ARC 1: The Promise of Peace
DAY 3: Confession
Zuko's not sure what he'd expected after six years, but it certainly wasn't this. Eleven year old Katara is a short gap-toothed girl who is not happy to see him. She doesn't even bother to say hello when the Water Tribe ships reach the harbor; she marches straight up to him—in front of the entire guard awaiting their arrival—and jabs him in the chest, declaring I'll never marry you!
That sets the mood for the visit (which, ironically, is for their formal betrothal ceremony).
"No, Sokka! I don't want to feed turtle-ducks with him!"
He finds her by the turtle-duck pond three days into their stay (she visits it in the middle of the night to avoid him). He's surprised to find that this huffy, mockingly polite girl with budding breasts and a waterbending mastery still remembers each name and each duck (somehow, she's found out the names of the new ones too). Katara talks to them, humming foreign songs and tosses bits of bread at them.
Part of Zuko feels like he should resent her. He's fourteen, a man by Fire Nation standards, and Katara is a child. She certainly acts like one, anyway. Noblemen have petitioned for years for the agreement to be broken (so they could, of course, marry their daughters off) and she's been called everything from a barbarian to backwater peasant. The look she has in her eyes, when she finally realizes his presence, has him rapidly categorizing her into another category.
There is a warrior in those eyes and even a clueless fourteen year old boy can see it.
"Did Sokka put you up to this?" she hisses.
The pond water writhes angrily behind her.
"I don't want to marry you either!" he confesses.
"What?!" she shrieks.
Zuko realizes he has two seconds before his short pitiful life ends in ice. He grabs her hands, pulls her close. Any other girl would blush furiously, but Katara glares at him and tries to pull away.
"My cousin!" he shouts, "My cousin died!"
It confuses her long enough for him to frantically explain.
"My cousin, Lu Ten, died in the war and my uncle nearly died from sadness," he says, "and this treaty keeps people from dying. Being together will keep people from dying."
Katara stares at him. Very slowly, she pulls away. There are tears in her eyes, one hand touching the pendent at her throat.
"My mother died in the war." She says softly.
The moonlight makes her eyes glow silvery bright, the sadness in her expression reminds him more of a goddess. A moon goddess. He can see himself, taller and older, holding hands with a beautiful woman (he doesn't know how it's Katara, but only that it is). There is no sadness in their eyes; only peace and love.
She steps out of the moonlight and the moment passes. Katara is a little girl, staring at her feet.
"I'm scared of living here," she says, "Without Daddy and Gran-gran and Sokka."
"I'll make you happy," He vows, "When I'm Fire Lord we'll visit the South every year."
"Do you promise?"
Her voice in tentative, unsure. Zuko nods.
"Then I'll marry you," she declares, "For peace."
They don't notice Chief Hakoda watching from the shadows with a deep, dark sadness in his eyes.