A/N: Apparently I don't know how to stick to an idea! Working through a bit of writer's block as I work on a multi-chaptered, post-canon Taang fic, I wanted to just put something down on paper. So - this happened! Never really attempted to write anything involving Zuko and Katara exclusively, so we'll see if this came off as absolute nonsense or not. Positioned between 'Southern Raiders' and 'Ember Island Players', just a little one-shot. I always wondered if Zuko had odd tendencies from spending so much time at sea and then on the road with Iroh - and alone. Compared to the Gaang who always had each other to watch their backs and split up the difficulties of being on the run, Zuko must have developed some habits and patterns on his own.
It had begun early.
All of them had noticed it, even if they pretended it was normal. There was no use in making a big show of questioning things. After all, they had just reached a tentative alliance and there was enough work to be done in regards to that. Some odd habits here and there were much lower on the priority list.
But they did not stop.
If anything, the extent of them grew over time. Most of the behaviors were subtle, perhaps by design. Of course Katara was the first to really pick up on them. Being the de facto mother of the Gaang made certain things more plain to her. She was a bit more … attuned to everyone's emotional and mental well being. Even if sometimes she was a bit off the mark, she cared. And there was a lower percentile chance of her saying something demonstrably off-putting or stupid than the others.
They had all agreed that it was best to wait for the right time to speak to him about it. Between running from Azula and the bevy of field trips, there was never any time to do much besides keep up their spirits, train and try to be ready for the coming of Sozin's Comet.
But finally - they were relatively safe. Zuko had been right. Who would go looking for the Gaang at the old, summer abode of the Fire Lord himself?
It took a few days for them all to settle in. Most of their concerns died off after a couple of nights without - miraculously - anyone trying to capture or kill them. Even so deep in the territory of the Fire Nation, they seemed … safe. Somewhere in the back of Katara's mind she wondered if that was because, as Zuko had said, no one thought to come looking for the Gaang here or -
Or if the Fire Nation was marshaling it's forces to invade.
It was their fourth day on Ember Island, and she shook her head to push away the thoughts of Fire Nation vessels gushing with black smoke, churning a path across the ocean. That wouldn't happen. Aang was going to overcome Ozai and restore balance to the world. He had to.
But the graceful, grey eyes of the Avatar were not at the forefront of her mind.
The sun was taking its time setting. There was a splay of orange and gold across the island, casting shadows that sat short on the sand. Briefly, Katara was reminded of the autumn and winter at the South Pole where shadows would drag, seemingly, until the horizon. A hand blocked her brow as she gazed out toward the dying light, humming as she couldn't help but think the sun was so much … larger here in the Fire Nation. More powerful. She couldn't tell if she liked that feeling or not.
Zuko had followed his dinner-time pattern to a tee. As it had been since the Western Air Temple, he only ate after everyone else had filled their bowl - and when he did eat? It was gone in seconds. On a purely gastrointestinal level, it was remarkable the way in which the Prince was able to consume so much food so quickly - and even with a degree of grace. Idly, Katara had wondered if that was something they taught you in the Royal Family.
It was still strange to her. The idea that their longtime foe was not only on their side now, and not only Aang's teacher alongside her and Toph, but was … royalty. Whatever that really meant for the Fire Nation. As far as she was concerned the whole concept would be better off thrown overboard.
Zuko had followed his dinner-time pattern to a tee. After waiting, without any prodding or issue, to eat last - and immediately cleaning his bowl - he got up and gave a short farewell to search for 'supplies'. Everytime, since the Air Temple, he had done the same thing. At first she had thought it was simply to try to ingratiate himself to the rest of them. An attempt to make himself useful, indispensable even. At the time it had boiled her blood, forcing up a new kind of disdain for him. It was something she had not thought possible at the time, considering he had once been adamant in trying to capture Aang.
And he had betrayed her.
Brief memories of light trickling down from crystals flashed in her mind. She willed them away.
Every evening after dinner Zuko left the group to go … forage, she presumed. Sometimes he came back with something - fish, a bird or two, eggs, firewood, remarkably decent tea leaves - and sometimes he came back with nothing. He was quieter when he returned empty-handed.
That had been the first of the behaviors that they had all wondered about.
Dragging her heels slightly along the soft sands of Ember Island's beach, Katara cast her gaze along the coast. Aang and Toph were likely finishing a post-dinner bout of earthbending. They had developed something of an evening pattern for their practice, since Zuko demanded that Aang perform his firebending training with as much sunlight as possible. A funny parallel, she had thought the first time he mentioned it. Her mind had flashed back to their battle at the Spirit Oasis.
"You rise with the moon. I rise with the sun."
Again, she blinked and waved her head to and fro. It jostled the pins that held her hair back. A lost cause, she reached up and undid the knot and braid that kept her hair up. It fell down in a simple part, pushed back by her palms that were a touch damp from the nearby seawater.
With one hand in her hair, trying to get it to stay out of her face amidst the early evening, coastal wind - she saw him. The dying light of the sun-set cast him in a fierce glow, his body illuminated in profile as he stood atop a rocky outcropping at the edge of the beach. At first she thought he may have been an intruder - a fire nation spy, an agent of Ozai tracking them.
But his movements were etched into her mind.
She blinked once again, telling herself it was because of spending months fighting him off. Keeping him from capturing Aang. Keeping him from endangering the little family that they had built together. - But now he was part of that family. Even if he was doing everything he could to stay distanced from it.
Her heels glided along the sand of the beach, walking along the water-line as the tide rolled in and out. It was calming. She had always enjoyed the feel of the tide, the gentle push and pull. Somehow it was more pleasant here in the Fire Nation. The warm waters were nothing like she was used to at the South Pole but - she was not upset by it. In fact, in their weeks and weeks in disguise she had learned to love the tickle of it around her ankles, the warmth in her arms and core as she bent the ocean - either training or simply for the joy of it, of feeling it.
She didn't make any attempt to hide her approach, and it was obvious that he noticed her long before she was in ear shot. Once her toes splashed at the oncoming tide some yards away, he stilled as if frozen solid. A loose vest covered his chest, but he was sweating even in the early evening air. By the way he stood - and the lack of any pyrotechnics to be seen as she had searched for him - he was doing breathing exercises.
"Fire comes from the breath. We may have met the Sun Warriors, but that doesn't excuse you from mastering the basics. Now - breathe. No! Not like that! You're not trying to huff and puff and airbend. Slow it down. In and out. You have to fill your lungs, feel it in your chest and core. Stoke the inner Fire."
The memory of Aang and Zuko's first lesson after arriving on the island played momentarily through her memory. For what seemed like the millionth time, she blinked to send it away.
He spoke first, turning and dipping his shoulder somewhat as he stood above on the outcropping of rock, ".. Just doing some breathing exercises. I should be back with supplies by nightfall. There are some eaglehawk nests along the taller cliffs. The eggs are - "
She curled a dark brow at him, hands resting on her hips where she stood below on the beach itself. The rocks he stood on made it so she had to look up significantly, but she still seemed taller than him in the exchange. Yet her voice was easy, almost teasing, "As funny as I'm sure it would be to watch you try egg-hunting, I just wanted to .. check in."
Her voice faltered in pitch at the end, lowering a bit. She didn't let it dissuade her though, and she pressed on even as his face warped into one of mild confusion. She sighed.
"I know we didn't get off on the best foot at first. Or .. at second, or third or - I realize this is all very weird but, you're with us now. You're welcome to hang around after dinner. I know Sokka would appreciate it if the way he looks at those broadswords of yours is anything to go by. You don't have to force down your dinner and hide just to - "
Her words came in a bit of a rush, as she didn't know how else to say things. But her eyes startled open and her lips hung open for a moment in the waning sunlight as he cut her off with a ferocity, voice rising momentarily - and wisps of smoke leaving his nostrils.
"I am not hiding."
Immediately, Zuko turned away from her and faced back down the sunset. His body flexed once, breath coming in a steady stream that filled his person. It was almost like he was .. ignoring her?
That wasn't a great choice.
"Oh, okay! So then what would you call disappearing after dinner every night? I cook for an hour and you scarf it all down in fifteen seconds just to go ahead and - 'poof!' - disappear and not come back until the sun's down, or sometimes even later than that?"
Her voice was starting to rise, glaring up at him as he tried to ignore her where he was positioned on the outcropping, some ten or fifteen feet overhead.
"OH! And by the way you're not as sneaky as you think you are! If you're going to try to be stealthy and sneak back into camp after everyone else is asleep for whatever reason, you should learn not to hit every single twig and leaf on the way in! It'll do you - and all of us trying to sleep! - some good!"
There was no stopping the swell of her voice, then. In fact, the tide was joining her outburst. Where it had been gently licking at her ankles moments ago, now the tidewaters were swelling and brushing up against her knees as she absent-mindedly bent it up, churning the foamy swell with each gesture of her arms up at the silent Prince.
"And really, is it going to kill you to be just a little easier on Aang? We all know how important it is that he masters firebending, but not even Toph is so stiff and demanding! He's doing his best and you should - "
Her voice cut off. Partially at the lack of response from Zuko as she sat above on the rocks, and partially because she was genuinely tired of having to speak up at him.
"- Oh will you get down here? I'm not about to keep yelling at you up there just so you can hear me."
There was a dip to the fervor in her voice. The spout of anger diminished, accompanied turn by turn by the water around her knees. The tidewater slipped away to their regular thrum, pushing and pulling along the soft sands. A couple of minutes passed, and Katara was ready to simply turn around and march back to the house. Maybe it was a mistake to try to talk to him about this. About them - the group, that is. Maybe -
The sound of him landing in the sand was surprisingly soft. He did, it seemed, have the ability to be quiet when he needed to. She supposed that was rational. He did get the drop on them more than once over the course of tracking them across the world.
"I'm not hiding," he repeated simply. The fury was gone from his tone, although there was still a stiffness to his neck and … something in his eyes. They didn't quite meet her own. Was it - shame?
Something coiled in her chest and wrenched at her ribs.
Ten or twenty feet from one another, she awkwardly shift her feet in the sand. Looking down, the water curled around her ankles and she took a sense of solace from the warmth. Perhaps she could get used to Fire Nation waters.
- Just for visits, of course. If they managed to make it out of the next few weeks alive.
"I didn't mean to say that you're … hiding. Just - why do you always disappear after dinner? You know you can sit with us. Nobody is kicking you out after you and Aang train. I know he needs to master firebending, and I know I'm not exactly a master firebender, but he seems to be making good progress and - "
It was startling how suddenly his voice came up. She had grown accustomed by then to his raspy, subdued tone. There was a certain quality to his voice that was wholly distinct. She was tempted to call it 'smoky' but that felt terribly reductive - and surrendering too much to his heritage. It wasn't just raspy, or smoky, or withdrawn but - damaged.
For a split second she wondered if whatever had scarred his face had hurt his throat. She knew, all too well, the pain and injury of smoke and flame.
"- We always had to be looking for the next resource. If we waited, she'd catch up. If she caught up, she'd find us. We were … outmatched."
It was quiet. A simple few sentences that left his lips without context. But her chest constricted from the manner in which he spoke them.
"Keep your mind on the next resource and you can change the odds. It's worked for me so far. Struggle or not, it's worked. It's kept me strong."
A deep breath entered him, the warm waters of the island coast licking at his ankles as well. He exhaled, eyes shut, and the waning sunlight finally died. They were both left in the violet, twilight glow of evening and the gentle lull of the waves.
Part of her didn't really understand what he meant. It wasn't as if he was clear and forthright - perhaps ever - as to what he was talking about. At least, not about himself or his family. That had been abundantly clear since his awkward, and nearly catastrophic, introduction into their little family. But now it was … all the more apparent. She wondered if there was more to Zuko's story than he had let on.
The curiosity, she reasoned, was what beckoned her forward. Nothing else.
"... 'We'? You mean … your uncle, right?"
She recalled their first, real encounter with Azula. She recalled the blast of scorching, blue flame that had sent the old man down. She recalled how Zuko had denied her offer to help. She recalled the arc of raging, stark-red fire that he birthed to life as he screamed for them to leave.
Zuko simply exhaled again, his chin moving slightly. As his eyes opened, they welled again with what she thought was shame. Despite how she felt about the so-called Prince, even after he helped her make some kind of peace with her mother's killer, the dullness in his golden eyes caused an ache to form in the low of her belly.
Twilight left things still.
His eyes broke open and stared at her as she tread through the tidewater to stand across from him, only a foot or so apart.
"... Yeah. We traveled together for - a long time."
Whatever it was that was keeping him from feeling safe, feeling a part of their little family - she was going to try to help. It was the only option in her mind, despite the odd sensation of it. On some level it surprised her how calm and sure she was about it. Against anything else, Zuko was a part of their family now - of her family.
Her hand reached out to gently grasp his wrist.
Immediately, Zuko's eyes widened and he seemed to be fighting the urge to flinch - to pull back, to run away - to hide.
But he didn't. And she gave him a smile that was so much a practiced part of her by then. Reassuring, calming, assuaging. Very, very gently she tugged on his wrist. The meeting of their skin was far more electric than she preferred to think about - so she focused on the simple pressure of the pads of her fingers against his pulse point. With a mild tug, she encouraged him to come sit on the beach.
"Well … why don't you tell me about it?"