Zuko spends the first day watching. Or he means to. Every instinct tells him to learn how their group works before he belongs to it.
But it is chaos. The youngest of them are rowdy, the oldest too absorbed in gossip to notice. The waterbender—Katara—is the exception, the point on which everything hinges. No work begins without her command, no disagreement resolves without her intervention.
He knows it's too much to carry alone.
So he lights the fire before she can ask and quiets an argument with a stern look.
He finds his place with them in moments.
Katara wants to resent his presence. She should hate the very sight of Zuko.
For a day, she convinces herself she does.
But when she rises in the morning to a fire already lit, a breakfast already cooking, the bitterness slips through her fingers. Zuko doesn't beg her forgiveness. He seems to expect nothing in return for his work. And though she won't admit it, it feels more natural with every day.
Their clothes are clean and mended, their group is fed and happy, and somewhere along the way, Zuko stops feeling like an enemy. He feels like a partner.