A/N: Back again!

Not sure if this needs a warning or not, but some mentions of an anecdotal story involving what might be taken as animal cruelty. Nothing happening directly, but just a heads up on that.

See you all at the end!


Chapter 20: Memories

Ursa was cold.

She could not remember the last time she could feel her fingers. Every time she had to pull them away from under her arms, to eat or help herself stand, she would see how unnaturally white and pale they were, like death. They cracked and bled, and though she had tried wrapping them in strips of fur, the furs seemed to feel even colder than the air around her.

It was getting about time to stand again, and Ursa, gritting her teeth, forced herself to extract one arm from the thick blankets she had wrapped around her shoulders. She placed the hand briefly against the furs beneath her, grimacing, then forced herself to her feet. Slowly, rubbing her arms, she began to pace, in a cramped, narrow line.

The girl, Nukka, sat on the opposite side of the large, disc-like ice float she had made, unlike Ursa only sitting on one fur, relying instead on only her worn parka for warmth. As Ursa moved, the girl's eyes focused on her, watching her for any signs of trouble.

She had kept Ursa tied up at first, with a leather cord. But even giving Ursa her gloves and wrapping her hands in cloth they had begun to turn blue in the freezing air rising off the ice. So, after taking back the gloves, the girl had cut the leather so Ursa could keep them close to her body instead, warning that, if Ursa tried anything, she wouldn't have to worry about losing fingers to frostbite, because the girl would start cutting them off. The girl knew healing, and she could keep the bleeding from being fatal, so she said.

Ursa wished, not for the first time, that she could pull down the single torch that the girl had set into the high cave wall above their heads for light, close enough to put her hands to. However, Nukka kept it too far away for any heat to reach them. She seemed annoyed enough by the maintenance it already took to keep refreezing the ice float at the center of the cave lake.

Ursa chanced a question. "How much longer?"

Nukka didn't immediately reply. She often kept to the edge of the ice float, and would stand up, moving her arms back and forth as she practiced her waterbending—summoning walls of ice from the lake, then immediately collapsing them, then summoning them again. She also worked on creating beds of ice spikes, which erupted from the water like giant deadly stalagmites. Over time, her improvement was obvious—early on, the walls were thin and uneven, the spikes like misshapen lumps of coal, but with each day her movements seemed to grow more assured, her hisses of frustration at failed experiments less frequent.

Right now, however, she was working on something smaller. She sat on her matted, dirty fur blanket, holding a long shaft of ice with one gloved hand. She had discarded the glove of her other hand on the fur beside her, and now she pulled at the ice, forming it into a long sharp point, until it resembled a knife as long as her forearm.

The girl finally looked up at Ursa, then grunted. "Soon," she answered.

Ursa's eyes scanned the cave above. In this dark place with no sky for any reference of time, soon could mean just about anything. However, she suspected the time for all to come to a head drew near. The girl had said they would be moving to another cave soon, and just a day earlier, she had left the cave for what had to be half a day. While she had left before to replenish the store of dried meats they had been surviving on, this time she returned with no rations.

In the beginning, Ursa had thought she might be able to use the girl's times away as a chance to escape, but she had quickly come to realize how foolhardy such an attempt would be. Even if the girl hadn't frozen her wrapped feet to the ice float, which after hours of chipping away Ursa had barely made a dent, she knew the water would likely be ice cold, and she was not a strong enough swimmer to have made it far, even if she'd had any idea of which way to go to reach ground, or if she did reach the tunnel system, which tunnel to take to make it back to the surface before she died of cold. In her younger days, before she had any children, had she gotten free of the ice she might have been just rebellious and reckless enough to attempt it. But with one last chance of making it back to Zuko, Kiyi, and Ikem, she didn't want to squander it.

So Ursa waited. Soon—she did believe that. Because Ursa had been down here in this cold place for what felt like an eternity. Surely a few weeks had to have passed by now, surely the full moon was drawing close again. She didn't know what would happen then, but it had to be better than sitting still. She could not act now, but she would be able to act then. Surely.

"I hope I don't have to kill you."

The girl spoke suddenly into the quiet, in her usual low, rough voice. She didn't talk much, and seemed comfortable that way, for hours, days at a time, saying nothing. Yet occasionally she would break it. Usually for some practical reason, though she could be occasionally drawn out to more, at least a little.

Ursa, who would have done anything to break the monotony, and distract herself from the many fears that skittered around in her mind, had learned to try to keep these conversations going if she could, whenever they happened. And, she rather thought they might draw out information that might prove useful later.

"Why would you kill me?" she asked politely, a question rather than a challenge.

The girl snorted and spat onto the ice. "If the Fire Lord doesn't cooperate, or tries something—you die."

Ursa's breath was coming out in icy sheets, and she tried to piece together what she knew with what she could guess. "You've communicated with my son. What did you ask of him?"

Nukka was silent for a moment. Just as Ursa was sure the conversation was over, she said, "I was wrong. She's the one who needs to die, not the Fire Lord."

Ursa considered that. She could have asked how the girl could even be certain that Azula was still alive—she had, after all, written a message in the moss for Zuko, pretending to be Azula and having killed Ursa. The girl's revenge. But from her agitated mutterings, she'd seemed to grow more certain her trick wouldn't have worked. Ursa had to agree; even as a child, Azula's writing had all the sophistication of a princess taught by tutors all her life, and it would likely only be all the more so now, and Zuko would have to see through the clumsy letters that Azula couldn't possibly have written it.

Instead Ursa asked, "Why… do you say that?" Ursa's feet were cold, and she couldn't stand walking any longer. She slowly lowered herself back onto the furs, wrapping her hands protectively close to her torso again.

"Because she deserves it," the girl said simply. She had stopped trying to shape the shaft of ice into a full dagger with her bending, and instead put her glove back on. Setting down the shaft of ice briefly, she instead produced a Water Tribe hunting knife from her belt, a slightly different style from the one she had left behind with the message. Picking up the ice shaft again, she began running the blade of the knife along the sharp edge of the ice, as though whittling a piece of wood. The long, even strokes seemed to relax her, as ice shavings skittered along the ice float surface. She added, "You were stupid to save her."

Ursa gazed down at the shavings, reflecting the dim light of the torch above. She could barely make out the girl's face in the shadows, though she knew it was covered in small scars, hardened with difficult years. As with Azula, Ursa knew there was nothing she could say to change the girl's thinking. What the girl intended to do.

For a moment, Ursa's mind wound back—to back then. The unwinding of destiny, as always never in any predictable pattern.


"If it is true, that all that time you never thought of me as a monster—well, it looks like you were wrong, weren't you?"

Ursa's eyes slid closed, as she accepted her fate. There was no place to run, to escape. Azula had made her choice—and perhaps it wasn't one that was all that surprising. Ozai had promised to destroy her. What better instrument than the child he had stolen from her? Who was, even now, even having rejected him on his own principles, so deeply under his thrall she could not see it herself.

The energy crackled. I love you, she thought. Azula, Kiyi, Ikem, Zuko—

She waited for the end to come. However, there was no flash of pain, and instead the crackle of power abruptly ceased. Instead she registered in the distance the odd sound of sloshing water, followed by a crack, like ice freezing. At last, her eyes opened.

Azula's hand, which had been in the process of forming a bolt of lightning, had fallen back to her side. However, she wasn't looking at Ursa—though she didn't immediately turn, her eyes had slid back, in the direction of the tunnel behind her.

Ursa squinted, and realized she could make out a dark figure standing there, on what appeared to be another small float of ice. The figure's arms moved slightly, and the ice float drifted forward on the water. The figure emerged into the torchlight—a girl, dressed in a Water Tribe tunic, a blue so faded it was almost gray. She was bent slightly, hand to chest as though it were paining her.

Azula half turned. "Nukka," she said, in a tone almost warm. "You're back early. Did you succeed? Where are the o—"

Azula seized, limbs stiffening. She pitched forward, then her back arched.

The girl stood with her arms raised in front of her, fingers bent.

"Lightning bending," the girl hissed. "You're a firebender."

Azula hesitated. Then she said, "Well, yes. You know my parentage. I was afraid to admit it, I knew how you all would—"

"Lightning!" the girl snarled again. "Even I know only a few of the ashmakers know lightning. The important ones, nobles and royalty—like Princess Azula."

Azula paused for a long moment, and she seemed to consider. "Oh well," she said, in a very different voice. Airy, yet cold. "I guess even I make mistakes."

The girl froze—evidently startled to hear her admit it so freely. And in that second, Azula broke free, shoving an open palm forward with ferocity. A jet of blue flame tore outward, powerful, yet narrow and precise, like a fiery arrow.

A shockwave from the force of the attack made Ursa stumble backward, falling against the stone of a nearby stalagmite.

The girl dove forward—under the blast. She disappeared beneath the water. However, Azula didn't stop—another burst of flames hit the surf exactly where she had been, sending up a steaming spray, followed by another blast and another.

The ice on which Azula stood suddenly dissolved—Azula sent a blast of flames from her feet, launching herself high into the air, and rocketing forward. She landed on the shore, bare meters from where Ursa leaned in the shadow of the stalagmite. Azula instantly spun around, flames at her fists—before her limbs seized again.

The girl emerged from the water, dripping, fingers bent toward each other as though gripping a struggling fire ferret. Azula fought against it, arms pinned to her sides twitching—but the girl had a firm grip now, and after a moment, Azula stopped. Instead, she relaxed.

"You've gotten better," Azula complimented. "That was some impressive waterbending. Or—passable, at least."

The girl let out a furious sound, somewhere between a lion-otter growl and snake-cat hiss, that made the hair on the back of Ursa's neck stand on end. "You lied to us. All along."

"Well, yes," Azula admitted. "It's what I do. Only you all were so easy to lie to, it wasn't much of a challenge. It was almost disappointing."

The girl made that same sound again, only this time it was more growl than hiss. "Who were you talking to?" she demanded.

Ursa, who had not moved from where she had half fallen behind the large stalagmite, realized then for the first time that the girl had not actually seen her. She had been far enough away across the water that perhaps, in the dark, she must have blended in with the jutting rock. And with the campfire that had been on the ice float extinguished, the only light was a few tiny embers from Azula's last attack, which now crackled at Azula's feet. Ursa could just make out their outlines, but Ursa must be all but invisible in the darkness.

"Oh, who else?" Azula answered carelessly. "My mother, of course. She follows me wherever I go. Telling me not to do this or not to touch that. Don't kill that person, that's not your destiny. Honestly, it gets old after a while."

The girl didn't look around, but rather she said, eyes narrowed, "You're insane."

"So people tell me," Azula said brightly.

Ursa took a slow, even breath, before she slipped her hand inside her sleeve, taking hold of a small tin she kept there, wrapped in cloth, tied with string. Slowly, carefully, she pulled the knot on the string, peeling back the outer layer.

"The Avatar has captured the others," the girl said. "But that's what you wanted all along, wasn't it?"

"Not necessarily," Azula replied. "I just wanted to teach my weak brother some real strength. Had he killed you all, that would have served just as well."

Azula's body, which had been held in a standing position, bent, until her knees struck the stone. Her head came forward, almost as though she were bowing. Her face had turned white with sudden pain.

The girl stepped out of the water, her hands still raised, as she watched Azula with cold, furious eyes.

"You told us a lot of stories about the ashmakers," she said in a low, cold voice. "Well, I've got a story for you. Something my brother used to tell me."

She loomed over Azula, hands still raised, fingers bent. "He told me that in the South, some of the people used to keep arctic seal hens. For their eggs, for food to stay alive. Problem is, when they bred more, they only needed one or two males for a flock, and didn't have enough to keep them all fed. So all the male chicks would be left out on the tundra to freeze to death. Some of the breeders were nicer—those took them out to the fishing holes, and held them under the freezing water until they stopped moving. They died quicker that way."

Azula's face hadn't changed, but she was twitching again—fighting for control.

Very slowly, the girl knelt down, raising one hand to lift Azula's head up to look at her. She whispered, "That's what I'm going to do to you. I'm going to hold you under the water until you stop moving. It'll be quick—quicker than you deserve."

Azula didn't look away from her, her lips tight with effort, still twitching, but the corner half curled, in the same condescending expression. "Do it then," she whispered. "Have your little power trip. You know, I always did like you best of all of them—because, dirty little peasant or not, you're the most like me."

The girl's eyes blazed with fury. She shifted back, and Azula's body lurched forward a fraction, toward the water.

Ursa, having shifted into a crouch, had finally finished removing the lid from the tin. Covering her nose and mouth with her sleeve, she stepped out from behind the stone.

The girl's hearing must have been sharp, because even with the echoing sounds of shifting water behind her, she spun her head. Her eyes fell on Ursa's shape in the dark, and they widened. Keeping one hand raised toward Azula, she immediately raised the other toward Ursa, fingers bent.

But she was too late—the tin, a moment before clutched in Ursa's sweating hand, now arced through the air, nearly invisible. Ursa felt a tug on her insides, but before the girl could get a solid hold, the tin struck the stone, directly between the girl and Azula, with a resounding clang.

White powder exploded into the air, directly into their faces. Azula tried to turn to avoid it, but it instantly coated the side of her jawline, leaving a white residue in her bangs. The girl gasped and choked, before raising furious eyes to Ursa.

However, before she could strike, she blinked. Her rigid fingers slackened, and she swayed to one side, pressing one hand to the side of her head. "Wha…" she began in a slurred voice. "Wha did you…"

Azula, who had been held in the girl's grip, shoved herself backward, away from her. But her movements too were suddenly strange, limp and unsteady. The powdery film clung to her skin, her dark hair streaked with white.

The girl tried to rally, narrowing her unfocused eyes at Azula's bent form. "I'm gonna… ki… kill…" Still crouched, she reached out with both hands, dragging them toward herself, but while Azula twitched again, she didn't move—bloodbending must take too much concentration to wield in such a condition. Growling in frustration, the girl, with fumbling, jerky movements, reached down to her boot, and from inside the fur lining instead drew out a Water Tribe knife.

Ursa stepped forward, careful to keep her sleeve over her face. The ground seed of the nightshade-henbane was potent in powder form, but became innocuous when it touched water. However, some of it was still lingering in the air. Ursa was already clutching the wooden box she had shown Toph earlier, the lid detached from the bottom. Her fingers touched the cloth.

The girl, still holding the knife, suddenly stopped. Her eyes had widened, and she turned her head back toward the water.

"Ya…" she said, still slurring. "Yakki… Wha… are you doing he…?"

The knife slid from her hands, clattering to the stone, and she lurched to her feet. Her hands out in front of her for balance, she staggered toward the water. She waded into its depths, splashing and squelching until she was waist-deep. As her progress slowed, she pushed out with both hands, pushing back the water as though it were thick grass in a jungle. She continued on, mumbling to herself.

There was no way for Ursa to get close enough to try to render her unconscious, and so she closed the wooden box, stowing it back in the depths of her sleeve. Instead, she turned to Azula.

Azula hadn't moved from where was sitting on the cave floor. Her eyes wandered over the stalactites on the ceiling, in evident fascination.

The powder had dissipated now, and as Ursa knelt, she let her sleeve fall from her mouth. She touched Azula's shoulder.

"Azula, my love," she said in a low, urgent voice. "We have to go now. It will only last so long…"

Azula turned her head to look at her, eyes glazed. "Oh, Mom," she said brightly. "You're here. Make Zuzu play with me."

Ursa dampened her sleeve on the cave floor, then carefully wiped away as much of the powder on Azula's face and in her hair as she could. She gripped Azula by the arm. Nightshade-henbane caused confusion and hallucinations, but it also made one more open to suggestion. She would have to rely on that.

"We need to go, sweetheart," Ursa said again. "I need you to stand up. Can you do that for me?"

Azula's face turned to a little scowl. "Is Zuzu having to do it?"

"Yes," Ursa said, a little desperately. "Yes, he's already done it."

Azula placed her hands on the cave floor, and tried to push herself up clumsily, not unlike the way she had done when she was three. Ursa tried to help her, but Azula batted her away. However, Azula wasn't even fully up yet when she swayed, and Ursa seized her by the arm to hold her steady.

"Okay," Ursa said. "Okay, we need to go in that direction." She glanced down at the remains of her extinguished torch, then picked it up, feeling it. The side that had hit the cave floor was slightly damp, but the other was still dry enough to be relit, she hoped. However, messing with spark stones again would take too much time. "Sweetheart, I need you to light this for me. Please."

"Did Zuzu have to do it?" Azula's voice was higher than usual—a strange imitation of her younger self. Even though she was trying to push Ursa away again, she couldn't fully stand on her own, and unwillingly leaned heavily against Ursa's side.

"Yes," Ursa said again. "He did." After a moment, she added, "It took him a little while to do it though, with how wet it is. Do you think you can do it faster?"

Azula giggled with delight, and instead of answering, raised one of her hands, twisting her fingers in a sharp gesture.

Ursa jumped slightly when the fire suddenly erupted on the end of the torch, blazing high for a moment in a cascade of blue, before it settled down, calming to a normal orange.

Though they hadn't a moment to spare, Ursa glanced down at Azula. She had seen Ozai firebend many times, in the safety of his practice rooms. It was a powerful style, decisive and harsh, and it had often left soldiers and sages alike in awe. Azula's bending back in the cottage had been wild and erratic, like her state of mind then, but in the few moments she had seen Azula fight against the Water Tribe girl just now, Ursa knew she had seen her daughter's true skill at bending for the first time. It was precise and elegant, just as Zuko had described. In spite of all the terrible things Azula had likely used it for, it was strangely beautiful.

Ursa pulled Azula along the cave floor as fast as they could go, Azula's feet tripping along, her body sagging heavily against Ursa's side.

"Mom," Azula said, the word a heavy breath against Ursa's neck, and she could almost hear the catlike grin in her voice, "You look funny."

"Yes," Ursa said distractedly. She raised the torch—if only there was a fork somewhere they could turn down, somewhere unexpected. But she hadn't seen any on the way in, and even if there had been, if it turned out to be a dead end, it would only be time wasted. Their only hope was to get back to the entrance, and fast.

"Your face looks scared."

"Yes, sweetheart." Ursa's eyes scanned the cave—she saw the place where the floor was submerged that she'd had to pass through earlier. They would have to wade through it. A problem she hadn't considered suddenly rose in her mind, and she tensed—however, they didn't have much choice if they were going to put as much distance as possible between themselves and the Water Tribe girl. The powder would wear off before the night was through, and the girl would still have her bloodbending before morning.

Azula's feet stopped.

Ursa had to stop herself, before she inadvertently pulled Azula over. If Azula ended up on the ground again, there was no telling how long it would take to get her back up.

Ursa turned her head slightly to look at Azula's face, to find she was scowling, her full lips puckered, a wrinkle in her forehead.

"Sweetheart—" Ursa started to say.

Azula suddenly shoved against her, staggering back a step, her back falling against the nearby cave wall.

"This is boring," she said, eyes sliding back along the cave. "I wanna go play with Mai and Ty Lee."

"You will," said Ursa, reaching for her. "But I need you to do this first. Okay, sweetie? Zuko did it already, I bet you can do it faster."

The challenge didn't have the desired effect this time, and instead Azula only folded her arms obstinately. "No. I wanna play. I don't care about Zuzu."

Ursa had to do something. Her mouth opened automatically, the familiar chiding reprimands she had used with Kiyi and Zuko and Azula all coming automatically. They'd often made Azula angry and she'd stomp off to sulk—but she had generally listened to them.

However, Ursa stopped. She asked instead, softly, "What's wrong, Azula?"

Azula blinked at the question, then scowled and looked away again.

Ursa reached forward, and gently touched her face. Azula had never given a straight answer to questions like this, even as a child, and Ursa had eventually ceased asking. However, Ursa recalled her mother once telling her that nightshade-henbane was thought to have the properties of a truth serum, and many had tried to use it for that purpose. No one was certain it really worked, but Ursa wondered if Azula might, for once, be coaxed into honesty, however slight. So Ursa could finally understand, at least a little, instead of this useless guessing.

"You seem upset," Ursa pressed softly. She shifted closer. "Won't you tell me why?"

Azula tried to step back from her, but her feet only hit the back of another large stalagmite, and she sagged against it. Her eyes darted away from Ursa's, then wandered back, resentfully.

"Mai and Ty Lee are funner than you," she said. "You're not fun. You're mean."

"Why am I mean?" Ursa murmured. She was standing beside Azula now, close enough Azula could reach out and lean on her again, if she chose to. "You can tell me, Azula."

Ursa could feel her own heart thrumming in her chest—she wanted to hear this answer. And yet, as the seconds passed, she thought of the Water Tribe girl who would come for them, when the drug wore off. For just a moment, Ursa's eyes flickered back toward the deeper part of the cave.

She suddenly felt Azula push her, hard. However, Azula was so unstable, the only thing she did was collapse back. Ursa tried to catch her, but her hand found only air.

Azula's elbow struck the edge of the water, splashing onto her Water Tribe clothes and up into her face. She lay there, staring up at Ursa, water dripping down her bangs. Her eyes were angry—yet as Ursa blinked, she suddenly noticed tears there, like the beads of cave water dripping from the ceiling.

"I hate you," Azula said, glaring up at her. "I hate you!"

Ursa stared back at her, frozen for a moment. And, with a sudden blinding clarity, she understood something for the first time.

She understood—that Azula was not going to explain her feelings.

Because that was often the way with children—they felt pain and hurt like any adult, but often couldn't explain to themselves or anyone else what they felt. They could only give disjointed clues. Azula, even when she was herself, fully lucid, making intricate plans and tactics so clever they were the envy of most military commanders, was, perhaps, even now still a child in that way. She had felt great pain, misery, but she could not explain it, even to herself.

Ursa felt tears well in her eyes. She didn't understand what Azula wanted or needed in this moment, if it was even rational or something that she could give, and she knew without Azula's cooperation she would not be able to push them forward any further. The longer they remained here, the closer it would be to the drug wearing off on the girl, and she would remember, and follow them.

And Azula would die.

Without knowing quite what she was doing, Ursa found herself on her knees, the shallow water soaking into the hem of her traveling clothes. Ursa's arms came around her, pulling her close.

Azula tensed in her grip. Her arms were limp, and she pushed against Ursa weakly, but there was no strength to it, and Ursa only held her all the tighter.

"I'm sorry," Ursa whispered in her ear, voice cracking. "I'm sorry, Azula. I'm so sorry. I just—wish I knew how to help you. I wish I had been a better mother, I wish I had protected you. I wish…"

Her face was wet, and she felt as the tears dripped down onto the neck of Azula's Water Tribe tunic.

Azula had stilled, her arms had stopped fighting. She sagged in Ursa's hold, limp as wet straw. Had the drug knocked her out completely? It certainly caused drowsiness, and was occasionally used as an analgesic.

Ursa gripped her tightly, trying to think. Most likely they would both die here—but perhaps it was dark enough they might hide in the shadows for a time. If the girl came close enough, perhaps Ursa could try to hit the girl with another of her herbal blends again. That was, if the girl wasn't ready for this exact plan, if she didn't reach out to bloodbend everything she could reach the moment she sensed anything off.

"I'll fight for you," Ursa murmured in her ear, not knowing if Azula was aware enough to hear. Like a mother bear, defending her cub—Ursa had been named for the constellation of the bear in the sky. An unusual name for a girl, and some of the other children in Hira'a had liked to tell her it wasn't very pretty. Her parents had told her they'd given her the name so she would be fierce, strong.

She was surprised when she heard Azula answer back, her voice—not normal, but not weak, either. Not as though she were on the verge of falling asleep.

"I'm cold, mommy," she said, in a tone matter-of-fact. "It's cold and wet."

Ursa pulled back, one hand on her shoulder, the other still holding the torch. Ursa gazed down at her.

Azula took Ursa by the sleeve, gripping it tightly, and pulled herself up to her knees. She wobbled and nearly went over, but steadied herself on Ursa's arm.

"I wanna beat Zuzu," she announced.

Ursa blinked, surprised. Azula, still trying to stand, pushed on her shoulder as though she were a convenient handhold.

Ursa reached up with her free hand to wipe away her tears. Then, grabbing one of Azula's hands, she used her legs to stand herself up, pulling Azula with her. The water that had soaked into their clothes cascaded off them, and she was sure Azula must feel even colder and heavier than she did.

There was no dry ground to walk on, and so Ursa stepped forward through the water first, leading the way. She gripped Azula's arm tightly, at every moment half expecting one of Azula's feet to hit a patch of thick mud or a deep sinkhole.

When at last they reached the other side, Ursa would have liked nothing more than to collapse on the bank, and take a moment to catch her breath. However, they couldn't afford any more delays, and so she pushed them onward, Azula still leaning heavily against her, their feet squelching on the rock, water dripping from their clothes.

The water was going to be a problem of course—on dry ground, it would leave a trail as good as a beacon. However, Ursa thought she had a plan. She didn't know if it would work, she hadn't studied the terrain outside at length, but she would just have to hope.

They emerged into the night outside. The sky was once again visible, lit in the silver light of the full moon.

Azula had gotten quieter over the course of their trek, her feet taking surer, quicker steps. She followed Ursa's quiet urgings more readily, without complaint.

It should have been a relief, but Ursa knew the truth—that it meant the nightshade-henbane powder was beginning to wear off, and when it wore off on Azula, it would also be wearing off on the girl. There was also the small matter that, once Azula was aware again, she might remember she had wanted to kill Ursa herself. That was not the chief concern on Ursa's mind at the moment, but it was a consideration.

Azula was steady enough that Ursa left her by the cave entrance, and went to the edge of the rocky outcrop. She stared down the rocky cliffside. There was no way she would be able to get Azula down it the way she had come, not in Azula's condition. They would have to take a chance.

Ursa turned back to Azula. "If you can, sweetheart, I need you to try to get us down from here with your firebending. Can you do that? Right there, next to the water."

Without answering, Azula swayed slightly, staggering forward toward the precipice, and Ursa caught her by the arm, just to make certain she didn't accidentally step off it. Azula squinted down, as though studying the spot. Then, smirking, with an almost smug kick of her foot, she launched them up into the air. Ursa gasped, and had to let go of the torch, letting it tumble down into the watery stream below, instead gripping Azula's shoulders with both hands. The fire under Azula's feet went out, and they began to descend. Air rushed past them, Ursa's heart pounded. They were up too high, they would break both their legs—

The blues flames ignited again, and they both landed side by side, feet touching down on the stone, almost gently.

Ursa took a moment to breathe, gripping Azula's arm in her hand. Then, steadying herself, she turned toward the waterfall.

It gushed down from above, a heavy, continuous crush of water that sent up a thick white spray in the night. She peered toward the base, and though it was impossible to see clearly in the silver light, she thought she saw what she was looking for—a dark patch at the base, darker than the stone above.

Ursa edged around the wet rock to one side, squinting as she tried to see behind the driving water. There was something. A dark space. Her heart rose, just a little. Perhaps. Perhaps—

Taking Azula by the hand, she drew her along after her, around behind the waterfall. Large rocks jutted from the ground around it, but as Ursa weaved around them, her eye caught a hole between two of them, just large enough to squeeze a person.

Ursa got down on hands and knees, and she had to make herself as small as possible to squeeze through. The rocks served as a kind of shelter from the pounding water of the fall, and so when she emerged she was hardly more wet than before.

Behind the fall was, as she had thought, an open space, and she wondered that she had not noticed it when she first arrived, or she might have tried to access the underground tunnels through it instead. However, as her eyes adjusted to the dark, lit only by the faint silver light edging through the side of the fall, she sank slightly. It was not a cave after all—just a hollowed out nook. Perhaps it had once led to the larger cave system, but the back wall was a solid wall of broken stones, possibly from an old cave in.

Ursa stared at the uneven wall of stone. Maybe it was better this way. She knew what she had to do—the only chance there was.

"Azula," Ursa murmured softly, half turning back. Prepared to go back out and bring her in.

However, Azula was already clambering through the hole after her, on hands and knees. Her movements were more sure now, and she stopped just inside.

Ursa quickly scanned the nook, searching for the best place. Finding a dark spot on the far edge, behind several jutting rocks, she turned back, dropping to a crouch. "Azula, sweetheart. I need you to come with me over here. Can you do that?"

Ursa offered her hand, but Azula ignored it, instead shuffling forward in the vague direction of the spot Ursa had indicated.

"Yes, here," said Ursa, pointing to the place. The waterfall already shielded the nook from view, but she hoped the rocks would add another obscuring layer.

Azula sat herself down, resting her back against the stone. However, as her eyes scanned her surroundings, unlike before they were no longer vague and unfocused—instead, they seemed to sharpen before Ursa's eyes.

Ursa crouched down beside her daughter in the dark. The nightshade-henbane would be wearing off soon. It could be potent breathed in, but in smaller quantities it wouldn't last more than a few hours, and had little in the way of lingering side effects. And it would wear off on the Water Tribe girl soon as well, if it hadn't already.

This was the safest place to hide. Right by the waterfall where the water and damp would obscure any trail left by dripping clothing, where the girl wouldn't expect. However, the place wasn't hard to find if someone was looking for it, which was why Ursa had to make sure the girl didn't look for it. And she would have no reason to—if there were a trail of water leading away.

Ursa, still crouched beside Azula, carefully reached into her sleeve, producing the small wooden box for the third time that night. Her hand touched the lid.

"Mother," said Azula. "This is an interesting place you've brought me to."

Ursa slowly raised her head.

Azula's voice had changed, no longer high and childlike. Instead, it lilted with the familiar sophisticated cadence, casual but with just a hint of menace. She was leaning an elbow against one of the nearby stones, her head resting on bent fingers, as though back reclining on the royal couches in her rooms.

"Azula," said Ursa, voice calm, but her heart beating in her throat. She shifted closer. "You're awake."

"Not drugged, you mean," Azula said, checking her nails. "That was a cute trick. Now, the only question is, should I kill you now, or later?"

Ursa continued to move carefully, slipping closer. "But what about the Water Tribe girl? She wants to kill you."

"I'll deal with her when the time comes," Azula said complacently.

"Of course you will," Ursa said. The drug's effects on Azula's mind had worn off—but sometimes the motor skills were slower to come back. Ursa had to act now. "Just—you have something on your face, dear. Let me get it for you."

Azula blinked. Her eyes flashed with annoyance and, strangely, a hint of uncertainty. "No I don't." But she didn't pull back, even as Ursa slipped off the lid from the box and removed the wet cloth. Careful not to breathe in, Ursa leaned forward—and held it in front of Azula's face.

Azula jerked back, eyes widening in fury and shock, before they once again slipped out of focus. She started to fall.

Ursa moved, faster than she would have thought, and in an instant she had her arms wrapped around her, holding Azula from behind.

Azula was not fully unconscious. "Mo…" she began, slurred. "You…"

Ursa pressed her lips to her cheek, which was cold and wet, and whispered in her ear. "I love you."

Then she pulled away, and pressed the cloth over Azula's nose and mouth.

Azula went slack in her arms, and Ursa carefully lowered her back to the cave floor, rearranging her arms to make her more comfortable. Her face was calm in unconsciousness, almost peaceful, and Ursa brushed back a stray strand of damp hair. She hoped Azula didn't catch cold—if only she had another cloak to give her.

Ursa took a deep, calming breath. Then she was moving, quickly stowing the cloth back in its box, slipping it back into her sleeve, crawling back through the slippery wet rocks outside. She made her way back to the spot Azula had landed them, and raised her eyes to the rocky landscape. Water dripped to the ground at her feet.

Then she took off across the stone expanse, as fast as her feet would carry her.


Ursa blinked, coming back to the present. She sighed, then shivered, her breath forming puffs of mist in the icy air. She rubbed her arms.

"You were stupid to save her," Nukka said again.

Ursa raised her eyes, to find the girl was watching her once more. She still held the ice dagger in one hand, the other holding her Water Tribe knife, but her hands had briefly stopped moving.

Ursa could still feel the moment when the girl had caught up to her, as she raced among the rocks. Her body seizing in place, the hand that had been coming forward in the act of running, trembling in front of her, unmoving. Her body rising slowly into the air, then rotating around to face her assailant. The pain, as the weight of the rest of her body, her skin and muscle and bones, fought against the dragging, upward pull of her own blood.

"You really are her mother, aren't you?"

"Yes—I am."

"So where is she?"

Ursa, summoning all the acting skill she had ever developed in her years as a teenager, acting with the acting troupe with Ikem. "The moment she regained her senses—she dried her clothes with firebending and abandoned me, to use me as bait. She is likely miles from here by now."

The girl standing there in the moonlight, face tense with frustration—and thought, as she worked to hastily concoct a new plan. Dragging Ursa through the air behind her as she hurriedly returned to the cave, never guessing that Azula lay, still unconscious, just at the waterfall's base. Carving out the note, then patting Ursa down for something she could use to send a message to the Fire Lord. Finding the doll, and running it through on a knife, leaving it for Zuko to find. Then racing north, pulling Ursa, as well as herself, along with bloodbending, to hide until the next full moon.

"She was going to kill you, wasn't she?" Nukka continued. "Her own mother."

Ursa was quiet a moment. "Azula… was all but raised by my former husband, the previous Fire Lord," she answered at last. "I was forced to leave my children when they were young."

"But your son isn't like her," the girl said.

Ursa was surprised at this, considering that Zuko had been their initial target, and she glanced back.

"He was going to give himself up, just for his Water Tribe friend," the girl explained, almost impatiently. Her eyes had darted away, and she scowled across the water. "She told us all the horrible things he'd done—but I bet she was lying. She was probably talking about all the things she had done."

This was more conversation than Nukka had had in all the weeks of capture—now that the decisive moment was coming, she seemed in a strangely talkative mood.

"But, I guess you have to make excuses for her," she continued, in a tone somehow both disgusted and grudgingly admiring. "My mother was like you. My brother was always a jerk—he did awful stuff, like ruin the neighbors' food stores just before winter because he thought it was funny, or string up some kid's pet snow hamster somewhere—she'd tell me he was just restless. That he'd grow up sometime. And when I was twelve, and both our parents got killed by your people's soldiers—he left, to run off with his friends. Well, I didn't want to end up some unwanted foster kid at a rich kid's house, so I learned how to take care of myself."

"I'm sorry," Ursa murmured. "That must have been difficult." In spite of everything she had been through the past weeks, she was glad of one thing; that Azula had not managed to kill the girl, as she had likely intended to. The girl seemed harsh and angry, but in spite of her threats to Ursa's fingers, she hadn't been unkind. When she had noticed Ursa's burn on her wrist, she had done her best to heal it, and given her blankets and whatever food and water she could spare, beyond just the bare minimum to keep her alive. Though her words were harsh, Ursa noticed she had generally tried to make her as comfortable as she could under the circumstances.

The cave was silent again, but for the dripping of water from the stalagmites above. Until the girl said again, "I hope I don't have to kill you. I hope the Fire Lord is smart, and doesn't try anything."

Ursa didn't reply. Because much as she wanted to make it back to Zuko and Kiyi, she couldn't hope for that. That it would all end the way this girl hoped.

Nukka held up her ice dagger again, and slipped the knife along the blade, sending shavings from the edge like sparks from a forge skittering over the ice.


A/N: There's another one down. We're getting closer now…

So, fun fact. The nightshade-henbane is based loosely on a real life chemical called scopolamine, or Devil's Breath, which comes from nightshade. (Nightshade is a family of plants of all different kinds, with the more specific variety of deadly nightshade probably being the most famous.) In case you were never afraid of taking business cards from random strangers or having weird powders blown in your face in public places, go look it up. (Hopefully it's exaggerated, but this substance was made for fiction.)

Less fun fact, the bit about killing the male chicks freezing/drowning was heavily inspired by a poignant real account I read a while back. (In that case, the chicks were going to be used to feed birds of prey which were being taken care of by caretakers, but obviously horrifying to the people charged with arranging it.) I'll leave it to you all to decide if this was something really done by some Southerners at some point, or just an exaggerated story passed around by the Northerners to scare each other.

Thanks for reading! If you have a moment, let me know what you thought, and hope to see you in the next one!

Posted 9/4/23