Author's Note: This chapter and the next few I'll be working on descriptions during conversation and general imagery. If you are so inclined, I'd love some constructive feedback on those points. General feedback is also welcome.
If you are interested in becoming a beta reader, please drop me a line.
Finally, this is the last of the intro chapters.
"Your mother is a monster..."
Those words still echoed in Kyala's mind as she approached the simple, grey, single story stone house from the air. The outside walls looked to have been bent out of the ground with some skill. Several large windows faced the grove to the East while a wooden door and smaller windows faced what was left of the road to the West. While the road her and her mother traveled on seemed unkempt at best, vines, bramble, and other underbrush almost completely obscured the road as she neared the house. She saw no one near the house, the gardens on the Eastern side of the house, nor near the grove.
"Your mother is a monster..."
Kyala landed softly in front of the imposing door. Fashioned out of solid ironwood, the door would last eons. Stained a light color and sanded smooth. Through the windows, Kyala made out the smell of recently cooked food and heard some work song of times gone by. A song filled with sudden and powerful movements that mimicked the Earth Kingdom bending style. Kyala imagined such songs were used to build cities and move literal mountains.
Kyala looked back over her shoulder at where her mother's carriage should be - slowly trudging back towards the capital. She felt lost and adrift. The desire to open her airbending staff and flee as fast as the wind could carry her grew the as she replayed what happened in the carriage again. She wanted to be lost in that torrent of air. To have time to process the deluge her mother tried to pour into her, as if Father's death was the final drop of water that broke the dam. It started as a trickle. A story about how she and Aang met and her face soured. Bits and pieces of clues and half remembered theories streamed out of Azula and she couldn't stop herself. Tears streamed down her face, but she wouldn't stop talking. Couldn't. No time. Never enough time.
Azula's plan to confront Piro alone. Wanted to know. Needed to know. To know what? Kyala could not understand. Azula trailed off into incoherency and focused on deep breathing. No, Kyala suggested it. Had she? To go in her mother's stead. That her mother should go home and rest. That she would take care of everything. Kyala expected some kind of protest. As Fire Lady Azula demanded to see every interaction through to the end - to leave nothing to chance. To see the force of nature that was her mother reduced to this mewling infant tore at Kyala's heart.
"Your mother is a monster..."
Kyala turned back to see a kindly old woman in green robes met her gaze with an expectant smile. She held a potted plant in one hand and leaned on a shovel in the other. Before Kyala could utter a word, the old woman gingerly placed the potted plant in her hand. Kyala peered at what looked like a miniature tree with some wonder. A trunk the width of three fingers with full branches, a full crown, and even what appeared to be tiny, immature, indigo fruit. A bonsai tree. Knots dotted the trunk like scars of once deep wounds and the trunk blackened as if once grasped by wrath made manifest. She wondered at its age.
"Come along, dear," the old woman's voice came from around the side of the house.
Kyala looked up to find herself alone on the front steps. "What just happened?" she raged at herself. Evaded by an old woman like a rank amateur. Bumi would never let her live that down. Kyala marched after the old woman, her staff held firmly in her right hand and the bonsai in the left. "Good thing he's not going to find out," she whispered to herself.
The old woman was either faster than she looked or had a much longer head start than Kyala realized. They reached the center of the young grove by the time Kyala caught up. In a spot cleared of brush and leaves, several pails of water waited for them. The forest thrummed with life around them. Without saying a word to Kyala, the old woman hobbled to the spot and put her foot on the shovel. She leaned her weight on it, but the soil resisted her attempts. The old woman tried again with similar results.
"Is your name Piro?" Kyala asked, "I am..."
The look the old woman gave Kyala would've given a platypus bear pause and hissed, "This grove is sacred. Within these woods," the old woman gestured around her, "the living and the spirits, alike, may come to find peace." With a finger on her lips, the old woman returned to her task. Each grunt and groan louder than the last as she repeatedly lanced the soil with little effect.
Kyala watched the spectacle with growing irritation, a trait passed down from her mother. At last, Kyala had enough and gently pushed the exhausted crone aside and took over. She clasped the shovel's wooden handle with one hand and sank the blade with her foot. The earth parted with ease. Within a few minutes, she'd dug a hole deep enough for the bonsai tree.
The old woman picked up the bonsai tree from the ground with some amount of reverence. Her eyes locked on Kyala's as she offered it to her. Kyala contemplated the diminutive plant. Why would anyone plant a bonsai tree? Wouldn't that defeat its purpose? She hesitated.
The old woman's face grew quite serious. "Long ago, when haunted by terrible visions and portents, your father found solace in caring for a sapling and meditating on its existence. The consequences of a lifetime of work, through sadness, strife, and joy, are represented in its very being."
Kyala's hands trembled as she took the bonsai. Its tiny fruit swayed from side to side as what she held gained new significance.
"When Fire Lord Aang could no longer care for it due to his failing health I took over its maintenance. This is your father's work and his alone. I have merely maintained its health just for this moment."
Kyala felt numb as the old woman guided her to the hole. The old woman helped Kyala free the bonsai from the pot soil. Roots, long pruned to stunt growth, hung limp in Kyala's hand. Her father's hand worked for years on this beautiful little tree and he'd never even hinted at its existence with her or Bumi. Did her mother know? What other secrets did he keep hidden?
"It is right that since Aang is now reborn, so too should this bonsai tree be set free to grow as nature wills. That one of his own should be the one to unchain its potential."
Kyala realized that she'd dug the hole wrong for her father's life's work. Too wide. Too deep. Uncaring. She scooped the pile of soil with one hand and fixed what she could. Mixed the bonsai tree's soil with the earth and together with the tree itself placed them all in the ground with great care. The old woman slowly poured water on soil around the bonsai tree and together they packed the soil. "Bumi should be here," she thought to herself too late. This ceremony, if one could call it that, should've been just between her brother and her. Dirt clung to her hands and pants and she tried to clean them off when she stood up. "He's not going to forgive me for this." Kyala hung her head in shame.
"Your mother is a monster..."
The old woman poured the last of the water around the bonsai tree and bowed her head for a moment in silent prayer. She picked up the shovel and buckets then walked to Kyala's side. They both stared at the newly planted bonsai tree in silence for a moment. She whispered "You are right, of course. I am Piro. I have known your father since he reappeared in the world so long ago." Piro stretched out her hand and patted Kyala on the shoulder affectionately, "Take as much time as you need. We will speak in my home when you are ready."
Piro left Kyala in silence - complete silence. No birds sang. No crickets chirped. No owls hooted. No frogs croaked. It was as if every animal in the grove quieted themselves out of reverence. Or fear. Kyala watched Piro as she left - her mother's desperate warning echoed again in her head.
The carriage stopped half a mile from Piro's home at Kyala's request. She decided the best course of action was to scout the area before confronting the woman that caused her mother so much distress. Kyala stepped down from the carriage and turned to face her mother. A hard expression lined the Fire Lady regent's face. She'd regained her composure and appraised her daughter with a calculating look. She took a deep breath, "You'll need this, of course." Azula handed her daughter her airbender staff. Kyala grasped the offered end, but her mother didn't let go.
"Kyala, I...," Azula's eyes searched over her daughter as if to burn this moment into her mind forever. A parent can never preserve their children's innocence forever. "Your mother is a monster. I've done terrible things to keep that which I hold so dear safe. And all that I have done," Azula's closed her eyes and released her hold on Kyala's staff, "is in vain."