I've started to get back into my writing groove! Even though I'm a little tired I've managed to write another chapter! There was a 4.7 aftershock last night at 1.30 in the morning, I'm still yawning! Hope you like this chapter!
; )
Chapter 17
A week. That was how long it took for Kaiya to start going backwards. She withdrew into her shell again. She had forgotten how lonely she was without Lee.
She had forgotten...
My first day. Kaiya looked up at the amazing wall hangings of the main temple. I have earth bending all day to day, to learn the basics. This should be fun, and Lee look pleased that he had to skip a day of school to teach some kid earth bending.
She had been standing here for half an hour, waiting for him to show up. So far, nothing.
Where is he?
How was she supposed to learn earth bending with no teacher?
"Yo!" The voice rang out very loud across the quiet temple hall.
She whipped around, startled slightly. Lee was leaning up against one of the temple arches, holding the appearance of a cool kid. He flicked his hand at her, motioning her to follow. She sighed, he was using a bit too much drama, just her personal opinion. She decided she had better follow him, she had no idea where she was going if she didn't.
He led her to a different training room than the day before. This one was smaller, the walls looked strong, made of some indestructible rock in case an out of control student bashed them up a bit. Kaiya had got the feeling that fixing up the wall you had just destroyed was a bit out of character for a beginner. She didn't think that this Lee boy was impressed very often.
Lee had dumped his bag in the corner of the room. It made a dull thud, like there were a ton of textbooks rattling around inside.
Lee looked at her sullenly. "Master Earthwave said if you were doing the drills confidently, after a while I could do some of my school work here."
"That's good!" Kaiya said brightly, trying to be friendly.
"Not really." Lee said flatly.
"Oh..." It looked like she had said the wrong thing.
"Well, you want to get started." Lee said.
"Uh... sure..." Kaiya said, not moving from the spot she was standing on.
"Well, first thing, take your shoes off." Lee bent down to unfasten his own scuffed sandals.
"Um... take off my shoes?" Kaiya was unsure that she had heard right.
"Yeah..." Lee looked at her oddly. "Gotta have contact with the earth, vibrations and all." Lee smirked. "Me? I go barefoot whenever I can; the Temple doesn't make me unless it's for something important. This is my only pair of shoes."
Kaiya looked in shock at the battered old leather shoes. She was about to pipe up that he'd get frostbite in ten seconds flat if he ever went to the North Pole. Earth kingdom person, remember, Kaiya the earth bender has never been within a hundred kilometre radius of the North Pole. Earth bender Kaiya has no idea what life in the water tribes is like.
"Are you sure?" Kaiya asked.
"Yes." Lee said exasperatly. "Just take them off."
"Okay..." Kaiya bent down and unfastened the knot binding the flimsy sandals to her feet. She slipped out of them gently and firmly placed her two bare feet on the ground.
Kaiya made a face. "That feels strange." She grinned.
Lee peered at her water tribe tanned feet. Her olive skin tone was very convenient for hiding the fact that her feet had never seen the sun before. They had always been trapped in one pair of boots or the other. Hopefully Lee would find nothing strange about her feet.
"What?" She demanded
"Nothing." Lee said quickly. "Haven't you ever gone bare foot, you know, at the beach or something?"
"No." Kaiya said flatly.
"Well, you should." Lee turned away.
"Does it matter?" Kaiya said.
"What do you know about earth bending?" Lee changed the subject abruptly.
"I know it involves a bunch of people chucking rocks at each other."
"Wrong!" Lee said crossly.
"So you're saying in the entire history of earth bending, people have never spent time chucking rocks at each other?"
"That's not the point, only uncivilised benders see earth bending as just 'chucking rocks at each other'."
Kaiya stayed silent. She was slightly intimidated by this lanky boy. He towered over her small body even though they were around the same age. Kaiya guessed this was because she was small for her age, Lee was the opposite; he was tall for his age.
We make a bit of a comic pair, Kaiya grinned.
"What?" Lee said, curious to see what was amusing.
"Nothing."
"We should get started now then," Lee said. He positioned himself in front of her, trying to make himself look important. "We start by basic earth bending forms. First, to move a rock."
He sank deep into a sturdy stance. He crashed his foot upon the ground, causing a small bolder to emerge from the hard packed soil.
Kaiya watched, so far unimpressed. She had figured out how to do that already.
"Now you try." Lee dared her.
Kaiya imitated the movement, also managing to raise a rock from the ground.
Lee looked slightly thrown. "I thought you hadn't had any training before?" He asked.
"You saw me yesterday, I taught a bit to myself." Kaiya shrugged.
"But..." Lee frowned, "You did that move flawlessly. No beginner can perfect moves that fast."
"I practice." Kaiya said firmly, "That's all; maybe it's just in my blood or something?"
Lee shook his head. "Let's just do the next one."
He bunched his fist at the rock and smashed his foot on the ground. He raised the fist and swung it around in a smooth arc. The rock followed his every order.
Kaiya breathed in and out slowly, like her grandmother had taught her for water bending. She felt her chi surge powerfully underneath her skin.
She stuck her fist out, praying to Twi that she wouldn't screw this up. She focused and stomped her foot.
The rock shattered into a thousand pieces.
Lee jumped and brought his hands up to his face to shield himself.
"Wow." He sounded awed.
"What did I do wrong?" Kaiya said in a small voice.
"This is insane." Lee crept over to the rock. "You gave it too much power!"
"Too much?"
"Yeah, made it explode with all that extra chi. At least, that's my theory. This doesn't happen much."
"How come?"
"Most beginners don't have enough energy; I doubted that you would have enough chi output for an entire day of training. But now..." He glanced back at the pile of stone chips that was once Kaiya's stone. "Have you learnt anything about chi?"
"Yeah," Kaiya said. it shouldn't be a giveaway that I'm the avatar that I've learnt about chi, I can just say that the spirit woman in our village taught me, and it was the only training that I've had for earth bending.
"You've learnt about chi?" Lee looked astonished.
"Yeah, an old woman taught me, she wasn't a bender, but she was in touch with the spirits and knew all about chi, she taught me some."
Lee sighed "That explains it, you have stronger chi than a usual beginner."
"So... Now what?" Kaiya asked.
"We have to modify our lessons to accommodate that factor." Lee sighed and drooped. "Aww man!"
"I'm sorry."Kaiya said sincerely.
"No you're not..." Lee retorted. "Nobody ever feels sorry for me, once you've been here a while, you'll know."
"Haven't found any reason why I should ignore you yet." Kaiya said slowly.
"You will,"
"You said that yesterday!" Kaiya said crossly. "What's the huge deal? Why can't we be friends?"
"I'm just your tutor for the time being... you want to return to what we're doing?"
"Oh... right, let's do that." Kaiya dropped her voice and returned to her bending stance.
Lee carried on teaching her for most of that day. Time after time she managed to catch on to what each move was about. By the end of the day she had completely mastered four techniques and was pretty good at five others.
By the end of the third day she was equal in skill to those in the bottom class of the temple. At the end of the week of catch up training she was ready to begin in the third lowest earth bending class. She advanced easily at first, each move was harder than the last, but not that much harder.
It creeped Lee out.
He tried to avoid her as soon as his teaching was over, for four weeks he had tried to keep away from her. She was a strange person. She knew he wasn't cool and yet she still persisted in trying to be friendly. All the other kids he had tutored before had been distant and cold to him as soon as they found out his status at this temple. They had payed attention to his earth bending instruction but as soon as they were caught up they ditched him.
Kaiya was most probably the most talented earth bender he had ever seen. He wouldn't have been surprised if she had completely mastered earth bending in a couple of years. It was amazing, and if Lee was completely honest with himself he knew that he was jealous. He had trained for years and years, most of his childhood was spent inside this temple, and he was one of the youngest benders close to mastering earth bending.
So what if this girl managed to do that before him?
So he avoided her, he wanted for her to disappear, go back to where ever she had come from. She was messing things up.
"Hello!" Kaiya said shyly. She had just come out of the earth temple library, probably studying the earth bending scrolls again. That was another thing that annoyed him, she was totally committed to her studies, when she wasn't in class she was practicing bending. When she wasn't bending she was studying scrolls about bending. Her dedication was weird.
"Go away." He did not want to talk to her, not now.
"What're you doing?" Kaiya asked.
"Stuff." Lee said stiffly, he did not want this unnatural girl to follow him.
"What sort of stuff?" Kaiya wanted to know.
"Studying." He had a history test on Friday, he desperately needed to study. Not hang around talking to the new girl.
"Oh, Okay. I've just finished in the library; I guess I'll see you tomorrow." She twirled her fingers at him in a mock wave and disappeared as quickly as she had come.
Lee was startled. He had thought she was one of those clingy types. Limpets that stuck to the first person they saw at a new place. He had to rearrange his thoughts about this girl, again.
Lee shook his head and carried on ahead to the library, there was no time to worry over the new kid now, he had to study.
Lee was a natural loner; most people didn't like him anyway, so why make friends? They were scared of the fact that he was a first grade master, how many ten year olds do you meet with that kind of power? What was freaky was that he did it in about four years, and he was close to getting even better.
Lee did better in his own company than with others. That was the point here. And there aren't that many things at the Omashu earth temple that a person can do by themselves... that are not against the rules.
If you're a goody good loner you could do extra studying...
Or if you're Lee you could sneak away and go to the massive Omashu market in your free time.
If you're a terrible earth bender loner you could go to one of the practice courts and go over that day's lesson...
Or if you're Lee you can earth bend a few joke traps and laugh as other students fall in.
And if you are a timid loner you could spend your time quietly reading in the library...
Or you could be like Lee, who goes out to ride the Omashu delivery system.
So you can see, Lee was not your typical loner, and today was no different. Because he had finished all his school work and his earth bending lessons had finished early, he now had free time for the next two hours before he had to go back to the earth temple to tutor Kaiya.
Sneaking out of the earth temple was never hard. The entire city was made out of rock for the spirit's sake. It was an insult to his abilities to suggest he couldn't sneak out in five minutes flat. Put simply, he just earth bended a small tunnel, just big enough for a gangly ten year old, through his bedroom floor and up into the abandoned house across the street. He then exited the house from the back window (the only exit not facing the earth temple) and climbed into the small park over the back fence.
This was where he was now, brushing any lingering dirt off of his clothing and whistling softly. He liked the temple, it was a cool home, there just wasn't that much freedom. Well, he would have a lot more freedom if he didn't get into trouble so often. For example, flicking rocks at other students in history class generally made you unpopular with the history teacher, who then, in turn, gave the order that you were to be confined to the temple for the next week. Not that it made much difference, he had got into trouble so many times he had temple confinement lined up for the next six months. If he wanted to get out, it had to be sneakily.
Lee slipped a wide hat onto his head, the bad thing about sneak town visits was that anyone could recognise him, and report him, so he had to go in disguise all the time. A wicked grin spread out under the wide brim of the hat, besides, he needed a disguise anyway for what he was about to do.
Lee started walking up the steep hill of the main city street, continuing the merry whistle all up the road.
Lessons were always so boring, Kaiya sighed a rested her head in her hands. It always struck her as funny that she knew more about earth kingdom history than the temple kids in her class. At least they weren't doing anything boring like water tribe history. She had heard most of the same history too many times by now.
She glanced out of the window. The sky was an incredible bright blue today, which only made her even more bored and frustrated. She wanted to do something fun. She liked history, but only when it was new to her and the other kids weren't being annoying.
So she just continued to stare out her window into the blue, blue sky.
Lee was now tucked into an out of the way part of the city. Not a lot of people had the stamina to climb all the way to the top of the city and there was nothing really up here except a few posh houses and the palace of the Omashu 'king'. Only the rich could afford a litter or an ostrich-horse to do their climbing for them.
At the moment he was sitting, perched, on the side of the large earth container, more commonly used for delivering mail around the city.
"Am I really going to go through with this?" Lee said quietly to himself. He gazed down at the dizzyingly high slide just a metre in front of him.
Lee grinned brightly, of course I'm going to do this, I didn't walk up this stupid hill for nothing.
He bunkered down in the container and motioned with his hands. The container swept smoothly forward.
"One quick ride," He promised himself. "Then back to the temple."
He pushed with his earth bending, sending the container toppling off the cliff.
Kaiya breathed out a sigh of relief as she exited the class room. That morning had been so boring she had wanted to cry. But she was free now, at least until her lesson with Lee.
She separated from the other kids as soon as they walked through the corridors. They were all heading off to their earth bending lessons in other parts of the temple. She still wasn't good enough to be in their classes, she was getting tutored by Lee. Lee had his earth bending lessons in the morning while she had school. He was supposed to be in school while she got bending lessons, but they had excused him until she was a little better.
Kaiya walked slowly down the corridors and out into the temple garden. She loved the gardens, they were proof that the earth kingdom wasn't just about the hard rock under the surface, rather, the earth kingdom was also about the grass and the trees and the animals that all thrived in the earth. Kaiya especially loved grass; she had only ever seen grass once before she came here. The only grass growing at the North Pole was at the spirit oasis, so it was a novelty. Here in the earth kingdom it was in abundance, and everyone took it for granted.
Kaiya flopped down beneath her favourite tree. It was a large leafy one she didn't know the name of. It rested on the bank of the small pond in the middle of the garden. It was a nice spot. That was another thing the North Pole didn't have; trees. They were just as wonderful as grass.
Does the earth kingdom know what wonderful treasure they have? Kaiya wondered dreamily, eyes half closed. She yawned and leaned back against the solid trunk.
CRASH!
A deafening squeal of breaking roof tiles and wood snapping rebounded through the air.
Kaiya sat bolt upright, shocked out of her trance like state. She glanced frantically around for the source of the noise, covering her ears and wincing. It seemed to be coming from outside the garden, in the direction of the Omashu main market. Kaiya ran to the high wall surrounding the area and jumped nimbly up to the top.
From the wall she could see most of lower Omashu, including the market a few streets away. Kaiya whistled softly, there was some sort of commotion at the market. She leaned forward and squinted, trying to pick out the distant images.
From what she could see one of the of the delivery carts had crashed in the middle of the main market, destroying one market stall and damaging a few more as it crashed through. There were fruits and vegetables everywhere as well as various items that had been knocked over. Kaiya scanned the market until she saw where the cart had ended up. It was lying on its side, next to another destroyed stall. She brought her hand to her forehead, shading her eyes and looked again. Now she could see a small figure in a wide brimmed hat step shakily out of the delivery cart and tumble to the ground.
Bet he got more of a ride than he bargained for. Kaiya smiled wryly. She had heard of the famous second use for the Omashu delivery system.
Kaiya began to feel sorry for the boy; the Stall owner was yelling at him and shaking his fist. The Omashu guards were already walking through the market to see what the problem was. If he wasn't careful he could get arrested.
Kaiya peered at the boy more closely. He seemed familiar now. His green tunic and white pants were grimy, but recognisable. His hair might have been black and curly but it was hard to tell at this distance, especially since the boy was wearing a hat.
Kaiya shook her head, what do I do? Do I go and help him? What if I get caught? Her common sense was telling her to stay in the earth temple, hope he gets out of the mess himself. She knew that was wrong however. Lee was her tutor; she'd never be able to face him again if she let this go.
"Bummer." She muttered.
Sliding down the other side of the fence was harder than it looked. It was quite a high wall and there were no handy vines like on the opposite side. She was quite a nimble person naturally but she still ended up on her butt. She stood up quickly and dusted off her clothes before any passersby saw her embarrassment.
Kaiya still wasn't sure of her way around Omashu, but she knew where the market was. So now she headed off there at a run. As soon as she was slowed to a half walk she knew she had to be nearby. Markets were the same everywhere, she remembered the main one at home, and how it always took forever to press through the crowds.
As soon as she hit these crowds she knew it was time to get pushy, otherwise she would never get to Lee in time.
"Excuse me." She said quietly as she wormed through the gaps in the crowd, "Pardon me,"
A young man holding a tray of cakes scowled at her as she narrowly missed knocking it out of his hands.
"Sorry." She apologised, diving through another gap into a large pocket of space.
Unknown to her she had reached the market awhile ago, now she was standing in amongst the wreckage of the cart crash. Most of the shopkeepers looked distressed and one elderly man was in tears.
"My Cabbages! MY CABBAGES!" He shrieked, clawing at the remains of his stall.
Kaiya raced over to the cabbage stall and patted the cabbage man on the shoulder. He was now screaming about the punishment that Lee should receive.
"Don't touch me!" He yelled hoarsely, wrenching his shoulder out of her grip. He turned around to face her. "Oh, it's you." The Cabbage man sniffed.
"Yeah, it's me." Kaiya replied. "I saw your stall was broken, is there anything I can do to help you?"
The cabbage man looked at her blankly. "Help me?" He seemed surprised.
"Yeah, you gave me a ride to Omashu; I wanted to pay you back." Kaiya said with a small smile.
"Well, okay... I Guess..." From his startled look it was obvious that no one had offered to pay him back before.
"What shall I do?" She asked politely.
"Well... Uh..." Now he had help he had no idea what to do with her. He kept opening and closing his mouth like a goldfish.
Kaiya thought quickly, she had to get Lee away before he got arrested. "How about I turn the offender in to the Omashu guards, then come back and help you with collecting the cabbages?"
"That sounds good. " The cabbage man sounded more confident. "You take the boy, I'll take care of the stall, don't worry about coming back and helping. I'll be ok, This sort of thing happens a lot." He shot an extremely dark look at Lee.
"Really?" Kaiya said in surprise.
"This kind of thing has happened to my family since Avatar Aang's time." The Cabbage man said mournfully, "I wish I knew what we did to annoy the spirits."
Kaiya patted him reassuringly on the back and moved over towards Lee. He was being held prisoner by a couple of the other stall owners. One of them was a butcher, and was holding a large meat cleaver menacingly in front of Lee, It was no puzzle why Lee hadn't tried to escape.
"I'll take him to the guards" Kaiya told the slightly skinnier stall owner.
Lee looked up, startled at the sound of her voice. He rubbed his forehead, probably puzzling over her sudden appearance.
"A little thing like you?" The butcher butt in, "Could you handle him if he tries to escape?"
Kaiya grinned, "I'm a lot stronger than I look." She said evilly, sneakily winking at the astonished Lee. "Watch this."
She thrust her foot forward just as Lee had taught her last week. A tall spire of earth erupted upwards behind Lee. The stall keepers jumped.
"Earth bender eh?" The skinny one said.
"I'm only a student, but I think I can handle this guy." Kaiya grinned confidently. "He's not an earth bender, is he?"
The two stall owners peered at Lee. He shook his head.
So he picked up on my plan finally, Kaiya thought, he's not as thick as he tries to pass off all the time.
"Right then," the butcher seemed to have relaxed now. "I guess that's okay, you seem to be able to hold your own against him." He stepped aside, But not before leering at Lee menacingly. "If I even here a whisper of you causing any trouble for the young miss, I will find you, you got that?"
Lee whimpered.
"Well, come on." Kaiya ordered, poking Lee as gently as she dared, "Start walking."
Lee put his head down and shuffled forward convincingly dejected. By the time they rounded the corner he had started to grin.
Together they ran through the streets, making for the high temple wall. Lee started to laugh like a maniac as they vaulted themselves over into the garden.
"That was brilliant work, my young pupil!" Lee couldn't stop himself laughing; he fell to his knees, clutching his stomach.
Kaiya's mouth twitched. "I know I'm brilliant, tell me something I don't know!" She, too, started to laugh.
"Well..." Lee stood up, wiping away his tears, "You have earned my respect, and my friendship, if you want it?"
Kaiya looked at the outstretched hand that Lee was offering her. This was something she had not really expected when she left the northern water tribe. She did not think she would ever find friends or feel at home anywhere else but the north.
Kaiya clasped his hand, a warm feeling of hope bubbling up inside her.
Lee grinned, showing white teeth. He spun around and started trudging back to the temple.
"Are you coming?" He yelled, "We still have that earth bending to do!"
Kaiya shook her head, a wide grin spreading across her face, and began to trudge up the hill after him.
He He He! Return of the cabbage merchant! I just love that dude! I was reading on the internet that there is going to be another Avatar season; the Legend of Korra! Aparently there may be something in it that invoves the cabbage merchant! Exciting!