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Part 5 of Tricks for Treats 2023 , Part 26 of Tricks for Treats 2024
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2023-11-01
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2024-12-05
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Blush

Summary:

Third Time's the Charm AU - Toph learns the differences between poetry and biology.

Notes:

Chapter 1

Notes:

Ask from aurantia-ignis:

M-may I request for more Third Time's the Charm!!

In which Toph somehow figures out (or more likely, has it TOLD to her face because she wouldn't believe it otherwise) what it means when Zuko gets tense and heated in reaction to her smiling/being happy/having the time of her life throwing rocks

A physical fight being started after that would be just right up their alley, I think? XD

This one made me cackle a little.

Chapter Text

"He's such a weirdo," Toph grumbled as she made her way down the stairs, the rocking of the ship making her slower than she would like. It would be easier on the deck, but stairs. Ugh.

"Not what you're used to?" Shiya asked. "What are Earth Kingdom gentlemen like?"

"Dunno. Never met one," Toph admitted. "I wasn't exactly prime marriage material back at home," she said, waving her hand in front of her eyes.

Shiya had stopped moving. "Never?"

"Nope. Although I'm pretty sure none of them randomly fluctuate their body temperature, so I wouldn't have been used to that anyway."

Shiya hummed. "That is unique to fire benders. Although I didn't realize the prince did it randomly too. He's got pretty good control."

"Is it bad?" Toph asked. “He doesn't do it often, but if I'm doing something that's bugging him…”

"It's when you do something?" Shiya asked. She almost sounded gleeful.

"When I tease him," Toph said. "Like when I punch him or tug his hair. I guess he likes his space. I could stop touching him."

"No," Shiya didn't shout, but she did sound needlessly panicked. "No, don’t—don't stop. That's not—Oh, I am not trained for this."

"This?"

"I don't even have siblings," Shiya continued, but more muttering to herself. "Look, just. You know how people—Actually no, you probably don't."

"Know what?" Toph demanded, bracing herself as best she could between two steps.

"Blushing," Shiya said.

"I know what blushing is. I can't see it, but it's in, like, all the poetry."

"Oh. Oh good. Well, uh. When a bender blushes, sometimes, especially if they're powerful, their temperature also goes up."

This didn't make any sense. "If I'm making him uncomfortable, I'll stop."

"No! That's not. You said you know what blushing is!"

"In poetry," Toph resisted waving her hands in the closed space. "That's all romantic stuff. Or like, metaphors. I know that people blush for other reasons too, I know their face gets weird colors. It can be because they're embarrassed or angry or—“

"Okay, but that's not—You're his wife. Obviously it would be for…poetry reasons."

Toph turned that over and over in her head and it was still all rough edges and unbalanced. "Just because I'm his wife doesn't mean he wants me touching him. In front of other people," she added, because she wasn't completely stupid and they were technically married and plausible deniability and all that.

Shiya didn't seem to know what to say to that. Eventually she offered, "You could test it."

"If he doesn't like—“

"You don't have to touch him. Just…get close. See what happens. Ask if he's angry if he gets…blushy."

It was tempting to make a comment about no eyes, but Toph knew what Shiya meant. And this was stupid so, "Fine, but if I piss him off, it's on you."

"Oh, I seriously doubt that will happen," Shiya muttered as they made their way downstairs

It was tempting to try it while they were meditating, to try sitting at his back or something. But Zuko got warm when he was meditating anyway, so that was a no go. Hand to hand training wasn't any better. They did touch when Zuko could be bullied into sparring with her, but there were no weird fluctuations then either. Sparring was normal public touching. It was fine.

It wasn't until Zuko knocked her over when he was practicing his bending on her targets—something that always made him frantic, the weirdo—that Toph had anything like a chance to test the theory. Zuko was already running warm when he dashed over and offered Toph a hand, but if this worked the way it was supposed to…

Toph let him help her up, but swung into his personal space a bit instead of stepping back. He froze for a second, but didn't do much else.

See, nothing.

"Wanna try that again?" she asked. She felt him looking away and was confused. He usually looked at her when he answered.

"Maybe at a lower intensity."

"Uh, no. I can put more oomph into my defense, you know. You didn't hurt me." Her tailbone was a bit sore, but nothing that justified quitting.

"I don't know…”

"Why aren't you looking at me?" Toph demanded. She was right here. There was no reason for him to be staring off into the middle distance.

His temperature fluctuated then, which, what? "I don’t—“ He looked at her, having to dip his head a bit more since she was closer. She could feel his breath, warm against her cheek. "Sorry. I just—” Warmer again, and no. Surely not. "I don't want to hurt you."

"You didn't," she said, wondering why the heat wasn't lowering. It was always a quick flash, why… "You won't. Obviously. You'd never hurt me."

The heat went up. Again.

"Obviously?" Zuko almost squeaked.

Pushing her luck, Toph bopped his nose with her finger, bewildered when he got even warmer. "Obviously."

Zuko didn't want to hurt her. Obviously. And that had nothing to do with whatever this blushing weirdness was, and Shiya could stop hiding giggles behind her hand right now!

And then Zuko was touching her arm, just above her elbow, light and careful and his fingers were so warm. "I don't want to hurt you."

"Good," Toph squeaked. "Cool," she made her voice lower, almost Rumble growly. "So, go again?"

"Yeah," Zuko said, stepping back, letting his hand drop, his temperature coming back under control—and that meant nothing! "One more time."

Toph made a rude gesture at Shiya when she was sure Zuko wasn't looking. Shiya choked on her giggles.

Chapter 2

Notes:

Ask from aurantia-ignis :

For Third Time's the Charm! ...... I don't know if you'd even want to write this since it'd be completely different from the rest of the fic, but.... Could we see Zuko as the POV character (because I'd dearly LOVE to see how you write his narrative voice!!) ......in which he finds out about Toph noticing his not-quite-random temperature spikes....

(bonus hilarity if this is a sequel to 'Blush' from last year 8'D)

Ask from Anonymous:

Hello! Please for Tricks and Treats October could you write about Zuko finding out Toph can metal-bend in Third Times a Charm, thank you 😊

I love these two idiots.

Chapter Text

The truth was, Zuko had no idea what he was doing.

This wasn't news to him. Or anyone else, probably. But it was just as frustrating as it had been when he was thirteen and fifteen and eighteen and twenty. Just as frustrating as it had been before his first failure of a marriage, and second.

He'd really hoped this third one would be different.

And it was. Toph was nothing like he'd imagined Princess Ina should be, or Princess Lian had insisted she be allowed to stay. She wasn't timid or uncertain about what she wanted. Wasn't obedient for the sake of obedience. Wasn't angry at Zuko, or longing for court life. Honestly, if Zuko could have picked all the qualities his wife should have, he would have failed to imagine Toph simply because he couldn't conceive of getting everything that was good. Good for the situation and maybe, just a little, good for him.

She came with quirks though. And Zuko was struggling to handle them.

"I don't see what the problem is," she said. The way her lips quirked, he thought there was a joke in there, at her own expense. But he wasn't sure. He was wrong about things like that so often. "We settled down for a week on a rock in the middle of the water. You said we're as safe right now as we'll ever be with the navy having taken out those pirates last week. Why can't we land?"

"We have limited supplies," he explained. "We can't just be on the water indefinitely."

"Okay, so we land somewhere that we can also get more supplies," she said, like that was easy. Like they could just look at an island and know how much game was on it, and if it was enough that it was safe for them to take some. Like any of them knew which plants were safe to eat—or make into tea, Uncle. How much fresh water there was. Like it wasn't risky to choose an island big enough where they couldn't see all the edges, where there was enough plant growth that people could hide and sneak up on them.

Although, from her perspective, maybe it was that easy.

"Even if we can, it's not that simple," he said. "And staying in one place is risky for other reasons. Even if it's only another Fire Nation ship that spots us, we're still safer being constantly on the move."

"You know how weird that sounds, right?" Toph said. "That when your people show up, we're not safe."

He knew. Well, he didn't know. But he suspected, and he'd lost two wives, and Princess Lian had been a message for sure, and—

"I know you don't like it," he said. "But the more we stay on this boat, the safer you are."

"That's bullshit," she snapped. "I'm safer on land than on this ship, and you know it."

That was…probably true. At least until Azula found some way to learn all of Toph's secrets. "I'm sorry. But you just have to get used to it."

She screamed. It was a short, angry thing, and pretty surprising. Not that Toph didn't get mad, but she wasn't a tantrum sort of person like Zuko had been for years. He jerked back, unable to help himself, which meant he was moving the wrong direction when he realized she was about to punch the metal wall.

A half formed, "Don't!" slipped out just in time for her fist to make contact. There was a terrible crunching sound as—as—

As the wall gave under her hand.

Toph was breathing heavily, and then started a litany of, "Shit. Shit shit shit shit…” that just went on and on as Zuko's brain tried to understand what he was seeing.

"Did you," he wheezed, "punch the wall?"

"No," Toph snapped, yanking her hand back and revealing a deep divot in an exact imprint of her fist. She must have realized how stupid that was, because she immediately covered the hole with her hand. As though that would make it disappear.

Although…

Her face scrunched, and her nose twitched in that way that Zuko hated himself for mentally classifying as "cute," and she made an abortive move like she was pulling her hand back, but didn't take it all the way off the wall. Just pressed her fingers back down and swirled them in a loose, slow circle and—

The wall was flat again.

"I totally didn't," she said, smirking.

He barely noticed. There was a sort of roaring in his ears as he looked at the metal wall his wife had just bent as easily as he lost his temper. She was so strong and gifted and—

"What?" she shouted, throwing her arms up in the air. "I didn't even touch you! I didn't even get close. Why are you lighting up like the boiler?"

Like the—

Oh.

Oh no.

She could feel that? He'd thought, since she couldn't see him blushing, she just wouldn’t—

Oh noooooo…

"I'm not," Zuko sputtered, lying about as well as she had. "I have no idea what you're talking about."

"Liar," she said, stepping well into his space, poking at his chest. Which wasn't covered in armor because he hadn't finished changing after sparring, so there were only two thin layers between her finger and his skin and—

Zuko hated how little control he had over his bending.

"Hey look," she said, and he was sure she was making a joke, she just had to be. "You did it again."

"No," he lied. Wrapped his hand around her wrist—carefully—so she wouldn't just…just touch him again. Her wrist was thinner than his, but he could feel the muscles moving under his fingers, the weight of her bones. She was delicate and strong and—

He hated himself so much, for wanting her like this, when he couldn't even give her the one thing she was asking for. Something she needed, as an earthbender.

"I'll think about it," he blurted, skittering back. "Okay. I'll think about what we can do. About…stopping. Again."

She wasn't watching him with her eyes, but he could feel her tracking him as he scuttled across the room, throwing on more layers as quickly as he could, even if he meant he'd trap his sweat under them. "Okay?" she said.

"Okay," he repeated, beating a hasty retreat out the door, almost slamming it behind him.

"Everything okay, sir?” Sergeant Mao asked, from her position across the narrow hall. Thank goodness it was her. She didn't laugh at him with her eyes the way some of the others did.

"I tripped," he blurted. And then, because he could not let this get any worse, "Carry on."

"Yes, sir."

He was wrong. She could laugh at him with her eyes.