Not Too Far from the Yew Tree

by hojichasunrise

Katara: two years of isolation chasing after her brother who vanished into the Earth Kingdom looking for work. Zuko: six years of isolation on an iron ship slowly losing hope that his horizon might ever change. After coming to realize his father never meant for him to return home, Zuko throws his fate in with Katara's side, but halting one hundred years of momentum isn't that easy.

2. The Edge of Snow and Water

Chapter 2 – The Edge of Snow and Water

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A/n: There are two changes made to canon I need to specify: One, that the position of Firelord is only available to males (which is quite in line with historical standards); and two, that there will be no celestial events, neither the eclipse nor the comet.

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She was resting in the residential garden at the interior of the family's home when the wife came out with the tea tray and set it beside her. "Thank you for saving my husband. I don't know what we would have done if you hadn't arrived in the village today."

"I'm glad my timing was so fortunate," replied Katara. She accepted the teacup and felt the bumpy, uneven ridges in her hand and the warmth of the genmaicha. Beside the teapot was a small plate of grilled mitarashi dango, sweet with notes of saltiness from the reduction used in the glaze. The wife heard her child crying and went back inside to attend to him, and Katara snacked quietly looking at their garden. The pear tree would blossom soon, but as of yet it was only budding. She contemplated if she could stay another few weeks to see it, but the village wasn't large and she didn't know if she would find anyone else needing medical attention there, though she had enough savings that she could have stayed as long as she liked regardless. Only the earliest flowers had come into bloom, violet and white crocus and yellow narcissus. In glazed pots placed in the center of each of the four directions the wife was growing aglaonema, with dark green leaves striped in white, and Katara was trying to discern the difference between them from their relative light conditions. The ones planted to the east and west seemed the healthiest and largest, but the northern had the most vibrant hue.

The wife returned and sat nearby with the child bouncing on her knee. The infant giggled, evidently recovered from his fussing. "One of my husband's visitors said a Fire Nation fleet was headed south. Do you know what they might be doing, Miss Katara? He thought you might have heard a rumor while on the road earlier."

"No, this is the first I've heard about it." The dango was less sweet when she thought of her own close memories of Fire ships, and she washed the sugary aftertaste from her mouth with a long drink of tea. "South to where?"

"They seemed to be veering off south-southwest. The visitor said they stopped at a town to the north last week and placed an order for fur-lined winter clothing for about twenty men. I guess they must have received it and been off."

She set the tea down. "Why would they need that when it's already spring?"

The woman replied that she didn't know. On her lap, the infant stared at Katara and reached a pudgy, small hand out towards her. "Oh, he seems to like you. Are you getting married soon, by the way?"

"No, I'm only seventeen."

"Well, I was married off at eighteen," she replied. "My apologies, I had thought your necklace meant you were engaged, but perhaps that's not a custom anymore."

"It is in some places."

Exhausted from the day's work, Katara took their offer of a bed in the guest room and went to sleep with a stomach full of braised tofu with mushrooms. She tossed irritably and woke in the darkness. Crickets chirped in the cool night air. Katara sat up and put a hand on her head, wondering why it bothered her so much, and in a few moments the idea solidified that their objective must have been the South Pole. She chastised herself that her brother would have realized it hours ago. In the morning she took off at sunrise at a run to the closest docks, but found the last ship had already left and wouldn't be back for days. The next town was only seven miles away and she begged passage in a haywagon setting off down the road. Oxen pulled it over a bumpy rural path at an agonizingly slow pace while she sheltered in the rear between straw and vegetables, and she bounced her leg irritably, wondering what her brother would do in her position. I'm a stronger waterbender than I was as a child. I can do something this time. There was nothing more important, and she bit back tears wondering if she would make it in time.

At the town she leapt from the wagon and jogged to the shoreside docks, thanked the spirits that a vessel was in port, and bounded up to a group of sailors standing in front of the ship discussing a document. "I need to buy passage on a ship to the South Pole. Now." Trying to remain civil, she bit back her panic and anger alike at the lethargic response to her request.

The crewmembers remained seated on the cargo crates, looked to each other, and the senior member turned reluctantly to her. "Well, the ship is leaving in two weeks, but we can find room for you."

"I need to get there as soon as possible. Two weeks is too late." Flushing in anger when the man gave her a patronizing look, she pulled a pouch of coins from her bag and threw it on his lap hard enough to make him wince. The scruffy man looked at it questioningly, then pried it open to peek inside. "I can pay," she said. "I need the fastest ship available and I need it to leave immediately."

Taking the coins, he stood up with some energy and replied, "I'll see what we can do." The next morning they departed on a sleek wooden vessel which cut through the waves like a knife. Katara, clinging to the railing, watched the shoreline to figure out their speed, worry for home flooding all other thought. In four days—a record speed—the temperature sunk bitterly and flurries draped the air in soft white and grey. The crew gave her a spare parka, man-sized and sub-par but warm enough, and she wrapped it around herself and tucked her hands inside. Cold on the ocean was worse than on land because of the pervasive breeze and damp. It was spring in the Earth Kingdom, but not yet had the polar region warmed appreciably, and soon the waterways choked in fragmented ice. The wooden vessel wasn't equipped to ram its way through and had to slow pace and take careful navigation of the channels. This isn't normal, she thought. The main channel wouldn't be this choppy unless a ship unfamiliar with the area had recently torn apart the banks. Every sign said that a large iron vessel must have passed. The captain came to approach her. "Girl, we can't go much further like this."

"I'll make sure you can." Katara went to the prow and took a firm stance on deck, feeling outwards to either side with her arms spread. Slowly and gently she coaxed the heavy ice chunks back to where their proper embankment should have been, clearing the channel, and the ship progressed in silent awe. If she was careless it would only take one incident to rip apart the hull and doom the crewmembers to drown, but there was no environment she was more familiar with.

"What is that?" exclaimed a sailor, and Katara looked up trying to find what he was pointing at. In a side-channel ahead of them a lone canoe was trying to navigate through the waterway, but was blocked by the torn-apart glacial ice. Squinting, she made out a young man with a wolf-tail and dark grey clothing. He was also looking at the ship, which now posed a large problem to him as the wake was enough to topple the canoe, and the young man rapidly maneuvered out of the way of the worst of it. Katara leaned over the railing as far as she could. "Sokka?" When a cloud shifted and sunlight hit his face, she recognized her brother. "Sokka! Hey," she called to a crew member, "bring him on board."

Sailors waved to him and communicated with a series of whistles and pointing, which Sokka somehow interpreted correctly, and his canoe was lifted up to deck by a winch at the side. Somewhat hesitant and half-soaked, Sokka stepped onto deck, barely able to look around before Katara threw herself on him in a tight hug.

"Hey, Sis," he said, patting the back of her parka-hood. "I'm back. Uh, so what's with this ship?"

"I haven't seen you in four years. Where did you go?"

"Working. Earth Kingdom. It may have been four years ago but I know I sat you and Gran-gran down and told you my plans," he replied, sounding grumbling but betrayed by the dearness with which embraced his sister. "Then I heard that a Fire Nation fleet was headed to the South Pole and I came to stop them."

"In a canoe? Did you come all the way from the Earth Kingdom in a canoe?"

"Hey, it's a good canoe. Check it out—see that? That's real whale-walrus blubber on the canvasing. And you, what the heck is this ship and where did you come from?"

"Working. Earth Kingdom," she replied dryly. "So we heard the same rumor. Sokka, look at the ice in the channel, it looks like something large forced its way through recently."

"Not only that, but there's that grey ash all over, too. You can't see it from here, but I was choking on it down there. It's the Fire Nation."

While the siblings had been reuniting, the crew had been off speaking hurriedly to each other, and the captain approached them for an address. "Listen, we don't want trouble with the Fire Nation. Where can we drop you off? I don't want to proceed any further and get caught up in a battle."

"I paid you for this passage!" Katara shouted.

"Sorry to inform you, but the cost of my wooden ship going up in flames would exceed what you paid us." He looked to Sokka, then the canoe, making a point. "They're bringing your things up now, but this is as far as we go."

As Katara and Sokka perched in the canoe while slowly being lowered back to the water, she muttered, "Dirty cowards."

"We're close enough, we should be less than an hour away now. It doesn't look like anything has happened yet so we might be in time. Uh, listen. If there is a raiding party there, what's the plan? I have," he said, while fishing through his own baggage, "a boomerang, two knives, and a large stick." He held up the stick for her to admire. "We're cutting it close. Your shipmates didn't happen to have any convenient armory on hand, did they?"

"My waterbending has improved—it might be something. Is Dad back yet?"

"I have no idea, but I doubt it."

The pair navigated the channel, following the path of destruction with ash polluting the water and mottling the snow. While still sheltered from line of sight, before the last turn they stopped to check on the situation. As Katara held the boat docked for them, Sokka snuck around to get a look. Crouching behind a snowbank, he scanned the area thoroughly then returned to her with a worried expression. "It is the Fire Nation, but it's not an invasion—there's only one ship. Nothing is happening yet, but I don't trust them. Let's go around and approach from their blind spot." He pointed off in the distance, then traced a long circumvention through narrow backchannels which were barely wide enough to pass their canoe and would conceal them well. The sun was already low in the sky and it would be dark by the time they finished the course.

#

Zuko exhaled flames to warm his hands, sparking orange along with the last line of sunlight in a narrow band. It had already grown colder with the diminished sun, and nights at the polar latitude were long and brutal. He'd never been so far south in the six years of his banishment. Next year he would be twenty, and he wondered if the celebration of the milestone would be held at sea. As the last rays faded there was a final gleam of crimson across the icesheets. Soon the only lights to be seen anywhere were on his own ship and the star clusters overhead.

Footsteps gently approached and paused a few paces away. "Prince Zuko, it's getting quite chilly. Come inside."

"I will in a minute, Uncle. I can't believe this little mound is their main encampment." He had been watching the village since they'd anchored and had only seen women, children, and the elderly shuffling around in terror. It seemed they didn't have even one defender left, much less were they sheltering the Avatar. "Don't they even have a proper city?"

"Not anymore. I've heard there used to be more development here, prior to the war. It's a hard land to make a living in."

"They're not even using lights. Look, it's completely dark in the settlement."

"There's nothing out here they want to see." The older man sneezed—he'd had a runny nose since they entered the polar circle. "Frankly, I don't want to see anything here either. I prefer warmer climates for our destinations, Nephew. Dinner will be ready soon."

"I'll be down soon," he replied. "It's so cold that it hurts to breathe." Before the older man could head downstairs, the ship lurched with a stomach-sinking metallic screech, and the slope of the deck was left at an unpleasantly steep angle. Zuko grabbed the railing reflexively, but his uncle had stumbled backwards and fallen with a loud 'Oof!' "What's happening? We were anchored. Did something hit us?"

"It would have had to been massive and moving fast to cause this." Already there was a panic inside the ship as the crew scrambled to action.

Zuko leaned over the railing and peered down into the darkness. Unable to make out anything concrete, he flinched as the ship took another hit which left the deck at a twenty degree angle. Crewmembers skid into the walls. Feeling the heat building within himself, with one hand hanging onto the rail for stability Zuko shot down multiple bursts of fire to light the surrounding area. In each flash he caught a second's length of clear vision. Squatting low in the water a short distance from their vessel were two figures in a wood-and-canvas canoe. Others had witnessed it and were organizing a response. As the frontal figure swept their arms up and made a pushing motion, another wave of seawater slammed against the ship, the angle inclined yet further, and the metal sounded like it was tearing apart as the water solidified to ice. Iroh tumbled to the far railing and the response of the crew was impeded, but Zuko was fit to send a swipe of fire at the assailants. He was awarded with terrified screams, but, as he tried to find a better position to counter from, another wave, this much more violent, struck the hull and sent the ship to a critical angle. "Fuck!"

Others had responded and were returning fire while the internal crew were a panicked deployment. Struggling across to the ladder, Zuko paused when he heard his uncle's voice. "The fuel tanks!" A heavy petrol scent tainted the air, and a momentary realization was all he was afforded before the responding soldiers sent another round of firebursts.

It seemed like the entire sea rose up into a wall of fire that was blinding, blistering-hot, and all consuming. In the inferno he heard the attackers on the canoe shouting to each other and making evasive maneuvers—for good reason, because while the steel ship could survive until the petrol burned off, the canoe was a tinderbox. He shoved off the wall and scrambled to the railing again, half pulling himself up, and watched the canoe at the edge of the immolation take flame. The waterbender tended it as fast as they could, but the thin, fragile boat wouldn't remain shiptight after even that much damage. As the inferno melted the ice the ship crashed down a level, slamming everyone to the ground. The fuel continued pouring out into the seawater and flames raced across the channel. Once more another shelf of the attacker's ice weakened until the weight of the ship broke it down, then again a minute later. At that point the ship was level and free-floating again and Zuko, standing to concentrate, extinguished the flames in their perimeter, leaving the ship solely spared as the oil ignited across a spreading ring and demolished the area. The ice shelf the village was perched on split with a long, deep gash up to their defensive walls and he heard the villagers screaming and abandoning their shelters to take refuge further inland. Petrol splashed against the banks and melted into the glacier at a troubling rate, burning the ice covering down to bare barren earth.

As the engineers patched the fuel tank to cut the flow off, Zuko looked out into the jumble of ice and flame, wondering about the fate of the attackers.

#

With the canoe engulfed in flames, Katara tried what she could to extinguish it as Sokka backed them out of the disaster zone, but the surrounding seawater was already tainted by the fuel, which had rapidly dumped into the channel and expanded across the surface in an iridescent slick. The flames were quickly overtaking the shaped-wood and oil-fortified canvas, which is what made polar canoes watertight while incidentally making them extremely flammable. Stumbling back from the licking flames, she knocked into her brother who was hastily rowing them backwards but failing to outpace immolation. The flames crept around the canoe, encasing them on all sides with inescapable fire.

Desperate and pressed for time to find a solution, Katara spun around and found a pile of clean ice atop a glacial fragment which hadn't been tainted by petrol. Melting that off, she funneled the water onto the canoe to keep the flames abated, but for every measure she soaked them in, an equal measure filled the canoe, weighing them down and slowing their progress, so every other motion she had to stop the firefighting to bail the canoe. The canvas, which had been the first material to ignite, was singed to the point of snapping apart. Fuel-tainted seawater began seeping between the boards.

Trying one more strategy, Katara scooped up the entirety of the seawater below them—fuel, fire, and all—and pulled hard. The canoe rocketed back as it rode the wave. Sokka, unable to steer, couldn't bring the oars in quickly enough. The boat knocked against an iceberg and was jostled hard to the side, still riding the wave she had created, and the oar was knocked from his grasp. However, they had nearly outpaced the flames, so, with oil-slick water pooling around her ankles, Katara repeated the procedure. They were washed back fifteen yards before impacting an ice shelf. The canoe went airborne with the collision, landed hard on the uneven surface, and the fire-damaged wooden frame splintered apart. She, her brother, and their baggage scattered across the ice, sliding and knocking into obstacles with stunning force, and before she could stop them she found herself slipping off the far side of the glacier into the freezing water. Without having taken a breath before the plunge, her mouth filled with water that carried the burn of the fuelsource and elicited sharp nausea. The tattered parka grew heavy and she was aware they were both sinking.

After the wall of flames shocked her with its bright, burning heat, Katara found herself enveloped in impossibly bitter-cold and heavy water. The light of the conflagration dispersed senselessly as a vague orange glow through the thickness of the glacial ice, but as they sank below the iceberg darkness gradually replaced it. She couldn't sense where her brother was and, as disoriented as she had been when she'd plunged into the sea, attempting to surface seemed impossible.

Her back hit against a rounded, hard surface just as her chest was burning with the immediate need for oxygen. At that moment a tremendous cold light filled the sea and a large pressure was released.

#

Just as Zuko had caught his breath and conferred with the engineering team, the deck below them turned into a mirror sheen of an intense ice-white light which instantaneously turned polar night into day. The entire region was illuminated, showing every bit of damage and washing out the existing fire with greater intensity. The column of light punctured even the swirling dark smog that had built under the low cloudcover. Stretching from the sky to the depths of the ice-cluttered sea, the lightsource warped with intense energy, but for as readily as it had appeared it vanished less than half a minute later. Awed motionless, he watched the world return to night. The fire still burning in the rest of the area looked dim by comparison.

While others were stunned silent his uncle ran to meet him. In a low voice he whispered, "Prince Zuko. Did you see the origin of that light?"

"No, but it was in the direction I think the canoe went. What was it?"

"No machine or work of nature could produce that, not even lightning."

After six years, Zuko wondered if the hope he'd been slowly abandoning might yet have a foothold. "Is it a spirit, or could it be from the Avatar?"

Equal parts astonished and cautious, his uncle replied, "Let's not jump to conclusions."

Glaring at the distance, Zuko squinted through the continuing fires and watched for motion or sign of its cause, but saw nothing, and in the next minutes nothing apparently occurred. Iroh waited for an order, but Zuko couldn't voice anything. Finally the older man proposed, "Shall we extinguish the fires? They are not a threat to us at this distance as the firebenders on crew can suppress our perimeter, but they won't cease on their own until the fuel is expended, and that might last until morning. It was a large leak."

"Do we have enough fuel left to return to the mainland?"

"Barely, if we take advantage of the currents."

"Let it keep burning. If it is the Avatar he'll come to save the village. If it's something else we might get the chance to see it emerge. The fire will drive it out." Iroh dispensed the order and returned shortly later, then the pair watched a quarter hour. The flames were functioning as an oversized balefire to keep the worst of the chill off, and there was still no motion to post resistance from the village, nor did anything emerge from the origin of the light. Fed up, Zuko pushed off the railing and turned sharply to find the crew members. "Begin assaulting the village. Use half the munitions reserve."

Though they might not understand why, they moved to obey, and the siege weapon was assembled within a few minutes. Large flammable rounds were brought and loaded in the basket, lit, and flung with enough force that the ship below them rocked. Like a comet the first salvo burned across the sky and impacted the snowy village, cutting out entire trenches and annihilating the structures in their path. He had the sentiment that most of the villagers were still hiding out in the snowfields and only a few of the most foolish had returned to their homes, but it didn't matter—just as long as whatever had produced the light saw what was occurring it would be forced to intervene. Another round was loaded and momentarily fired. Standing beside his uncle, Zuko waited to see what would crawl out of the arctic water.

#

An arm wrapped around her waist and uplifted her from the water. Katara felt the weightless sensation of flying, then was laid gently on the surface of a sturdy glacial sheet. Suffocating with seawater in her airways, she turned to her side and half-coughed, half-vomited it up, and cleared the rest with hasty waterbending on her own esophagus. As she wiped her mouth clean and looked around, her breathing still rocky and labored, she saw her brother lying motionless on his back nearby. "Sokka!" She stumbled over and assessed him. With gentle pulling strokes of her wrist above his chest, she coaxed the water out of his lungs as best she could, then turned him to his side, pressing a firm hand on his back and shaking his shoulder. "Sokka, wake up!" Repeating the procedure once more brought additional fluid out, and he began sputtering and coughing with sudden animation. Her own chest still hurt and she was dizzy with the rapid progression since the assault began. Now, looking across the channel and ice structures, beyond the still-burning waterway the ship had initiated a bombardment. "Sokka, get up," she pleaded, although with the canoe destroyed they had no easy way to reach the village, let alone could they even approach the ship as the fire was serving as a protective barrier.

From the air tumbled down an array of their baggage and the tattered remains of the canoe. A boy around fourteen with a clean-shaven head and bright, flowy clothing landed nearby with a small current of spinning air. He turned to the siblings and smiled amicably. "I found most of your things." As he turned to view the siege, his smile dropped. "What's going on? Are they fighting someone?"

"They're attacking my village!" She staggered to her feet and could barely keep upright. "Who are you?"

"I'm Aang. That's Appa over there, but he wants to nap for a while, I think," he said, and pointed to a large mound resting on a nearby island. His voice tried to seem cheerful, but he had a hard time keeping the act up, and he turned to survey the area as if he had no clue where he was. Katara, unable to spare time to address the anomalous presence, moved past him and pulled her brother to his feet. He dug through the pile of their possessions to find his boomerang and strapped it around his waist. "Hey, wait," he called as they moved past him to the edge of the glacier and began discussing what to do. He was left behind speechless as Katara formed a small raft out of ice and the two boarded, then proceeded to navigate to the main shelf through a jagged labyrinth.

#

Twenty minutes into the barrage Zuko debated whether to call a halt to the operation when he spotted two figures running along the shore towards them. In the firelight he observed that they wore Earth Kingdom style clothing, with the smaller figure in an oversized, tattered olive parka. Looking more carefully, he made out that she was a woman, and watched as she ran to the bank and began pushing the flaming water to form another of those waves they had been hit with previously. "So, you survived," he muttered, and looked towards where they had come from, which was somewhat in the direction the light had originated at. Thinking it suspicious, he let the waterbender girl demonstrate what she could do. However, they were more distant from each other than before and the ship, at that angle, was not facing broadside to them but near-prow, which was well designed to cut through waves without taking damage. The ship was not again overturned, and by the time she tried forming the water into ice, firebenders were at the ready to melt it back away. "You don't have the advantage of an ambush this time, little girl."

The other figure paused at the shore seemingly unable to contribute, and Zuko thought he must be a non-bender. With her first attack dispelled easily, the girl was forced to dodge return fire and was driven away from the shore. Her attack had been impressive, but not Avatar-level, and all she had demonstrated thus far was one element. Nothing else had come after them and there was no spirit lifting from the ocean to revenge the village. Disappointed, he gave the order to ceasefire. He watched the two defenders converse over what it meant as the previously steady cannonade suddenly halted. Out of his peripheral vision he caught an orange blur moving against the snowscape which held his attention. A teenager wearing Air Nomad clothing joined the two defenders. Curious, Zuko descended to the main level and ordered the ship to dock on the primary icesheet. Even in their state of damage it was a simple operation. The chain of the anchor wound rapidly about the mechanical spool and one chug of the engine was sufficient to reach landfall and drop the front departure hatch. When they stabilized there was an empty silence resounding across the South Pole after twenty minutes of ear-ringing artillery fire.

Zuko disembarked with a small escort and approached the three, saw their fright, and left the escort to stand at ready as he moved forward alone. They faced each other and he saw just how young the trio was. While the boy in orange was spotless, the other two had taken a heavy beating and were clearly fatigued and injured. "You, boy," he addressed the one with his head crested in a blue arrow. "It's a cold night to play dress-up. Explain your costume."

He looked confused, but before he could answer, the young woman shouted, "He hasn't done anything. You explain why your ship assaulted my village!"

"I believe you assaulted us first. Do you realize what position you're in? I think you're better off controlling your temper when you speak to me."

"Why are the Fire Nation down here?" demanded the young man.

"I was looking for something. Apparently I haven't found it." Looking over the pair, he denoted their striking blue eyes and general resemblance. He thought they might be siblings, and apparently Water Tribe, despite their foreign outfits. The youngest, with the arrow markings, was underdressed for the weather and seemed to be at last suffering for it. Zuko said, "You had no right to attack us."

"Extinguish the flames and leave us alone," demanded the girl. "You've done enough here and we have nothing for you to take."

As he looked at her and considered the situation, the girl continued to glower but did not attack him, wary of the firebenders standing ready only a few paces away. He had thought his predecessors wiped out all the waterbenders from the south, but they must have done a sloppy job and filed an optimistic report to the Firelord. However, a surviving waterbender was meaningless towards regaining his station, and he had no intent to clean up a mess made by others. The last known Avatar was born to the Air Nomads one hundred and fourteen years previously upon the death of Roku, and the next element in the cycle would be water. While the boy was a curiosity, the girl was the only one relevant to him as the only apparent bender present, so he addressed her. "What was the origin of that light?"

"How should we know?" she snapped, looking on the verge of crying from fury and helplessness.

"You ran here from its direction, so I'd say I'm quite valid in thinking you saw the cause. You should answer me."

"We don't know," replied her brother. "We only just got here and saw a Fire Nation vessel menacing our hometown."

"Whom you immediately and heedless to reason attacked," Zuko replied with a bite to his tone.

The girl shifted, but her brother grabbed her shoulder and shook his head before she could get herself into any more trouble, then he said, "Tell us what you're looking for, and you can take it and leave us the hell alone."

"I'm looking for the Avatar." Nothing registered on the faces of the siblings, but the younger boy looked scared. "Girl, are you the only waterbender here?"

"Yes, I am. You already killed everyone else." There was more hurt in her voice than he cared to listen to.

"Well, I hate to say it but you aren't up to snuff to be the Avatar with that pitiful excuse for bending." He surveyed the three of them, who were nothing but barely subsisting children, before turning to leave. "Let's go," he told the attendants, and he passed between the columns they formed at attention around him eager to reboard his ship—marred, rusted, obsolete, underpowered, and understaffed, but his. They extinguished what of the fire was in their path and left the rest to burn off over the course of the night, then the vessel pulled back through the canal heading to the main sea. Behind them the village was a smoldering, collapsed disaster zone and the three defenders remained where they were on the edge of snow and water.

#

Shaking in long-repressed pain, Katara dropped to the snow and pulled out handfuls of meltwater to heal herself of a smattering of burns and contusions. "Sokka, are you injured?"

"Less than you. Splash your magic water for now." He turned to the younger boy, who now had his arms wrapped around himself and teeth chattering. "You're going to freeze to death. I'll take you to the village and find you something to wear, if we have anything left after that."

"Wait," he said, and he turned to the oil-fire. The metal ship was at the horizon blending into the far darkness. Taking a stance, he inhaled as if preparing to bend. Katara paused to watch him. The strange boy sent out a breeze over the surface of the channel and, like a candle extinguished with breath, the fires of the oilspill flickered out as the gentle wind suppressed them. The trio were left in peaceful darkness, the ship vanished out of sight without returning, and the smoke dissipated enough to reveal the stars.

"Was that airbending?" Katara whispered.

Sokka, not pleased, commented, "Well, I guess that isn't just a costume, then. Let's go back to the village since I can't see anything now. Thanks for that, by the way, real helpful." He helped her stand and the three made their way to what remained of home. She had questions, but moreso exhaustion. Taking the first bed she found in a partially destroyed tent and leaving Sokka to announce their return, she couldn't say when her attempts at healing herself fell away to sleep.

#

Docked at an unaffiliated island forty miles away which was populated by only seabirds and small animals, the ship was in the midst of repairs and a sorry state. The work would take two days before they could make the longer part of the trip to the nearest outpost to refuel. Zuko sat on a rock grouping to observe the work, wondering if the majority of the damage might be able to be hammered out but suspecting that the waterbending girl had left a permanent mark. Maintaining the ship was a top priority, because without it his nearly-impossible mission would become fully unachievable, and he didn't think his father would issue him another without proof of progress on his task. Absentmindedly he ran his fingertips over the short hair that was still growing in, hoping a new hairstyle might make him look more mature. For now he kept the longest section as a phoenix-tail, not a topknot, feeling too self-conscious to look formal as he felt like anything but a prince. His vision in his damaged eye was noticeably blurred compared to his right, and similarly for his hearing. Having hoped his still-growing body might heal better than standard, he was disappointed in the progress and coming to terms that he would never regain perfect senses in either.

The land was pallid, infertile, stripped by wind and harsh seas, and the ground broken by storms and winter freezes so that only the hardiest plants could cling to life. Even at a short distance from the polar village, the temperature had mellowed and the wind abated, giving the crew an easy lull to carry out repairs.

Restless, he walked to a tent sheltered by a spindly, frail grove of trees clinging to the sub-arctic turf and entered, greeting his uncle who was seated on a rug with a low table beside him arrayed with refreshments. The castiron teapot itself warmed the tent appreciably. Iroh, usually quick to make pleasant conversation, was silent and contemplative. Zuko, irked at the waste of effort and the quick refutation of his chance at redemption, was equally silent, though far more miserable. He'd hoped his uncle might have insight as to the meaning of the column of light but, seeing his expression, knew he was still just as perplexed. Steam rose as his uncle wordlessly poured a cup for him and the two made themselves comfortable for the wait. Outside, the hammering and welding carried on while seeming a world apart from the comfort of the tent, separated from the cold by a snapping stretch of crimson canvas.