AN: \v.v/ (ta daaa) Thanks, reviewers!
Somebody asked about Tyno... and yeah, he'll be back. Also! Toph and Aang will finally be returning in the next few/several chapters. Hooray!
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Zuko was already gritting his teeth when he arrived at the informal dining room where Azula took most of her meals. He didn't like this room, probably because he associated it with word games and the subtle grillings he had endured here. Azula was seated at one end of a long rectangular table, sipping from a fragile porcelain cup. Her eyes followed him as he took his place opposite her.
"Wine, brother?" She waved a hand and a servant rushed to fill his empty cup. "It's a special summer variety. I've broken it out some months early, but the warm flavor is said to pair well with roast duck."
Zuko met her gaze and tried not to think about her choice to order water fowl. "Sounds great."
"You'll thank me later."
Servants brought out a selection of delicacies on several tiny plates and Zuko ate in tense silence, made only more uncomfortable by Azula's apparent ease. She tasted each plate before her one at a time, then selected a plate to push forward and began the process again. She was eliminating her least favorite dishes. Her servants looked on with rapt but well-concealed attention.
"In case you were wondering," Azula finally said as she pushed forward the third dish, "you made a mistake today."
Zuko's eyes flicked to the servant waiting to refill his untouched wine cup, then back to Azula. "I don't remember asking you."
"Advice freely given, then. Whatever you're hoping to accomplish, this arrangement will only complicate matters."
"They're royal hostages. They belong in a royal suite."
"But yours, Zuko?"
Zuko's mouth twisted and he glared at her raised eyebrow, her knowing little smile. He had thought a lot about this subject in preparation for this meeting, but now that the moment had come to defend his decision, his heart was still in his throat. "The Water Tribe lives communally. Keeping them close is a show of respect."
"Which they have done what, exactly, to earn?"
"When I lived among them, they had the courtesy to treat me as a guest, even knowing full well who I was."
"And that worked out so well for them."
Feeling abruptly queazy, Zuko set down his chopsticks and sipped the wine. It was as good as Azula had hinted, and that only bothered him more.
Azula sighed and, with a gesture, called for the next course. Servants cleared away the small plates and replaced them with bowls of rice and dishes of sliced roast duck.
Roast duck was one of Iroh's favorites. Zuko took a few bites and felt strange. His throat hurt. Perhaps he'd swallowed a bone.
Azula was watching him like he was throwing some kind of tantrum and she was sick of it. "Think, Zuko. The ship is full of secure rooms. At least put them far enough away that you won't be the first casualty when they try to escape."
Zuko turned a piece of duck over and over on top of his rice. "I realize that it's a risk," he said at last. "But Katara alone is going to be a problem during the full moon, no matter where she is."
"I doubt she could do much damage in the brig."
"Then you're underestimating her." Zuko straightened and frowned down the table. "She's resourceful. She finds water in places you'd never expect. The last time Katara stood under a full moon, I watched her almost single-handedly take out Zhao's supply station - because he had her brother. Keeping them separated would be a mistake."
Azula assessed him in much the same way she had on that beach, when Zuko had redirected her lightning. "You expect her to escape with her brother and leave the Avatar behind?"
"No. I told you she'd never leave her friends. But Sokka could slow her down on her way to break into the brig. She'll try to protect him, no matter the cost."
Zuko's stomach was cramping. He set down his chopsticks again. He didn't like thinking about this, about Katara in a fight while pregnant. He didn't like to think of the guards closing in on her. He didn't like to think of fighting her himself - really fighting her, and all the brutal desperation that entailed now that so much hung in the balance. There had to be some way of preventing that fight, but he didn't like the ideas that were occurring to him and time was running out.
"I suppose you would know," Azula said, "but I wish you'd take the time to consider how this situation looks. It wouldn't seem so deviant if it was just the waterbender."
Zuko frowned at her, not understanding but feeling a whole new discomfort growing all the same.
Azula plucked up a morsel of duck and watched him dryly. "You aren't the first prince to bring home spoils of war, but you might be the first to keep foreign royal siblings in an adjoined room like concubines."
Zuko jerked back from the table, upsetting his wine without even noticing. "It's not like that at all!"
"The truth is merely one more version of a story when it passes through the Fire Court, Zuko." Azula shrugged minutely and ate her bite of duck. "But by all means, don't let me prevent you from doing things your way."
Hot-faced and far past the point of choking down another bite, Zuko surged to his feet and stalked from the room. Anything to get away from this budding horror.
He was used to storming down the stairs, through the corridor, and into his empty sitting room, so when he burst through the door and found two young dignitaries sitting at his table eating noodles, he froze.
They looked so different in shades of red, though Zuko couldn't have said why. Even with their wolf-tails, they looked refined. Katara had shunned the skirts in favor of loose pants, but the splits in the sides of her long tunic made this the most feminine clothing he had seen her in since that parka at the South Pole. If that even counted as feminine. Which, to Zuko, it didn't.
She looked beautiful, subtly elegant as she paused with her wrist bent and her chopsticks poised over her bowl. She looked like she belonged in a palace. But even in fine clothes, even in chains, she did not look like a concubine. Zuko nearly cringed with relief.
"What do you want?" she demanded.
At her tone, all the guards stiffened. Where he hovered discretely behind her, Yotsu snapped his eyes up to gape at her. Sokka just raised his eyebrows at Zuko inquiringly as if to echo the question.
Zuko didn't look at any of them. He just glared down at Katara, the epicenter of all his problems. "Leave us."
The guards clanked out and Yotsu followed, shutting the door behind him. A fragile silence stretched.
"Wait," Sokka said. "Were we supposed to go, too?"
"I don't care how much you hate me. If you disrespect me in front of my subjects again," Zuko enunciated, never tearing his eyes from Katara's rebellious glare, "Sokka goes back in the brig and you will stay here with me, alone."
Katara's mouth tightened. She looked like she was trying to think of a way to fight him, even though he held every advantage. Zuko wasn't sure whether he wanted to shout at her or kiss the hard line of her mouth until it softened to him again. He gritted his teeth and did neither.
"Do you understand?"
"I want to see Aang and Toph," she bit out. "Let me see them, and I'll behave."
"This isn't a negotiation! If you don't do as I say, you lose the privilege of seeing your brother. End of story."
Her nostrils flared and she only glared harder. "It'll be a lot easier to stomach pretending to respect you if you do something worthy of it."
Sokka leaned back from the table as if the air between them had grown too hot, but Zuko didn't notice. He stalked toward her and stood just on the other side of the table, a leap away, blind with fury.
"What does it take, Katara? Because I've made a fool of myself for you over and over. I'm risking everything to let you live here so you'll be safe and comfortable. I've offered you freedom, a throne, everything I have - and you'd rather suffer and spit in my face than compromise." His hands, unnoticed, had balled into fists. "Do you want me to be cruel? Do you want me to live up to your worst expectations? Is that what it's going to take to make me worthy of your respect?"
Katara met his stare for a long, still moment. She spoke in a perfectly level voice. "I want to see Toph and Aang."
Zuko glared at her viciously, then spun away in a flash of fire and burst through his bedroom door. It thundered shut behind him. He ripped the curtains from his window and burned them to a heap of ash. He kicked his too-large pallet hard enough to send it slamming flat against the wall. He drew back to blast fire at his own altar- and stopped. And sat down hard with his elbows on his knees and his face in his hands.
No matter what he did, nothing worked out in his favor. He was going to return to the Fire Nation a laughing stock with an insubordinate concubine that he was too weak to discipline. No, two insubordinate concubines. People would think he was some kind of spineless incestuous pervert. It wouldn't matter that he'd captured the Avatar, he would still be an embarrassment to his father. Disgraceful.
And at some point, word would get out that Katara was pregnant. And that… Zuko hadn't really thought much about how that news would be received back home. He'd been avoiding thinking about it all day, actually. It was a headache waiting to happen, and he already had so many of those.
Zuko shoved the heels of his hands into his eyes and flung himself flat on the floor. What was he going to do?
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"Wow," Sokka said, staring at Zuko's door as the silence solidified. "That was intense."
Katara thunked her bowl down on the table so hard she sent a chop stick flying, but she hardly noticed. "He's a spoiled child. He thinks he can order me around like one of his servants. I might be in chains, but I'd rather die than obey him."
Sokka peered at her thoughtfully. "Did he really offer to free you? As in, no chains?"
Katara shot him a dirty look. "It would just be a trade-in, Sokka. I might get out of the cuffs but I would have had to agree to conditions."
"What conditions?"
"I didn't ask, but I think 'I promise to never escape' was probably on the list."
Sokka scooted a few inches closer to her and spoke more quietly, but his eyes were wide. "And you didn't think about maybe just lying so you could get us all out of here?"
Katara scowled at him, then at the remnants of her noodles. "I don't have to lie to beat him."
"Katara, this isn't the time to take a principled stance against fibbing. We have to get Aang off this ship." He shot a sideways look at that door again. "And, call me crazy, but I really don't think Zuko has hit his worst yet. He's been tightly wound since we got on this ship, and I don't want to see what happens when he snaps."
"Me neither," Katara sighed, rubbing her fingertips through the short hair on the back of her head. "Listen, Sokka, it's too late to try the easy way now. We just have to wait a little longer, anyway. The full moon is in three days. With enough food and water, I'll be strong enough then to fight all night if I have to."
"That's good," Sokka said, shaking his head, "because you'll probably need to. Zuko knows how powerful you are. He's not going to take any chances."
"He already has," Katara said, grim-faced, "by ever letting me out of the brig."
Sokka watched her for a second, then put his hand on her shoulder. "About that… Why are you out, exactly? Zuko told me it was for your health, but it was pretty obvious that he was trying to keep something from me."
Katara's gut clenched and she refused to look at him. She had been dreading this moment. "I'm not totally sure, either. I mean… there is this one thing, but I don't know what Zuko's trying to accomplish by moving me."
"Okay, so what's the one thing?"
"I, um…" Katara licked her lips and looked down at her hands twisting in her lap. "I might be, I mean I'm pretty much positive now that I am… um, pregnant."
She didn't look up as the quiet stretched out, so she didn't see the understanding break on Sokka's face, and she didn't see his eyes flit over to the empty spot on the wall where a Fire Nation tapestry had been hanging just a few hours ago. She felt it, though, when Sokka hugged her. She squeezed him back for a long while, desperately tight.
When they finally parted, Katara cleared her throat. "An illegitimate child can still make a claim on the throne in the Fire Nation. So I'm going to raise him to be a better Fire Lord than his ancestors."
"And that's what you told Zuko, huh?" Sokka rubbed the back of his neck and puffed out a breath. "No wonder he's been such a basket case."
"Don't sympathize with him!" Katara hissed.
"I'm not! I'm just saying I could see how I'd act like a moody jerk, too, if I was trying to look after the mother of my child and she was challenging me in every way she could think of."
"He's not trying to look after me, Sokka. He's buttering me up. Just wait. He'll be offering me some medicinal tea or something in no time."
Sokka peered at her, then at Zuko's door. "You're probably right. He doesn't really… think like we do, does he?"
Katara made a disgusted noise and cast her eyes over this strange room with its opulence and rigid tidiness. To grow up in a place like this must have warped Zuko's brain.
"Hey," Sokka said, grinning, "wanna go turn the lamps out in our room and sleep in the dark?"
Katara grinned back, and when she followed Sokka into their room, she left her thoughts of Zuko behind.
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For the entire next day, Zuko stayed out of his quarters. He rose and ate early, then met briefly with Lieutenant Roshu. What he learned of the man set his mind at ease. A good soldier and an honorable Fire Nation man. Zuko gave his new orders and sent him to join the guards in the royal suite.
After that, he practiced firebending on deck under the rheumy eyes of Lo and Li. They had unnerved him as a boy, and his lessons with them had suffered for it. Now, though, he just found them dull. He listened to their reedy voices as they told him (often at the same time) what was wrong with his form. It was irritating, but still better than talking to Katara.
"So much anger! So much power!"
"But to harness it, you must narrow your focus."
"Quiet your mind."
"Breathe," they said together, "and let your passion burn through you."
Zuko began his kata anew, but his knee had started throbbing again and his mind would not still. Iroh had always told him that power in firebending came from the breath, not muscle or emotion. Yet Azula was an astounding bender and she had trained for years under Li and Lo. Maybe Iroh had been wrong.
Iroh had been wrong about other things.
Zuko trained without rest until the sun had long passed its peak, then snapped some orders and stalked down the stairs and corridors to the drill room. He did not have to wait long before the guards escorted Sokka through the door. Their eyes locked and held while the guards removed his chains and then retreated to the edges of the room.
Sokka stood over his sword where it waited for him on the floor, but did not pick it up. "So we're going to keep doing this, huh?"
"Until you yield or I kill you."
Sokka watched him for a long moment, then shrugged. In a rush, he snatched up his weapon and waded in, his expression stony. They fought until both were breathing hard and sore from several minor hits. Zuko had just shoved Sokka away and was about to press the attack when his knee spasmed. With a grunt, he adjusted his stance to the defensive. But instead of attacking, Sokka spoke.
"Katara told me," he said, low enough that the guards wouldn't hear.
Zuko stiffened. The sweat on the back of his neck went cold. "Told you what?"
"About your kid."
It was like he'd been kicked in the chest. For some reason, he had thought this wouldn't come up here. Fighting Sokka was the simplest thing in Zuko's life right now. He wasn't ready to face this, but he swallowed and held his head high, and waited for the attack that was sure to come.
But Sokka just watched him, a more thoughtful look on his face. "I don't really know what to believe about you anymore and I'm not sure whether I should hate you or just be angry." He shrugged, shaking his head. "But despite everything you've done, I kind of still want to believe that you really are too honorable to turn into the kind of man who imposes his will on his family."
Zuko scowled, as confused as he was angry. "I wouldn't exactly call Katara family."
Sokka fixed him with a dry frown. "You think the kid could possibly be anyone else's?"
"No!"
"Then you and Katara started a family. A crappy, divided family that probably shouldn't exist but does." Zuko opened his mouth to contest that but Sokka just surged on. "Look, you don't have to like each other to share responsibility for your kid. Is that what you want to do or am I misreading that nest you built for her?"
Zuko felt himself blushing and glared off to one side. He should bark something, raise his sword, anything to make Sokka just shut up, but his knee was throbbing with every beat of his heart. When he opened his mouth the wrong words came out.
"She makes it so hard to do what's right."
"Yeah, so… maybe I can help you out with that."
Zuko shot him a suspicious look, but Sokka just shrugged.
"I know Katara's putting you in a tight spot, and you're looking for a way out of doing a whole lot of stuff you don't want to do just to save face. So," Sokka said, taking a big breath, "because I love my sister and I want her to be safe, I've decided to make life a little easier for you."
Zuko frowned at him and was about to demand what that was supposed to mean, but Sokka moved first. He threw down his sword and held up his hands.
"I yield," Sokka said loudly. "You're clearly never going to give up, and I'm never going to beat you."
There was a shuffle from the guards still waiting by the door, but Zuko just stared at Sokka and mentally scrambled to understand what he was playing at.
"You win, Prince Zuko." Sokka bowed his head. He waited a second and then looked up significantly. "I pay my respects to a superior fighter."
Zuko watched him an instant longer, then stiffened his spine. "I accept your surrender…" He watched the other man straighten, then dropped his own sword on the mat. It made a heavy steel sound and a rush of air like a sigh. "…Prince Sokka."
Sokka's eyes shone as if he wanted to make a joke, so Zuko turned away and made for the door, struggling to keep the limp from his stride. As he approached the guards, they stared straight ahead, more alert than usual. "Take him to the healer, then back to my sitting room," he bit out.
As Zuko stormed up the stairs, he fought the urge to hit something with each step. His knee was screaming, his mind was racing, and he was furious - and he wasn't sure why. After all, hadn't he wanted this? Hadn't he wanted Sokka to admit defeat and just get it over with? Now that it was done, though, Zuko felt… wrong. Not exactly cheated. Just wrong.
He stalked into his sitting room and was immediately annoyed by all the guards loitering around. Guards, Lieutenant Roshu, and Yotsu, but no Katara. Probably, she preferred being alone in her room to being watched by all these strange men.
"Out," Zuko barked. They hustled to obey, but Zuko wasn't watching anymore. He banged through to his own room and, though he didn't notice that the bed had been straightened and the drapes were replaced, he did see the basin of water waiting and felt a surge of gratitude for Yotsu. He would bathe, and it would calm him before he had to sit down for dinner with Sokka and Katara.
Zuko had stripped off his clothes and pressed a few handfuls of water to his face and was actually starting to unwind a little when he heard his bedroom door unlatch behind him.
He froze. It wouldn't be Yotsu. He would announce himself. And the suite had been empty… except for… but she wouldn't just…
The door opened slowly. There was a rattle of chains.
For a long moment, Zuko waited, hardly daring to breathe as water dripped from his nose and chin. She had stopped in the doorway, and there was no way she could miss seeing him where he knelt in the middle of the room. There was no way she wouldn't see that he was naked. Any second, she was going to think better of this and Zuko would hear the door shut behind her as she left.
But the door didn't shut. She wasn't leaving. What did she want? Why wasn't she speaking? At last, Zuko schooled his features and turned to face her.
Katara stood leaning against the door jamb with her arms crossed. "Where is Sokka?" she asked quietly.
Zuko held himself steady, very aware of her unflinching gaze. Despite their times together in the dark, despite all the ways she had touched him, she had never seen him naked before. And maybe it didn't matter to her anymore, but it kind of mattered to Zuko. He didn't want to stand up and expose himself to her unless he absolutely had to.
"He'll be here soon," Zuko said in a hard, level tone. "He's fine. Now, get out."
"That's not what I asked."
Katara raised a hand and Zuko whipped around to find the water rising up from the basin in a long, glistening tendril. It reared up before him like a viper and hovered there. Zuko braced himself to bat it from the air with his fire, but remained still, waiting for the attack. It didn't come.
"Did you send my brother to that enslaved healer to tidy up the damage you caused?"
"Yes." Realizing how bad this sounded, Zuko went on. "We didn't fight for long today so there wasn't much to heal, but that's where he is."
The water swayed before him. "And yet here you are, the mighty Crown Prince of the Fire Nation, covered in bruises and bathing on the floor like a peasant. What, no waterbending healer slave to serve you, Prince Zuko?"
"Katara," Zuko snapped, "stop this." To his horror, his body was beginning to react - to her gaze, her threatening voice, her righteous scorn, he wasn't sure. If he stood to face her now, she couldn't help but see that he was hardening. She would be scandalized. She would think he wasn't taking her threat seriously. And he was. "I don't want to fight you," he said, and in so many ways it was the truth.
But it was also a lie.
"Oh, you mean you'd rather just threaten me when you feel like it?" Katara laughed mirthlessly. "I'm sorry Zuko. You lost that option when you moved me in next door."
"Well if I'd thought you would come into my room to harass me while I was naked," Zuko said through his teeth, "I would have locked you in."
Katara was silent for several long seconds. Then the water returned to the basin with deceptive gentleness. "Don't think I don't know what you're up to, Zuko. You can talk about your good intentions all you want, but I'm not buying it. I don't trust you, and the next time you get in my way, I won't hesitate to take you out."
Zuko glared over his shoulder at her, but Katara had already withdrawn, quietly shutting the door as she went.
He slumped and passed a hand through his hair and allowed himself several rapid breaths. Moments later, muffled by his door, he heard the sound of the guards returning with Sokka.
Sokka… Did he really mean to help Zuko or was Katara's little show of strength just now a part of some elaborate strategy between them? No, that couldn't be. Sokka would never approve of Katara coming into Zuko's room at all, much less while he was in a state of undress. Katara had to be acting without his knowledge. And if Sokka didn't know, Zuko sure wasn't going to tell him.
No, he would deal with this directly.
Zuko finished his bath, but it wasn't the calming time he had anticipated. His mind was whirring and every splash of luke-warm water against his skin was equally unnerving and arousing.
.
.
Katara sat on her side of the screen while Sokka got cleaned up on his. He was saying something about appearances, but she wasn't listening anymore.
She was thinking about earlier, when she'd heard Zuko blow through the sitting room and dismiss everyone, when she'd peeked out, hoping to see Sokka and had instead only heard the quiet splashes coming from behind the other door. She hadn't really thought it would be unlocked when she tried the knob. But it was. And there he was.
Now, Katara scratched the side of her neck and glowered at the floor between her feet and tried to focus on the right things. Not the muscular sweep of his back or the curve of his pale backside. Not the spectrum of bruises on his chest or the big red scar on his shoulder. What was important was that she'd made a stand. She'd shown him he could bellow all he wanted but he still had every reason to be afraid of her here, no matter the chains she wore.
But she kept thinking about that scar. The scar he'd gotten helping her rescue Sokka. She remembered healing it by the campfire, how strong and fine he had seemed that night. He'd said he would marry her that night. Make her Fire Lady.
Katara fiddled with her manacle and glowered at the floor. None of that should matter now. Clearly, it didn't matter to Zuko. Not like it mattered to her. All Zuko wanted was to dominate her and bend her to his will. Two days left until the full moon - she couldn't wait to escape.
And when she was out of here, she could forget all about the peculiar edge in his voice when he was angry and afraid, that edge that sounded so like desire.
"…could at least try to seem like you care." Sokka stepped out from behind the screen, dressed and ready. "Have you even been listening?"
Katara straightened up. "Huh? Oh, about the appearances, right. I totally agree, Sokka!"
He frowned at her. "Right. So you promise to be polite at dinner?"
"Polite? I'm always polite. When am I ever not polite?"
"To Zuko."
Katara stiffened and shot him a horrified look, then scowled, but Sokka quietly rushed on before she could protest.
"Look, we don't have a lot of time left before the full moon. You could spend that time embarrassing him in front of his servants if you really want to, but that means I'll probably end up back in the brig. That's one more cell for you to bust open, and one less pair of hands to help you save Aang. Or," Sokka said, holding up his hands as if to calm her, "you could play nice for two days and we can take Zuko down together."
Katara frowned up at him, then sighed and gave her head a helpless shake. "Sokka, I don't know if I can do it…"
"Little sister," Sokka said as he knelt down in front of her and grabbed her shoulders, "if there's anyone I know who can be nice to someone just to make a point, it's you."
