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You’re a terrible person!
Spreading war and violence and hatred is in your blood.
The Fire Nation took my mother away from me.
Her words reverberate again and again in his mind. The first two had hurt for very obvious reasons; nobody enjoys being insulted, and Zuko is no exception. But that last one… The Fire Nation took my mother away from me. It’s like being slapped in the face by his own sins.
Zuko knows that pain. Lying on the cold stone, facing away from her and placed as far away as their confines will allow, he doesn’t quite know why he made her aware. Looking back, it might’ve been better to stay silent.
But he needed to do something. Seeing her—the strong, brave, beautiful waterbender, who fearlessly fought him even before she knew how—crying had broken something in his heart. In that moment, he needed to comfort her in any way he could. He’d seen people pull others into their arms to comfort them, but it didn’t seem wise to hug someone who was a) mad at him, and b) had fought him and won on several occasions.
So, he did the only thing he could. He apologized and he shared his pain—which, now that he thinks about it, was the first time he told anyone (except for Uncle) about his mother.
Maybe it helped? She’d stopped yelling at him, at least. And last he checked, she was no longer shaking with sobs. But he doesn’t know how long ago that was. They’d both felt a shift in their power as the sun slipped beneath the horizon—his ebbing, and hers flowing—and wordlessly decided to try to get some sleep. They’d need it for the impending fight with Azula.
He should probably check again soon though, right? If Uncle ever found out that he left a pretty girl in distress of any kind—even when they both knew she’d probably handle any situation better than he could—he’d never hear the end of it. Chivalry, and all that.
But it’s probably also unwise to leave your back turned on an enemy for a prolonged period of time. He shifts ever so slightly, and rolls over to face her.
His face falls.
She’s shaking again, and for some reason that he doesn’t fully understand, the thought of her crying again strikes hopelessness in his heart. Without even really thinking, he rises to his feet and starts walking towards her. How he’ll soothe her, he has no idea, but he has to do something, and—
Oh. As he approaches, he notices that her teeth are chattering, and she’s curled up in a ball. She isn’t shaking with sobs, she’s shivering in her sleep from the cold.
He hadn’t noticed that it had gotten colder. Uncle would be—will be, he corrects—proud to learn that he instinctually engaged his breath of fire and stoked his inner flame to compensate. But now that he’s thinking about it, the cave has become cold. Very much so, in fact.
But how can he fix it? He’s a firebender, so it really should be quite simple. Somehow, though, he doesn’t think she’d appreciate blasts of fire. Nor would she enjoy him lying down next to her and radiating his own heat—she was shocked enough to be placed in the same giant cell as her former enemy. Waking up right next to him would not make her happy. If only he had a blanket, or something that could—
He’s got it.
After a few minutes of radiating as much warmth as he can, he tiptoes over, removes the outer layer of his teashop uniform, and drapes it over her sleeping form.
As he settles back in his corner of the cave, he steals a glance at her once more and smiles. She’s stopped shivering, and has snuggled into the blanket. The thought comforts Zuko enough to fall asleep on the hard floor within minutes.
Katara wakes up with pain in her back and the sweet scent of tea in her nose. She’s accustomed to sleeping on the ground, but yeesh. This floor is hard.
Grumbling as she opens her eyes, she remembers the events of the previous day. Getting thrown in prison with Zuko, yelling at Zuko, crying in front of Zuko, being shocked by Zuko’s kindness and compassion, thinking Zuko looked adorable in—
Nope. She’s gonna stop that train of thought before it leaves the station. Zuko can’t be trusted. He’s just trying to trick her. He’s gotta just be trying to trick her.
But he seemed so very genuine when he said he was sorry about her mom. He didn’t even react to her yelling. It even seems like he understands her pain. He knows what it’s like to lose his mother. And having hair really did wonders for—
Nope. She’s not going to think about how Zuko has suddenly become attractive. Desperate to escape the battle being fought in her mind, Katara puzzles over the events of last night instead. She was freezing cold to the point where her teeth were clattering—quite humiliating for a child of the South Pole, but she was caught off guard.
Then, and she doesn’t quite remember how, because she was quite tired by that point, she felt warm again. It was like sitting in front of a crackling fire, or getting a nice warm hug. It couldn’t have been Zuko firebending at her; it would’ve been too hot and too short.
Glancing across the cave for any form of a solution (a geothermal vent, perhaps?) she’s caught off guard by a sleeping Zuko. His face is relaxed and calm, showing the youth hidden beneath his layers of anger. Or former layers of anger. She still hasn’t figured that one out yet.
Her gaze is drawn away from his face by—gosh, she’d almost unwilling to even admit it to herself—Zuko’s bare arms. She hasn’t seen a lot of boys her age, okay?! It’s not her fault that the boy who chased her halfway around the world (who also shared the trauma of his mother’s absence with her) has extremely toned arms!
But… why didn’t she notice them yesterday. Wait, yesterday, he was wearing a tea shop uni—
Oh.
She looks down to see that her blanket is, in fact the outer layer of Zuko’s tea uniform. He must’ve taken it off to cover her during the night.
He saw how cold she was and tried to help fix it.
Against every ounce of good judgement she has—but is it really against her judgement, because he’s not the same as he was when he chased them—she pulls the uniform back up, and turns to sleep a little bit more, snuggling into it just a little bit.
When she wakes up, she’ll apologize for yelling at him. Then maybe he could give her an actual warm hug.