Oof. Another bruise that Katara always felt complicated about- coming from a place with limited traditions.
Knows they’re there somewhere, had been around at some point, worse to know that than not, worse that she had a glimpse of what her tribe could’ve been like once, crying out for something of her own, something to latch onto, home, that’s my home, and instead, watching in somewhat abject horror as they move forward with Northern advancements and away from any history they could collect.
Might as well have never fucking existed. Her- a living fucking artifact. Felt her people look at her sometimes like she belonged behind a glass case instead of in their society. Something pretty to look at and discuss- look kids, the last southern waterbender, isn’t that interesting? Did you know she’s the reason we were raided? That we joined the war and our entire tribe fell apart and never fucking recovered? Isn’t that neat?
Though that’s not technically true anymore, her being the last southern waterbender, though the blending of the tribes make a lot of lines blur. Doesn’t change the fact she’s still treated more like a walking, talking relic among them than anything else.
She shrugs at Kazik’s question and thinks it comes out more like a wince. “Umm, it’s kind of hard to know because of the, umm, you know-“
Raids. Doesn’t say it out loud. Doesn’t have to.
She sees the realization hit him, and he starts to apologize, but she stops him.
“No, I know, it’s okay. Well, it’s not, I don’t mean it like that, but it’s not your fault.” She thinks they both cringe a little. She looks up at the ceiling and blows out a huff of air and then looks back at him. “Umm, Sokka had a scroll once, I think, when we were little? I don’t know what happened to it.” What does happen to all of the things you used to have when you were little? A random memory of a random doll you haven’t seen in over a decade, and the thought wakes you up in the middle of the night because you have no clue where it’s gone. “I remember some of it. It had a bunch of stories of like, mythical creatures in it. Mostly pictures, really. Dragons and whatnot. I remember one about a sea monster that had a lot of heads and every time you cut one off, two would grow back in its place.”
Kazik tilts his own head at her as she thinks back on Sokka’s old book. Wondered wherever that thing got to, if he still had it or not. The green dragon from her dream- ashes to ashes. Felt so familiar. Did she imagine it all? Wishful thinking from a wishful girl? Poor little Southern child with nothing to show for it.
Her hands fidget, scars smarting from the cold, and she fiddles with her bracelet a little.
She remains thoughtful and thinks of any oral stories passed down. Cold, snowy folklore meant to entertain the war torn children and distract them from their parents being gone.
“Gran told us a story once that she said her mom told her about the seals we have in the South. This was before Gran actually lived in the South, so they didn’t know very much about us, and it was all very mythical to them.” She says this with a smile that felt like she was baring her teeth more than anything. “Well, the story says that the seals we have can shapeshift into humans, and if you manage to steal their seal skin when they’re in human form, they’ll be bound to you for life and unable to return to the ocean unless you choose to give the skin back.”
She looks back at Kazik, and he looks worried, eyes so sweet, her stomach hurts. He reaches a hand out to one of hers, and she nearly hisses when she realizes her own is almost iced over. She’s freezing now, actually, making the air around them unnaturally cold, hem of her sleeves frosty, and she eases up.
“That’s,” he says, watching her carefully, seeming to struggle with how to name it, “well, Katara, that’s sad.”
She shrugs in what she hopes is nonchalance, but the furrow of his brow is unrelenting in the way he’s searching her face, in the way he’s holding her hand, body running hot.
No warm and fuzzy lessons to be learned from these stories, if any. Hasn’t thought about any of these things in so long. Fire Nation dredging up so fucking much from her lately, and she can’t pinpoint the leak. Can’t patch up where all this hurt and softness and fucking debris is coming from. Some younger her getting dragged out and mottled- 14 year old Katara fighting Azula and having a crush and feeling so lost and alone and thinking about all these things she doesn’t understand.
Wonders if you cut off her head, what Kataras would grow back in its place.
“Katara-“ Kazik starts, voice low and soft and something hitches inside her, his hand soothing on her cold skin-
“Katara!” another familiar voice comes from behind her, making both of them jump, and she looks over her shoulder to see Zuko walking brusquely towards them.
The interruption does remind Katara that she and Kazik are still hovering by the front door having this conversation and that she is in fact just holding a basket of herbs for Azula in one hand and Kazik’s hand in the other and that they are dripping all over the palace floor.
Seeming to have the thought at the same time, they break apart from each other, and Katara turns to face Zuko, who, yeah, no, if his face is anything to go by, does not miss the way they separated. A pointed look down at her hand that was just holding Kazik’s and then a sharp look at the guard in question.
She tilts her chin up to him defiantly, daring him to stick his nose in her business.
He comes to stand in front of her, and she feels Kazik retreat the respectable feet back that guards are meant to have and feels the loss of warmth at her back immediately.
She looks up at Zuko, who is looking her over in his own assessment before meeting her eyes. Checking her from head to toe, hands twitching, though he keeps them at his sides. Obsessive man.
He looked less tired today, but there was some look, something on his face that was haunted. Executions, she knows, were not things the Fire Lord wanted to attend. Zuko had seen too much death altogether, too.
“How did it go?” He nods at her basket. He sounded worried. He came when he knew they were back, and he shouldn’t have. He didn’t have time for that, he was Fire Lord-
“They had three out of four of them. They said one of them was an Earth Kingdom one.” Zuko raises his brow and nods a little to himself before looking at her with something stern.
“Does this mean you’re gonna want to take off for the Earth Kingdom now, too?”
Katara huffs something like a laugh. “Spirits, Zuko, let’s start with what we have.”
His expression doesn’t ease. “That wasn’t a no.”
“Can you relax for once? I’m back in one piece, aren’t I? Gods, do we really need to have this conversation again about this overprotective thing? I took your guards and everything.”
He pinches the bridge of his nose. “No, no. We don’t, I swear. I just-“ he places his hands on his hips and looks down at his boots, hair swaying over his shoulder a little, and the effect was unfairly beautiful.
“You just what?” Katara prompts.
He sighs and straightens, crossing his arms over his chest. “Worry, Katara. I just worry when you’re gone. When you’re not here, where I know where you-“he cuts himself off and flushes a little. “I’m glad you’re back.”
Protective, overprotective. Dragon-like urge to hoard everything in his cave and not let it out of his sight.
How many people have left him too? Can’t stand for people he cares about to be away for too long. Wants them close, wants them right where he can see them, even to a fault, sometimes. Spirits, Katara gets it. Could love to the point of suffocation if someone would let her. More and more and more and more and don’t leave and do you promise you’ll come back? Feed that hungry little girl inside herself who wants to drag and accumulate until things can’t be taken away again.
Katara’s heart stutters unevenly in her chest. Can’t help the way it makes it patter something irregular. Don’t, she tells it sternly, you don’t do that anymore, you don’t. Wishes she could bloodbend the damn traitor to even it out. Don’t go there, don’t do it, Katara. You told yourself you wouldn’t fucking do it, don’t poke the sleeping fucking dragon, leave the fucking rock unturned, don’t look under there, don’t fucking-
“Did you drop what you were doing to come down here when you heard we got back?” she asks, gesturing vaguely to her and the front door they were still standing in front of.
Had hardly even been ten minutes.
Stupid, stupid idiot with your stupid fucking stick poking this stupid thing that just hurts you-
He watches her carefully, and she watches him chew on the inside of his cheek.
I just feel very protective of you.
Another reminder to not say the next thing she wants to. Knows she will anyway but gives herself the appropriate minute to pretend she won’t.
“Your guards could’ve told you we made it back,” cocks her head at him, “safe and sound.”
Zuko inhales deeply, can see the way he fills his solar plexus like no matter how much oxygen is in there, there will never be enough.
“That,” he says, pausing for just a second, like he’s giving himself the out, the opportunity to not stoke it either, “isn’t good enough for me.”
It seems he also chose not to listen. Protect you, keep any eye on you, unspoken- protect what’s his-
They watch each other. Katara still dripping on the floor, and Zuko standing stock still, arms crossed like if he moves a muscle, he’d either run towards her or away.
He takes a step closer, so close she really has to tilt her head up now, body heat familiar as always, but his heady scent now joins her senses.
When he speaks, it’s just her name, but it’s low and filled with implications, “Katara-“ she’d never know where he was going with it because as soon as he says it, they hear-
“Zuko.” He practically jerks away from her, and it does not hurt her feelings, it doesn’t, and they both look behind him to see Mai walking towards them in that obnoxiously elegant way she has, and something that feels like an anchor wraps itself around Katara’s heart and throat and drops 200 feet downward.
Another snippet of the newest chapter of my fix The Princess in the Tower
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
