They had come back from their unsuccessful - and unexpectedly satisfying - manhunt yesterday and Katara had avoided him ever since. Even when the two of them had packed up their camp and mounted Appa she had stayed quiet. It made Zuko grow anxious and he wondered if she thought of their night together as a mistake. He wished she didn't. He didn't.

Katara had retreated quickly after dinner, keeping her head low and her gaze anywhere but on him. And as the sun started to set and everyone got ready for the night, Zuko still sat staring into the fire, wishing things were different between them.

The flames danced around each other, like bodies intertwining, and it only made the sinking feeling in his stomach multiply.

With a sigh, Zuko stood from the ground, dusting the dust off his pants before suffocating the fire with a flick of the wrist. He prepared himself for a night of tossing and turning, pondering anxiously about what to say to Katara and how to act around her. What he was not prepared for was the very waterbender occupying his mind also occupying his tent.

"Oh, erm, hey", Zuko said and scratched the back of his neck nervously, still standing at the entrance with the flap of the tent open.

"Don't just stand there", Katara said, her gaze still stuck to the ground like it had been at dinner, and moved over to make place for him on the bedroll, "get in here."

The fabric fluttered close behind Zuko as he kneeled down next to her, waiting for her to speak. She fidgeted with her hands, nervously rolling her bottom lip between her teeth, gathering her courage and trying hard to find the right words.

"I-", Katara started, but closed her mouth again, shaking her head silently to herself.

"It's okay", he urged her on, reaching out to lay a hand on her shoulder. Her head snapped up at the contact, their eyes meeting for the first time in days. But instead of answering with words, she answered with a kiss; feeling the warmth of his lips on hers that she had missed so.

It was an intense kiss, the way their lips moved against the other's and their tongue intertwining, dancing like the flames in the fire before. Zuko groaned in her mouth and lowered her body down to the bedroll.

"Don't stop", Katara managed to get out between kisses and moans, tugging his shirt off of him. It was wrong, she knew that, but she couldn't deny herself any longer.

She spread her fingers along his taut muscles, scraping her nails lightly against his skin, as she hugged his hips with her thighs, and Zuko couldn't help but to grind into the warmth in between her legs.

Katara's fingers worked swiftly over both of their bodies; tugging his pants down to his feet so he could kick them off and flinging the outer layer of her own outfit over her head before shimmying out of her leggings.

Zuko's mouth latched onto her exposed neck, kissing and nipping and licking at the sweet skin as she writhed and moaned underneath him.

"We have to be quiet", he murmured, though did nothing to still his exploring lips and hands. He brushed over the bindings over her chest, searching for the right strand to tuck on for it to unravel. She had made it look so easy two nights ago.

"You okay?" Katara laughed breathlessly, smiling at the eagerness in which his fingers worked.

Zuko didn't answer for the longest of time, his lips still kissing her neck and leaving purple love bites all around. "No", he huffed against her skin chest before pressing a soft kiss to her lips. He sat up on his knees and watched idly as Katara shook her head at him, a big smile on her lips, and undid the white linen.

Zuko could feel himself strain against his underpants as she laid the bindings to the side of the bedroll - her brown, smooth skin glistened from the moonlight that filtered in through the tent flap - and when she surprised him by unraveling her lower bindings as well he couldn't keep his hands away.

"Mm", Katara moaned as Zuko cupped her breasts, rolling a nipple between his fingers while suckling at the other.

"Quiet", he reminded her and as he felt her nod her head above him he moved his hand from her chest to play with the curls at the junction of her thighs. The wetness that met his fingers made him smirk with pride.

"Zuko", Katara whimpered, begging for him to fill her, but he instead teased her opening, swiping his thumb over her clit so she bucked off the bedroll; but never dipping inside of her. "Please", she breathed, shutting her eyes tight and biting her lower lip as she lifted her hips in an attempt to increase the friction she so craved.

"I didn't think I'd get to do this again", Zuko whispered - more to himself than to her - against her chest, still kissing her skin and nipping at her nipple as his fingers circled the bundle of nerves above her center. "I'm savouring it."

"You're driving me crazy, that's what you're doing", Katara huffed, though a smile donned her lips at Zuko's small admittance; he had wanted to do this again, he had waited as she roamed it over a thousand times in her head before coming to a conclusion and he smiled at her as she finally put her pride aside and went after what she wanted.

Zuko retracted his fingers from her entrance and dragged them slowly over her body, leaving a wet track on her skin as they wandered upward, and he looked her deeply in the eyes as he plopped them in his mouth, sucking her juices off of his fingers.

"La, Zuko", Katara breathed, her eyes filled with an unquenchable lust that only drove him crazier by the second. Her hands were in his hair in an instant and her lips on his; if any part of Zuko had hesitated before it was all gone by now as he kissed her back ferociously and kicked his underpants away.

Her legs wrapped around his hips once more and her warm, wet core swept up against him, making him growl in need. She almost screamed as he entered her, hitting that sweet spot deep within her, but his mouth on hers muffled the sound.

"We must be quiet", Zuko said again, though his own moans filled the tent with hers.

"I don't think I can", Katara smiled, one of her hands finding his and intertwining their fingers.

Zuko nuzzled the crook of her neck, cursing against her skin, and Katara bit her lip as their hips met in hard, fast thrusts. Her other hand scraped at the skin on his back, marking him in her own way; like he had on her neck and chest.

She moaned his name and he hers as heat built in both of their stomachs, making them both come undone in the arms of the other. Their lips moved against each other in a dance that could be called nothing less than beautiful, each swallowing the moans coming from the other that would otherwise awaken the entire camp.

And as they laid together, basking in the afterglow of their shared climax, Zuko couldn't help but think how utterly magnificent she would look against the red silks of his bed in the palace; and there, they never would have to be quiet again.