"Love is brightest in the dark."

-Inscription on the entrance to the Cave of Two Lovers

I look down at my hands as soon as I leave the room. The tingling from being so close to the blast has yet to leave me, and I suspect that it will follow me like an evil spirit for quite some time. Shooting that orange energy felt like I was breathing fire from my hand. I felt like I had to get it all out of me, all the anger and shame that I had bottled up inside, and I did.

Only to have it replaced by fear.

By the Gods, I ask myself, what is happening to me?

As I stumble through the hallways, I recall what my father told me in the hospital room. Each step pulls me further into the memory, even though I desperately try to yank myself out of the recollection.

"Aelius," he had said. With the two black-armored Imperial Guardians behind him, I already knew that the conversation was serious. "Something is happening to you, and we have no idea what it is."

"Dad, I don't know either." I said from my hospital bed. "All I know is that one second some man in a purple robe is walking through the meditation hall, and he looked at me and then I passed out." I turn a corner in the hallway, and the memory keeps pounding inside of my mind.

"You need to forget that you ever saw that man, my son. He is one of the secrets of our people, and without him we would not be able to survive the way we do." My father had been expressionless, his voice as commanding and authoritative as the two black armored guards behind him.

"Secrets?" I had shouted. "We don't have any secrets from our own people! We are supposed to be one big family, one big community! We're a minority and we have to sell ourselves to keep from being hunted!" I walk on trembling feet in the direction of the estate's central living room.

"Aelius, you will be silent, and you will listen to me!" My father had shouted. "You must, I tell you, must forget that you ever saw that man! He is dangerous and not to be trifled with!" His face had been red, and his breath had come in unsteady pants.

"Who in the Gods is he then!" I had yelled right back at him.

"He is the future!" My father slammed his hand against the screen of a heartbeat monitor. He fumed for a few seconds, maniac fire in his eyes, but then he took a deep breath. His eyes closed, and for a few minutes, I could hear nothing but my own heartbeat and his deep breathing. When he opened his eyes again, they were emotionless and cold. "Leave us," he turned and ordered the two Imperial Guardians. With heel-clicks, they turned and left the room, the door sliding shut behind them.

I sit on one of the couches in the living room. The white plush furniture molds to my shape as I slowly lay down on it. I look at the high vaulted ceiling, and my eyes retrace the familiar lines and patterns above me. A large white crystal chandelier blocks part of the ceiling from my view.

"Aelius," my father says from my memories, "the world is in chaos. As an Energybender, you need to try to cleanse the chaos from the world. It is your duty." I see my father's face in the cold white marble above my head. "That is why the Gods gave us the power to control the purest of elements. We are here to purify the world."

"How?" I had asked. I had heard my father talk about our duties as Energybenders before, but never with such solemn seriousness.

"In time, you will learn." was all he said. His eyes closed again, and I thought he had fallen asleep.

"What's happening, Dad?" I recall myself asking him after a few more minutes of silence. I close my eyes and listen to the faint gurgle of the hallway fountain. The water is calming, and I feel my heart rate slowing.

"The day you and your sister were born," My father's voice was as smooth and calm as the gurgling fountain. I keep my eyes closed. "Your mother and I knew that both of our children would be special." I bitterly smile at my father's words. They had given me a warm feeling inside, but that would be shattered within minutes.

My father, with his soft voice and calm expression, stabbed the very core of my being. "When your sister seemed to be able to read minds, we were terrified of what people would think of her."

When we learned that you could change things, from stone to fire to water and air, into pure energy, we were so scared we considered going into hiding for a few years. We didn't know what our children were becoming." I had been speechless. In that moment, I knew that if my father had opened his eyes, he would not have been recognizable to me. I had nothing to say when he kept talking.

"But when your mother died, I knew that you and Iulia would have to be the hope that the world needed. Her last words were that I had to protect you two with all of my heart, and I have tried to do that. Gods, how I have tried.

"The forces at work in the world now, Aelius," He then said, opening his eyes to reveal dark grey pits, "they are even more dangerous than the people that killed your mother. Things are happening all over the world, terrible things. People are dying by the thousands, and not just those that are fighting for their Nation. People are having bombs dropped onto their houses, their families taken and being forced to work in slave camps, women being taken from their husbands and being passed around for the victor's pleasure.

"You and your sister need to help change that. The suffering in this world, the chaos, the brutality, needs to be purged. Someone needs to take the power of the world into their hands and end this war and the strife and suffering that divides the Four Nations. Our people, my son, are in the middle of it all. We have the perfect opportunity to do so." My father paused, and blinked a few times as if he was surprised at what he had just said. I was as surprised as he was, but I was furious too. My father had not even had the guts to look me in the eyes and tell me that when I was a child he was scared of me. I was still fuming about that, and I still am.

"Then why do we fight for each of the Nations?" I had asked, letting my anger fuel my words. "Why do we sell our bodies like whores to the highest bidder?" I could feel my body trembling in anger.

"People have families to feed." My father said, closing his eyes again. "And some people will do anything to provide for their children."

I had been silent for a few moments, feeling my anger boil inside of me. I eventually stood up and started walking towards the door, beyond my father. "And some people don't deserve to have children." I said, not bothering to look at the man behind me.

I feel my body shaking now, disturbed by the rough memory. I feel my lungs jerking with uncontrollable sobs. My father was right to be afraid of me. I cannot be human. I can shoot explosive energy from my hands, I can suck the light out of a room, and I can change anything into energy that just drifts away into the air. I cannot control any of it; I cannot even control myself.

I realize that I have closed my eyes. I open them, and find that my eyesight is blurry. I am not surprised to find that I have been crying throughout my recollection of my father's conversation. I have been crying a lot recently. I am weak, undeserving of the gift the Gods have given me. Iulia is wrong to think that I can improve, because all I am is a failure.

I am a failure.

I barely hear the footsteps when they come. My sobs almost drown them out.

"Aelius?" A faint voice asks. I do not look at the source. I do not feel like moving. Perhaps I can just die here, right now, on this white couch, and be forgotten by the entire world.

"Are you okay?" The voice asks again. I close my eyes, willing my body to just give up on trying to survive, because I know that I cannot. My body fights me by keeping my heart beating and my lungs working of their own accord.

I hear footsteps that grow louder, and then I feel my head sink down as someone sits close to it on the couch. Please, I silently beg of the voice, kill me now. Release me from the cruel world that I have no place in.

The voice does the opposite. I feel strong arms lifting me up, and then pulling me back across the couch. The arms are unfamiliar to me, but they are warm and comforting. I do not fight them or the sobs that still rack my chest.

The arms wrap around my chest in an embrace. I feel a chin, curved and smooth, put itself against my shoulder. Warm breaths brush against my ear, and long strands of thick hair tickle my face.

"Just let it out," the voice says. I still cannot put a name to the voice, but it must be some sort of being sent by the Gods to bring me back to them. "It'll be alright."

I open my eyes after a few sobs. I look down at the arms, and through the blurry tears coating my eyes, I see two red sleeves and crimson fingernails. A name comes into my head, but in my condition, I cannot remember it completely. I instead can only feel the arms around my body and the heartbeat against my back.

I spend a few moments trying to calm down. The heat against my body helps bring life back into me. It is like a fire was rekindled inside of my brain, and it burns away all the pain and sorrow that my father made me feel. As the ashes blow away inside my mind, I remember the name.

The girl whose life I saved.

The girl who now has saved me.

"Cathra," I say, but it is more of a whisper. I feel the words drift away from my lips like a leaf in the summer wind.

"I'm here, Aelius." The girl says into my ear. Her words are a comforting fire that worms into my brain and gives me a feeling that I have never truly felt before; the feeling of gratitude.

Neither of us says anything. What could we say? She came across me crying in the living room, and decided that she would help me. Iulia would have just decided that I needed space and left me alone. My own sister, who knows me better than anyone else in the world, would not have known that I needed her right now. This girl, who I have only known for a few days, saw me and knew that I needed someone to hold me and pick up the pieces of me that were broken.

Pieces that I had never even known were broken are now a part of me again. All it took was a touch.

Cathra takes a deep breath and exhales warm words. "What's wrong?" she asks. The words tunnel into my very center, they bounce around inside my head, and they carve a niche into my throat.

"I am." I say, my words scratchy and weak.

"How?" Cathra asks. Neither her nor I move. Having her arms around me reminds me of the way my mother used to hold me when I was younger. It's a comforting memory.

"I don't know who I am anymore." I whisper. My words are the pure truth, and they bring a few tears out of my eyes. I stare at a singular point outside, past the pool, past the gardens, and way beyond the white marble walls that outline the estate. I look at the wall of the cavern. Tiny white crystals embedded in the tunnel walls glow back at me.

"No one knows who they are, Aelius," the way Cathra whispers my name makes my heart pound. The pounding fights against the sobs before they can rise up out of my chest. The girl continues speaking, and I feel her chin move up and down with every word. "That's what life is for. To find out who you are."

A crystal, over two miles away from me right now, draws my attention. It shines brighter than all the other crystals around it. The blue stone that surrounds it is not visible because the light is so bright. My eyes hurt a bit looking at it, but I do not look away. Right now I need a light to hold on to, something to remind me that I am alive.

Cathra's heart beats softly against my back. "I know who you are though, Aelius." Her words have an unfamiliar fire to them. Her arms leave my chest, and a animal panic runs through me. I am so scared that she left me that I turn around. She is still there, and her crimson eyes burn with a smoldering fire. "You are Aelius of the Impera Clan, and you saved my life two times within the past week, and never once did you ask for anything in return."

I close my eyes. "Anyone would have saved you, because-"

"No." Cathra says with such force that I open my eyes, afraid that she is going to hit me. "A good half of the world would have let me die, because I am going to be Fire Lady one day, and they would rather see the Fire Nation burn to the ground than thrive for more than a day."

Cathra leans closer to me, and I feel her warm breath on my face. Her face is only a few inches away from mine, and her eyes are burning into mine with a deep fire. "You're a mystery to me, Aelius, because you can do amazing things, and yet you don't want to."

Her words burn into my mind. She is right, but it does not bother me because of how true it is. "I'm afraid I'm going to hurt someone." I say. The words just burst out of my mouth, and I close my eyes in an attempt to halt their exit. It does not work. "I don't want to hurt anyone. I just want-"

A warmness brushes against my lips, unsure at first, but then it seems to find its strength. I stop talking, and just give in to the rush that I feel coursing through my body. I realize, after a few split seconds of gentle probing, that the warm is two thick lips planted against my own. Cathra's lips.

I feel a rush of fire hammer into my heart. The feeling is familiar to me. I felt it for the first time after I saved her life from the truck. I was unsure of what it was at the time, and part of me was afraid of it. Now, however, it gives me life, and kindles the energy inside of my own heart.

I do not know how long the kiss lasts, nor do I care. It might last a few seconds, it might last a few minutes, and it might last my entire eternity. I know that when it is done, I open my eyes to find Cathra doing the exact same thing. Her eyes are no longer smoldering cinders; now they are passionate fires. I feel her quick breaths against my throat, and I realize how close we still are.

"I think I know why I saved you," I say softly. The words slide out of my mouth like water that has finally found the path of least resistance. "I think it's because I love you."

What happens next is a blur. I feel two strong arms pushing me back, and my back lands against the soft plush couch. Then Cathra, with her long black hair falling past her face, is above me. Her head is surrounded with a white halo from the crystal chandelier above us. She leans closer to me, and plants her lips on mine once more. I feel her chest lower itself down onto mine, and her heartbeat drums against mine.

"That's okay," she says after a few seconds. I close my eyes, and her warm voice reminds of the feeling of a soft fire on my face. "Because I know that I love you."

We kiss again, this time even more passionate than before. Her fire courses through my entire body, and my heart welcomes the warm that it brings. Her lips and mine gently caress each other, and I feel my hand moving of it is own accord to press her harder against my chest. She responds with hungrier kisses that I return right back to her.

I do not know when it happens, but the kisses stop. It does not bother me, because we both fall asleep. In my dreams, I feel a gentle heartbeat under my arm, and with each deep breath, I smell exotic flowers. It feels like paradise.

I love it.

"Oh, Gods," a voice says in my dreams. I open my eyes and see Iulia standing in front of the couch. Her arms are crossed in front of her, but she has a smile on her face. She shakes her head slowly. "All I wanted was a broom, Aelius."

I close my eyes and take another deep breath full of the smell of Cathra's hair.

"Well," Iulia's voice calls out to me before I fall asleep. "At least you both kept your clothes on.