“Good, your fever’s going down. Now how are those ribs?” Her hands trail down from his forehead to the center of his body. “Hmm, not as good as I want them to be. This might hurt a little.”

His chest seizes in pain immediately as she attempts to mend the shattered bones. He wishes he could stop her. He wishes he could burn her hands from his body. He wishes she would let him die. 

“There. That’s better,” she says softly, and opens his mouth to bend water down his throat. 

His fever breaks that night.

She’s not expecting to see his hazy eyes staring back at her when she enters the healing hut. It’s easier to heal Prince Zuko when his eyes are closed and he’s lying still. Now that he’s awake, now that his fever’s broken, now that his bones are on the mend, she wonders what to do with him. 

“You,” he says in a deep, raspy voice, deeper from his illness. “You were at the oasis.”

“Yes.” She stood with Sokka and Yue, trying to protect the moon spirit from Zhao and his men. 

“Katara.”

She wonders why he feels the need to call her by name. She’s surprised he even knows it. 

“I should be dead.”

“You should.”

“The force of Zhao’s attack-”

“I was able to heal most of the burned skin with minimal scarring. The force of the blow shattered your ribs. I had to work quickly to stop the internal bleeding. You’ll have to stay in bed longer, though. You still have a lot of healing left.”

“My uncle?” he asks again. 

“I don’t know.” 

As far as she knows, every Fire Nation soldier drowned in La’s revenge...every single one except Zuko. Sokka tells her La spared him because he would have died from his injuries. Katara thinks La spared him out of gratitude, for delivering the fatal blow to the one who harmed Tui. 

“Who would know?”

“I’ll ask around. Let me check on your ribs.”

Her hands are less steady now that golden eyes watch her every move. 

As soon as he can sit, he starts making demands - for a ship, for parchment, for an audience with the Chief. 

“Eat the food I brought you,” she says, rolling her eyes. She’s starting to prefer him unconscious. “The broth is delicious.”

“I need to let my father know I survived.”

“He knows,” she tells him. Chief Arnook sent word to the Fire Nation, hoping to settle on a ransom. “He knows you killed Admiral Zhao. You’ve been labeled a traitor to the Fire Nation.”

He hurls the bowl of soup at her. She bends it right back at him. 

Sokka urges her not to heal him again, and she’s inclined to agree. She holds out for three days before she wonders how his ribs are faring. 

He’s the only patient in this healing hut. He thinks he knows why. He’s a traitor to the land he’s from and a prisoner to the land he’s in. 

“What will your people do with me?” he asks, while she soothes the bruises beneath his scarred skin, evidence that his bones are moving back where they belong. 

“They’re not my people,” she reveals.

There’s nothing more absurd to him, that this young woman with hands cloaked in healing water, would not consider these people of the Northern Water Tribe hers.

 “I’m from the South. I came here with my brother a few years ago to learn waterbending.”

“I didn’t realize the South had any waterbenders left.”

Her hands still. 

“That’s thanks to your people.” 

He doesn’t see her again for five days. His ribs ache. 

“He’s a liability,” Chief Arnook says. 

“Yeah, especially now that you told the Fire Lord we have him,” mentions Sokka critically. The relationship between the two of them suffers irreparably now that Yue can no longer keep the peace between her father and her husband. 

Katara wonders if this means Sokka will consider leaving the North Pole now. Maybe she can convince him to come home, the way she had to convince him to leave all those years ago. But Sokka will never leave, not when he’s Arnook’s heir by marriage, not when he has a son he has to raise alone. 

This may be her time to leave, however. “I can take him back to the South Pole,” she offers. “That way the threat’s away from here. The Fire Nation won’t attack the South Pole. There’s no need when they’ve already taken everything. The North, on the other hand, has too much to lose.”

“Katara-“ her brother begins. He doesn’t want them to be separated. He still stands by some promise he made to their dad that he would always look after her. But she’s grown up now. She’s a master waterbender. And it’s time to go home and wait for new waterbenders to be born. It’s time for her to teach them. 

“My mind’s made up,” she says. 

Prince Zuko will return to the South Pole with her, as a prisoner of the Southern Water Tribe. 

He’ll trade one icy pole for another, it seems. When he hears the news, he wishes she had let him die. 

“When do we leave?”

“As soon as I think you’re able,” she replies. “It will be a long journey. You’ll need your strength. How do you feel today?”

His body feels better, but nothing else. His mind is raging at the thought of spending the rest of his life in that plundered village of ice and snow. He’s seen it before, briefly when he was under Zhao’s command, as they searched for the Avatar. He never wants to see it again. 

She helps support his weight when he begins walking again. His arm hangs around her shoulders, and though he’s working hard to keep the indignance plastered on his face, she can tell by the stride of his steps that he is eager to walk again. 

They take laps around the hut until his breaths grow heavy, and then she helps him back into his bed. He eats his soup without protest. 

A question persists on the tip of her tongue. It’s bothered her for weeks, and now she feels like he’s in a stable enough mood to answer it. “Why did you kill him?”

Zuko had attacked first, as soon as Zhao struck Tui, not the other way around. Zhao’s final blow, while intended fatally, had been in response to Zuko’s wave of fire. Even on the ground, with shattered bones and melted skin, Zuko rained fire down on Zhao until the admiral’s death. 

She would have done it, had her bending not been taken from her. Sokka would have, if he could have gotten close enough without being burned. Zhao expected this from them, the enemy. He clearly didn’t expect it from Zuko. So she wants to know why he did it.

Why did it matter so much to you?

“The sky’s not supposed to be red,” he replies, reminding her of how it felt to have the moon plucked from the sky, how it felt to be without her bending. “He could have destroyed the whole world. Mortals have no business with the spirits. We can’t understand them.” 

“Yeah, but La would have handled him, like he handled the rest. You didn’t have to.” 

“I didn’t know what La was going to do. I just knew what I had to do.”

“What did you think the mission was here?”

“I was told that we were here in case the Northern Water Tribe was harboring the Avatar. I didn’t know Zhao had other plans until we got to the oasis. No one knew. All those soldiers died fighting blindly.”

“They’re all fighting blindly if they think this war is justified,” she returns.

He’s standing in the healing hut when she comes to check on him. He knows not to leave; there are four guards right outside in case the idea ever strikes him. His back is straight, and if he’s in pain, he hides it well. 

Wordlessly, she sheathes her palms in water and presses them to his chest, searching for lingering damage to the bones. There’s barely any left. 

“I hope you don’t get seasick.”

“I don’t.” 

“We leave in a week,” she decides. A week is enough time to work out the details with Sokka, like where to avoid Fire Nation fleets and how much money she’ll be allowed to take with her, and which vessel she’ll be given. Sokka wants her to take a couple guards too, but she’s hesitant to add more stakes to the clandestine transport of the Fire Lord’s son. 

He smirks. “You shouldn’t have healed me before we left.” 

She’s seen what his hands can do. She won’t let that intimidate her. “You shouldn’t try anything. Not when I know exactly where you’re vulnerable.” Her hands can shatter as well as they can mend. He’ll learn that if he wants to survive the journey. 

He could melt the shackles, but he doesn’t desire to have molten metal coating his wrists. This will be his last morning in the healing hut, and his first morning outside in weeks. Two guards grab him by each arm and force him forward, not that they need to. He has no qualms walking out on his own. He wants to leave this land as much as they want him to. 

For a quick second, he pauses right outside the entrance of the hut, as soon as he feels the sun on his face. 

She brings the glass up to her lips. “I used to love his way with people. He was so good at making everyone love him,” she laughs bitterly. “Now I hate it.”

“No one’s forgotten what he did to you.”

“It certainly seems like it.”

“If you think Toph doesn't advocate for you, or your brother doesn’t want to strangle him every time he shows up, or I don’t take every measure to avoid him, you’re mistaken.”

“How dare he!” She shouts, but who can hear her save him over the fireworks. Down below, it’s a celebration of peace, a tribute to the Avatar’s defeat of his father, a celebration of his reign. She should be celebrating down there. She should be praised for her part in all of it, but as great as Aang’s contributions to the people, he saved all his selfishness for Katara, so now she hides away up here with him.

“Did you see her?”

“Yeah, I saw her.”

She swallows the rest of her drink. He offers to take the glass from her, but she refuses. “Don’t look at me like that,” she tells him. “All pitifully, like I’m some sad, pathetic, pining-“

“I don’t think that at all, Katara. I’m angry with him too. My uncle told me the spirits will punish him. It is the greatest dishonor to them when a man shames his wife.”

“He seems to be doing just fine.” As an afterthought, she adds, “Besides I’m not his wife anymore. I’m a divorced woman. A divorced woman who needs another drink.”

He doesn’t stop her. In fact, he offers to share one with her. He has a bottle of fire whiskey hidden away in his personal bedroom, so he ushers them inside and takes the bottle out of its chest.

“Don’t you hate how the words follow you?”

“What do you mean?”

“Once you’re marked with one, that’s all they see you as - banished, divorced,” he throws in another one of his own, “widower.”

She pours her empty glass to the brim with whiskey and takes a long sip, grimacing as it goes down. “You were so handsome on your wedding day. So unbelievably handsome,” she says in response, giggling as she says it.

It is so different from the usual awkwardness that occurs when he mentions his late wife that he laughs in relief. “Thanks, I guess.”

“You’re so tall.”

“Am I?”

“Yes. And handsome.” Another firework shoots off in the distance, and she drinks some more. “And your daughter,” she pauses heavily, and Zuko suddenly remembers how hard it is for her to see Izumi and Lin and Sokka’s brood of children; yet, she loves them all more than anything. “Your daughter is so beautiful.”

“She gets that from Mai.”

“She gets that from both of you.” Another sip. Another tear on her cheek. She wipes it away hastily. He should tell her to take it easy with the whiskey, but the warning dies on his lips. Healing a nation is easier than healing a heart; he knows this personally.

“I propose a toast,” she says, “to Aang and his new whatever-she-is. Spirits help her if she has his child.”

"Katara-"

“I’m going to bed,” she decides. “I’m getting tired.”

“I’ll call a guard to escort you.”

“No, the people talk enough as it is. I don’t want anyone seeing the divorced woman leaving the widower's bedroom.”

He wants to hold her, or at least offer some of his uncle’s wise advice, but it’s all useless.

“Goodnight, Katara.”

“Goodnight, Zuko.” She turns to leave, but pauses just before she reaches his grand double doors. “Or…”

“Or?” He prompts.

“Or I could...stay.” Her hands reach for her robes. She loosens the sash but holds the beautiful pink silk tightly closed around her body.

He swallows hard. “You could.”

“Should I?”

“You should.”

“When do the servants come?”

“Sunrise.”

She lets the robes fall open, baring the sheerest layer of white silk that drives him absolutely wild. She doesn’t remove the robe from her shoulders. She saunters towards him. In one movement, he tugs it to the floor.

“I’ll be gone by then.”

And she is.

xxx

Usually, Zuko tucks Izumi into bed. With the party, and the whiskey, and Katara, one of her nursemaids tucked her in last night. Tonight, the honor is all his.

“Can we have a party like that all the time?”

He smiles and hands her the stuffed dolls she’s slept with since infancy. “I don’t think we can afford it.”

“Are you sure?”

“Izumi, I had two meetings today about the budget. I’m sure.”

She turns on her side and tucks her hands underneath her face, pouting at his answer. “Who was that lady with Uncle Aang last night, Daddy?” she asks innocently.

He sighs. “She’s Uncle Aang’s new girlfriend. Remember when Aunt Katara first came to stay with us here?”

“Mmm-hmm.”

“She came to stay with us because she isn’t married to Uncle Aang anymore.”

“Why not?”

“Well, Uncle Aang is the last airbender in the world, and he wants very badly to have kids because he hopes they’ll be airbenders like him. But your uncle doesn’t think Aunt Katara can have kids, so he asked her if they could break up, and she said yes.”

That’s the kid-friendly version, he supposes. The reality of it has him calling Aang a self-serving asshole several times. In the real-life version, Aang doesn’t want a divorce. He wants a hiatus, where he spends a year knocking up random girls to have his airbending children, and stays married to Katara because Aang just 'loves her so much'. In the real-life version, Katara throws her arms around his waist and begs him to let her stay since she’s too humiliated to go anywhere else.

But Izumi’s too young for that mess.

“Okay.”

“Did that answer your question?”

“Yeah. Is it story time now?”

He tickles the underneath of her chin. “Yeah. It’s story time. Which one do you want? Do you want Love Amongst the Dragons?”

She shakes her head. “I want Aunt Katara.”

“You don’t want Daddy’s stories?” He holds his hand theatrically to his heart, feigning heartbreak. “You don’t want Daddy?”

Izumi giggles and nestles her head more comfortably against her pillow. She might not make it through a whole story; her eyes are already heavy. “Aunt Katara tells the best stories.”

“Well, Aunt Katara isn’t here right now. You’re stuck with me, so it’s Love Amongst the Dragons or nothing. The choice is yours.”

“Can you get Aunt Katara?”

On a normal night, sure. The night after the night he fucked her three times in his bed and didn’t speak to her since she snuck out of his room before sunrise, less sure. A lot less sure.

“Another night, sweetheart. It might take a while to find Aunt Katara, and it’s already late.”

“Tomorrow?”

“Tomorrow. She’ll tuck you in tomorrow.”

“I still want you to tuck me in. I just want her to tell me the story,” she clarifies.

“Oh, I’m sorry. My mistake. Now it’s time for your favorite story. Once upon a time, there lived a dragon emperor who was cursed by the dark water spirit…”

Izumi falls asleep before the emperor falls in love.

xxx

The kids all love to play together when they’re reunited. Sokka’s eldest is eight, and his youngest two are fourteen-month-old twins, and everyone else’s kids fall somewhere in the range. Katara loves to play with them. She has Toph’s two-year-old daughter, Lin, in her lap while Izumi and Kya spin around the garden, pretending to be water fairies.

“Careful with her. She’s going through a killer hair-pulling phase right now,” Toph comments.

“She’s fine.”

“Don’t say I didn’t warn you. She’s brutal, aren’t you, Lin? Just brutal. She bites too.”

Katara looks down at the seemingly innocent toddler in her lap. “No, not my Linny.” She kisses the top of the girl’s head.

“Soak it up, sweetness. Lin and I are leaving tomorrow.”

“So soon?”

“Yep. My metalbending students need me. They’re basically opposed to letting me have a vacation.”

“More like you’re opposed to taking one. You’ve been nonstop work since you were twelve.” She looks down at Lin. “Well, with a little bit of time for play.”

Toph laughs. “Believe me, that’s not play. She’s a piece of work, and her father was a piece of work.”

Katara smiles sadly. What she wouldn’t give to have her own piece of work.

“I can feel your self-pity radiating off you.”

“Sorry.”

“It’s okay. And it’s okay if you can’t have kids. What’s not okay is Aang calling a quits if you can’t. You should do what he’s doing. Find some tail of your own and see if you're  really the problem. It could be him. 100 years in an iceberg - maybe it had some effect.”

She sends Lin from her lap towards Izumi and Kya. She doesn’t want Lin to overhear any of this conversation, even if she doesn’t quite understand it. “Can I tell you a secret?”

Toph’s eyebrows quirk in amusement. “Please.”

“You can’t tell anyone.”

“I won’t.”

It’s on the tip of her tongue. She wants so badly to say it. I slept with Zuko. Part of her still wonders if it even happened. If she tells someone, it makes it more real. But what if he doesn’t want anyone to know? What if he’s ashamed? He hasn’t even spoken to her since it happened.

“Come on, spit it out.”

I slept with Zuko. I slept with Zuko. I slept with Zuko.

“I’ll tell you some other time.”

“Oh, my god, you did not just do that to me! You fucking tease!”

“I know. I’m sorry!”

“Ugh, just when I thought I was going to get something juicy. Wait, where are you going? You can’t leave me alone. Only one of these kids is mine. I don’t take care of other people’s kids. I’m not crazy like you.”

Katara’s already walking out of earshot while Toph grumbles. She laughs. Toph can handle it. It’s just Izumi, Kya, and Lin. Sokka’s twins are napping, and Ahanu, the eldest, is with Sokka anyways. She’s watched all six by herself before. Usually, she loves it.

Now, she only wants to find Zuko.

xxx

There’s a knock on the door of his study. It instantly irritates him. Servants and cabinet members know not to disturb him in his study. He must be hearing things. Then he hears the knock again. He darts up from the chair at his desk and practically rips the door open. He’s ready to yell at whoever finds it upon themselves to interrupt his work when he realizes whoever is Katara.

“Is this a bad time?” she asks.

“Um, no.”

“You looked like you wanted to kill me for a second,” she says lightheartedly.

“You’re probably misreading me.”

“Probably. You’re not one to lose control of your emotions.” Then she crosses the floor and perches herself on the edge of his desk. She crosses one leg over the other and smirks at him.

“You don’t usually pay me visits in the middle of the day,” he remarks. “Must be important.”

“It’s not. Just killing time.”

“Oh yeah? Nothing on your mind at all?” She’s been all he can think about nonstop.

She’s quiet for a second and looks down at the floor, all of her enchanting bravado gone and replaced with quiet vulnerability. “Did you, um, have fun the other night?” she asks him.

He clears his throat. “Yeah, I did. I thought I made that clear.”

“Well, you did...then. And then yesterday I didn’t see you at all and I thought, maybe, that’s how you wanted it to be now.”

“That’s not how I want it to be at all.”

“Okay, great, I was just confused about it.”

“I’m sorry about that. I was avoiding you yesterday in case you wanted space. I know you’ve been going through a lot lately, and I didn’t want to add to it.”

“You don’t add to it, Zuko. You take it away.”

He smiles. He understands what she means. Since the other night, he’s felt lighter in a way he hasn’t been since he lost Mai. “Maybe I’ll see you tonight.”

“You will,” she pauses, and his heart beats excitedly. “Izumi asked me to help you tuck her in tonight, so you’ll see me then.” His face must show his disappointment because she fucking laughs at him. “Did you think I meant it another way?” she teases.

“Nope. I’ll see you tonight. Izumi’s bedroom, right after bathtime. Make sure you have a good story ready to go. She’s very critical these days.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.” She jumps off his desk. “Well, I won’t keep you. Good talk.” And then before he knows what’s happening her lips are on his in a bruising kiss that sends his head reeling back to the other night when there were far less clothes between them, and before he can react and pull her closer, she’s gone, walking to the door. “See you tonight, Zuko.”

xxx

Along with being a self-serving asshole, Zuko realizes Aang is also a plain idiot.

Katara arches above him, bathed in candlelight. Her hands grip his shoulders as an anchor. Her knees rub against his silk sheets. Her moans are the most enchanting sound he’s ever heard. She’s so vocal in her pleasure, so open with how much she wants him. Every chance he gets, he presses open-mouthed kisses to her flushed skin. He sucks at the pointed peaks of her breasts and digs his own fingers into her alluring hips, guiding her, meeting her at a point of pure pleasure for the both of them.

She falls against him after she reaches her peak, and he holds her even tighter as he finds his own within her a few thrusts later. She hums contentedly against his neck and threads her fingers through his hair playfully.

Aang had this. He had this beautiful, hypnotizing, sensual woman as his wife, and he chose to walk away from her.

He catches her hand in his hair and holds it with his own. She’ll be gone before sunrise, like she always is, but he’ll make the most of his time with her. Only an idiot wouldn’t.

xxx

“That was a very good story. Best one all week.”

Katara laughs. “Well, it didn’t do its job. You should be asleep.”

Adds Zuko, “Yes, you should.”

“Can you tell me another one?”

“Izumi, it’s already late.”

“Daddy, please.”

Katara taps the little girl on the nose and smiles. “I know just the perfect one. Stop me if you’ve heard it before. It’s called Love Amongst the Dragons .”

“Good one,” Zuko whispers to her before they both kiss Izumi goodnight.

They hold hands as they sneak through the corridors to his private balcony. He kisses her senseless against the railing while she briefly realizes she hasn’t been sad in days.

xxx

As a personal friend of the Fire Lord, Katara has special privileges within the palace. One of them is the ability to take Izumi into the city, as long as they’re escorted by a couple of palace guards, of course.

Katara decides she and Izumi deserve a trip to Katara’s favorite shop near the harbor for some sweetened milk and tea cakes. Izumi reaches for Katara’s hand as they walk down the street. It’s something she’s started doing recently, even in the palace. She’s been a lot more affectionate with Katara recently. She’ll rest her head on Katara’s shoulder in the gardens, and she wants Katara at storytime every night now. Katara doesn’t mind. She hangs on to all of it. She’ll be seven years old soon, this light in her life. She squeezes her hand as they enter the shop.

Izumi picks the table, and the guards camp out at the table behind them. They wait for their tea cakes and sweetened milk. When the glasses arrive, they clink theirs together. She takes a sip, which turns into a gulp. Zuko doesn’t allow her to have many sweets.

“Is it good?”

“Mmm-hmm.”

Katara laughs. “Good.” When Izumi doesn’t stop drinking, she says, “Hey, save some to wash down the cake.”

“Can I have two?”

She clicks her tongue. “I don’t know. Your father wouldn’t like it.”

“Please, Aunt Katara.”

“I love you, sweetie, but I don’t want to be on the Fire Lord’s bad side.”

“Please, please, please.”

“Fine, you can have one more glass of the darn milk, as long as you promise not to tell on me. Deal?”

Izumi nods and finishes all of her first glass. “Aunt Katara?”

“Yeah, sweetie?”

“Can you be my mom?”

She forgets how to breathe. “What?”

“I don’t have a mom,” Izumi states.

“Yes, you do. She just isn’t with us anymore. She would have loved you so much. Your mom was such a wonderful woman.” But Izumi doesn’t know that, Katara realizes. As much as Katara holds onto the image of her mother, as much as Katara commits to memory the sound of her voice, Izumi never met Mai. Izumi never got the chance to know her.

“I want a real mom, and Daddy told me you wanted a baby.”

Katara remembers missing her mom, longing for the love and comfort specially given by the woman who brought her into the world. Zuko is an amazing father, but Izumi deserves the chance to have the unconditional love of more than one person.

They make a perfect pair, a motherless child and a childless woman. It doesn’t hurt that Katara loves her so much, ever since the first time she came to stay when Mai died and Zuko was a clueless wreck who fumbled when placing Izumi in her arms, repeating again and again that he didn’t know what to do. She and Zuko are always there for each other. The two of them make another perfect pair.

“I love you so much. I would be honored to be your mom. You don’t have to call me your mom, but I’ll be here for you always.”

"I want to call you mommy."

She’d left the first time she stayed, once Zuko got a handle on things. She and Aang had only recently been married, and he was so insistent on her return. He needed her help rebuilding the air temples. They needed to be ready for the return of the airbenders. Yeah, right.

"Then you can call me mommy."

The next glass of sweet milk arrives for Izumi, and the young girl takes Katara’s advice. She eats the tea cake first, and then she washes it down with the milk. Katara hands her a napkin to wipe the milk from her top lip.

They stop at a few shops on the way back. Katara learns they both like to window shop. At one of the outdoor booths, Izumi spies a dark water spirit mask sold alongside others.

“Daddy would love that!”

“Oh, yeah?”

“Love Amongst the Dragons is the only story he knows. It’s his favorite.”

Katara tugs her to the booth giddily. “Then we have to get it for him.” She pays a few coins to the vendor and gives it to Izumi to keep safe for Daddy. Keeping it safe to Izumi is wearing it herself.

There’s nothing pulling her away anymore, like there was when Izumi was born. Now this golden-eyed girl is an anchor.

And so is her father.

xxx

“I don’t want to go back to my room.”

“It’s almost sunrise.”

She pouts at him, as if he controls the sun. He wishes he did. He’d never let it rise. “I don’t want you to go either.”

Her hand is on the knob of the door, but she’s still facing him. She always waits for a minute before she leaves him, like she’s waiting for him to call her back. As much as he wants to, he can’t. A Fire Lord isn’t expected to be celibate, but if the servants ever see him with the Avatar’s ex-wife, the whole nation would know the gossip in a week.

Already, there are rumors. They aren’t exactly discrete. They take every meal together. They tuck Izumi in together. She’s the only one allowed in his private study. They just make sure no one catches them touching. As long as they aren’t touching, the rumors stay rumors.

“I’ll see you at breakfast,” she says.

“It’s not that far away.”

He tries to be optimistic. But she leaves, and it’s hard. Breakfast is very far away.

xxx

“You’re not wearing your mask.”

“Izumi, I can’t wear it to official meetings as Fire Lord. There’s a protocol.”

But his six-year-old crosses her arms in front of her. “I’m telling Mommy.”

Did he just hear her right? “You’re telling who?” he asks.

“Mommy. Aunt Katara’s my mommy now,” she answers plainly as if delivering old news.

“Does she know?”

“Yeah, I asked her if she could be my mom, and she said yes.”

This is definitely not old news to him. “When did this happen?”

Izumi shrugs. “Forever ago.”

xxx

Katara,

You have no idea how much I’ve missed you, or how deeply I regret my behavior. I was so, so stupid. No one compares to you. No one connects with me like you do. We were perfect together, and I will always be angry with myself for ruining that. Please find it in your heart to forgive me. I want our life together back, the way it was always supposed to be.

Love always,

Aang

She burns the letter.

xxx

“I’ve never felt like this before,” she mentions to him one night in the afterglow, caressing the scar on his face.

“I know what you mean.”

She’s never felt such a pull to someone. She’s never felt as understood or appreciated or cherished. Aang never stopped saying he loved her; Zuko never stops proving it.

“When Mai died, I couldn’t imagine sharing what I shared with her with someone else. But that’s not what this is. It’s not the same. I’m different now. You’re different. Our relationship is different.”

He’s taken a step forward by confessing this. She’s bold enough to take another. “I love you.”

“I love you too.”

 She pulls away from him, but he holds her tighter. “Zuko, I’ve got to go. It’s almost sunrise.”

“Stay,” he mutters sleepily against her ear.

“Zuko, it’s hard enough to leave you as it is.”

“Stay. Stay forever. If I need to write up some official announcement, or bribe some servants, I’ll do it, but I don’t want to spend another morning without you.” He kisses the shell of her ear, and her resolve shatters completely.

They fall back asleep. The servants wake them. Funny enough, the sky doesn’t fall. The day goes on as normal, and surely the gossip is raging behind her back, but she doesn’t care like she thought she would. She doesn’t care about it the way she cared when they talked about her and Aang.