Zuko awoke much later that night. He bolted upright, ready to defend himself-
The stout healer-woman grabbed his hand and eyed him reproachfully. "Sh, don't wake your brother." she reprimanded softly. "You're safe, and so is he. The fever has broken." she let go of his hand, and turned back to the bed next to his.
What is she . . . Booner? Zuko lowered his hands, and turned. The boy was lying on the other bed, wrapped in blankets, a cool, damp cloth on his forehead. He looked much better than he had just a littler earlier that night.
"What? So surprised that a complete and total stranger would offer such kindness to a hurting family?" the woman asked.
Zuko opened his mouth to bark out an answer, but stopped when he realized she was smiling kindly at him. He looked away and instead replied, "No, I didn't."
"Well, that isn't right." he looked back at her, caught her frown in the gloom. "Two boys such as yourselves, well," she glanced at Booner. "I can see that you've both been hurting. You need someone to help ya' along. And for someone to go after a kid like this. That isn't right. It's disgusting."
Zuko said nothing. He wasn't sure how to respond to this.
The woman looked back at him, and apparently saw something in his posture. Her disgusted, angered look faded, and she lightly patted his arm. He tried not to flinch.
"Just rest. Your brother will be fine; the worst is over. The best you can do for him now is rest, and gather your strength again." she stood, and picked up a lantern. She smiled at him. "Both of you will get treated to a good, home-cooked meal in the morning." she promised, leaving the room.
Zuko laid back down, exhaustion still tugging at his mind.
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Booner said nothing as the kindly woman lead him through her house, dressed in new, clean clothes. He couldn't see, but he did feel much better than he had before. The constant press of fever-heat had lessened, his clothes and hair and body were clean. The only heat he could feel internally now was in his belly, but he did his best to ignore it. Externally, he could sense the warmth of the teenager that had rescued him.
So it wasn't just my mind playing tricks, he thought, quietly and quickly eating the bowl of soup the nice woman had set before him. He really did save me. But why can I feel him? How? And how was I able to track him-?
"I'll go get your brother up for some breakfast. He's slept in long enough." the nice woman told him, cutting through his thoughts.
Booner nodded once, listening as her footsteps left the room and grew fainter, his heart pounding. If his brothers had managed to track him down, then he needed to be ready to run.
When the woman returned, however, with the teen. He could feel eyes on him, but didn't give any indication of it. He just kept eating his food, glad for the warmth. The teen moved to sit across from him, and from the sound of it, was starting to scarf down food as quick as he was himself.
A scrape of wood on stone, to his left, and then he heard the nice womans' voice, "I never did catch your name, young man, or your brothers. My name is Malla."
He has a brother? Booner contemplates this a moment, listening carefully. I don't think there's anyone else in here.
"My name is Lee," the teen replied. "My brothers name is Booner."
I am what? Booner struggled to keep surprise off his face.
"It's nice to meet you two formally, at last," Malla says cheerfully. "As I understood it yesterday evening, you were going to meet with you uncle after finding your brother."
Lee cleared his throat slightly, then said. "Yes. That was the plan. But uh . . ."
". . .you didn't expect that his kidnappers would've injured him." Malla supplies gently, guessing.
"Yeah, pretty much." Lee is quick to jump on this. "But we need to get moving soon. Otherwise Uncle will think I was captured too, or hurt."
"Why would anyone want to capture your brother, though? If you know, I can inform the local Town Guards and they'll be on the lookout for them." Malla asks, hopeful.
Lee hesitates a long moment.
". . .it's because I look to much like the Fire Nation." Booner said softly. Lightly now . . . lightly. Give bits, and let her draw the picture for herself.
"Well, you both look like Fire Nation," Malla starts.
Booner tenses, and he can feel the warmth emanating across the table from him lessen. . . .as if Lee were trying to hide. How do I . . ?
"But I've learned not to judge based on appearances." Malla finishes. "I can see that the Fire Nation hurt you, a few years back. And because of judging based on looks, your brother got hurt. I'm not going to follow along and hurt you, too."
He could practically feel the smile in her voice. The warmth returned back to it's previous strength. ". . .thank you . . ." he says softly, shyly.
"Yes, thanks." Lee says gruffly.
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"We'll make camp here today." Zuko said, hopping off the ostrich-horse and stooping by the small pond.
A small meadow just to the side of the path, with a tiny pond at the far end of it, and trees all around. Pretty much the perfect place to stop for the day.
"It's still light out." Booner said quietly, speaking for the first time all day.
"I know." Zuko replies, grabbing his pack and pulling out the basket with the herbs.
". . . normally we keep moving until the sun sets." he followed up, confusion in his voice.
"I. Know." Zuko repeats, pulling out a small pot and filling it with water. "But Healer Malla said we needed to clean your . . . wound, and replace the bandages at least once every two days."
The kid remained silent, which suited Zuko just fine. He cleared a circle of earth next to the pond, then set up the kindling he'd brought along. "I'm going to get some wood." he says gruffly, standing and walking towards the woods.
By the time he got back with an armload of branches, Booner had climbed off the ostrich-horses back and was crouched by the water. Some turtle-ducks were swimming in the pond, and Booner was currently petting at a mother and her brood of turtle-ducklings.
Setting the wood aside, he slowly came closer and crouched next to the kid. Booner was just picking up a turtle-duckling when Zuko decided to say, "My mom used to keep turtle-ducks."
"Turtle-what?" Booner replied, startled. He fumbled and dropped the baby back into the pond. It went under the surface, coming up peeping in alarm, but none the worse for wear. The mother quacked angrily and swam forward, snapping her beak over the kids fingers. "LET GO!" Booner cried out, startled and pushing at the mad little reptile-bird.
Zuko couldn't help a chuckle, and reached out to help the boy loosen the turtle-ducks grip. "You never heard of turtle-ducks?" he asked, dubious.
Booner shook his hand and shrugged. "Didn't have 'em around." he replies, shaking off his hand. The kid seems to glance at Zuko. "Your mom kept them?"
"Yeah, she did." Zuko replied stiffly, standing and moving back to his prepared firepit, arranging the sticks he'd brought. "A long time ago." he winces slightly, then quickly lights the fire with his bending, glancing at the kid to detect any signs of surprise.
Booner just remained by the water, cautiously reaching out to the turtle-ducks, that had already retreated from the bank except for one brave duckling or two.
Setting the pot of water up over the fire, Zuko pulled out a clean roll of bandages and the herbal mixture healer Malla had given him. He reached back into memory and recalled her instruction on how to dress the wounds.
"Be gentle," he recalled her saying. "It's many smaller wounds, and all need to get cleaned, especially the eyes, which are most delicate. There might be some bleeding still, but the biggest concern is keeping any infections at bay."
". . .you mentioned an uncle?" the kid suddenly asked, gently petting a turtle-duckling. "At Healer Malla's clinic. You and him are refugees?"
"Yes." Zuko replied, tugging him closer. "Hold still. I need to clean your eyes."
". . .why isn't he with you now? And are you really Fire Nation colonials?" Booner continued, wincing as the bandages were slowly taken off.
"Yes, we're from the colonies." Zuko answered. "I chose to go my own way." He carefully pulled away the last of the bandages, setting them aside for now as he took the kids chin and lifted his face towards the light, eyeing the wounds.
He really had been cut up pretty badly, but it was healing. Slowly. Booner blinked his eyes open a little, but immediately winced at the action. ". . .do you think your uncle would like me?" the kid asked tentatively.
"Uncle takes a liking to nearly anyone. Hold still." Zuko replied gruffly. Scooping up a bit of the healing goop on his fingertips, he carefully started dabbing it onto the wounds. Booner winced and squirmed, but didn't protest the action. He finally stopped and carefully inspected his work. Nodding to himself, he took the bandages and rinsed them in the pond, then put them in the bubbling pot of water.
". . . .Healer Malla said the Fire Nation hurt you. But . . ." the kid hesitated a long moment. " . . .why would they hurt their own?"
Zuko eyed the kid, but said nothing for a long moment. "Because I was a disgrace. Weak." He finally said.
". . .you don't seem weak." Booner offered hesitantly, reaching up to feel at his eyes.
"Stop that." Zuko replied gruffly, grabbing his hands. "Don't touch your eyes, you might make them worse." Catching sight of something, he tugged the boys hand closer.
"I mean it." Booner insisted. "You're stronger than others I've met. . . . what're you doing?"
"Your hands. . ." There were some small, faint burn scars on the kids hands, as if he'd grabbed a hot piece of metal, perhaps.
"I helped in a bakery. With the fires." Booner replies quickly. "And I really mean it. You're one of the strongest people I know."
"I lost my honor. I refused to fight. . .I'm not strong." Zuko bit back angrily. The fire flared higher, and he struggled to calm down and reign in his temper. "You're just an Earth Kingdom boy. You wouldn't understand."
Booner remained quiet a long minute. "Then help me understand." he held out his hands, palms facing upwards. "You're Fire Nation, but you helped me. That means there's others that are nice, like you. And your uncle."
"Yeah, but you wouldn't just walk up to a Fire Nation soldier and ask for help." Zuko replied angrily, thinking of his sister.
"There's good and bad people everywhere in the four nations." Booner countered. "There's mean earthbenders, too."
"Yeah, like there are any nice firebenders?" Zuko snapped.
"I dunno, I haven't met one yet." Booner crossed his arms and pouted. "Just like, at some point in time, there had to be Air Nomads who fought in battles. Nothing's all the same thing. There's little differences everywhere that makes a huge difference, in the end."
". . .this is starting to sound like stuff the Avatar would say." Zuko grumbled, pulling the pot of water and bandages off the fire.
". . . and what's wrong with that?"
". . . .nothing." Zuko sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose to ward off a headache. "Nothing at all."
Booner said nothing, startling when Zuko tugged him a little closer and sat him down. He hesitated, considering waving a hand in front of the kids face to test his reaction, but thought better of it, instead wrapping the bandages carefully over the kids eyes.
"There, done." Zuko said gruffly, tucking the medical supplies away and standing. "I'm gonna see if there's anything to eat." he stalked off towards the trees.
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Traveling had changed significantly since taking in the young earthbender, hardly a week ago.
At least he's smart enough not to try bending while blind. Zuko thought wryly, glancing at Booner as he worked on gathering firewood. The kid was sitting next to their ostrich-horse, petting it. Then again, maybe I should get him to try a little. The longer he holds it back . . . the exiled prince didn't want to follow that train of thought any farther.
Arranging the kindling, Zuko quickly and cautiously set it alight with firebending, adding on more and bigger sticks as the fire grew and ate up the fuel greedily. "I need to get more firewood. Stay here." he ordered.
Booner shrugged, turning his head as if he were glancing towards the fire, then away. Zuko turned and started to move away from camp when he heard a quiet, "I'll keep an eye on the fire, then." he paused and looked back. Booner seemed to be eyeing the flames, which was impossible. The bandages were still wrapped around his eyes. Besides that, Healer Malla had pulled him aside before they left and informed him that it was unlikely his brother would ever see again.
He brushed it off and kept moving, collecting as many large branches as he could find. When he returned, Booner was prodding at the fire with a twig, hands inches from the flames, somehow tolerating the heat and avoiding getting burned.
"What are you doing?!" Zuko demanded, hurrying closer.
The kid flinched and fumbled the twig, dropping it in the fire.
"You could've set the whole forest ablaze!" Zuko barked angrily. How could this kid be so stupid?
"Yeah, right." the kid muttered.
Zuko tossed the firewood to the side. "You know what, I have had it!" he shouted. "You hardly ever talk, and when you do, you act like a smart-aleck! All you do is take up supplies that I need for my journey! You don't do anything to help at all!" he huffed for breath, hands balled into fists. The fire had blazed hotter and higher, but at the moment he couldn't bring himself to care.
Booner flinched, lips trembling. Then he pressed them into a thin line, and stood, taking an earthbenders stance. "Do you think that I wanted to come along with you?" he snapped, rage tinging his voice. "You're no great prize yourself! You ignore me unless you're telling me to stay put. Tch! As if I can even get anywhere you couldn't find me!"
"What is that even supposed to mean? If you had wanted, you could've stayed with that healer woman for all I cared!" Zuko shot back.
"I'm blind! How hard is that to comprehend?!" Booner bit back defensively, "I wouldn't be able to run more than five steps in any direction without tripping, slamming into a tree, or burning myself in the fire! You wouldn't even have to do anything other than wait until I hurt myself, then drag me back!"
Zuko barely hesitated. "You tracked me across hours worth of grassland! You were hunting me down!"
"I WAS NOT!" Booner screamed back at him. The fire flickered and flared. "Earthbenders were throwing their weight around and beating me up! Again! And then I sense you there and they stopped!" he sniffled softly, but held his stance. "No one else has ever helped me! I guess I was wrong, though." he turned his back, stumbling away from camp quickly, hands held in front of himself.
"Where the heck are you going?!" Zuko snaps at him.
"Away from you! Since, obviously, you don't care what happens to me and never wanted me around anyway!" Booner shouted back, breaking into a run.
Zuko growled under his breath and stalked over to the fire, sitting next to it as he listened to the sound of the kid storming off grow fainter and finally vanish altogether. Taking deep breaths, he slowly grew calm again.
I'd never seen that kid before he just - appeared at my campsite!
. . . .after I saved Li and used firebending against those earthbenders in the village.
Those same jerks that took Li were beating up Booner? Okay, he could see them doing that. But no one was helping the kid? Zuko must've drawn whoever was hurting the kid off when he arrived and demanded they let Li go. The kid did have a fever at the time, so he could've seen it as Zuko saving him. All plausible . . . as long as you forgot that that the kid was blind at the time.
He said that he sensed me . . . but how?
Zuko knew about the Inner Flame. All firebenders had it, could sense it within other firebenders, if trained. Booner was an earthbender, though. So it couldn't be that.
The fire had reacted to Booner's anger . . . .
"I helped in a bakery. With the fires."
No. No way. No way that kid was a firebender. And yet . . . it was the only thing that made sense in any of this. No matter how Zuko added it up in his head, the kid being a firebender was the only one that made sense.
"I just set an angry firebender kid loose in the forest. Not good." Standing, Zuko followed the kids trail through the trees.
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The sun was setting. Booner had always been able to track the suns progress through the sky. Even with his vision gone, and the warmth blocked by trees and probably hills farther off, he could feel the suns power slipping away.
He didn't care, though. He. Didn't. CARE.
Earthbenders don't need the sun! he thought savagely, shifting through his katas over and over again, smothering the warmth in his belly and making sure no flames left his hands as he shifted through the motions of one earthbending kata, then going into the next with hardly a pause for breath or thought.
He went from one to another, losing count of how many he'd done or how long he'd been going at it. He just kept moving over smooth stone and rough gravel and soft grass by the river he'd found, moving through the open space between water and trees that he'd marked out as he paced. Practiced until his rage was numbed, everything was numbed except his katas and determination to memorize and perfect them.
He ran through another set of katas that he'd had trouble with in the past. Something to do with getting a certain motion right. He couldn't really remember.
"BOONER!"
"Huh-?!"
SPLASH
Sitting up from where he'd tripped into the river, Booner sputtered and listened carefully. Finally, he stood. Walking to where he estimated was the center of his practice-space, he started up his katas again. At least I won't spout flames by mistake now . . . .
"Booner!"
It was Lee. Of course it was Lee. Booner kept going through his katas, shivering. "I'm practicing here."
"It's getting dark out. And . . . Why are you soaking wet?" was that . . . concern? And why would he care about me?
"I got distracted and tripped." he snapped back, feeling heat creep into his hands. He held back flames, but thought he'd released a bit of heat. Hopefully, if it was as dark as Lee said it was, he wouldn't see any heat shimmering in the air. Fire flickered in his belly, begging to be released, and he buried it in earth, and calm.
". . .I'm, sorry, about what I said earlier." Lee started awkwardly.
Booner hesitated, but remained silent, looking in the direction of his voice. Finally nodding and shrugging, he wrapped arms around himself, shivering a little. He heard Lee sigh, his footsteps as he came nearer.
When the teen was close enough to reach out and touch, he slowly offered a hand. Lee took it and lightly tugged him away from the river, guiding him through the trees. There was a flicker of heat about Lee, but external; like holding a torch. The fire was there, full of energy, but without anything to burn. He didn't think so, at least . . . .but how did he know, anyway? What was Lee doing?
"What are you doing?" he asked at last.
Lee was silent a long time as they traveled through the trees. "How do you view the four nations?" Lee finally asked.
Booner frowned, but organized his thoughts. "The Water Tribes live at the North and South Poles, and have been waiting out most of the war. The Air Nomads lived high up on mountains, and were peaceful. The Fire Nation lives to the west, proud and fierce. The Earth Kingdom is most of the world, the people diverse, and stubborn."
"That's where they live, and how they are, but what do you think of them?" Lee reiterated.
". . . I don't know." he answered honestly. "All I ever heard about them were from my parents."
Lee remained silent until they got back to camp. Pushing him closer to the campfire, now mostly embers, presumably to warm up. Crackling and snaps, as branches were added on, and the fire built back up again.
"I'm Fire Nation." Lee finally said.
Booner swung his head towards him. "You're a colonial." he replied, puzzled.
"I'm not. It was the best story I could stick to, especially with you coming with me on my journey." Lee admitted.
". . . .why are you telling me this?" Booner asks slowly, trying to fit the pieces together.
"Because I'm not just Fire Nation. I'm a firebender." the words rang through the quiet night air.
A firebender. A. Firebender. He'd been traveling with a. . . with . . . Okay, stop, slow down. he ordered himself. One step at a time. Urgh, this makes my head hurt.
Lee must've seen something in his face, because he took his wrist and held his hand closer to the flame that suddenly blazed to life, cupped in the teens hand. "Do you trust me?" he asked.
Booner barely hesitated to reply, "Yes, of course I do." And then, warmth hovering above his palm. It flickered, and danced, pulsing like a little heartbeat. A tightness about his chest, a suppressing, choking weight that had been settling bit by bit in layers over the days, finally lifted. The fire in his belly perked and leapt up, pushing aside some dirt that had choked it.
He allowed himself a small smile.
"So you are a firebender." Lee said quietly, quiet shock and underlying warmth to his voice.
Booner felt his smile drop, hard. He tensed, then put the flame out with a flick of his wrist and clench of his hand. He sensed, more than felt Lee tense and flinch. Deliberately, he held his breath and shoved dirt over the fire in his belly, smothering it and pushing it back, back and away - !?