Chapter Text
The next time Firelord Zuko encountered Master Katara, he also encountered a stormy night at the Western Air Temple as he waited for his delegation troops to reach him. The thirty-six-year-old Firelord had just started a modest fire in the center of a dilapidated hall to warm himself when a metal panel on the wall flung itself open.
"Zuko?" came Katara's familiar voice. "Is that you, Zuko?"
"Yes," Zuko said, stepping into the firelight.
Sighing, the waterbender stepped out of the storm panel and relaxed against the doorway. "Oh, good. I thought that you and Aang had both gone out into this monsoon."
"This is hardly a storm of that caliber, Katara, believe me," Zuko laughed, then noticed the flash of fear cross his companion's face. "Come and sit by the fire with me," he said, holding out his hand. "I didn't know you were afraid of storms."
"I'm not," Katara said, as she sat, "but storms are a different animal in the air. I’ve never had to endure one alone up here. Aang had to fly down the mountain to settle some issue with...someone." She shrugged, "I can hardly keep all his obligations straight anymore."
"That doesn't sound like you," Zuko said. "I remember when you had your vacation days scheduled out on an hourly basis."
"Well," Katara laughed thinly, "what you gained in organization, I lost. Besides, all the trips Aang and I take in one year would never fit on a calendar."
Zuko prodded the fire with his sword. “That has to get old. You’ve been traveling like that for the better part of twenty years. Don’t you and Aang want to settle somewhere for a while?”
Katara sat for a moment in silence, then she said, “I asked Aang to stay with me in the South Pole. I didn’t expect us to live there forever. I just wanted a year or two with my people. I wanted to see the tribe’s progress with my own eyes. I wanted to help deliver some of the new babies being born there.” She shrugged. “Aang said we didn’t have time to put down in one place for that long. There’s too much world-mending to be done.”
“Yeah, there is,” Zuko said, “in the South pole.”
“No, Aang was right,” Katara sighed. “In this day and age the Avatar has to be ready to leave at a moment’s notice. He’s settled fifteen territorial disputes in two countries in this month alone.”
Zuko threw another piece of detritus on the fire. Katara took the waterskin from her belt and offered it to him. He drank, unable to refuse the courtesy offered. When he had placed the cork back in the bottle’s mouth, he spoke. “I don’t want to speak out of turn—”
“Then don’t,” Katara was quick to say.
As usual, Zuko persevered. “—But I’d like to know whether you would consider going to the South Pole alone? Without Aang?”
Katara snorted. “And have everyone wonder where my husband is?”
“Well, let them wonder. You didn’t agree to be chained to him every second of the day when you married him.”
“He’s the Avatar. I kind of did.” Zuko gave her a level stare. “Besides, I couldn’t go alone,” Katara said. “Aang knows about Odek.”
“Who’s Odek?”
“He’s a Northern warrior who moved to the South after the war.” Katara avoided Zuko’s eyes and fiddled with her betrothal necklace. “He’s been after me to marry him for the past ten years.”
The small fire jumped three feet high, its heat temporarily painful until it fell once again to campfire size. “This warrior knows you’re married, right?” Zuko clarified.
“Oh, he knows,” Katara said, with false cheer. “But Aang’s not Water Tribe. To a Northerner, that doesn’t count. To Odek, Aang’s just my long-term foreigner fling.” When Zuko could only stare, open-mouthed, the waterbender rushed to say, “I’ve made it very clear I’m married. A couple times, I’ve had to make the Tribe elders intervene. Odek’s got to be the only guy in the world who’s not too scared of the Avatar to approach me.”
“Well, the second guy,” Zuko said before he could stop himself.
“Huh?”
“Surely Aang doesn’t take this suitor seriously,” Zuko said, hurriedly. “He knows you, Katara.”
“It still wouldn’t be proper to go live in the South Pole without my husband,” Katara said. “People would definitely talk.”
They both fell into a moment of quiet, contemplating Katara’s situation. The wind outside the temple’s enclave screamed like a predator bereft of its prey. Katara shivered, then she moved a little closer to Zuko’s side of the fire. Zuko positioned himself so the stray raindrops that made it into the temple fell only on him. Considering the prowess of the waterbender beside him, it was a gesture of futile gentility. “I think you should go to the South Pole and challenge this Odek to a fight,” Zuko finally said. “You win, and he has to leave you alone for the rest of his life. No man should have the right to keep you from your home, Katara, not when you fought so hard to save it.”
“Northern Tribesmen don’t fight women,” Katara objected.
“They’ll fight you,” Zuko said. “You’re a war veteran. Odek would be mocked as a coward if he refused your challenge.”
Katara stretched out her hands and let the campfire warm them, letting her eyes fall closed. “You’re right,” she finally said. “I am Master Katara of the Southern Water Tribe. I’ve never let a man stop me before, and I shouldn’t start now.”
Zuko nodded firmly. “That includes Aang, if he’s stupid enough to try to stop you.”
“Aang’s not stupid,” Katara said. “And he won’t stop me. He doesn’t need me right now.” There was more to that statement than what met the eye, Zuko could tell. He didn’t pry.
Through the strident wind and steady rain, the two friends heard a distant horn. Zuko’s delegation was trying to contact the Firelord. Zuko pulled a smaller horn from his pack and walked to the edge of the temple. If he looked down, he would see nothing but free air for several hundred feet. The Western Air Temple was built as precariously as all the other Air Nomad structures. He edged a little closer to the drop and peered into the storm. Faintly, off in the distance, he could make out a group of torches that seemed unbothered by the rain and wind. He angled himself carefully in that direction and took one more tiny step forward. Before he could lift the horn to his lips, he felt a pair of arms wrap firmly around his waist.
“If you’re going to be that reckless,” Katara said, close to his ear, “then I’m going to make sure the Firelord doesn’t fall to his death on Air Nomad territory.”
“I’m fine,” Zuko said.
Katara tightened her arms. “Now you are.”
Despite himself, Zuko smiled. “Now I am.” Then he raised the horn and blew three long blasts into the turbulent sky.