A. N. : Short introspective chapter after all this socializing.

Firebenders wake up at dawn.

It doesn't matter how well or how much they sleep, they always rise with the sun. With their blood boiling and fire at their fingertips.

Even Lin is the same, and at her age, bending is limited to sparks. Fire comes later, often around three. Azula made a flame at two.

Zuko's first fire was at seven.

It's not dawn yet, but Zuko is awake. He hasn't been able to sleep well since his banishment. Uncle doesn't have the same problem, but Uncle isn't the one whose dishonor was burned in his face.

Zuko thinks back on this day, and he wonders what he should've done.

The strategy of that old general was objectively a good one, but it felt wrong. It – Li and his family and those rotten guards and Song's legs and Jet's crazed eyes – it still feels wrong.

Fighting the Agni Kai ? Defying the Fire Lord not only in words but in acts too ? Going up against the father he loved – and he still loves him, even when it burns to think about him and it must have been Zuko's fault somehow, because father isn't wrong, father can't be wrong –

Lin shifts in her sleep.

It makes him smile, the way she's so small and fragile and innocent and trusting. The way she doesn't know better. The way she doesn't have to know any better.

Father would kill her. Azula would kill her and father would be proud. Proud to have a daughter who doesn't let things such as feelings get in the way of duty.

There it is. Zuko's failure. Feelings. A weak heart that even exile can't strengthen. That makes him act against his best interests.

He tried to save Zhao even though they had been fighting to the death the second before.

He wanted to make sure Lin would be safe and Azula shot Uncle down, she shot him down and if he hadn't been late –

Mother loved him, though. She loved him even with that weakness of his.

Mother, who disappeared the night grandfather died, the night Azula said these horrible, horrible things father would never –

Duty over feelings.

He wouldn't want to – he wouldn't – but he would do it.

Zuko curls up on himself.

Dawn is coming, but he feels cold.