Cadence Chapter Two: Unyielding
"Wake up!" came an irritated, snappish voice from above her.
Korra's turquoise eyes flew open and she struggled to sit up in the tangled mess her nest of blankets had become.
"What is it?" she asked, rubbing at her eyes and yawning when she realised there was no immediate threat. "Earthquake and this place is about to cave in? Fire?"
"No," Mako said, in the tone of one talking to mentally handicapped child.
"Damn," Korra muttered, climbing to her feet.
Mako stared at Koda, knowing that he should curb the boy's attitude, yet not really wanting to. In a place where everyone automatically acquiesced to his wishes and practically licked his shoes, it was rather refreshing to have someone talk back to him. It reminded him of...
It reminded him of a time he had sworn never to revisit.
"Follow me," he ordered, striding out the door. "You are to keep two paces behind me at all times."
Korra bristled even as she darted after him, anger swirling in her stomach. If a man had told her to do that back in Republic City, she would have screamed sexist at him and knocked him on his ass. Except here, she was pretending to be a male, so she went with what she could only imagine what Bolin's reaction probably would have been.
"Yes, sir, idiot-sir," she growled.
Mako halted so abruptly it was only her Avatar reflexes that saved Korra from ramming into him.
"What did you call me?" He didn't turn around, but the hairs on the back of Korra's neck prickled all the same.
"Uh...idiot?"
"Don't ever call me that again." His voice was low, but the menace in it was perfectly clear.
"Yes, sir, hothead," Korra said before she could censor it. It was times like these that made her wonder if she had some kind of subconscious death wish.
"Do not call me that, either!" Mako practically snarled.
He turned to face Koda only when he was sure his expression was controlled and indifferent. Hearing Koda toss out Bolin's favourite nicknames for him had made his stomach churn uncomfortably.
"Okay...so what should I call you?" Koda asked, apparently not perturbed in the slightest that he had irritated someone who possessed complete control over his life.
The more Mako saw of the boy's composure, the more certain the fire bender became that it wasn't a product of ignorance, but confidence. The sort of bone-deep confidence that very few people possessed, and then only with good reason.
Considering Koda was a slave in an underground Equalist base, Mako was rather curious what he was so confident about.
Korra huffed a little as Mako proceeded to ignore her question. Well, what did she expect? She was technically his slave, and a rather free one at that – she doubted she'd be getting away with this kind of behaviour if anyone else was her master, but Mako just didn't seem to care.
She kept her silence after that, following him through the maze of hallways until they emerged in some sort of cafeteria. Being an Equalist base, it looked almost eerily normal...until she noticed that those eating were dressed in brown clothes and wearing leather collars, and they were guarded by men built like komodo rhino who wielded thin, wicked-looking whips.
Korra noted that there were no women among the guards. But then again, she had the impression there weren't many women in the Equalist faction full stop; she hadn't seen one female in Equalist garb since she'd been brought here.
Unsure of exactly what they were doing there, she sent a questioning glance in Mako's direction.
He responded with a nod at the room in general and a curt, "Eat."
Korra shuffled into the throng, feeling uncertain but assumed this area was where the slaves took their meals. She took an apple, a banana and an orange from the selection, grateful that Amon seemed to understand that well-fed slaves were better than starved, malnourished ones – at the very least, they could do more work.
She sat at one of the rough wooden benches, quietly munching her fruit and trying to keep her head down. It worked up until one of the guards began hassling a slave for spilling some of the porridge he had been offered. With a start, Korra realised it was the boy she'd traveled with, the one who'd addressed her when they'd first been collared and ushered into the tunnels.
It might have been the fact that she knew this boy, however dimly. It might have been the fact that her nature was such that she despised seeing anyone bullied. Whatever the reason, Korra found herself standing and darting with such haste that only the Avatar could posses across the room before her mind could even raise an objection.
As the whip whistled towards the boy, Korra extended her arm, catching the blow. The whip left a prominent welt across her wrist, but Korra didn't care – it was nothing compared to some of the injuries she'd suffered in the past, and she was more worried about the young boy before her. He was gazing down at the remnants of his breakfast, and looked as though he were trying not to cry.
"Come on, kid, you're probably better off not eating that slop," Korra told him, trying to bolster his spirits. "How about some fruit? I've got a nice, juicy apple..."
For his part, Mako was a little surprised. He'd seen the boy stumble, and had deliberately looked away, setting his jaw against the prickling of his conscience to aid him, he'd heard the whip come down but there had been no answering cry of pain. He'd turned to find Koda with his arm slung companionably over the boy's shoulders, guiding him back to a bench under the baleful glare of the guard. Mako's keen eyes picked up the bright red welt that wrapped around Koda's wrist and forearm, the obvious mark of a whip.
But Koda hadn't so much as whimpered. And Mako knew you had to have a high pain threshold to remain silent when a whip caught you.
Just further evidence that this slave was not what all that he appeared to be.
"Mistake..." came a quiet whisper from Mako's left.
Mako's eyes cut in that direction. A man was leaning against the wall a short distance from him, his eyes on Koda. Mako recognised the man; Zhao was a professional slave-taker, the Equalists finest, in fact. He was usually in charge of every slave-taking trip, however occasionally less experienced lackeys were sent to out to find potential slaves.
As demonstrated by the family they took – an experienced slaver would never have attacked a group with children. Children could do little, and cost much in terms of food and shelter to raise.
But Mako was curious as to why taking Koda had been a mistake. The boy was physically fit, and while he clearly had some bending potential, the collar kept him rather subdued.
"How?" he asked.
The man blinked, and it was then Mako realised he had no idea he'd spoken aloud. "Your pardon, Master Mako?"
"Why was taking the boy a mistake?"
Zhao paled. "I-I...it is not my place to question my Master Mako's choice..."
Mako quelled the urge to roll his eyes. Honestly, with all this simpering and pandering going on about him, was it any wonder he found Koda's less-than-subtle defiance refreshing?
"You said 'mistake'," he went on, a threat clear in his voice.
Seeming to understand that further refusal to elaborate would anger Mako, Zhao went on. "You're right, I do not think it was wise to take the boy. When my master first taught me this business, one of the things he most emphasised was how to spot one who is 'unyielding'."
'Unyielding' the word whispered in Mako's mind. "Explain," he snapped.
"One who is unyielding can be recognised by a thousand things," the man continued. "The way they move, the way they speak, they way they interact with those who have power over them. They can be of any age, gender or origin, but there is one quality they have in common – the stubborn, unbreakable will that earns them the name 'the unyielding'. They do not submit in the way other slaves will; their spirits do not, will not, be broken. They can be beaten, whipped, raped, starved, chained; it doesn't not matter what you do to them, they will die before they are broken."
Mako stared at Koda as the dark-haired boy bit into a piece of his orange with gusto, still chatting amiably to the child next to him.
"You may gain their obedience, but it is nothing but a shallow reflection," Zhao continued. "They may do as you say, but their minds will always be consumed by thoughts of escape or revenge or both. I know you are strong, Master Mako, but watch your slave closely or he may slit your throat as you sleep."
Korra slid the cleaning cloth down the length of the electrified kali sticks, before testing it against her thumb. It singed her skin with barely more than a whisper of pressure, and she grinned, healing the slight burn with a flicker of energy. She didn't have to worry about anyone seeing; Mako had gone off to train with Amon, instructing her to maintain his weapons in his absence.
It was an easy enough job; Korra suspected that, as slaves went, her position was a rather cushy one.
She set the kali sticks aside, the last of the weapons she'd been ordered to work on, and surveyed her finished work with more than a touch of satisfaction.
In fact, now that she'd finished, maybe she could have a bit more of a look around the base. She couldn't escape yet; there were too many people in the corridors during the daylight hours, at least, she assumed these were the daylight hours, someone was certain to see her and stop her if she tried to slip out of the base. Her escape would either have to take place at night or she would have to create some sort of diversion during the day.
Frankly, Korra preferred the idea of sneaking out at night, because a diversion added all new layers of complications.
So, while she wouldn't try escaping, there was no reason she couldn't wander the base a bit, map it out in her mind...
Korra opened the door and walked straight into Mako.
"What is it with you and hanging around in doorways?" she grumbled, scooting backwards to allow him to enter the room.
"You're stupid," was all Mako said.
"Oh, yeah? Since when were you a walking IQ test?"
"I told you to stay in the room. You were in the process of leaving the room. You could not understand a simple command."
"I didn't misunderstand it, I chose to disobey it," Korra clarified. "Big difference."
Mako's eyes narrowed suddenly, dangerously, and Korra had to fight the urge to take several steps backwards. "Including the difference between being considered stupid and being beaten for disobedience?"
Mako could admit that he found the idea of inflicting pain on Koda rather distasteful – he'd never been one for deliberate torture – but he wanted to see if the threat would cow him.
Korra silently ran through every swear word she could think of in her mind, but it did little to help. The entire point of using swearwords was to say them aloud; thinking them didn't give them quite the same punch.
But since she'd played this hand, she might as well stick it out to the bitter end, see how far Mako was willing to let her go...
"If you think the threat of a little pain is going to stop me, you've severely underestimated me," she said quietly.
Mako stared down at Koda and found himself thinking he was rather short for a male. But the height difference didn't seem to intimidate him, nor did the menacing aura that Mako had deliberately projected or the threat of violence. The boy simply stared straight into his face, his jaw set, green eyes blazing with determination...
The sight rang a dull bell in the back of Mako's mind. He stared into Koda's unsettling turquoise eyes, unable to shake the feeling he had seen them before, that he had seen this expression before...
Then the boy blinked and it was lost, a phantom of memory flitting away through Mako's mind.
"Who are you?" he asked, his voice soft but as deadly as a scorpion bee's sting.
A hint of fear entered Koda's eyes, and Mako found his already prominent curiosity about the slave deepening. Threats didn't scare him, but he practically panicked whenever Mako inquired about his identity?
"You have bending potential," the fire bender continued ruthlessly, watching Koda's eyes for any hint that he was hitting close to the truth. "You are a bender, most likely from either of the Water Tribes, though I suppose that Republic City and The Earth Kingdom are also a possibility."
Korra hoped her nervous, gulping swallow wasn't as audible as it felt. "You're bluffing; you have no idea if I'm a bender or not, let alone where I'm from."
Mako smirked and stepped past her into the room. Korra scowled at his back as he inspected the weapons she'd been ordered to maintain. It was hard to tell whether he was pleased or not, but he wasn't criticizing her work, and she supposed that was the best she could hope for.
"Come," he ordered abruptly, turning and striding into the corridor.
The one-word commands were really starting to irritate Korra; she wasn't a Polar bear dog for Spirits sake!
But she followed obediently, practically jogging to keep up with his rapid pace. "Where are we going?"
Mako didn't answer. Korra huffed grumpily to herself and didn't ask again.
So when they walked into a large room in which Amon was feasting at a long table laden with gourmet dishes, Korra couldn't have been more surprised. She knew, logically, that since Mako was being trained, she assumed, by Amon he would spend a lot of time with the leader of the Equalist faction, but she hadn't really been prepared for it.
Korra silently cursed the collar around her neck; with her bending restricted, it was hard to sense the presence of others, and so she kept getting nasty surprises like this all the time.
"Ah, Mako," Amon smiled, and Korra suppressed a shiver.
Korra couldn't begin to fathom what madness drove Mako to believe Amon was a better prospect, but it sent a pang of pain through her chest, so she made an effort not to dwell on it.
Mako took a seat at the table and began to eat without so much as looking at Amon. Uncertain as to what she was supposed to do, Korra stood behind Mako's chair, keeping her eyes fixed on the ground. She wasn't stupid; she knew showing Amon any of the defiance she'd been showing Mako would probably get her killed.
"Any problems with your slave?" the Equalist asked.
Mako shot him a withering glance and then bent his head to his plate again.
"What about you, boy?" Something in Mako coiled as Amon addressed Koda. If the boy was stupid...
Korra said nothing, she simply glanced at Amon then lowered her head again.
"Nothing to say?" Amon inquired, his voice venomous.
Korra dropped her head a little farther, hoping the show of submission would mollify him.
He laughed. "Why, Mako, I do believe you've picked yourself a mute!"
Mako hid a smirk. It seemed Koda had stronger survival instincts than he'd first thought. At the very least, the boy seemed to recognise that Amon would by no means tolerate what Mako did.
Mako concentrated on finishing his meal, only barely listening as Amon detailed the afternoon's training plan, wanting to be out of the Equalist's presence as soon as possible. When he'd finished, he stood up from the table and exited the room, without bothering to excuse himself.
He'd learned early on that he didn't actually have to show Amon much respect; after all, Amon needed him more than he needed Amon.
Koda shadowed him out of the room, every inch the perfect submissive slave until the door closed behind them.
"Jeez, creepy much?" the boy commented, throwing a baleful glare over his shoulder.
Mako smirked.
That night, Mako carefully inspected the weapons he'd had Koda clean before he replaced them on the racks. He'd given them a cursory inspection before he'd had to leave for his daily lunch with Amon, but all that brief glance had done was assure him Koda hadn't completely destroyed them. Now that he had the time to sit down and properly examine them, he realised that they had been cleaned by the hands of an expert. This was no fumbling civilian going on third-hand rumour of how to take care of weapons; these had been handled by someone well-used to taking care of such weapons.
Combined with Koda's energy-suppressing collar, his near-fearlessness in the face of threat of physical pain and the way he'd reacted when Mako had mentioned that he might be a bender, his suspicion that Koda was a bender of some sort could now be considered fact.
"Where are you from?" he asked abruptly.
"Nice try," Koda volleyed back from where he was sorting through Mako's closet.
"Family?"
Koda shot a suspicious look over his shoulder, Mako only seeing a flash of irate turquoise before the boy turned back to his task. He didn't like those eyes, those damnable turquoise eyes that nagged at his mind like a physical itch.
Korra, for her part, wondered at Mako's newfound chattiness. Maybe he was lonely...
Some part of her screamed that he should be; that it was nothing less than what he deserved. She cared for him, yes, but it was hard to snuff out the childish voice of her wounded heart, screaming that he had hurt her and that he should pay for having done so.
But all the anger in the world didn't dull the pain of it.
Korra shook her head, firmly pushing aside those kind of depressive thoughts and resumed clearing Mako's closet.
"Will anyone be looking for you?"
Korra snorted. "You have no idea."
But even assuming he was lonely, why pick his slave to try to socialise with? But then again, from what Korra had seen, she was probably the only person around who didn't pander to him. No matter how antisocial a person claimed to be, it was human nature to seek out companionship. And in right now, Korra, or Koda, as he knew her, was probably the closest he was going to get.
Mako was smirking as though her response amused him somehow. Korra squashed the urge to hurl one of his own weapons at him and instead sat back to survey her finished work. The closet wasn't sparkling clean, but it was neat.
"Okay, I've tidied your closet; can I go to sleep now?"
Mako shrugged. Korra took that as permission to curl up in her pile of blankets and close her eyes.
But she didn't go to sleep. Instead she waited. She waited as Mako read through a few pages of a book. She waited while he went through the requisite bathroom routine. She waited as the light in the room went out, and Mako's breathing slowly assumed the deep, even rhythms of sleep.
And then Korra rose from her makeshift bed, creeping towards the door with every particle of stealth she possessed.
'Softly, softly, softly,' she chanted it in her mind like a mantra. 'Softly, softly, softly...'
She wasn't about to underestimate Mako's senses, even when he was asleep, something told her that the current environment would encourage hair-trigger reflexes even in slumber, but since she wouldn't be approaching the bed or anything so foolish, she thought she might have a chance to get away with it.
She slowly eased the door open, ever vigilant for any sound from the bed that might signal Mako's awakening. But his breathing didn't so much as hitch.
She gave one last cursory glance into the room she'd just exited, some part of her urging her to remain but she knew it was foolish. Each day that passed in the Equalist base made it more likely that Mako would discover her disguise; he'd already figured out that she was capable of bending and she'd only been here for two days! What would he do when he discovered who she really was?
She knew what she wanted him to do, but she knew just as well that he would probably do something very different. Mako had made it clear that she and Bolin were no longer considered an important part of her life; he would probably kill her, or hand her over to Amon for a fate worse than death.
Korra shivered at the prospect. She had to leave, or she'd be facing death. And not just physical death; she knew it would kill something inside her if Mako ever truly committed that final betrayal. And if Bolin ever found out it would ruin him.
Mako had done nothing to deserve her devotion and loyalty. He had done everything he could to rid himself of them, but Bolin was a different story. He was the brother she'd never had, as Asami was the sister she'd never had; complete with sibling rivalry.
So she'd leave Mako, and go back to the people who she knew loved her as much as she loved them.
Korra closed the door softly behind her, the solid darkness in the room meaning she was never alerted when Mako opened his eyes, and silently watched her leave.
At the sound of voices, Korra darted into a side-passage, pressing herself against the wall in the hopes she might go unnoticed.
She'd found that the underground base did have a day and night. During the 'day' all the torches along the walls were lit, filling every room and corridor with light. Not as bright as that above ground, of course, but bright enough so that you barely noticed you were below the surface.
Night seemed a different story. Now, every third torch was lit, filling the corridors with shadows and plunging the base into a sort of half-light.
Korra wondered why they weren't using electricity, but supposed the power source and generator needed for such power might be used to detect the base's location. She didn't see how; couldn't they build it underground, perhaps?
The Equalists, guards, most likely, passed her by, and Korra slunk back into the corridor, consulting her faultless memory to re-trace her steps to the entrance she'd been hustled in from.
She felt like her senses were heightened to breaking point as she crept down the many corridors, alert for the slightest breath of sound, the barest flicker of something at the periphery of her vision...
So when she heard soft footsteps from both ends of the corridor, both sets converging on her, Korra had time to prepare for the inevitable confrontation. She hadn't brought a weapon from Mako's room because she knew it wouldn't have done her any good in a confrontation with a guard, she would have to bluff her way out of trouble, not fight. With the collar on, she put no faith in her combative abilities, she might win against some of the more mundane Equalist lackeys, but she doubted she'd then have the energy she needed to get far enough away from the base so that any hunting parties couldn't recapture her, and she was fairly certain that a slave carrying a weapon would look a lot more suspicious than a slave just walking alone down a corridor at night.
The footsteps came closer, and Korra struggled to act calm, to stroll down the corridor as though she belonged there, as though this was what she had been instructed to do. If she recalled correctly, there was a storeroom along here somewhere; she'd gotten her blankets from it, as it held mainly cloth and weapons, so maybe she could say she'd been sent to fetch some extra sheets or something...
When the pair of guards she was walking towards came into sight, Korra did her best to look surprised. But she made no effort to speak to them, instead dropping her eyes and moving to the side like a good slave should.
But apparently the guards weren't about to let her move past them uncontested.
"Slave, why are you wandering the corridors?" the taller of the two barked, his hand resting on the hilt of a thin blade.
"I was instructed to get a blanket from the storeroom...masters," Korra replied, keeping her voice as meek as she could make it, only just remembering to tack the word 'masters' on to the end of her sentence. After all, that was what slaves did, right?
"Really?" The shorter man gave her a cold, assessing glance that Korra didn't like. "Perhaps we should accompany you..."
Korra's first thought was that they were going to sexually assault her. Then she remembered she was masquerading as a boy. She then told herself not to discount the whole sexual assault motive just because they thought she was a boy; sure, it might have been less likely, statistically speaking, but it could still happen.
The taller man groaned. "Come on, Zhao, our shift's nearly over."
The man called Zhao said nothing, merely watched her with fixed, unblinking eyes. "Get moving, slave."
Korra gritted her teeth as she moved down the corridor to the storeroom door barely five metres in front of her. She went in, snatched the first blanket she could find, and trotted out, hoping that the guards watching her were imbeciles, that they would take this simple act as proof she had been truthful.
Zhao simply nodded, then gestured back down the corridor. "Now let's see you take it back to your master, boy. You're Master Mako's slave, aren't you?"
She'd been hoping for a Neanderthal, and instead she got a man who seemed a bit too clever for his own good. Korra wasn't too sure about her views on the Spirits, but she was certain something was conspiring against her.
As she retraced her steps down the hallways, she tried to think about what she could say when she opened the door to Mako's room when her 'escorts' found that he was still asleep and had probably never ordered her to do anything.
She was still in deep thought when they rounded the corner and started down the final corridor to Mako's room. When she saw the light shining from beneath the door, she seriously considered just knocking the guards' heads into the wall and making a run for it. If there was light in there it meant that Mako was awake, and if Mako was awake it meant he was aware she'd gone and was probably even now strapping on his weapons to go looking for her, however if she knocked on the door with an armful of blanket and a pair of Equalist guards flanking her...
It was safe to say that Korra wasn't looking forward to that confrontation, mainly because she had a feeling it would result in extreme and immediate pain for her shortly afterwards.
She was about to make her move, when Zhao stepped in front of her and knocked sharply on the door. And while Korra knew she might have had a chance at subduing these two if she caught them surprise, she knew there was absolutely no chance she could take out Mako, not with the collar on. So, she'd just have to play her cards right.
The door cracked open, one impassive amber eye peering through the gap.
"What is it?" Mako asked Zhao. But Korra could hear the unspoken 'you had better have a damn good reason for disturbing me' in his tone.
As she watched, his eyes slid past the Equalists and rested on her. Korra stiffened as he registered the blanket, the expression that she just knew looked furtive in spite of her best efforts and braced herself for whatever his reaction was going to be; all she knew was that it would be ugly.
"About time," Mako scoffed. "Get in here."
It took Korra a few moments to realise that Mako had addressed her. Not knowing why he seemed to be giving her a free pass but by no means turning it down, she moved past Zhao and slid into the room as Mako cracked the door a fraction wider to let her in.
"Now; what did you want?" Mako addressed Zhao, his voice dripping with venom.
"We found your slave wandering the corridors and simply wanted to ensure he was doing so on your orders," Zhao said, his voice seemingly calm, Korra knew however that he was probably hoping Mako wouldn't kill him for disturbing his slumber.
"Hn." Mako shut the door in their faces, rudely dismissing them and leaving two very relieved guards to return to their duties, unharmed.
Mako turned back to Koda, who was clutching the blanket and eyeing him as though he were some sort of volatile chemical reaction, one that the slightest touch could set off.
When Mako had woken just in time to see the boy slipping out the door, his first thought had been to charge after him. He'd risen, lit the lamp, and had actually seized his kali sticks before he abruptly decided to let Koda go. Mako had never liked the concept of slavery in the first place, and if Koda had the guts to attempt an escape from one of Amon's fortresses then Mako felt the boy had earned his freedom.
He had just decided to go back to sleep and pretend ignorance of Koda's escape until the morning, when his keen hearing had caught the sound of footsteps outside his door.
Mako had barely cracked the door open so whom ever had knocked wouldn't be able to see that Koda's nest of blankets was conspicuously vacant, only to be confronted with Koda himself, clutching a blanket and hemmed by two guards.
It had taken Mako only a moment to realise that Koda must have been caught, and had obviously claimed to be on some sort of errand; apparently, the boy could think fast when he needed to.
If Koda had groveled or tried to appeal to him, Mako might have done something very different. But as it was, the turquoise-eyed boy had just stood there, looking both nervous and resigned, as though he wasn't sure of what was coming, but knew it was bad.
And, almost before he thought about it, Mako had found himself playing along. It had been nice to have someone who rolled their eyes at him without worrying about what he would do to them for having done so; Someone who snapped back at him instead of taking his orders with a nod and a false smile.
He stared at Koda for a moment, then kicked his boots off and laid his kali sticks beside his bed before dousing the lamp and climbing under the covers.
He heard a soft rustling sound in the darkness that told him Koda, too, was settling in for the night.
No one spoke.
Korra reflected that she and Mako seemed to have reached some sort of silent agreement. Neither of them talked of Koda's attempted escape, and neither of them had spoken of the way Mako had covered for her.
But Korra thought about it. She thought about it often.
What had possessed Mako to try to cover for her? He didn't owe her anything so why had he done that? If it had been anyone else, she would have said it was out of compassion or the goodness of his or her heart or something along those lines but she hadn't seen a lot of evidence for the goodness of Mako's heart lately. He was so focused on whatever it was he was doing for or with Amon that it seemed he'd blocked out everything but that single obsession.
Sure, he'd probably manage to achieve whatever it was that he was working towards, one day, but after that, then what would Mako do?
Korra hated that the notion bothered her. He was the one who had abandoned them, he was the one who had tossed them aside, defected from his country, gone against benders, one of which he was; so why did she find it so impossible to do the same to him?
With a sigh and a weary shake of her head, Korra reaffirmed her vow to escape from Amon's clutches as soon as possible; all this time with Mako was making her contemplate things she really had no desire to contemplate. Heartbreak was a wound that never truly healed, but it would probably get a little better if she stopped poking at it and prodding at it.
Korra sat down in the slave's eating area, this time sticking close to the wall and Mako; she wasn't about to get involved in an altercation again, not with the same guard that had escorted her back to Mako's room standing there. That Zhao man was leaning against the wall, watching her with his unblinking, snake-like stare, and she had a feeling he was just looking for an excuse.
"I know you," a woman next to her said slowly.
Korra turned around and did her best not to yelp in alarm. She knew this woman, too; this was one of the healers in the village she'd aided. Kana, she thought it was. She remembered a brief conversation in which the woman had announced an intention to visit her family in another village as soon as the disease was under control; she must have been grabbed on the road, then.
But Kana had only known her for a few weeks, she couldn't recognise her from that, could she? Mako had known her for years and he didn't seem to have the slightest suspicion she wasn't anything but what she appeared to be: a dark-haired, tanned skinned boy.
But then again Mako hadn't been one to pay much attention in the way of physical appearance. His only contact with her in the last year or so had been their confrontation, in which he hadn't shown a whole lot of interest in her at all. So maybe Kana had a better idea of what she looked like now, and actually could see through her disguise.
"Aren't you the man that helped that boy?" the former healer went on, voice full of admiration.
Korra tried not to give an audible sigh of relief. As it turned out, Kana only recognised her from yesterday, not the village. She didn't know her as the Avatar who'd healed the sick, she knew her as the slave who'd had the guts to intervene between a guard and another slave.
Which, now that she thought about it, had been kind of stupid. Sure, the guard hadn't actually done anything about it except glare, probably couldn't be bothered, but if he'd decided to press the issue, Korra knew she'd have been in trouble.
"Have you been here for long?" Kana asked, sounding sympathetic.
"Not too long," Korra said honestly. "I was on my way home when I got grabbed."
She became aware that, though Mako still held his practiced expression of disinterest, he was listening intently to their conversation.
"Me, too," Kana smiled. "I was a healer, you see. I couldn't leave the village I worked in for months because there was an outbreak. Eventually, we appealed to Republic City for help and they sent a none other than the Avatar to help us."
Korra could sense Mako stiffen, she silently cursed Kana's conversational streak.
"It was amazing, really. I always thought she could do nothing but fight, I never knew she could heal, too! Although," Kana reflected, "I doubt there are any healers here."
Korra nodded.
"She left a little before I did. I hope she didn't get caught as well. She did seem rather exhausted..."
'If only you knew, Kana,' Korra thought. 'If only you knew.'
"Koda!" Mako barked. "Come!"
Korra shot to her feet with an apologetic glance at Kana and hurried after Mako as he left the food hall. Again with the one-word commands; she was not a Polar bear dog!
Mako told himself he wasn't hurrying along the corridors, per se, he was just moving quickly.
And it had absolutely nothing to do with what he'd just overheard. Absolutely nothing.
He yanked open a heavy metal door and descended down a set of winding stairs, hearing Koda scrambling after him.
"What's going on?" the boy hissed. "Where in the flameo are we going?"
"The cells," he snapped. "Now shut up!"
"Jeez, someone needs to cool their head…"
Mako ignored him as the stairs opened out into a dark, cold corridor lined with cages. He strode past them, dark eyes searching through them like child sifting through dirt to find a lost marble.
He didn't even know why he was doing this, not really. But since the woman had mentioned that the Avatar might have been captured he knew he needed to see if she had spoken the truth. There had been no flash of long chocolate locks in the food hall, so he had descended to the cells.
The more he walked, the more his stomach twisted. He hadn't seen Korra in weeks, hadn't had any true interaction with her in months and yet, the thought of her imprisoned in here; easy prey for the men who lived here, fodder for Amon's whims, was sickening.
He reached the end of the corridor and threw open the heavy door to the interrogation room. The prisoners kept in these cells were those that were to be 'persuaded' to relinquish information. Korra was the Avatar, it went without saying that Amon would have ordered her to be interrogated.
But the room and the tiny adjoining cages were empty.
Mako hissed through his teeth.
"What are we looking for?" Mako asked curiously. "I mean, I presume you're looking for something, with the way you're stomping around and growling under your breath..."
Mako turned. "When you were with the other slaves, did you ever see a woman with long chocolate brown hair?"
Koda blinked, the movement almost invisible in the near-darkness that shrouded the dungeons. "No; why?"
Mako pushed past him and retraced his steps out of the prison cells.
Korra breathed a silent sigh of relief at the fact the darkness had concealed the shocked look she knew must have decorated her face and followed him.
Mako was looking for her?
Mako, for his part, was silently running through all the possible options that could befall a slave under Amon's control. He'd checked the food hall, the prison cells, the interrogation room…
Mako grimaced as he realised there was another option. Korra was beautiful enough to have been claimed by one of the elites as their exclusive slave, the way Koda was for him. Except that Mako knew most people under the direct command of Amon made sexual use of their personal slave.
Like a polar leopard on the trail of a wounded tiger seal, he went to the elites' quarters, kicking in the first door he could find.
A woman cried out and cringed away, but her hair was black, not brown. The next room held a blonde with bruises around her wrists. The next one held a man.
Mako went through the elite barracks like a raging fire, kicking in each and every door but there was no Korra to be found.
"Can I ask why you were kicking doors in?" Koda piped up as they left. The boy sounded a little shaken; probably a product of what they'd seen in those rooms. "Or is that not allowed?"
Mako glared at him and did not reply.
At least he had established that Korra wasn't in the grasp of Amon and his Equalists. She had probably escaped from the slavers, or they'd never caught her in the first place.
Or she was dead, but Mako found that train of thought strangely unsettling, so he didn't dwell on it. Still, something in him relaxed at the idea that Korra was not a slave in this fortress.
Mako strode back to his room, never realising that his turquoise-eyed slave was shooting him some very strange looks.