Chapter Text
The sign at the entrance read “Caldera Elite Sport Horses” in sharp, polished lettering, black metal against pale stone, designed to catch sunlight like it meant something.
And it did. For the people who came through those gates, it meant pedigree. Funding. Precision.
The drive curved up through trimmed hedgerows and carefully maintained fencing, leading into a wide courtyard that always looked just a little too clean to be real. Gravel was raked into perfect lines. Potted plants lined the outside. The strips of grass were lush, green and neatly trimmed.
Caldera Elite Sport Horses sat on land large enough to divide itself into multiple buildings.
On one side of it: the livery barn. A long, practical building with wide aisles and functional tack rooms for boarders paying to be part of the Caldera name, even if only temporarily.
On the other side: the family yard. A much shorter building with a single stable aisle. It held the family's own handful of competition horses. All of them young, all of them with strong genetics and promising skillsets.
Beyond the buildings the courtyard opened out into a structured maze of gravel paths and arenas. A large outdoor jumping arena sat closest to the main yard, its fences freshly reset from the previous day. Beyond that, a second outdoor ring for flatwork and schooling. An indoor arena stood slightly further back, long and insulated, with mirrored walls and carefully maintained footing for winter training.
Staff and riders moved around the property like pieces on a board. And at the center of it all was the Caldera family name. Ozai Caldera owned it all. Or rather, controlled it all. He was rarely here nowadays, neither was his daughter Azula. They were abroad more often than not, competing on international circuits, representing Caldera at the highest level where mistakes weren’t corrected, they were punished in results sheets and sponsorship contracts.
When they left, the yard didn’t get quieter. It got more efficient. Like everything knew it had to compensate for their absence.
Zuko lived above the family barn. A private apartment sat above the short stable aisle, tucked behind a separate staircase near the tack room, close enough that he could hear the horses shifting in their stalls at night.
Most people thought it sounded luxurious. It really wasn’t. It was convenient, practical. Another way to stay available, since his life barely contained anything outside of their horses anyway.
Zuko had lived there since he was old enough to train horses on his own. Which, depending on who you asked, had either been impressively or alarmingly young.
At nineteen now, he was already one of the most talked-about names in showjumping. Not just good, not just promising. Good enough that people used words like prodigy when they thought he couldn’t hear.
Of course his sister, Azula, had gotten there first. Cold precision. International placings. Magazine interviews. The kind of rider who looked effortless in the saddle and terrifying everywhere else.
Zuko was different. Where Azula rode calculatedly, Zuko rode intense, emotional, with a technical instinct that made trainers talk in lowered voices at warmup rings.
Together, they were the next Caldera generation. Their father’s legacy, polished and sharpened. Because before he became the owner of Caldera Elite Sport Horses, Ozai Caldera had been an Olympic rider himself. And around here, success wasn’t something you pursued. It was something inherited, expected and maintained.
Sokka had never been good at staying in one place.
Not because things went badly, mostly because eventually something else called. Another season. Another barn. A friend of a friend who knew someone looking for a stablehand. A ranch job for the summer. Herding gigs. A stable near the coast that needed someone who didn’t mind cold mornings and skittish horses.
He liked movement, or at least, he’d convinced himself he did after years of doing so.
Caldera had been meant to be temporary too. Elite barns had never really been a place where he felt utterly comfortable. This was a position that would look good in his recommendations later on, while he figured out what came next. Fancy facility. Good paychecks. Reliable work. Did he mention the paychecks? He’d been there a few months now, long enough to stop getting lost, long enough to know which horses bit and which people gossiped. Long enough to learn other’s opinions.
And Caldera was a place built entirely on opinions. Especially when it came to Zuko Caldera. “The Prince” the stablehands mockingly called him when he wasn’t around. Never to his face. Mostly because nobody wanted to be forced to pack their bags that same day.
Sokka could see where they were coming from. Zuko moved through the stable like everything had to happen correctly or civilization itself might collapse. Tense. Particular. A sharp kind of quietness that could explode at any moment of perceived incompetence. The scar that cut across the left side of his face only intensified it. He was the kind of rider who noticed if a horse's boots had been fastened unevenly from across the yard. It was fair to call him difficult, intense, and a little arrogant, if Sokka was honest. Sokka knew the teen was definitely short-tempered and very clearly born into a world where he was used to people listening when he spoke.
Sokka, unfortunately, also knew that Zuko rode like a young god.
It was deeply irritating and Sokka had tried being unimpressed, he really did. But then he’d accidentally watched him train and that had ruined everything. Because Zuko didn’t just sit pretty on expensive horses, he made them… work. Difficult horses collected themselves. Skittish horses focused. He could take something tense and messy and channel it into elegant, directed movement.
Sokka had had a moment or two when mucking the stalls that looked out onto the outdoor arena where he had meant to only glance up, just briefly, out of professional curiosity, and had ended up standing there with the pitchfork in hand, not moving. Just watching.
The horse, obviously.
Totally not Zuko.
There was just something in how the tiniest, barely visible corrections changed the entire animal underneath him. And then sometimes, after a set of particularly intense jump combinations, after repeating them over and over until every stride and every distance was perfected, Zuko's whole expression would soften for half a second. He would lean forward to pat the horse's neck and the prince would be gone, along with all the sharpness and the tension. It left space for something unexpectedly gentle, and then vanished as soon as it had appeared.
Sokka hadn’t had a lot of interaction with Zuko’s horses. Not only were they in their own building, they and Zuko had their own groom. ‘Had’ being the important word, because apparently none of the guys ever lasted very long over there. Not in a dramatic way, no one ever stormed out, nobody quit after an explosive fight, but stable gossip filled in the blanks for every worker that left the stables shaking their head and driving off the property for the last time.
The morning started like any other. Too early, slightly cold, smelling like hay and tasting like bad coffee that had been drunk too fast on the drive over. Sokka had barely made it through half the aisle, throwing the morning feed in the livery horses throughs when one of his colleagues took the bucket out of his hand.
“Manager wants to see you.”
“Okay, thanks." Sokka reached to take the bucket back, but grabbed only air.
“Immediately.”
As he left the aisle, Sokka was confused more than anything. Immediately sounded serious. He thought it to be reserved for when someone broke something expensive, when there was a mix up of turnout times or there had been any other sort of dramatic stable incident. As far as he knew, none of those things had involved him. He’d been doing good work. He showed up on time, accomplished his tasks correctly at a more than reasonable speed and got on well enough with the other stablehands as well as the boarders.
So while he had absolutely no reason to be nervous, he found himself oddly feeling so anyway. Curious too. Because immediately could result in just about anything right now.
“Ah, Sokka. Come in.”, the stable manager, who was also Zuko’s uncle, greeted him. The small office on the side of the indoor arena had always smelled of tealeaves whenever Sokka had walked past it before. Sure enough, a freshly brewed pot stood on the desk in front of Iroh.
“Tea?”
“No, thanks.” Sokka sat down across from the older man. “You wanted to see me?”
Iroh looked up with the expression of someone entirely too calm to be delivering good news. He folded his hands neatly. “This morning, I came to work to find a letter on my desk.”, he started, “Informing me that Ming would not return to work today.” Zuko’s groom, Sokka thought. He started to have a bad feeling about where this conversation was headed.
Iroh continued smoothly, as if discussing the weather. “Which leaves my nephew without assistance in the family stable.” Sokka nodded slowly. “That… sounds like a staffing problem.” “Yes.” A pause. Then Iroh added, just as gently, “A recurring one, as I’m sure you know.” The old man gave Sokka a small, patient smile. One that said I am going to ask something of you. Instead of asking though, he continued talking.
“The horses are in frequent rotation.”, he said, “They get trained over a few seasons. They win. They… accumulate value… until they are sold to make room for the next prospect.” Right. Here, horses were business. Investments. “I’m tired of the grooms changing out even faster than the horses do. I need someone who won’t quit in a month.”
“And you’re telling me this…?” Sokka had a sinking feeling he knew exactly what was coming.
“Your work here has been consistent. The boarders respect your work ethic. The horses respond well to you. And you have not, as far as I am aware, accidentally created any lasting structural damage.”
Sokka squinted, his tone suspicious. “You make this sound like a promotion.”
Iroh sighed. “I’m assigning you to the family stable, starting today. Your paychecks will be adjusted according to your new responsibilities, of course.” That made Sokka perk up in his chair. At least he would get something out of this new position. Iroh got up, a silent expression that their conversation was done. He walked Sokka to the office door. “I would not ask this of just anyone.”, Iroh stated.
“Because the other stablehands would just refuse?”, Sokka could not suppress a slight eyeroll. He still was ‘the new guy’ after all. Iroh smiled, a little caught. "Partly. But also because I believe my nephew and you could make a good team.”
Sokka could barely contain a snort as he made his way across the courtyard. A good team, sure. If working with Zuko was anything like what he had heard through the grapevine, the boy was anything but a teamplayer.
For the first time since he had started his work at Caldera, Sokka stepped through the half-opened barn door into the family stable building. There were obvious similarities to the livery stables. The same paved stone floors, the same windows, the same stalls, except the metal bars here were painted an expensive, glossy black instead of the usual gray. Under the overhead lights there was not even a speck of dust visible on them. Four stalls lined one side of the inside, the other contained the separate tack and feed rooms. Sponsor banners hung overhead, showing off competition names, luxury feed brands and old championship placements in all sorts of colours. Ribbons framed in neat displays lined the open wall space, with photographs of horses midair over impossible fences speckled in between. Absolutely everything looked organized with an intensity that felt almost threatening. Nothing out of place. No halters that had fallen off the hook, no random forgotten jacket thrown over a stall door, no mysterious brushes that somehow belonged to everyone and no one at the same time.
Sokka looked down at himself instinctively, eyeing his dusty work jeans and trusted leather boots that had survived years of travel and work in all sorts of weather. He’d never felt… underdressed at a stable before. Like someone had accidentally pasted a ranch hand into an equestrian catalog.
The alien feeling only intensified when he spotted Zuko, who obviously fit right into the spick-and-span interior.
He was halfway down the aisle lifting hay bales off a wheelbarrow with the sort of grim determination of someone who had already accepted the inconveniences the universe had handed him. Black breeches. Black quarter zip with the sleeves pushed up to his elbow. Branded, functional riding clothes that somehow managed to look both athletic and painfully expensive at once. Small accents of dark red and gold stitching lined the collar and matched with the elegant golden buckle of the smooth leather belt around his waist. Everything was neat, fitted and annoyingly put together, even while doing manual labor. His dark hair was messier than usual and his expression underneath showed something between mild annoyance and deep focus. Doing the work. Efficiently. Like this had happened before. Which, considering the groom turnover, it probably had.
Sokka hesitated near the aisle entrance.
Because if he was being fair, this wasn’t work Zuko had to do. He could have waited. Could’ve stood around looking irritated until management found someone. He could’ve complained and disappeared upstairs to his apartment until someone else would take care of it. Sokka looked at the four horses happily munching their morning feed. Zuko had apparently just… gotten on with it instead. Like he was used to stablehands suddenly disappearing without warning. Which, honestly, felt a little sad when Sokka thought about it too hard.
Before he could overthink further, Zuko lifted the bale by the strings, turned, and noticed him standing there. The look he got was quick. Assessing. Eyes flicking down to Sokka’s muddy boots and then back onto his face. He put down the hay again and picked a single strand of it off his chest. Sokka took a step further into the absurdly polished aisle.
“Iroh sent me over. I’m-”
“Sokka. I know.”, Zuko nodded.
“You know my name?”
That got him a look. Not quite offended, just briefly harder to read.
“I know everyone who works here.”
Something about the way he said it made Sokka feel unexpectedly called out. Like Zuko actually noticed more than people gave him credit for.
Zuko inhaled for a moment, like taking a last breath before rattling off long rehearsed information. He straightened his posture and turned towards the stall on one end of the aisle. “Sozin’s Comet.” A dark chestnut gelding lifted his head over the door immediately. He had a white star on his forehead and his ears flicked towards Zuko curiously. “A little tense. Smart. Get’s bored easily.” Comet stretched his neck just far enough to nose at Zuko’s sleeve and his hand lifted without him looking at it, scratching the horse's forehead in an automatic, familiar movement.
“Blue Fire.”, Zuko continued while pointing towards the grey mare in the neighbouring stall, then moved his hand over, “Warship. Direction Of Lightning. Might bite if you come onto her too fast.” The black mare pinned her ears as soon as Zuko pointed at her. Friendly, Sokka thought with a huff. Zuko didn’t waste a lot of time on introductions and shifted seamlessly into instructions. Clear, specific, delivered with the sort of precision that implied mistakes had consequences.
“They get morning and evening feed. Hay ad libitum. Turnout in pairs. Front and bell boots on every time. Blue-” “-doesn’t like being lead from the right side.”, Sokka finished the sentence, which earned him a questioning look from the other. Sokka shrugged. “I helped Ming bring them in once.” He didn’t mention how he had seen the other groom lead her from the right with the mare basically dancing around him before Sokka had taken over.
Zuko continued. “Warship’s hay gets soaked so he doesn’t inhale the dust.” Sokka took a glance into the geldings stall before opening his mouth yet again. “Should probably think about using pellet bedding instead of straw then, too. At least in the summer.” He could not quite tell if the other boy’s expression was annoyance at being repeatedly interrupted in his instructions or actually thinking over the suggestion. Something in his posture shifted almost imperceptibly. Like expectation recalibrating. Maybe, just maybe, he’d expected to have to explain everything from scratch. Instead he moved on. “After jump schools or harder rides, they get ice boots.”
“Twenty minutes?”
“Yes.”
“Magnetic wraps if they’re stocked up?”
“...Yes. And you tell me immediately if you notice.” Zuko’s face showed the tiniest hint of pleasant surprise. “Obviously.”
By now they’d reached the feed room. Rows of supplements lined a long shelf on top of multiple big containers. Absolutely everything was labeled with measurements and times.
“Feed, grains and supplements are written on the board. No changes unless I say so.” “Obviously.”, Sokka snorted.
“Feed timing matters.”
Sokka raised an eyebrow. “Okay, now I feel like you think I’m a complete idiot.”
That stopped Zuko and he looked over his shoulder to Sokka, who had his arms crossed in front of him. “You’re new to the aisle.”, he said flatly.
“I’m not new to horses.”
Zuko didn’t respond to that.
“So,” Sokka picked up the conversation again after a minute as they walked back out into the aisle, “for warm-ups, do you want me to lunge them, or ride them a bit first? Or just walk them out?” Zuko stopped. Sokka paused too, halfway into his sentence. “…or I can just-”
“You don’t move the horses.”
The interruption was sharp. Final. Sokka blinked.
“Okay, I mean, I was just asking what your preference-”
“That is not your responsibility.” Zuko turned fully now. His expression was tight again. Not angry, exactly, just controlled. The kind of control that meant this wasn’t up for debate. “I handle that myself.” There was no hesitation in that answer. “Your responsibility is basic care,” Zuko stated. “Feeding. Mucking. Turnout. Equipment.” Sokka glanced down the aisle instinctively. A pause. Then he heard a quieter, but no less firm: “I move them.”
He nodded slowly, processing that. There was ‘the prince’ again. “Okay,” he said carefully. “Got it.” Zuko studied him for a second, like he was checking whether that answer would hold. It must have, since he visibly relaxed a little, along with a short exhale.
“Get them out to the paddocks. Then start on hay and mucking out. You can start brushing Lightning at 11, I’ll tack her up after.”
And with that, Sokka was left alone.