and turning it to ice. It took shape slowly; a small, domed structure made entirely of ice. There was a narrow archway that pass for the entrance and a small hole in the top, which Zuko suspected was to allow air in and smoke out. He recalled seeing such structures at the South Pole when he'd first located the Avatar.

"Why is it so small?" he asked, frowning when she completed her Bending with a pleased smile.

"The smaller sizer helps keep the heat in," she explained. "If I made it big - the size of a palace or something, there would be more of the structure to heat. An igloo this small can be heated with body heat alone, if there isn't anything to burn to make a fire. Of course, we have plenty of kindling for a fire, but since there is only the two of us, and it's only for this evening, there's not much point making something bigger. We only need enough room to sleep and to have a small camp fire to keep us warm and cook something for dinner."

Zuko rolled his eyes at her practicality.

"You live in one of these where you come from?" he asked her.

"Yes," she nodded proudly. "I've never been able to make one with my Bending before. Or more accurately, I've never had to. Before I met Aang and left the South Pole, I was still very new to my bending. Since then, a tent has always sufficed. It's nice to be able to use my bending to make my own house, though. Come on, help me find some kindling to make a fire."

She strode to a nearby tree, picking sticks up from the ground that had been exposed as a result of her bending the snow that had been piled on top of them.

"All of this is damp," he grumbled. "It will take forever for it to light."

He watched with no small amount of annoyance when she used her Bending to pull all the water from the sodden wood until it was dry as bone. When they had enough wood to last the night, she crawled through the small archway and into the structure. Zuko sighed before following her. He didn't have high hopes for it being warm or comfortable. When he crawled into the igloo behind her, he hid his surprise. It was roomier inside that he'd expected. Nothing like his quarters on his ship, but by no means a closet.

She was using her Bending to create a fire pit from the snow on the ground inside the igloo, leaving the space dry and free of the wet stuff he was already sick of.

"I miss the sun," he complained, dumping his bag and his pile of wood on the floor and nudging her out of the way when he saw her attempting to make a fire. Obviously she'd forgotten for a moment that he was a Fire Bender and that fire stones weren't necessary.

She didn't complain at the touch. Zuko noted that she simply moved over to her bag and withdrew what he suspected was usually her tarp. She laid it out on the ground on one side of the fire pit as a ground cover before unrolling her sleeping bag on top of it. He hid a smirk when he watched her help herself to his sleeping bag, unrolling it next to hers and puttering about the small structure. Ordinarily he would've protested anyone touching his things, but the way she did it, without even a thought of how it might annoy him, amused him more than it should. That, and he kind of like the fact that she rolled them out next to each other, either intending to sleep right next to him or planning to share his with him as she'd done the night before. If he was being honest, Zuko didn't even know which he'd prefer.

Sharing with her was warm and her body heat was filling him with his Bending power once more, replacing his need for the sun to awaken his powers and maintain them. On the other hand, he shouldn't be wanting to crawl into his sleeping bag beside this girl he barely knew – especially when they'd tried to kill each other in the past. Zuko shook his head, beginning to suspect he had a problem that would likely take years of therapy to unravel whenever he got back home. If he ever got back home.

It was clear to him as he set up the fire and used his bending to light it, that Katara felt more at home in one of these things than she did anywhere else. When she began humming to herself whilst unpacking her bag, fishing out pots and pans and a small knife, Zuko looked on with a strange sense of amusement niggling at him. Since his ship and his crew had been confiscated, he'd grown used to having to cook his own food - something he was not very good at. But there was something about watching her that cured some of his bad mood. She looked entirely too content inside the small, icy dome.

He watched as she sliced up some vegetables before bending water from outside and channelling it into a stewing pot. She followed it with some meat, throwing it all into the pot and setting it over the fire to stew. Zuko glanced around, wondering what he should be doing. In the palace and aboard his ship, his food had simply been delivered to him. When he'd been on his own and with his Uncle, he'd had to help with the cooking process but Katara seemed much more efficient at cooking than him or Iroh. Shrugging to himself, he took the teapot from his belongings and crawled back out of the igloo. It wasn't ideal to have to melt the snow himself but he piled a few handfuls of the powdery stuff into the pot and crawled back into the dome before fire bending it to make tea.

She glanced at him a few times, offering him hunks of vegetables and pieces of bread to nibble on as she cooked their evening meal.

"You live like this, don't you, Water Bender?" Zuko asked a little while later when he resorted to sitting on his sleeping bag and sipping his tea.

"Yes," she smiled. "When the men of my tribe went off to war, there were only the women and children and the elderly too old to fight who were left behind. Most of the women were pregnant, so I got used to having to care for the children, pick up after Sokka, mind my Gran-Gran and do most of the chores. Honestly, being inside this thing is the closest I've come to feeling at home in a long time."

"You didn't feel at home when you were at the North Pole?" he frowned.

She looked up at him for a moment, stirring the stew and eyeing him strangely.

"No," she admitted. "I didn't really notice at the time but now that I think about it, I didn't feel at home there. You came to my village in the South Pole. You saw how we lived. Igloos and tents were the extent of what we could build. Without any capable water benders and with so few materials at our disposal, we had to build them by hand. At the North Pole it was like being in any other city made from stone or wood. It might've been made of ice, but the buildings were modelled on Earth Kingdom homes. They just didn't feel the way this does."

"You mean this one-roomed, tiny dome of ice where you sleep on a fur on the floor, rather than on a real bed or even a sleeping platform?" he scoffed.

"I could make a sleeping platform, but it would be made of ice and would melt under our body heat if we slept on it," she pointed out.

Zuko supposed she had a point. He watched as she returned her attention to their dinner, humming a song he'd never heard.

"What are you humming?" he asked when his curiosity got the best of him. Uncle had a tendency to hum too, while he drank his tea or played Pi Shoh. He could usually pick the song and recall the words when Uncle did it, but Katara hummed songs he didn't know.

"A Water Tribe song," she said, looking up at him again. "I didn't even realise I was humming. It's something Gran-Gran used to do when she was doing her chores. Am I bothering you?"

"No," Zuko shook her head. "I just don't know the song so I can't imagine the words."

"Would you like to hear them?" she asked, looking surprised by his friendlier tone given that he'd been snapping at her all day.

Zuko thought about it.

"Are you any good at singing?" he asked.

She snorted.

"Sometimes, I manage to forget that you're a prince," she chuckled. "Then you say something that defies what everyone else would consider manners and I remember again."

"Why? Because I didn't agree to listen to you singing without finding out if you're rubbish at it?" he frowned.

"Yes. Most people would politely decline if they didn't want to listen, or suffer through listening in silence, even if I was terrible. You rudely ask if I'm any good before deigning to accept or decline the offer to hear one of the songs of my people."

"Well, I don't want to listen if you're rotten at it. Why torture myself?"

Katara laughed and Zuko wondered if she found his words genuinely amusing or if she was laughing at him for being rude.

"I have an alright singing voice," she said. "At least, by Water Tribe standards. Do you want me to sing, or can I go back to humming, your highness?"

Zuko made a face at the way she spoke the address of someone befitting his royal birth. For some reason the idea of having her call him that made him uncomfortable.

"I was stripped of my titled when I was banished, Water Bender," he sighed. "My Uncle may refer to me as Prince Zuko as a formality but I'm technically no longer the Prince of the Fire Nation. Until I reclaim my honour and restore myself in my Father's eyes – which I must do if I ever want to reclaim my throne - I'm just a banished Fire Bender. You don't have to call me 'Your Highness'."

She snorted at his explanation and Zuko frowned before realising when she shot him a bemused look at that she'd had no intention of referring to him by his title in a respectful manner. She'd done so to annoy him because he was being a snobby bastard. Zuko found his lips twitching in amusement rather than anger as she stirred their stew once more.

"Don't give me that look," he chided, smirking. "Now sing for me, peasant."

"Call me peasant again and see where it gets you," she retorted. "I might not be some fancy princess by Fire Nation standards, but I am daughter of the Tribe Chieftain."

"Head peasant is still a peasant," Zuko smirked at her.

She threw a spoon at him. Zuko dodged it easily even as he began to laugh. He waited in silence after that, watching her gather her courage to the idea of singing out loud with him listening. He didn't delude himself to think that it was as simple as opening her mouth and letting the words out. He'd been pressed by his uncle many times during their four years searching before they'd found the Avatar to sing out loud with other people listening. It hadn't gone well.

When she did finally open her mouth, her voice wasn't bad. It wasn't anything to write home about, but she could carry a tune well enough. She sang in a haunting high voice, weaving a tail about a young Water Bender's fight for the freedom to marry who she wanted to, rather than who her Tribe Chieftain chose for her. Zuko listened silently, closing his eyes to better hear her song and ingest the words. He could tell she was grateful that he'd done so when her voice grew a little stronger and surer without his gaze fixed on her.

He listened and he waited for the song to end, realising even as she sang that though her people were considered little more than peasants in the eyes of his people, their culture was rich and expressive. More so than his own. The Fire Nation might once have been a place where singing and stories and great tales of love and loss were born – at least, that's what Uncle said – but the Nation he recalled knew nothing of such things.

When she trailed off at the end of the song, Zuko opened his eyes to watch her once more. Her cheeks were flushed slightly, perhaps with embarrassment, perhaps with happiness at the recollection of her people. It bothered him a little that he didn't have any fond memories of his own people the way she seemed to. All of his memories of his time at the palace involved his father being horrid; his sister being cruel; his grandfather being utterly dismissive and his mother being taken away from him.

~O~O~O~O~O~O~O~O~O~O~O~O~O~O~O~

Katara bit her bottom lip amid the silence that followed her performance. She used her bending to channel some of the stew into cups for each of them when it was ready, noticing idly that Zuko seemed to have reacted poorly to her song. Not as though he hadn't liked it or that he thought she was a terrible singer.

His brow was furrowed into a deep frown and he watched her without seeming to see her. His eyes flashed occasionally with warring emotions and she suspected that his glimpse into life in the Southern Water Tribe had triggered memories, good and bad, of his own Nation's traditions and legends. From the look on his face, she was thinking most of them were unpleasant.

When she tried to hand him the cup of stew, he didn't take it and Katara frowned.

"Zuko?" she asked softly, setting down her own cup and touching his arm lightly.

He blinked as he came back to himself, his eyes darting to hers and one of his fists clenching, ready to bend at her should she prove a threat. She held his cup out to him in silence before handing him a hunk of bread to dip into it when he took it from her.

"Thanks," he muttered, looking down at the food.

Katara thought about trying to make conversation, but she doubted she was going to get much out of him. He was frowning even as he tore into his bread and began dipping it into his stew. Her stomach was cramping with hunger too, after the long day spent walking, carrying her heavy pack, and bending the snow from their path so that they wouldn't lose their way. Tolerating Zuko's foul temper and bitter moodiness whilst doing so had left her with quite the appetite. She found herself tucking into her stew heartily, going back for a second helping when the first was gone.

Zuko did the same, looking like the long day had taken something out of him, too. It had been a long time since he'd woken her trying to sneak out of the sleeping bags to steal supplies and Katara was ready to turn in as soon as she'd finished eating. Moving the stew-pot from over the heat of the fire and covering it, she figured that letting it continue to stew overnight would make it taste all the better, come morning.

Night had well and truly fallen when she took both of their cups and crawled to the entrance of the igloo she'd made, bending more snow to rinse their cups before returning.

"The wind is picking up out there again," she said quietly to Zuko when she returned. "Do you want me to close off the entrance completely?"

"What would you usually do?" Zuko asked.

"If I was at home and a blizzard was coming – before I discovered my bending – I'd have had to work with the others to ensure we wouldn't all be frozen inside our homes and trapped. The entrances would be kept clear of ice and snow, covered with animal skins to block out most of the wind. Now that I can bend, sealing the entrance almost all the way won't be an issue. The only thing we have to worry about is making sure that there's enough air for the two of us and to maintain the fire."

"Isn't that what the air hole at the top does?" he asked.

Katara nodded. "I'll have to keep an eye on that to make sure it doesn't close up during the night, but I want to leave the entrance open a little for the air flow. But not all the way. Who knows what the scent of our food might lure out of the woods? In this weather, I don't imagine many of the wild creatures are faring very well. We don't want to end up with an Armadillo-Bear trying to burst in on us during the night."

Zuko nodded.

"Block it most of the way. Do the walls need reinforcing to withstand another blizzard?" he asked.

"I don't think so. They're two feet thick all the way around. Unless a tree blows over and lands on it, it will hold," Katara said seriously, bending the snow to partially close the entrance. It went against her nature to do so, given what she learned in the South Pole as a girl, but she did it with the knowledge that she could liquefy the entire igloo if need be.

When she turned to look back at Zuko, he was in the process of stripping out of his coat and his other layers of clothing until he wore only his sleeveless tunic and his pants. Katara sighed tiredly before doing the same. She froze in the process of pulling her coats off until she wore nothing but her tunic, when Zuko suddenly started sniggering.

"What are you laughing at?" she demanded, turning questioning eyes on him and finding him watching her as he laughed.

"I forgot about that," he commented.

"What?" she asked.

He crooked a finger at her and Katara narrowed her eyes on him, not at all liking the wickedly amused expression on his face. Shuffling closer across the sleeping bags, she watched him lean toward her and prod the side of her neck.

"You've got a love-bite," he laughed. "Right here."

Katara's cheeks heated immediately as she clapped a hand over it in mortification before remembering that he was the one who'd given it to her.

"You gave me a love bite?" she hissed furiously.

Zuko laughed even harder at her sudden fury, looking like she'd told the best joke he'd heard in years. He nodded as he laughed, watching with amusement as Katara clawed at her own flesh, wishing she had a mirror to inspect her reflection.

"When the soldier was questioning us this morning," he said. "I forgot I did it until just now."

She was sure her cheeks were crimson as she shoved at him in annoyance.

"Well, don't do it again!" she snapped. "Imagine if we ran into Sokka and Aang right now! They'd kill you."

Zuko had the audacity to roll his eyes.

"They couldn't if they tried, Water Bender. And I'll do whatever I have to if it makes this," he wiggled a finger between the two of them. "Look more legitimate that you're my girlfriend. If it will save us, I'll do it as often as I need to."

Katara narrowed her eyes on him in annoyance.

"Sometimes, I really don't like you," she grumbled before pulling the rest of her things off until she was dressed in only her pants and her sarashi wraps on the top half. It was entirely too hot in the small igloo with their fire crackling away merrily under Zuko's supervision.

"I know," he smirked. "What? You're sleeping naked with me now, too?"

He eyed her lithe form critically.

"Don't be a jerk!" Katara snapped. "It's warm enough in here that I was sweating in my coat. I don't imagine being in a sleeping bag will be pleasant when it's this warm in here. And who said anything about sleeping with you?"

Zuko scowled at her.

"I did, Water Bender. If you want to pull off the idea of pretending to be my girlfriend, you'll have to share a bed with me."

"There's no one here to see if we do or we don't," Katara argued. "The last two nights were spent that way because it was too cold not to."

"And when I do this?" he asked.

Using his bending, he dimmed the fire to a soft glow.

"Why would you do that?" she asked, frowning.

"Because the walls of this thing are beginning to melt," he said. He pressed his hand to the icy wall before showing her the moisture upon his palm.

"If I open the door again, it will cool back down," she suggested. "We never had this problem at the South Pole."

"That's probably because your whole continent was made of ice and snow. You're on the ground here, rather than an ice flow. And if you open the door, who knows what kind of critters will get in?"

"Won't the fire go out if we burn it that low?" she asked.

"Not if I keep an eye on it," Zuko said.

"What about when you fall asleep?"

Zuko rolled his eyes.

"It's not cold enough that we'll die without waking up, Water Bender. I'll just use my bending to re-light it if it goes out."

Katara huffed out a breath.

"I still don't see why I would have to sleep in your sleeping bag with you again when it's warm enough that sharing body heat isn't necessary for survival," Katara said stubbornly.

"You draw your bending power form the moon, right? Zuko asked. Katara frowned at him.

"You know I do," she said.

"And I draw mine from the sun," he said. "Only, there hasn't been any sun for weeks now."

"It's there, behind the clouds," Katara frowned, unsure what that had to do with sharing a sleeping bag.

"It is, but it's weak. Meaning that my bending is decreasing in power. I have to find another means in this infernal blizzard for maintaining a relative level of heat inside myself to be able to bend."

"Every time I touch you, it's like touching a furnace," Katara rolled her eyes.

"For you. Not for me," he said. "I'm still cold, even with the walls sweating in here. Absorbing your body heat and generating more with you is probably the only thing that allows me to keep bending, right now. This blizzard has a spirit world feel to it and I'm thinking it's invoked with the need to rid the world of Fire Benders until the war is over."

"You think you'd lose your power without sharing body heat with me?" Katara asked, surprised at the idea.

"I wouldn't lose it forever, just until the blizzard ends. Like a solar eclipse, too long without the sun and Fire Benders are diminished in their power. If there was ever a way to slow the wheels of war, this will be it. Without bending, most Fire Nation soldiers don't know much hand-to-hand fighting."

"What's to stop them from just snuggling with people to maintain their power?" Katara asked.

"Most people don't know how to draw their power like that, and most wouldn't be willing to do it because it limits the ability Bend without that person as the replacement source," Zuko shrugged.

"Is this a chi thing?" Katara frowned at him.

"Noticed that, did you?" he asked, rather than answering.

"I thought it was just me. Whenever I get close or touch you, like this, I can feel…." She trailed off as she reached over and touched his arm, her chi sliding against his immediately.

"Feels like my chi envelopes yours, doesn't it? Zuko asked quietly, looking at her strangely.

"Yes," she said. "Is that because you're somehow drawing power from me?"

Zuko shook his head.

"No. I don't know what that is. I'd have to ask my Uncle. I've never heard of it happening with anyone else, and I've never had it happen with any other Bender."

Katara blinked at him.

"You feel it too, right?" she asked, subconsciously moving closer to him as their chi brushed and touched so intimately.

Zuko nodded. "But it's not because I'm drawing power from you by stealing your body heat. There's an art to doing that, which most fire benders don't know about. Uncle told me about it a long time ago and I tried it when I touched you the other night. Fire Bending requires a heat source. Like the other elements, the material that I bend has to come from somewhere. Generally, that fire is created through rage and anger manifesting as fire, but the fire still comes from inside me. I give it life, I fuel it. You simply Bend water. I create fire to bend it. But if a Fire Bender is too cold and kept away from the sun for too long, the ability to make it diminishes – like running out of energy."

"Are you saying Fire Benders are solar powered?" Katara asked, raising one eyebrow. She barely noticed the way she'd began tracing patterns over his forearms with her fingertips as she spoke to him.

"Not in so blunt a fashion, but yes," he frowned. "We draw our power from the sun because it is the life-giving energy that fuels our bodies, as it fuels the rest of the world."

"So how are you using my heat to fuel your fire?" she wanted to know.

"I learned how to maintain the fire energy within me, even when I'm not manifesting and bending it. Uncle taught me. It's always there, but if I'm cold and tired, it dims. Stealing your warmth, like this, means I warm up and the energy returns." He tugged her closer as he spoke, moving her until she was pressed against the length of his tall, wiry frame. His hands were hot as he slid them over the exposed skin of her midriff and Katara felt her heart rate rising even as her cheeks flushed pink.

"This is why you keep dragging me into your sleeping bag?" she asked.

He nodded, keeping a firm grip on her as he laid back on their sleeping bags and pulled her along with him until she was stretched out on top of him.

"You realise that if anyone knew about this, they'd have a heart attack, right?" Katara asked him.

"I'm not exactly going to go blabbing to your brother or the Avatar, Water Bender," Zuko said quietly.

"No, but we'll both know."

"Are you going to keep talking and being so tense, or are you going to let me sleep?" he demanded, lifting his head to glare at her. Katara propped her chin against his sternum to glare back at him.

"I can't sleep on top of you, Zuko. It's weird. And it will make both of us stiff, come morning."

"My track record so far suggests I'll be stiff either way," he replied.

Katara swatted him.

"Must you be vulgar?" she demanded.

"I take perverse pleasure in seeing you blush," he retorted.

"Oh, for crying out loud!" Katara grumbled, attempting to roll off him and failing when he held her firm on top of him.

"Stop squirming," he complained. "Just hold still and let me siphon your heat enough that if I wanted to, I could roast you alive."

"I'd rather you didn't," she said.

"Didn't roast you, or didn't steal your heat?"

"Would you let me go? It's too hot for cuddling."

"Only a Water Bender would complain it's too hot in the middle of a blizzard," Zuko said.

Katara made a noise of frustration, swatting him again when he began to laugh, still refusing to release her.

"You're insufferable," she accused, wriggling in his grip some more and managing to slide to one side of his body though both her arm and her leg where still thrown across him and she still laid half on top of him.

"Comfortable now?" he asked.

"No," Katara said. "Would you stop being so clingy?"

"I was out in the bloody blizzard all day, Water Bender. I'm freezing, even in here. Be grateful I'm not suggesting you strip naked to better share all of your body heat with me, rather than just some of it."

"Again with the vulgarity?" she demanded.

Zuko grinned in response, a wicked expression that made her insides twist over.

"You kind of like it," he accused. "Don't bother denying it. You blush every time I mention it and I didn't hear any protest to kissing me this morning."

"I didn't have much choice, did I?" she argued.

"Of course you did. You could have killed that soldier and run for it."

"You sprang at me out of nowhere and kissed me before I even realised it was you," Katara protested and Zuko began to laugh at her indignation. Katara realised, belatedly, that he was enjoying antagonising her.

After the wretched mood he'd been in all day, she couldn't say she minded all that much.

"Didn't stop you kissing me back though, did it?" he teased.

Katara nipped him, turning her head and nipping his chest in punishment.

"Ouch!" he protested, though it sounded feigned.

"Serves you right," she huffed, hiding a smile of her own against his shoulder. It amused her more than it should to learn that the serious, angry prince of the Fire Nation actually had a playful side.

"I'm not above flipping you and making it so that you'll have another reason for needing to drink that tea from now on, Water Bender," he threatened and Katara laughed. She couldn't help it. A giggle escaped her before she could contain it and she laughed out loud at the very idea.

He started laughing too when she laughed so much she kicked her legs with glee. Rolling to her back as she laughed all the harder, she felt Zuko prop himself up on one shoulder, watching her as she positively rolled on the floor at his threat.

"It wasn't that funny a suggestion, Katara," he protested, still chuckling.

She'd almost had herself under control but at his words she dissolved into giggles once more.

"How am I meant to get any sleep with you giggling and writhing around like squirrel-snake?" he demanded, and Katara laughed even more.

Shaking her head at him, still laughing, she wriggled closer until she was pressed to his side once more, a quiver rushing through her when he slid his hand slowly across her stomach, his warmth making her ache strangely. When she finally got her laughter under control, he was leaning over her slightly, watching her as though she was a complex puzzle he was trying to solve. Katara smiled at him softly and his eyes darted to her lips.

She licked them self-consciously, tension fizzing between them suddenly. He was so close, and kissing him had felt so good that morning. Without conscious thought to do so, she found herself reaching for him, tangling her hand into the hair at the nape of his neck. He didn't flinch back or pull away from her touch and Katara watched his golden eyes jump between her lips and her own blue eyes, his expression a mixture of hunger, intrigue and guarded worry, as though he weren't sure they should be kissing again, but wanted to do so nonetheless.

Carefully, he lowered his lips to hers, capturing them softly, tasting her mouth slowly. The brush of his lips against hers made her heart race inside her chest and the feel of his chi curling around her own nearly made her delirious. Pressing up against him more fully, fisting his hair to hold him against her, Katara kissed him hungrily, needily. After so long without human contact of any kind before she'd approached him, her body seemed bent on making up for lost time.

His hand on her stomach curled further around, pressing to the small of her back and moulding her to him firmly. Katara felt the strangest urge to wrap her legs around him and she realised then that she was in trouble. It was one thing to kiss him for the sake of their safety in front of Fire Nation soldiers. It was entirely another to do so in private, with no one to perform for and no reason for it other than simple want.

Without conscious thought, she found herself peeling him out of his shirt, snagging the hem and dragging it up, over his chest. She broke the kiss as she pull the garment off over his head and he shifted to discard it completely before pulling her to him and kissing her once more. Katara's breath came in soft gasps as he claimed her lips once more, his hands hot as they pulled her closer, his bare chest almost too warm to touch.

Just as she felt his hands sliding up over her ribs heading for the bindings on her chest, there was a sudden thump against the wall of the igloo, followed by the sound of rapidly pounding fists.

"HELP! HELP US!"