Chapter Text
Gaoling
Southern Earth Kingdom
Eighteen Years after the Death of Avatar Mara
The door slammed shut behind her as she stormed into the room, she managed to hold in her scream of frustration for a grand total of four seconds. Which was just enough time to reach the bedding laid out in one small corner and scream into the hay pillow there. Another day another busted score, and this one was more important than ever! She had made barely enough money to cover the cost of the room for another week and without that money she would have to go without eating for another few days.
Even screaming she had to keep her frustration in check—Slow breaths, even amidst the screams—her fingers flexed but her unnatural claws did not come out, she had mastered those before she could walk. Her inner flame not long after. She would not accidentally burn down another room.
After a few minutes of screaming, she rolled over onto her side. The rough hewn material beneath her was some small comfort against her fur. She would go hungry tonight, but food was easy enough to come by, she had long since abandoned any notion that she would find gainful employment outside of a circus. Everyone knew her, which made being a thief an exceptional challenge, the poor girl cursed by the spirits to have a tail and cat ears and fur rather than be normal. Rumours abounded as to why she was like it, and she gave a different story to anyone who asked, but the horrible truth was she had no idea why the spirits had cursed her. Mother didn’t look like this, and according to her, her father didn’t either.
Her difference made identifying her incredibly easy, anyone spotted her could recognise her, and many would turn her in for a quick bit of coin. No one trusted her, even her own family had often turned its back on her, leaving her to scrape by. She was left hungry, cold and without anything to her name and not for the first time, every time she was landed in trouble they would leave her to fend for herself and eventually she would find one of the family safehouses and beg for food and shelter. She had been turned away more often than not.
Once she had spent an entire month living in the great foggy swamp trying to avoid the guards of Omashu after a botched robbery of the palace. She had lived by scavenging and cooking what she could find, sleeping in any dry spots. She had met several strange animals and even some spirits out there, which had almost scared her out of her mind. Only one was kind to her, giving her food and clean water, the spirit had looked like a pale ghost of a girl with hair the colour of wheat and eyes like a clear lake. She had been young then maybe seven or eight, a decade since she had last seen the spirit.
Wondering if she could find the same spirit if she just walked out of the city and into the swamp at its border, she shook the notion off after realizing that she still had some responsibilities in Gaoling, namely to watch the safehouse and look for potential targets. She couldn’t spend time reminiscing about a girl who might not even have been real that she met in her worst moments, she dropped to the ground and began to stretch—if she must wait for nightfall she could at least practice her forms—she moved everything out of the way to clear space so that it was only the stone wall and began to work through all the Kata’s she had been taught.
The family included several firebenders who, on intimidation from her mother, had taught her, by the time she was twelve she was better than all of them. Desperation made her a dangerous fighter, and even without her bending her claws are sharp enough to cut through stone and she’s tough enough to survive what others could not. All of this made her far too formidable for the family to give up on her, but her constant bad luck and her easily identifiable appearance made her a liability. Even her name was a joke, Catra. Like she was cursed to always be known as the freak who ran afoul of a spirit and became a cat. Her ears and tail were something to point and laugh at, not something that had saved her life hundreds of times, often when she heard them snicker she wished she was as deaf as everyone else in the world apparently was.
Her anger fed into her flame and she had to be careful to tamp it down to a controllable level, never letting the flames grow wild and out of control. She worked through the forms that were usually practiced in a wide open space or on the battlefield in the cramped confines of her room, adjusting on the fly until she could feel a sweat working up. Matting down her fur.
She did each of the dozen sets twice, a standard exercise, her stomach complained and muscles screamed. But if she couldn’t do this whilst hungry, she wouldn’t survive the next few weeks. It was her first lesson from the family. Survival only came to the strong.
The hours disappeared as she worked through all the forms she had been taught, using only the tiniest controlled flames, letting out a breath of heat she relaxed as a sound caught her ears, most wouldn’t notice it unless it was right outside their door. For her she could hear it from the end of the street. She glanced out of the small hole cut into the wall that counted as her window. Night had fallen and only the moon provided any light, but she could see a large carriage rolling down the street no doubt towards the Beifong estate, a small sigil of a crescent moon was emblazoned on the side. She smirked as the well appointed carriage of the Brightmoon Family rolled past.
She knew the Brightmoons well enough, having robbed them at least twice before, the illustrious daughter she knew even better than the matriarch of the family, Glimmer Moon was a rebel who hid her wealth to try and ‘find the right crowd’. They didn’t part on the best of terms despite a lucrative few weeks together. But one of the few remaining members of that family was traveling in comfort to Gaoling, at the same time as the problem.
The family had given her a task, an item that needed stealing and had organized the opportunity, A scroll containing the writ of the firelord, being carried by his eldest daughter Candilia. How they had organized for the Princess of the Fire Nation to end up in Gaoling was beyond Catra’s understanding. Still the attempt at simply pickpocketing it had failed spectacularly and she was lucky no one noticed her enough to identify her behind the hood and cloak. But the fire nation's security would be on high alert.
Still she had to succeed, or lots of promised punishments would be inflicted upon her. If both the Moon’s and the Beifongs and the Princess of the fire nation were in attendance. There was no chance that young Lord Beifong wouldn’t show off his wealth with an extravagant feast. Which meant empty sleeping quarters. She could maybe try and sneak in and pilfer the rooms whilst everyone was busy at the meal.
Grabbing her cloak and stepping out into the cool air, it was time for a slow stalk towards the Beifong estate. She had robbed it a few times, and the paths inside were well known to her. Choosing the right one for tonight was the problem. The darkness greeted her as she stepped into the alley.
It took her only a few minutes to reach the estate, sneaking across the open grounds towards the guest wing she could hear voices carrying on the wind, distant even to her enhanced hearing. A high pitched laugh that she recognised—Glimmer of Brightmoon was here in Gaoling at the same time as the Princess of the Fire Nation—she could use this, get in steal the document and leave nothing else out of place then go pilfer Glimmers room of some item that had next to no sentimental value but was made out of silver or gold or encrusted with gemstones. The rich earthbender wouldn’t miss any of it, if she even noticed it was missing—she would, Catra thought. The girl had an annoyingly good eye for detail.
It was a quick scramble over the walls and down into the garden, leaving only slightly chipped stone behind her. Then through the various bushes that littered the well groomed guest's garden, built in a firebender style with a great turtleduck pond in the middle of it.
Slipping across the courtyard without being spotted was easy, her fur acted as a natural camouflage and her sharp hearing, near perfect night vision, and sense of smell meant that no one could sneak up on her. Taking only a few minutes for a very bored pair of guards to walk past, she crept up into the guest quarters.
It was silent, save for the pair of guards out on the balcony, she padded through the rooms slowly. So as not to alert their attention. The first door she came across was already wide open, left in a hurry. Which meant it had to be Glimmers, that girl was deceptively quick and able to move like her airbender mother despite her earthbending mindset. Yet somehow she was always, always late—a detail which had caused Catra no end of grief during their brief period working together imitating Daofei—including apparently to a dinner with her biggest political rival and the daughter of one of the most powerful men of all time.
The room was a mess, she’d been here for less than a few hours and already things were strewn about, several large wooden cases of traveling supplies lay on the bed. With dresses and pants discarded on the bed as the Princess of Brightmoon looked for appropriate clothing.
She set about a quick rummage, the girl was wealthy beyond measure, Brightmoon owned two of the largest mines in the earth kingdom and traded regularly with Omashu, Ba Sing Sae, and even the fire nation. So it didn’t take her long to find a few items that she could barter off: A pretty necklace with a sapphire set into it, a bracelet of pure silver, and a broach, opening the broach she saw a picture of a smiling earth kingdom man, a much younger Queen Angella her airbending tattoo’s hidden by her long hair, and in her arms a baby that could only be Glimmer. She left the broach but pocketed the bracelet and necklace Plus an odd pouch of loose coins, more than enough for her to eat for a few weeks and Glimmer would hardly miss it.
Carefully she hid each of the items in the folds of her clothes, when she heard a voice down the corridor, it was of a young man, probably around her age with the way the voice still cracked. “Your Highness, we should have been at the dinner ten minutes ago. I can only keep tour hosts entertained for so long. The Brightmoon girl has asked for you.” If there was a response she didn’t hear it. Instead after a minute he walked down the corridor and to a staircase.
Counting an extra twenty seconds she crept towards the room, and stopped when she reached it. There was the strong smell of Iron coming from the other side causing her nose to twitch. Someone was bleeding in there, before she could help herself she wrenched open the doorway.
The chamber was almost identical to the one she had just come from save for a quickly hung painting of the Firelord, the immaculately organized shelves and dresser, and a body of a young woman, laying with her throat cut blood trickled out of it. The wound would be lethal unless she acted quickly.
Without thinking she rushed forwards over to the woman, she realized with a start who this was, the princess of the fire nation, the target she planned to steal something from, a letter marked with her sigil. Eyes glancing around the room she spotted it, unopened on the writing desk. Then focused back on the woman gurgling her lifeblood. She could do this; she reached over to find a jug of water made for drinking and with a quick exhale heated it to near boiling before pouring it over the wound, it stung as it hit her hands but she was used to being burnt. Then she grabbed the wound with both hands and channeled a very small controlled and intense blue hot flame across just the cut. The woman's eyes shot open and she screamed loudly. Which was awful for her but good for the princesses chance.
That was all the help she could offer, feet were pounding up the stairs behind her, darting across the room, she grabbed the scroll and leapt to the window, unleashing a torrent of fire at the frame to make it large enough to fit her.
She had made it less than twenty steps across the courtyard when an Arrow sunk into the ground an inch in front of her. She turned rapidly on her heel and moved in a different direction, out of the corner of her eye she spotted a man, standing in the broken window, bow in hand notching another arrow. Behind him other guards were hauling the princess to her feet.
The second arrow she managed to knock aside with her claw, it was aimed for her heart and would have skewered her through if she hadn’t been a hair's breath faster. She made it to the cover of the bushes and dived under. It was a mad scramble to reach the wall, she leapt up the first part when she felt the sudden shifting of the stone beneath her and she was thrown back.
Rolling backwards as she hit the ground, she had to keep herself moving or whatever earthbender was coming after her would trap her. She came up on the balls of her feet dropping into Horse stance, one hands claws extended. She faced off against Glimmer Moon.
She was wearing the long flowing skirt that hugged her frame well and was still wearing the stupid moon shaped pearl diadem that she brought with her everywhere. She smirked hearing her hit the ground but it was too dark for her eyes to see exactly who it was she was fighting.
“Give it up Assassin, the guards are coming any minute now you’ll be captured, don’t try anything and I won’t hurt you too much.” Her voice was still full of that cocky self assuredness that Catra had at first liked about her but had become grating over the few months they knew each other.
She laughed, it was just her luck. If it was anyone else in this house she was fairly certain she could take them down and move on, but Glimmer was scrappy and tough, she was perhaps the best Earthbender that she had ever met. If this came down to a fight she was still sure she would win, but not before more guards showed up. Glimmer's stance lowered slightly as she heard her distinctive laugh.
“Catra?” the voice was full of confusion, they hadn’t parted on the best of terms.
“Hey Sparkles.” The nickname always annoyed her, “I would love to catch up but I’m on the job at the moment so if I could…” she stepped back towards the wall.
“That’s it, two years without a goodbye and it’s just a ‘I’m Busy’” She was furious, “and now you’re what an assassin?!”
That stopped Catra cold, she turned to face Glimmer summoning a flame to illuminate her face, the other girl gasped at seeing her. “Do you really think I’m a killer? What was our one rule?”
“Nobody gets hurt.” the earthbender repeated it like a Mantra. To them it was, they weren’t Daofei bandits, they were professional thieves. Sure Catra had defended herself against attack all the time. But she never killed anyone—At least not intentionally—she kept quiet and stole enough to stay alive.
“Exactly, I didn’t kill her, I found her sprawled on the bed bleeding out. Yeah I took some stuff, can’t blame a girl for needing to eat. But if it wasn’t for me she’d be dead, so I won’t take a thank you. But if you could just let me go?” she could hear the guards closing in.
Glimmer stared at her for a tense few moments. She stared right back, willing herself not to sweat. If Glimmer didn’t believe her then this might be the end of an eighteen year long run of bad luck.
“You expect me to believe someone broke in and tried to assassinate the Fire Nations princess, at the same time as you broke into the beifong manor looking for loot, and you just happened to stumble across the assassins botched job? How stupid do you think I am?”
That did sound really unlikely when it was said like that. “Glim, I’ve called you annoying, a spoiled brat, and a sparkly menace who’s a pain in my backside, but I've never ever thought you were stupid.”
The staring continued, the sound of guards was so close even Glimmer could hear them now. She whispered to her “An hour, maybe two. Then I come looking for what you stole.” She shifted her feet and a hole in the wall appeared. It was only a few feet wide. She scrambled through desperately and barely had time to pull her tail through before it shut behind her without a trace of earthbending.
She could hear Glimmer shouting on the other side of the wall that “The assassin must have escaped the other way.” She decided she wasn’t going to stick around and wait for them to come check. She sprinted off into the night, towards her safe house.
Glimmer made her way back to the estate at a slow pace, she had to think. What was Catra doing in Gaoling? Last she’d seen her the girl had been down on her luck in a smugglers den in Omashu trying desperately to fence off a stolen portrait of the King of Omashu. Realizing how desperate she was she had left that day to talk to the King and ask forgiveness, as a noble herself she argued in her favour. By the time she came back to tell her that she didn’t have to keep running. The girl had gone, not even leaving a note in their home.
Being abandoned by the Cat girl had forced her to hang her head in shame and head back home to Brightmoon. Her mother had been beyond furious. Her daughter had disappeared for Six Months and every attempt to find her had been thwarted by her moving to stay ahead of them. But in that time she had learnt more about the Earth Kingdom than she had done in fifteen years cooped up in the palace.
It took her nearly two whole years to convince Angella to let her leave the palace again, and only because she was being escorted. Castaspella, her aunt, was going on a diplomatic mission to meet the new lord of Gaoling, Lu Beifong. She wouldn’t normally even consider going with her aunt on any long journey but after being stifled for so long she jumped at the opportunity.
Of course it got interesting when they arrived and the fire nation had a whole company escorting the princess around. Then when they were invited to dinner with the new lord she realized she had nothing to meet someone above her station. So she’d had to improvise, she had chatted most of the night away with one of the guards, a close friend of the princess. An archer named Bow. The irony was not lost on him but he’d laughed good humouredly at all her jokes. He disappeared off a few hours into the meal when the princess still hadn’t arrived. Glimmer didn’t blame her, after all lord Lu Beifong was perhaps the most boring man she’d ever met.
Then she had heard a screaming, Bow had taken off at a deadsprint. She has rushed outside, she was more manoeuvrable in the open air, her aunt had followed after Bow, despite her constant nagging and her obsession with embroidery Glimmer had to admit that her aunt was a formidable earthbender. Then she heard the shout of “Assassin!”
She had rushed out into the Gardens only spotting something moving away from the princesses rooms in the guest quarters by the faint tink of an arrow grazing whoever it was shot at.
To say she was shocked to hear Catra’s voice was an understatement. She had thought to never see the thief who had briefly stolen her heart. She had long since gotten over her childish crush but looking into those heterochromatic eyes she couldn’t see a killer behind them.
So when Catra asked she let her go, promising her she would track her down as soon as she let Casta know. She made her way back to the estate. Which was in a frenzy. Making her way back to the table, Casta was looking over the princess, she was a trained healer, one of the best in the earth kingdom. The princesses' retinue had let her look at her.
Lu was fussing demanding information from the guards. He gestured for her to come back into the house with a “Princess, you shouldn’t be chasing down assassins.” She glared at him and stormed past.
Candalia gestured for her to approach and several of the guards stepped aside. She stopped in front of the woman whose throat was heavily bandaged. It was Glimmers first real time seeing her, she was older than Glimmer expected maybe twenty eight or twenty nine, with Shoulder length black hair which she knew customarily would be up in a top knot but because of her treatment hung loose around her shoulders against her pale skin, her amber eyes despite obvious pain were sharp and focused. She spoke slowly every word a whisper that Glimmer had to strain to hear.
“I hear you went after my assassin?” her gaze pierced through Glimmer like a knife. “Very brave, I think it was a spirit, eyes like a cat and clawed hands, which burnt my flesh. Yet it used a knife to try and cut my throat.”
Glimmer stared at, Catra didn’t use knives, she was a woman proud of her bending and willing to use her claws. But never a blade. “I did your highness.”
“Did you get a good look at it?” she coughed once and Casta glared at Glimmer and then at the princess. She was always protective of her patients.
“I think so? It was dark but I could follow its trail. It did get away from me." She kept trying to obfuscate Catra’s identity but she wouldn’t lie directly to anyone on Catra’s behalf, not after Omashu.
“Then Glimmer Moon, I must ask you a favour.” She grimaced and rubbed her throat. “The Spirit assassin stole something of great importance to the fire nation. I am sending Bow.” she gestured at the man over her shoulder, the handsome one who had entertained her with jokes all evening. His face was now a grim mask of determination. “To find this spirit assassin and bring it to justice, and recover what was stolen. I would ask that you help him as best you can. If you do so I will owe your house a great boon.”
“What was stolen?” She found herself asking automatically.
“A scroll case, the contents of which are between me and the Fire Lord.” Her tone despite being whispered brooked no arguments. “Will you help me?”
“Of course,” she found herself agreeing without thinking, maybe if she played this right she could keep Catra from being executed by the Fire Nation, “I can guide your soldier.”
The woman smiled and it was a dangerous thing. “Thank you.” she turned to the soldier behind her. “Bow, I order you to escort this earth kingdom princess to find the assassin and recover the stolen documents, until I recall you, serve her as you would me.” There was a playful tone to her voice as if this was some old joke between them.
The soldier bowed deeply, “As you wish Princess.” then stepped forward and bowed to Glimmer “Princess, please lead the way. We may need to head to your rooms to pack for the journey. I’ve had guards gathering supplies. If the assassin has fled the city, it may be a few days before we can return.”
Over his shoulder she could see Castaspella mouthing ‘Absolutely not’ before she could say anything out loud she grabbed Bow by the arm and dragged him away.
Hopefully Catra had fled the city already and she could have another adventure without having to go home and be locked up for another year.
When the two of them arrived at her room Bow surveyed the carnage like a well trained bodyguard should and said “Are you sure the assassin wasn’t after you?” She snorted, she was going to use the same excuse on Castaspella later tonight.
She grabbed one backpack, which she kept stuffed with dried rations and two changes of traveling clothes. Catra's lessons of preparedness had rubbed off on her well enough, if it couldn’t fit in one bag, don’t bring it on the road. That had gone out of the window when she was back in brightmoon, but shoving one backpack away at the bottom of a travel case was easy enough. She grabbed a change of shoes into tough riding boots and was ready to go. She turned and saw an expression on the soldier's face, one of open admiration.
“What are you staring at?” She wanted to shout but kept it at an angry whisper level.
He chuckled and said “Wasn’t expecting a princess to be ready for a journey without two hours of packing.”
She glared “I packed this back home, be ready for anything and nothing will surprise you.” she quoted. It was what Catra said before some heists that inevitably went wrong and she was forced to improvise. “Now come on, we're wasting moonlight.”
Bow laughed and disappeared into an adjoining room, returning with his own backpack, a quiver of arrows, and a heavy looking bow. So he wasn’t a bender? Instead he was some master archer. He shrugged at her and gestured for her to lead the way.
It didn’t take them long to set off onto the street, she walked from house to house, talking to people. Her bribe money had vanished from its place in her backpack, which could only mean that Catra had decided to help herself. But once she began to describe a Cat person, most people, even ones awoken from their chamber, made a sign to ward off bad luck and pointed her towards a different street.
After an hour of asking directions eventually the two of them came to a shabby looking house at the city's edge, cramped and dirty. Whoever lived here either was too shabby or too poor to pay maintenance.
She was planning to break down the wall and just grab whoever was inside and hoped it was Catra so she could scare her into giving up the stolen papers. Bow simply tried the door first which swung open at his light touch.
Inside the room was abandoned, there were clear signs of habitation, Catra’s fur was stuck in small clumps around the place like she’d had to abandon it in a hurry. She gave the place a once over finding everything missing, even a clear line of dust from a heavy box, which had been left in a cupboard for months. The scrolls were nowhere to be found. But sitting on the table was her aunt's hideous sapphire necklace.
If Catra was using this place as a safehouse and had abandoned it in a hurry she was panicking, if she had left when she was discovered then she couldn’t be too far ahead. In any direction, but only three main roads led into Gaoling, one led to the northern territories and it would be a week before anyone traveling on foot hit another town which was under the protection of Brightmoon. In the summer heat that would be dangerous for her and if her mother found out then Catra would be strung up. The eastern road led to Ba Sing Sae, where a quick messenger hawk would ensure she was captured before she made it past the first checkpoint. The western path led to Omashu, and the chances of her risking that city again was highly unlikely unless she wanted to be captured and lose a hand as a thief. But there was another way out of the city, one Catra had talked about years ago.
It was utter madness to think she would go back there, but if she was so desperate then maybe just maybe. She stepped out and stared at the south side of the city, the huge canopy of trees of the great foggy swamp stretched out for hundreds of miles, even if she skirted the edges. She could work her way along its border until she reached an unaffiliated town and started over.
The worst part was the water, it would clog Catra's fur and of course fill Glimmers boots. This was going to be an absolute nightmare. She looked over at Bow who was following her gaze and frowning.
“Come on Archer, not scared of a bit of damp are you?”