When Lee wakes up, it takes him a moment to figure out where he is. A sea breeze blows in, sharp and cold, warning of an early winter.
For a few seconds, he believes he's back in the cave, still surrounded by an uncaring, and nearly silent world.
Then, he remembers Cinderman, the village, and his ongoing nightmare.
He's in the Avatar Shrine, lying next to the finished Sky Bison statue.
"Was wondering when you'd wake up." The keeper man's voice startles him from off to his left.
The man stands with his arms crossed, a concerned expression on his face.
"What am I doing here?" Lee wonders aloud.
"You stumbled in here last night, calling out for your brother. You seemed to think you were in Ba Sing Se. When you saw me, you thought I was him. So, I just talked with you for a while until you laid back down. You were asleep the whole time."
"I really should just tie myself to the bed." He pouts. "I'm sick of everybody knowing my business."
"Then you should stop spending time in small villages." The man sits beside him, a bemused smile on his face. "Word tends to spread quickly."
"Do they think I'm crazy?"
"Doesn't matter what they think."
Lee groans. Not this again!
"I think they think I'm crazy. Who sleepwalks every night?
"Doesn't matter what they think." The man repeats, in the same tone of voice.
Lee stands up, intent on ending the conversation and going back to Ye Wan's home.
"Where are you going?" The man asks.
"Home."
"Where is that?"
"You know where I live!"
"No need to shout."
"ARGH!" Lee stomps off. The wind wraps around him again, and again he feels it's wild call.
If I start now, I could be in Ba Sing Se before winter.
He shakes his head to banish the thought.
Just how would I travel alone? I could probably find my way, but I'm not a Bender. There are bandits.
Giving up that line of thought, he enters Ye Wan's house.
"Lee! Where have you been? I've been so worried!" Ye Wan hugs him and ushers him to a seat at the table. She sets a steaming cup of tea before him.
"I sleepwalked to the Shrine. The keeper found me." He replies. The wind whispers enticingly at the edge of the window.
"We really might need to tie you down. You could go wandering off the cliff!"
"That's what I said, basically." He mutters.
A sudden inspiration flashes through his mind.
"Hey, would you go to Ba Sing Se with me?" He asks. "I want to find my brother."
Ye Wan sets rice before him and returns to washing dishes behind him.
"Maybe next year, Lee. It's getting cold at night now. Not a good time for traveling." She says.
"But he might be gone next year! He might move! Or maybe he'll go back home, looking for me!" Lee says.
"Lee, how long has it been since you've seen your brother?" She asks, softly.
"Around three years." He replies, sullenly. He gets a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach.
"He could have moved in those three years. He may not be in Ba Sing Se. If he were going to go home, don't you think you would have seen him already?"
She sits beside him and rubs his shoulder.
"What are you saying?" He asks, warily.
"I'm saying that maybe your brother isn't coming. The Siege of Ba Sing Se was pretty bad. We lost many good soldiers." The pity he's beginning to hear in everyone's voice makes itself known in hers.
"My brother is alive! I know he is! I have to find him! You said you'd help me!" He shouts, betrayal sharp and stinging in his chest.
"We are helping you, Lee. We're giving you a warm place to sleep, food, an education, and a guaranteed job when you're older. You'll want for nothing in this village with us. That's more than a lot of people in this world can say." She reaches again for his shoulder.
"No!" He jerks away from her, ignoring the hurt expression on her face. "I wanted to find my brother. All you people have done is try to distract me! I stayed with you because Cinderman lied! And Hua lied! I stayed because I didn't want to go with them, because I didn't trust them! But it's you people I shouldn't trust! I have to find Sensu, and all you're doing is saying it isn't possible and keeping me here! You don't know Sensu, you don't know what's possible! He's alive and I have to find him, and nothing and no one is going to stop me!" He sprints out of the house, bounding over the fields and into the woods.
He can't see where he's going due to the tears blurring his eyes, but he keeps running.
Eventually, he can't go any further and collapses in a heap, trying to catch his breath.
"You can still catch up, you know." Weilai says, sitting beside him as though he's been there a while.
"How? They're already in Gao Ling." Lee rasps. A sob shudders through his body, but with no breath to give it sound.
"They're not here."
"Yeah, I know that."
"Go get your stuff, you can catch up to them." Weilai urges.
"Why do you feel so sure?"
"You're not?" Surprise is evident in his voice.
"I'm not sure of anything anymore. Other than the facts that I want to find Sensu, and these people have no intention of helping me do that."
"Then follow those facts. Just start looking for Sensu."
"How? I don't have anyone to protect me, I can't find enough food on my own, and it's getting too cold to travel." A bitter laugh works it's way past Lee's lips.
"I thought those were the things "those people" told you to stop you from leaving. Are those your reasons, or theirs?" Weilai asks, making air quotes.
"Maybe they aren't entirely wrong." The sinking feeling in his stomach comes back.
"Maybe. But the only right decision is the one you make. Are you going, or staying?" Weilai leans back against a tree and watches him.
Lee thinks through his time in the village. How he'd hated being there with Cinderman, even if he was going to find his brother. How fun the prospect of a journey had been. How bored he's been since. And Ye Wan's betrayal, along with everyone else in the village.
It had been nice to have Sensu with him in spirit. To know the people he'd known, play the games with them that he'd played, to sit in the very schoolroom that his brother had disappeared every autumn to.
But the echo of Sensu's laugh bounces around in his head. The dreams he's had of meeting Sensu in Ba Sing Se, seeing it's famous walls.
The wind calls to him again, crisp and cold and clear through the trees, the scent of the forest autumn upon it's breath, beckoning him to follow it to the ends of the world.
"I'm going." He says, standing up and walking.
"You're going the wrong way, Lee." Weilai hops up from his position against the tree and follows him.
"I know. I want my pictures. And Sensu's tea. He'll kill me if I let that go to waste. You know how expensive and rare White Dragon Tea is?"
Weilai just laughs, and then is gone as though he was never there.
When Lee gets back to Ye Wan's home, there is nobody there. The village is oddly quiet until he sees everybody by the town square.
He hears the voice of the Shrine keeper yelling at everyone to just "let the boy do as he sees fit! He's got to make his own choices sometime!".
He ducks inside the house, grabs a waterproof bag and tucks his pictures and the tea beside it. He throws in a few changes of his new clothes to try to cushion the precious items and then heads back towards the woods as quickly and quietly as he can.
He ties the bag to his belt and jogs a ways in until he's sure that no search parties resulting from the impromptu town meeting will find him.
The trees haven't yet dropped their leaves, and above him is a vibrant canopy of colors. The deep blue of the sky is a stark, but perfect contrast to the reds, oranges, and yellows.
He takes a deep breath, feeling more calm and alive than he's felt since the fire. He slows to a walk, intent on enjoying the world around him.
He heads east, sure that if he keeps the mountains on his left the he'll stumble across Gao Ling eventually.
The sun gets lower in the sky and the air gets colder. Lee forgot his coat. He unties his bag and put as many of his extra clothes on as he can.
Shivering, he continues on.
The scent of rain tickles slowly at his consciousness, becoming more sharp and persistent over time.
He glances up when the last rays of the sun disappear and the first drops of rain start to fall.
He walks faster, eyes darting for a hollow trunk or a rocky overhang to hide under.
The wind blows bitter cold, bolting right through his clothes and stealing away whatever warmth had been left in him.
He finds a river, starts to follow it, remembering Dad's advice to head for water if he ever got lost, because villages and towns are usually by water.
The rain drives at him harder,and although he knows it's pointless, he starts to run. He continues looking for signs of shelter.
His breath coming in gasps, he has to slow to a miserable walk once more after a few minutes.
The darkness closes in, like it did in the Spirit World, only now nobody was coming to save him.
A terrible hole opens inside of him, and his stomach twists into knots.
"Weilai? Weilai, where are you?! Help me!" He calls out into the black, howling night.
The river's cheerful burbling sound has long since become an intimidating roar, fighting with the icy wind for his attention.
Lee considers sitting down and just waiting, but he knows that if he does it will be the last thing he'll ever do. It's too cold to stop completely, and too cold to run. Unless he finds somewhere to get out of the elements, he needs to keep moving now.
A giant gust of wind blows him sideways, he trips over a stump while trying to get his feet back underneath him and before he knows it, a surge of icy water covers his face, fills his eyes, ears, mouth and nose. A surprised gasp draws more water in, and coughing and spluttering, he struggles for the surface.
Repeatedly, he pushes off the bottom of the river, and it keeps pulling him back down. His limbs are tiring quickly and he can't keep fighting. He slowly relaxes and is surprised to find that his body floats. He can't see where he's going, and occasionally he's swirled back under in the eddies, but he floats!
Once the giddiness from this discovery fades, he discovers something else: He is still very cold. Getting colder, and dawn is a long, long way away.
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He feels warm. Almost too warm. No, not almost. Way too blistering hot! His skin is on fire! He can see it, flames dancing across his arms and hissing at him. Despite the water, they persist, and it stings like a thousand wasps. He repeatedly dunks himself in the water, trying to put the fire out. His clothes!
Where are his clothes? Wait, why does that matter? It's too hot for that!
Vaguely, he hears someone call his name. Who is that? Whoever it is sounds pretty worried. And maybe mad.
A wavering image of someone nearly twice his height and a face that is a swirl of white and red fills his vision. He feels like he knows this guy, but can't seem to remember why.
The guy calls his name again and the earth seems to shake as a pressure is applied to his shoulders.
A girl calls out, her voice weak but very insistent and the earth goes back to the way it was before.
He feels himself falling into the flames again, and he's too tired now to care and the ground rushes up to meet him.
A/N Okay, I'm sorry for the long wait all. It's been a crazy year! As promised, I've been working on this story slowly but steadily. I will be going to a 56 hour work week between two jobs soon, so this is still technically on hiatus, but it's always in my thoughts and whenever I get a chance, I jot something down. Updates will still be rare, but it is being worked on! Thank you to everyone who's read this far, special thanks to any new readers out there! As always, feel free to write a review or send a pm with any advice, constructive criticism, ideas etc.
Shout out to my followers and favoriters: bigadog, NovaOrion, and BethXAngel! Thank you all for reading this increasingly long fic! I hope you enjoy it!
Special thank you and shout out to Matheus Bezerra de Lima for the pm! I really appreciate it and it really made my day! :)
I am working on the next Zuko chapter, but I doubt it will be up before the end of the week. Shouldn't be too long though! After that one, it may be a while.