A/N. First of all, I'm so sorry for leaving you all hanging for more than a month (or even two). I had some crazy work stuff, PhD stuff and life stuff, and it finally calmed down enough for me to write some chapters! I will be more active the coming weeks!

But the good news is that I can now catch up with the stories I missed!

As the sun shone brightly on the ice beneath them, Aang inhaled the air deeply. It smelled cold and dry, but at the same time, it was exactly what he would expect from this far south.

This was the fourth day of travel, and if his math was correct, they should be close to the village that had once been the centre of the Southern Water Tribe. He had told Katara and Hakoda, during the first two days, of the only time he had been to the South Pole before the war. He had been six or seven years old, and he and Gyatso had wanted to travel to the islands east of the Air Temple, but strong winds had pushed them off course.

It had been a stop of just over an hour or so, the time to give Gyatso's bison some time to rest and eat. The bison had been old, and Aang remembered how the animal always had great difficulty during longer journeys. Gyatso had told him not the wander off as he had spoken to the chief of the village, and Aang recalled how he had been impressed by the big looming figures. It was only now that he realized that the people had looked large because he had been small… And because they had worn great parkas.

He had visited the North Pole more often, and it was because of that exact reason that he ahd not wanted to train his waterbending there. Tashi, who had been in charge of his cultural education, had always told him and the other children of the temple that the Southern Water Tribe had been created by a group of Northern tribesmen who had refused to live under the strict hierarchy of the north… But, as Katara had explained to him rather often… That hierarchy had still survived and had been applied to the South as well. Less forcefully, for sure… But still, it had been there.

He heard soft laughter coming from the saddle, and smiled to himself, something he was getting used to once more. There had been no bad dreams, since that he had woken up from the Spirit World… Sure, the airbender knew that he should be preoccupied with the fact that Sozin's spirit and Szeto had been poisoning his mind… But to be honest, he didn't want to be involved in everything that was happening. Let the Avatars handle that, in the Spirit World. They had nearly left him to his fate during the fight with Ozai. They could manage this alone just fine.

Just as the others could manage… Well, whatever Azula was going to do. He had done enough. And Katara too… They had done enough. The airbender had wanted to ask the others to come with him, but he also knew that if everyone accompanied him to the south, that the princess would get suspicious… She had wanted him to leave the war, threatening Katara. But they now had something Azula couldn't know. Katara herself…

Glancing towards the saddle, he saw said waterbender talk to her father, who looked far calmer than Aang had ever seen the warrior. Perhaps it was the idea of going home after six years, or the fact that his daughter was safe and out of Azula's reach… But Aang could swear that Hakoda looked years younger.

They were still wearing the clothes they had used in the Fire Nation, as none of them had something more appropriate for the weather around them. For the moment, Aang had extended the thin layer he used to keep himself warm in whatever condition, but he couldn't do that for the whole time they would spend at the South Pole… So, he hoped, for everyone's sake, that Kanna had kept some clothes of Katara and Hakoda in her igloo…

Spirits, Kanna… He knew Pakku had sent a message to the old woman, telling her what had happened… Or at least, he hoped. Knowing the old waterbender, it was entirely possible he had just said Katara was missing, without any more information… Hopefully, that had not killed the older woman… He had not spoken much with her, but she had seemed… Hard. A woman so used to the horrible life she had been forced to life that it had made her as hard as stone. But underneath, a person who cared enormously for her family. And Aang had seen the way the woman had looked at Katara and Sokka. The hard exterior vanished when she thought no one was looking.

Looking back to the horizon in front of him and Appa, he saw the soft glistering that told him that just behind the horizon was land. At least, here in the south, it meant land. It was the sun reflecting off snow and ice. Sure, there were icebergs in the water underneath them, but they had not given off that light.

"I think we are approaching the Pole. At least, the landmass." Aang called towards the saddle, and after a few moments, he felt a hand on his naked shoulder.

"Hey." It was Katara's voice, concern clear in her tone, "I know this is not what we wanted… But I have to admit, it will be good to see… home."

Aang heard the hesitation in the waterbender's voice. She had told him, the first night they had travelled that she was afraid of what home would look like. There was the possibility that the few northern waterbenders had changed the village so much that she wouldn't recognize anything… But the other option, an Aang thought that was the one she was most afraid of… Was that home wasn't home anymore.

Sighing, he looked into her eyes, her haunting blue eyes, filled with hesitation and wonder. At the sight of that expression, he felt his own gaze soften and Aang couldn't help but smile.

"No worries. The others promised to keep us informed if something happens… And I have to admit, as you said… It will be good to be away." He whispered back, knowing it to be true. For once, they would be able to… Well… be normal. It sounded weirder than it actually was, as he had been used to the normal way to live your life. But the last year had been… Well, it had been everything but normal.

As he glanced over his shoulder, the airbender watched as Katara scrambled back over the saddle towards their belongings, strapped to the back of the wooden structure. As he let his eyes wander, he saw the pale blue eyes of Hakoda looking towards him. Aang was still unsure what to make of Hakoda's attitude towards him. It confused him how the older warrior acted around him… Just before the invasion, Aang had thought of Hakoda as a… well, a guy he could grow to like nearly as much as he had loved Gyatso or one of the other monks. But the airbender had seen the worried looks at the air temple, and then, he had seen the anger when the chief had learned about his and Katara's marriage… It was a very awkward situation.

To put it nicely.

Turning back around, Aang watched the landscape in front of him. The glistering landmass that he had seen in the distance a few moments before was visibly closer now, and underneath them, icebergs like the one he had been trapped in drifted in the ocean. Inhaling deeply, he could smell the cold in the air, and he knew that if he released the cocoon of warm air around them, then in no time, they would be shivering and probably have trouble thinking straight because of the cold.

"It is the beginning of the eternal moon season." He heard Hakoda sigh behind him on the saddle. There was no answer from Katara, so Aang turned and saw that the older man had joined him on the front of the saddle, while the waterbender was still at the back.

"Oh… Ehm… Is it nice?" Yep. It felt awkward. Terribly so.

"No… I think it will drive me crazy… After the six years I spend in the Earth Kingdom. I got used to the changes between day and night.."

It was not talking about the weather, but it was rather close, and Aang had to restrain himself from cringing. This was not going to be easy…

"Sir…"

"Hakoda."

"Oh.. Yes. Ehm… I'm… Sorry. Sorry about-"

"It's alright." The brusque tone that the chief used suggested he was lying, but Aang would take it. Everything was better than the awkward silences he had got used to during the breaks of flying from Kirashi Island.

"I wanted to ask… How will your mother react?" That had been nagging his mind nearly as much as Sozin and Szeto had done, and Aang didn't mind admitting it. He had not asked Katara, for he feared she was asking herself the exact same thing.

Watching the chief, the airbender realized that he too, had not thought about that. The pale blue eyes that made him think of Sokka each time he talked to Hakoda widened, and the man bit his lip just like Katara did when she was anxious or worried.

"Tui and La… Mother. Oh, she is going to kill me. Then you. And after killing us and disposing of our bodies, she will give Katara a small pad on the shoulder, smile, and pull her to her home to talk about all that happened." Hakoda groaned.

"Why you?" Aang saw movement from the bac of the saddle, so asked his question in a hushed tone.

"Because I didn't keep my promises, like the one that I would come back after a year… And letting you and Katara do stupid things." That sounded like a reproach if Aang had to be honest… But he didn't mind. Everything was better than being ignored.

"You seem to be getting along." Katara's voice suddenly sounded, and Aang quickly looked over the chief shoulder to see that the waterbender had pulled out a parka from the bundle of bags at the back of the saddle. Where, in the Spirits names, had she got that?

Katara probably saw his confusion, as she rolled her eyes.

"You don't think Sokka forgot to pack clothes for the South Pole, right?" She shook her head, but Aang saw the small smile on her face, suggesting that it wasn't irritation, rather amusement. The waterbender turned once more around, and Aang saw Momo's head poke out from between several bags. The lemur clearly looked unhappy about being forced into such a climate, even though he couldn't yet feel the cold Aang knew was around their little warm air bubble.

Underneath them, they passed the thin line of ice that hugged the coast of the icy landmass, and behind it… Snow. Snow, ice and flat tundras as far as the eye could see. The airbender heard Appa groan and guessed that the bison wasn't a fan of the blinding light that the sun was creating on the snow.

"Why is it called Eternal Moon season? It seems rather… well, sunny." He padded the bison just behind the ear. From his lessons at the Air Temple, Aang knew that the Poles were not like the rest of the world, as there were just two seasons… Dark cold and sunny cold. But always cold.

"Because, in a week or two, the sun will disappear underneath the horizon. It will be darker… Not pitch dark, but rather the dark just after twilight. The moon will shine through months of darkness. It is rather… Well, I guess some people would find it disturbing." Hakoda explained.

"I always find it rather comforting." Katara's voice sounded once closer to him, and glancing around, he saw that she, with her parka now around her body, had joined her father at the front, "It is the season to work together. To be together." At that, Aang didn't know why, but his cheeks felt warmer, as if there was some hidden meaning to the last three words…

"Yeah, no kidding. Mother usually had her hands full nine months after the Snow Month." The chief grumbled, before his eyes found Aang's, "Snow Month is the few weeks in the middle of the Eternal Moon. It is… Well, it forces most people to stay inside. And people who stay at home too long have two things to do. Argue… And something else."

For some reason, the airbender suspected that Snow Month would be spent at Kanna's igloo for him and Katara. But that could just be his imagination. Not answering the explanation provided by Hakoda, he opted to glance down, and saw that they were now well above the landmass.

"Where to?" He asked instead of talking any further about Snow Month.

"West!" The older warrior answered almost immediately, and Aang suspected the man had a much better idea of where they were exactly than he himself did. To him… Well, it looked at the same. But even so, he tugged at Appa's reins and turned the bison westwards.

"Dad, perhaps you should find a parka too. Aang can't keep this air around us all day." Katara spoke from just behind him, and he heard Hakoda grunt at that. The shuffling behind him seemed to suggest that the chief did what his daughter had told him to do.

"Don't worry." Katara's voice turned to a whisper, and he felt the soft air of her breath just behind his right ear, "Non-benders can't get out because of the snow… Benders, however…" The slightly higher pitch in her voice made him think she had been thinking along the same lines as he had done.

"We won't spend Snow Month arguing I guess?" He tried to sound suave, but to him, it sounded rather like an awkward squeak.

"Arguing is boring." Katara answered before he felt her get away from behind him, sliding back to the saddle.

Exhaling softly, Aang felt a little better. Sure, this forced vacation meant that he was apart from his friends, and from his duty… But his duty was also to Katara. And keeping her safe. But he wasn't going to say that to her. She was more than capable of protecting herself. If that had not already been proven, surviving a siege in a city searching for her and saving his sorry ass was proof enough.

Looking over the enormous snow-white plains in front of him, Aang suddenly saw a faint glint far away to the west. Peering towards the glint, he saw it again. And a few seconds later, once again.

"Spear point." Hakoda's voice came from his left, and the airbender turned to the chief. The older warrior was wearing his parka too and looked in the same direction as Aang.

"Meaning people." The airbender exhaled. That had to be the village.

"It should be there indeed. But a spear point? That doesn't make sense. There is nothing to hunt this late into the year, all the herds have migrated inland." Aang listened tot the chief as he saw from the corner of his eye that Katara also joined them once more.

"It is the village, no doubt." The waterbender spoke with such certainty that it convinced him. He had no idea how they actually knew where they were, but they probably knew the pole far better than he ever would.

"Can't the light reflect from something else?" He asked, "Another metal object?"

"The only metal we use is spears, knives and cooking pots. I doubt that anyone is cooking outside. No, that is a weapon. And whoever is on the lookout, if we can see the glinting, they van certainly see us." Hakoda grumbled.

"Oh, they know Appa!" Aang sighed in relief. No worry!

"That isn't necessarily good news." Hakoda continued his grumbling, "If the Pakku's message reached my mother, that would mean she will eat you for breakfast. If it hasn't reached her, she will still kick you around for being here instead of fighting in the war."

Oh… Yeah… Pakku's message would probably be the first confirmation the South Pole would have had about anything that had happened since the comet, since that the old waterbender left for Ba Sing Se…

"Well, one way to find out." Katara looked at him, and in her hands, the airbender saw his staff.

"Seriously?" He asked, not wanting to go down there… Alone.

"Someone has to warn them about what has happened. And I don't see Dad jumping down." Katara smiled sweetly at him, as she handed the staff. Aang sighed, knowing she was right… But still. Did he have to meet Kanna alone? While he did not know what the older woman knew. If she had got Pakku's message, she would kick him right back to the Fire Nation to get Katara… And if she had not got the message, she would kick him back to the Fire Nation to wipe the floor with Ozai… Again.

Neither option sounded like something he would enjoy.

He took the staff and caught the look Hakoda was giving him. It was halfway between amused and weirdly uncomfortable. Not wanting to get an explanation, Aang stood on the bison's head, who groaned sympathetically. Glancing down, he saw the wind whip over the snowy tundra beneath him… Yeah, this was going to be fun.

"It will get cold as soon as I drop down." He smiled at Katara, who nodded. And at that, he let himself slide down, into the abyss below.

As soon as Appa's fur disappeared beneath him, Aang couldn't help but laugh as he felt the wind take him into its grasp. It was way too long since he had done this… So long. Last time… Spirits, last time was so log ago he didn't actually remember. He had dropped down from Appa several times at the beginning of his travels with the Water Tribe siblings, but… well, to be honest, most of the time, it had been to hear Katara's surprised shout that turned into that crystal clear laugher he loved so much.

It had also been too long that he had truly laughed… After all the worry, the horrible things they had lived through these last few weeks… Sure, it wasn't over. But the voices were quiet, the fighting was done… At least, until Azula would resurface. But until then… Maybe until then, he could live in peace? Just for a while. A few months. Zuko had told him that the monsoon season was making real war near impossible, and that, if the fighting started again, it would not be until spring.

So why not live… Just a little. Just a little. That couldn't hurt anyone.

Pushing the air to his left, Aang felt himself turn around, so that he faced the sky above him. Appa was getting smaller and smaller, but the airbender could have sworn he saw Hakoda with a horrified expression watch his fall. Of course, the chief had never been there to see him do this kind of thing, and would probably think Katara had made him jump to his doom.

Laughing once more, he pushed the button on the staff. The fabric wings sprung out of the pale blue wood, and as he grabbed the handles, Aang felt the air currents catch on the wings. Exhaling slowly, he pushed the air under the glider so the fall he was in changed into a slightly more controlled pummeling crash. He knew most people would be terrified of this kind of flying, if you could call it that… But he loved it. Each time he had taken someone with him on the glider, he had always been looking out not to be too wild.

But now, alone? In a place where the ground was a literal cushion to break his fall in case he messed up? Oh no, he could do anything he wanted here. The flicker of reflected sunlight he and Hakoda had spotted approached fast, and Aang pushed the air behind him to direct him towards the place where it was coming from.

The ground was still far away when he saw the first thing that was clearly human made. A break in the ice, creating a large semicircle hugging the coast. Inside the semicircle, Aang could distinguish several darker spots, which he supposed were the tents he had seen a year ago when he had woken up in the iceberg.

Descending, he began to spiral downwards above the huddle of tents. Looking it over, he realized… Well, that not much had changed. Instead of the one igloo, there were three now, and one or two more tents… But that was it. The water around the village was new, and the small snowy bank that had encircled the village had been replaced by an icy wall, as high as he was…

But nothing more.

The joy of the free fall from Appa forgotten, Aang frowned. This was not what they had agreed on travelling on the ship that had brought them from the North Pole to the Earth Kingdom. Pakku had been enthustiac about going south, proving to Kanna he had changed, by helping the Southern Tribe to get back on its feet. But… But this? Sure, it looked a little better… But the airbender had seen how quickly just a few waterbenders had been able to restore the Northern Water Tribe to its original state after the battle… This was not that.

This was clearly not the same level of dedication. Why? Was it because of the fact that the North had looked down on the south? It had been that way even in his time… But this just seemed petty. Any decent human could see that the south needed help, and if they were able to provide it… They should give it. And northern waterbenders were more than capable of helping. So why were they not helping?

Aang could see people in blue parkas looking up at him, so he guessed that he was clearly visible. Recalling the lessons of the Brother Tashi, he sighed and angled the glider slightly to the right, making a direct line towards the edge of the village, just outside of the perimeter of the ice wall.

Tashi had always insisted that the Water Tribes were friendly and willing to trust strangers… If they respected the people of the poles. And that meant being invited in. Aang guessed that dropping out of the sky right into the village would be considered rude. A year ago, Katara and Sokka had taken him to the village, but this time, Katara and Hakoda were still high in the sky. Glancing up, he saw that Appa was slowly making his was down… But it would still be a few minutes, at least.

Touching the ground, Aang pulled in the glider's wings and straightened. The snow underneath his feet felt solid enough, but he heard the soft crunch of ice. Katara had once told him that in the colder times of the year at the South Pole, the snow could be covered with a layer of ice, and that anything weighing more than a few kilos would break the layer and find itself with its knees up in the snow. Looking down, he could feel the layer of ice being very thin. Exhaling softly, he released the airbending he always had around him, and the ice broke immediately. He had been hovering less than an inch, but that was probably enough…

Looking down, he saw that the snow arrived at the edge of his boots, and he also felt the cold around his feet, and the harsh icy wind whip around his clothes. Yeah… That was not ideal. Quickly bending the air back around him to create the warm atmosphere he was used to, Aang knew he could not keep doing that with such cold winds around him… at least, not for more than a day.

"You."

Quickly turning around towards the ice wall, Aang saw three persons come towards him. Two were clearly waterbenders from the north, wearing the slightly darker blue parka's typical of Agna Qel'a and the third was… Oh… Of course.

"Hello… Kanna." He spoke the name hesitantly, as he had been told to call her Gran Gran last year… But he felt slightly awkward to call her that, truth be told.

"Go back." The old woman's eyes, so like Sokka's and Hakoda's, burned with something he had never imagined seeing from anyone with that eye colour.

Hate.

"Oh, of course, you got Pakku's lett-" Before he could finish the sentence, he was surprised at how quick Kanna crossed the small distance between them. A knife appeared in her hand, and he felt the cold point against his ribs.

"Oh, I did. Go back and don't come here again without my granddaughter." The old woman's voice was tight with emotion that Aang recognized only too well.

"Lady Kanna, maybe you shou-" One of the waterbenders began, before being cut off by the harsh voice of the woman in front of him.

"I don't care if he did what the old fool said in his letter. My granddaughter is missing, and he is here."

Aang didn't like how much venom was put into the word he, and liked it even less when those icy blue eyes turned back to him.

"Find her. If you value your life, find her and bring her back." Those words began with hate, but Aang heard the slight crack in the emotion at the end of the sentence, and saw a flicker of despair in Kanna's eyes.

"Kanna, it is alright!" He interrupted as soon as he dared, "Everyone is safe, we got her out! Or rather, she got me out after I was stabbed, but that is a whole other story! Katara is alright."

Immediately, the look in the old woman's eyes changed into confusion.

"What? Pakku said that Kat was missing."

"Nothing else?" Oh Spirits…

"I'm going to skin that fool alive. What happened?" Aang felt the point of the knife being removed from his skin, and was relieved by that. How would he have explained to Katara that he got stabbed once again, and this time by her own grandmother?

"Ehm… Very, very long story. Maybe we should wait for the others?" He glanced up to see Appa just above him, looking for a place to land safely.

"You took them with you?" The relief in the old woman's voice was palpable.

"Well, Sokka stayed with Zuko, but I took your son and Katara." At the mention of the waterbender's name, he saw the old woman look at him with an expression he didn't quite manage to place. A frown changed into an arched eyebrow.

Yeah… He guessed she would learn everything about him pretty quickly.