"Damn, that sounds intense. What happened?"
Toph had asked so casually about the scar, the question almost didn't register. Of course she hadn't known. Her seismic sight is so incredible it can sometimes be easy to forget, no matter how many jokes she cracks about her blindness, but of course she hadn't known.
War is over. Has been for years. It was long since past when this conversation started, too.
But for Zuko, war is never over. He's been at war since birth, and he is warring now all the same. It's just different these days.
He had mentioned without thinking that it still hurts sometimes, but he knows that pain is all in his head. He doesn't remember how it came up. He forgot the second Toph started asking questions.
She learned of its size, of its severity. What everyone else already knew but never pried into. So he didn't expect Toph to follow up on it. None of their other friends ever had.
He felt himself drowning in his newfound need to explain himself. The memory pulled him under, losing himself in it as he described it, imaginary water filling his lungs even as he felt what had once been the very real fire on his face like it was happening all over again.
He broke down. He was gone, caught in the tide, the strong current taking him too far from shore, holding him down as itburned.
He was vaguely aware of Sokka and Suki gripping his hands. He barely felt it.
Next thing he knew, he was curled up in the fetal position on the ground, rocking back and forth, and Iroh was there doing his best to calm him. He didn't remember the conversations that resulted before Aang and Appa took off to get help. He didn't remember them leaving, either.
Everyone was so kind, so sympathetic. Sokka and Suki never left his side. Katara was enraged, the angriest Zuko had ever seen her, but she was quick to assure him as he returned to the present that she wasn't mad at him, that he hadn't done anything wrong and it wasn't his fault.
Sokka told him later that just meant Katara truly did care about him. He told him later she had said she wished she'd known sooner, that she would likely have been much more forgiving much earlier on. Zuko told Sokka he didn't deserve that kind of forgiveness, that he should have been forced to earn it as he was. Sokka told him that was exactly what he had told Katara when she said it, too.
Zuko laughed. Sokka did not.
Katara, Aang, and Toph are currently visiting the Fire Nation. A family reunion. It's nice having them close by, if only for a short time. They haven't all been in the same place at the same time in too long.
They haven't visited since before that talk they had outside Ba Sing Se. Katara has not forgotten.
Aang may have believed he was doing the right thing the day of Sozin's Comet, but now he may yet regret not killing a certain disgraced former Fire Lord when he had the chance.
And Katara loves Aang, and she respected his following his conscience at the time. But she has to follow hers, too, and Aang is just going to have to live with that.
She herself couldn't bring herself to kill Yon Rha, and she has no intention of killing Ozai. But she'll be damned if she isn't going to make him bleed.
After dinner their first night in town, Katara slips away. She has a mission. She is determined.
There are guards at the entrance to the deep space which houses only Ozai. Katara scoffs, unsure why they even need to bother. The man is helpless anymore. Although she supposes he does still have enough supporters who would love to overthrow Zuko that they can never be too careful.
She, however, is not here to help. The guards will let her through.
She readies herself in her head, though, just in case.
Do you know who I am? I am a master waterbender. Possibly the most powerful waterbender alive today. I am capable of things you cannot even imagine. I am one of the Fire Lord's best friends. I am the Avatar's wife. But I do not need them to destroy you; I can do that all by myself. Do not fuck with me.
She takes a deep breath as she descends into the dungeons.
I am basically the Fire Lord's sister in-law. This is personal. This is a family matter. Get the fuck out of my way.
She knows she could not say that, though. She doesn't know who all knows and in all honesty, neither Sokka nor Zuko nor Suki really do, either. Katara wouldn't risk their safety like that. But it's true. She and Zuko were practically family before he got involved with her brother, but now Zuko is fucking stuck with her.
"Lady Katara?" a guard stops her at the top of the steps.
It's good she's recognized. This will most likely help her cause.
"It'sMasterKatara," she says sternly. "And I'm here for a visit."
"By all means."
She thinks she hears the tiniest crack of fear in his voice.
Good.
Ozai doesn't acknowledge her when she reaches him. Asshole probably still thinks himself above interacting with peasants.
Ha. I'm a master and a war hero. I'm a fucking legend. What the fuck are you?
She isn't normally so arrogant, even in her own head. But she isn't usually so angry, either, and her ire fuels her confidence fuels her conviction.
"I guess sometimes the phoenix just chokes on its own ashes, huh?" she says with a cruel smirk.
She doesn't even sound like herself. Aang would not like this side of her. She's not actually sure how Zuko would feel about it, either.
But they're not here.
And she is going to hurt this man. But no more than he deserves. In fact, far less.
"I didn't always agree with Aang's decision to let you live, you know," she continues. "But now? Now I think maybe it is better this way. Killing you would have been letting you off far too easy. You deserve tosuffer."
With her firm stress on that last word, she opens her water pouch and splashes its contents all over his face. She instantly freezes what makes contact, and then she kneels to look him dead in the eyes.
"I know about Zuko's scar. I know who did it and why. Youmonster,how do you justify mauling a thirteen year old boy like that? A child crawling on his hands and knees, begging you for mercy? And youattack?You set his fucking face on fire? A kid not even trying to defend himself? What a fucking coward. You think you were so powerful, you thought you were going to leave your mark on history, but the only mark you ever made was on an innocent child's face. Youwillbe remembered, I'm sure. But history will not be kind. And neither will I."
Ozai is growling through his teeth, visibly trying not to howl in pain. Katara is considering the stages of frostbite in her head, how long she should leave him like this and the amount of damage she could do.
She thinks about how she could burn his face like he burned Zuko's. But no, that shecannotdo. She doesn't give a fuck about how it would hurt Ozai, but she knows it would hurtZuko,treating that kind of mark as revenge. He still struggles so much with having to see his face like that every day, no matter how many years he's had it. He still struggles having to be reminded he didn't deserve the punishment which forever changed his reflection, and Katara fears marking Ozai so similarly would only reinforce to Zuko that such a scar truly is a punishment which had to have been earned.
She bends the water back into her hands, and Ozai's face is already bright red. Some skin comes off with it.
Oh well.
The water comes for him again, turns back into ice, this time in long frozen spears. They pierce through his shoulders, his chest, between his ribs. They break skin, dig into muscle and tissue, narrowly avoiding vital organs.
"Is that all you've got, little girl?" he seethes.
"I'm not here to end your life," she answers. "I'm just here to make you hurt."
"You're weak," he taunts. "You're weak just like the Avatar, and just like yourdear friend,my worthless son."
"Zuko isnotyour son. Don't youdareever call him that again. You don't deserve him."
She wiggles her fingers, jarring the ice picks. She doesn't stop until he can no longer contain his screaming. Ice melts and drips down his body, mixing with blood from his wounds.
She can't stay down here too long, she doesn't want to risk any of her family coming to look for her. She has no regrets about what she's doing, but she does not wish to be caught in the act. She doesn't want anyone else to see her like this.
She hasn't told anyone but Aang yet that she's pregnant, but if he knew she was behaving this way he'd be upset enough even if she wasn't carrying his child. It would make it so much worse that she is.
Butsheknows, and that thought makes her blood boil all that much more.No onewill ever harm her child the way this man had harmed his. And she will not allow such an act to go unpunished.
She shifts again, and the water slithers down around Ozai's wrists. She decides to leave him like this, with ice cuffs pinning him to the floor.
It will melt eventually, without her there to hold it. She is satisfied.
Ozai's screams aren't anywhere near on par with the screaming she's heard from Zuko in the middle of the night while camping out. She was once too full of spite and distrust to ask. Now that she has come to love Zuko like a brother, she almost wishes she had never learned.
Katara runs back upstairs, ignoring the guard staring at her with wide eyes as she bolts away from the scene.
Ozai doesn't know how lucky he is it's not a full moon. She still finds bloodbending abhorrent, but that didn't stop her with the leader of the Southern Raiders and it sure as shit wouldn't have stopped her here if she'd had the option.
"Where have you been?" Aang asks her the very second she returns to the parlor room their group is occupying. Zuko, Sokka, and Suki are all a little drunk. Aang is completely sober. Toph isplastered.
Everyone looks concerned. She doesn't even want to ask how long she'd been gone.
"Umm…I had to use the bathroom. Took forever to find one. This palace ishuge.So, anyway…"
"I know you're lying," Toph laughs, speaking in a sing-song voice which chills Katara to the bone, because now she knows she's as good as caught.
Katara wonders if any of them will ever remember they can't lie with Toph around. And that Toph has no filter. And that this fact is a thousand times worse when she's drunk.
"Katara, sweetie…" Aang is deeply uncomfortable, like on some level he knows.
They weren't planning on making the announcement they came here to make until tomorrow anyway, so at leastthatisn't currently being disrupted, but this evening is not off to a great start regardless.
"Toph?" Aang asks directly. It is entirely possible she knows exactly where Katara was. Katara can only hope Toph wasn't looking for her.
"Oooooh,someone'sin trouble!" Toph is speaking with that same sing-song and Katara briefly considers bending the pot of hot sake in the middle of the room straight into Toph's face, but quickly decides against it.
But Sokka, she notices, is staring right into her soul. Hedoesknow, without a doubt. She doesn't know how he knows, but heknows.
Sokka is slightly amused by Katara's flustering. He realizes this is the first time she's been back to the Fire Nation since they found out the truth behind Zuko's banishment. If he's honest with himself, he's wondered ever since that revelation if she was ever going to do something about it. He suspected the second she disappeared today that the answer was yes.
He is also slightly in awe, because if she is this flustered then she must not have been fucking around. For a moment he is actively afraid of his little sister. He doesn't yet knowexactlywhat she did, but he knows she didsomething,and he knows what shecando. Katara is very rarely the vengeful type, but when she is…
Even the darkest depths of the spirit world has no fury like his sister.
"Katara, you didn't…"
"Really, Sokka? I'm surprised youactuallydidn't!"
"Oh no." Zuko's caught on.
"What? 'Oh no'what?"Aang still hasn't.
"Katara!" Sokka mocks offense. "You should know me better than that! I would never hurt anyone to defend my love's honor."
"Lying!"
"Ahem. As I was saying. I just like to visit him from time to time and, umm, talk to him. About, you know, stuff. And things."
"Oh,no."Zuko's cheeks flush and he downs a tall glass of sorghum liquor and watermelon juice like it's a shot.
"More booze, please!" Toph calls to a passing servant, and she iscackling.
She definitely knows, too.
"Nothing says payback like flinging around a boomerang while staring deep into a man's eyes and telling him all about howvery, very wellyou're fucking his 'son.'"
"Nope! Can't hear you!" Katara raises her hands to cover her ears. "I amnotlistening!"
"I am!" Toph laughs even harder.
"Okay, that's kind of hot," Suki offers. "I just stabbed him."
"You what?" Aang shouts. "Are we talking about Ozai? I didn't spare him just so you could all—"
"Kyoshi, back me up here!" Suki interrupts, and she couldswearAang's eyes glow for a split second in approval.
"But youdidspare him," Zuko snickers. "You should seriously have known better. So if anything, this isyourfault."
Katara puts her hands back down just in time to hear Zuko add, "And Sokka? Umm, yeah, that'sreallyhot."
"Why?" Katara groans. "Why, oh why, what have I done to deserve…"
"Well, whatdidyou do?" Aang demands, and no one even stops when servants roll in carts of bottles for them, presumably making one large trip so they don't have to return to whatever the fuck is happening here anytime soon.
"Apparently nothing everyone else hasn't already done!" Katara shouts defensively. "Which is a relief! I would have been very disappointed in all of you if I'd really been the first!"
"Okay but how is this the firstI'mhearing about any of this?" Zuko can't stop smiling. This is wonderful.
"I might have told the guard I saw that I know where he lives and that if he told on me I'd chop his balls off and feed them to him while he slept," Suki says with a shrug.
"Holy shit," Toph responds. "Uh, she'snotlying. Sokka, Zuko, proceed withcaution."
"Oh,theyhave nothing to worry about," Suki chuckles, and she finishes her drink and pours herself a new one.
"Okay, still not lying. Good to know."
"Well, I didn't hurt him," Sokka notes. "Not physically, anyway."
"I think you didfarworse," Suki points out, and Zuko emits this strange, happy little half-hum, half-sigh that makes Sokka's pupils blow wide open.
"Yeah. Mmm, yeah, I really did. Heh."
"Fuckers never sawmecoming," Toph boasts.
"Oh no,oh no."Zuko is beaming. This is amazing.
"I didn't do anythingtooterrible," Toph explains. "I only broke some bars off his cell door and rammed them through his limbs to stick him to the wall. He deservedwayworse."
"What the fuck."Zuko may never have looked so happy. "That must have taken the healersdaysto fix! How did I never hear aboutthat?"
"Suki's got threats. I don't need 'em."
"Zuko," Aang turns in abject horror. "You're really okay with this? He's still your—"
And for the second time today, Katara puts a stop to that train of thought.
"Don't. You. Dare."
"What, Katara? He is—"
"I said,don't you fucking dare."
Everyone is quiet now. No one is laughing anymore.
Katara takes a deep breath. "Thatthingdown there isnotZuko's dad. He isn'tanyone'sdad. Iroh is Zuko's dad.My dadis Zuko's dad. Ozai hasno such claim.He forfeited that right a long time ago. I'm sorry, Zuko, I know I don't get to tell you how to feel, but… Don't think for a second blood ties mean you oweanythingto that monster.Weare your family. He doesn't deserve you, and you deserve better. AndAang,I thought better ofyou.I figured being raised by monks would mean you wouldunderstandfamily doesn't always have to mean anything traditional!"
"Katara, calm down, I'm sorry, you're right…"
Sokka's a little relieved to see the fear in Aang's eyes watching Katara lay into him like that. It's nice to know he's not the only one to ever react that way to Katara's anger.
"Nah, Katara, you're good," Zuko replies calmly. "I'm touched."
"Thank you, Zuko," Katara exhales, now actually trying to calm herself. "I just… I donotwant to start our family in a world wherethatis an acceptable definition of 'family.' That isnotokay and that isnotthe kind of worldorthe kind of family I ever want to encourage."
"Waaaaaaaait a minute," Toph starts, and Katara instantly realizes what she's given away. "You're starting a what now?"
"Umm… Surprise!" Katara gives a very large, very awkward, andveryforced smile.
"Yeah, uh," Aang scrambles. "That's, umm, kind of why we came here and wanted to get everyone together."
"Exchanging tips on how to torture the abusive, murderous fuckface in the basement was just an added bonus!" Sokka brings back the laughter.
"Well, congratulations!" Suki exclaims. "Sokka, you're gonna be an uncle!"
"You'reallgoing to be aunts and uncles," Katara corrects. "Mai and Ty Lee, too. Becauseweare family."
"That's great news," Zuko keeps on smiling.
"Weirdest pregnancy announcement ever," Toph comments in perfect deadpan, but she can't keep a straight face for long.
"This is not at all how I pictured it," Aang mutters.
"That's your problem, twinkle toes. I say this is perfect!"
"So, everyone but Katara's getting shitfaced to celebrate, right?" Suki asks as she pours herself another round.
"Actually, babe, if the look on Zuko's face is anything to go by, I think we need to split so I can tell Ozai all about it later," Sokka whispers in a manner which was obviously intended to be loud enough for all to hear.
Zuko, for his part, turns bright red, but does not protest.
"Sokka, no!" Katara shouts, but everyone is still laughing and laughing and laughing.
"Yeah, hate to break it to you, Madame Fussy Britches, but he wasn't joking."
"Toph, I thinkyouhave had enough."
"Hey, you're gonna have a real kid of your own to boss around now! You don't need to pretend to bemymom anymore!"
"Or mine," Sokka agrees. "So…"
"Suki, how do you live with this?" Katara teases.
"Umm…very, very well,"Suki replies, mimicking the same tone of voice Sokka said those same words in earlier.
"Forget I asked! I regret everything!"
And Sokka does, in fact, walk out hand in hand with both Suki and Zuko, the three of them stumbling and giggling as they exit.
This has indeed been one of the weirdest evenings their group has ever spent together, but Toph was right that it's kind of perfect.
Because Zuko has been at war since birth, and for him the war will never truly be over.
But he has a family now. He has love he could never have dreamed he'd find. And for just a little while, he feels almost at peace.
M. M. M. M. M. M. M. M.
A flash. A scream. Applause. The heavy red curtains fell on the first act.
Zuko hadn't realized he'd stood up. His stomach dropped when the curtains did; he felt sick. Pulling his hood over his head, Zuko fled the auditorium— up the steps, out to the balcony, hands gripping the railing in front of him turning the cool metal red hot. The night was warm, and the ocean breeze made the air sticky and wet. He took a deep breath and held it for a moment before exhaling and taking another; just like his uncle had shown him. "Breathe, Prince Zuko," Iroh would have said, "do not let how you are feeling decide who you will be."
Breathe.
It was all he could do to keep from burning the entire theatre and everyone in it to a smoldering pile of embers. Zuko never told anyone, including his friends, how exactly he'd gotten his scar. Everyone, he assumed, had their own idea of what happened and, as he was more than happy to never have to discuss that day ever again for as long as he shall live, it didn't really matter to him what conclusions they'd drawn for themselves. The Ember Island Players had gotten some of the details wrong, but it didn't matter. Now they knew. Now everyone knew that Zuko, the banished Prince, had been burned by his own father, on purpose, as punishment.
Zuko sat down against the balcony and put his head in his hands, the scar felt rough against his fingertips. He wanted his uncle. He wanted his mother. Inside the auditorium, his friends sat in stunned silence trying to process what exactly it was that they had just seen.
"Did he just…?" Katara trailed off.
"Yes." Sokka sat stoic, blood boiling. Suki, who had seen Zuko rush out of the room, put a reassuring hand on Sokka's shoulder before standing and exiting the theatre the same way Zuko had. She found him outside looking directly at nothing off in the middle distance, breath shaky and muscles tense. He had never looked small before, she thought. Suki offered him her hand. She knew how the others would react— Aang would worry about him, Katara would pity him, Toph and Sokka would try to play it cool but tension would be thick enough to cut through with a dull blade— so Suki decided to do something different in treating him exactly the same; like nothing was wrong like she hadn't just watched what was almost certainly the worst day of his life play out in front her to roaring applause.
"Come on," she said, "the second act is starting soon." Zuko stood and, with a knowing look, followed Suki back to their seats.
The group walked the path back to the house— Zuko's house, that he had lived in, with his father, who had burned his face on purpose— in awkward silence; looking to each other, then to Zuko, then to the ground. The play left a sick feeling in each of their stomachs and a bad taste in their mouths. No one wanted to be the first to speak.
They parted until dinner.
It went exactly how Suki predicted, Zuko sat completely silent, Aang and Katara exchanged nervous glances, and Sokka attempted to remedy the situation with jokes so bad that Toph sent a rock his way just to make him stop. Finally, Katara spoke up.
"Look, can we talk about what happened tonight? It's got us all on edge and we're going to stay there unless we work through it."
"What's to talk about? It was just a play, it's not real." Sokka asked through a mouthful of crab.
"And it wasn't even a good play," Toph added.
"I just think that if we're supposed to be a team then we should be honest with each other about how we feel. It's what friends do," Katara said.
"Katara's right," Aang said. "The ending really freaked me out, and I know that all of you can feel it too."
Sokka sat up straighter and spoke seriously, "we already knew that Ozai is a really bad dude, we're gonna take care of it. There's nothing else to say, it was a play. Fiction."
Zuko stood and turned to leave.
"Where are you going?" Katara asked
"Out," he replied, curtly.
"We're having a discussion."
"You are. I'm leaving."
Katara stood, arms crossed, and said, "don't you think we should talk about this? As a group?"
"I think we should pretend we never saw that stupid play and start over tomorrow," Toph shouted from across the courtyard.
"Agreed," Zuko and turned to leave again.
"Zuko wait!"
"What?!" he snapped at Katara. "What do you want? What do you want to talk about??" He took a few steps towards her and she stepped back. Sokka started to stand but Suki held his arm and pulled him back down.
"Do you want to talk about how Ozai is completely evil beyond comprehension? About how he wants to destroy the world?" He was yelling now. "Do you want to talk about how horrible of a father he is? How he banished me and turned my little sister into a weapon?
"Or did you want to talk about how he burned me? He put his hand to my face and held it there and listened to me scream until I passed out! He was going to kill me like he always wanted to! Like he probably killed my uncle who I betrayed over and over and who loved me anyway! Like he killed Ursa!!!" He slammed his fists down at his sides and flames in the courtyard rose high into the air and crashed down, throwing embers like a wave against a rocky shoreline sends seafoam in every direction. Zuko ran off down the path, into the night, towards the beach. His ears were ringing, and his heart pounded so hard he thought it might give out.
Sokka heard the front door open and shut sometime later. Then, a bang. Instinctively, he placed his hand on the hilt of his sword and sat up in bed, listening for some sign of trouble in the darkness.
Suki stirred, "Sokka? It's probably just Zuko."
"Yeah..." he said, warily. "I'm just...I'm gonna go check."
"Check on the noise, or on Zuko?" she asked; he slipped out of the door without an answer.
In the hall, an attic opening he'd not noticed before exhaled a dull glow. Below it lay a ladder collapsed on the floor, the source of the noise that'd awoken him, he presumed. Sokka set the ladder against the opening and began his ascent. Halfway up he could hear someone in the room rifling around, digging through boxes. Quietly, he climbed the rest of the ladder and stood at its top watching for a moment as a distressed Zuko threw a ceramic and cursed himself.
It was only a matter of time before the others woke up to the noise, and the last thing Zuko wanted was pity. Zuko paced like a caged animal, exhaling flames with every breath. He wanted to burn down the house with himself and every memory of what used to be inside. Were his memories of his family's Ember Island home happy, or was he equating happiness with having a mother? Was it happy, or was it just Before?
Sokka watched silent and still at the top of the ladder while Zuko dug through more boxes. He hadn't been noticed yet and he hoped to keep it that way; he didn't want to startle Zuko, but more than that he was a tinge curious as to what Zuko was looking for. This wasn't a tantrum it was a frantic hunt for an unknown treasure, somewhere in those boxes and crates was something that Zuko desperately wanted. After a few minutes, he found it. Zuko pulled a small wooden box from a larger one and sat down with his legs crossed and his treasure chest held on his lap. Carefully, he removed the lid, setting the box on the floor in front of him, took out neatly wrapped and ribbon bound scrolls. He opened 2 of them, scanned them, and tossed them aside. The third, he unrolled and examined closely. The panicked energy from before began to dissipate and Sokka figured that was as good a time as any to check on his friend. He knocked twice on the floor to announce his presence and pulled himself up and into the attic.
"Hey, man…" Sokka said, approaching cautiously. He had no idea what Zuko was going to do but he could tell by the way his shoulders shook that he was close to tears.
"What do you want? Can you just leave me alone? Please?"
"Zuko I—"
Zuko cut him off before he could finish, "I'm fine. Go away."
Sokka ignored his protests and sat down near but not next to Zuko who was still looking down at the same scroll he'd opened.
"What is that?" Zuko looked to him and then back to the scroll, carefully he held it up so Sokka could see. Sokka moved in closer, they sat shoulder to shoulder as he looked over the paper more completely. A theatre poster, a neat portrait of a woman with long dark hair looked back at him. She held a flower in one hand and a painted dragon flew behind her. The title of the play, Love Amongst the Dragons, printed in large letters.
He gave Zuko a confused glance, it was a nice picture and all, but he didn't entirely understand why Zuko tore the room apart looking for it.
"She's my mother…" Zuko whispered. He hadn't meant for his voice to sound so small.
"Ursa?" Sokka asked, remembering that Zuko had mentioned a woman when he was yelling at Katara earlier in the evening."
Zuko nodded in response.
"She's beautiful. You look like her."
Zuko scoffed, "I would have." He brought his hand to his scarred cheek.
"Is she—"
"Dead," Zuko's voice was sharp and cut through the question like a knife. "Ozai was going to kill me so she killed Fire Lord Azulon for him, his life for mine. And then he killed her. Or exiled her. Or imprisoned her. I don't know. She was there, and then she was gone, and she never came back for me so she must be dead!" His voice rose as he spoke, he fought back tears.
"Everyone knows what he did to me. Did you know back home I'm a cautionary tale for fire nation children? The crown prince burned and banished because he didn't respect his elders, his father, or his country; 'so you better behave, children, if you don't want to end up like Prince Zuko!'" He let out a deep breath and traced his fingers across his mother's picture. Sokka wanted to say something but was at a complete loss for words. He thought of his own father, his loving, caring, do anything for his children father who would die before he let anyone hurt his children; and then he thought of Zuko's father who on three separate occasions had wanted to hurt his own son himself.
Finally, and warily, Sokka asked, "what happened that day?"
"You saw the play." Zuko scoffed, not even a full and complete breakdown was going to rob him of an opportunity to rattle off sarcastic quips.
"No, I mean, what really happened."
"It was a stupid war meeting; I don't even know why I wanted to go so badly. I just wanted to be included. My uncle said that I could go in with him as long as I didn't speak. Children are to be seen and not heard, and I wasn't even supposed to be seen. One of the general's presented his plan to my father. He was going to sacrifice an entire battalion of new recruits as a distraction; they wanted to use our own soldiers as bait! And I thought about my uncle and how Lu Ten died fighting for the Fire Nation and now they want to just leave their own people to die on purpose and pretend that it's a justifiable loss? The few for the many like the few don't matter?!
Zuko stood and paced back and forth in front of Sokka, throwing his arms around wildly as he continued, "I'm an idiot and I don't think things through, and I spoke out of turn. I disrespected the general and the punishment is Agni Kai. But when I went to face my opponent it wasn't the general… 'You will learn respect, and suffering will be your teacher.' That's what he said to me, I will learn respect and suffering will be my teacher! I was on my knees begging for mercy and forgiveness and told me to suffer!! And he put his hand on my face and left it there and all I could hear was my own screaming… I woke up 3 days later on a boat with my uncle and a letter that said to come back with the Avatar or don't come back at all..."
Sokka— and the others, who had finally been roused by the yelling and item throwing and were now huddled together at the bottom of the ladder listening to Zuko describe the worst day of his life— sat in stunned silence. It hadn't ever occurred to them that the Avatar witch-hunt Zuko was on hadn't been of his own design.
"But we didn't even find Aang until... How were you supposed to..?"
"I wasn't. It'd be in bad form to kill your wife and your firstborn, so he sent me off instead. Probably hoping that a storm or some act of Agni would kill me and save him the trouble and the scandal. The worst things I did in my entire life I did for him, so he'd love me."
"Why did you go back? After what happened in Ba Sing Se you went back home, why would you go back there? Back to him?" Sokka's voice was raised; indignant and disgusted not at Zuko but at the realization that Fire Lord Ozai was, somehow, an even more despicable human being than Sokka could have ever imagined him being.
"I didn't know what else to do… Everyone in Ba Sing Se would know that uncle and I were Fire Nation, we'd have to leave the city as refugees again, I was going to lose everything again and Azula said that if I helped her capture Aang that I'd be a hero, that I could go home with her and my honor would be restored. She's my little sister and I... I hadn't been home in 3 years, I hadn't slept in my bed in 3 years, I just wanted to go home…
"I left with Azula, I betrayed my uncle, and when I finally came to my senses it was too late. I confronted my father, he tried to kill me again and I escaped. I didn't even say goodbye to Mai, I just left her a note like a coward. I went to break my uncle out of the prison but when I got there he was already gone. Gone. I don't know if he's dead or alive or imprisoned; like my mother, I just know that he's gone, and he didn't come for me."
Zuko sat leaned against the wall across from Sokka; his breathing was shallow and shaky. The moon still shone bright through the open attic window, but Sokka knew dawn couldn't be too far away. He'd never heard Zuko talk like that before; he'd never seemed so small. Outside of his occasional recklessness and general moody behavior, Zuko was so serious and somber most of the time that it was easy to forget he was a kid too just like the rest of them. They sat in silence while the sun rose and the moon fell, and the sunrise washed the room in oranges in pinks. Sokka thought about Yue, and about Suki who was waiting for him downstairs. Zuko thought about the way the light coming in through the shutters hit his mother's picture in a way that brought her to life; maybe he does look like her. Maybe love isn't in the position you're born into or the people you've lost, maybe it's in the place you've carved for yourself and the people you choose to fill it with.
"I'm sorry about your mom, Zuko."
"I'm sorry about yours too."
M. M. M. M. M. M. M
The atmosphere amongst the occupants of the beach house is sullen and cross following their night out in the theater.
It isn't lost on them that the edifice they have come to know as their solace belongs to the very monster man who brought upon their 'deaths'. The certainty that it had all been a fictionalized retelling was not enough to temper even the echo of the crowd's rabid enthusiasm as they cheered the demise of the Avatar and his friends, nor erase the visceral image of the thespian Fire Lord standing before his adoring subjects—triumphant in his accomplishment of world domination.
They step through the threshold of the tyrant's once home. The air grows thicker in acerbity.
Zuko wants to snark at them, I told you they'd butcher it. If he had been the person he was even a month ago perhaps he would have, but the words wither in his throat. The scene of him engulfed in Azula's flames, however fake or fantasized, sears across his mind on relentless repeat so that it is more selfish entreaty than consideration that has him abstaining from permeating the burdensome silence with his signature brand of pessimism—realism.
Dinner is an equally stilted affair, the only sound to be heard is the clob of chopsticks against wooden bowls and the crackling of the campfire solemnly harmonizing with the occasional sigh of dejection.
This, however, does not last too long.
He supposes he should have seen it coming. This is the boy who offered his friendship at the slightest show of goodness from him. The Avatar is as buoyant in his movements as his element. Though Zuko has come to learn when it comes to his disposition, it is more alacrity than air that has him flitting from one emotion to another, ensuring he never dallies in his worries for too long.
So when Aang bellows, "That's it!" as he discards his bowl with a careless flick, the remains of his uneaten congee spilling carelessly across the cobblestones of the courtyard, Zuko doesn't so much as blink at his latest antics.
He is more surprised at Sokka's indignant huff seeing as it is the first sound he's made in the past two hours (which is subsequently also the quietest he's ever witnessed the other boy to be in all the time he's known him) since they've arrived.
"I would have eaten that," Sokka mutters irately.
(It is fitting however, that this should be the commentary to break his speechless strike.)
"I mean, what's the big deal? It was just a stupid play!" Aang exclaims emphatically, his voice cracking in his vehemence. "If anything, we should be laughing our butts off—that writer obviously didn't know what he was talking about!"
"Speak for yourself, Twinkletoes," Toph chuckles. "I happened to enjoy my portrayal. It was wrong, sure, but what did you expect from a patchwork of second-hand accounts combined with your regular sprinkling of Fire Nation propaganda? It was dumb, but that was the point. You all know the truth, don't you? Quit being such wet blankets about it already."
After having heard a similar iteration from Toph earlier, Zuko finds no offense from the jibe. Unfortunately, the same could not be said for the rest of his companions, save Aang—though even his propensity for optimism appears ready to float away on the next gust of wind.
"At least you were in the play," Suki offers, good-naturedly, if not a bit feebly.
"I think I'd rather just not be in it altogether, if it means I'd have to be depicted like—" Katara shudders before grumbling, as if there truly are no words for that disaster of a parody, "...that."
Zuko wholeheartedly seconds her sentiments.
"Toph's right though!" Aang blusters on, and it all seems rather void but he admires the kid's pluck. "In fact, I think we should all take this opportunity to look back on our adventures—"
Zuko groans. Frankly, he doesn't want to think too much about what it said about him that the Avatar's evasion tactics had relied mostly on improvisation and sheer, dumb luck than calculated military strategy and cunning.
"Or maybe we should just not."
"But Zuko," Aang turns big, round, pleading eyes at him. "Aren't you at least a little curious about what really happened? Not even Toph's heard about half of what we were up to before she joined up with us!"
"You were idiots then, and you're only just a little bit now," Toph snarks. "What else is there to know?"
"Toph," warns Katara just as Sokka sputters, "Hey!"
"It might be good for morale," Suki suggests gently. "I know I could use a pick-me-up."
Zuko gets along with Suki—at least, as well as he is able to get along with anyone. Still, he can't help but shoot her a betrayed glance following her pronouncement. Zuko just wants to sleep, but he should have known better. The minute he starts wanting things is usually the moment they float out of reach.
Suki smiles back unrepentantly, so he sighs in resignation and straps himself down for a long night of reliving his failures (again) and listening to their tales.
"I am a pretty gifted storyteller," Sokka puffs his chest then starts stroking oddly at his face, particularly the area at the sides of his mouth.
Okay? he ponders with a large heaping of confusion.
"That's the spirit, Sokka!" Aang exclaims, but before Sokka can thank him much less get a word in, Aang launches into the story of how the Water Tribe siblings actually found him. Unsurprisingly, it involves less tears—"By which Sokka means no tears!"—and an infuriated Katara and that, he can believe.
Zuko doesn't anticipate being spoken to for the rest of the night. At best, he is a mere purveyor of their communal fire. At worst, an engaged and enthusiastic reaction to the boys' avid narration will be expected of him. And as socially inept as he may be, he has enough tact to refrain from volunteering his side of the events. Even with the amends he's made, he hardly thinks it would encourage rapport to rhapsodize about a time they had been on separate sides at all, no matter how early it had been in their acquaintance. Zuko would (very much) like to retire at some point in the evening without having to worry about suffocating in his sleep.
(He hasn't had that concern for two weeks now, it was practically a new record.)
So imagine his surprise when the focus shifts to him. Toph, much to his mortification, recounts his outburst at being told by a child decked out in derisory Avatar robes (that had to be illegal, right?) that the scar on his 'Prince Zuko costume' was on the wrong side.
"I don't get it," Katara purses her lips, befuddlement clear in the furrow of her brows as she turns to him. "You'd think the Fire Nation would know such an important detail about their own prince."
"Yeah, Sparky." Toph stomps over from the opposite side of their circle to plop down beside him with all the grace of a landslide. "I didn't even know you had a scar until tonight!" She pokes aimlessly at his right cheek. "What gives?"
He stares at her agog before realizing she has no way of deciphering his countenance. So, he responds by addressing Katara's comment instead.
"I don't see why they would," he shrugs. "I'm sure by the time they heard, if they heard about it at all, I had long been banished."
"I'm confused," Aang rubs his head contemplatively. "If you're banished, what's with all the wanted posters? I thought being banished meant you had to stay away, but then they also want to imprison you? You're their prince, it doesn't make sense!"
"Come to think of it," Suki muses, "Why were you banished in the first place?"
"Hold up," Sokka did that thing where he stroked the sides of his face again—seriously, what was up with that?—"I've always wondered, how come you were branded a traitor way before you even joined us? Reading your poster wasn't exactly at the top of our to-do list."
Katara interjects with, "And what were you doing so far out in the South Pole that day we found Aang, anyway?" while Toph reminds him, "Plus, that still doesn't explain why your people don't seem to know anything about you or your scar."
A headache begins forming at his temples from the barrage of questions. He sighs in vexation before regarding Katara.
"Isn't it obvious? What did you think I was doing? I wasn't exactly sailing around for a vacation destination." Then lowly, somberly, at Toph, "And they haven't been my people," he rubs subconsciously at his marred flesh—mind flitting to that war room—always, always there—and to a whole division of loyal soldiers that in the end, he arrogantly assumed he could defend yet ultimately failed to protect. "Not for a long time."
There is silence in the wake of his disclosure, punctuated by the snap of the tinder as it is disturbed by the gale gusting in from the beach, and an unnameable terseness that fills the air.
"Why—" he's not sure why he whispers, but it feels appropriate given their stricken expressions. "Why are you all looking at me like that?"
Suki is the one to brave breaking the taut stillness, staring at him with purpose.
"Zuko, when—who—" she stutters with what he speculates is an uncharacteristic timidity. That is until she gathers herself with a deep breath, the query crystallizing on her exhalation.
"How did you get your scar?"
It occurs to him, belatedly, that he may have said too much.
"I don't see how it matters," he retorts, hoping the curtness in his delivery puts an end to this inquisition.
But Zuko never did have much luck getting what he wanted.
(No, he broods with a bitterness he wishes he didn't harbor so much, Azula made sure of that.)
"We don't want to upset you—"
"So don't."
Undeterred, Katara finishes in tonalities as soothing as the morning tide, "But it helps to talk about things that might have hurt you."
Around him, the pressure builds. A deadly gas awaiting a fuse.
"Oh, 'it helps,' does it?" he snarls, rage thrumming like wildfire in his veins—igniting his body, and detonating through his next words. "And who exactly does it help, huh? You sure it's my best interests you have at heart? Or—I know! You wanna know my weaknesses, keep the big, bad fire bender on a leash!" He throws his head back, some facsimile of a laugh escaping his lips. "Unless, of course, you're just saying that to satisfy your insatiable need to mother everyone."
Boom.
"Please, I haven't had a mother in years," and he hates it, he hates how it is his voice now that breaks and his body wilts as the violent cloud of his fury dissipates—all the rancorous contention leaking out of him. "I don't need your ridicule or your pity. I've been fine on my own."
And this is the moment he loses everything, he is convinced. Because this is what Zuko does, and what he is best at. His fingers are but sieves from which good things slip. All of him is a razor blade destined to pierce any that would dare come close. He is downfall personified, he is a plague.
This is how it should be, he reasons, cut him now as they would a festering infection.
(As his father, his sister, his mother, would.)
For broken things beget broken things, and they deserve better than to have him bring ruin upon them all.
But then a hand—hands—ground him, keep him rooted, keep him still.
"Well then," Sokka avers, with his special brand of genial but no less poignant solemnity. "It's a good thing we aren't in the business of dishing out pity. Isn't that right, gang?" He clasps his right shoulder, the gesture teeming with meaning though Zuko is the last person to decode it.
"Ridicule, on the other hand…" Toph snickers. Katara sends her an affronted glare before realizing the futility of such an action. She sighs her discontent instead, before returning her attention to him.
"And you're not anymore," Katara says with an earnestness that confounds Zuko to discover is directed at him. "On your own, that is."
"I don't understand," and truly he doesn't. He knows it is not their way to spill blood (barring Katara's commination during his early days in the Western Air Temple, which was more than fair), but this is the first he's lost his temper in front of them for no valid reason. His choleric speech had their bonfire flaring with every harsh and erratic breath he expelled, sure signs of his waning control. "Aren't you going to kick me out? At least put me in chains!"
Katara's hand joins Sokka's on his opposite side as she approaches him from behind. He has to crane his neck to ascertain her aghast mien. "For what? For being angry? For talking out of turn?"
(It always boils down to this, doesn't it? Agni, why couldn't he ever just keep his mouth shut for once in his miserable life?)
"I'm sorry," he mumbles, because he is and he doesn't know what the right thing to do or say is.
"I know," Katara smiles, but there is something desolate in the curl of her lips. "You always are," she sighs. "I'm sorry, too."
Her thumb brushes back and forth across the nape of his neck and he would have started at the unfamiliar touch if her apology hadn't already caught him off guard. In truth, this entire night has been an anomaly with how quickly they all have made his head spin in the last few minutes alone.
"You're sorry?" he gapes, genuine bafflement coloring his articulation. "Why?"
"For pushing you to talk about what I should have known was a sensitive topic." It's her turn to squeeze his shoulder. "I really am sorry."
"There's nothing to forgive," he stammers, for there honestly isn't. He's still trying to get over the fact he received an apology, let alone that anyone sought a dispension of forgiveness. From him.
"Katara's maternal instincts and overbearing need to talk about one's feelings can be annoying. Believe me, I know."
"Gee. Thanks, Toph," Katara deadpans.
"But she's right," Toph's roughened hands encircle his left forearm. Compared to the siblings, her grip is near painful, as if to dig in her point. "Bottling it up, burying your emotions… it'll only hurt you more."
"But it doesn't hurt," he insists, stubbornly ignoring the waver in his importunity as his palm spans the breadth of his ragged scar. "It doesn't."
"We're not talking about the hurt there," Katara grazes cool fingers from his back to his front, before placing it prostrate and precise. "We're talking about the one here."
Right atop his heart.
"The monks have a saying," Aang has since nestled on his knees in front of Zuko. Without him noticing, their entire circle has gotten closer so that he is at the center—warm bodies surrounding him from all sides, little planets orbiting the sun.
"Holding onto anger is a lot like holding onto hot coals that you mean to throw at someone else. In the end, you're the one who gets burned."
"What do you want from me?" he questions wearily though he knows the answer.
"Nothing," Katara assuages. "Nothing you aren't willing to give."
"And we know you're a fire bender, buddy, but don't you think a fire shared is a village warmed?" Sokka grins encouragingly before sobering. "Maybe you don't want to, but I think you may need this. You've got all this—this—pent-up frustration inside you. I can't believe we never noticed it before, it's practically oozing out of you! Like pus from a boil!"
Zuko grimaces. "Thanks, Sokka."
Unfazed, he goes on. "Don't tell me you've had someone to talk about this with. I can't imagine you and Azula sitting round a campfire having a heart-to-heart."
You'd be surprised, Zuko thinks, if that night of confessions at the beachside counted at all.
"There's still so much we don't know about you," Aang adds. "We just want to understand."
"But, why?" he blurts, frustration mounting again like a forest fire. He is desperate to fathom their persistence, to decipher the motives behind their inexplicably lambent eyes, their magnanimous looks and their delicate tones.
"Because we're your friends, Zuko," Suki murmurs while everyone makes their approval known one way or another. "Sharing burdens is kinda what we do."
Oh, he thinks dumbly, Oh.
"It doesn't make for a pleasant bedtime story," he states with an almost believable clinical detachment, steadfastly ignoring the pounding of his heart at her proclamation of friendship. "And it's heavy. This is a load I wouldn't wish on anyone."
"All the better," Katara chirps, settling with her knees aside behind him, "that there's five of us then, right?"
Perhaps it is the security found amongst the shadows of the eventide that loosens his tongue. Perhaps it is that Zuko is just too exhausted, figuring that the fastest way to reach his bed is to simply not argue. It might even be the contentment that Aang and Sokka's adage brings him, the closest taste of home he's had since his separation from the person whom he now knows, without question, he loves most in this world. Or maybe it is simply time , here, on this island, the ghost of dual timbres wisened with age—and it can help you understand yourselves—ringing in his ears. And so beneath a collective scrutiny of ingrained amity and determined tolerance and encouragement and just… goodness.
He begins his tale.
He speaks until his already hoarse voice grows even hoarser, the words clumsy and stilted on his tongue, unused as he is to telling his story—along with the extensive range of sensations that come with it, and the illimitable memories it incites within him, some sentimental while others he would rather forget altogether.
He speaks of a mother's love lending him both strength and weakness, of how it should have been enough yet still could never outweigh his longing for the love of a father who scorns him, of a sister he adored until she, too, eventually saw him as nothing more than a hindrance, then an enemy. He speaks of an uncle whose favor brought him places he knew he ought to be but secretly did not think he deserved, of advice dispensed wisely and discarded carelessly, of a compassion that flamed so bright within him a King saw it as too untamable to remain, and so he snuffed it out with a fiery hand to his face. He spoke of lonely years with nothing but sky and sea and the musings of an old man over tea as his only company, of a path he knew deep down had been aimless yet it was all he could hold on to because it was a reminder that he was still real.
"Three years," Suki mouths, devastation written so plainly upon her profile Zuko couldn't bear to look at her. "He had you chasing a ghost for three years."
"So… so what you said… about losing your honor?" Katara mutters wetly, and if that isn't evidence enough of her sorrow then surely, the unceasingly dampening spots between his shoulder blades are.
He winces at the flashback her inquest incites, shaking his head in internal, forlorn reproach. His shame galvanizes him enough to want to explicate his reasonings out loud, for if there is absolution to be found in his ramblings then all the more reason to try.
"For so long, I fooled myself into believing that finding the Avatar meant regaining my honor. It never occurred to me until recently that honor wasn't something that could be taken away from you. It's something you earn for yourself," he sighs despondently. "Some days though, it wasn't even about honor—I just wanted to go home. But more than anything, my father led me to believe that if I captured you then I would finally, finally have his approval—his love," he shakes his head before releasing a hollow chuckle. "What a stupid thought."
"No, no it wasn't stupid!" Toph exclaims. "It's a parent's job to love their kid. And even then it's not supposed to be conditional!"
"I can't believe he would—that he'd bur—" Aang cuts himself off with a jerk, as if the word, burn, is a most foul curse that would be invoked at the slightest whisp. Zuko doesn't dissuade him.
(There was a time when he felt the same way, too.)
"His own son," Aang finishes dazedly, his face a river of tears, a torrent with no signs of abating.
"I'm sorry," Zuko tries again, a little alarmed now at the frequency of watery displays before him. "I didn't mean to make you sad. Oh," in his panic, he thumbs impetuously at the stray droplets coursing down the arch of Toph's cheeks. In this light, she looks exactly her age, so young and slight, yet so contrary to what he knows of the mighty and unflappable earth bender. A pang goes through his chest that he could ever be cause for her melancholy, for any of theirs. "Please don't cry."
"You first," Toph replies, inconceivably subdued and gentle as she reaches up to frame his face. Zuko holds his breath when he assumes she will palm at his scar, which she does. But there is no judgement there, only indubitable acceptance, and comfort, as she brushes roughly at the tears he didn't even know he's shed.
"Oh," he repeats, not for the first, and certainly not for the last, time tonight.
Suki sniffs. "He doesn't deserve you."
Sokka abruptly declares in hard intonations, "I'm gonna kill him—"
Before he can completely swear his intent, the water in the fountain behind them solidifies into menacingly pointy shards while the earth underneath them trembles dangerously.
"Get in line," Katara hisses darkly at the same time Toph grunts, "Not if I get to him first!"
Sokka's eyes are red-rimmed and gleaming. Still, he announces with a fair amount of acid in his inflection, "I know how you feel about this Aang, but you better hold me back when the time comes cause if I get my hands on that crazy, stupid, son-of-a—"
Zuko lurches forward to cover Aang's ears.
"Sokka!"
It seems the contact is all the incentive Aang needs to throw his arms around Zuko. The fire bender isn't expecting the extra ninety pounds and for all four, gangly limbs to wrap around him like a pentapus so he has no choice but to fall back to accommodate the extra weight, his head landing on Katara's lap as Aang does his utmost to actually meld himself onto his body.
"Slothdog pile?" Toph asks unnecessarily and with a gargantuan amount of glee that the shift in mood gives him whiplash. "No way I'm not getting in on this!"
Toph burrows her head onto his hip, knocking Aang's leg aside as she commandeers Zuko's own left leg like a body pillow. It appears to be all the permission everyone else has been seeking as well, for like dominoes they begin falling into place around him. Katara tucks his head a little more securely on her thigh before leaning her upper body against the lip of the fountain at her back while Suki lists against Sokka who leans his head onto Zuko's right shoulder.
"What—what's happening right now?" he doesn't want to appear too scandalized but he is at a loss for what to do with his limbs, outstretched as they are on either side of him. The Royal family didn't do touch, much less hug. The gesture became even more scarce when his mother… when she was gone, and though his uncle was a lot more free with his affections, it still hadn't warranted familiarity. His muscles contract at the overwhelming amount of contact.
"I wouldn't think too hard." Above him, there are traces of moisture on her visage but Katara chuckles, fond and ebullient now, much to his relief. "Just go with the flow."
"Says the water bender to the fire bender," he bites back weakly, which only fuels Katara's amusement.
Aang fastens his hold around the prince's torso, and he tenses even more.
"You know your dad's wrong, right, Zuko?"
"About what?" he quips sarcastically, but is surprised by the ardency in their antiphon.
"About everything," Aang counters fiercely. "Like, yeah, you chased us all over the world but you never aimed to kill!"
With his lineage it feels like a low bar but he nods his acknowledgement and his gratitude.
"You didn't save me from the pirates, but you kept them from… touching me," her tone is as algid as the glaciers of her homeland, but the rattle of Katara's bones is so prominent that he shakes along with her. "It could have gone a lot worse."
"I wouldn't do you that dishonor," he whispers brokenly, sick at the scenarios he can so acutely guess is conquering her imagination, it's own horrific play dancing along her features.
"I know," she reciprocates, just as gravely, "I know that now."
"You kept your promise. You could have come back, razed our village—"
"And mine," Suki joins Sokka.
"But you didn't."
He frowns. "Those days, my word was the only currency I had that was worth trading."
He doesn't like how they make it—him—sound. Every decent deed he had fulfilled in pursuit of the Avatar was done so as a courtesy mostly to himself. If he was to regain his honor, he had to act with as much honor as his, admittedly dastardly-to-begin-with, mission could provide. Now, Zuko isn't exactly an authority—even on his good days—on altruism but he could at least recognize that in those moments, any clemency administered had been the right thing to do.
"Anyone would have done the same," he defends faintly, then immediately wishes he could take it back when Katara growls.
"No, Zuko," she clenches quivering fingers around the ubiquitous pendant adorning her neck. "No, they wouldn't."
"It's more than that, though," Aang asserts imploringly. "It's just you. It's so obvious, how did we ever not see it before now? It's who you are," he takes a deep breath, the wisdom of a thousand others before him laying siege in his every movement, every syllable. "And who you are is the most honorable guy we know."
He does a double-take.
"You… you really think that?" He shakes his head in frantic incredulity, blood roaring like a storm through his veins. "All of you?"
He looks at each of them in bewilderment—lingers especially on Aang, at the roundness of his cheeks that should be testament to his naiveté yet so contrary to the maturity shadowing his bearing—as if he can divine their rationale through sight alone. He doubts them, and it makes him feel older than sixteen, his cynicism a pallium shackled to his shoulders. But there is a chorus of devout agreeance, Aang's hope a living, tangible thing that he gives to Zuko freely. He fumbles. He doesn't trust the fervor with which it sets him aglow (metaphorically and physically, it would seem, as Sokka comments mildly, "Wow, you're like a heated blanket with how warm you are. Hey, why didn't we think of doing this before?"), but Zuko—even with his infinite skepticism—cannot find it in his fractured heart to reject it.
"Zuko?" Aang prompts, raising his head so he can catch his eye, gray and gold colliding in an affable display of security. "You believe us, don't you?"
"Yeah," Zuko reassures, albeit timorously. He takes a bracing, meditative breath before releasing it, sinking into the downy cosset of their affections as he turns his head to Katara's stomach, lowers his arms to clutch Suki and Sokka closer, bundles Aang on his chest with his heated breath, and secures Toph to his side with a hand to her back. Then, stronger, "Yeah, I guess I do."
When he decided to share his tumultuous past, he thought that he might shatter and they would rejoice at the gravity of his turmoil. But he should have known better than to assume his friends—and how marvelous a notion, to think that he of all people would have a group he is honored to name as such his own—will let him. He knows Suki had called themselves so earlier, but he doesn't quite believe it. Not until now.
"We won't let him touch you again."
It is said through a yawn as one by one, they nod off, until only Zuko and Katara are left to drift close to the edge of lethargy. She strokes tenderly at his hair, so reminiscent of his mother that he feels a familiar burning in his eyes and a lump at the back of his throat once more, all from the simple motion—or so he tells himself.
"Sleep, Zuko," she sweeps away the strands at his forehead before impressing upon it a tender kiss. "No one will hurt you. Not anymore, not ever."
Zuko can take care of himself. The way he's brought up, he's had to. Beyond that, they are at the very front lines of a war—any day, any second, could mean the last for them and they would have no way of knowing until it is upon them, so Katara's asseveration should not have brought him the relief it did. If anything, he should have denied it with the same dose of pessimism realism he approaches most everything in his life.
But perhaps, just this once, he will allow himself the privilege of their refuge. He will allow himself to believe in the vehemency of their promise.
I just wanted to go home, he had said. And this is not a place he pictured himself ever being in, trivialized to a mere furnace, yet strangely he finds he does not mind it (not that he would ever divulge this forthright), not even a little bit. The struggle and strife of his history, of his present, are unchanged, but an effervescence envelops him in spite of the five bodies weighing him down.
Maybe even because of them.
He closes his eyes when Katara has another go at running her fingers through his hair. He can almost conjure the ghost of his mother's smile when she used to employ the same tactics to lull him to slumber. He thinks of his uncle, mistifying and genteel and terrifying and loving all at once, sitting vigil at his bedside when fever and delirium took him during those early days of recovery, and long after then, whether or not he admitted to his desire for him to stay. He compares this house and everything it represents—a relic to his family's happiness—to this strangely colorful and caring mismatch of a rugged group that someway, somehow, just manages to fit perfectly into his arms. He tightens his embrace, and it suddenly hits him.
He supposes home was something he could carry with him all along.
"Sleep," Katara hums.
And so he does.
Later, much later, when the power from the comet has receded to the faintest of throbs, and his sister is sedated and heavily guarded while his father is in chains at the bottom of the most isolated prison in the Fire Nation, their fates to be decided in the coming weeks by a tribunal composed of the remaining leaders from all nations—when he retires to his room in lieu of that of the Fire Lord's (despite the mantle and all it entails, both the sordid and the noble, falling solely onto his shoulders), and he sports yet another scar, a burn, that he will bear just as proudly as the first and more fiercely than even his eminent title, for there was no higher honor than protecting a friend—when his uncle has resumed his seat, snoring soundly and deservedly on an armchair next to his vast four-poster, always at his side as if they had never parted for even one second, and he is sandwiched between his two most favorite twelve-year olds in the world, Toph as unmindful of his injury as one would expect her to be when she plants her sleep-dead body right atop his chest, and Aang entirely all too much, curled into a ball that hardly breaches his space, apart from his head as he dozes lightly on his shoulder—when Sokka and Suki are passed out at the foot of his bed, his leg a pillow for their weary heads and their bodies as tangled onto each other despite Sokka's own bandaged leg (like the kindred souls he knows them to be, like magnets helpless against each other's pull), and Katara has expelled the last of her curative waters on him, much to his insistence that he doesn't need it any longer, before she sinks into the only unoccupied space above him on his bed—when they lie there in the first quiet they've achieved since they all adjourned here, their heads touching and their breathing in sync—he opens his eyes.
"You did it, Zuko," Katara's voice is a susurrant trill tinged with exaltation and pride. "You're home."
As he does then, he does again now, and tightens his hold—a hand to steady Aang's lolling head, another at Toph's back to still her fitful body, his leg pushing to burrow the blanket further into Suki's side, and the fireplace flaring with his breath to heat the figures he cannot reach. The difference in this embrace, however, is in the absence of doubt and the lack of fear, replaced with all the affluence of his adoration—unhindered and abounding.
"Yeah."
It is his turn to press a kiss onto her forehead, lips moving tired but no less grateful and indulgent.
Cradled in the warmth of everyone he loves and cares about, he is quite inclined to agree.
"I am home."
Mmmmmm. Mm. M. M. M. M