That night, Zuko waits for Katara to come to him, as had become their routine. He sits on the edge of his bed, fists pressed under his chin and brows furrowed tightly. The burden of the crown was one he didn't even bear yet, but Hakoda's reminder was like a sudden punch to the gut. Not only would his responsibilities be great, having to both lead the Fire Nation as well as mend the ties between the four elemental nations, but they would be something no Fire Lord had faced before. It was an unprecedented challenge.
Yet that wasn't at the forefront of his mind. When he'd really sat down and thought about his future, he kept circling back around to Katara. Where would that put them? They still hadn't made the borders of what they were any clearer, remaining a something, yet he couldn't move past the thought of leaving her behind once the war ended.
Surely, they couldn't continue being something once he was Fire Lord. The scandal would be one that he couldn't work around. The royal bloodline was a sacred thing to the Fire Nation, considered to be one of the purest and consisting entirely of firebenders and fire nation nobility of some sort. Even his mother had been selected for her relation to the past Fire Nation Avatar. It always came down to blood, and the fact that he was even intermingling with a bender of another element—a waterbender, no less, their exact opposite—would cause uproar among traditionalists.
At the same time, he didn't want to let her go. He had no formal claim to her, and he wasn't sure she even felt the same way, but she'd gotten under his skin.
Literally. He added with a bit of bite. Sprawling back on the bed with his bound hands resting on his bare stomach and his legs hanging down over the end of the cot, he lets out a frustrated breath.
Capture the Avatar. That had been his one and only drive in life for three years, a fifth of his life so far, and it had been so simple then; so easy to keep his eyes on the prize, so to speak, when there were no complications. Every detestable thing he'd done in pursuit of that single-minded goal had been done without a second thought because he was inherently right in his goal, as the end result had been a noble one. Or so he'd thought. Now that he saw every side of this complicated war, he could no longer be sure of what he wanted of his future. Did he want to be selfish, and have a future with Katara and whatever they were, as unsure as it was? Or did he want to follow his birthright and lead his nation?
Should I just disappear?
He blinks, staring at the tiny cracks in the decrepit ceiling. His memories of being some anonymous Earth Kingdom citizen were some of the happiest in his life once they'd gotten settled. Iroh had had his teashop, and he'd been surprisingly content to help him run it.
Was Lee's life really so bad? Zuko snorts, pressing the heels of his palms against his eyes. No matter how simple it had been, it couldn't exist anymore. Lee died when he betrayed his Uncle, and that life had come to a swift end because he couldn't just be happy. Being happy was never enough when he'd felt his father's love and approval had been so close.
The stone barrier at the door shifts and a sudden weight settles on the very edge of the bed. It's not heavy enough to be Hakoda or Sokka, so he assumes it to be Katara. His mind is instantly put at ease by her presence, and he keeps his eyes closed as he reaches over to stroke his hands over her arm affectionately.
"Take your hands off of me before I break them."
Definitely not Katara. He jerks his hands back against his stomach, sitting up and looking at the intruder. Zuko doesn't recognize her until she turns her head to glare at him and a faint memory scratches at the back of his mind. He's seen her eyes before, but he can't recall where.
"I thought you were…" He thinks better of it, cutting himself off, clearing his throat, "Are you Suki?" He croaks. He'd heard the name when Sokka had been talking—babbling, Zuko amends—about the escape from the Boiling Rock, and it fit her.
"You're Zuko." He takes that as a yes, and also takes it as an affirmative that they'd met before, which certainly wasn't a good thing.
"I'm sorry." He might as well apologize for whatever he's done to her already.
"You should be. You burned down my village." Zuko nods. He'd burned down more villages than he liked to admit, and he was ashamed to say he couldn't recall which village was hers.
"Like I said, I'm sorry." He's going to be apologizing for the rest of his life, he's sure of it. Suki doesn't seem to accept his apology, though, crossing her arms.
"How did you manage to get them to trust you so much, letting you teach Aang?" He lifts his hands as if to display his bound wrists, but another figure comes through the doorway that draws his attention. Katara stops when she sees Suki, shocked, and Zuko takes in all of her with a harsh swallow.
Her wild mass of hair cascades down her shoulders and frames her face, obviously tousled in the way she'd learned he preferred, and she's dressed in her bindings with the outermost layer of her tunic hanging open and draped over her shoulders. It's as close to lingerie as she can get, really, and Suki looks between the two of them for a moment before realization visibly dawns on her.
"Oh." It's said with pure surprise, but Suki's second exclamation is aggressive, "Oh." Neither Katara nor Zuko try to defend themselves, because it's clear that the warrior isn't stupid, and she doesn't need to say the rest of what she's thinking. That's how. Suki stands and leaves, walking out of the room deceptively calmly.
Zuko gives Katara a desperate glance, sitting up completely, and before he can beg her to follow, she's gone. Toph sits in the empty doorway, sighing.
"This—"
"Isn't what it looks like?" Suki interrupts, spinning on her heel and stopping both of them in their tracks. Katara can tell she's furious, but beyond that fury, there's true concern for the waterbender, "How could you let this happen?"
"I…" Katara has nothing to say, gaping before closing her mouth. She doesn't know how any of this happened. She doesn't know why she keeps coming back to him. The only proper word for how she feels towards Zuko is addiction, and addiction is far from rational.
"How involved with him are you?" She insinuates well enough, and a blush creeps up to color Katara's cheeks as the activities of the many nights before flash through her mind all at once.
"Katara…" She lets out a frustrated noise, turning away from Suki, "From what I've been told, you are one of the people here with the most reasons to hate him." Katara doesn't have enough words to elaborate how much she had hated Zuko before all of this. All of her feelings were colliding and clashing, all thrown about as if they were tumbling through a raging river. How could she ever explain this to someone else?
"I do." Katara murmurs, holding herself.
"What?"
"Hate him. I do hate him." Maybe she wanted to hold on to that hatred. Maybe it was safer than the butterflies she felt when his hands ghosted her skin as if she were the most priceless thing he'd ever encountered. Maybe she wanted to pretend to hate because it was easier than what she refused to call love.
"I don't understand." Suki says honestly, watching Katara with wide, confused eyes. She knew Suki loved Sokka, and that it was something so simple, and Katara can't help but feel a flash of jealousy of the ease with which she understood her feelings.
"Neither do I." Katara responds, nervously tucking a disobedient strand of hair behind her ear, "You can't tell anyone about this." Suki looks dumbfounded, immediately spitting out rebuttals.
"There's too much happening." Katara interrupts, "There's a war we need to end, and this will just be a distraction for everybody. I'm not going to make this any harder for Aang. Please understand." She implores the warrior, being as sincere and open as she physically could, and she only hopes it's enough to convince her.
"It feels wrong but…fine." Katara can't even get her appreciation out before Suki speaks again, "On one condition."
"Name it."
"You stop this. I won't tell anyone about what you've done with Zuko, but I won't make any promises if you keep doing it. That's where I draw the line." It should be a simple condition, one she easily could have meet just weeks before, but now she finds herself torn. Suki's gaze is hard, unwavering. She isn't about to change her mind.
"I will. I promise." She needed to. This addiction was unhealthy, and one she should be thankful for the help in quitting, but she doesn't want to stop. Perhaps this was the push she needed, "Thank you." Suki nods, taking her thanks as gratitude for her silence, not understanding what it was truly for. It was better that she didn't.
Katara had never been so restless. She tries to fill her days to be as busy as possible, but she always somehow winds up with down time that she doesn't want. She's resorted to practicing waterbending forms she's long since mastered, bending water out of the canteen on her hip and through the air, turning it to shards of ice before melting it and reforming it back into a flowing stream. She whips the band of half frozen water around herself in an intricate spin before tossing it at the low ceiling of her room and letting it rain back down on her in a delicate mist. It's refreshing, but it does nothing to distract her from the firebender whose burning touch refuses to leave her skin. She feels as if he's branded her without leaving any visible marks, sighing as she traces his favorite trail along her skin.
It starts on her wrist, flowing up across the sensitive crook of her arm and crossing her collarbone, dancing up to her jaw and eventually to her lips, where his mouth would join his fingers and he'd kiss her as if it was the only way he knew how to breathe. Her hand lingers on her lips, playing along the edges, and she's sure she's never wanted someone's touch so badly.
When had the mistakes, the sudden fits of passion, become an obsession? When had she memorized his favorite trails on her body? When and how had all of this happened?
Bending the tiny droplets of water off her skin and twisting the resulting bead of water in the air, she tries to distract herself once again. She gathers the water droplets from all around her into a cohesive stream, idly manipulating it in the air until she wraps it around her wrist and freezes it there; creating a sort of bracelet that numbs her skin. She wears down some of the ridges of the ice with her thumb. Would she ever free herself of him?
"Hey." Toph greets, leaning in her doorway, "Sparky wants to see you." Of course he does. She hadn't spoken to him since she'd made her deal with Suki, and she knew how much he hated being left in the dark, but she didn't trust herself to be near him.
"I don't want to see him." She responds, melting the ice around her wrist and guiding it back into her canteen.
"Ah." Toph murmurs, her fingers tapping her arm as she thinks, "I'm guessing your chat with Sokka's girlfriend didn't go well, then." Katara worries her lip, sitting back on the edge of her bed and putting her chin in her hands.
"No—yes. I…I don't know." Katara finally breathes out hopelessly. She's surprised when Toph lets out a frustrated groan.
"You two were made for each other." Katara glares at her indignantly, "Do you know how dramatic you both are? Zuko is a little more broody about it, but still, I can't deal with this lovesick stuff anymore."
"I am not dramatic. And I'm not lovesick!" The waterbender counters, and Toph doesn't even dignify that with a reply.
"Just say you'll talk to him so I can get out of here."
"I won't." Toph looks like she's close to strangling her, knocking the back of her head against the doorframe in frustration.
"Why not? You two have been all hot and heavy lately, what'd Suki say to change that?" Katara doesn't know where to begin, or what to say, so she just lets out a tense breath and looks over at Toph with more aggravation than she had any right to.
"It's complicated." Toph is just about ready to give up, already turning to leave until Katara continues speaking, "Why haven't you ever cared about all of this?" Toph stops, an amused smile tugging at her lips.
"Who says I don't care?" She turns back to face Katara, "I just don't see the point in putting my two cents in on your love life. I signed up to be Aang's earthbending teacher, not your relationship counselor. Do I think your little fling with Zuko is a good thing? No, obviously. It's not gonna end well, but that's not really my place. I'm just here to move the doors around." Katara is stunned, this being the most input Toph has ever had on the situation. She shouldn't really be surprised with the answer, but the young earthbender had seemed so impartial up until this point.
"Oh." She answers, at a loss for words for a moment, "But why didn't you tell anyone else? Sokka or Aang or—" The idea of her father finding out makes fear stab her sharply in the gut, "Anyone?"
"Yeah, like that'd do a lot of good." Toph snorts, "Aang has a crush on you, and Sokka is your brother. You think if I told them you were getting in Hot Pants' pants that'd bring the group together more? You know, I would like to not be his prison guard at some point in the near future." Katara has to admit, the girl didn't get as much credit as she deserved for her intellect.
"Well, thank you, I guess." She's not sure if she should really be thanking her, but she deserves something, "But I'm still not talking to him." Toph throws her arms up in exasperation, storming out of the room. Distantly, she hears her call:
"I'm getting him anyway!" Katara yells her name to stop her, but she's already long gone, leaving her to fume on her bed and consider leaving. By the time she decides sleeping outside was a better option than facing Zuko, she's too late, his form appearing in the doorway and making her legs suddenly feel weak.
"Katara." He says softly, as if speaking too loudly will startle her, "You've been avoiding me." It hadn't been long, maybe two days, but when they'd built a habit of ravaging each other every night, the time felt like an eternity.
"I've been busy." She tries to sound aloof, but she'd never been the best of liars.
"What happened between you and Suki?" He asks, stepping into the room. It suddenly feels hotter, and she wonders if it's a trick of her mind or his immense body heat. She wishes she could feel him to tell.
"We talked." Silence follows, powerful with it implications.
"Is there any chance you could tell me what about?"
"No." She stands, pressing her hands firmly on her hips, "So if that's all you came here to talk about, you should go." He surprises her by smiling and shaking his head with a short chuckle.
"She threatened to tell everyone about us if you kept seeing me, didn't she?" The surprise that flickers across her face is enough to tell him he's right, "That's pretty good blackmail." Katara plants only one finger against his chest to force him to step back from her.
"It's not blackmail." She hisses, forcefully removing her finger from him.
"Yes, that is definitely blackmail. She's using something she has against you to make you do—or not do, I guess, in this situation—something. That's the definition of blackmail, Katara." He steps closer again, and his scent washes over her. He smells clean, and she can feel the water droplets in his damp hair.
"She's doing it for a good reason."
"Still blackmail." He responds, but she's barely listening. Desire clouds her thoughts, making it hard for her to comprehend the nonsensical words she hears. He doesn't comment on her distraction, moving closer to her like they're magnetized, and when he burns the ropes around his wrists and settles them on her hips, she doesn't resist him.
"Not very good blackmail, apparently." She whispers, hands fisting in the fabric of his tunic. Maybe it wasn't. Perhaps she did want everyone to know. Possibly it was just her libido speaking, and after she'd expended it, she'd have the same regret as always. Now, though, she could add the paranoia that Suki would find out about her violation of their agreement.
"She doesn't understand the situation enough to blackmail you." Zuko whispers into the skin of her neck, his breaths making her skin tingle as wisps of steam passes his lips.
"She understands enough." She gasps when his teeth graze her, her hands involuntarily tangling in his hair. She convinces herself that she'd initially intended to pull him away, but she finds her hands holding his head down.
"Do you want me to stop?"
"N-N…Yes." She stutters over her words before he can even properly finish his question, forcing her hands out of his hair and pushing him away by his shoulders, "Suki might be right." Zuko looks down at her, the only word for what's in his gaze being offense.
"She is?"
"Why are we doing this?" Despite the coldness of the words, she can't keep her hands to herself. She grazes her thumb across the arch of his cheekbone, feeling the rough, thick skin of his scar. His eyes bore into hers, and it betrays the fact that he has no answer. Neither of them knows what they're doing.
"Why should we keep doing it?" He seems just as speechless as before, but a wry smile crosses his lips.
"We shouldn't." The reasons that Zuko should leave her room and not look back are innumerable. Politics, nationalities, personal wounds and disputes, just to name a few, yet none of that matters when he grabs her jaw and pulls her in for a desperate, heated kiss that steals her breath. It's far from their most graceful kiss, but Katara doesn't hesitate when she calls it their most passionate.
He doesn't try to pretend that their problems don't exist, he practically elaborates on them with the ferocity with which he caresses her, and she's glad for it. They could never pretend to be a happy couple when she isn't even sure they're a couple in the first place. As they'd established before, they were something, and that was enough. When her back hits her cot, his weight settling over her and hands roaming every inch of skin he can find, she sighs his name. Even when he's stripped her, his heated hands and mouth tracing patterns on her skin that make all worries of Suki, of the war, of everything, leave her mind, she idly wonders where they'll be in a month. In a year. In a decade. She wonders if they'll be around that long at all, and decides that perhaps they won't be, and that she might as well enjoy her pleasures while she can still feel them.
Zuko thrusts into her solidly, hitting something within her that makes her entire body tense and shudder, and she digs her nails into his sides in response. Whispered pleas for more leave without her consent, and she tries to silence herself by burying her face into the crook of his neck, but her cries only increase in volume against his skin. He knows why she's trying to be silent, his own quiet grunts lost in her hair. Even their climaxes are silenced, declarations of pleasure swallowed by the other as their lips clash.
"We can fix this, you know." Zuko murmurs in the following stillness, holding her against his chest. Katara frees herself of his grip and sits up to look down at him, frowning as she pushes his unruly bangs out of his eyes.
"How?" She isn't entirely sure what he's referring to fixing—just another testament to their myriad of problems—but she's confused no matter which one he means.
"We can take away her leverage." He catches her hand as she pulls it back from his forehead, holding it tightly, "If we tell them first, she'll have nothing and—"
We can be together.
It's a statement that hangs silently in the air, and one Zuko can't quite get out of his throat.
"Fix this." She finishes for him, because now she knows exactly what he means, "But the time isn't right, Zuko." She doesn't need to elaborate. He knows what's at stake.
"When will it be right?" He shifts beneath her. She's about to answer when words suddenly burst out of him like a mental damn has been broken, "Even if we get through the war and end it, what then? Do you think the Fire Lord can be with a waterbender even if they're just something? My nation would never stand for it. The only time we can be together is right now. There is no other time to fix this because this is the last chance!" She's struck speechless by his intensity, the fire in his eyes reminding her so strongly of the angry, petulant person he used to be.
But he's right. She doesn't want him to be, but he is.
"We'll tell them." He relaxes slightly, jaw clenched as if he's physically holding unsaid words in his mouth, "Tomorrow." He nods.
"Tomorrow."
A/N: Hey so this was literally the hardest chapter I've written so far! Not only is it really plot intensive, but I'm also on Winter Break, which, you may think would give me more time to write, but actually limits it. I'm so busy meeting up with my friends from home and I don't have a proper bedroom in my father's apartment so I don't have any privacy to write.
So anyway, expect some longer waiting time between updates until I'm back at college. R&R y'know. ~ Jiggle