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The flight to Zigan was quiet.
Normally their flights were a chaotic mess, one where Kirima was cracking jokes and Wong tried to peacekeep and Rangi got ready to kill, and where Kyoshi tried to focus solely on flying without a crash. Jinpa was also usually with them.
This time was different. Kyoshi had instructed Jinpa to stay home, and the Flying Opera Company took just the bare necessities. Kirima forwent her alcohol and Wong left his theater gear at home. Lao Ge even came.
Clouds drifted past, the winds stung her face, and Lek’s death hung between them all. It clamped shut mouths and choked the words in everyone’s throats.
Lek was young when he died. He was fifteen and poisoned by the purest form of evil Kyoshi knew– Jianzhu. She saw true evil and felt true hatred thanks to him. It made her sick when she thought about that fateful shopping trip, when her gloves chafed against her hands.
If even one thing was different that day, would Lek have survived? Sometimes Kyoshi wished that she’d died instead, or that she entered the Avatar State and saved his life (she would never tell Rangi this).
She wished that they had more time.
They were in the process of reconciling when Jianzhu had sent the shirshu venom into his neck and left him to choke to death. Perhaps, had they had more time, they would’ve been siblings.
No, that’d be wrong. They were always siblings.
Before long they landed in the fields of Zigan, now replenished. The old shack at the fringes of the field was repaired and in better condition, the people more lively. Kyoshi left Yingyong to graze in the grass at a nearby outcrop, and everyone else unloaded.
Kirima, like she did all those years ago, silently counted the number of rows and the distance from the end of the field to arrive at Lek’s grave.
Like it was when they buried him, the ground was barren and unmarked. To any unassuming farmer, it was just a patch of land.
To the Flying Opera Company, it was their brother laid.
Kirima spoke first, kneeling solemnly to the grave and saying hoarsely, “Lek . . . we miss you.” A tear formed in her eyes, but she pressed on, “You were a brother to all of us. Your memory will never be forgotten.”
With a shaky hand, she took a bison whistle out of her pocket and placed it on the grave. “It’s Longyan’s,” she whispered, almost inaudible. Kyoshi recognized it as her mother’s bison. “You loved him. You– you deserve to keep it.”
Kirima finally broke, and Kyoshi watched with a stab of pain as tears fell from the usually easy-going Waterbender. “We miss you. I hope you at at peace now.”
Kyoshi watched, stiff, as Wong gently helped her up and said his own final words. His eyes, somber and teary, fixed onto the dry patch of land as he said, “You had so many names. Bullet, Skullcrusher, Whistling Death. To me, you were, and always will be, just Lek.”
Wong wiped at his eyes. “You deserved more time on this earth. The spirits dealt you a poor hand, but Lek, your memory lives with us forever.” He drew in a shuddering breath. “Lek, you were one of the most loyal brothers I could ask for. I pray for your peace, in every life after this one.”
He bowed his head, and solemnly he placed what seemed to be old cloth slings. By the looks of it, these were the start of Lek’s rock-throwing journey.
“Your lucky ones,” Wong whispered. “Take its magic with you.”
Leave it to Wong’s poetic speech to make Kyoshi tear up even more. It made this sore spot hurt even more, and Rangi started first.
Her composure was already shaky, uncertain. She was clearly trying to keep her voice level and posture rigid. She stood at attention, and said in a clipped voice, “Lek, you deserved better. You deserved everything.”
She paused, her breath in sharp, quick inhalations as she tried not to cry. “I thank you daily, you know. If you didn’t do what you did we never would’ve been able to take care of Pengpeng or take Xu Ping An. You helped– you helped Kyoshi overcome a lot of challenges. For that, I thank you.”
Rangi, her poor girlfriend, looked every bit like a piece of fragile porcelain. She pulled herself together enough to squeeze out, “I have a gift for you, brother.”
No one missed the implication– Rangi had called a fallen daofei her brother.
With a slight tremor to her hand, Rangi took a Pai Sho tile. It had a flower engraved on it, unfamiliar to Kyoshi. Rangi told Lek’s grave, “This was the tile you finally beat me with. I hope luck carries to your next life.”
The tile crunched the dirt it was placed on, and when it was Kyoshi’s turn to speak she was unable to for a while, too choked up.
“You were my brother,” she managed to croak. “My true brother.” And the almighty Avatar fell away to reveal the same, desperate girl at Madam Qiji’s treehouse. “I treated you so horribly because I was jealous I never got to have Hark and Jesa as my parents. But I’m glad they saved you.”
Kyoshi regretted every snippy word, every sarcastic, hurtful quip flung in the young boy’s face. Her brother’s face.
Dimly she felt a gentle hand on her shoulder– the warmth of her girlfriend, Rangi. Kirima and Wong were both comforting each other, while Lao Ge had his head deeply bent.
“Lek, I wish you were here to see us now. I–” Tears clogged her throat and she wiped at her nose– “You’d tease us, I’m sure. But I’d give anything to hear it. And– and I’m sorry I couldn’t save you that day.”
With shaking hands, Kyoshi took a deep breath and pulled a small, smooth stone from her pocket. “You probably remember this,” she said softly, “but during the raid here, in Zigan, I was so amazed at your aim. It– it was the best I’d ever seen.”
Deciding to cut to the chase she placed it reverently beside the bison whistle and told his spirit, “I picked one of them up and kept it. I’ll always remember you, Lek, not as a member of the Flying Opera Company but as my brother.”
Lao Ge, the last member to speak, finally looked up. The gap-toothed, manic look on his face was gone; in its place was an expression of loss and true mourning.
He had no words, but when he placed Lek’s headwraps down it meant more than any word could ever say. Wong and Kyoshi worked together to bury the items with him, and silently they boarded Yingyong.
Silently they left their brother’s grave.