made in the earth kingdom

by suzukiblu

Summary:

Zuko feels wrong being here, but it’s hard to feel wrong being with Song.

Notes:

This was the winning bid for my fandomaid Queensland flood auction back in my LJ days (yes it was really that long ago, oh God why did this take so long to finish, I have NO excuse), from arrayepl. Request was for the final installment of this trilogy, which pleased me greatly as I really wanted to do the third part but kept flaking out on myself. As we can see, I . . . I kind of couldn't stop doing the third part. Unfortunately I also continued flaking out for QUITE A WHILE, since I’ve only finally managed to finish it now.

Zuko feels wrong being here, but it’s hard to feel wrong being with Song. Every day her mother makes them breakfast and then goes to work in the apothecary and leaves them in the apartment, and Song mixes up medicines from the book of recipes and then she goes out and delivers them to the people who ordered them and comes back with new orders. The first day Zuko tries to wait in the apartment because it’s terrifying to be outside where they will hurt him, but it’s terrifying to be alone too and Song—they might hurt Song.

He doesn’t want Song to be alone and hurt. If he’s with her—maybe they’ll hurt him instead, if he’s with her. He’s a boy, they almost always hit boys first unless . . . unless the other thing and his fingers tremble with bad things he’s seen and couldn’t do anything about, was useless about, he despises the Earth Kingdom. He didn’t see things like that back ho . . . back in the Fire Nation. Things like that didn’t happen in the Fire Nation.

He follows Song out, terrified to his core, and her whole face lights up when she realizes he’s coming with her.

“You don’t have to,” she says anyway, shyly, and Zuko just shakes his head and keeps following her and tries to keep his hands from trembling. It doesn’t work, but Song smiles soft and pretty at him and holds his hand, and then it almost does.

They go outside. It’s bright. It’s terrible. The enemy is everywhere and the enemy is holding his hand, but the enemy isn’t the enemy anymore.

.

.

.

The boy's name isn't really Dao, Song knows—of course Song knows, she gave it to him—but eventually that's what she thinks of him as. He’s so quiet, practically a shadow in their small apartment, and sometimes she almost forgets he’s there. Only almost, though.

She could never really forget him.

Every day Mother goes to work and Song and Dao go out, and he carries the medicines for her and they hold hands the whole time, and she likes it. She introduces him to Mei Wan and Bai and the Akaba family and a dozen other customers—this is Dao, he’s staying with us now—and every time Dao cringes a little, but every time he also cringes a little less. He’s scared of people, but whenever they meet anyone new Song has to talk to them from behind him, because he's more scared of her getting hurt than getting hurt himself. The shopkeepers think they’re cute, and sometimes they get free things; a piece of fruit or a steamed meat bun or a stick of candy. Dao never trusts the free things, so Song lets him take the first bite and wait a little every time, and only then do they eat them, when he’s sure they’re safe.

It makes her sad that he thinks they wouldn’t be, but she loves to hold his hand and she even loves the look he gets on his face when they meet strangers, so determined and defensive and like he would do anything to keep her safe from the dangers he sees everywhere.

“You worry too much,” she tells him, gently. He looks at her, and she knows those eyes mean you don’t worry ENOUGH. It’s true; she doesn’t. But Song decided a long time ago that she is going to believe the best of people, no matter what it costs her.

The cost of living small and afraid all her life is so much worse than being burned, she thinks.

At least, she wants to be the kind of person who thinks that.

.

.

.

One night, Song’s mother tells them a story.

“Before the war, there was the Avatar,” she says. “The one spirit who did not only take mortal form, but lived as a mortal, life after life—the one spirit who cared what it meant to be human and cared what became of us, and the one being in all existence who could bend all four elements. That was a time of peace, when the Avatar kept the balance between the Water Tribe, the Earth Kingdom, the Fire Nation, and the Air Nomads, and all four nations lived in harmony. In those days, we were all a part of each other, and we all knew it.”

“But we were always separate,” Zuko says, frowning, and Song and her mother look at him in surprise and he palls anxiously, hands snapping up to cover his mouth. He didn't mean to interrupt like that, he just—no one's told him a story since Mother, unless Azula's lies count, and Mother always—he always asked questions with Mother, she never minded. “I'm sorry,” he blurts, everything in him fighting back the instinctive flinch because he knows it makes Song sad to see, and Song's mother's face goes soft.

“Oh, Dao,” she says, and reaches out. Then Zuko does flinch, but she just lays her hand on the unbandaged side of his head and smooths his hair back gently, in a way that . . . in a strange way.

In a way that makes him want to cry, a little.

“We weren't separate,” Song's mother says. “We were just different.”

“Oh,” Zuko says softly, good eye blinking a little too fast as he stares down at his lap, and Song reaches over and takes his hand, and then that's two people touching him at once, touching him kindly, and his face goes hot with shame. This is no way for a prince of the blood to behave, sitting around listening to useless old legends and blurting out in the middle of them like a child—not a prince with any claim to honor. But he has no claim to honor, he reminds himself for the thousandth time, and so when Song scoots a little closer and Song's mother strokes through his hair again, he doesn't pull away or say a thing.

“In those days we were all a part of each other, different and in different places but still together,” Song's mother continues, and Song stays close against his side, and Zuko's face goes hot and he wants to hide it. “We traveled the world, learning of it and about it, of and about each other, and we were all stronger for it. When the dark came, Earth Kingdom guards hung Fire Nation lanterns burning with Water Tribe oil to guide Air Nomad gliders in the night. When the floods came, fire and earthbenders built walls out of sand and clay, and air and waterbenders held back the rapids. When the spirits were slighted, Air Nomads prayed forgiveness on Water Tribe altars, armed with Earth Kingdom offerings and Fire Nation blessings.”

“Fire Nation blessings?” Song asks softly. “But I thought the Fire Nation didn't believe in spirits, Mother.”

“Of course the Fire Nation believes in spirits,” Zuko says, scornful before he thinks better of it, and then Song looks upset and he winces. “I mean—I didn't mean—” He cuts himself off, struggling for words, and Song just looks more upset.

“The Fire Nation knows spirits exist,” Song's mother says, reaching out again, and before Zuko can even understand what she's doing she's pulled them both to her sides, careful of both their injuries. Zuko's face goes hot again, and Song's unhappy expression fades, and Song's mother just . . . holds them. “That doesn't mean they believe in them.”

“It's the same thing,” Zuko protests, softer than he would normally, and doesn't even worry about the maybe-hit for arguing until after Song's mother is already smiling at him, proving it will never come.

“Knowledge isn't faith, sweetheart,” she says. That's too much, and Zuko stiffens, but can't quite bring himself to squirm away. He hasn't . . . he hasn't had anything like this for . . .

It's been a very long time.

“I don't understand,” he says anyway as he hides the good side of his face against Song's mother's shoulder, feeling stupid and shamed and small. The worst prince anyone could ever imagine, and no wonder he isn't worth keeping, even if—even if Song's mother doesn't mind him, right now. It won't last, he reminds himself, and Song's mother strokes a hand through his hair again and he almost really does cry.

“Someday you will,” she promises, and for a moment Zuko pretends he will still be here when that day comes.

.

.

.

The spring festivals begin and Dao does not want to go, Song knows, but she yearns to. Father loved the spring festivals, and this is . . . this is her first without him.

She cannot be inside in the quiet, pretending that's alright.

“You don't have to come,” she reminds him as Mother weaves flowers into her braid and Dao watches them with anxious eyes. His hair's longer and softer and the infection in his burn's finally gone, but he doesn't look any less scared or any less wonderful than the first night. “I know you don't like to be around that many people.”

“But you'll be alone,” Dao says, nervous and quick. Which is true; people do foolish things at festivals, and Mother will be needed to care for the ones who are a little too foolish.

“I've been alone before, Dao,” Song tells him, smiling. He looks hurt at that, like the thought of her being alone is painful, and something in her stomach flutters light and bittersweet at the sight. He is so good, she thinks. She has never met anyone as good as Dao, except for Father.

With Father gone, some part of her can't help feeling, Dao must be the only person this good left in the world.

“I want to come,” Dao says, quick again and still nervous. Song thinks about trying to talk him out of it, but . . . it's nice. She likes that Dao wants to come; that Dao worries about her and wants to protect her and thinks she is worth his attention and protection. She wishes he didn't always have to be so afraid, but . . .

“Alright,” Song says, and smiles at him again as Mother ties off her braid. Dao's face turns red with embarrassment and he looks away, and Song pulls her braid over her shoulder and wishes, again, that he didn't always have to be afraid. She thanks Mother for doing her hair, and Mother smiles too and touches her cheek, then goes to collect her medicine bag. “Come on,” Song says, picking up the brush, and Dao looks at her in confusion.

“You brushed my hair this morning,” he says.

“It's a festival, silly,” Song says, smiling wider. “We'll tie it back tonight.”

Dao stares at her, and she knows the only thing he's thinking of is his burned and bandaged face. She can't pretend to understand that, not really—the scars forming on her leg make her less attractive, she knows, but at least she can hide them when she chooses; can pretend she's never been hurt that way. Dao doesn't get that choice and never will, no matter how well his face heals.

Even if she didn't pull his hair back, though, that side's not long enough to hide the bandages. It burned away with his skin and even now still hasn't had that much time to grow back, and parts of it never will.

“It'll look stupid,” Dao says softly, finally, and Song wishes so, so badly that the world had been kind to him a little more often.

“You never look stupid,” she tells him. At that Dao looks hurt, and looks away. Song can't imagine how awful life has been to him, and reaches over and gently touches the back of the brush against the back of his hand. “There are festival masks, if you don't want to let people see. I'll buy you one.”

“No!” Dao snaps, jerking his head back to her and glaring, red-faced and embarrassed. “That's not—I don't need one, I'm fine.”

“But I want to,” Song says, and Dao looks so angry and so ashamed, arms all folded up around him.

“I'm not your responsibility!” he snaps again.

“Then I'll buy you one, Dao,” Mother says as she leans back into the conversation, folding her spare coin purse into Dao's hands and smiling gently down at him. He looks so shocked that Song could laugh, except the reasons he's shocked are too sad. “That should be enough for a mask, if you want one, and dinner for you both.”

“That's not—” Dao chokes a little, like his throat's seizing up around the words, and looks miserable. “I'm not—”

“Song needs an escort. You'll take care of her for me, won't you?” Mother asks, and Dao stills, and then clutches the purse to his chest awkwardly and nods so fiercely that Song's face feels hot at the sight. He is the best person she knows, bar none.

And so, so much more handsome than she realized the first time she saw him.

Song braids Dao's hair but the pieces at his temple are too short and look odd sticking out, and Mother laughs softly and shows her how to bind the top back into a bun and leave the bottom loose, the way older boys do. Mother asks Dao's permission to cut the hair at his other temple and he looks upset at the idea, but nods nervously; once she has, both sides fall evenly and frame his face. The burned side is still a little ragged-looking, but Song is too busy fighting valiantly not to blush again to notice.

“You look great,” she promises him, although Dao still won't look at the mirror. He softens a little when she says it, at least, so Song counts that as a victory. Mother fusses over them a little more, making sure their clothes and faces and bandages are all clean, and then sends them out while she finishes getting ready herself. Song feels bright and pretty and shy with her hair full of flowers and Dao beside her, and even manages not to cry when she remembers how Father would scoop her up in his arms and swing her around first thing out into the street on festival nights, back in their old village—the one the Fire Nation burned.

She holds onto the sight of the streets all decorated and crowded and full of paper lanterns and paper flowers, and the feel of Dao holding her hand tight so he won't lose her. He's so handsome, she thinks again, and then sees him trying to hide his face and remembers that he doesn't think that himself.

“This way,” she tells him, and pulls him into the crowd. It doesn't take long to find a booth selling masks, and she points. “Which one do you like?” she asks.

Dao hesitates, then just snatches up the closest one—it's a theater mask, bright red and fierce, and Song starts to ask the merchant how much but sees Dao's expression change out of the corner of her eye and pauses. Dao stares down at the mask another moment, then carefully returns it to the cart and takes the one next to it instead. It's another theater mask, but this one is blue.

“Is that the one you want?” she asks. Dao does not look at the red mask as he nods. Song asks the price and the merchant tells her, and they pay from the little coin purse Mother gave Dao. Dao frowns at the coins like he doesn't understand them, turning them over and over in his fingers, although Song supposes she wouldn't understand money very well either if she'd been too busy starving on the street to ever have any.

The merchant gives them a little bit of a discount with a friendly wink, enough of one so Song can easily afford a mask too, and Dao frowns distrustingly and Song smiles in gratitude. She helps Dao put on the blue mask, and takes the red one for herself, even though something tells her it might be a bad idea.

But Dao looked at it like he wanted it.

Song slips the mask on and looks at Dao, and even though she can't see his eyes she feels like he's staring at her.

“Let's go,” she says, and holds out her hand for his.

.

.

.

Zuko follows Song's pretty pink skirt and flowery bright braid and arterial red mask through the crowd, hating how many people there are and stopping more than once to pull her away from the trajectory of ones with a bad look.

He learned fast which looks to avoid, after he left the ship.

After the ship left him.

Song doesn't know which looks to avoid, or if she does she doesn't care, and Zuko thinks that's why she brought him home to begin with but still wishes she weren't that brave—like she thinks she has something to prove, like she thinks she absolutely must be fearless, or else . . . what, exactly? She's Earth. The Earth Kingdom doesn't have honor, they aren't cast out in shame when they cower in terror or break their word; they don't have to be fearless. They can run and run all they like or stand and fight and it doesn't matter, it doesn't mean anything, doesn't make them cowards or heroes or—or—

Song pushes up her mask like she's wiping away blood and nods towards a row of booths full of food and treats. The smell of food makes Zuko nauseous, sweet and sickening as it wafts through his jangled nerves and over the bad looks hidden in the crowd.

“Do you want to get something to eat first?” she asks, and Zuko shrugs uncomfortably and looks down. It's Song's mother's money. Even if he didn't feel sick at the thought of eating, spending it's not his decision.

“If you want,” he says. Song smiles a little, he doesn't really know why, and pulls him past the booths.

“They have demonstrations too,” she says. “Last year in my village—” She hesitates, just a second, and Zuko only just has time to realize she's hesitating at all before she goes on—“last year in my village a theater troupe came through. We went and saw them twice.”

“You want to see a play?” Zuko asks, a painful clutching feeling twisting up his chest. He remembers going to see the Ember Island players back when . . . back when his mother was still . . .

He hasn't really seen any plays since then.

“They have other things,” Song says, smile turning a little subdued. Zuko hates causing that, but he's so bad at pretending things are okay. Things aren't even a little okay, except for Song, and he can't just ignore that. He wishes he could, but even if he could he doesn't deserve to; every scrap of unhappiness and every nice thing he ruins are all punishments he deserves. He deserves so much worse than that, in fact.

“Okay,” he says anyway, because he can't punish Song for the things wrong with him. Song brightens, sun-warm and vibrant, and Zuko wants to go back to the apartment and hide, but follows her anyway. That's normal, now; he says things he wouldn't say and goes places he wouldn't go, because it's Song. Or because someone has to.

He can't stand the idea of her being sad, and he can't leave her alone.

They cross the village square hand-in-hand, Song stopping a few times to say hello to customers of her mother's—some she's introduced him to and some she hasn't, but does now. It's too many names and faces to remember, but Zuko does anyway because forgetting is too dangerous: he has to know who people are, so no one can ever knock on Song's mother's door and lie to him. He knows he won't be there long, but as long as he is, he's not going to make trouble for them.

Not anymore than he already does, anyway.

“Which way do you want to go?” Song asks as they pause on the edges of a crowd surrounding a flat . . . well, it looks a bit like a ring for a traditional Agni Kai, if traditional Agni Kai took place on flat dirt. Zuko frowns a little, wondering what it is, and shakes his head.

“I don't know. I've never been to a festival before,” he says. There are booths and small platforms lining the street on both sides, too many to even try to see all of, and all he wants is to be back in the apartment with Song and her mother, listening to their stories and eating their stew and pretending he'll get to stay. But that's selfish and something he doesn't deserve, so he doesn't say anything.

“Never?” Song looks surprised, and loosens her grip on his hand. Zuko hates the way her fingers feel when they're letting go. “Not even the spring festival?”

“No,” he answers, uncomfortable. He remembers parades, being carried in them on a palanquin with Mother and Father and Azula—at the front and without Mother, the last times, but before that behind Grandfather's and Uncle and Lu Ten's own palanquins. They were supposed to sit very still and straight and look serious, and they never stepped off the palanquins to join the festivals. The festivals were for common people.

. . . oh.

No wonder Song's looking at him so strange.

“I didn't. I,” Zuko tries, face hot as he fumbles for a lie, but one won't come and even if it would he doesn't think he could say it; lie to Song? His honor's gone now, he'll never have any again, but lying to Song would be so much worse than a matter of honor. “Never,” he says finally, helplessly, and Song keeps giving him that strange, confused look.

“Well, now you have!” she says after a moment, brightly, and then Song smiles at him and Zuko can see her thinking—see the strangeness leave her face, the confusion melt away as somehow she explains it to herself. And then he's miserable, because even if he's not coming up with the lies himself, he's letting her do it. Maybe that's not as bad, but it feels even worse.

He's lying to Song. But what would he say, even if he told her the truth?

Even someone as kind and forgiving as Song wouldn't want him if she knew what a coward he was.

The ground vibrates, and Zuko jerks in alarm even as Song gasps in delight, grabbing his shoulder and pointing into the ring.

“Look, Dao, earthbenders!” she exclaims excitedly as the crowd around them cheers, and all the blood drains out of Zuko's face. He's never seen an earthbender up close—he remembered Uncle and Lu Ten's stories from the war and avoided them as much as he could. Watching two horrifyingly huge, muscle-bound men take position on opposite sides of the ring, he knows he was right to. Either of them could snap his neck and snuff him out with less effort than Song uses to grind herbs for medicine; could snuff him out without even meaning to.

He wants to grab Song and bolt but the crowd's surged up to pin them in and she's staring into the ring, face flushed with all that delight and excitement that just colored her voice, and he doesn't know how to get her to come. She looks so happy, why would she come?

Zuko's terrified.

They're trapped, pinned in tight, and anyone could hurt them and they couldn't get away, anyone could do anything to them and who would care, really? He's seen so many horrible things in the Earth Kingdom, no one would intervene, no one would step in and save them. Song's mother, maybe, but Song's mother is far away and just one woman anyway.

There's a man in the middle of the ring, shouting at everyone. The crowd shouts back louder, deafeningly louder, and Zuko claps his hands over his ears and chokes on the almost-whimper. Song's shouting too, he notices, but he can't pick her voice out of the rest.

She sounds just like all of them.

One of the earthbenders stomps, and the ground jumps. The crowd roars.

Zuko is too terrified to even breathe.

.

.

.

The match is small and clearly just a demonstration, but Song has never seen an Earth Rumble fight before and it's exciting to watch. There'd never been very many earthbenders back home, and most of the ones they'd had had left to find a master and not come back. Song had never understood leaving home and staying gone, and understands it even less since being forced to, but . . .

She shakes her head and focuses on the fight, mind cleared of sad thoughts. Sad thoughts do not have a place at the spring festival, Song reminds herself; the spring festival is a celebration of the renewal of the earth and the thriving energy of their kingdom.

The spring festival was her father's favorite festival.

One of the earthbenders knocks the other out of the ring, leaving a furrow of broken ground and upturned earth behind him, and Song cheers with the rest of the crowd. She doesn't like fighting, but she likes feeling . . . she likes being a part of a thing, even if only a little. Anyway, the fighters aren't hurting each other—and boys love Earth Rumble, Dao will probably want to watch the whole demonstra—

Song stops cheering, and stares at Dao. He seems to be watching the fight as intently as she'd assumed he would be, but he's holding himself so stiff that for a moment she wants to snatch the mask away and make sure he's alright underneath it. If she didn't know how much he doesn't want to show his face, she would.

“Dao?” she tries, but another fighter is stepping into the ring and the crowd is cheering and she can't even hear her own voice over the sound. “Dao!” she tries again, but the crowd is still cheering and he still doesn't hear her.

The next fight starts, and the ground shakes. Dao flinches back so hard he nearly trips over the man standing behind him, and Song catches his arm just in time to keep him from falling.

“Are you okay?!” she shouts, hoping he can hear her. He can't, she can tell, but that doesn't mean she can't feel the tremble in his arm, and then all she can think of is how stupid she is. Dao is not like the village boys, or any other boy at all. He's been hurt and he's still scared from it and he doesn't trust people and goes to ridiculous lengths to avoid anything he thinks might be dangerous, or anything he thinks might hurt her. Of course he doesn't want to stand in the middle of a half-rioting crowd and watch people pretend to hurt each other.

She's so stupid.

“Come on!” she shouts, pulling at his arm, and Dao probably still doesn't hear but stumbles after her either way. Song holds on tight, knuckles nearly white, and just keeps pulling him through the crowd. She hadn't really thought about how big it had gotten, but with Dao's trembling hands locked tight in hers she can't think of anything else at all.

She's so ashamed of herself, she thinks even as she guides him out of the crowd, and Dao hides his shaking hands in his sleeves and looks away as if he's the one who should be ashamed. As if he's in the wrong, somehow, when that's the absolute last thing he is.

“I'm sorry,” she says as soon as she thinks he can hear her, and he just shakes his head. “I should have known you wouldn't like that kind of thing.”

“It's fine,” Dao says, staring at the ground. Song wants to hug him, but she knows Dao isn't always comfortable with being hugged. Or . . . ever, it feels like sometimes.

She wishes that whatever did that to him . . .

No. She doesn't wish that.

She just wants to.

“It's not,” she says. “I should have known.” Dao shakes his head again, still not looking at her, and Song squeezes his hand tight and tries to think: Dao is not like other boys, he does not like roaring crowds and unpredictable violence. What does Dao like—what will calm him down?

It shouldn't be so hard to come up with an answer for that. But Dao's so busying worrying and holding himself back all the time that Song's never actually seen him feel good about anything. Not bad, about some things, but never actually good. She's just been waiting for it to come, while Dao's waiting for . . .

She doesn't know what Dao's waiting for.

“Come on, we'll do something fun,” she says, thinking of the wound on her leg that's half a scar, thinking of Dao's face behind that mask, of the festival music in her ears and the way her father would sweep her off her strong legs and spin her around. Dancing, she thinks—everyone likes to dance. Her leg's stronger now and Dao's not sick anymore; still healing, but stronger, not sick.

They could do things like that.

“Come on,” she says again, and pulls him towards the music. Dao follows, head down and shoulders slumped in a way that hurts Song to see. She tells herself he won't always be this sad and scared; she won't let that happen. Dao is a good person. He doesn't deserve to have to feel that way, to think he has to hold himself back so much. Good things are going to happen for him.

Song will do everything it takes to make good things happen for him.

There's an area sectioned off for dancing, full of music and people and loud laughter and louder cheering, and Song takes Dao just into the fringes of it. The crowd's not as thick here as it was back at the earthbending match, but she doesn't want to take any chances.

“This is better, right?” she asks, just to be sure, and Dao looks at her and then looks around.

“Aren't they going to get in trouble?” he asks. Song thinks he's trying to make a joke, maybe, but a moment later knows better—there's no mistaking the confusion in his voice.

“It's a festival,” she says. “People are supposed to be loud.”

“But they're . . .” Dao trails off, and Song waits but doesn't get a response, so instead takes both his hands and holds them up between them. A sudden rush of shyness comes up on her, but she asks the question anyway.

“Would you dance with me, Dao?”

“I—dancing's not—” He starts, stops, shakes his head. Song squeezes his hands, and he shakes his head again. “I don't know how.”

EVERYONE knows how to dance, Song almost laughs, before she remembers that Dao's never been to a festival before. Before she remembers finding him on the street, half-ruined and half-dying, abandoned by every person who passed by without stopping to say, are you cold, are you hurt, are you hungry, can I help, come with me.

Dao's never been taken care of. And he deserves taken care of.

“I'll teach you,” she says, and steps into the first position.

“. . . okay,” he says, very quietly, and mirrors her.

.

.

.

They get back from the festival sticky with sugar and honey and half-dizzy from dancing so much and so late that Song's almost asleep even before they get inside, and Song's mother is waiting at the kitchen table with soft steamed meat buns and an even softer smile. Like just in case, like she wanted to see them, like . . . like Zuko's not sure. The buns taste as bland as all Earth Kingdom food does, but he eats every bite of his and feels warm and full and a little shaken. No one in the Fire Nation waits up for him like that, he thinks. No one in the Fire Nation dances—especially not in front of people.

But he's not in the Fire Nation anymore.

“Did you have a good time?” Song's mother asks—quiet, so she won't wake Song who's curled up fast asleep on the couch—and Zuko doesn't have an answer for her so he hides his face.

“Thank you for the mask,” he says, and she smiles at him and tells him a story and tucks him into the futon next to Song's, and Zuko lets her because it's still so unfamiliar that he doesn't know what else to do. She smooths the blankets and leans down with another smile. He doesn't even know she's going to kiss him until he feels her lips against his unbandaged temple, and by then it's too late to react anyway.

“Spring is here,” she tells him in a murmur. “It's almost time to leave the city.”

“Oh,” Zuko manages, and that warm and full feeling twists into coldness and nausea. He knew this was coming, he reminds himself, but the feeling doesn't change.

“We need to find someplace to settle down before the fall,” Song's mother says, stroking his hair in a way that makes him want to cry almost as much as what she's saying does. “There's always work on the farms in summer, even in places that don't need an herbalist, and we'll need the money to get through the winter. The city's too expensive—and it's no place to recover, anyway.”

“Okay,” Zuko says, staring at the wall past her shoulder, not wanting to think yet. He can't think yet.

“I know you don't like strangers,” Song's mother starts, and he shakes his head fast.

“It's okay,” he says. “I'll be fine.” He won't, but he'd never say that. Song's mother smiles wider, and strokes his hair back.

“You're such a good boy, Dao,” she says, kissing his forehead again. Zuko doesn't feel good; he feels worthless and wasted and like all he wants is to curl up into nothing and disappear. But he doesn't say that either, and Song's mother smooths the blankets one last time, smiles at him one last time, and then heads off to bed herself.

Zuko lies awake all night, staring dully at the shadows of the ceiling and wondering how long he has until they leave him.

Wondering how he'll survive once they have, and if he should even bother.

.

.

.

Song wakes up to sore legs and shooting pains in her burned calf, but still feels dreamy and wonderful and full of the memory of Dao concentrating so hard on dancing with her that she thought he might've even forgotten to be scared, just a little. He left the mask on all night and she put hers back on to match, but she watched the tension in his shoulders change from nervous to focused and she felt his hands hold hers just a little softer than before.

She really liked how it felt, when they did that.

Song smiles into her pillow, hiding her face for just a moment, and then breathes out soft and braces herself to set her aching leg on the floor. It'll hurt, she knows, but that's okay: it only hurts because last night Dao danced with her.

That is so very, very worth a little pain.

Or a lot, she corrects as she settles weight onto the leg and barely stifles a whimper. It hurts. But it's still worth it, so she just breathes out slow and focuses past it, pushing herself up and looking around the small apartment. Dao is curled up small on the futon and Mother is at the stove, cooking fish and tofu and bacon and eggs with cheese and more good-for-burn-victims food—lots of meat and protein and calories, and lots of money to spend. Song worries about that sometimes; Mother's always managed it, but she wishes she could help more all the same.

When she's better and bigger, she promises herself as she starts to get up. She'll help Mother as much as anyone can, then.

“It's alright, darling, I'll bring it to you,” Mother says from the stove, and she's much faster than Song with her hurting leg and is immediately there with a bowl full of food. Song smiles a little weakly and accepts it, wishing she'd been able to get there herself.

“Thank you, Mother. It looks really good,” she says, and then glances over at Dao. He's already looking back at her—of course, Dao can't sleep through anything, he was probably awake before she was—but even expecting it she blushes. “Good morning, Dao,” she says into her bowl, a little more shyly than she means to, and Mother smiles at him.

“Good morning, Dao,” she says too, and Dao shifts uncomfortably and pushes himself up onto his knees, sitting with his hands fisted on them.

“Good morning,” he mumbles to both of them, head bowed. Song wants to hug him, but represses the impulse; Mother cups the uninjured side of his face and smiles at him.

“Breakfast's ready,” she says. “I'll get you a bowl.”

“Thank you,” Dao mumbles, not lifting his head. Mother pets his face once, then heads back over to fill another bowl, and Song ducks her own head quick to see his face. She wants to know how he looks. She expects him to be tired and his usual kind of nervous, but she's hoping for a bit of contentment. Just a little, after last night. Last night was so good, and Song wants to know he had fun too.

Except the look on Dao's face is anything but content.

“Dao?” she asks automatically, reaching towards him in concern, and Dao doesn't flinch, but the way he shrinks in on himself is almost as bad, she thinks. “What's wrong?”

“Nothing's wrong,” he says, but there's none of the usual denial or defiance in it—he sounds defeated. And he looks that way. Looks that way in a way that makes her heart want to almost . . . just makes her want . . .

“Mother!” Song blurts anxiously, but Mother's already there, crouching down and setting aside Dao's breakfast to touch his face again, catch his eye with hers.

“Dao, are you hurt?” she asks gently, and he starts to shake his head, but stops when it pushes his face into her hand and just shrinks in on himself again.

“I'm not,” he says, but his voice is so small. Mother gives him a long look and Song looks back and forth between them anxiously, afraid of what might be wrong. She doesn't see anything and she can't think of anything, but for Dao to look like that it must be something awful.

“Is this about us leaving the city?” Mother asks, and Dao shakes his head fast; Song startles and looks over to Mother.

“We're leaving?” she asks.

“The city isn't a good place to recover. It'll be better in a village,” Mother says, and strokes Dao's hair back off his face. Song can understand that—and Dao gets so nervous around new people and never has a chance to get used to any of them, there's so many here; moving to a little village where it was always the same people all the time would have to help. Being so sad and scared all the time can't be helping him get better. “I told Dao last night, we'll be leaving as soon as possible.”

“Oh,” Song says, and looks down at her feet. She thinks about Mei Wan and Bai and the Akaba family and all their other customers and how there is no place left in the world that knows them except for this one, and for a second feels regret—but then the thought of Dao blossoms up so much bigger and more important and she thinks, maybe he'll get better there.

After that thought, there's really nothing that could convince her to stay.

“Okay,” she says, lifting her head and tightening her grip on her bowl. “Can we start packing after breakfast?”

“That would be very thoughtful of you,” Mother replies, smiling. “I have to go around to all our customers and talk to them about finding someone new to take care of them once we're gone, so that would help a lot.”

“Okay,” Song says again, nodding quick and tightening her grip on her bowl even more. Starting over is so scary, she hates it, and the idea of doing it again makes her queasy, especially remembering why they started over last time. But even with that awful memory in her head, she can't get past the thought that maybe Dao will be better without so many strangers, maybe it will be easier for him.

Maybe he will smile a little, just once.

They eat, and Mother leaves. Song does the dishes; Dao dries, staring down into the small clay bowls like maybe the secret of the whole wide universe is in there and then stacking them with immeasurable care. Song wants the secret to be there for him. She's pretty sure she's thought that before, but Dao has a way of tripping her head up. Just a little, just enough, she's not sure which, but it's . . .

It's Dao, she supposes, and puts away the dried dishes.

“We should start with the main room,” Song decides as she looks over the apartment. She's never had to pack before—there was nothing to pack, last time—but it makes the most sense to her. The things in the kitchen they'll need until they leave, and the same for most of the things in Mother's bedroom. The only things they'll need from the main room are the couch, which they won't be able to take anyway, and her futon, which will be easy to roll up at the last minute.

Song packs everything up as carefully as she can; the little vases Mei Wan gave them, the pretty scrolls Bai painted, the extra blankets from the Akaba family, the mismatched festival masks from last night, and everything Mother ever took in trade for medicine or midwifery or whatever people needed. All the little bits and pieces of their life here, all kind and thoughtful and painfully new. Even with all those bits and pieces they still don't have much, but that just makes what they do have even more important and Song doesn't want to lose or forget any of it.

Dao spends the whole time silent and lost-looking, even while he's following her directions about how to wrap up the vases and tie shut the scrolls and which corner of the apartment to tuck everything into. Song wonders if he's ever left this city before—she knows he couldn't have come from outside it in the condition he was in when she found him, and the city is not neutral, exactly, but Fire Nation ships come through the harbor all the time. Mother's treated a lot of burns.

Song doesn't know why people let the ships keep coming. Mother told her not to worry about it, she'd understand when she was old enough to understand, but Song doesn't want to understand, she wants to know. Song does everything she can to forgive people, but Dao's burned face and too-quiet voice and constant fear are not something she will ever give absolution for.

Mother isn't back by the time they finish the main room—they really don't have much—and Song thinks about it, then decides to move on to Mother's room. There's even less there, just Mother's medicines and a scant few small things, but if they stop Song will think about the last time they left a place. About the last time they left home. The home that isn't there anymore. The home that's just . . . gone. Erased. Burned to nothing, reduced to ash and graves, scorched trees and abandoned ghosts. No one stayed to rebuild, and in a few years no one will remember there was ever a village there at all. In a few years . . . in a few years no one will remember Father at all, his big strong hands and loud laugh and fierce grin and how hard he fought, how kind he was, how—how—

Song finds the other heirloom that survived the fire wrapped up in the back of Mother's closet. She jerks back from it and pain shoots up her burned leg and drops her to the floor, but she's already crying anyway so it's not as if it matters.

“Song?” Dao asks, sounding frightened and uncertain, and for a second Song thinks he's reaching for her but when she turns to look at him even through the blur of her tears it's obvious he's shrinking back. She tries to push herself back to her feet and tries to smile, tries to pull herself back together, back into herself, but her leg hurts too much and the pieces just won't go. She is a dropped vase and a torn scroll and ripped blankets and broken masks and Father is nothing to anyone in the world, in this city, in—

Father is gone, and she and Mother are the only people who will ever love him again.

No one else will ever know he existed at all.

“I'm fine,” she lies with a smile she hopes is less cracked than her voice, and Dao is so stiff and tense and practically halfway out of the room. And then he's not, he's crouched close with his hands awkwardly fluttering over her shoulders, and Song cries harder and curls in on herself, hiding her face in her knees. Dao's hands come down and that hesitancy in them vanishes, and he holds on tight. It's not a hug, but to him it might be. Song means to tell him it's okay, she's fine, he doesn't have to, but somehow just ends up crying more.

“The. The thing in the closet,” she stutters. “Get the thing in the closet.”

Dao stares at her for a moment and she bites back another sob; he scrambles quick into the closet and comes back with the half-wrapped last proof of her father's existence, staring down at it instead. Song wants to cry harder, but isn't sure she could.

“Pretty,” Dao says softly, and in any other situation Song would delight in that softness in him. Here and now, though . . .

“Pack it up,” she says, averting her eyes.

He does.

.

.

.

Song's mother comes back late in the day with an armful of empty bags and the kind of food that can survive a long time on the road; a lot of food, Zuko notices. He wishes it were less. If it were . . . if it were he could pretend they won't be very far. That he could see them again, maybe, like if they came back to the city for something sometime, or just any accidental run-in.

He still doesn't know where he's going to go after this. Back to the docks, maybe, but as bad as it is everywhere else the docks are so much worse and maybe he shouldn't. But it's not like there's anywhere else he could go, and the docks . . . the docks are the only place he ever sees red in this city.

There's Song's pretty pink skirt, here, but Song isn't going to be here anymore.

Song and her mother pack up the rest of the bedroom and most of the kitchen and Zuko cleans up inexpertly behind them and tries not to look anything like how he feels. He's almost out of time, if he ever had time at all, and he always knew it wouldn't last but he'd thought . . . he'd thought they'd just send him back where he'd come from, and he could maybe come by sometimes and see how they were. Not bother them, just . . . just pass by and see how they were, and keep walking quick. Maybe they'd have smiled or waved or asked him how he was like they do with all those other ex-patients, but nothing more than that. Zuko didn't expect or want more than that, really, he knew he didn't . . . that he wasn't . . .

He'd just thought he'd be able to see them again, even if only from across the street.

“That went quick. Good job, you two, I think we'll be able to leave sooner than planned,” Song's mother says, planting the broom on the floor and surveying the mostly-bare apartment with satisfaction. Zuko surveys it too, and feels just that bare and packed-up inside, like someone bundled up everything he had and took it away. He wishes he hadn't helped. They might be staying longer, if he hadn't.

“When?” he asks, quieter and raspier than he means to.

“The day after tomorrow, I think,” Song's mother decides, tilting her head thoughtfully as she leans against the broom. “Perhaps the day after that—I'm not sure I'll be able to track down all the rest of our customers tomorrow and I'd hate to leave without telling them. There's a few pieces of furniture I need to find new homes for, too.”

“Is there anything we can do, Mother?” Song asks hopefully. Zuko studies his feet, wondering if it'd be stealing to keep the clothes they gave him. He doesn't have any others anymore, but he didn't earn them himself. The only thing he could give them in trade is his knife, and the idea of giving anyone his knife is . . . it's . . .

He should give it to them, he thinks. It's probably not worth much—nothing he's had ever has been—but it's the principle of the thing. If nothing else, the honor he doesn't have any more would demand it.

Maybe they'd even remember him a little if he did, some small and secret part of him thinks.

“Not tonight,” Song's mother says, setting aside the broom and smiling at them. “I'd appreciate it if you could both give the place a more thorough scrub-down while I'm out tomorrow, though.”

“Of course, Mother,” Song says happily, and Zuko nods even as his stomach sinks. One more step to them leaving; one more way he'll be helping them leave. He wishes they weren't making him help.

Except he shouldn't wish that, because if they weren't letting him help . . . he'd have been sent away by now, if they weren't letting him help.

He just wishes . . .

Forget what he wishes. It's not like he has the right to, anyway.

Song's mother makes dinner, brown rice and roasted fish and fat, sticky sweet rolls, and Zuko sits at the kitchen table with her and Song and eats it with them, feeling small and miserable and lonely and is-this-the-last-time? Or will tomorrow be the last time, or the day after tomorrow, or the day after that? Will he have warning, will they stop to say goodbye, or will they just leave late at night, take all their things and walk out while he's half-asleep?

He wants them to say goodbye, except he wouldn't know how to say it back and he'd probably mess it up and make them hate him. Not that it matters; he won't see them again anyway. He just—he just wants to be able to think that if they ever think of him again, it won't be badly. At least not very badly. He knows—he knows he's not good, he knows he isn't the kind of person other people want around or think much about at all, but . . .

He just wants them to say goodbye, even if he won't know how to say it back.

They eat. They clean up. They go to bed. Song and her mother talk about moving and their patients and a dozen shared experiences that Zuko knows nothing about. They sleep, or at least Song and her mother do. Zuko lies awake in the dark, dreading the corners of it, and watches Song sleep. Or the shadow of her, anyway—the windows are shuttered and the fire in the stove is just embers and the oil lamp is hanging on by only the barest thread. He can feel it guttering, fighting to last, and he gives it what he can but that can only be so much, and when it finally dies it hurts. For it or for him, he's not sure.

And Song is a shadow in pretty pink that Zuko can't see, and sleep just won't come.

He thinks of this small safe place, warm and shadowed and somewhere he can sleep, and wonders if he will ever sleep again. He knows he won't be lucky enough to find a place like this again—he's never lucky, that Song and her mother found him at all was just—just a fluke. An exception to prove the rule.

Another thing to have taken away.

Sometime after midnight Song has a bad dream and Zuko reaches across the thin line that divides the couch and the futon and cups her trembling hands in his own. Song makes little grieving sounds and he breathes warmth into her without thinking about it, without remembering better. Song doesn't breathe the way she should in response and he barely represses the flinch.

Song is Earth. Song is Earth and—and it's best that she leave. That he not be around them. They're dangerous. They—they are. They're the enemy. They're the enemy and he's not . . . he's not really Fire anymore, not really anything anymore, but that doesn't make it okay to be with the enemy. Even if they're not—even if they're not like the enemy is supposed to be. Even if he's not anyone who should have enemies, now; he's not worth that anymore. He'll never be anyone's rival or risk factor or worthy opponent, never be a soldier or officer in the field, never be a prince or lord leading his people into battle to better the world.

The world is too dark and awful to better, anyway.

The sun comes up, Song's mother leaves, and they spend the day cleaning. Song is determined to make the apartment better than new and before lunch has already fixed half a dozen little things Zuko hadn't even noticed were broken. They make lunch together, but Zuko can't eat more than a few bites—this time, will this be the last time? Next time? The time after that? When are they going to leave him, and when will he manage to stop caring that they have? They're Earth, he shouldn't care at all, they're Earth peasants and he is the blood of lords, he is—he is—

He is not the blood of lords. He is just a mistake made a long time ago and finally rectified. He is no one's prince, and he will never be a worthy lord. No one will ever follow him.

Or stay with him.

They're almost out of things to clean when Song's mother calls up from the street and Song peeks out the window and gasps in shock, then bolts downstairs. Zuko bolts after her reflexively, checking his knife just as reflexively, but when they get down there it's just that Song's mother has bought an ostrich-horse. It's not as big as a dragon-moose or komodo rhino, but Zuko still lingers back warily as Song gets introduced to it by her mother. He doesn't really know anything about animals anyway.

And it's just another way for them to leave him faster.

“Dao,” Song's mother calls, beckoning him over with a smile, and then Zuko has to go even though it's the last place he wants to be. She gives him applegrass to feed the ostrich-horse and it tries to take a bite out of his hair instead, but eventually it settles for the applegrass after all. Zuko's never fed an animal this big and it'd be . . . it'd be cool, he thinks, except he just can't . . . he just . . .

The ostrich-horse makes a low, sawing sound and nudges at his hands in search of more applegrass, and Zuko almost cries. But doesn't, because that's shameful and . . . and no. It doesn't matter if it's shameful, he has nothing left to shame. He doesn't cry because Song would feel bad if he did, and Song should never, ever have to feel bad.

She just . . . she shouldn't. Earth or Fire or neither or nothing, Song should always be okay.

And thinking that really makes him want to cry.

“I managed to track everyone down. We'll finish up the cleaning tonight and leave tomorrow morning,” Song's mother tells them, and Zuko blinks fast and concentrates very, very hard on petting the ostrich-horse.

“Okay,” Song says with only the barest trace of a nervous smile. Zuko just keeps petting the ostrich-horse; he can't really think past that. Thinking past that would mean . . . it would be all sorts of . . .

He just can't.

Should I leave now or should I stay and help clean first? he wants to ask, but mostly he's thinking about the lonely weight of his knife in his sleeve and the question that actually comes out comes out wrong.

“Can I stay 'til you do?” he manages, voice barely above a murmur, and Song and her mother give him blank looks. His heart sinks; of course he can't, he should've just gone, he's so stupid—Song's mother's face clears, suddenly, and then pain flashes across it and she drops to her knees and cradles Zuko's shoulders in her hands.

“Oh Dao,” she says in a wretched voice, and if he didn't know better it'd sound heartbroken. “We wouldn't . . . we're all leaving, honey.”

“What?” Zuko asks stupidly, not understanding, and her hands cradle his face instead, her eyes soft and kind and still more pained.

“We're all leaving, honey,” she repeats. “We wouldn't go without you.”

“But,” Zuko tries, blinking fast again, except more words won't come and Song's mother just keeps looking at him like that, tender and painful and touching his ruined, shamed face and. And he doesn't. He doesn't. Why is she looking at him like that? He doesn't—he doesn't know why she's looking at him like that.

And then he actually does cry and covers his face, mortified and so mad at himself, he's so stupid he—

“Oh Dao, honey, I'm so sorry,” Song's mother says, wrapping her arms around him and holding him close and making no sense. “I never even thought you might—I should have, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to scare you like that.”

“I wasn't scared,” Zuko says numbly against her shoulder, staring at the blurred fabric of her shirt.

It's not a lie—“scared” isn't anywhere near big enough a word. Song's mother strokes his hair and more tears slip out and they're getting her shirt all wet but she's still holding him just as tight and—and—

“I wasn't,” he says, and she holds him tighter.

.

.

.

Once Dao starts crying it's like he can't stop. Mother takes him inside and Song ties up the ostrich-horse in the courtyard and can't understand what's wrong with her. Dao thought for two days that they were going to just abandon him, and she spent both of them with him and never even thought something might be wrong. Not even for a moment.

How did she not think that?

Song makes sure the ostrich-horse is okay and blinks very fast and then heads back inside. Dao is sitting at the table with tears all down his face and Mother is sitting with him, holding him close. He's still crying and Song is heartsick at the sight of him so miserable and Mother is just stroking his hair and making soothing noises that just make him cry harder.

Song wants to cry too, but instead she makes tea—the sweet jasmine blend that Dao pretends not to prefer—and she has never in her whole life devoted herself so utterly to such a simple task, she thinks.

The tea is as perfect as Song can make it, and when she sets it in front of Dao he looks up at her with wet, hollow eyes and her heart breaks, perfectly and absolutely. He is the kindest boy in the world and he should never, ever have to look that way.

She really could cry, with him looking that way.

Mother presses the teacup into Dao's hands and he wraps his fingers around it and looks down and tears fall into it and Song hides on the far side of the kitchen, so lost for what to say and so angry with herself that she never wants to say another word again. She tries so hard to take care of Dao, to understand him and make him happy, but she couldn't even understand this one thing—this most important thing. How could she let him think that?

He's already had so much worse than anyone deserves, and she's supposed to be the one making sure he never has to feel anything like that again.

He should never feel anything like that.

Mother stays with Dao and Song looks for anything to do with herself but there's nothing, everything's all packed away and cleaned up and she already made the tea Dao's crying into and what else can she do, everything she tries is always—everything she tries just isn't good enough. She wants to see Dao happy but how does she even deserve that? She can't take good enough care of him to deserve that.

She needs to. Dao needs someone to and Mother has to work so hard already, Song has to be the one to take care of him because someone has to and Mother works so hard already and—and—and someone has to, that's all, no one else will. No one did before.

It's not fair, that no one did before.

It's not fair.

She's useless. Helpless. Dao needs her and she can't do anything what's wrong with her—

Mother spends the whole night comforting Dao and Dao spends the whole night trying not to need it and Song spends the whole night finishing the cleaning and being no good at all. In the morning Mother makes breakfast and Song sits with Dao at the table but still doesn't have anything that could help. Dao is completely quiet and that's not strange, but Song still can't find her own voice in the presence of that silence. If he'd say something, just one thing, then she'd know what to say too. She'd have the way, the words would come, something would work and it would be fine it would all be fine and okay and—and—

And Dao won't say anything, and Song is afraid that he will never, never be okay.

“Eat up, you two,” Mother says, setting breakfast in front of them. “We have a big day ahead of us.”

“Yes Mother,” Song tries to say, but it comes out, “How could you think we'd leave you, Dao?” He stares at her and she pales in dismay, clapping her hands over her mouth. She didn't mean to say that—it's such a mean and unfair question to ask, especially when she already knows the answer.

“I—I—” Dao stutters, and Song flushes in shame and looks away, and Mother gives a very soft sigh and reaches out to touch both of their faces.

Even turned away, Song does not miss Dao's flinch.

“I'm sorry,” Song whispers hoarsely, and Mother pulls them both close and Dao looks too afraid to hold on and Song just knows she doesn't deserve to. Of course the only thing she could say would be the worst; of course, how could she, how could she do that, Dao needs her to be better than that, to be—to be—

Mother lets them go, and Song blinks back tears.

“Dao,” she starts, except she still can't look at him. “Dao, I—I shouldn't have—”

“It's okay,” Dao mutters, but it's not. They eat anyway and Mother cleans up and the next thing Song knows they're in the courtyard with the ostrich-horse, all packed up and ready to go. She thinks a bit about crying again, but she's left much more important places than this.

They walk out of the city together, Mother leading the ostrich-horse and the way and Song and Dao on either side of her. Song wants to walk beside Dao and hold his hand like they did at the festival, but she's afraid if she tried he wouldn't let her. So she doesn't try.

It's not like her. She knows it's not like her.

But she still doesn't try.

.

.

.

Song doesn't talk to him the whole way out of the city, and Zuko doesn't blame her. He's so weak and he's shown her that; how could she ever respect him after that? How could she even like him after that?

He's weak, and no one should like him.

But Song's mother wanted him to come with them, and he can't imagine doing anything else. Even if he's weak, even if he's more of a burden than a help—he's still a body, he's still a boy; he's still a better target than Song. He hopes.

If that's all he can do, he'll at least do that much.

For right now, though, all Zuko can do is keep up with Song's mother and try not to be obvious about keeping an eye on Song as he does. He feels nauseous, and more and more nauseous the farther they walk, but he just keeps thinking about Song's leg. It's almost healed—even his face almost is, now—but he knows it still hurts her when they're out too long or when she stresses it too much. Even if it didn't, it's still weak.

He wishes he were bigger. Stronger. Not much, just—just enough to carry her when her leg starts to hurt, like he knows it's going to. The ostrich-horse already has a lot to carry with almost all of Song and her mother's things on its back, and he doesn't know how strong it is.

But he's not bigger or stronger and he just feels sicker and sicker the farther they walk.

Song stumbles and her mother reaches back and steadies her before Zuko even has time to react. Song stutters an apology, looking embarrassed, and her mother just smiles down at her in a way that hurts . . . something. A thing Zuko doesn't have a name for, exactly. A . . . a thing that hurts. A thing he thinks he's jealous of, even though he doesn't have the right to be.

Song's mother keeps an arm around Song's shoulders and they keep walking. Zuko concentrates on the walking; it's the only thing he can do right now so at least he's going to do it right. It's only one thing, but it's something.

He has to do something.

One step. Two steps. Three steps. Four—steps, like they're dancing. Song counted them off, one and two and three and four that's right, Dao, just like that! No one dances in the Fire Nation. It's frivolous and foolish and indecent and no one should ever waste the time, the steps, one and two and three and four that's right, Dao, just like—

He notices the arm around his shoulders after he's already stumbled. Song's mother is looking down at him, her face soft with a thing he doesn't know as she holds him steady, rueful and amused and hard to understand. Complicated.

“You two,” she says with a smile, shaking her head, and it even sounds . . . if Zuko didn't know better, he'd think she sounded fond. She guides them off the road and ties the ostrich-horse to a tree and makes them both sit down side-by-side, then checks them over the way she always does.

“I'm okay, Mother, we don't have to stop,” Song says softly and Zuko nods in emphatic agreement except it makes his head swim a little too. Song's mother just shakes her head again with a tired little smile and touches both their faces.

“Don't push yourselves,” she tells them, although Zuko can't for the life of him figure out why he's included in that. “We have a long way to go, and you're going to need to save your strength.”

“Yes, Mother,” Song says, her voice a barely-there mumble, and Zuko tries not to look at her. He doesn't think he should be; he messed up and she's mad at him. Instead he looks at the road and the grass and the rocks and the ostrich-horse and Song's mother and there's not enough to look at. There should be more to look at. Just anything not Song.

Song's mother gives them both a piece of jerky to eat and a canteen of water to sip from and then goes to take care of the ostrich-horse, and Zuko and Song keep sitting side-by-side without touching or looking at each other. He wants it to be like it usually is when Song's mother checks them over, where they're so much closer and Song will hold his hand when her mother touches his burn and he'll hold Song's hand when her mother touches her burn and it never hurts more than that hand can make it easier to deal with. Or almost never. And then they keep holding hands for a little after and that at least makes it easier.

Almost always makes it easier.

It's not perfect, but Zuko knows better than to waste time wanting perfect. He just wants good enough.

Song has . . . Song's good.

He wishes they were holding hands.

Song's mother comes back and checks them both over again—Zuko isn't sure if she's worrying or what, he doesn't really know—and then takes the canteen back and helps Song back up and onto the ostrich-horse and helps Zuko up and onto it too, which he understands even less. His head hurts, but that doesn't mean he can't mount. And then Song's mother checks them over again, and then he really does think she's worried.

He didn't . . . he wishes she weren't.

“Would you two like to hear a story?” she asks, smiling up at them as she leads the ostrich-horse back onto the road. Zuko wants to say no and wants to say yes and wants to say please don't worry, I can protect Song. Except he can't, of course.

“Yes please, Mother,” Song says softly, and Zuko nods because Song said yes. He guesses it's better than silence, but also wishes they could just have the silence. Zuko doesn't want silence but he's afraid of reacting wrong again—every time Song's mother tells a story he says something wrong and they give him those strange looks and then he doesn't know what to say. They try to be nice about it, but it still scares him to be different. The first thing he learned off the boat was not to be that.

As bad as being different was in the Fire Nation, it's infinitely worse in the Earth Kingdom.

“What about?” Song's mother asks, and Song hesitates and Zuko glances back to her uncertainly. He isn't going to choose, but the pause in the conversation makes him anxious and he wants it filled.

“Dao can pick,” Song says, and Zuko's heart sinks. He doesn't know any Earth Kingdom stories, just the ones Song's mother has already told him and would it look suspicious if he asked for one of those again? His—his mother and the nursemaids would tell the same stories over and over but Song's mother always tells new ones and maybe that's how it always is in the Earth Kingdom.

“Song can pick,” he counters quickly, shaking his head, and Song's mother laughs.

“Well, someone should pick,” she says in amusement.

“You can!” Zuko and Song blurt in unison, and Zuko flushes in embarrassment at how loud his voice was. He didn't even have to say anything; Song was already talking anyway. Song's mother laughs again but Zuko doesn't feel laughed at and it's . . . he isn't sure what it is.

“Oma and Shu?” she suggests. “The founding of the Dai Li? The rivalry of the Gan Jin and the Zhang?”

Love Amongst the Dragons, Zuko wants to say, the founding of the Fire Sages, the rivalry of the Yu Yan and the Imperial Firebenders. But those are all stories Song's mother wouldn't know, and even if she did know them they'd be too dangerous to ask for, so instead he bites his tongue and stares down at the saddle. Song should be the one to pick anyway.

Song's mother keeps making suggestions and Zuko keeps looking at the saddle and Song makes soft, indecisive noises in response, but Song's mother never sounds any less patient. Zuko's chest hurts, when he notices that. And then two men step out from the dark side of a curve in the road and grab Song's mother's arms and she gives a startled little gasp and oh.

Oh no.

Song's mother tries to jerk away from the men holding her and Song shrieks in alarm and Zuko feels hot and cold and sick like a fever. This—he knows this. And it is the last thing he ever wanted.

“Mother!” Song cries, struggling to jump down off the ostrich-horse. Zuko grabs her—she'll hurt her leg, she'll crumple—and grabs the reins too and almost almost just bolts, runs, takes Song far away because these are bad things this is a bad place this is bad bad bad—but before he can or can't a third man is there and snatching the reins away and baring his teeth up at them in an awful, awful smile that flashes in the dark like the blade in his hand.

Song screams.

Zuko doesn't have the room to react past the terror, but the sound of Song's shriek and the sight of that flashing blade/smile makes him react anyway. He throws himself out of the saddle at the man's knife arm and hangs on with everything he has, and the man curses and tries to shake him but Zuko just holds on, thinking hit me HIT me drop the REINS—

Song is still shrieking, and he can hear them—hear them hurting her mother and—and they'll hurt her too, they will, he can't let them. The man throws him off and yanks the reins down and Zuko fumbles for his knife; it isn't a sword but it's still a weapon and he can—

The man reaches for Song and Zuko forgets everything that isn't instinct, and fire blooms bright in the dark.

And Song screams.

“Firebender!” one of the men snarls in rage, kicking him in the chest. Zuko goes sprawling, breath control breaking like it's nothing, and he should be terrified but the men aren't looking at Song anymore so he's—just not.

They are going to kill him, but they aren't looking at Song anymore.

Getting hit barely matters after that. He loses his chance of regaining his breath control with the first kick to his stomach and his knife with the second but it's okay, it's okay, just as long as Song thinks to run it'll all be okay—

The man stops kicking him. Zuko throws up, weak sparks sizzling against stomach acid and bile, and tries to breathe but can't. The man makes a weird noise and falls over, but Zuko's still gagging and can't look to see why. He thinks he sees the other two men on the ground too, but that doesn't make sense. This doesn't make sense.

“It's alright, darling, you're alright,” Song's mother soothes as she kneels next to him and holds his hair back while he vomits again. Zuko's eyes are wet and blurred and can't be trusted, but he can see something sharp in her hand. He gulps in one last breath and waits, but she doesn't stab him and doesn't stab him and still doesn't stab him and he doesn't have the breath to hold, and when he gags on his next inhalation she just strokes his hair back and murmurs soothing, disjointed nonsense.

Except it's not nonsense.

“Hush my little dragon-bird, hush my firefly. I will light the lanterns, you need only light my eye. Stay bright little firefly, sleep tight little firefly. The sun will rise again but it's the moon's turn for the sky,” Song's mother sings, soft and disjointed and in the wrong key but—but—but that's. But that's a Fire Nation lullaby.

Zuko can't do anything but burst into tears.

.

.

.

Mother dries Dao's tears and cleans him up and leads him past the bandits' too-still bodies and off the road and Song follows numbly and without thinking, the ostrich-horse's reins just barely in her grip. She cannot afford to think; she might just never think again.

“That was dangerous,” Mother says. Song does not look back towards the road and the bodies on it.

“I didn't mean to,” Dao says. He's not crying anymore, but his voice sounds like he's crying and he's wearing the look he always wears when he expects hit. Normally Song would be sad to see it but right now she isn't anything. “I don't even deserve to, I—I didn't mean to.”

“I know,” Mother says softly, “but it was still dangerous. You mustn't ever bend, Dao, if anyone saw you they would take you away. Do you understand?”

“Yes?” Dao answers uncertainly, and maybe he does but Song doesn't. Kind and handsome and kind Dao just bent fire and Mother does not even look surprised, Mother is calm and sure and steady as hard rock while Song feels like sand at the mercy of wind and tide.

Dao just bent fire.

Dao bent fire.

Dao is . . . Dao is a . . .

“Good boy,” Mother says firmly, gripping his shoulders, then turns to Song. “Darling, you can't ever tell anyone. You know that, right?”

“Because they'll take Dao away,” Song repeats distantly, feeling like she's not inside herself.

“That's right,” Mother says.

“And we . . . don't want them to?” Song tries, still feeling distant and disconnected. Dao flinches, and Mother . . . Mother looks so sad.

“No, we don't,” she says. Song stares at Mother's hands, strong and gentle and full of knowledge and full of needles with blood on them. Or they were, at least, when those men had attacked and Dao had burst into fire. There's a deep smear of red-brown on the inside of her thumb. Those were Earth Kingdom men and that is Earth Kingdom blood.

And Dao just bent fire.

I'm scared, she wants to say. Mother, what are you DOING? she wants to say.

Dao, are you okay? she wants to say. It's what she's been saying constantly, all this time, time and time again since she found him.

What she thinks she'll never say again.

Mother checks Song over even though no one even touched her (but the fire it was so close, she felt the heat of it, it blinded her, she was so AFRAID—) and then leads them back towards the road, Song on the ostrich-horse and Dao walking hand-in-hand with Mother, ahead enough that they'd have to look back to see the bodies. Song doesn't look back, but she sees the fear in Dao's face when he does. She wants to be angry, to scream at him—you LIED to me, you're one of THEM, you HURT people!—but she just can't because that would mean it was real and she just can't . . . it can't be real.

Dao can't be one of those people.

They walk for a long time with nothing but Mother's soft songs to break the silence, on and on until it's just too dark to walk anymore, and then Mother takes them back off the road and sets a fire in the darkness that Song flinches back from the sight of, and Dao's face crumples and his fingers curl in on themselves like they're trying to hide. Mother and Dao sit next to the fire; Song doesn't.

“Mother,” she says, shaky-hurt and not understanding as Mother rations out their night's supper into the pot over the fire and Dao looks at the fire instead of either of them or anything else. Song has a vivid and horrible image of him calling it to him, of it flaring up huge and horrible and hungry and devouring them whole, burning them to nothing, oh spirits, Oma and Shu, quicksand and broken jade—

“A healer takes an oath, Song,” Mother says, quiet and serious, and everything drains out of Song.

“That's not—I'm not—”

“You're not,” Mother agrees, stirring their slow-cooking supper, “but darling, I am.”

Song almost cries and almost runs off into the dark, but she doesn't want Dao to see her cry and can't forget the men from before who came from the dark. She almost does both anyway, but instead just goes to the edge of the firelight and sits down against a tree, knees drawn up tight to her chest. She doesn't look at Mother or Dao, just the edge of the fire where it is slowly devouring a thin stick and turning it to ash and ruin.

This is not—this is not what she thought they were doing.

And Mother didn't even look surprised. .

“You knew,” she says, and gulps back a sob.

“I thought perhaps,” Mother murmurs, feeding another stick into the fire. “Firebenders . . . burns aren't quite the same, on firebenders. But it was hard to be certain, with the infection.”

“I'm sorry,” Dao says, his voice just barely cracking. “I didn't—it was dishonorable not to say.”

Song laughs and it's ugly, and she wishes she hadn't. Dao flinches again, and Mother reaches out and strokes his hair back against his head.

“You did the right thing,” she says, and Dao blinks fast and looks at the fire. “You were just trying to be safe, Dao. Anyone would do it.”

“It's dishonorable,” Dao says again, and won't look away from the fire. It's painfully bright, but his eyes don't squint or water at the light, and Song feels nauseous when she notices that. That way he is different, that way he is a bender, and not—earth, or water, even air, any other bender would be fine, even good because benders can be so useful and hardly ever have trouble finding work, if Dao was any other kind of bender it would be good. Fine.

But he's not and it's not and the fire is making Song's eyes water.

“You're Fire Nation,” she says, and his expression crumples all over again and he hides his face against his knees.

“No,” he says. “I'm—no. Not anymore.” Song stills, and doesn't know what that means or what to think of it. Mother just touches the back of Dao's shoulder very gently, the exact same way she touched him yesterday. The exact same way she always touches him.

Song knows what that means even less, even though what it means is completely obvious.

“Do you want to tell us?” Mother asks gently, and Dao's shoulders hunch.

“No,” he whispers.

“Alright,” Mother murmurs, stroking Dao's back soothingly as she leans in and kisses the top of his head. He tenses a little again, but the tension all drains out almost immediately. “Dao. Will you look at me?”

He does, but Song can't quite do the same. She promised herself that she would be kind, that she would be a person who trusted and thought the best of people, but this . . . this is not . . .

Dao is not who he is supposed to be, she thinks, helplessly. And there is no changing that.

“I want to be very sure that you know this, after before,” Mother says, holding Dao's hands gently in her own and speaking with all her sincerity and all her compassion. “We won't leave you behind for being a firebender. We won't leave you behind for anything. We will always keep you, for as long as you want to stay with us. Do you understand, Dao?”

“. . . no,” Dao whispers again, even quieter, and his eyes are wet gold in the firelight and Song does not understand how she did not see that before, how she missed that. She should've seen. She would've just thought he was a war-child if she had, she knows, but she still should have seen.

Mother wraps Dao up in her arms and Song stares at the fire until her eyes water from the light.

.

.

.

In the morning they pack up and head out just like nothing's changed, and in a way it hasn't except the reason Song won't speak to Zuko is completely different, and he can't decide if it's worse. It must be, he thinks—she knows they are enemies now, except he doesn't have enemies because he is not Fire at all, he is not anything at all, and if he is nothing he does not deserve honorable opponents—

Song's mother gives him the ostrich-horse's reins to lead while Song rides, and leads the way herself. Zuko wants to ask why she did not kill him with the hidden sharp things that she used against the men who attacked them, but she would just say more things he cannot make sense of. He understands the words, and he even thinks he understands that Song's mother really means them, but he just . . .

He doesn't understand why.

They walk a long time, again, and over lunch Song's mother sits across from them and gives them both very serious looks. Zuko has a wistful moment of feeling like Song is on his side again, even knowing he doesn't deserve it, but of course she's not.

“I need you both to understand what to do if we are ever attacked again,” Song's mother says, and Song nods and Zuko nods too because he just—because he wants Song to be on his side, or at least wants to be on hers. Even being Earth Kingdom would not be so bad, he thinks, if it would mean being on Song's side. “What happened was very dangerous for all of us. If it happens again, you two need to run and hide, and not come back until I come for you.”

“But I can fight!” Zuko protests reflexively—he has no honor, of course he doesn't, and he doesn't deserve his firebending, but there are still things he can do and for Song and her mother there is nothing he would not do, if they are really going to keep him. He still doesn't know why they would.

“Dao, no,” Song's mother says sharply, and he flinches in shame. Shouldn't have spoken out, doesn't he know better than to speak out by—“Bending is even more dangerous. Don't you remember how those men reacted yesterday?”

Zuko doesn't understand why that is a problem—they hurt him instead of Song, isn't that a good thing?—but it wasn't what he meant.

“I can fight with swords. If—if we could find some, maybe,” he blurts out quickly, gripping the sides of his bowl, and Song's mother pauses, looking surprised. But it's better this way anyway, Zuko knows; he's an awful firebender. “My—when I was worthy of my mother, she taught me.”

“You are worthy of any mother, Dao,” Song's mother says, going soft and gentle again. He feels like crying, the way she says it, but he's done that enough. And anyway, he knows it's not true. “What kind of sword?”

Zuko would laugh, because it's almost funny, except nothing in the entire world is ever going to be funny again.

“Dao,” he says, and mimes the action of splitting a sword. Song's mother tips her head, and blinks.

“You . . . Song,” she says, casting a suspicious glance over to Song, and Zuko doesn't understand why until, “Did you tell him—”

“I didn't,” Song says, although she says it without looking at them. “But he saw them when we packed.” And Zuko remembers, belatedly--in the closet, a sword half-wrapped and hidden away. He hadn’t realized it was a dao blade, though.

“I’m not lying,” he says.

“. . . hm,” Song’s mother says, frowning faintly for a moment. “Well then. A coincidence that fortuitous must be a gift from the spirits.”

“I don’t--I want to fight too!” Song blurts, and her mother hums softly and gives her a sad look.

“I’ll teach you, darling, if you do,” she says. “But until you’ve learned, I still want you both to run.”

“Yes, Mother,” Song says unhappily, and Zuko nods. Even though he could fight, it’s the easiest thing she could’ve asked of him, because it means keeping Song safe.

.

.

.

They spend some time gathering plants, both to eat and to poison Mother’s needles with. Song holds edible mushrooms in one hand and poison mushrooms in the other, laying against the healed scar crossing her palm--the scar from Dao’s knife, the only thing he has left of . . . wherever he was before he was with them.

The Fire Nation, she supposes.

It doesn’t look like a Fire Nation knife, though.

“What’s that, Dao?” Mother asks.

“Tea?” Dao guesses after a long moment, pointing at a curling white flower, and Mother muffles a laugh.

“No, sweetie, poison,” she says kindly, patting him on the shoulder. “So let's definitely get some.”

They do, and Mother sets up outside of camp and spends dinnertime making poison. She’s not far, but she’s out of sight. Song thinks about Dao and fire, and tries not to shiver. Dao’s never hurt her on purpose, but . . .

Dao’s never hurt her on purpose.

That doesn’t mean he’s never hurt her, though.

That doesn’t mean . . .

“. . . let me see,” she says quietly, and Dao startles, then stares at her.

“Your mother said I shouldn't,” he says.

“I—I know, just—let me see. Please,” Song says. It’ll only be this once. She’s not stupid.

“. . . okay,” Dao says hesitantly, stepping closer to her, and Song tries not to bristle.

“Just—just a little one, okay?” she blurts. “Promise!”

“I . . . I promise,” Dao says, looking injured. Song feels bad about that. He cups his hands, though, and a tiny little flicker of flame appears between them. Song stares at it, thinking how easily it could become an inferno and burn this whole forest up.

It’s just a tiny little flicker, though. Just the littlest thing. She could blow it out with a breath, and not even on purpose.

It reminds her of Dao, if she thinks about it. Which . . . makes sense, really.

She blows out the flame, and Dao startles.

“Sorry,” she says, not sure if that was . . . just, not sure.

“Um,” he says uncomfortably. She wonders if it’s a bad thing to blow out a firebender’s fire. “It’s, uh. It’s okay.”

“Okay,” she says, just looking at him for a long, long moment. Mother is making poison and Dao smells like smoke and dinner is probably cold by now, and she . . .

She doesn’t know what she is.

She should be with Mother, actually. It’s as good a time as any to learn how to make those poisons.

She stays with Dao, though.

.

.

.

Zuko should tell them who he is, but why would they believe him? Even if they did, it doesn’t matter. That person doesn’t exist anymore. The Fire Sages wrote him out. He could walk right into the palace and no one would know him anymore.

No one would care to, he means.

Not that anyone really cared to before. Mother, and maybe Mai and Uncle, but . . .

Never mind.

They have a long way to go, probably, and every step of it he keeps thinking this is the farthest away from home I’ve ever been. no, this is. no, this. As if he still has a home; as if he still has the right to that home, to any home.

He keeps thinking it, though.

“Alright back there?” Song’s mother says, glancing back to them.

“Yes, Mother,” Song says. Zuko doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t really feel alright, but he can’t imagine the situation in which he ever would.

He should really stop thinking of himself as “Zuko”, he thinks. He’s tried to, once or twice, but it’s never taken.

Maybe if Song calls him “Dao” enough times, it’ll stick.

Maybe.

They keep walking. Zuko keeps being Zuko, even though really he’s only Dao. Zuko had honor and family and a life and a destiny. Dao has an Earth Kingdom knife and a couple of people who don’t mind that he’s . . . what he is. Stupid, and weak, and . . . and not their enemy, because he’s no one’s worthy opponent, but . . .

He thinks about Song’s mother’s fistful of sharp needles, and wonders again why she hasn’t just killed him. Anyone else would have. Even Song might’ve, he thinks, remembering the way she’d looked at him the first time she’d seen him bend. Remembering the way she’d looked at him the second time she’d seen him bend, and the quick rush of her breath blowing out his barely-there bit of flame.

Someone should have, he thinks.

They keep walking for a long, long time.

.

.

.

In a clearing deep in the woods, Mother gives Dao Father’s swords, and Song a thin little package of long and wicked needles. Dao takes off his shirt and ties all his hair back and starts doing a--kata? That’s what they’re called, right?

Mother shows Song how to throw a needle, and tells her to get practicing.

Song does, obviously, but it’s hard not to sneak little looks at Dao on the other side of the clearing between throws. He’s still too skinny. He looks sad, because he always looks sad, but there’s an unfamiliar determination to him, even when he messes up--which he does a lot, it looks like. He never cuts himself or drops a sword, though, so . . .

So.

Song’s much worse at throwing needles than Dao is with swords, though the more she practices the easier it gets. At least, easier when she’s doing it from a standstill and practicing on a target. She can’t imagine doing it like Mother, who could hit the eye of a needle coming out of a roll.

Who could hit a person’s eye, coming out of a roll.

Song has never hurt anyone on purpose. She can’t imagine hitting a person. She tries to think of those men who attacked them on the road, and it’s a little easier to imagine then. She remembers them grabbing Mother, and kicking Dao, and . . . and it’s a little easier to imagine then, yes.

But still so hard to imagine.

The days go by, and they travel farther along. Dao gets more confident with Father’s swords, and moves quicker and smoother through his katas every morning. Song gets a little bit more confident with Mother’s needles, but still isn’t sure she’ll ever be able to wield them as effectively as Mother can. It’s easier to learn the poisons--not so different from making medicine, really, and she’s been doing that for months now. If she’s in close enough, she thinks, all she’ll have to do is stab someone, so . . . so that won’t be so hard.

Except for the part where she’d have to stab someone, that is.

They don’t run into any more men hiding in the dark curves of the road, though, so she doesn’t have to figure out if she actually can. They come to a pretty little village and Mother asks around, and there’s not much work for an herbalist, but plenty of work for anyone with a strong back. Song’s helped in the fields before, so it’s tiring but not so hard, even with her leg. Dao has no idea what to do, which is no surprise from a city boy, but he does his best to help. The villagers are kind, which Dao of course doesn’t trust and Mother accepts graciously. Song tries to be gracious too, because that’s still the kind of person she wants to be.

They don’t stay very long—just enough to resupply, and earn a little money for the next village—and Dao seems relieved to leave. Song wonders what it would take to help him relax, just a bit. She hopes staying someplace long enough will be enough to do it, because otherwise she just doesn’t know what to do for him. He’s so brave, but so afraid all the time, and she wants something better for him.

Even . . . even though he’s . . .

There must be something that’ll make things better for him.

Dao gets faster with Father’s swords. He doesn’t bend fire again. He doesn’t tell them where he came from or how he wound up in an Earth Kingdom city with a burn like that on his face, and they don’t ask. Song isn’t sure she wants to know, and Mother . . . is Mother, she supposes. Mother just doesn’t need to know things like that.

They already know the important things anyway, Song reminds herself. They know Dao has nothing, and needs everything, and is so good and kind and . . . and . . .

And a firebender. A firebender, but so good and kind and . . .

Song breathes out, and thinks about dancing. Thinks about Dao standing between her and everything he thinks might hurt her. Thinks about how soft he is, and how afraid he is to be soft.

Thinks about the way the Fire Nation so obviously hurt him, and wonders how they could do that to anyone, much less one of their own.

They pass through other villages, and Mother keeps looking for one that needs an herbalist. They help on more farms, and in a few stores, and once on a lakeside dock. Dao gets stronger, and Song feels strange about watching it happen--watching him finally, finally fill out from eating consistently, watching him learn how to tie his hair back properly on his own, watching him lift bigger and heavier things and move faster and faster through those katas. She wonders if she’s getting stronger too, although she doesn’t feel like it. She thinks she’s a little better at hitting the target with her needles, at least, and she’s much better with poisons.

Dao doesn’t look like an Earth Kingdom boy, really, but no one seems to notice. Or if they do, they make the same assumption Song would’ve made if she ever had and think he’s a war-child, and don’t say anything.

He looks more like an Earth Kingdom boy every day, though, she thinks. He’s not as terribly pale as he was when she first met him, and his hair’s grown out a bit more, and his muscles are more . . .

She blushes when she catches herself looking, and looks away.

She turns fourteen on the road, and wonders how old Dao is.

.

.

.

“How old are you?” Song asks one morning, and Zuko—Dao, he tries to think, but it just rings false—Zuko pauses, and lowers his borrowed swords. “Zuko” should ring false too, but it still doesn’t.

“I’m not sure,” he says. He doesn’t know how Earth Kingdom calendars compare to Fire Nation ones, and even if he did, he has no idea what month it is. It’s very strange to think about, now that he’s thinking about it—he used to always know what month it was. He used to always know what day it was.

It’s been a long time since then, though.

“When’s your birthday?” Song asks.

“I’m . . . not sure,” Zuko says slowly, because he really doesn’t know what day it would be on an Earth calendar, and he’s not sure Song would recognize a Fire date either. “Why?”

“It’s mine today,” she says. “I’m fourteen.”

“Oh,” he says, and frowns. He didn’t know. He’s not sure if he would’ve done anything different if he had, but . . . “Um . . . happy birthday?”

“Thank you,” she says. “Are you fourteen, do you think?”

“Maybe.” He looks around the clearing, a little lost. What a strange thing not to know, he thinks. “I was—thirteen, last I knew. So maybe by now.”

“So maybe we’re the same age?” Song looks a little brighter at the thought; Zuko’s not sure why.

“Maybe,” he says. He can’t be older than her, at least—it’s been a long time, but not that long. He touches his scar, and thinks—“No. My birthday’s in the summer.”

“So I’m a little older,” Song says, and he nods. He’s not sure if it matters, but it’s a strange thing to think about all the same. He spent so much time more worried where his next meal was coming from or if his face would ever heal or if he was going to die or what horrible thing might happen to Song, thinking about how old they are is just . . . strange. “You’re still taller, though.”

“Yeah,” Zuko says, instead of my parents are tall. He thinks he might die if he tried to say that. If he tried to say anything about them at all.

He thinks he might die anyway, even just thinking about them.

Song doesn’t say anything else, and Zuko makes himself concentrate on his kata again. She watches him, which makes him self-conscious—as if he’s not used to being watched, when he’s spent his whole life being watched. Even in the Earth Kingdom, someone is always looking at him for one reason or another.

Staring at his scar, he means.

Song isn’t looking at his scar, though.

.

.

.

Watching Dao train is something Song does more and more as time goes by. He doesn’t tell her to stop, and Mother doesn’t tell her to focus on her own training, so . . .

So.

They’re in a village again, and again it’s not a village that needs an herbalist so they’re lugging heavy bags of feed out to a little barn, just her and Dao while Mother helps out in the field. Song wishes she could do more. Her leg is strong enough that it hardly ever gives out now, and she knows so many medicines and so much more than she ever did before, and none of it’s enough to find a safe place for Dao, a place where Mother wouldn’t have to work so hard and could just be Mother again, and not the constantly moving and constantly tired woman who knows countless poisons and carries sharp needles up her sleeve and knows how burns affect firebenders. A place where Dao wouldn’t have to be so afraid all the time.

It makes a lot more sense how afraid he is, now that she knows he’s a firebender.

It makes a lot more sense, but she still hates it.

She’s not sure which part she means she hates.

They stack all the feed sacks in the barn and Dao sneaks a look at the ostrich-horses. Song’s not sure if he’s afraid of them or wants to pet them. It’s Dao, so the line between the two desires is much thinner than Song wishes it were.

She goes over to the nearest ostrich-horse and pets it herself. Dao follows her, probably to make sure she won’t get herself bitten. He always thinks the worst is going to happen.

Song wonders what it would take, to make Dao not always think the worst is going to happen.

There’s a noise outside, and Song turns. Dao moves in front of her, because that’s what Dao always does. A man steps into the doorway, and Song . . .

Her fingers tremble on the ostrich-horse’s flank, and it squawks in discontent, prancing in place. The man in the doorway flicks his eyes over them, then looks over his shoulder. His silhouette is huge and imposing and red.

“It’s just a couple of kids!” he calls back.

“Bring them out,” someone says. Song trembles.

The man in the doorway steps towards them, and Dao takes a step back. Song lets him push her, and grips his sleeve. Another man steps into the doorway. She could stab them, she thinks. Dao doesn’t have his swords on him, they’re with their ostrich-horse, but she has her needles. There’s a paralysis poison on them. So she could stab them, but they’re wearing armor and she doesn’t know who else might be out there or where Mother or the farmers are or anything.

Dao tenses, and she grips his sleeve tighter.

“Don’t,” she whispers. They don’t know who’s out there, and Dao isn’t armed. The only thing he could do would be . . .

He doesn’t.

The men drag them out. Dao looks numb. Song feels numb. Mother is standing between two more men; the farmers are kneeling on the ground in front of several more, clutching each other.

The men are Fire Nation.

Mother, Song wants to say, but that’s a weakness, that’s telling them something they don’t need to know. And you never tell the Fire Nation anything they don’t need to know.

There’s an officer. He’s on a komodo rhino. He looks at them for a moment, then dismisses them entirely and turns his attention to Mother and the farmers. Song wants to grab Dao’s hand, but the men are holding them just a little bit too far apart to make it easy and that would be telling the Fire Nation something else they don’t need to know.

Dao’s face is so blank.

The officer is talking to Mother. He’s looking for a thief in the area. Mother says she doesn’t know anything about a thief. He says she’s a stranger here, isn’t she. She says she is. The officer takes Mother and the farmers into the farmhouse and the soldiers set up around the door. None of them have weapons, which means they’re all . . . which means they must be . . .

Song trembles.

One of the soldiers is looking at Dao. She reaches out and moves his hair over his scar, and he stiffens.

“What a waste of a pretty face,” she tsks.

“War child?” one of the other soldiers guesses, looking at him quizzically.

“Looks like it.” She lets Dao’s hair fall back into place, looking disgusted. “The longer we’re out here the less honor I see.” Dao flinches, his shoulders hunching. Song wants to hurt that soldier more than she has ever wanted to hurt anyone in her life, she thinks.

“We should tell the general,” the second soldier says.

“Why?” the first asks, tilting her head.

“He always wants to know when there’s war children,” he says with a shrug. Song feels a distant horror, her hands clenching into painful fists. Why would a Fire Nation general care about a war child? Why would anyone from the Fire Nation care about a war child?

She doesn’t like the answers that are coming to mind.

Someone burned Dao.

The second soldier leaves. The first one keeps looking at Dao. Song wants to hide him away so badly that it hurts. She thinks she might throw up.

“Where’s your father?” the soldier asks. Dao’s mouth turns into a white line, and he doesn’t say anything. “Hm. Don’t know, or won’t say?”

Dao doesn’t say anything, still. The soldier changes tactics.

“Your mother?” she asks, and Dao flinches again. “Calm down, kid, it’s not—”

Someone screams from inside the farmhouse. It’s quick and cuts off almost immediately, but it happens. Song’s heart jumps into her throat, and Dao lunges forward. The soldier stops him almost absentmindedly, one of the others grabbing onto him too, and he struggles violently in their grip.

“It wasn’t Mother,” Song manages, even though she knows better than to say anything at all. Dao stills. Standing next to Fire Nation soldiers, he looks . . .

How could she ever have thought he was anything but Fire?

How can he look so much like them, and be so different?

“There we go,” the soldier says. “The one in the hakama or the one in the hanbok?”

Dao’s mouth makes that thin white line again, and the soldier sighs.

“You’re not getting anything out of Earth Kingdom brats that easy, no matter who their father was,” one of the others says.

“What, you want me to interrogate children?” the first soldier says witheringly, and the second one comes back. “What’d the general say?”

“He said bring the war child,” the second soldier says. Dao stiffens again, and the bottom drops out of Song’s stomach.

“No!” she blurts reflexively, grabbing for Dao even as one of the soldiers yanks her back. “He’s not—leave him alone!”

“Kids,” the first soldier sighs, and grabs Dao by the back of the neck and drags him off. Song shrieks—can’t stop herself—and tries to run after them. One of the soldiers yanks her off her feet and her leg picks now to give out when she tries to kick him and—and—and they’re taking him away, they’re taking him away to who knows where and he’ll never come back and—and—

“DAO!” she shrieks, and the last she sees of him is his very pale face and that terrible, terrible scar.

.

.

.

The soldiers drag Zuko off, and he lets them drag him off because if he upsets them they might do something to Song, even if—even if they’re Fire Nation, even if they’re honorable soldiers, Song’s the enemy so . . .

The moment Song is out of his sight he starts to panic. He can still hear her shrieking, so that’s—that’s good, right? Unless she’s shrieking because they’re hurting her. Unless—

His breath comes too fast, and it’s all he can do not to spark. It’s all he can do to keep walking. The soldiers dragging him down the road are talking to each other over his head but all he can hear is a dull roar and Song’s shrieking, and none of it makes sense. If he’s not with Song he can’t protect her, but if he’d fought they might’ve hurt her, but now he can’t protect her, but—

“Calm down,” one of the soldiers says. “I’m sure those Earth Kingdom savages tell you enough stories, but we don’t hurt children. Especially not war children.”

“I’m not a war child,” Zuko manages, struggling not to dig his feet in as they drag him along. There wouldn’t be much point; both soldiers are bigger than him.

The soldiers give him strange looks. It takes him a moment to recognize them as . . . sympathetic?

No, he must be wrong about that.

“It’s alright, kid,” the first soldier says, and Zuko can’t imagine how it could be.

There’s a bigger cluster of soldiers on the road ahead, and a few komodo rhinos. Zuko aches with homesickness and terror in equal parts, and can’t quite keep his hands from shaking. He doesn’t know what this general wants with war children, but he’s not a war child, and he just wants Song.

“General,” the second soldier says, and the komodo rhinos part and reveal—

Zuko freezes.

Uncle drops the teacup in his hands.

“Zuko,” he says, looking stricken, and Zuko hides his scarred, dishonored face and bursts into tears. The soldiers let go of him, and Uncle rushes forward and grabs his arms. Zuko twists out of his grip, too humiliated and ashamed to even look at him, and chokes on a sob. Uncle grabs onto him again, though, pulls him in, and—and—

Zuko doesn’t think he’d even recognize it as a hug, if it weren’t for Song’s mother getting him used to the idea again. He wants to return it, wants to cling to him, but he isn’t Fire anymore, isn’t worth anything like that, isn’t anything Uncle should even recognize, much less embrace.

“My boy, where have you been?” Uncle says, sounding—he sounds like it hurts, but Zuko can’t imagine whatever it is hurting any worse than this already does.

“Don’t call me that!” he chokes. He isn’t Uncle’s boy. He isn’t anyone’s anything. He’s something Song is scared of, something weak, something cowardly, something that’s always afraid and isn’t a worthy opponent or an honorable prince and can never do anything right.

Uncle grips his arms tight, pulls his hands away from his scarred, tearstained face, and Zuko is so ashamed he could die. The soldiers all look shocked, but not as shocked as Uncle.

“My boy,” Uncle says again, his voice rough. “I’ve been looking for you for months. I’m so sorry.”

Sorry? What does Uncle have to be sorry for?

. . . what was Uncle looking for him for? Why would anyone ever? The Fire Sages wrote him out, he doesn’t exist, Uncle shouldn’t even be looking at him, much less looking for him.

“Why?” Zuko asks, hating the way his voice shakes around the word, and pain flickers across Uncle’s face.

“I’ve never been sorrier in my life,” he says. That’s not even what Zuko was asking, but he has no idea how to wrap his head around the answer. Uncle didn’t do anything wrong. He’s the one who . . . the one who . . . it’s him, he’s the one who did all this.

“What are you doing here?” he asks, voice still shaking. He shouldn’t be talking to Uncle, he has no honor and he’s been written out, but Uncle is talking to him.

“I told you,” Uncle says. “I’ve been looking for you.”

“Why?” Zuko asks again. Father doesn’t want him. No one wants him. He’s only survived because of Song’s pity, and surviving because of the enemy’s pity is enough reason to die itself. Except he doesn’t have enemies, because he’s not worth enemies, and he doesn’t have honor, and he doesn’t have . . .

He has a knife and borrowed swords and Song and her mother’s pity, and nothing else.

But Uncle looks so pained.

“I didn’t know you were being abandoned like that,” Uncle says. “Without guards or anything to your name or . . . If I’d known, I never would’ve let you go alone. Not for anything. I wouldn’t have let you go alone even with anything to your name.”

“I don’t have any honor,” Zuko says. Of course he was left with nothing. He never should’ve had anything, as weak and undeserving as he is. He shouldn’t even have what he has now.

“You have done nothing dishonorable,” Uncle says, that pained look flashing across his face again. “You have done nothing wrong. The Fire Lord—”

Zuko chokes on a fresh sob, and Uncle wraps his arms around him again.

“Oh, Nephew,” he says. “I am so glad to see you.”

Zuko can’t do anything but cry.

.

.

.

Song can’t do anything but cry. They took Dao away and Mother is still in the farmhouse someone screamed from and the soldiers won’t let her go to either of them and all she can do is cry. She’s so useless. She can’t do anything.

“The general isn’t going to hurt a kid. He just wants to know war children are being taken care of,” one of the soldiers tells her, but she knows that’s a lie. What kind of Fire Nation general would care about that? What kind of Fire Nation anyone would care about that?

They wouldn’t have war children, if the Fire Nation cared about things like that.

“Give him back,” she manages past her tears, but of course they don’t. Of course they never will. Of course she’ll never see Dao again, not for anything, no matter what she says or does. They’ll take Mother away too, and they’ll probably even burn her again just to make the point. Just so she knows beyond all shadow of a doubt that there’s nothing left to hope for.

She wanted so badly to be someone who could trust other people. Who could trust the world.

She should’ve known better.

She might as well have been wishing for the Avatar to show up and fix everything.

Song cries, and the soldiers mutter among themselves, and Dao doesn’t come back and no one comes out of the farmhouse. She thinks she’ll cry herself to dust and mud and die right here. There’s nothing left to live for, so why shouldn’t she?

She should hurt them, she thinks. They deserve it. For whatever they’re doing to Dao and Mother, whatever they’ve done to other innocent people, whatever—

“Song!”

Song’s head snaps up, and Mother is approaching with soldiers on either side of her and Song can’t do anything but throw herself at her. The soldiers don’t stop her this time, or she’s fast enough to do it before they can grab her, she doesn’t know which. Her vision is too tear-blurred for her to tell.

“Mother! They took Dao!” she sobs helplessly. “I couldn’t—they said he was a war child and the general wanted him and they took him!”

“Shhh, darling, shhh,” Mother murmurs, cupping her face in her hands. She doesn’t say it’ll be okay, and Song cries harder and clutches her as tightly as she can. Dao doesn’t deserve this. Dao isn’t a war child and the Fire Nation doesn’t deserve him—even if he were a war child, the Fire Nation hurt him, how dare they just show up and try to take him away? How dare they think they have the right?

She wishes her needles were as poisonous as possible, and that she’d put them in those soldiers’ necks.

Mother strokes her hair, and Song cries, and the officer gives orders and the soldiers get ready to leave and Dao—Dao doesn’t come back, still.

“Give him back!” Song sobs, and Mother wraps her arms tighter around her. One of the soldiers sighs; another rolls her eyes. Song wants to hurt them. Song wants to kill them.

“We told—” one of the soldiers starts, and then Song hears the sound of clanking armor and looks up again and—

“Ah,” she chokes. There’s another officer—the general, she knows immediately—and he’s standing there with his hand on Dao’s shoulder.

“My apologies for the trouble,” the general says, voice deceptively kind.

“Dao,” Song says numbly, and she’s not sure if she runs at him or he runs at her but she’s throwing her arms around him a moment later. Maybe they both ran at each other, she thinks, realizing that Mother and the general are nowhere near either of them.

“I’m sorry,” Dao whispers, and Song buries her face in his shoulder and holds him as tight as she can; tighter than she even knew she could. He puts his hands on her back, light and hesitant, and she almost starts crying again. She loves him. She knew that already, but right now she loves him even more than she knows how to. Enough to be able to kill anyone who so much as looked at him wrong, she thinks.

“You would be Song’s mother?” the general is saying pleasantly to Mother, who doesn’t seem to know what to do any more than Song does. The only things Song thinks she could do right now are hold onto Dao and stab anyone who tried to take him away again.

“Yes,” Mother says, voice just faintly guarded.

“I must thank you,” the general says. “You have done a great service to me.”

“A service?” Mother says warily, and Song stiffens. Dao hides his face against her hair.

“Yes,” the general says. “I have been looking for my nephew for a long time. He tells me you saved his life.”

Song blinks, and Dao tightens his grip on her. She digs her fingers into his back. She wants to kiss him, but not as much as she wants to hide him away someplace safe.

Dao has an uncle? A Fire Nation uncle? A Fire Nation general uncle?

The idea that Dao has anyone is so . . .

“Your nephew,” Mother says.

“Yes,” the general says. “Perhaps you will join me for a cup of tea, and we can talk a little more.”

That’s how Song ends up having tea with a Fire Nation general, sitting at a low table outside the farmhouse with him on one side and Mother on the other. Dao is right beside Song, so close their sides are pressed together. It’s not close enough. Song still feels like someone is going to take him away at any moment.

“I apologize for all the fuss,” the general says. He sips his tea. Mother doesn’t sip hers. “I was searching the area and ran into the local regiment, and they—well, it’s a long story, but I’m sure it was all a bit confusing for you.”

“I think it was more upsetting for the farmers,” Mother says.

“I suppose that’s true,” he says. “All the same, you’re alright, aren’t you?”

“Yes,” Mother says. It’s a lie, Song’s sure, because she is definitely not alright. “I’m sorry. You said you were Dao’s uncle?”

“Yes,” the general says. “Dao? That’s a nice name.”

“Song picked it,” Dao murmurs, his nose practically in his tea.

“Wiser than going by your own, I suppose,” the general says.

“I don’t have my own name,” Dao says. “The Sages wrote it out.” The general looks pained, and sets down his cup.

“They cannot take your name, Nephew,” he says. “Not even the Fire Lord has that right.”

“If anyone would, he would,” Dao says, still staring into his tea. The general keeps looking pained.

“I am so sorry it took me so long to find you,” he says. “I swear I would never have abandoned you, if I had known sooner.”

“It’s not your fault,” Dao says. His tea must be the most fascinating thing in all four nations.

“It is,” the general says. “I should have known better.”

“Mm.” Dao rubs at his eyes, then looks away, shifting restlessly in place. Song isn’t sure what to think. Is this safe? Is Dao going to be safe?

. . . is she going to find out his real name, after this?

What a selfish thought to have.

“I am so glad you are alright,” the general says, gentle and kind and almost convincing, if Song pretends he’s not wearing red. It makes her think of that little flame Dao held cupped in his hands for her and finding his pretty little knife hidden away in the rotten rags of his clothes, though she isn’t quite sure why.

She doesn’t know what to do or say.

Dao doesn’t seem to either, so . . .

“He was so sick when we found him,” Song says. “How could you let that happen?”

“Song,” Mother hisses warily, but the general doesn’t look angry.

“I was foolish,” he says. “I promise you, I will not be so foolish again.”

“You’re Fire,” Song says. “Why would you promise me anything?”

“I owe you a great debt,” the general says. “A life debt, one might even say.”

“She didn’t save your life,” Mother says.

“No, but my nephew is too young to be expected to pay back such a debt,” the general says, shaking his head. “I will carry it in his stead.”

“I don’t have any honor,” Dao protests, his voice raspy-soft and pained. “There’s no life debt in saving me.”

“There is,” the general says, shaking his head again, and Song almost actually believes him.

It’s true, after all. Dao is worth so much.

She just didn’t think anyone Fire would realize that.

“I don’t want a life debt,” she says. “I just want Dao to be safe.”

“As much as that is in my power, he will be,” the general says, which is when Song realizes that—of course, obviously—the general is going to take Dao away.

Of course.

Obviously.

She thinks she might cry again.

.

.

.

Uncle serves tea to Song and her mother and Zuko doesn’t know what to do or think or . . . anything, really. Uncle wants him, though, Uncle still—Uncle still cares if he’s alright or not, if he’s . . . if . . .

He doesn’t even know what to feel. He’ll never go home again, never have honor again, never see the Fire Nation for as long as he lives, not for anything, but Uncle still . . . Uncle still . . .

He doesn’t know what to feel.

They drink the tea. Uncle tries to press money and treasure and all sorts of gifts on Song’s mother, and Song’s mother politely refuses each one. Zuko isn’t worth any of those things, but doesn’t know how to make Uncle stop. He doesn’t know a lot of things, right now.

Really, he’s never known anything.

Song sits beside him, so close their sides are pressed together but not close enough, and Zuko wishes he could talk to her but doesn’t have the words to explain. Is she mad at him? Is she scared of him? Is she taking this badly, or well, or . . .

He just doesn’t know.

Uncle and Song’s mother talk for a long time, and Zuko and Song just sit there and listen, although Zuko doesn’t really listen very well. He’s more concerned with Song, what she’s thinking or not thinking, and the thought that this might be the last time he ever sees her. She wouldn’t want to see him again after this anyway. He’s still not Fire, still won’t ever be Fire again, but Uncle doesn’t care, Uncle wants to keep him, Uncle still—still—

Zuko can’t even think it.

Uncle and Song’s mother go into the farmhouse for . . . some reason, Zuko misses whatever it is, and then the two of them are alone.

“Your uncle is a general,” Song says.

“Yes,” Zuko says, even though Uncle shouldn’t even consider himself his uncle anymore.

“And a firebender?” Song asks hesitantly.

“Yes,” Zuko says. “A really strong one.”

“Oh.” Song looks into her empty teacup.

“He wouldn’t hurt you,” Zuko says.

“I don’t believe you,” Song says, which . . . which is fair, really. What’s there to believe in about him? “You’re going with him?”

“Yes,” Zuko says. He doesn’t think he could stop himself if he tried. Even knowing he’s not worthy, even knowing he has no honor, even knowing he’d be keeping Uncle away from home, even knowing all those things . . . he just can’t bring himself to reject Uncle, even when Uncle should be rejecting him.

He doesn’t think he could reject anyone who still wanted him, after what a weak, shameful thing he’s been.

“Okay.” Song blinks a few times, looking around. She looks like she might cry. Zuko feels pretty similarly.

“I’m sorry,” he says.

“For what?” she asks.

“I don’t . . . I don’t know,” he says, because there’s just too much to be sorry for. “All of it, I guess.”

“You don’t have to be sorry, Dao,” Song says like that’s really his name. He should tell her the real one, probably, but he doesn’t. “You’ll be safe? With your uncle?”

“Yes,” Zuko says. He thinks Uncle is probably the safest place in the world, if it came down to it.

“Okay,” Song says, and looks into her teacup again.

“Okay,” he repeats hesitantly. She sets down her teacup and turns towards him, and he can’t help turning towards her in turn. She takes his hands in her hands and squeezes tight, meeting his eyes in a way that makes him too nervous to say anything else.

“I just want you to be safe, Dao,” Song says. “I really—I really want that. So be safe, okay?”

“Okay,” he says, helpless, and she leans in and kisses him.

.

.

.

Dao’s uncle takes him and they leave, and leave them behind.

“Perhaps we’ll go south,” Dao’s uncle says as he helps Dao up onto the komodo rhino behind him.

“What’s south?” Dao asks.

“Nothing,” his uncle says. “But I hear it’s lovely this time of year.”

Dao says goodbye, and Song says goodbye, and Dao’s uncle says he still owes her a debt and Mother turns down the money again and Dao and his uncle leave, and Song will never see him again, she thinks, and she already wants nothing like she wants to see him again. But Dao will be safe, now, and maybe with his uncle around he won’t be so afraid, and maybe he’ll be happier if he can firebend again, maybe that will help, maybe that will give him a reason to smile like he never could for her.

Maybe she’ll miss him ‘til she dies.

Song looks down at the knife in her hands, and reads the inscription.

Notes:

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Series this work belongs to:

• Part 3 of read the inscription