Trouble started with a letter. Not what was in the letter, but the fact that a letter arrived at all.
Katara, in Katara fashion, spiraled late into the evening, her thoughts racing as she appeared in the healer's ward to help and feel wanted again. She considered writing a letter. To whom? She was a bit frosty with her father right now. She expected a stern missive sent her way after Sokka and Suki docked asking in direct terms why she stayed back, and a subtle plea that she come see him soon because he missed her. Maybe he'd mention Gran Gran to make the case stronger.
Her brother was a potential choice. However, he had his own woes in figuring out the logistics of a Water Tribe heir marrying a Kyoshi Warrior captain. Suki once confided in her that she didn't miss Kyoshi Island and thought of the Southern Water Tribe her true home, so it shouldn't have been difficult. Her upbringing, however, mandated that she not approach her beloved first, and Sokka's blinding love for the woman made him dense. It was the only time Katara's observational prowess overwhelmed his. You idiot. Just propose.
Toph would yell at her. Something along the lines to forcibly wrestle her insecurities into submission alongside a threat to bully this Lady Fa woman and her forefathers.
So. Aang was the obvious choice, except he understood her to be the closest epitome of perfection to walk this realm. He had told her this while dating, and she was sure after mutually breaking their hearts that the illusory view would fade. It did, in some ways. Though he still thought too highly of her, and she was not in a mood to be falsely endeared.
Browbeat. That word made her wince. Is that what the council thought she did? Wielded a righteous sledgehammer until they acquiesced?
Next to her, Healer Joru grunted. An uptight man in the forties from a colony, he was a sparrowkeet stuffed in a human's body. His nagging put Gran Gran to shame. After she healedthree cooks with burnt hands did he finally admit Water Tribe healing was not quack medicine. Now, they maintained a rapport of pretend disdain.
"You're going to fracture her leg again with that angle, it's not a baton" he would grouse, and she would roll her eyes and go, "Who will mother hen me when you leave for the spirits next year?"
Now, they worked quietly. There were rare occasions, where not a single palace occupant required help beyond a stern reminder to not walk through training courtyards if they cherished ones limbs, during which Katara helped Healer Joru reorganize his elixirs. Some she was familiar with from her travels. Others were unique concoctions of Fire Nation herbs and spices.
She opened her mouth and pointed to a bright pink vial of sludge. "What does this do?"
"Hastens healing from Shirshu venom paralysis."
She grinned wryly. He noticed and lifted what would be a coaxing eyebrow if he still had hair.
"Aang's bison was hit with it once. Had to bend perfume to get us out of there." She smiled at the memory. "Zu—"
She stopped. Healer Joru sighed, hands covered in green numbing sludge, another surreptitious invention of his.
"Yes, yes, you and the Avatar on countless adventures. Speak, girl. Your silence is worse than your usual babbling."
Setting the vial aside, she slumped onto a chair. "Do you think I'm annoying?"
"Yes."
She pouted. There was no hesitation in his answer. "Why?"
"If I tell you, will you fix yourself?"
"Only if you fix that endearing personality. Really, I am surprised Councilor Jin's daughter hasn't asked you to heal her yet."
"Alright. I am bored, so humor me." He held his hands up and she thoroughly scrubbed it of sludge and peeling dry skin.
"Is pragmatism truly the way to heal a nation?"
"Good grief, I anticipated a rant about foolish Councilors, not statecraft philosophy. I can point you to the Fire Sage's temple. Now leave me be."
"See." She explained what happened at the council meeting, excluding the detailed mentions of political negotiations. When she finished, Healer Joru tapped a raw pink finger against his chin.
"Already you have made a mistake."
She blinked. "Pardon?"
"Yes. You see, a person of the palace would have the discretion to omit names in addition to explicitly confidential matters."
Anger shot out of her an uncorked bottle of fizzy honey lemon soda. "Apologies for being not a person of the palace. "
Healer Joru looked unperturbed. "Few in this current court begrudges you for your homeland and upbringing. I would be the first to bring the matter to Fire Lord Zuko. The matter, simply, is that you think with your heart."
"I don't see that as a problem. If more people thought with their hearts, who knows how many lives could have been saved?" If the Fire Nation truly loved peace, then her mother would have lived. Hakoda wouldn't have left their childhoods to protect them. Aang would have been raised with fellow Air Nomads.
"Yes. You are on a great path, Lady Katara. It would be a dishonor if you didn't polish it with skill. Did you master bending overnight?"
She failed to see the connection to bending. Fine, I'll bite. "No. It took practice, reading dozens of scrolls, learning, and a teacher."
"Exactly. When you first came to this clinic, you jumped to learn. Countless questions about Fire Nation medicine."
"You didn't trust me until I healed that boy's arm," she pointed out. Healer Joru and his assistants had been positively scandalized at her glowing hands.
He tutted. "That, I had never met a waterbender before. These people don't know what to expect of you."
"Are you saying I'm supposed to take insults lying down and just observe?"
"Learn. You take them, pick them apart, and rise above. Be willing to learn the art. Have you sat down to study our ancient scrolls? Learned about why the Fire Nation is so allergic to changing particularities? The formalities and titles and hierarchy? I am sure you have experienced times where you regretted assumption. Assumption is poison for the novice and a polished weapon for the master."
Auntie Wu came to mind. It was embarrassing, really, thinking about how easily she'd wanted to believe the fantasy that Auntie Wu created for her that she ignored Sokka, who's instincts seldom failed them.
She wasn't naturally the impulsive sort; at times that demanded she rise, she rose. Discretion was not in her blood. She saved Haru and his father and all those prisoners; became the Painted Lady and saved a village; saved Aang from sowing destruction in uncontrolled Avatar States; taught herself to bend sweat. She led the team through a desert and spoon fed them provisions to keep them alive.
She was frighteningly competent, unless Fira Nation matters were involved. Could anyone blame her? Accepting Zuko as easily as the others did, when he had hit Gran Gran and pursued them across the planet? Her mother, murdered in the snow, to save her life…
Perhaps…Healer Joru had a point. An infinitesimally small point.
Healer Joru leveled a knowing look. "Is that a challenge you can rise to? Does the Fire Nation deserve your efforts?"
She lifted her chin. "I never turn my back on people."
Hawky saved her from indecision and arrived with a letter. The bird skid into the messenger hawks' room near the East Wing with practiced ease, enticed by fellow hawkish companionship and the promise of squirrel-bat entrails. Aang and Zuko had already retired for the night after showing King Kuei the city to appeal to his extant desire for travel and to convince him bears were not a highly valued commodity for trade.
Katara unrolled a letter from Hawky's foot. It was from Suki, detailing their stop in one of the colonies. Smellerbee was beginning to doubt the absolute necessity of disbanding colonies after reuniting with her Earth Kingdom boyfriend. Meanwhile, Toph was as caustic as could be expected and had taken a new approach to metalbending that involved liquid mercury. Katara shuddered at the thought.
It was here, in the room on the seventh floor, that she spotted a black-clad figure scrambling across a corner of the window, feet jumping from jutting planks of rock.
Earthbender.
Katara was slow to uptake. Times requiring combat all but vanished in the last three years. She improved her offensive bending whenever she met with Pakku and sparred in the training yard when time allowed, which admittedly were diminishing occasions.
Blood thrummed in her veins. She threw the windows open in time to see a dark blue below the night sky scramble onto the roof.
"Hey!" She screamed, uncorking her waterskin. Hopefully the guards below who were circling the grounds heard. She lifted her hands and sliced them through the air in an arching motion; water crystallized to ice and formed a spiraling bridge to the roof. She was halfway onto the dips she created to help climb up when a plume of dust and clattering stone crumbled under where her delicately made bridge connected; she plummeted two floors down before she was able to regain control of the water. She froze a platform under her feet, connected to a random windowsill.
Shouting erupted from below her. A hastily thrown fireball threatened to melt her ground and send her plummeting again.
"Go!" She called to the guards below. "They went that way!" As she reconnected the bridge, she tried to think. The guards would be too slow to climb up all the floors. If Zuko ha returned to his rooms, he would have the Kyoshi warriors with him and possibly a firebender or two that passed the vigorous vetting system implemented after the last assassination attempt. But this was an earthbender. She needed to even the odds.
Nodding in affirmation to herself, she formed a series of regularly spaced ice crimps. Her hands slotted into them perfectly and she hoisted her body up, climbing one hold by one hold. Fear sludged in her veins and sent her foot slipping twice. She dangled, took a deep breath, and continued.
On the roof, she recollected the water into her skin and darted across the thick paneling. Two lamps in the distance had been set out. Someone shouted; she created another arching bridge from this tower to the next, skidding until she found a tower with a wide open door and loud crashes below.
She descended into bits of wood flying in the air, two Kyoshi warriors holding splayed fans, circling a lithe figure donned in black from head to toe. The top half of an olive face was the only visible skin.
The eyes were gold and feminine. The moves were that of an earthbender.
One Kyoshi warrior stood at a door with her arms outstretched. Pounding sounded from inside.
"No, Fire Lord Zuko! You must go!"
The other warriors continued their dance. The intruder tapped her foot.
Once. Twice. A flick of a wrist.
The warriors' fans scrunched upon themselves and unfolded around their wrists. One fell to her knees in a desperate cry, clutching her hand. The other swung to make use of her newly christened metal fist; the intruder flicked her wrist again and the warrior swung into the wall, her hand snapping to a metal sconce carrying a candle like a magnet.
The door burst open, Zuko heaving and flames erupting from each hand. The intruder growled and leapt.
Not so fast. Katara caught her with a water whip around the ankle and swung her into the wall. Instead of a smash, the wall caved in, as if carrying the intruder in a soft embrace and bulged outwards again to push the woman onto her feet. The whip retracted and Katara tried again. It fizzled mid-air into nothing when a fireball whizzed past.
The intruder's flick-motion sent a sheet of metal—where did that come from?—to catch it. Fire and metal met in a small explosion and pooled across the floor, brittle chunks swimming in hot molten sludge. Zuko stumbled backwards in surprise.
Katara raced to create a water torpedo. "She's a metalbender!" The third kyoshi warrior stepped in front of Zuko, ready to absorb the next blast, only for her metal accouterments to flatten and coil around her arms and wrists.
Zuko barked. "Katara, move!"
"Don't—fire and metal—" Another explosion. A burning smell emanated from the new wooden floors.
The intruder recovered in the thicket of heat and steam. She raised a hand, her movements slowing.
The Kyoshi warriors carry fans and wear paraphernalia made of gold-metal alloy.
Fire Lords also had a love of gaudy gold. It just so happened that Zuko had not yet changed out of his formal robes into sleepwear, and his pauldrons—
"Oh, La."
Zuko's next orders were drowned out by gold scaling over his face. The last she saw of his mouth was contorted into horrified lines. He fruitlessly clawed at the gold setting a cast from his chin to forehead, like foil over food, muffling his cries.
Fear coiled in Katara's gut. She raised her hands. And yanked.
The intruder choked, falling to her knees, her fingers snapping backwards with the force of the whip. For good measure, Katara snapped her legs together in an ice cast and froze her to the floor. It would not last long with the molten metal sliding around and the general Fire Nation night heat, but her focus narrowed to the figure struggling to hold on, refusing to collapse.
This intruder was almost as good as Toph. It had taken the short girl over a year to master metalbending from afar—previously, she could only do it with hand to hand contact. Toph would be crucified for her wayward students later. On the plus side, that would make identifying the intruder far easier.
Katara squeezed her eyes and summoned vague memories she usually heralded with mirth and scrambled to find bits of serious conversation. Something about how Toph discovered metalbending; different types of metal; fighting her with water and figuring out that…
Zuko's body slid to the floor. She clasped a hand around his arm and pried his steaming hands from his face. "Slowly." She instructed. "Zuko, I'm going to send a high pressure jet of water and cut around your nose and mouth. I might miss and hurt your face."
His hands clutched hers desperately and he jerked his face in something of a nod. "When I'm done, please send a fire whip to your right."
She rolled her wrists and pinched her forefinger and thumb together. Its release siphoned the water from the steam, condensing it into a jet as it passed through her icy palms, the sweat from her body and his, and the ice holding the intruder down. The jet cut through the gold, snapping away the gold covering the bottom half of his face. He gasped and scrambled up, her hand guiding his arm to shoot in the direction of the intruder before she could make a dramatic escape.
The woman yelped and tripped over her feet. Katara had been burned before and winced. It was not a pleasant feeling.
Gathering the last dregs of her strength, Katara jetted the rest of the Kyoshi warriors free. She collapsed over Zuko's torso, her breaths coming in drawn out pants. The last time she had used water as a knife was during a gala in Gaoling held for Toph's birthday as a party trick. A jet required double the energy, and the precision quadruple it.
She mentally added this technique one that needed to be improved immediately. She couldn't be heaving like a ostrich-horse forced to hike a mountain when she was a war hero. Sokka wouldn't let her hear the end of it.
Zuko's own stuttering gasps evened. Her arm, flung over his abdomen, oscillated with his every breath. The situation seemed oddly familiar, though the violent nature of it didn't bring her ease.
One of the warriors stumbled to her feet and ran down the hall, shouting requests to find a healer, Aang, and General Shen. Another remained to watch the unconscious intruder.
"Katara? It's Ty Lum." The warrior rubbed her forehead and a streak of white peeled away. "Is he—"
"I'm fine." Zuko intoned. Katara turned, the back of her head digging into his side.
With the rest of his face covered, he looked rather like a disgruntled attendee at a masquerade ball. A rivulet of blood fell from between his lips and over the corner of his mouth.
A quiet gasp parting her lips, Katara forced herself up. Her muscles' protests remained short-lived in the face of a vivid memory, a rumpus in the courtyard, lightening setting Zuko's body aflame in a cobweb and Katara, finishing the fight he started.
She wiped her brow and coiled an arm around Zuko's back, helping him into his room. He settled onto an ottoman, wheezing for air and attempting to remove the rest of the gold. She slid to the floor and sagged against his legs. The cool floor was a relief.
"Wait." She distantly noted the empty room, devoid of personal artifacts and lackluster lighting. A half-full glass of water teetered at all the edge of a mahogany desk. "Give me—a bit."
He was shaking. It would be a stretch to call it fear. This was the beginnings of a rage, made clear in the tips of his fingers glowing red and a hiss of steam. She clamped her own cold hands around his.
He grit his teeth. "Piandao was right. Damnit."
"We did think you were a little paranoid." Katara admitted. After the orange incident last year, Zuko had started to refuse eating any food not made by his chefs (Uncle Iroh wailed loudly for hours until his nephew agreed to sip his tea), and hired the Kyoshi warriors to replace his standard guards (though Mai was behind that bit of genius, further sinking her in the eyes of a nationalistic court).
"How about now?" He deadpanned.
"Isn't this way past your bedtime? Keep going and I'll leave you like this. It'll give Toph ideas."
"Metalbenders." He groused. An eerie pause followed. "Are you injured?"
"Other than my ego in anticipation for Master Pakku lampooning me for that third-rate bending, never better." The headache pounding behind Katara's eyes began to subside. As strength returned to her arms, she coalesced water from the desk around a hand and shot a stream straight down Zuko's face. In a few more cuts, the gold mask fell free, bright red scars left in its wake.
Zuko raked a hand through his hair and breathed heavily. She recollected the water around her fingers and waved it over the remaining injuries; a cut from an explosion across his left thigh, a bruise blooming under his chin.
He inhaled weakly. "Thanks."
"Consider my debt for taking a lighting bolt for me paid."
He looked down at her, watching her with that strange edge again. "There's no debt, Katara. I'm the one who can't repay you."
There was a frightening dearth of adequate things to say to the Fire Nation's ruler telling the daughter of a decimated tribe he was in perpetual debt to her.
So she eked out a very eloquent, "Oh. Thank you." And then it occurred that you didn't really convey an expression of gratitude for someone so earnestly insisting this, and Pakku would definitely question his vote to install her as a Water Tribe ambassador, but none of those background things mattered, looking at this man who had become a permanent fixture, pleasant company in her life.
When she thought of enemies, it was never his face. Not since she…
"I—Zuko." She said his name firmly.
"I should...say I didn't say it right. What I said earlier. I didn't mean to imply you can't handle yourself." His eyelashes were thick, far too thick any man had business boasting. The scar blooming from his nose to ears seemed duller than usual, as though a gray cloud cast over his face. He was tired and weary and angry.
She shook her head. "No apologies necessary. I've been thinking over some things but don't… do that anymore. We've all told you that you did your part. You don't owe us anything." She thought for a moment. "We owe each other the things friendship demands, things like this," she waved her glowing hand, "and your best effort at fixing things. And I've seen you do that, even when you mess up."
"Which I have."
"If I have to start singing Ember Island Player's bit about Fire Lord Zuko, steamier than a sauna, hotter than the sun, no where else to go but to him, the buried son— "
"Enough, enough!" He turned a violent scarlet, hand heating again. She winced.
Loud footsteps echoed in the distance, a cacophony heightening in intensity. Their hands were still locked. She detangled her from him, averting her eyes and leapt to her feet. "Check with Healer Joru. There might have been some internal damage I couldn't find."
He rolled his eyes, presumably at the prospect of being fettered over. "There's no one better than you."
Her heart did a weird tumble as Aang burst into the room on an air scooter. "Zuko! Are you—Katara and Zuko! Are you guys okay?" His eyes grew bulbous at the misshapen gold strewn over the ottoman. Healer Joru and two military personnel barely avoided jostling him on their way to the Fire Lord.
"What took everyone so long?" Katara inched towards the window, uneasy at the sudden flurry of action.
General Shen, a greying man who resembled Zhao without a beard in favor for two thin wisps of hair hanging from his chin, gave her a perfunctory nod.
"Fire Lord Zuko. This was a coordinated attack. We need to move you immediately."
Healer Joru snipped. "He needs to rest."
"I advise you to leave for a safe house. I will update you on confidential matters when…" General Shen looked askance, and Katara bristled.
Healer Joru prodded Zuko, aghast. "Lady Katara needs to stay and help."
"She should leave, a lady of her stature must be exhausted after—"
"Absolutely not." Katara snapped while Zuko narrowed his eyes and swatted Healer Joru's hands away.
"Lady Katara stays. I stay. Someone explain why no one remained on this floor despite strict orders that one firebender watch each entrance at all times?"
General Shen's second-in-command, the handsome and charming Lieutenant Lee, transformed his usually toothy smile into one of a morose deliverer of news. "There was a coordinated break-in that demanded most of our forces, which were already stretched thin by guarding King Kuei's convoy."
"Where?"
"The prison-hold. Ukano, father of Lady Mai and former governor of Omashu, is dead."
Bleary-eyed, Piandao lowered a scalding cup of tea.
"We need to call General Iroh."
"I swear by Agni, no."
"Fire Lord Zuko—"
"I can handle this." He hung his head in his hands. "I'm not a child who needs to pester Uncle over everything."
Mai was already on a balloon on her way to Omashu, carrying a personal edict from Aang to King Bumi delineating a kind request to keep her safe. General Shen determined that, in the absence of the ability to find whether the murder was carried out by a fanatical supporter of Zuko's, or a servant of New Ozai Society that wanted to damage Zuko's reputation, Mai was at too high of a risk to remain. Katara suggested that perhaps the kill was simply a diversion from the real target, Zuko, but at least a few hours of recovery were needed before any real interrogation of the intruder could take place.
Speaking of, the intruder had to be kept in a purely wood-made home in on the outskirts of the city. Their prison-holds were made of metal and stone, deep in the earth, elements that were a veritable heaven for the metalbending earthbender. Katara had half the mind to send Sokka a message asking that he move 'coal prison' above 'jerky perfume' on his list of inventions.
As for how she and her accomplices managed to enter the palace, Zuko was in no state of mind to discuss it. Katara herself felt wrung dry.
"How did you get there so quickly?" Aang asked.
She explained, much to the group's befuddlement.
Piandao rested his chin on the back of his hand, now an empty teacup dangling from his fingers. "Being able to leap from building to building on a bridge of ice is no easy feat."
"That was quick thinking there." Aang said after she explained the rest of it, eyebrows furrowed. It was a face he made precisely in two contexts: egg pudding and word puzzles. "I guess I should have paid more attention to Toph. Water cuts metal?"
"A high-pressure water stream does. It takes more energy than creating a wave the height of this room." The tea tasted almost as good as Iroh's. Katara licked her lips to savor every last drop. "Some metals can be broken if you heat it and cool it immediately. Toph told me gold and copper have a different structure so just freezing and hitting it won't work."
A curious glint crossed Piandao's face. His appearance was impeccable in the dead of the night as they were during a fight, nary a hair out of place. "Well done, Katara. You three stay here; I will check if General Shen has any security detail updates."
The candlelight heat in the lounge rose and dimmed in tandem with Zuko's seething. Aang laid a comforting hand over his back. When Katara did the same, she felt him stiffen, so she retracted it, driven by a sting of hurt.
He had wanted to leave with Mai. But he was a Fire Lord without a wife first and a boyfriend second, so all they could do was bid her farewell with platitudes to stay safe. The stony-faced girl had departed with not so much a hunch in her back. It was no secret Mai abhorred her father, though whether that translated to mourning his death remained to be seen.
Zuko breathed. "Was I wrong to let him live?"
Aang jumped up, denials tumbling out of him. Extinguishing life was a line he would never cross. It was so simple for him.
Ukano, apart from his attempted assassinations, had once kidnapped Kiyi, Zuko's long last half-sister mere days after Team Avatar located his mother, founded a guerilla group that indiscriminately destabilized towns to place the blame on Zuko, and then became infamous as the leader of New Ozai Society. The calls for his head after arrest were overwhelming. No nation would have blamed Zuko. Indeed, they probably would have shaken his hand and sent him gold in a komodo rhino's worth of weight.
He was trying so hard not to be like his father and in the process sometimes missed the bigger picture. Still, Katara supported his decision. She knew how easy vengeance was, and how hard it was to leave it.
"Right, Katara? Tell His Majesty fiery-ness." Finished with his speech, Aang looked imploringly to his former girlfriend.
She bit her lip. Her knee grazed Zuko's, a tad too warm through his baggy pants. The urge to place a hand over it was overwhelming, instinctual even. "You did the right thing. Whoever these people are, we'll find them and put them on trial too."
Piandao's return was marked with a tight smile. He towered over Zuko, who had finished, or temporarily delayed, his bout of doubt now and returned himself to the mantle of Fire Lord.
"We will pen a letter to Toph in the morning. Is Mai safe?"
The swordsman nodded. "A hawk just returned with a confirmation. She will make landfall in Omashu in thirteen hours. A letter has been sent to her mother as well. As for security, we will call for the rest of the Kyoshi warriors."
"Captain Suki is unavailable."
"Surely in an emergency—"
"No," Zuko said firmly.
"Zuko," Katara started hesitantly, "Sokka wouldn't mind—in this case—"
"None of the warriors could stop a metalbender. You saw what happened with my firebending, too."
Piandao frowned. "Are you suggesting we send for a metalbender? Considering the circumstances, we can't request anyone but Toph to join us."
"She can tell who's a liar," Aang pointed out.
"One who slipped through her school and snuck onto a ship carrying King Kuei?"
"We don't know that yet." Katara hated to think what Toph would feel at the news. Despite her churlish ways, the girl loved Zuko possibly more than the rest of them.
Zuko sunk further into his seat, gritting, "No! We can't trust anyone else."
"I'd suggest you either request your uncle to return, or bring in Toph to provide security and determine who can be trusted. It's not possible that six intruders were able to enter the palace, incapacitate dozens of guards, and make it to your private quarters," Piandao paused to look at Katara thoughtfully, "and be left nearly unscathed without aid from the inside."
Aang nodded vigorously. "Yeah, Zuko. Toph's busy but she'd abandon everything for a chance to kick ass. We can figure out something until she comes. I'll follow you around myself if I have to."
Katara felt it necessary to remind the airbender that was a terrible idea. "Aang, your airbending against Toph's metalbending landed you in hamster-pig wheel."
"Maybe I'll barricade myself in the dungeons. Uncle can step in as Fire Lord," Zuko mumbled, nonplussed.
"Zuko…"
Zuko sighed and turned to Katara. Exhaustion was carved into every crevice on his ashen face. "Can you find a waterbender?"
Katara's heart lurched. "I can help."
"Lady Katara proved herself capable tonight," Piandao added. "I fear what could have happened had she not been around."
"I…can't ask anymore from you. You're busy as is—Healer Joru informed me you spend hours helping him, on top of your ambassadorial duties."
She vowed to swap the man's bandages for seaweed the next time she saw him. "Technically, I wasn't supposed to be here this month." Lady Fa could swim in scummy glee. For now. Katara would have her revenge next time. "You've protected our nations from falling further into chaos after the war. So suck it up and let us protect you."
Perhaps he was too tired. Perhaps he saw the fierce promise in her voice, the set eyes and grim expression.
"Alright."
The tension that lingered in the room softened with the Fire Lord's acceptance. Piandao collected his empty teacup and departed with an order. "I'll speak to General Shen. All of you should rest. It will not be an easy day tomorrow."
With a hug to both of them, Aang left as well, too tired from what was probably an overeager babysitting of Bosco.
"Katara?" Zuko lifted an eyebrow.
She tried not to overthink. Alone, again, in the middle of the night in a lounge near his quarters. "I—do I go back to Mai's place?"
Zuko drowsily tossed a flicker of fire out the door. Milo, his attendant, scurried in.
"Take Lady Katara to Lady Mai's home."
Milo lowered his chin to his chest in apology. His enormous side burns twitched. "Lady Mai's home is currently off-limits and being searched."
The torpor fled from his posture, replaced with indignation. "Are they out of their minds? How could she possibly be involved?"
Katara inched towards the poor boy who by happenstance was on the receiving end of a paranoid, exhausted, haunted Fire Lord.
"Of course not, Fire Lord Zuko. Just to be thorough." He cleared his throat, clearly familiar with every range of Zuko's personality. "There was also the possibility the attackers meant to harm her. It will be suitable to return tomorrow."
Zuko rubbed his eyes. "Fine. Escort her to the Fire Lady's quarters."
"I beg your pardon?" Milo squeaked the same time Katara gasped, "No, it's fine, there's plenty of hotels in the upper district—"
"That defeats the purpose of guarding me." He grumbled something under his breath about unnecessary numbers of ballrooms and lounges in the palace and incompetent guest management.
Right. She followed Milo, a sense of foreboding settling in her stomach.
