That is a whole lot of a reviews, wow! Thank you guys so much!

Gerbilfriend: Yeeeah she tried so hard, and got so far.

Actualcypher: Talk about timing! I love it when that happens ^^ Thank you, I really tried to make Lien a good character. I tried to make it realer, but I don't like making things dark, personally. I find it depressing if things are too real, ya know?

Anonymous Legacy: Lien is, at the core of everything, a good person with good survival instincts. And as that goes on, we'll see those two things clash, along with her time in the desert, and her heritage as a Gansu. I haven't delved much into it yet, but I will get there.

Lightsbane1905 : I don't know why but that played in my head like a creepy kids song in a horror movie.

Akagami hime chan: I know! These children are all such terrible liars, my god.

Yulionde: Thank you!

AkiraYuni: Just Lo is fine! And you're welcome ^^

Guest from July 5th: Yeah…. We're just not gonna tell Aang that

RedtailHawk19: Thank you very much! I try! Long Feng is an awful person to try and write, frankly.

Touch of Talent: Thanks! I spent way too much time on that opening, tbh.

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3broomstix: IT's not soon but it is here!

MrCcoz: Yes! Lien is quotes shakespeare a lot!

Guest from July 7th : I'll see what I can do!

Guest from July 8th: I live for drama, thank you!

Missanonne: Success! I have created a Jet fan! My work is now complete ^^

Girlsdream: Thank you!

Amgs: You're very welcome!

Wicked Neko: You have very excellent questions, which al be answered in time.

Serenacp0: Thank you! I'll work on How to Outrun Death soon!

Calcu22: Thank you!

Guest from july 31st: Thank you! I tried very hard on all of this.

Animagirl: Thanks! I try!

De junco: Wow, you have really been thinking about this story, thank you for the review! I really hope this next chapter doesn't disappoint.

Nightmaster000: Thanks! I don't know, really. It might never come up, or it might.

DannyPhantom619: That will be a long ways coming!

"Something troubles you."

Lien wasn't surprised that Iroh noticed. She had been doing well in their Pai Sho games, and for her to lose twelve in less than an hour was out of the blue. Even Zuko had been eying her strangely for a while, when she had deigned not tease him that day.

She looked at the old man, pressed her lips together, and nodded slowly.

"Yes. Last night was… stressful," she confessed. She didn't know that she wanted to tell them everything. In fact, she was pretty sure that if she did it might put them in danger. Lien feared the Dai Lee, but more than that she feared the ruler of a city who was so feared that loyalty was bought by a fourteen year old girl who inspired further terror.

"Do you wish to speak of it?" he offered, and waved Zuko over for more tea. The boy brought it with a long suffering sigh.

Lien considered it while she plucked her cup from Zuko's hands with a soft thanks. The tea was jasmine, and Zuko, bless him, remembered she liked honey.

"You're sweet," she said, patting his arm lightly. The boy jerked from her and grumbled, his cheeks red. To Iroh, she said, "I attended a party with people much more important that I. I am an artist, not a politician. I shouldn't be anywhere near the aristocracy unless I'm there for their money."

"You could be a politician, if you chose. You think well before you speak." Lien didn't know if it was a compliment or not. She looked out the window, caught Jet's eyes from above the street. So he hadn't confronted Zuko last night. How curious.

"Thank you. I think. Recent event's have shown otherwise," she shook her head.

"One failure does not mean there will never be a success," Iroh said wisely.

"I don't know how much you know of the rest of the Kingdom," truth, swirled under lies that he didn't even know she was telling, "But my people, the Desert Dwellers of the Si Wong, are not looked on favorably. We do what it takes to survive, and for that we are cast as honorless thieves, bandits and beggars, who will swindle a cat of his coat if one is not careful. We must speak carefully when trading and bargaining, or we will gain nothing. And we cannot afford to lose without acquiring in return. Thought we may show charity on the lost, the desert does not. Not even to her own sons and daughters."

Lien wasn't sure where the tangent came from. It was something she had stored inside her heart for a long time. Her cup steamed when she brought it back to her lips.

"That goes double for a warm blooded bastard."

Iroh's frown was so minute she might have missed it if she hadn't been searching his face. So he didn't like how she had addressed herself? The old man cared. She smiled when she set her cup down and moved a tile.

"If the desert is so terrible, why live there?" Zuko asked. Lien was surprised he had returned in time for her little speech. He had seemed preoccupied with his own embarrassment.

"Lee," Iroh chided, "Don't be rude to your friend."

"She's not my friend!" Zuko snapped, whirling on his uncle. Lien caught the plate the toppled off of his tray on instinct. She swallowed thickly and handed it back, making certain not to touch his fingers. She set her cup aside and stood so she could bow.

"I should go," she said to Iroh, "Thank you for humoring me."

"Nonsense," he argued, "You don't need to leave just because my nephew never learned to control his temper."

"It's fine," she insisted. She didn't know why it hurt so bad, to have yelled in front of her. She knew, she had to know, that Zuko wouldn't consider her a friend. All she did was pester him while he worked. She studiously avoided looking at him when she aimed her smile at the boy and his uncle.

"Have a pleasant day," she wished, and walked away.

Once she was outside she took a breath, a long one, and stretched her arms above her head until both shoulders popped. The sun warmed her skin and she winked at Jet when she saw him spying on her. Had he seen what had happened? Or had he missed the raised voices?

She would ask him another day.

For right then she had a date that she now had time to prepare for.

"So that is what Avatar Kyoshi's army became," Wan Shi Tong didn't sound excited or disappointed, or even surprised. Interested, certainly, but Lien figured that the matters of mere mortals were of little true concern to him.

"Yes. I don't know what to make of it," she tucked her knees under her chin. She was sitting in an alcove she had founds years ago, one that rested above one of the levels of the book shelves and had a single, small window that allowed light in from the outside world.

And what a world it was. Purple grass stretched as far as she could see, up into green mountains and a red sky. Creatures that she had never dreamt of existing before ran across the fields and soared in the possibly sentient clouds. She liked the dragon birds.

"I understand why they exist, and I don't support monarchy's as a general rule of thumb, but more than that I can't stand people who rule by fear. And what he's doing now, it will only backfire. So have so many skilled warriors under the absolute command of one person it a terrible decision. I hate him."

"Would you kill him?" Wan Shi Tong asked, surprising her.

"Me?" she looked at him. Her, Lien, Harmony. Would she kill him? She feared him. She feared him just as-

Just as the Gansu had feared the Jiu Zhu, millennia before she was born.

We are Gansu, little one. Willing to eliminate. If it means the survival of our people, "We will do what it takes to survive. Heaven and Hell send aid to our enemies, for we will endure."

"Yes, humans are like that," Wan Shi Tong sounded almost disappointed in her. Lien pursed her lips before she finally shook her head.

"I would not kill him," she corrected. He gave her a look and Lien straightened. "Have I lied to you before?"

It wasn't that she wasn't willing to. Death was not the end, she knew that. But she didn't think that she could, and she was sure that if she did, it would do more harm than good in the long run.

She scratched her cheek, thinking.

"Come," Wan Shi Tong said abruptly. "I think I have something that will interest you."

Distracted now, she crawled out of the alcove, on top of a book case and jumped down to follow the great owl. Being in the spirit world was curious, in the sense that gravity wasn't quite like it was supposed to be but it still existed. Perhaps this was what it was like on the moon.

Wan Shi Tong lead her down, down, down into the depths of the library. She had thought she had explored most parts of it, but this was somewhere she was not at all familiar with. The walls were new, for one thing. Still expertly crafted but the stone it was carved out of had not been weathered yet and there was no sign of the years anywhere. All of the library was meticulously maintained but age showed no matter and it did not show here.

They stopped at an open doorway. Lien peered inside, curious. There was a table set up in the middle of the room with books laid on top, beside scrolls and leaves of blank papers. Lien walked forward, curious. Normally piles of books here were high and towering. These scant few were odd. On the walls were tombs that Lien had read already, in fact they were ones that she had kept coming back to for years and years afterwards. Now they lined the shelf, sorted by subject and author name.

"What is this?" she asked, touching a volume of poetry by Zhu Lee. The room wasn't sorted the way the rest of the library was. She couldn't figure out what was going on.

"This is your room," he said.

Lien paused, looked at him.

"Pardon?"

"This room is yours," he repeated, sweeping his wing towards the table. She went to inspect what he had put there. They were obscure firebending texts. Things she had never read before.

"I- Thanks you."

Her eyes started stinging. She turned and hid them in the owl's feathers while she hugged him. There was a long beat before she was totally enveloped in the feathered hug of a warm owl spirit.

Lien was pretty sure that Smellerbee was about the most sadistic girl she had ever met in her life. Her whole body ached and she had been holding positions for hours, twisting her limbs in ways that made her thank every god she could name for her flexibility.

"I can feel this in my uterus," she complained, struggling to keep her balance with her feet so awkwardly spaced and her legs bent in ways she swore they were not meant to.

The smaller girl snickered at her expense. Off to the side Jet made a sound of disgust and Longshot pulled his hat lower over his ears.

"You can stand up now," she offered, and Lien launched herself back into standing. She stumbled a little before she straightened out.

"Christ, I've never hurt so much in my life," she complained. Exaggerating and rolling her shoulder to try and get it to stop aching.

Longshot shot her a long look.

"Christ is like, a messiah who died in abrahamic texts," she explained, "It's a curse."

''In what texts?" Jet looked thoroughly confused.

"Abrahamic. It's a religion from the, west I think? I don't know where it would be from where we are. Hell, probably another dimension," she shrugged casually, and got an eye roll from the moody boy. He'd been marginally less obsessed with Zuko lately. He even took a break from his stalking last week to take a walk around the Lower Ring with the three of them while they tried to find a decent enough knife for Lien.

She had idly suggest she just made one out of glass, to which Smellerbee retorted that unless she wanted to be a very obvious assassin, it wasn't going to work.

"Anyways," Smellerbee interrupted them, probably for their own good, "I got you a stick," she declared, and pushed it into Lien's stomach.

The taller girl looked down at it. It was shiny, hard wood. It was less of a stick and more of a mini staff, with metal caps on both ends. A baton? There was a ring carved around it, about a third of the way up, with metal clamped there too, but the craftsmanship was rougher than it had been with the metal on the two ends.

Lien flipped it around in her hand a few times. She could use a knife, to hunt and skin animals, but fighting with one was not one of her forte's.

Smellerbee had her own stick, identical to Lien's.

"Hold it here, that'll be the hilt, and block when I swing at you," she instructed.

Lien nodded and settled onto the balls of her feet, waiting. Timing was everything, timing and predicting, patience and power. She watched.

Smellerbee's eyes moved before her hand and Lien had the mock up knife there to intercept when the smaller girl struck at her. She yelped in surprised when it was sent flying out of her hand. Cold metal touched her chest and Lien looked down at the end of Smellerbee's baton.

"Oh," she said. The smaller girl threw her a vicious smile.

"Didn't think I was that strong, did ya?" she taunted. Lien scratched her cheek and smiled sheepishly.

"Sorry. Can we try again?" she asked. Smellerbee stepped back enough that Lien could grab her own baton. She flipped it around, playing with, before she got ready again. This time when Smellerbee struck she was able to block it.

This part wasn't that hard. She remembered playing swords with her cousin when they were little, before his mom died and he turned into an asshole. And it wasn't like Smellerbee was trying very hard. It was practice.

It occurred to her, rather belatedly, that she wasn't being shown any real stances or practice moves. Was that because Smellerbee didn't know any? Was she entirely self taught?

Lien's thoughts distracted her enough that the other girl smacked her fingers this time.

"Focus!" she scolded, "I'm not teaching you so you can day dream."

"Sorry, sorry. I'm a sage, not a soldier," she joked, and braced herself for another round.

Smellerbee came at her again, from different angles and different speeds. Lien had height as an advantage, but it didn't do much good when the other girl kept darting in and smacking her in the ribs.

It hurt. The lesson itself left her limping back home, bruised and sore, but it was worth it. She had to be ready for the day of Black Sun. She was involved now, there was no backing down anymore.