Katara's thoughts are all over the place as she and Nukka play their game.
She forms the ice disc with practiced hands, making sure to smooth out the edges. With a sharp flick of her wrist she sends the disc shooting across the tundra. Nukka scrambles to her legs and bolts after it, barking wildly.
A tiny smile stretches across her face as Nukka leaps up in mid air and catches the disc with ease. Katara claps lazily as the wolf trots back to her, ice disc in her mouth.
Normally Katara would bend down and take the disc then throw it again, but today she's distracted. Hama had told her earlier today that she would need to talk to her about a new technique she had been working on.
Realizing that Katara isn't going to take the disc, Nukka plops down into the snow and begins to lap at the ice.
A few minutes later Katara hears her name being called by her waterbending master. She gulps nervously, but obediently goes to join her teacher.
Katara's nervousness has turned to giddiness.
Hama moves her fingers over the chest of the elder, brow furrowed in concentration.
The elder hadn't looked very good hours before, in fact the majority of the tribe had been preparing for his death.
But the color has returned to his cheeks and he is breathing better. He looks much more comfortable then he has before.
"His blood was clotted in certain areas," Hama explains. "I could feel it."
A small part of Katara tells her that there is so much that can be potentially bad about this new technique, but if it can be used for something as good as saving lives then perhaps the bad things can be over looked.
"I can clear bruises off of the skin, no water needed. I can stop men from bleeding to death; I can make the blood flow in the proper directions." Hama pauses and watches as the elder drifts off into a restful sleep. "Perhaps I could restart a heart, even." She pulls a blanket up older the elder and sighs.
Katara nods, smiling. "And scars? We could heal those too, correct? We could make new skin, do something with the blood—"
Hama is already shaking her head.
"Katara," she says gently, "no technique can bring back things that are dead."
Because that is what Zuko's scar is. It's dead.
Hama pats her hand and then instructs her to reach inside herself and feel her own blood. They practice on each other for a couple of hours, simple things, like moving limbs and gaining an understanding of the way the blood moves and works inside of the body.
Hama calls it bloodbending, and by the end of the day she calls both her and Katara the Southern Water Tribe's first bloodbenders.
Before Katara heads home for the evening, Hama warns her.
"You are my best student—"
"I'm your only student," Katara interrupts, raising an eyebrow.
Hama narrows her eyes at her. "That is beside the point. You're the only one I've shown this to, and I'd like to keep it that way for the time being."
"I can't tell anyone?"
Her teacher shakes her head, slightly exasperated. "No, Katara. They would not understand that this is a gift."
Katara promises to keep their secret. She goes to bed thinking it's a shame no one else will know of this amazing discovery.
That night she dreams that she can reach even further into the body. She removes the fluid from people's eyes and ears. She forces the contents of the stomach back up the esophagus, the throat and out of the mouth. She can twist people's body parts around, causing them to shriek in agony.
She wakes to her own screams and immediately rolls over and curls up into Nukka's fur. The wolf whines and licks at her tears.
Now she understands why bloodbending must be kept a secret.
She wonders if maybe the bad things about bloodbending outweigh the good things.
Considering the state that Katara had left him in, Zuko is doing much better.
He leaves his bedroom regularly, almost as often as he did, before. He eats his meals with his family and their guests in the dining hall. He goes out into the garden and practices his sword fighting while Sang chases squirrels. He's even started up his firebending again.
The only problem is that Zuko refuses to go out in public.
Refuses.
Which is why Ursa asks her to have tea with her the day after Katara and her family arrive in the Fire Nation for the summer.
Katara agrees, of course. It is always nice to have one-on-one time with Ursa. She is like an aunt.
She smoothes her hands over her lap, wiping away imaginary wrinkles from her robes.
"It's good to see you, Katara. You're looking well and you're growing up beautifully," Ursa says, smiling at her over her teacup.
Katara can't help but beam at the praise. "Thank you." She straightens up a bit and pours honey into her tea, attempting to look debonair.
"I wanted to talk to you about Zuko."
Katara's tea is quickly forgotten. She peers up at Ursa curiously. "What about him? He's doing much better."
It's Ursa's turn to beam. "Yes, he is, thanks to you. Your patience and care helped him out greatly last summer. You're a wonderful friend, Katara." Ursa clears her throat and sets her teacup down, looking Katara right in the eye. "I was hoping you could do something else for him, actually."
Katara doesn't understand why Ursa is bothering to ask. Everyone knows she'd do just about anything for Zuko. He's her best friend, after all.
She nods eagerly anyway. "Of course."
Ursa's look of relief turns into worry. "He won't leave the palace. At all."
"At all?"
"He won't leave for anything. I know he's afraid of what people will say about his face, and that he doesn't want people to stare at him. He just doesn't understand that he got the scar because he was honorable—"
Katara can feel her bottom lip beginning to wobble, but she forces herself not to get upset. It wouldn't do to burst into tears.
She jumps a little bit when Ursa reaches across the small table and pats her hand comfortingly. "You're such a sweet girl, like your mother."
A silence stretches out between them and suddenly Katara wants nothing more than to bolt from the table. It's been five years, and she has managed to come to grips with the fact that her mother will never sing her to sleep again, but there's still days when she'd rather not talk about her. Today is one of those days.
Ursa seems to sense what she's feeling and immediately changes the subject. "There's a Festival of Lights coming up in a couple of weeks," she starts, picking up her teacup. "The Royal Family has been known to attend, although I personally wasn't planning on going this year," she explains. "But, I was kind of hoping you could coax Zuko into going with you and Sokka."
Katara nods slowly, thinking. She's pretty sure she can come up with something. "Okay," she says, smiling. "I'll get him to go."
Ursa's face breaks out into a grin and her eyes shine with unshed tears. "He's very lucky to have you as a friend, Katara."
"There will be egg custard—"
"No."
"—and fireworks—"
"Nope."
"—and dancing—"
"No way."
"—and lots of super fun games—"
"Not happening."
"—and I'll be with you the whole time."
Zuko freezes at this and straightens up out of his firebending stance. He looks at her for a moment before turning away. "Absolutely not."
She tries not to let this hurt her feelings. She reminds herself that she's dealing with the New Zuko, and that he's gruffer and more prone to snap at her. She understands why. He defines his life now by what happened Before He Got His Scar and After He Got His Scar.
Katara knows that you can't define your whole life around one event, but she thinks Zuko must come to understand this by himself.
"It would mean a lot to me," she says quietly, taking a tiny step toward him.
He takes a tiny step back. "I know." She can see how upset and frustrated he is. "I know and I'm sorry, but I just… I can't." He steps completely out of her reach and then he is walking out of the garden, leaving her alone.
Katara is growing desperate. The Festival of Lights is in three days and she has yet to convince Zuko to go with her. She has tried to have Sokka talk him into going, but Zuko threw a boomerang at him before he could even ask.
This resulted in a fight, leaving Sokka with a black eye and Zuko with a limp. Both boys have made up since then, of course, but Sokka has not tried to ask Zuko about the festival again.
Katara decides that she must be mean and manipulative.
She must use Zuko's own weaknesses against him. She realizes that this kind of makes her a terrible person, but she doesn't care.
Desperate times call for desperate measures.
She bangs on his bedroom door and after a beat it opens up.
"What?" Zuko asks.
Katara takes that as her cue to promptly burst into tears.
She is messy crying.
Zuko instantly panics.
"WHAT'S WRONG? DID SOMETHING BAD HAPPEN? DID ANYONE HURT YOU?" He quickly lowers his voice. "Don't cry, Katara, okay? What happened?"
"You…won't…go to the…festival with…m-m-me!" she wails dramatically.
Zuko's eyes widen and he starts to shake his head frantically. "No, no, Katara! You know I can't! Please don't cry though! I promise we can do something around here, okay? Now please stop crying—"
She forces herself to sob harder.
Her vision is blurred, but she can sense Zuko's growing alarm. "Please…please don't cry, Katara…" There is a broken quality to his voice, and Katara almost feels bad for doing this to him. Almost.
"I just want you to go with me!" Big, fat tears fall out of her eyes. Katara thinks she's being pretty convincing.
Zuko lets out a cry of frustration. "Katara, you know I can't…"
She lets out a strangled choking noise and covers her face with her hands.
There's a sigh of dejection. "If I promise to go with you will you please stop crying?"
She nods.
"Then I promise to go with you to the Festival of Lights. Don't cry, okay?"
Her hands fall from her face and her tears instantly clear. "Great!" she says, grinning up at him.
His mouth falls open and he stares down at her stupidly.
"We're going to have an awesome time!" She pats his good cheek before turning and sprinting down the hallway. As she turns the corner she hears an explosion of curses.
She just giggles.
Katara won't allow Zuko to wear a hood over his head. He grouches at her the whole time they exit the palace and make their way into the city.
In retaliation he refuses to wear his crown so that no one will know who he is.
Katara begrudgingly agrees.
Azula and Sokka have curiously decided to stay behind and watch the fireworks from one of the multitude of palace balconies. They don't bring the wolves either, because they attract too much attention. And scare small children. This is all fine with Katara. This means she can concentrate on making sure that Zuko has a great time.
They reach the center square, where the festival is being held. Katara brushes against him and she can feel him trembling.
She gives his elbow a gentle squeeze and smiles up at him. He looks terrified.
"It's okay, Zuko," she soothes, squeezing his elbow again. "We're going to have fun. I promise."
He nods slowly and gulps. "Fun. Right."
They get their egg custard first.
Zuko barely touches his, choosing instead to hunker down in his seat and try to tilt the scared side of his face away from everyone walking by.
Katara watches him for a few moments as he does this, trying to think of a way to get him to loosen up a little.
So she flings a spoonful of custard at his face.
"Hey!" he shouts, giving her an astounded look.
She simply flings another spoonful at him.
"What do you think you're doing?" He quickly wipes off the custard with his napkin, growing furious.
"Having fun," she answers sweetly. When he looks up at her incredulously she merrily grins wolfishly.
Then she flings a third spoonful at him, hitting him squarely on the forehead.
"That's it." He stands up swiftly and upturns his entire platter of custard over her head.
She lets out a surprised shriek but is out of her seat in no time. Her revenge will be swift.
She throws fistfuls of custard at him, which he attempts to dodge. Eventually he slips on custard that has hit the ground and falls to the floor in a heap.
People all around them are staring at them in disapproval. But Katara doesn't care because somewhere between having custard thrown at him and falling to the floor, Zuko has started to laugh.
Zuko isn't very good at the festival games. Mostly because when he can't win he gets frustrated.
So when Katara wins a giant stuffed panda and hands it to Zuko with a flourish, he glowers at her for the next half hour.
Katara has to bribe Zuko to dance with her. She promises to clean his swords for the next week.
She thinks it's only a small price to pay.
He looks at everything except her face as they step out into the area reserved for dancing. The music is upbeat and happy, and couples are swirling around them with large smiles plastered on their faces.
"I don't really…" Zuko glances around awkwardly before clearing his throat, "…dance."
She gives him a reassuring smile. "That's okay. I'm not that good of a dancer either."
He rolls his eyes at this, but she grabs hold of his hands anyway. Katara quickly learns that Zuko wasn't exaggerating. He steps on her feet on several occasions, and doesn't seem to know what to do with any of his limbs.
Katara takes a moment to observe how much taller and ganglier he is compared to last summer. It's kind of funny, actually.
She hadn't been lying when she'd said she couldn't really dance either. But she's faring much better then Zuko, whose starting to knock into other dancers accidentally.
With some clever maneuvering Katara manages to dance them to the side of the floor before skidding both of them to a stop.
Zuko looks relieved, but his eyes narrow in confusion when she doesn't let go of his hands.
Katara starts to spin them around instead.
Katara has always liked spinning. It's fun. Much more fun than dancing.
She can tell by the way that Zuko is hysterically laughing and shouting that he agrees.
The fireworks are beautiful. They're red, blue, purple, pink, green and any color you can think of, really.
Katara stands shoulder to shoulder with Zuko. They're standing with the rest of the crowd, watching the explosions light up the night sky.
She glances away from the colorful display and looks up at Zuko. His mouth is open and his eyes are wide with awe and he doesn't seem to care that he's standing around with a bunch of strangers.
For just an instant he's forgotten about his scar.
Katara rapidly blinks her eyes. This is a happy moment and crying would be silly.
She turns her face back towards the sky and wishes that maybe one day he'll forget about his scar permanently.
It's when they're walking back to the palace that she hears it.
"Scarface." And then someone laughs.
Zuko freezes and all of the happiness that she had worked so hard to see drains off of his face to be replaced with a dead, blank expression. She knows he's simply trying to keep a straight face for her. She knows he doesn't want her to see how much it affects him, how much it hurts him.
But she does see.
Katara is furious.
She whirls around, eyes narrowing at two teenage boys standing on the side of the main street.
"What did you just say?"
Both boys look surprised, as if they hadn't been expecting the small, petite little girl to turn around and scream at them. The one on the right quickly regains his composure. "Nothing—"
"It wasn't nothing," she shouts. She storms right up to them and they gape down at her in shock. "You called my friend a name."
The one on the left looks irritated. Katara wonders if he's the one that said it in the first place. "So what?" he spits. "What's it to you?"
"What gives you the right to say anything about him?" Her fingers curl into fists and she glares venomously up at them.
The boy on the left narrows his eyes at her. "And what are you going to do about it? Protect your boyfriend? I mean, he probably gave himself that scar in a firebending accident anyway—"
Katara is practically seeing red as she hauls off and slaps him across the face.
"YOU SHUT UP. YOU DON'T KNOW ANYTHING YOU STUPID, BIG-HEADED, UGLY LITTLE—"
When the boy on the left rushes at her it is reflex that makes her reach out and grab his blood, shoving him back against the wall.
The boy that had been on the right shoots her a look of terror before bolting down the street. Before Katara can do anything else to the boy now slipping down the wall onto the street Zuko yanks her up and starts to drag her towards the palace.
She shouts and squirms the entire way, but he does not relinquish her until they are safely behind palace walls. Then he pulls her into an empty corridor.
"Katara, what did you do back there?"
She has yet to register the fact that she has even bloodbended. She's still seething.
"It was that jerk—"
"No, Katara! What did you do to him when you threw him against the wall using…I don't know! What did you do?"
She calms down enough to look into his face. There's horror there, and fear. He's trembling again.
She shakes her head, growing afraid. "I don't…I…"
"It was some kind of bending, wasn't it? You bent his…" Zuko is starting to look ill. "You bent his blood didn't you? Didn't you?"
She's crying and she's so scared he'll look at her like she's the one who's scarred now.
"Hama said that it'll help people. That we can save lives using it."
He's already backing away from her and he doesn't stop until his back hits the wall on the other side of the corridor.
"That technique can really hurt people, Katara. You have to learn how to control it!" There is a tremor in his voice, but he keeps her gaze.
"I'm so sorry!" she says, gasping now. She doesn't want him to think less of her. She doesn't think she can deal with that. She was just trying to stick up for him.
"It's...it's okay," he says softly. He doesn't look so horrified anymore. He just looks tired. "You just sort of freaked me out, that's all. I don't think you'd ever intentionally hurt anybody anyway."
She doesn't have the heart to tell him that he's wrong.
Instead she looks down at her feet and tries to catch her breath. "Yeah."
She finally looks up and catches Zuko watching her. They stare at each other for a long time, as if taking each other in.
Katara once again reminds herself that things will never be like how they were before last summer. Things are different now.
She has yet to decide whether this is a good or a bad thing.
She thinks that maybe she'll have to see how things play out. That they both will.
The next day Zuko finds her and asks her to explain the positive things about bloodbending. She spends the entire afternoon showing her all the techniques that Hama has taught her. Zuko looks impressed at the majority of them, even going so far as to say that these techniques could greatly improve modern medicine.
When they eat lunch together in the garden he thanks her for standing up for him the night before. He also assures her that her bloodbending doesn't make her a monster, and that he's sorry if he gave her that impression last night.
Then they spend the rest of the day throwing discs (mostly ice, some wooden) for Nukka and Sang to catch.
Before they go their separate ways to their own bedrooms, Katara reaches out and brushes her fingertips across a good part of Zuko's cheek, a park that sits right under his burn. She won't touch his scar yet. She knows that neither of them are ready for that.
She tells him that he's not a monster either.
A/N:
See? Told you that this chapter would be happier.
Thank you all for the amazing reviews! I truly appreciate them!
And to everyone who wished me a happy vacation, thank you! I had a ton of fun at all of the parks! I'll be broke until Christmas, but it was worth it. :)