Ozai's Vengeance

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Disclaimer: ATLA is the property of Nickelodeon and VIACOM. No profit is made by this story.

Notes: I want to thank everyone who has stuck with me this far. In particular, I want to thank my reviewers and everyone who has added this story to Favorites and Alerts, especially the lurkers who came out to review! I love hearing from you guys, so let me know what you think!

≅

The day would not seem to end. Had it really only been that morning that Sokka had stormed into the nursery, sword drawn, accusing Zuko of siring a bastard with Katara at Aang's cremation? The moment felt as though it had happened years ago. Now he sat in his office and Xiao Zhi stood in the very spot that Jun had vacated only hours earlier. Iroh took his usual place beside the teapot to Zuko's right. The old man looked somehow revived by the family dinner. His smile was even pleasant; one would never know that they were discussing the possibility of a well-funded, silent insurrection within the Fire Nation.

Zuko steepled his fingers. He looked at Xiao Zhi. "Well?"

"The bounty hunter knows she's being followed."

Of course she does. It's never that easy. "How?"

"We suspect her shirshui recognized a scent, my Lord." Xiao Zhi blinked twice. "If some citizens of Tetsushi are in fact involved in a plot against you, they could have stolen samples of cloth and armor from your retinue while you were in the village. She could have trained the animal to sniff out certain fragrances: clove oil, the household soap. It is common for my men to bathe and treat their weapons while still on palace grounds."

"I am familiar with the shirshui's talents, Xiao Zhi," he said, thinking briefly of a blind beast and a necklace. He sighed. "What were her movements before she was aware of being followed?"

"Frightened, my Lord. Erratic."

Zuko frowned and looked at his uncle in the corner of one eye. Jun? Frightened? Things were worse than he'd thought. "Frightened of what?"

"Most likely this message, my Lord." Xiao Zhi withdrew a scroll from one sleeve and handed it to Zuko. He unfurled it, squinted, and read: "Midnight. We'll find you. Be ready." A single stylized flame sat inside a black inverted triangle -- a symbol of Jun's visitors, perhaps.

"Are you certain this message isn't for me?"

"My Lord?"

"Nothing." Zuko rolled up the scroll and handed it to his uncle. Iroh read it, lifted two bushy eyebrows, and gave Zuko a look that said: Don't even think about it. Naturally, this meant that Zuko could do nothing but. "Has Jun seen this?"

"Yes, my Lord. We left behind a copy for her to find."

He nodded. "Good. Have you formulated a plan?"

"We will intercept the bounty hunter's visitors upon arrival, my Lord."

Zuko leaned back in his chair. "Now why does that sound too easy?"

Xiao Zhi and Iroh shared a tiny, proud smile. "Because it is, my Lord," the captain of the guard said. She adjusted her posture. "If Jun is smart, she will go to a public place for this meeting, hoping that her pursuers will make less of a scene. On the other hand, if she has misjudged them, the area will quickly become a battleground. With our men there, that means the possibility of a market square in flames."

Zuko watched his uncle idly walking a Pai Sho tile over his fingers. The White Lotus, of course. "Then we change the game," Zuko said. "I want Jun publicly arrested. Put her in stocks outside the tower."

Iroh clicked his tongue. "Oh, the tower…" He sighed. "That brings back memories…"

Zuko thought he caught Xiao Zhi rolling her eyes just a little. "And the charge, my Lord?"

Zuko smiled, just barely. "She called my son a name. Figure it out."

Xiao Zhi saluted. "It is done, my Lord."

The captain of the guard left, and in her wake Iroh rocked on his heels. "Your enemies are either very clever or very stupid, my nephew."

"They came to our city, uncle. They're stupid."

"I meant about the time of night, although your sentiment is not unappreciated," Iroh said, raising his teacup. "Surely midnight is not the best time for firebending."

His uncle had a point -- as usual. Perhaps Jun's visitors already knew that she had been to see the Fire Lord, and thus expected a horde of operatives whose threat they sought to diminish by arranging for a midnight meeting. Perhaps they planned it this way all along. But he had already changed one variable: he had moved the location, and he -- and his men -- knew the tower well. They wouldn't be caught by surprise the way they might in a twisted back alley. He had forced his enemies onto open ground. As for the firebending, he could dole out ryu-nyuu if necessary. Zuko already had enough burning through his system to keep his breath of fire alive until mid-morning the next day.

"I know that look, my nephew," Iroh said. "I don't like it."

Zuko stood. He pulled his cuffs straight. "I'm going to see my son, uncle."

Iroh smiled. "I hope he tires you out."

≅

With a puff of flame up the pneumatic pipe, the lock fell aside and Zuko pushed through the secret entrance to Katara's room. She lay in bed with a scroll across her lap. She looked up to find him stepping hesitantly into the room and said: "Are you here to continue our negotiations?"

If only. He sighed and leaned against the secret panel, heard it click shut. His eyes locked onto Kurzu. The child sat on the floor playing with a miniature wooden version of a Water Tribe club. A boomerang of similar vintage sat discarded nearby. Zuko crossed to him and picked up the boomerang. It felt old and sported the teeth marks of who knew how many Water Tribe children. He guessed it was an old toy of Senzo's, possibly one of Sokka's too. "These are surprisingly lethal, young man. You'll have to be careful."

Kurzu turned around, blinked, and said: "Thu-Thu!" He shook his tiny club in Zuko's direction.

"No," Katara said behind him. He heard her slide out of the sheets and pick her way across the trundle before settling down beside him. Her body still held its warmth from dinner; Zuko recalled her fingers tracing across his knuckles and suddenly the hairs on his neck seemed oddly alive. "Da-ddy," she was saying. She pointed at Zuko. "Da-ddy."

Kurzu's face crinkled as though Katara had said something funny. "Thu-Thu."

"It's a lost cause. He's rebelled against me already."

"Oh, shut up. He has not." Katara bumped him with her shoulder. She leaned against him. "Thank you for tonight."

"The screaming children? The constant threat?"

"I haven't had dinner with my family in years. I'd forgotten what it was like."

A stray thought unraveled within his memory. He frowned. "You said something about an ultimatum."

Katara snorted. "Oh, that. Turns out Sokka really likes you and he wants me to settle down and start pumping out loads of little 'princess ponytails' at the earliest possible opportunity."

"No, really, tell me what he said."

"I'm telling you. Princess Ponytails."

Zuko looked down at her. Katara wore the slightly-irritated look she always had when she was being painfully truthful. He blinked. "Clearly…" he said, swallowing past a dry throat, "clearly that passage leads to another world, where up is down and your brother doesn't hate the air I breathe."

Katara stuck her tongue out at him. "Oh, please. Sokka doesn't hate you. He doesn't care enough about you to hate you."

Zuko squeezed his eyes shut. He felt another headache coming. "That's just…beautiful."

"Okay, maybe that came out wrong. The point is that he doesn't hate you. He doesn't even know you that well. But you impressed him today. A lot. And that's really hard to do."

"I threatened his life."

"Like I said, you impressed him."

"I've endangered his wife and children."

"His mind will change. It always does. And you're protecting his wife and kids like they're your own. Again with the impressiveness."

The more time Katara spent with her brother, Zuko decided, the more they started to sound alike. He pinched the bridge of his nose. The weight of the day hung on him like wet clothes. He rolled his neck and each bone crunched loudly. He winced. Never, ever fall asleep in the nursery again.

"Sounds like you could use a healing session," Katara said.

"It's just soreness. I'll be fine. All I need is a shower and a nap."

She frowned. "A nap? Aren't you going to bed?"

He shook his head. "Xiao Zhi and her men are apprehending Jun the people tracking her later tonight. I want to be awake when that happens."

Katara slapped her forehead. "I totally forgot to ask! What did she say?"

Zuko shrugged. "Not more than I just told you. Jun received a message. We intercepted it. She's being arrested now; we'll lure her visitors to open ground and see what we can see."

"Did the message itself have any clues?"

He shrugged. "An insignia. A rather uninspired one, but it gives us something to go on." He stood. "We'll learn more soon enough. For now, I need to rest." Zuko leaned down and picked Kurzu up. "And you need your face washed," he said. "Let's go."

Once hidden behind a half-closed door, Zuko pocketed a bar of Katara's soap -- white ginger, the shirshui wouldn't recognize it -- and quickly wiped off Kurzu's face. "Thu-Thu," the child said, still clutching his toy club and trying to avoid the cloth in Zuko's hand. Zuko washed the child's face and hands, then carried him back to Katara. "Thanks for watching him."

She frowned. "You're leaving already?"

He kissed her forehead. "If I stay, I won't want sleep."

≅

His sleep was fitful. He couldn't seem to relax. Finally he got up and scrubbed himself off in the shower, first with a pumice and then with Katara's soap. It smelled like memories of sharing a tub with her and the child, and he had to switch the water to cold for just a moment.

The clothes he'd left hanging on the chair were gone when he emerged. So was his towel. Frowning, he pushed into the room to find Katara dressed in deep purple robes, fixing a straw hat and veil over her head. She turned and he saw red paint dancing across her lips and eyes, her face somehow older with the weight of legend on it.

She nodded at the clothes, mask, and twin blades waiting on his bed in a way that made Zuko feel even more naked than he already was. "I hope you didn't think you were going without me." She threw a towel at him.

He quickly tied it around himself. "Where is my son?"

"In the nursery with Iroh and the other kids. He's fine. Did you really think I'd like let you go alone?"

"I thought… I didn't know you knew I was going."

"Zuko, you stole my soap to fool the shirshui. I noticed it the moment I took a bath. It didn't take much guesswork after that."

He pinched the bridge of his nose. The remaining water on him slowly began to steam away. "I need you here. My son is here. My uncle is here. Your brother is here. His children are here."

Katara put her hands to her hips. "Don't you trust your uncle? What about Sokka and Suki and Toph? Don't you think they can protect the family?"

He sighed. "Of course I do. But you're the one I trust the most."

She smiled. "Thank you. But flattery will get you nowhere. I'm coming with you and that's final."

"Katara-"

"Zuko." She stepped closer. "Were you not listening this afternoon? All of me. All the time. Those are my terms." She took his hands. "If you want me to be Fire Lady, you have to remember that I was the Painted Lady first."

Her chin rose and as her head tipped backward he saw gold glimmering on her forehead. He quickly reached out and pushed the hat back from her head. There on her scalp was the circlet he'd given her twelve years ago -- a reward straight from the vault in the form of a piece rumored to have come from the original Painted Lady. "You kept it," he said.

"Of course I kept it. You gave it to me." She took the hat back and began re-affixing it to her head. "Zuko, I don't know if I've ever told you, but I saw the Painted Lady. Her spirit, I mean. She appeared to me and thanked me for helping a Fire Nation village." She looked at his mask. "If the Fire Nation needs the Blue Spirit again, then it definitely needs the Painted Lady."

Zuko crossed to the mask and picked it up. "It's not your fight. Not yet."

Her fingers drifted over the hilt of each sword. "I've defended every home I've ever lived in, Zuko. This can't be any different."

He gave her a look that he hoped communicated the frayed, stretched feeling she was giving him. "I can't lose you."

She smiled a little ruefully under her veil. "And I can't be left behind." She laid her hands on his shoulders. "Don't tell me it ends here, Zuko."

He looked at her hands on him. They were good, strong hands, slender but steely, with enough power to stop his heart and rule the ocean. "It ends the day I die," he said. "Let me get dressed."

≅

Their flight through the city involved an old escape route of his through the palace -- funny, how some things never changed -- and his once-well-trod path up to the tower. Katara helped matters by shrouding their travels in fog. They arrived just before Xiao Zhi's operatives; Zuko guided them into a tree overlooking the paved yard outside the tower. From there they could see Jun's dark shape on the pale stones. She knelt before the stocks; if Zuko squinted he saw the word for "slander" hanging about her neck on an iron plaque. Apparently her shirshui had followed her scent; it lumbered from tree to tree before finally laying down at her feet. Xiao Zhi's agents, dressed as simple tower guards, quickly deployed in a pincer formation around the tower.

"Now we wait," he said under his breath. The mask made his words echo strangely in his ears. He had always done his best never to speak while wearing it.

"Does Xiao Zhi know you're here?"

"Probably. But she won't have told her men. She can't risk there being a traitor in the ranks."

"Is that a serious possibility?"

Slowly, he nodded. "If someone poisoned Kurzu, they did it from inside the house."

Beside him, Katara shuddered. "We'll find them," Zuko said. "They'll be punished. I'll-"

"Hey, look." Katara nodded at the courtyard. Far down the path, a group of hooded figures approached. Seeing them, Jun began to struggle inside the stocks. The shirshui rose to its feet and circled her, its mighty tail twitching. It knows their scent. Zuko watched his men take an almost imperceptible step forward. He leaned down, gloved hands clenched on the tree's trunk and the branch that supported his weight. He remembered his old lightness and stopped moving just before the wood creaked. A single figure stepped forward and knelt before Jun. He was dressed in the simpler robes of a fire sage neophyte, one who might care for the poor. He wet a rag in a small bowl of water and applied it to Jun's face. The woman turned her face this way and that, and spat at him.

"Get away from me! I'm done with you! I didn't do what you asked, so just kill me!"

One of Xiao Zhi's men stepped forward. "Is this gentleman giving you trouble, prisoner?"

"Yes! I want him gone! Get rid of-

"HEY!"

Zuko's eyes tracked in the direction of the shout. A clot of his men had simply vanished. His eyes roved wildly, but they were nowhere. The other guards, visibly shaken, broke ranks and began casting their eyes anywhere but at Jun. No. No, no, no. This isn't happening. Not when we're this close!

"Help me!" Jun was shrieking. "Somebody help me!" Her shirshui went wild, swinging its tail into the crowd. A smoke bomb went off and the creature reared up and roared its displeasure; Zuko smelled pepper and his eyes began to water.

"Damn it-"

"I'm on it," Katara said beside him, and a wave of fog cut through the smoke, dispersing it in two waves. But the clear air exposed something even worse. More of his men had disappeared -- where in Koh's great cave did they go? why didn't they make a sound? -- and the intruders hacked at Jun's chains. The bounty hunter screamed and writhed, trying to fight with blind, watering eyes -- just as furious as her sightless animal companion.

"Get away from me! Get away from me!"

"Stay here," Zuko said, unsheathing his swords.

"Zuko-"

But he was already on the ground, whirling, aiming for the one that Jun feared the most. His men, what few remained that weren't clawing uselessly at their eyes, rushed to help him. The prison alarm went off; a dull clanging high above his head. Inside, he heard the din of shouting prisoners. Someone came at him with a hatchet; he wove away and slit the man across the belly. Hot blood was on his shoes, he moved through it, ducking, slicing, defending. The mask protected his eyes but only a little; already his vision blurred. He blinked hard. His prey kept moving, kept shuffling just outside his reach through groups of larger, tougher men who carried shovels in their long, tattered sleeves. One of those to head and you're dead, Zu-Zu. He aimed for the handles, tried slicing them in half. One blade stuck. He tried wrenching it away but the other man grabbed his arm, grinned, started to squeeze-

-and froze, just before a look of supreme terror crossed his bearded face. His limbs stiffened and locked. Trembling and sweating, he let Zuko go. His shovel rose. "Help me! Help me, I can't stop!" He began swinging at his compatriots. Their hoods went dark and wet the moment the shovel connected. "Help me! Help me! I can't stop it!"

Around him, hooded men began to writhe and screech, their bodies twisting as they formed a defensive wall of unwilling flesh around Zuko and Jun. He looked up and saw Katara on her branch, a vision of the Painted Lady, her fingers plucking the air like a puppetmaster. May the sages bless that woman and forever keep her name on their lips. Grinning, he turned-

-and saw a second smile open up on Jun's scarred throat where someone had slit it wide open. Blood bubbled out and she gurgled pathetically. He was vaguely aware of someone shouting -- him -- and another presence, his prey -- how did he appear so quickly? -- trying to shuffle away. Zuko reached out with the swords, made a claw that drew the other man backward. He pinned the other man to the ground. A hand armed with a dagger came up; Zuko saw it flash and wrestled it away. As he did, he noticed the age in the hand, the liver spots and puffy blue veins. He squeezed the wrist and the other man yelped in protest, started to arch and convulse, clawing at his left arm. The dagger dropped. His hood fell-

-and revealed Yun Zi, the man behind the Society for Justice in Learning.

Zuko ripped his mask off. "What are you doing here?" Zuko asked, shaking him.

"Too late…" Yun Zi said, wheezing.

"Why did you kill Jun? What didn't she do? Did she betray you?"

His brow beaded with sweat, Yun Zi shook his head. "Too late…"

"What's too late? What's going on? Tell me now!"

A wry smile bent the old man's features. Cold rippled across Zuko's skin. The old man gestured him closer. Zuko leaned down, his eyes on the dagger. "You're too late…" Yun Zi rasped. "The plan is...already in motion…"

A terrible, dry laugh warmed Zuko's cheek. Zuko sat up. Eyes dancing through the pain, Yun Zi continued laughing. "Too late," he whispered, coughing. "Failsafe…" His body seized. Fingers clutched his heart. He arched up off the ground once and stopped breathing. His eyes remained open, still crinkled with triumphant laughter. They stared lifelessly at Zuko.

Katara was running toward him. You missed something, Zu-Zu.

Yun Zi. Why was it Yun Zi?

Who is close to you?

Katara said: "Yun Zi? But why?" He pulled the mask back down.

Who do you trust?

Yun Zi had said there were Fire Nation boys with nothing to do since the military schools stopped operating. He had sent numbers and charts and testimonials. He had sent-

Who arrived just before the poisoning?

Zuko's hands clenched on the swords. "Tom-Tom." He started running.

≅

Without Katara beside him he moved faster. But she gave chase and she tripped him up; she kept slicking the streets with ice that he slid down, skidding, heedless, just intent on his goal. His blades gave him traction as his feet slid out from under him. He used them to make a corner, then a jump, then he was on the rooftops. Just let her try following you now, Zu-Zu.

Katara made the world foggy and he sliced through it. He knew this town better than she did. He followed the scent of the sea. He ran along the spine of his city. Tiles clattered down as he leapt from building to building; below him he heard Katara cursing. All of me. All the time. Well, it went both ways. Can't be Daddy Zu-Zu all the time, can you? There's too much of Ozai in you. He ran and birds and pygmy pumas skittered out of his way. One part of him -- the part that might have gone quietly mad in a corner years ago -- wondered how he must look. He imagined the Blue Spirit's hungry smile. He remembered how it had made Aang shout. That was a lifetime ago. How could you possibly justify fighting a child?

"Zuko, don't do this!"

But he just kept running. And so did Katara. He cleared the first palace perimeter and so did she, arcing through the air on a ribbon of ice that became a whip that knocked him to his feet. Grunting, he pushed up from the ground and ran through his own gardens like a thief. His breath puffed around him in the mask. My son. My son. Tom-Tom the traitor is in the same house as my son. And my uncle. And my nephew. And my nieces. He ran and he saw Iroh, saw lightning crackling from the old man's fingers as he redirected Azula's firepower, saw the Dragon of the West and a cone of flame erupting from the old man's mouth, heard the old words that once embarrassed and pleased him in equal measure: I love you as my own. Heard them and knew what they meant, for the first time.

He ran.

"Zuko, no!"

They were in his mother's garden, now, just steps away from where he needed to be. His fingers itched. The swords seemed to reach out of their own accord, divining rods, they pointed to where Tom-Tom slept -- the Fire Nation still does not suffer weak links in the chain -- but then his whole body locked and he fell, groaning, into the grass.

Bloodbending. He might have known. Behind him, he heard Katara panting. Breath rattled in her throat. She coughed and spat. "You can't do this," she said through gasps. "You don't…have to do this."

"Let me go, Katara."

"No. I won't." She coughed again. "You don't know…what you're doing."

"Yes. I do." He tried wriggling but only his fingers and toes and tongue would move. It was like being wrapped in a spider's silk. "Let me go, damn it!"

"No." She fell to her knees. He heard it and felt it in the ground. "No."

"He's in there with my son! He's in there with your family!"

"You can't keep doing this. You can't keep running off."

"Don't you dare presume to lecture me! And don't turn this into something about us! This is about my son!" He suppressed a scream of frustration. Fire pushed past his teeth. "I've held back all day! This morning and this afternoon when you and he were threatened I held back! And now he's right there-"

"Zuko, I'm tired…" He heard her stand. He caught sight of purple robes fluttering as she wavered on her feet. "I can't hold you much longer."

"Good. Let me go. Let me do what I have to do."

He watched her feet cross in front of him. She now stood between him and the door. "If I do, you'll have to fight me." Her breath had calmed. "Can you do that, Zuko? Can you fight your way through me?"

He shut his eyes. "Don't make me do that."

The invisible bonds coiled about him loosened gently. He heard her hat fall lightly to the grass. "Put the swords away," she said. "Fight me like you used to."

Slowly, he rose to his feet. He set the swords down. He pulled the mask away and tossed it to one side near her hat. Her hair had gone curly with sweat. Her makeup had run. The golden circlet still glittered on her scalp and forehead. She shrugged off the outermost robe. She assumed a bending posture.

"I love you," Zuko said. "Don't make me do this."

In answer, she merely uncorked her double waterskins. Twin serpents of water hovered near her hands. Taking a deep breath, he summoned two blades of flame, and waited. She moved first. The whips went straight for his face -- she wasted no time -- and he ducked down, rushed her, leapt high in the air and let flame follow his kick. She pushed a tide of water -- much more now, and he smelled the pond in it, clever woman, she'd taken advantage of his time in the air -- and he fell backward onto the grass. He popped back up and fired punches at her as he ran; she batted them away with a penta-pus.

"Why are you doing this?" She slid water beneath him; it sprang up and enveloped him, he couldn't breathe and then he was flying, upside down, hurtling toward the turtle-duck pond. Just before his head connected with the mud she let him go and he balled up tight. He splashed down and mud went in his mouth and then it was cold, so very, very cold and he was climbing, she raised him up on a pillar of glittering spikes, like old times: "Sweetness," he said through chattering teeth, "you remembered."

"Damn it, Zuko, you're really stupid sometimes," Katara said, shearing the ice apart. It crackled under the pressure. Zuko slid free of the ice but heard it needling down through the air above him -- he found himself oddly reminded of Mai -- and soon he was locked up tight again. He shot fire straight from his mouth and shattered free. Then two fire-whips were in his hands and he made her jump, broke her root, but she hopped on a disc of ice and made straight for him -- arcing upward on a tongue of ice that became a vortex of water. She was tall, the center of a cyclone, he stood there dizzied by it until it was too late and she came crashing down over him, soaking him, her weight in all the crucial spots and her two fingers pressed up into his throat: "We could take him together, Zuko," she said through clenched teeth. "If he's the traitor you think he is then he expects you tonight. But tomorrow? When things have quieted down? During sparring practice with the Avatar's widow, when he thinks he still has your trust?"

His breath came too fast. He began to see stars. "Toph could…"

"Right, Zuko. Toph could." She leaned down and her eyes sparkled in his vision. "If this is about family, Zuko, then let's keep it in the family." Her lips hardened. "Tomorrow we give Tom-Tom the fight of his life."

Zuko sat up. Stars followed him. "You would have fought me just to keep me from acting too hastily."

"Not would have. Did. I did fight you to keep you from acting too hastily." She ran hands over him. They trailed into interesting places. "No permanent damage, I hope?"

"Nothing important." He spat out mud. "We may yet have more children. Provided you let me live that long."

"Ha ha, very funny. Let's go see Kurzu."

That thought alone gave him more energy, and he rolled to his feet. He picked up the mask and the swords, offered Katara her hat and robe, and they strode back into his palace covered in blood, grass, and mud. The guards gave them raised eyebrows and tight-lipped smiles -- dear sages, the rumors this night will start -- as they made their damp, dirty way to the nursery. The guards outside the room gave them the once-over, but Zuko simply blew fire up the pneumatic tubes in the proper combination, and unlocked the door.

Inside, Iroh and Master Sho sat at a Pai Sho table. Sho smoked from a gold filigree water-pipe with a cake of sweet orchid tobacco slowly blackening at the top. He rose and saluted. "Good evening, my Lord. Or, considering the hour, good morning." He bowed to Katara. "My Lady."

"Master Sho?"

"He puts the Sho in Pai Sho, nephew," Iroh said, rubbing his eyes with the ball of one hand. He smiled. "Did you two have fun on your date?"

"We'll discuss it later. For now, I want a watch put on Tom-Tom. Where is Kurzu?"

"Asleep. If you want-"

"No, I'll get him." Zuko moved past the beds trying to make as little noise as possible, but Senzo sat up suddenly.

"Uncle Zuko," the boy said. He squinted in the dimness. "Is everything okay?"

"Everything is fine, nephew. Go back to sleep."

"Are you and Uncle Aang taking us on the dragon today?"

He almost asked What dragon? But the boy was clearly talking in his sleep. "Not today," he said.

"Uncle Aang said there would be dragons," Senzo said, lying back down. "I want dragons."

"I'll do my best," Zuko said.

"Okay…" Senzo fell asleep with his face firmly planted in the pillow. Zuko moved on. Kurzu lay asleep on his own bed, and stirred only a little when Zuko picked him up. He felt perfectly normal: no fever, no chill, lungs clear, not even a runny nose. Zuko wrapped him in a blanket and carried him off.

"Uncle. I'm taking him for the night."

Iroh smiled up at him pleasantly. Something seemed to glitter near his eyes. "You called him 'nephew,'" he said. "You called your nephew 'nephew.'"

Zuko adjusted his uncle's collar. He tugged dry, silvery hairs free of it and smoothed them down. "Of course I did." He hitched the baby higher on his arm, and left the room. He mouthed Bed? to Katara and she answered Please. This time he simply followed her to her room: no secret passages, no tricks. The women at the door parted to let them through without even a second glance, and he locked the door behind them with his own breath.

≅

A tickle across his nose. Her hair. White ginger and sweat and the smell of summer storms on her skin. He inhales, she inhales. In, out. In, out. His son's breathing, too. He sees them without opening his eyes -- so this is how Toph does it -- sees his wife's necklace on the stand beside the bed, sees a hand reaching to pick it up. Long, familiar fingers scratching blue stone. It dangles. It glimmers. Laughter. Growing, rasping, mocking laughter. He freezes.

"Those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it."

He sees the face, the long hair, the crown, the beard, the blue stone hanging where the left eye should be: Ozai pulls it away and he sees the terrible wound, the scar, his own face, his own ruined face; there's a blue glow and Ozai's smile and the crackle of lightning-

"NO!" Zuko sat up and fire came with him. His left arm made an arc of flame across the bed. It dissolved into pre-dawn shadow. No one sat there. Ozai was dead. Zuko felt for his own chin -- cleanshaven as ever, aside from stubble. Katara put a hand on him and he jolted.

"It was just a dream," she said as Kurzu began to cry.

Zuko looked down at his son in horror. You just shot fire over your own son's head. Over your son's face. He started shaking. Mute, his vision blurred, he gathered Kurzu in his arms as the child wailed. You could have scarred him. Kurzu's tears smeared across Zuko's bare skin. The child roared into his neck. Zuko couldn't see, suddenly. Everything had gone wet and indistinct and his throat had closed; his knees came up and he made a ball of limbs around his son. He rocked and his son shrieked.

"Don't be scared," he heard himself saying. "Don't be scared. I didn't mean to…" I didn't mean to. Dear sages, I promise I didn't mean to. "I'd never…" He couldn't speak, couldn't breathe. He kissed his son's scalp. "I love you. I would never... I'm not like that, I promise, I'll never be like that-"

"Zuko." He looked up and Katara was staring at him, head tilted, a few flakes of red paint still at her hairline. She held her arms out and he moved and she moved and all three of them were a tangle of arms and shoulders. "It's okay," she said in his ear. "It'll be okay."

"It's not," he insisted. "I could have hurt him." He choked. "I could have hurt you. Katara, I fought you tonight. I-I.. I left you behind with those monsters, I just left you there! They could have killed you and I just ran away!"

"Ssh. Calm down. Deep breaths."

"I can't do this. I was a fool to think I could. I wanted this so badly and I thought I could make it work but I can't. He's in me, he'll always be in me, he'll make me hurt you-"

"Zuko." Katara pulled away. Her fingers lifted his face and turned it toward hers. Her eyes were flint. "The only way Ozai can hurt any of us is if you believe his lies about who you are. He's dead now. He's finished. He has been for twelve years." Her fingers traced the scar. "The fight is over. You won."

His own voice was so small he wanted to hide his face: "I shot fire at you. I love you and I shot fire at you-"

"And I whipped you, Zuko. Don't forget. I can take you any day of the week, whether we're sharing a bed or not." She smiled ruefully. Her hand moved into his hair. "Don't you know that you only got to fight me because I let you? If I wanted to, I could have burst a blood vessel in your brain and ended it all right there."

She's got you there, Zu-Zu. He smiled. "Now who sounds like Azula?"

Katara rolled her eyes. "Azula. Please. Don't make me laugh." She looked over at the nightstand and picked up her golden circlet. "I'm the Painted Lady, remember? She protects the Fire Nation. That includes the Fire Lord."

He frowned. "Where is your other necklace?"

Katara reached under the bed and withdrew a scroll. The rather racy title immediately piqued Zuko's interest: "Bedtime reading?"

She stuck her tongue out at him and began unrolling the scroll. Inside was her necklace, rolled up between sheets of vellum. "I got lonely," she said, handing him the necklace.

Zuko lay down with the child, still sniffling, on his stomach. "You poor thing," he said, dangling the necklace before his son's eyes. Kurzu immediately quieted and reached for it. Zuko looked at her in the corner of one eye. "Had to make your own fun, didn't you?"

She settled down beside him. "I'm sure a long-time bachelor like you knows all about it."

"You're cruel," he said, eyes drifting closed.

She burrowed into his shoulder and curled an arm over him and his son. "You like it. Don't act like you don't."

"I love it." Eyes shut, he smiled. "In my dream, you were mine."

"I'm here now, aren't I?"

"Yes. Thank the sages." His other hand, the one not holding his son, found her hair. "Tomorrow?"

"Tomorrow we start cleaning house."

≅

Note: Whew! Long chapter! Thanks for sticking with me through this one. Let me know what you think!