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The only reason Zuko was here was to teach the Avatar how to bend fire. Even if Zuko wasn’t a master, Aang had to learn the basics. He had wanted to take Uncle with him, since Uncle was a master and on top of that, he was the perfect one to teach Aang. But Uncle wasn’t here, had left before Zuko visited, and Zuko didn’t know where to find him.
The pitiful spurts of smoke that he was capable of now reminded Zuko of relearning how to be comfortable around fire again. It had taken over a year for Uncle to be willing to let him spar with the crew, and after his first terrified flare with the candles, he didn’t create his own fire for six months. At least now he could still manipulate others’ fires.
Aang couldn’t produce his own fire either, and barely could manipulate the existing fire they had. Zuko didn’t know what to expect at the Sun Warriors’ temple. He hoped it wasn’t like the Air Temples. He hoped that maybe just being in the same holy spot of the first firebenders would cause a spirit to teach Aang how to fuel his own flames. Even if Zuko’s didn’t come back, he could still teach the katas if the spirit wasn’t willing to share the knowledge.
He wouldn’t be wholly useless without his bending. He had other things he could offer. Knowledge of the Fire Nation, for one. Some money he had stolen, for another. Knowledge of how to firebend, the main factor as to why he was allowed to stay.
Even if the rest of the group, especially the Water Tribe siblings, wasn’t happy about it. They didn’t have to be. They just had to be on the same side until Uncle became Firelord like he should have been seven years previous.
And then Zuko would be Uncle’s problem, not theirs. Simple as a finding the Avatar the first time. Time consuming and emotionally draining and easy.
“What did you do, before I came out of the iceberg?” Aang asked from the bison’s head.
“What?” Zuko hadn’t really been paying attention to the child in front of him enough to tell if that was the first time he was asked. He moved in the saddle to be closer so Aang wouldn’t have to shout.
“You were looking for me, right? So what did you do?”
Zuko didn’t want to admit to visiting all the Air Temples. Aang was forgiving, but Zuko didn’t think he would be so forgiving if he knew that Zuko had ransacked the temples looking for him.
“I, uh, listened at ports to see if there were any rumors about people that claimed to be the Avatar.” And he had, but that was after galavanting around the Temples. After Uncle tried to convince him to take a break.
“That’s it? You just floated around? That seems so boring. Did you see anything cool?”
“One of the rumors was about this kid who was rumored to bend earth and fire. It was just a pair of colony brats messing around. I didn’t even know families like that existed. I was excited though, because if they were a firebender then they would want to come back with me.” It wasn’t the last mixed family Zuko had seen, but it was definitely the first.
“Families like what?” Aang sounded confused.
“You know, two different benders from the same family.” At the time Zuko had sneered at the idea that Fire would be willing to consort with Earth. Looking back, Zuko was jealous of their family and how they protected one another.
“Avatar Kyoshi’s parents were different benders. Is it really not common anymore?” Zuko should have chosen a different topic. Zuko should have chosen a topic that was more interesting than finding out that of course colony families would be mixed.
“There’s not exactly a lot of other benders in the Caldera. I just hadn’t even considered the idea.” He needed to change the conversation to something that didn’t make Aang remember what life used to be like. “On one of our shore leaves Uncle insisted on drinking a cup from every tea shop in the port, to figure out who was best. We overstayed by a week so he could finish and he didn’t even like any of it. I think he spent more time trying to teach the owners how to properly brew a cup.” Zuko trailed off. That wasn’t exactly a cool story.
Aang turned around and jumped from Appa’s head to the saddle. “Zuko, I don’t want to be the bearer of bad news, but drinking tea for a week isn’t cool.”
“I know it isn’t cool!” he snapped. “I don’t have very many stories!”
Aang looked at him with wide eyes. “You’ve been all over the world! One of our first stops after leaving the South Pole we saw the Unagi, and the elephant koi and the Kyoshi warriors! All of those things are cool! How did you not see anything? Did you visit anywhere?”
“No.” Even if he had, Zuko wasn’t exactly the hero in his own stories about traveling.
“How’d you find us so quickly? I thought we’d be safe at the Western Air Temple but then you were all ‘Hello, Zuko here!’ immediately!” Zuko flushed at the reminder of his reintroduction to Aang’s friends. “The temple isn’t supposed to be easy to get into if you’re not an airbender, none of them are.”
“There’s trails to all of them, and maps.” Zuko explained.
“What?” Oh. One facial scar and three years later and Zuko still didn’t know when to shut up. Well, since the kid was going to ask.
“I, uh, Uncle and I we searched for you there first. I was hoping that you had been hiding at one of them. But we didn’t find anything there!” He said the last part forcefully, willing it to be true. And they hadn’t found anything Avatar related anyway, which is what he meant.
Aang looked at him suspiciously.
“But uh, I fell into a pit that led to a cave that had stairs that took me to the temple. And I knew what direction you were going and that the temple was there. So. I guessed.”
Aang started laughing. “You fell in a hole.”
“The cliff just disappeared!”
At least the kid was laughing.
——
Zuko could feel his inner fire smoldering inside him after meeting the Masters. That Uncle had met them too... Zuko hoped he would be able to tell him, once this was over. He wanted to tell Uncle that he wasn’t so angry and that his bending was better than ever.
The flight back was smoother. Appa didn’t need to be guided back to the Temple, so Aang sat in the saddle with Zuko. Aang was just wearing a robe and he had to be cold, so Zuko took a deep breath, warmed it, and released it towards Aang, who perked up immediately.
“Was that you?”
Zuko nodded hesitantly. Now that his fire was back, he didn’t want to make himself unwelcome by bending too much around the others who were already loath to trust him, but if the boy got frostbite before getting back, the Water Tribe girl might actually kill him.
“Can you teach me how to do that?” He asked excitedly. “I can already keep myself warm with air bending, but Katara and Toph complain about being cold all the time and I didn’t even think about keeping them warm like that!”
Zuko didn’t understand how Aang could say so many words without pausing to breathe.
“Yeah, I’ll teach you. It’s one of Uncle’s tricks.” Zuko started to think about what Aang had to learn and what would be the best order. Maybe Uncle really hadn’t been prepared to teach him that first year, instead of just thinking Zuko wasn’t ready. “He also taught me how to redirect lightening. You’ll be able to get that one faster than I did; Uncle said it was based on a waterbending move he’d seen.”
Aang would probably learn all of it faster than him. Zuko wasn’t a talented bender to start with, and then after his banishment it was a slow crawl to be as good as he was now. And Azula and Father and Uncle were all leagues ahead of him in ability.
The airbender looked pleased. Zuko let the silence sit between them. He wasn’t very good at small talk, and he didn’t want to push away the best hope the world had for peace.
He closed his eyes and started to doze.
“Zuko?” a quiet voice asked, rousing him from his sleep.
“Aang?” The peppiness that was there at the beginning of the return journey was gone.
“When I separated from Sokka and Katara and Toph, I went to the Eastern Temple.” Aang started.
All vestiges of sleep left Zuko. He didn’t think he left the place with any more damage than it already had. There was no reason for Aang to be upset with him. He didn’t speak. He tried to give no indicators of the stress he was very suddenly feeling. He looked at Aang.
“I walked around and the temple was so damaged after I disappeared. I’d been there before, because that’s where Appa was born.” Aang stopped speaking for a moment. “There were a lot of burn marks, in the courtyards. And they looked newer than from when... from the first time the Fire Nation visited so I was just wondering if those were there when you visited or if Zhao did that or...” Aang trailed off.
Zuko‘s stomach clenched. At the time the courtyard had seemed the most practical option, but now Zuko wanted to strangle his past self, not for the first time. They should have not done it inside the temple. Aang wouldn’t have noticed if it happened outside.
“That was me.” Zuko said, voice rough, averting his eyes. Aang would be mad or he wouldn’t and it wasn’t like he would never have found out anyway. Zuko was always terrible about offering up information he shouldn’t. “Or, well, not me specifically. But I ordered them to do it.”
“Why did you burn so much?” He risked a glance at the young boy to see wide wet eyes and guilt built up inside him. He had never had the right to enter those temples, not after what the Fire Nation and his family specifically had done.
“I don’t— we tried to avoid adding anything that wasn’t strictly necessary. But there were so many.” The benders forced the flames hot enough that they didn’t need much additional fuel. It was more efficient that way, and now Zuko was even more grateful to Li who had suggested it.
“Zuko, the scorch marks were huge. My people were already gone, why did you have to destroy their things too?” Aang was never going to forgive him after this. Once this war was over, and Aang had no use for him, he was going to hate him for violating the Temples.
“Growing up, we were taught all the proper protocol for going to battle. Uncle and my cousin were on the battlefield already and Azula and I were going to join them at some point. One of the rules is that you can’t just leave someone without their last rites. It’s — it’s just wrong. Even if you don’t believe in spirits.
“And Uncle made us visit the Eastern Temple first and it took three weeks for the seven of us to even find it in the mountains. And once we were there, I started looking but Uncle wouldn’t let me start until the morning. And Li and I were searching to see if there was anything about you, your identity, if you were hiding there. We found so many. It’s wrong not to handle the remains.”
Zuko breathed. The Eastern Temple had by far been the worst.
“Aang, I’m so sorry. Uncle— I didn’t know what to do with— with your people. We cremate our dead, so we kept their ashes separate from the soldiers and buried the soldiers. Uncle wanted to let the wind carry the monks ashes so...” Zuko stopped talking. There wasn’t really an excuse for what they did. He wasn’t trying to blame Uncle, because it was Zuko’s fault for visiting in the first place and Aang would need to like Uncle when all of this was over with.
“Nuns.”
“What?”
“Nuns lived at the Eastern Air Temple, not monks. We lived in the South and the North.” At the rough tone, Zuko looked over. Aang was crying. Zuko caused that. Katara had called him a monster and it hurt because she was right and he was not good. Only a truly terrible person would cause a kid this kind of distress.
“I didn’t— I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have been there and it wasn’t my right to think I knew best.” Zuko was never good with words, and his apology was lackluster. He had gone to a sacred site, demanded that large pyres be built in the temple instead of just outside, he had even wanted to break into the inner sanctum, and never had he been more grateful that Uncle hadn’t let him.
He just hoped that Aang let him stay, after knowing this.
Aang came from the left, so Zuko couldn’t hear or see him. The sudden touch on his shoulder caused Zuko to jerk back, sparking from his fingertips before realizing that Aang was hugging him.
Zuko stiffened, but stayed still. The child clinging to him like an oyster-clam would say something or he wouldn’t, and either way Zuko couldn’t change the past. Zuko carefully moved his free arm so it was resting against Aang’s back.
“Thank you.” Zuko almost missed it, it was said so quietly. It was easy to forget that Aang was a child when he could wield so much power. That behind the Avatar was a twelve year old boy that was the last of his people.
“After the first time we met, we went to the Southern Air Temple because I thought — and when we got there I see now that it was the remnants of— of what you did and I found Gyatso and—“ Zuko’s shirt was soaked through. What was he supposed to say in this situation? “It was the first time I went into the Avatar state. There were so many people there...”
“I’m sorry. I thought we had found everyone.” Guilt filled Zuko. He knew at 13 he and the others had tried their best, but it still clearly wasn’t good enough. Even if the only place they didn’t check was the inner sanctum of the main temple, he should have known and pressured Uncle anyway. “You shouldn’t have had to see that.”
“It’s not your fault. You weren’t there when... And then when you were there you tried to right it the only way you could.” Zuko appreciated Aang trying to justify to himself why Zuko wasn’t a monster, but it wasn’t necessary. Uncle knew what their family was capable of, and that they were still responsible for it. That’s why he told Zuko about Avatar Roku, so Zuko would understand not only was he responsible for the Air Nomad Genocide, but also for not stopping it in the first place. And he and Aang couldn’t redo the past, but Avatar and Prince could finally end the war.
Zuko said nothing, and just focused on keeping the air around them warm. The hands gripping his shirt slowly unclenched, and he could hear the light snoring of the boy leaning on him.
——
Back at the Western Air Temple, Zuko knew he needed to clean what he had done three years previous. He hadn’t bothered before, demanding that they move on to the next lead. So far he had avoided the area he remembered the pyres being when he and Aang practiced, but he didn’t know if Aang had seen them yet. During his own exploration, he knew the black smoke residue and scorch marks remained.
Katara would possibly help him, but he didn’t want to risk her rejection. Besides, he didn’t want her to hate him for it either. Even if Aang had taken the information well, that didn’t mean that he liked everything about it. And he couldn’t draw attention to him cleaning up because then Aang might notice. So water would have been the best way, but it wasn’t an option. That left the two earthbenders, who would be able to flip the stone so the scorched side was no longer visible.
The little girl, Toph, couldn’t see the extent of the damage, but he knew she was more skilled than the boy. And she didn’t hate him, even though he burned her. At least he didn’t think she hated him; she liked ordering him to carry even after her her feet healed, and she was always grinning and laughing around him.
He waited to ask when Aang and Katara were practicing above the cliff, near the river.
He didn’t understand exactly how her bending worked, but from what she had bragged about earlier, she could tell when he was there and if he was lying. So. He wouldn’t lie and he would ask her nicely to help him finish his mistake.
Zuko found her in the main courtyard, where the rest of them slept. She was just sitting, apparently without a care in the world. He sat down opposite of her, and she turned her head in his direction, but was off the mark.
“Sparky, is something eating at you? I’ve felt your nervous pacing for the past hour, and I gotta say, it’s not a good look on you.” She flicked a rock at him, and he easily leaned to dodge it. It wasn’t her best effort, so he hoped she was in a good enough mood to help.
“I, uh, was actually coming to ask if you could help me with something.” He didn’t want to admit his laziness the last time he was here, but if she asked he couldn’t lie.
“What’s in it for me? I don’t work for free.” Zuko frowned. He didn’t have anything that would be of value to her, but she had to help. Aang shouldn’t have to see it again.
“Stop freaking out on me, fireboy. We can figure out what’s in it for me later; I don’t forget my debts. I never thought His Royal Highness would ask a lowly earth kingdom girl for help, so its gotta be good.” She stood up and Zuko followed suit.
“Beifongs aren’t lowly anything.” Zuko grumbled, and she hocked a loogie into the fire pit. “That’s— never mind. I uh, need help rearranging some of the floors here.”
“Yeah, alright, I’m in. Lead the way.”
He was lucky that the spot that Aang and the rest of the group had chosen as their base was so far from where the pyres had been. They walked in silence towards the damaged floors. He stopped once he entered the half blackened room, surveying the damage.
“So are you going to tell me what I’m looking at here?” He looked at her, staring at the floor. Zuko didn’t know if she could tell if the layer of soot was there or not, but he certainly wasn’t going to rise to her bait. Sokka and Katara would fall for it at least half the time, but Zuko wasn’t going to.
“I came here, a couple of years ago. This room and a couple of others had some... large fires in them. Aang knows, but I don’t want him to have to see it.” There. No lying involved and it still clearly indicated what Zuko needed help with.
“Ah-ah! No lies of omission. Full truth, Sparky, or I’m not helping.” Zuko didn’t know how someone so tiny could be so evil.
“I ordered all the bodies my crew and I found in the Temple to be burned.” Zuko tried to be blasé about the whole thing. “Aang knows, like I said. So, I don’t want him to see it.”
“We’re not finished talking about this, but her Sweetness and Twinkletoes will be back soon. How am I supposed to hide this if I don’t know what’s burned and what’s not?”
He didn’t think of that. “I can—if I— I’ll walk around the edge of the area that needs covered, and then you can move that part? I don’t want to damage the place more than I already have, just hide the blackened stone. I was going to scrub it out, but Aang’s going to know if I’m doing that, but like I said—“
“Yeah, yeah, you don’t want him to see it. Whatever. Start walking.” Toph interrupted.
Zuko walked around the stone in the center of the courtyard, leaving over a hands width of an edge in case Toph missed some of it. The two pyres were close enough that he just made one big circle. No sooner did he finish the circle did Toph stomp her feet, creating a polished marble floor, free of ashes and char.
He looked up, and the ceiling, which followed the same general outline. “Can you get the ceiling too? It looks like the same area as the floor.” She stomped again and the ceiling smoothed out, lightening the place up.
“Don’t you think it looks good?” Despite his somber attitude, Toph was treating this like it was a game. He thought there was a note of sincerity in her question, underneath the jibe.
“Yeah, it— it looks great.” He dithered, before deciding to go forward, “There’s two more rooms like this, in the other buildings.”
Toph groaned. “You’re carrying me.”
——
He ended up carrying her to both of the other courtyards and back to the group’s base. There were no remnants of Zuko’s first visit now. Katara and Aang were back from training Katara looked like she was preparing everything for dinner.
“Toph! Are you okay?” The concern in Katara’s voice grated on Zuko. He wouldn’t hurt any of them, and even if he did, it wasn’t like he could actually hurt Toph without her maiming him in return. It was a fluke that he burned her feet and an accident and she let him know how she felt about it that night with a bruised rib.
“Sparky couldn’t hurt me if he tried.” She patted his face, his right, before jumping off his back. Toph sat down in her usual spot.
He didn’t know how unwelcome his presence would be right now. Toph and Aang didn’t seem to mind when he was there with them, but he knew Katara did. After what seemed like minutes of deliberation, but was probably only seconds, Zuko sat down near Toph. He didn’t want to keep asking favors of the earthbender, but she was the most accessible person for the things he needed help with. Even if he was going to pay for it later.
He had taken a large tea pot from the palace, and even brought enough cups for the five of them he knew would be there. But he didn’t consider that it wouldn’t just be the ones he had chased so long. And Uncle would be disappointed if he excluded the other three.
He stood and went back to his room, which was far away from the others, and another reminder that wasn’t welcome. He grabbed the teaset, and made sure he had enough leaves for all eight of them before leaving.
He sat back down next to Toph, holding out one of the cups. “Can you make three more cups like this one?”
She took the cup from his hand and three lumps landed in her lap. Toph lifted one and formed it into a rough approximation of a tea cup. “This good enough for your taste, Princey?”
It was a little ugly, with a couple of bumps where the other cups were smooth, but it would be fine for his purposes. He would drink out of the ugliest one either way.
“Yeah, it’s fine.” And it was. She took the other two lumps and did the same process, but they were smoother and more refined. Zuko took them from her and went to the fountain to wash them and fill the tea pot. On his return, Katara was using spark rocks to try and light the fire.
“Aang!” Zuko called, and the boy in question turned to him. “Light the fire.”
“I don’t need help!” Katara exclaimed as Aang bounced over to them. Zuko didn’t doubt that she didn’t need help. Clearly she had kept them all surviving for months.
“Aang needs to practice his bending. Lighting and managing a campfire is a practical way to do that.” Zuko tried to be patient, but Aang needed to be more comfortable around others when he worked fire.
“I don’t. I haven’t made a flame since, since the time I burned Katara! I don’t want to do that again.” Aang protested.
“Then don’t aim towards her?” Zuko was confused. There was a clear target for his fire, all Aang had to do was have one good punch of flame, and then just not extinguish it.
Zuko sighed. “Katara, Toph, do you mind standing over there until we get this thing lit?” Katara certainly minded, but she stomped over to the other side of the courtyard, Toph looking bored behind her.
“What about our stuff?” At this point Aang was making excuses.
“You’re not lighting anything except this bundle of sticks. I’m right here and can stop it.” Zuko was moderately insulted. He was a good enough bender to keep Aang from accidentally things on fire.
“I know you can feel your inner flame. You’ve always had it, but you’ve been smothering it. Breathe, acknowledge your flame, and channel a small piece, through your Chi lines, and then out your hand.” Zuko held his hand out to demonstrate, a small flame appearing at the center of his palm.
Aang looked at him with trepidation before holding out his hand, palm up. He took a deep breath, and a flame grew in his hand. He looked at Zuko with excitement. Zuko gestured towards the pile of sticks, and Aang pushed his hand inside. Once the kindling caught fire, he pulled his hand back and closed his fist.
“Good!” He turned towards the girls, “Fires lit!” Focusing on Aang he instructed, “Just listen to this fire. It came from you, so you can feel it, right?” A small nod. “Good. Keep it the way Katara wants it to cook, if she wants flames or embers.”
Aang looked nervous, but determined. Katara came back, glaring at Zuko for disrupting her preparations. He shrugged it off; this exercise was akin to meditating on a candle, but she would get some use out of it, and maybe if Aang could see how useful fire was, how much life it had, he wouldn’t be so intimidated to use it. Toph walked out of the courtyard, probably looking for something more interesting to do.
Katara finished the ingredient prep faster than ever before, now that she didn’t have to manage the fire and the food and calling everyone there.
“Aang? Can you makes the flames like they’ve been burning an hour? Like. Smaller.” Katara asked.
Aang moved to a lotus position, and closed his eyes. Within seconds the fire was a small flickering hum instead of a fresh inferno.
“Like that?” Aang asked, clearly desperate for encouragement.
“It’s perfect! I was ready to wait for it to do this naturally, but I guess we don’t have to do that now.” Katara added some ingredients to the pot hanging over the fire stirring them.
The others were slowly trickling in, drawn but the smell of smoke and Toph finding them to tell them dinner was almost ready. At each addition, the fire would flare incrementally from Aang’s excitement before going back down.
Sokka was the first to ask what dinner actually was. “It’s rice with some vegetables we got from that village nearby.” She gave him a look that dared him to complain about the meal.
He didn’t.
She added the rice last, giving it a good stir and guessed it would be another fifteen minutes, some Earth time keeping system that meant little to Zuko, before everything was finished.
When she started collecting dishes, Zuko grabbed the teapot and held it in his hands. Uncle insisted that the tea be heated with actual flame, but the fire was monopolized and it was less obvious if he just heated the water. He focused on bringing the water to a soft boil, then added enough leaves for the eight of them.
Uncle must have known Jee’s sun watching trick, because he never oversteeped tea despite never having a timer. The only kind Zuko could make consistently was jasmine, and that’s all he brought.
After one and a half degrees, he started pouring, the same time Katara starting ladling soup into bowls. He preened internally, happy he had judged the time correctly.
He passed out cups, keeping the first one Toph had made for himself, and the nicest one she made for her. Finally he sat down next to her, cup in his hands, bowl in his lap.
Aang was still focused on the fire, and Zuko called out “Aang. You can stop watching it now. Just eat.” The flames grew to their unsmothered potential and the boy dug into the soup he had been given. Zuko calmed the fire before turning back to his food.
The others chattered, talking about what they accomplished during the day and what they had found. None of them spat out their tea so Zuko considered it a win.
A small gust of wind caused a chill in the courtyard, causing multiple members of the group to shiver. Zuko took a deep breath and sent warm air over them.
Toph turned towards him, “Was that you?”
He nodded before remembering, “Yeah.” He kept his voice quiet so he wouldn’t disturb the rest of the conversation.
She moved the earth between them so she was closer. Zuko didn’t pull back in surprise, but he might have been startled. A little. He definitely didn’t jump when she grabbed his left arm. He hadn’t done that in years.
“Holy shit.” The others were looking at them. He tried gently shaking her off, but she clung to him like a limpet.
“This is my payment for the cups. You’re my new heater.” She went back to her soup and Zuko looked at her with his one good eye.
“Alright.”
They would talk terms for the other favors he asked of her later, he decided.
She didn’t let him sleep in his room that night, demanding he join them out in the main area to prevent her from getting cold.
There were worse things than twelve year olds clinging to him, he guessed. Even if they were these absolutely terrifying twelve year olds.