Archive of Our Own

Being the chief of the Southern Water Tribe taught Hakoda many things over the years. Compassion, composure, and above all, how to be frighteningly observant when it came to his tribe.

Whether it was determining the root cause of an argument between groups or individuals that went much deeper than either was willing to open up about, picking up on the shift in the air that indicated an incoming winter storm to prepare for, even something as simple as knowing when a small hole in a tent would spell much larger problems down the line, and needed to be addressed sooner rather than later; he knew. He noticed, like any good chief would.

That was the least he could do, especially as their numbers dwindled more and more with every passing year. Notice. Hakoda could protect them this way. He could take in what others disregarded, so that they could keep living without the same burden of insight.

It was a talent that had extended easily into his parenting his children when they were young.

Sometimes it was nothing more than the subtle flicker of Sokka's wide, blue eyes in one direction or another when he knew he'd been caught, or the little crease between Katara's perpetually knit eyebrows when she had dealt with a comment about Kya or her bending from one of the other kids. No matter what the source or tell, Hakoda could pick up on it in an instant.

The skill had allowed him to wedge his way into broaching more than a handful of uneasy topics over the years as they'd grown; the name of Katara's most frequent tormentor, how Sokka's bravery and humor hid the worry he had over losing more of his family, what it meant that Hakoda was going off to fight in the war against the nation that had murdered their mother. Hakoda laid his fingers over the portrait of Kya he kept wrapped against his heart even now, letting the full-body sigh that he'd been stuck with for years finally make its way out of his body.

This was a quiet moment. This was safety, at last. Not like then.

Leaving them had been its own form of torture. Worse than anything the Fire Nation could have thrown his way. The quiver of his son's lip— so young when he'd placed an unfair expectation on himself that Hakoda's parting words hadn't helped to subside— would live in his memory forever. For years, it was all he had of his children; big, blue eyes like their mother's and chubby-cheeked faces still round in their youth. They stayed that way in his mind even as the time droned on in a never-ending state of fear, an inability to rest properly, and sore, aging bones.

Katara and Sokka grew up without him there to see it.

They grew into responsibilities and burdens that should never have been theirs to bear. Into powerful benders and honorable warriors, with ghosts behind those once-innocent eyes that they'd had when Hakoda left them in the Southern Water Tribe.

By the time Hakoda saw both of his children again, they looked like the soldiers he'd left home with. It was the one thing that he had never wanted for them; that look. The one that weighed him and Bato and every other man from the Southern Tribe down.

He took much greater comfort in the fact that when he did see them again, it was alongside a gaggle of rowdy teenagers just like them to share in the feeling. That they didn't have to bear that burden all on their own.

When the final battle was won, and a moment to breathe had settled over the world, Hakoda found himself— somehow— in the Fire Nation. Of all places. The locale riled something in his gut, but the war had been won here, and none of the children who had accomplished that feat on behalf of the rest of the world were ready to part ways yet.

Hakoda knew the feeling. Knew what it meant to have to finally say goodbye to family when duty called him elsewhere.

So he stayed in the Fire Nation. In Caldera.

Slowly, he allowed himself to meet his children's new friends properly. Outside of strategy meetings and low-toned discussions that carried the fate of the known world. He allowed himself the chance to get close to them, now that death and heartbreak were less of a certainty than before.

Toph had been an open book right from the beginning. Young, confident, and brutally honest in a way that Hakoda had quickly come to appreciate. His kids were more reserved in how far their abilities could take them, despite being a master waterbender and incredibly skilled warrior. In fact, most of this small band were too humble about their skills for his taste. To meet someone so young and already well aware of what it meant to contain the power that she did? To use it against the world that wanted nothing but to underestimate the blind girl who'd only just begun to grow out of her childhood? Well, it was a breath of fresh air.

They exchanged war stories like old friends within minutes of meeting, and her unapologetic laughter filled a room just as quickly as his own did.

Getting to know the avatar himself , on the other hand, hadn't quite been what Hakoda was expecting.

When they'd first met, back on a stolen Fire Nation warship, Aang had been weak; dead, then revived, but a shell of the boy that Bato had described encountering when he'd run into Sokka and Katara in the Earth Kingdom. Since then, he'd met a dozen versions of the avatar. One brimming with optimism, another hopeless, one who was willing to do whatever it took to save the world, then striving to do whatever it took to stay true to himself. He was interesting, that boy. But beneath everything that his mere existence suggested for the world and for his own life, Aang was a good kid. A good man.

He was caring, and diplomatic, and encouraged Katara to have fun. Hakoda hadn't been quite sure he'd ever have that sight again. Any evidence that his children had found hope, light— something that might turn into love— during the world's darkest day was alright in his book.

In that same realm, Hakoda was quite fond of the head of the Kyoshi Warriors. She'd certainly shown her prowess in battle at the Boiling Rock— his back twinged in pain at the mere thought of the moves she had enacted during the riot as if they were her everyday. But beyond her might, he found Suki to be incredibly charming. Quick as a whip, unburdened by the excessive humility that, he'd learned, most girls her age outside of the Southern Tribe were forced into expressing.

She had no qualms about shooting blunted comments at Hakoda with a smile, or knocking the boys on their asses when they would spar with her. It came as no surprise to him that Sokka had tripped head-over-heels for this girl along the way to winning the war.

What had surprised him was the way she turned koalasheepish when he finally asked her about his son. Gone was her bravado and confidence, replaced instead with an awkward air that anyone would have noticed, not just a Water Tribe chief with a way of picking up on things.

"Sokka is incredible, sir—" She fenced, scratching her nails lightly over her arm as she spoke.

"'Hakoda', Suki, please."

"Hakoda." She smirked at him, rolling her eyes playfully. "He had a few backwards ideas about women when we met—" He had no idea where Sokka had picked that up. Just the unfortunate act of having grown up without Kya and without Hakoda there to straighten him out? A thought for another time. "—but he's loyal, and smart, in a quiet way. I think a lot of people overlook that part of him. In another lifetime, I think we would have been very happy together."

"'Would have been'? I guess I just assumed, but are you two not—"

She shook her head. Slowly, smiling all the while.

"We talked about it. But it was war, you know? And well…" she trailed, eyes flicking to the right.

"Let's just say life has a way of surprising people, Hakoda." Suki spoke sagely, confining a curt laugh to her throat and shoulders as she turned to properly face where her previous look had been sent. "Not that I have to tell you that."

Hakoda chose to ignore the comment this time, following her eyes instead.

They'd found themselves this time off to one side of the sparring courts. The rest of the small band of war heroes were chatting aimlessly at the opposite side, where he couldn't quite hear what was being said, but could still relish in the way his daughter leaned into Aang's side and gestured animatedly as she spoke; a small stream of water from the nearby turtleduck pond being traded back and forth between the two of them. Toph added her two coppers to their conversation every so often, hands tucked behind her head as she watched the battle using the one foot she kept flat against the earth.

For the first time since becoming chief, he couldn't decipher what about the group Suki had been referencing.

That is, until a clash of action drew him away from the group, and instead set him to watch the actual battle underway in front of them.

The new Firelord spun on one heel, shooting himself up into the air so that when he came down, his crossed daos pressed the force of his entire weight onto the sword Sokka braced with both hands. It was a pale imitation of the blade his son had fought with during the war, but had been close enough of a match for it to be his choice of weapon for these more casual brawls.

Not that anyone passing by would be able to tell that they were just casual. Sokka and Zuko exchanged hits and movements like they were intent on seeing the other put into an early grave.

Even with Zuko refusing to use his bending— Hakoda wasn't sure he'd be able to spectate their sparring if that were the case— the pair were so evenly, violently matched. It didn't quite surprise Hakoda as much as he'd thought it would. Zuko and Sokka were the closest in age of the group who had ended the war, both had been raised to believe wholeheartedly in the duty they had to family— for better or for worse— and their nations, and their tempers clearly shared the need for a healthy outlet.

So, they beat each other with swords. Naturally. Hakoda likened it to the roughhousing that some of the other tribesmen would do during the war to get out their excess nervous energy. Despite the vigor in which they went at one another, teeth bared and voices reduced to growls and grunts of effort, it was obvious that they would never harm one another. From Hakoda's spot, the way they pulled specific punches was clear. He had counted no less than five times in which one of them had their weapon primed to land a blow that might cut skin or cause harm, only to twist or tilt their blade at the last second so that their opponent wouldn't be hurt. The first had nearly given him a heart attack; Zuko's daos in perfect position to leave twin gashes in Sokka's arm that never materialized.

Unlike the others, Hakoda hadn't quite gotten a grasp on how he felt about the new Firelord yet.

With Aang and Toph and Suki, it had been simple. Good kids who had always been that way, fighting alongside and caring for his children from the start, and never showing any ill intent beyond simple childhood emotions clashing.

Zuko was a different story.

He knew that Katara had begrudgingly chosen to trust him, and that said trust had developed into a much more tangible camaraderie that was supported by the fact that Aang and the Firelord got along famously; their own history nothing more than a foundation that they'd built off of. Hakoda was less familiar with what his son thought of Zuko. Clearly, there was at least enough of an understanding there for them to interact as they were now.

But how far did that understanding go? How could any of them be sure that the boy currently letting Sokka get the upper hand in their fight— as if Hakoda wouldn't notice the way he was purposefully keeping his right leg slightly bent so that his stance was unstable— wouldn't just as easily revert to the ideologies that had been passed down through his family for generations? Hakoda had seen him during their stint at the Boiling Rock; bending like that, especially firebending, was more power than most people were meant to keep contained. Bending like what Zuko had could start wars; comet or no.

The stance the Firelord maintained finally broke, and he was sent backwards onto the sand with Sokka tumbling down after him. They both existed in a brief instance of shock, a few quiet words exchanged with wide eyes until Sokka was chuckling and pushing up from where they laid, extending a hand to Zuko who—

Didn't take it. Who instead wrapped his hand around Sokka's forearm, Hakoda's son grinning like he'd won the war all over again as he pulled the Firelord up to stand. They stood close together, locked in an imitation of the Water Tribe greeting. Sokka said something under his breath to Zuko, whose brow shot up to his hairline in response and— was the Firelord… getting red? Because of…?

Hakoda looked to Suki for an explanation, but received nothing more than a shrug and a smirk from the Kyoshi Warrior.

"Would you four stop that!" Toph called out from across the sparring pit. "I can hardly hear myself think!"

As the teenagers laughed together, a common understanding buzzing between them, Hakoda found himself watching the pair closest to him. Flushed with the exertion of the spar and— in a thought that put something sharp in Hakoda's gut— the potential of something more?

Sokka and Zuko? Spirits, and he'd thought Katara seeing the avatar was complicated enough. Imagine if that were the case as well. It was comical. Laughable, even, for him to consider the possibility.

His son would never fall in love with the Firelord. Hakoda was just seeing things. Placing meaning where it didn't belong. They were just good friends. Brothers in arms. Boys who had survived a war, and found safety with one another. They were just like him and Ba—

Spirits. No. Not like him and Bato. Not at all—

Sokka turned to say something crass to Toph, and Hakoda watched Zuko's eyes track Sokka's movements with something soft behind them.

—right?

Sign #1: Increased Physical Contact

It was in times like these that he had to force himself to remember that the war was over.

Bato helped, in every way he could, but even his care— only granted in private, small doses, since Hakoda hadn't found it in him to break the news to Sokka and Katara yet— didn't eclipse the fear. Didn't erase the nights he would shoot up from bed in a cold sweat, fighting off memories and the phantom blazing heat that nearly scorched his skin more times than he could count. Didn't eliminate the way he flinched every time the new Firelord laid an open palm on his son's shoulder.

It wasn't fair to Zuko. He knew that. Well, his head knew that. His body was having a much harder time adapting to the presence of someone he would have battled off on sight.

And this visit to the Fire Nation? This visit was going to test him.

Sokka might as well have been glued to the Firelord's side, never further than the distance that could be bridged by an arm or a regal, proper tilt to whisper something in Sokka's ear. Seeing Zuko be so official didn't sit right with him. Sure, Hakoda could reckon with the fact that the young boy he'd escaped prison with was the Firelord now— as preposterous as that sounded, considering he was only a year older than Sokka, and he was nowhere near ready to take on sovereignty yet— but it was the way he behaved around the other dignitaries that was throwing Hakoda for a loop.

The Zuko that he had come to know was quiet, of course, but never rigid. Nervous, but in a way that made him more jittery than eerily still, the way he was now as he addressed the delegations from each nation. Like he'd been carved out of ice and placed at the Fire Nation's spot around the circular table instead of the way he'd stumbled in alongside Aang and Sokka before the Earth Kingdom and Northern Water Tribe had arrived.

Yet the instant the grand doors had opened for the Earth King, Zuko's shoulders had shuffled back until his spine was rod-straight, and every word spoken carried an air of propriety that Hakoda had never heard from the boy.

"May we discuss the impact these new routes might have on the colonies within the Earth Kingdom privately, Firelord?" Kuei piped up, handing Zuko's most recent proposal for renewed trade routes back to Aang so that they might make their way back to him.

"Chamberlain," Zuko called, just loud enough to gain the attention of the older man who stationed himself just far enough away from the table to give the illusion of privacy, "please find a time for the Earth King and I to further discuss the Earth Kingdom route proposal during his stay." He asked, though his jaw was set throughout the sentence.

"Yes, my Lord."

"Chief Hakoda? Your thoughts?" The boy asked, catching Hakoda's eyes. His brow ridge pinched together in the center, and as if that weren't enough of a cry for help from the new leader, the way his son fixed him with his own pleading look certainly was.

Right. He needed to stall a moment to get his wits about him. As much as he liked to believe himself competent in these more diplomatic settings, much of his own leadership experience had also been isolated as a result of the war. And, to make matters worse, it wasn't as though his voice held much weight in these conversations. Aang would listen to his thoughts, but Aang would listen to anyone. Zuko was perfectly respectful— as much as he could without showing favoritism.

But getting Kuei and Arnook to pay any mind to the opinion of the Southern Water Tribe, as small as they were? It was a fool's errand.

Still, with the way his son was looking at him, he had to try.

"I believe wholeheartedly that the Firelord only wants what is best for the harmony of the collective nations." Hakoda extended a hand towards Zuko, who had visibly reduced the tension in his jaw at Hakoda's open support. "Might I see the route agreement once more in detail, Firelord Zuko?"

Zuko tipped his head towards Hakoda, and passed the scroll to him by letting it first move through Sokka.

Which was when he saw it. Sly, but clearly there, for anyone on this side of the table which— luckily for them— was just himself and Sokka. His son laid his thumb over the top of the open scroll which, when lolled over as it was, created a false sense of space between his hand and the Firelord's. What Hakoda bore witness to from his vantage point was how the rest of Sokka's fingers drifted over Zuko's in a slow drag.

Quick enough to be missed. Slow enough to make Hakoda blink a few times, just to make sure he wasn't imagining things.

Then Sokka was handing the scroll to him, and Hakoda forced himself to focus back on his responsibilities as a chief, not as a father.

"Ah yes, in terms of the connection between the Southern Water Tribe and the Fire Nation…"

When the meeting finally drew to a close, Hakoda lingered next to the door, eagerly awaiting his son. He'd been able to write off the spar. It was just a small blip before they'd found themselves headed back home for the first time in what felt like forever. But if Hakoda was noticing a surreptitious connection between Sokka and Zuko, how long did they have until someone else noticed as well? Someone who would see this not for what it was, but what it could turn into.

A political nightmare for a vulnerable world.

Arnook was quick to follow Kuei, who let himself out quicker than anyone else of his station rightfully should, but slowed his pace the closer he came to the other Water Tribe leader. Great.

Look, he didn't dislike Arnook. He just didn't particularly like him, either.

"Hakoda," the other chief greeted with a too-wide smile, "you made some excellent points during today's meeting. I deeply appreciated your thoughts on the Air Nation Restoration propos—"

"What do you want, Arnook?" Hakoda asked, though he couldn't find it in himself to tear his focus away from where Sokka and Aang spoke in close quarters with Zuko. Very close quarters. Especially his son, who held the Firelord loosely just above his elbow.

"Right to the point, as usual. I'd like to reopen our previous conversations around the Water Tribe Unity Project." Hakoda resisted the urge to laugh. Arnook's 'Water Tribe Unity Project' was nothing less than the elimination of the Southern Tribe's culture. They'd spoken about it at length already; all of the other chief's grand plans for 'unification' sounding more and more like the imposition of the North on the Southern Tribe with every passing word. Grand buildings and booming economic structure and a leadership hierarchy that, while acknowledging both chiefs, only placed one as the supreme leader of the Water Tribes.

Arnook's plan had made the assumption that the Northern leader would take this role, citing previous experience with such massive tribe-scapes as his reasoning.

Unfortunately for Hakoda, he was distracted. Incredibly distracted, in fact, with the horrendous decision-making skills of two of the world's greatest war heroes; whose sides had inched closer and closer to one another until they spoke to Aang looking like a united front, despite the conversation seeming light and meaningless from where Hakoda stood. And Arnook had noticed. Had followed his eyes until they similarly landed on the boys.

Spirits damn it all.

"Ah, I see." Arnook sighed, a little too fondly for Hakoda's taste. "Your son. Quite the boy you have there, Hakoda. He and I share a deep loss, of which I'm sure you know."

Hakoda raised an eyebrow, and Arnook clapped a hand onto his shoulder. He did everything in his power to fight back the urge to toss it away.

"I was unaware."

"Well, it was quite painful for us, you know. My daughter, Yue. She sacrificed herself when the Fire Nation murdered Tui, and took his former place among the spirits." Arnook nodded sagely along to his own tale, a hand over his heart. The action dripped with falsehood and dramatics. "From what I came to understand, she and Sokka entertained a connection. Perhaps, they saw then what you refuse to now, Hakoda—"

The other chief turned to leave, but not without letting his fingers dig into Hakoda's shoulder.

"—the tribes ought to be united."

Hakoda needed to speak with his son. Soon.

A bright sound rippled through the chamber, and Hakoda took a moment to rethink the urgency.

He would speak with Sokka. Just as soon as his son finished whatever conversation had him laughing like a kid again. He could wait.

Sign #2: Frequent Letter Writing

Hakoda had severely underestimated the amount of work that could pile up in two weeks.

That was how long he and Sokka had been in the Fire Nation, and exactly how many days' worth of issues had crept up on the tribe while they'd been away. This had never been a problem before, but Hakoda supposed that 'before', there hadn't ever been reason to leave the tribe without its chief family.

Now, Katara was off on her worldly adventures with Aang, solving crises in every nation while rebuilding another, and Hakoda and Sokka had been called to the Fire Nation, a trip they'd only just returned from. Which had left the Southern Water Tribe under the watchful eye of Kanna. He loved his mother dearly, but she was much better at handling the issues that required wisdom than the ones necessitating brute strength. Her back wouldn't allow it these days.

His wasn't faring much better, as he strung the bowstring-tight ropes to secure the newer, larger tent that the tribe had been working on building for the last month. Something was spiking his nerves along his shoulders, which he had come to learn was his body's code for 'stop doing that repetitive movement before you send yourself to the spirit world'. He stretched out his back in as much of an arch as he could manage, and only when his eyes opened towards the clear blue sky did he finally spot it.

Was that a cardinalpigeon?

The little red dot soared across the sky, clearly far from its home. There were hardly any flying birds in the Southern Water Tribe to begin with, messenger or otherwise, but there were specifically no cardinalpigeons. The only time Hakoda had ever even seen one of those breeds had been in—

He breathed a sigh that came straight from his stomach.

Sokka. Who he hadn't yet spoken to about how important it was not to cause international turmoil by crossing a line he never thought he'd have to say not to cross.

And now there was a Fire Nation bird flying away from the chief's family tent.

What had his life turned into?

"Amaruq, do you have the rest of this handled? My age is catching up with me." At least he didn't have to lie about it. And at least he could get a short rest out of the act of squashing the thing that was most certainly not there between Sokka and Zuko.

Luckily, Amaruq was more than happy to take the rope right out of his hands, tugging it into position with much greater force than he had, even if the technique behind the pull and the subsequent knot Amaruq tied both lacked finesse. No matter, he'd learn with time.

Hakoda, on the other hand, had spent a bit too much time learning; in the tribe, on the battlefield, now in the political sphere. He knew quite a lot after all that time, or so he liked to think. More than it was worth it to know. Because every little thing just seemed to make his life just that much more complicated than it was before.

Case in point: his children's love lives. The existence of which still didn't always sit right with him considering he blinked and his kids had aged half a decade.

Stepping inside his family's tent, he didn't have to look hard to find his son. Sokka sat next to the rolled-up window flap with his knees drawn close to his chest and a few dots of ink on his cheek; no doubt a result of his awful habit of scratching his head with his brush still in his hand.

"Writing someone?" Hakoda asked, not looking to raise suspicion of what he'd noticed too early. Sokka had a tendency to overreact when he thought Hakoda didn't approve of something he'd done. Always had, ever since he was a kid. Distantly, Hakoda knew that he should be proud to have his son admire him as much as he knew Sokka did, but it did make him worry at times as well.

He wouldn't be around forever, and he wasn't perfect. Spirits, Sokka nearly had as much experience as he did— it was why Hakoda included him so frequently in his responsibilities. In an ideal world, Sokka would be the next chief. He'd seen the world, but Hakoda needed him to see this tribe now, too. From a lens that wasn't a child's. Something that couldn't happen if he was too wrapped up in a torrid… whatever was happening with the Firelord.

Just to take a bit of pressure off of this moment, Hakoda mindlessly adjusted some of the furs and decorative items in the tent. Not that it mattered; Sokka kept looking out the window, his voice solemn.

"Yep." He answered. Hakoda nodded, gnawing on the inside of his lip.

"Anyone in particular?"

"Nope."

Hakoda hummed. Alright, he'd have to be a bit more direct than that.

"Looked like a Fire Nation bird…"

"Cardinalpigeon."

"Right, right. Cardinalpigeon." Alright, this was not working. "Listen Sokka, we need to talk about—"

"Dad, when did you know you loved Mom?"

Hakoda saw a dozen shades of red. Red like the blood that beaded on his finger when he'd accidentally stuck himself with a fish hook; too distracted by seeing Kya for the first time. Red like the sunset the first time he watched it with her, cresting over the snowy mountains. Red like emblems on Fire Nation ships. Red like the uniforms their soldiers wore, the ones who came in search of his daughter and stole his wife from him instead. Red like the element itself; burning. Destroying.

"Where is this coming from, son?" He asked, not wanting to assign his worst fears to the question that could very well be innocent. He hoped it was innocent. He needed it to be.

"Just curious, is all."

The chief settled himself into a seat near Sokka. Far enough away to give him the space that he clearly wanted, considering he wouldn't even give Hakoda a straight answer, but close enough to remind his son that he was there. That this wasn't the war. That he didn't have to be strong and solitary anymore.

"She fell in the snow."

Sokka finally turned to face him, one eyebrow raised as he shot his dad an unimpressed look.

"I'm serious. We were walking around the village— it must have been two or three months since I started courting her— and I said something completely idiotic, but it made her laugh. That full-body kind of laugh where your stomach starts to hurt," Sokka's lips quirked up at the side, like he knew the feeling as an old friend someone had reminded him of, "and she lost her balance. She fell, and I caught her, and I remember thinking in that moment; 'I'll make sure nothing ever hurts you. I want to be there for you, with you, always'."

Neither one of them felt the need to point it out. At least, Hakoda assumed Sokka could feel the pain echoing like a ghost in his chest, too. It haunted the fact that, despite all his best attempts, and all the promises that he had made when they were young, he hadn't been able to protect her in the end. She was still gone.

"Is it always like that?" Sokka finally asked. "They get hurt, or almost get hurt, and you're left picturing the million different ways that they can be taken from you? Is that always what loving someone feels like?"

Hakoda had to blink in silence for a beat before he collected himself enough to formulate a response. When did Sokka grow up so much? When did he start thinking like an adult? When did he lose his trust in the world that he had as a child, slipping and sliding around the ice and snow without a care in the world, even when it cracked his teeth or froze his little fingers within an inch of frostbite?

For that moment, he thought that Sokka might be right. That loving someone inherently meant worrying about them until the bitter end.

Then Hakoda thought about Bato. Loving him as he did now. How it was just like loving Kya. How it was nothing like loving her and never would be. And he had his answer.

"Not always." He said quietly, his original purpose there forgotten. "Sometimes, it's just warmth."

The official message wouldn't arrive until three days later, on the back of a dragonhawk, and addressed directly to Hakoda himself. Inside, a scroll detailing how four days prior, the Firelord had fallen victim to an assassination attempt that would require some recovery time, and to anticipate delays in Fire Nation correspondence until further notice.

He didn't think it was right to broach the topic now. Nor would it be right to inquire why choked noises of pain and grief were slipping through the thin wall between his bedroom and Sokka's. Not when he knew their source horrifyingly well.

His son's pain was only further proof; this couldn't go on.

Hakoda couldn't keep Kya from pain, but he'd keep their son from feeling it the way he had.

Sign #3: Meaningful Eye Contact

Despite his best efforts, the torturous something bubbling and boiling like a threat between Sokka and Zuko would, in fact, go on.

Did it make him a better father or a worse one for not having it in his heart to forbid Sokka from pursuing the Firelord when he knew that doing so was for his own good? Was it better to trap his son in their tribe until the flames that had been ignited within him burned out into nothing more than ashes? He would be saved from the insults and ridicule that would inevitably come from that nation, but would that pain be worth it if its existence meant allowing Sokka to experience that beautiful, worldly thing that Hakoda had only been able to name once he'd felt it first with Kya?

His thoughts kept running around in circles, but at least the repetitive act was better than listening to Arnook droning on and on about how desperate the Northern Tribe was for resources. As if they didn't dwarf his own tribe and their imposing wall of ice didn't spill over with gold pieces and blue jade.

Hakoda and Sokka had found themselves returning to the Fire Nation sooner than Hakoda had anticipated. Perhaps he'd assumed that an assassination attempt serious enough to leave Zuko's written word silenced for two weeks would have correlated to an extended period of rest and rehabilitation for the Firelord.

Yet here they were even so, Zuko wincing and readjusting his posture every few minutes and Sokka staring at him like he could will his friend into becoming well again. Spirits, these boys were asking to become a scandal.

"With our continuously growing population, it is only necessary that we utilize our newfound connections to the other, most honorable nations so that our developing economy may similarly benefit their own." Arnook rhapsodized, hand waving in the air in such a way that Hakoda could picture the swirling cup of a liquor-loaded beverage he must usually have when practicing these outlandish speeches. That was the only logical reason why he could believe the swill he spewed.

"What precisely do you propose, Chief Arnook?" Kuei asked, eyes glancing up over the rim of his glasses.

"Well, it would vary from nation to nation, of course. In terms of our sister tribe, perhaps we could see increased levels of Northern Tribe presence in Wolf Cove—"

"Chief Arnook," the Firelord sounded, drawing all attention to where he sat. Though this table had no true 'head', it certainly felt as though it did in that moment, "I ask that you refrain from furthering the agenda of combining the Water Tribes during these meetings. To my knowledge, Chief Hakoda has already explained his stance on the proposal—"

Zuko tipped his head slowly in Hakoda's direction, but the chief couldn't help but notice how a certain pair of golden eyes just so happened to drag over their ocean blue counterparts next to Hakoda before returning to Arnook.

A favor? Or an act brought on by the connection rumbling under the surface between his tribe and the nation they now found themselves in? The connection buzzing between two young men upholding the world?

"— and I will not tolerate any attempts at currying favor towards your plan from our fellow nation leaders so that you might pressure him into accepting your inequitable offer."

Aang lifted his teacup to his lips, poorly hiding an amused grin behind the cup as Sokka studiously took notes with a similar look. Hakoda couldn't be bothered to care about their reactions, though. Not when the corner of Arnook's lips were tipping up into an expression that Hakoda found causing an unpleasant stirring sensation in his stomach. He bit back bile as his fellow chief leaned both elbows onto the table.

"I find it incredibly interesting, Firelord Zuko, that you are so quick to defend the Southern Tribe." Any trace of positivity was wiped away from the youngest trio at the table, now centering razor sharp looks hardened in the throes of war upon the man. They looked like dolphinpiranhas circling prey in the water. Hakoda couldn't decide if he was proud or mortified, and didn't have the time to, either, as Arnook's attention was laid upon him. "It almost makes one wonder whether there is something deeper tying you to the tribe."

Don't let him see fear. Don't let him see that the boys had been caught. That was all Hakoda could think, although he should have seen the signs of what was swiftly to come.

"What are you suggesting, Arnook?" Zuko leveled. Hakoda hadn't ever heard him speak with such restraint and such fury at once. Maybe this was a glimpse at the boy he'd been before Hakoda had met him. The other chief hardly even acknowledged the Firelord as he responded to him.

"Chief Hakoda, you should know that word of your proclivities has reached the North. My navy tells me you've taken up with another man in the absence of your late wife. Is it too far to suggest that the man you've dragged with you to the bottomless depths of La's fury might be in this very room?"

"You spirits-damned weasel snake!" Echoed from Hakoda's right, and he just barely made out the sound of Sokka's shout through the fog of frigid fear that was slipping through his veins. His hand shot out to grip the back of Sokka's tunic on instinct alone, and he could distantly sense his throat making a sound close to his son's name as he dragged him back into his seat.

At some point, Hakoda had also stood, and now met Zuko's bewildered eyes over Sokka's head.

"Need your youth to defend you, South, or is your pallor simply a result of being found out?"

He hated him. Hakoda hated Arnook. It burned in his blood to melt away the icy fear, and singed the names of the people he loved— taken in vain by this other chief— into the muscle of his heart. He dared to mock the noble death of Hakoda's wife, life taken as sacrifice to protect the most precious light of his daughter? He dared to spit venom at him for finding himself again the arms of a brave warrior over another fair woman from his tribe? He dared to suggest that Hakoda would look at the Firelord as anything more than the young man he was; scared and thrust headfirst into a rule that no one so young should ever have been made to carry? As anything other than the boy he was?

This man mad him sick. Hakoda's lips dropped apart to voice as much, but he found himself beaten to the punch by a louder, younger voice.

"That's enough! Guards, see Chief Arnook removed from these grounds at once!"

Sure enough, a pair of metal-fitted guardsmen took Arnook by the arms. He swatted at them, and turned his bared teeth back towards the Firelord.

"You have no rule over me, ash maker! Our status is equal!"

"You made the poor decision to throw baseless accusations against men who braved the battle against my father. Who spent years far from their homes and working tirelessly to bring peace and harmony back to our world. That is something even I can't say that I have done. You will not insult them in my home."

And then Arnook was dragged, kicking and shouting, out of the meeting hall. Leaving the awkward band of remaining leaders to gather themselves, and what could be salvaged of what was once a respectful joining of minds. Zuko and Hakoda looked briefly at one another where they stood, Hakoda just barely managing a small, appreciative nod in Zuko's direction before settling back down next to his son.

His son, who hadn't looked away from Zuko even once since he'd stood, and now only breathed shakily with a subtle vibration in his shoulders. The Firelord lowered himself back to his seat as well, and fixed Sokka with a steady look. They lingered there, and Hakoda almost felt the need to say something.

Thankfully, Aang beat him to it.

"Firecracker buns, anyone?" The airbender asked, a wide, forced smile splitting his face as he held the tray aloft.

Sokka plucked one off of the proffered plate, stuffed it into a cheek, and fell back against his chair with a huff, arms crossed over his chest.

"Shall we discuss the division of labor for the city development venture?" Kuei piped up, and Hakoda nodded, even as his hand dragged over his face.

Sign #4: Exchanging Gifts

Really, the conversation was a long time coming. So long, in fact, that at some point between when Suki had first made Hakoda aware of his son's change in affections and the present moment, several years of arduous chiefdom had passed him by in a blur.

Sure, that blur contained a number of rather eventful pauses in its movement; Hakoda's revelation of his relationship with Bato to his children— which went over much better than he'd imagined, Sokka in particular appearing very relieved at the news for a reason Hakoda couldn't place— the finalization of the plans to finally begin building Republic City, and enough time for Hakoda to truly allow himself to breathe, the threat of impending doom associated with his son's foolish decision-making in the romance department seemingly put to bed.

Slowly but surely, the letters had reduced themselves down to biweekly occurrences. Hakoda took immense comfort in the infrequent sight of bright red birds soaring through the Southern Water Tribe air. Far from enough to be suspicious, and without any interference on his part.

Hakoda hadn't been without the opportunity to interfere, of course. It had presented itself more than a handful of times over the years, even as he and Sokka were called to the Fire Nation less and less as time marched on. There were fewer topics that truly required the gathering of all the leaders, especially after Arnook's outburst had set a simmering tension between the Southern and Northern Tribes, and they were all getting old.

Well, all except for the Firelord and the avatar, who— like his son— were moving into their prime leadership days now that they had shaken off the final hints of childhood from their shoulders. On the rare occasion that Hakoda did have to reach out to the Firelord, it still felt a bit odd to remember that the one receiving his messages was no longer the boy he'd known. Though, maybe that was because it meant his son was no longer the boy he'd known, either.

Sokka was growing up more and more every day. His features were thinning out and he'd gotten taller, stopping just shy of Hakoda's own height. Thank the spirits for that, Hakoda wasn't sure what he'd do with himself if his son wound up taller than him. In fact, Sokka seemed to be growing steadily into a mirror image of Hakoda. Not as he was now, but as he had been. As a younger man with brighter, warmer lights in his eyes and a carefree love glowing in his chest. It was all just a tad too close to the truth he didn't want to acknowledge; his children weren't children anymore.

But maybe he had already come to terms with that, somewhere where he hadn't noticed acceptance growing like lichen over every sentimental memory.

Aang had visited the Southern Water Tribe recently, bringing his darling Katara back to him for the first time in ages. Or, what felt like ages. More likely than not, it would have been nothing more than a handful of weeks. Time moved differently as he grew. The days stretched on forever, but the years flew faster than the bison carrying his daughter and the man she'd fallen in love with.

The avatar had used the visit to ask for Hakoda's blessing to propose, and now the chief awaited the news from Katara like a fuse burning down to an explosive. Had he truly already missed his time with her? Was she already gone from his world to one of her own making, leaving him— and the short portion of her life they'd spent as a real family— behind in the snowy landscape he called home?

Were they another unspoken casualty of the war?

Hakoda knocked back the dark, spiced beverage as he stared into the roaring bonfire at the center of the tribe. It burned a bit going down, but at least he could use it to wrench himself out of his own mind. This was precisely why he didn't spend much of his time lost in thought. It was far too easy to walk down shadowed paths he wouldn't choose to explore even with a torch and a guide to get him to his destination.

This was not the night for him to feel bad about himself. Not when his family had gathered in their home nation once again, and had brought with them a cluster of souls he'd last seen together as awkward teens.

"Sokka, stop pulling my braid, you're not five anymore!" Katara scolded, and her brother yanked his hand back against his chest so that he could shrug with false innocence.

"Why do you always think it's me?!" He shouted back. "It could be your boyfriend!"

Aang went red in his spot next to Katara, and Toph barked a laugh.

"Ooh! Did that hit too close to home, Twinkle Toes?" She teased, and while the airbender sputtered, Katara took on her own shade of crimson that almost got lost in the fire. Almost.

"Y'know, Aang, I didn't think that would do it for you, but I guess since you're bald—"

"Your dad is right there, guys." Aang pleaded.

And suddenly there were six sets of wide eyes locked onto Hakoda.

"Busted." He sighed fondly, flashing a smile at his kids as he took another long swig of the rich firewhiskey Zuko had brought with him. That Firelord sure was a nice boy. Er— man. Not a boy anymore, just like Aang and like Sok—

"Don't let me spoil your fun, kids. I'm pretending I won't remember this tomorrow." He lifted his mug towards the group with a smile. "With luck, I won't. I'd like to continue only associating my son's antics with his childhood."

That earned him a solid round of chuckles from Toph and Suki, but the former cut herself short, the corners of her mouth lifting to her eyes in a mischievous grin.

"Well, what do you know!" She announced, and next to Sokka, the Firelord used a finger to tug at his collar. "Sparky! What about Sokka pulling someone's hair gets you goi— ow!"

"Oh no, who did that?" Suki chimed, and Toph instantly set into her with a dramatic, sarcastic monologue about how she was 'just a simple girl from a simple family, how could she be treated in such a way'. As the rest of their small group brushed off whatever it was that the earthbender had been about to say, Hakoda couldn't tear his eyes away from the snow at the base of the logs the six of them occupied.

In particular, the spot where Sokka had drawn his boot back to toe at the side of Zuko's own.

So much for not having to worry anymore.

Hakoda drained his mug, and let the burn settle in behind his ribcage.

This was going to be the longest Blue Moon Festival of his life.

⚬──────────✧──────────⚬

He shouldn't be doing this. It was, looking back on his many years in this world, one of the worst decisions of his life.

And yet there Hakoda was, having slipped right by the lowered defenses of two young war heroes in far better condition than he was so that he could monitor them flitting around the festival. In his defense, they had been the ones to drift off together in the first place.

Hakoda blinked a few times against the flickering of the torchlight all around them— his vision was beginning to blur. How strong was that stuff? He'd only gone through two mugs…or maybe three? No, at least four. Four seemed right. Amaruq just kept offering up cup after cup until his entire body felt like it was radiating a veil of heat from the pleasant buzz of liquor. He'd lost count once he'd realized how wrong he'd been about his son retreating from the danger that Zuko represented.

They hid it well, but clearly not for the benefit of their friends. No, all of them laughed too openly at Toph's teasing and smiled too bright when they glanced at the pair to find them making quiet contact in some way.

So if not for them, then for him? Hakoda? Sokka's own father, blending in with the rest of the world from whom they clearly felt the need to hide? How had he become an outsider in their lives? In Sokka's life, which usually beat its steady rhythm just one wall away from him?

Hakoda's fingers curled into the firm expanse of the tent wall he leaned against for support. He didn't know how much longer he had in him before his vision blurred the rest of the way and his legs turned too weak to hold him up. He'd only ever gotten this drunk once in his life, and it had come just as unexpectedly, though it left him in a far more emotional state than he felt tonight.

That night, after he and his family had lost everything, he'd curled himself on a cooling side of a once-warm bed with a heavy coat still scented like pine needles, leather, and a hint of the flower Kya had always laid in her bath curled between his arms.

He stayed that way until the sharp, cold drink that tore at his throat had stolen all thought from his head and vision from his eyes; red and glazed.

But he wasn't there yet. He was still standing. Still conscious. Still able to see just how brazen his son was being when he and the Firelord believed that no one was paying them any mind. Still able to save him from ruin if he needed to.

A wave of mind-blurring numbness washed over him then, and he had to clutch both hands against the tent to keep himself standing.

Focus, Hakoda. The last thing he needed was one of the tribespeople discovering him passed out in the snow. He'd never hear the end of it from Bato. Or Sokka. Or Katara. Spirits, where had the boys gone off to?

A small crowd was gathering around the line of barter-shops that ran through the center of the tribe. Plenty of Northerners— in strict opposition to the tensions between their leaders— had ventured to the South for this festival. It was a rare year, in which the blue moon was better seen from their tribe than their counterparts. Enough to draw tourists. Enough to hide him in his spot.

Not enough to block the Firelord's signature top-knot from his sights, even without the usual golden decoration he wore there.

Sokka was smart, loaning Zuko one of his coats. It sat a little too wide on his frame, and the blues disguised him amongst the other travelers as just another member of either tribe. It was only his pale skin that almost reflected the moonlight that was left to give him away. That, and— Hakoda's bleary mind only remembered when the boy in question turned to ask Sokka something— the scar he wore that had become famed alongside his rise to power.

Hakoda let himself remain tucked into the shadows once Sokka and Zuko slowed to a simple stroll from booth to booth. Most of them went ignored, and Hakoda had shuffled through the bumble of other drunkards and foolish children who'd sneaked too many moon ales from their fathers for one night behind the pair. Somehow, the movement had only made his state worse, until he found himself in the one he existed in at present; moments from faltering, but in an advantageous position to watch them stop in front of a weaponry booth.

It was owned by one of the tribes more artistic blacksmiths, Qilak, and was stuffed to the brim with fine knives and swords and other metal pieces fit more for home than battle. Almost all of the works of art were meant for just that; decoration alone. There were far fewer battles to fight with clashing metal now that the war had ended, and many soldiers had begun hanging their chipped and battered tools of the fray in their homes as symbols of its end.

Which left only beautiful things to be made out of what was once purely practical.

Just what his son plucked off of the wall of Qilak's booth to present to the Firelord, who had his back turned to him. Sokka tapped Zuko on the shoulder to show him the blade he'd selected; a wide thing that curved in at the top like one of the firebender's dao swords. Except this one was singular. What would the point of a singular blade like that be when they were meant to be used as twin— oh, the second was still on the wall. Right. Hakoda blinked, his reflexes lagging and slow.

It was a lovely blade, even from where he stood. Long lines had been dug into the metal around the perimeter, and they curved into a series of swirls and rising carvings of movement near the hilt, which bore similar patterns in its leather. In the torchlight, the dyed leather was blood red.

When Zuko turned to face Sokka, it was with a longer weapon brandished in both hands, offered up to Sokka with a nervous smile. That smile melted into soft surprise when he laid eyes on the dao, then up at Sokka.

Hakoda tore his eyes away from them in a move that— he would explain to any who asked him— was meant to check for potential observers to the act, and not at all related to the sharp pain that flashed through his heart. No, there was no reason other than protective precaution for Hakoda to look away. He was a warrior. A soldier. He could witness a look of vulnerable trust, care, and something a bit more dangerous when it was leveled at his own son and not force himself to turn away for the sake of said son's privacy.

That look was intended for Sokka's eyes only, and for someone who could tell— someone who could see what it meant— to have it, too? When it wasn't supposed to be his memory to have? Hakoda couldn't bear the guilt of that on his soul.

So he looked away. He looked at the ground that swung back and forth not of his own volition, and gave them the hint of privacy that they would never be able to maintain if the world knew what he was slowly coming to accept was true. If the world knew about their fierce Fire Nation leader brought to gentle gazes by an unrecognized, not-quite prince; about fingers tracing over blades like extensions of the one holding them up? They would be locked behind gates and doors and walls until they could never be seen by the light of day again.

When he dared to tip his head back up, coins were being slid across a small table, and the pair were stepping to the side, where they could trade the swords they'd purchased with one another. Zuko clad with two new, finely carved daos, and Sokka with a large broadsword, tides captured mid-crashing along its silver blade.

Sokka pointed out something across the pathway that Hakoda couldn't see, but a few exchanged words later, Zuko was heading off in its direction.

Hakoda wished he'd chosen to look away again. It would have saved him from the sight of Sokka turning back to Qilak's booth, tossing another handful of coins, and walking away with a traditional pendant-carving knife stuffed into the pocket of his coat.

When Hakoda fell backwards, it was into a pair of warm, waiting arms whose owner huffed with effort to hold him up.

"You have had way too much whiskey, mister." Bato's familiar voice chided. Hakoda let the world bleed away, comfortable in the knowledge that he'd been right about two things; some things are better left unseen, and Bato was never going to let him hear the end of this.

Sign #5: Public Displays of Affection

Whether his headache the next morning had come from the liquor or the unfortunate events of the night before, Hakoda couldn't tell. But judging by the carefully raised eyebrow of the man he loved, staring him down from his place on the corner of Hakoda's side of the bed, neither one would hold a candle to the stern talking-to he was about to receive.

"Koda—"

"I know, I know," he whined, rubbing his palms over his eyes like that might scrub away the throbbing ache in his skull, "'Koda, love, you can't stumble around our village drunk off your ass', 'you're the chief, you can't just run around without a care in the world', 'what about your image with the Northerners'—"

"I wasn't not going to say those things," Bato sighed, "but the impression wasn't needed."

Hakoda groaned loud enough to fill the room, his head thumping back onto his pillow. Every single noise was stinging his mind, little daggers puncturing the space behind his eyes. There was some shuffling of the sheets near him, and a firm pressure against his forehead that let itself trail down to his lips. Bato kissed him sweetly, before thwacking his chest with the reserved might of the warrior he was.

"What were you thinking?" He grumbled, and Hakoda hissed as he rubbed over the spot on his sternum where Bato's hand hade made contact.

"Clearly, I wasn't." Hakoda shot back, and glanced to the side at the small pitcher of water Bato must have brought with him. "It's a festival, Bato. I'm not meant to enjoy myself?" A crooked smile crawled over his lips, every minimal movement twinging a different point in his brain. The worst one was decidedly just when the muscles in his cheek were activated; it stung him in the temple like a sword cut and a hammer strike all at once.

The temporary enjoyment was not worth this. Spirits, how much had he had to drink last night? He remembered the first fire whiskey. Remembered complimenting Zuko on the choice of beverage and the sheer quantities that had arrived with him on the Fire Nation ship— enough to get the entire village heavily impaired. Then it went fuzzy, then it all was missing. Gone. Like he'd never lived the time between his third pour and the warm clutch of Bato's arms.

Evidently, it had worked a bit too well.

"Drink." He heard Bato's voice commanding him, hands clamped over his eyes to keep the light from seeping in.

"Yes, darling, that was the problem. The source of all evil. What got me into this—"

"No, you stubborn turtleseal," his partner carefully pulled one hand away from Hakoda's face, and he groaned pitifully at the loss that now let morning light coat his vision in red even with his eyes closed, "drink."

Hakoda dared one of his eyes to blink open slowly, taking several seconds before he was able to bear the intrusion. Bato kept a cup near his chin, holding it out in an offering. The chief sighed— a deep, full-body noise— as he accepted it, dragging a long sip into his dry, foul-tasting mouth. How had Bato managed to kiss him? At least the water seemed to wash a bit of it away. Not enough to better the dreadfully fetid feeling he was drenched in, the heat of the bonfire and the drink also managing to make him sweat enough to leave his hair dampened in his sleep, but enough to make his own tongue tolerable.

The water was nice. Cold, crisp. Something to wake him up from the hazy stupor he'd fallen into. Something to spark his head into a small amount of recovery from the burning fog that didn't feel quite right. How long had it been since the last time he drank? Before the war, surely. There was no use for being out of your mind when the enemy could spring a trap at any moment. After the dust had settled, there had been no time. It was all decrees and bartering and trade routes and negotiations that boiled down into headaches like these all the same; no need to double the wretched feeling.

No wonder so few had caused such a blur. But thankfully the relatively limited amount was also just as easily wiped away. Hakoda was seeing flashes of the night painted on the inside of his eyelids.

A sea of blues and browns and cream-white furs. The dull roar of the fire and the laughter that echoed around it into the moonlit night. Sitting across from the cluster of children who'd all grown up too fast. Who were no longer all limbs and round cheeks, but battle-honed skill and trained muscle always prepared for the worst to come again.

"Thank you." Hakoda forced out, vocal cords tightening as they were exposed to the chill.

"Yeah, well, don't say I never did anything for you." Bato mumbled, another feather-light kiss planted on the back of Hakoda's hand. "I'm going to help Kallik and Amaruq with the chores. I'll take care of yours, too."

The chief hummed.

"If anyone asks—"

"—you're as sick as a polarbeardog and are taking the day to rest."

A shared smile passed between them, and Hakoda couldn't keep down the memories of using similar white lies when they were younger.

"I love you." The chief whispered, like it was still the wicked secret that the two of them only shared in the darkness of a spare tent. Like the world didn't know about them, and that they could keep living in the privacy that came from keeping a secret. The ease that lingered between them when they finally found a moment to themselves.

Such moments came much less frequently now, and always with pairs of eyes that threatened to pry them apart just for the chance to have a look inside their chests. To see the care beating in blood-red muscle. Like they needed proof of what existed.

"As the moon loves the tide." Bato answered, smiling in that soft way he did when he couldn't hold it back anymore. When he couldn't pretend to be angry at him any longer. The retired warrior slipped out of the tent, and Hakoda let himself relax into the fluffed-up comfort provided by his bed; laden in furs and pillows embroidered by Kanna or Kya before she'd left them for the spirit world, or— for one poorly finished item in particular— Sokka, after he'd demanded to be taught the skill by his grandmother upon their return to the tribe.

For a handful of blissful moments, he was surrounded by nothing but the sweet balance of cold and heat that was offered by the Southern Tribe tents.

Laid with thick layers of furs and hand-processed leathers, they trapped every ounce of heat inside; but the stitched openings that served as windows still let a gentle breeze slip in when they were opened as Bato must have done while he was out. Hakoda never opened the windows himself. Something about the low lighting and the contrasting heat had always settled nicely in his mind and on his skin. But this was pleasant.

Tui forbid Bato ever find out Hakoda admitted he was right about the fresh air being good for him.

Sadly, like all good things, his fragile peace came to an end much sooner than he would have liked.

"This is the worst possible place for—" A hushed voice intruded through the opening in the tent wall, and was swiftly joined by a lilted laugh that was more air than sound, clearly following the original speaker's lead in keeping their voices low.

Then it was nothing but a muffled noise and something clicking. Over and over, paired with more barely there sounds that might as well have been screams based on how deeply they infiltrated his aching head.

Hakoda caught the briefest image of a crowd of people, of the outline of two familiar shapes that had been blurred along the edges until they were as fuzzy as Aang's bison. A shock of black stood out against the gentler combination of browns and blues.

"What was it you were saying?" The second voice broke out again, and they must be closer to the window than Hakoda had thought, because he was still just able to make out the words as they were whispered into the world. "'Worst possible place for'… me to remind my boyfriend how beautiful I think he is?" Another clicking sound and— yeah, no, not a clicking sound. Not with the subtle, wet current that underscored each one.

Teenagers.

Specifically, teenagers who were making out next to the chief's tent. Hakoda withheld the scoff in his throat until it came out sounding like a low growl instead, and he reached out for one of the extra pillows to crash it over his own face. Anything to block out the obnoxious cacophony of sugar-sweet sentiments that would never have to understand the complexities and trials of the war times that had encompassed his whole life.

He wasn't bitter. Truly, he wasn't. But there was still that nagging feeling— under all of the varied pains of drunken stupidity— that the children who now ran around the tribe would never understand all that had been given up for them to be able to do so. All the lives lost and freedoms that had been survived without so that they could exist in a carefree happiness. These kids who were sneaking around needlessly had no idea. Part of him knew that should make him happy. That his people would never have to know those dark times again.

But his children had. They had done it all. They'd been beaten and bruised and ran themselves ragged across the face of the known world until it finally had been freed from that nation that had terrorized all others— or ensured their swift elimination— for a century. And yes, Katara had found Aang in the process, and yes, the pair were blindly happy together. And both she and Sokka had experienced broad, exciting, meaningful lives that he never would have been able to give them in the Southern Tribe alone. And Sokka had—

Sokka had—

"Sokka," the first voice griped, and Hakoda sat straight up in his bed at the sound of his son's name, plucked right from his thoughts, "do you know what would happen if someone caught us? Like this?"

The second— Sokka, his Sokka, his boy— groaned loudly, and something smacked against the wall. Not teenagers at all. Just those who'd lost the chance at normalcy during those years.

"Oh no, the Firelord is in love with a 'Water Tribe savage'," Sokka complained, voice dripping sarcasm and vitriol around the slur that had frequently been shouted at Hakoda and the rest of his men in their time away, "and he's a man! That must be the worst thing a Firelord has done in the history of Agni's bloodline!"

Hakoda was going to be sick. Actually, this time. His hands shot out for the closest thing to a bucket he could find; wrapping around the edge of the water pitcher and letting the bile spill full-force from his stomach. Well, there went his fresh water. Not that he felt up to even another drop of it now.

"I'm serious."

All was quiet, and for a blessed moment, Hakoda considered the remote possibility that he had imagined the whole thing. That he had nothing to worry about, and his son who had grown up despising the nation whose troops had shattered their family wasn't in a committed, political minefield of a relationship with said nation's sovereign. Who he was serious enough about to buy a carving knife for.

"I don't want you get hurt." Zuko's voice trailed back into his room, all hope for a simple, safe life for his son lost the minute the words hit his ears.

Hakoda realized with a start that he shouldn't be listening to this at all.

This was a private moment. A stolen bit of time between two boys who wanted nothing more than a chance to be themselves, together, alone. He could understand that. Better than anyone, really. What it meant to find those moments. What it meant to be scared less about your own life and more for the one you loved.

Was that what Zuko meant? He certainly sounded like he understood the dangerous game they played by even daring to look at one another for too long. There was that string of fear running through his voice that Hakoda recognized from his own. From stolen seconds during downtime when he'd trace his fingers over the rises and falls of Bato's cheeks, trying not to notice how thin they'd gotten since their rations had run low and hunting was not turning out as well as they needed.

"I won't." Sokka answered. "I'm a tough guy, your fieriness. If I haven't died yet—"

"Don't joke about that."

"—then what are a few rookie assassins gonna do?" Silence. Then another click. Another kiss. Because they thought they could. They thought they were safe, and Hakoda was disrupting that belief just by letting that rogue window that was never open stay as it was.

As much as it pained him— physically, not mentally, Hakoda was much too excited about not overhearing any more of this conversation— he managed to push himself out of bed with the least amount of wincing possible. Hakoda crossed the short distance to the open window, and reached up for where the coil of hide was tied up against the wall proper.

"I can't lose you. I'm terrified that if— when something happens, it'll be my fault. My title, my family, the things they did during the war…" a long pause, "I don't want loving you to be the sword that runs you through."

He stopped. Hand in the air like a statue, barely an inch from the tie.

Hakoda hadn't been fair to them. To his son. To Zuko, who could very well be his son soon, too, if what he'd seen— what he'd heard— was anything to go off of.

Maybe it was the old wounds, left to fester and rot through wartime and through the bigotry towards his people that he was still met with at every turn during his trips to the Fire Nation. The only place he'd even been safe from the coarse, unthinkable language targeting his skin or the fur lining of his collars or the braids and beads strung into his hair had been… the palace.

The palace.

The Firelord's domain. Zuko's. A boy grown into a young man who cared deeply for his son. Who loved him. Who made sure that his home was a welcoming and secure place where he and Sokka and— spirits— even Arnook would be free of old ideologies, and could participate in the formation of new ones alongside Zuko and Kuei.

"If being in love with the Firelord is what kills me, it would be the most noble death I could ask for."

"You spent too much time in that poetry club." Zuko's voice rumbled thick with emotion and the ghost of a laugh.

It was the last thing that Hakoda heard. It was the last thing he needed to hear. The window fell shut with only his hand jumping down to keep it from making noise as it did. Hakoda wouldn't dare to disturb them. Not something so good. Not something worth protecting, even if just for a minute more. Even if just from him, and even if just in their own minds.

He smiled, but it dropped when the sting of his headache reminded him of its existence. As Hakoda shuffled back to the hold of his bed, he made a note to show Sokka the techniques he'd learned from his father on how to properly carve blue jade. When the time came.

It was the least he could do.

Sign #6: Asking for Permission

Hakoda didn't say anything to Sokka about that day, but he kept it tucked in the back of his mind every time he caught his son looking up at the sky— awaiting a specific cardinalpigeon and the royal seal of the Firelord stamped on the letter it would carry— even though he would pretend to have no idea what his dad was talking about anytime Hakoda would ask about it.

Fire Nation ships came less frequently to the village now, but Hakoda had to assume that was far from Zuko's choice. Republic City's construction had hit a recent snag, and it had kept Katara and Aang wading up to their ears in bureaucratic nonsense; trapped from traveling for the time being in their Earth Kingdom apartment. From their letters, it seemed like a small miracle the project was moving forward at all, but it came with the need for the prominent world leaders involved to spend much more time in the new city.

Kuei, Zuko, Aang; all, it seemed, but the Water Tribes were involved immediately in the matter. Much of their contributions were already sent during the terraforming phase of development— the waterbenders and earthbenders working in tandem with a handful of machines that Sokka had a hand in designing— and they wouldn't be so hands-on again until the buildings needed to be constructed. Hakoda was thankful for the reprieve, but every day that passed apart from his friends and loved ones was clearly starting to wear on Sokka.

Most of his time was spent in the workshop, tucked away from the rest of the world, where he could toil away on the ideas that occupied his mind. An irrepressible scowl was beginning to etch itself onto Sokka's face, even when he laughed with the other young men of the tribe who had joined them from the North. He was trying, that much was obvious, but Hakoda knew firsthand that it was difficult to connect with those who hadn't experienced the trials of the last century in the same way as they had. The others just didn't understand the outlook and reverence for life that came with almost losing it again and again and again.

So when nearly a full three months passed had passed since a fire-sealed ship had docked on their shores, the last thing Hakoda expected was the announcement of the Firelord's arrival. The last thing any of them expected, based on the way a certain warrior perked up like the sun had risen for the first time in decades.

Hakoda had approached the ship's gangplank the way a chief would; calm, collected, as though he was anticipating the arrival of his fellow dignitary. He couldn't say the same of his son, who barely let the Firelord set foot in the snow before he was tackling him into a tight embrace that sent them both careening into the powder.

"Sokka!" Zuko and Hakoda called out in sync, though with very different tones to the way they spoke the name. The chief let out a fond sigh as the boys sat up, his son instantly moving to brush snow off of Zuko's back, even as most of it melted away under the firebender's body heat. To their credit, they both maintained every possible shred of deniability.

Despite Sokka's presence nearly entirely in Zuko's lap, they only purposefully connected where their hands sat at the base of each other's upper arms. To anyone who wasn't aware of what they were to one another, they would appear to be nothing more than very good friends reuniting after some time apart. Hakoda couldn't be more grateful, considering a small audience was developing between the Fire Nation guards that arrived alongside Zuko and the passersby of the village around them.

"What? I'm not allowed to miss people when they abandon me for half a year?" Sokka snipped, and Zuko shook his head at him, moving the smaller boy off of him so that they could both stand up; slowly, as to not slip and end up right back where they were, though Hakoda doubted they'd mind.

"You're being dramatic." The Firelord huffed, a little puff of steam sprouting from his breath in the cold. "As much as I want to catch up, I need to speak with the chief first. If that's alright with you, sir." Zuko's attention turned to Hakoda, and he didn't catch the surprise in his chest in time to stop it from rising to his features.

Hakoda nodded— wide eyed and a bit slack jawed— before extending his arm in the direction of the tent he and Sokka now shared alone without Kya or Katara there to keep it as full as it once was. Zuko started off, and Sokka was quick to tail him, but the firebender drew to a quick halt so that he could address Sokka over his shoulder.

"Alone."

His son stopped, and that all too familiar scowl was back. Like it never left. The chief watched him draw deep, intentional breaths through his nose as his lips quirked up into a sneer. They disappeared in an instant, replaced with a pair of palms raised in the direction of his partner and his father.

"Sure, yeah, no problem." He conceded, frustration tainting every word. Hakoda figured he might feel the same, if he'd been separated from Bato and told the distance would remain even when they were at last in the same place again. "I'll go…tighten a screw or something."

Sokka stalked off, and Hakoda could see the conflict in Zuko's eyes; the Firelord exhaling slowly and marching again towards the tent.

As they ducked inside, Zuko's hands began carding repeatedly through a section of his hair that had been drawn over his shoulder. His shoulders were slowly pulling themselves together, an act which hardly made the boy who'd only gotten broader in his training and age take up any less space in the room. Hakoda couldn't quite make out what he could possibly be so worrying for the young man. Not when attempts on his life had been brushed off like water on a turtleduck's back.

"What's wrong, Zuko?" Hakoda asked plainly.

"I must have written it out a dozen times." The boy responded, shrinking further into his own hold where his fingers wrapped around his sides. "How to tell you something that I shouldn't be the one to tell you, how to ask you for this thing that's so important to me when I know you aren't…fond of me—"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," Hakoda interrupted, slipping around to the front of the Firelord. The moment he did, he became incredibly aware of the tightening of his own heart. Zuko looked so young. So young that Hakoda almost had to wonder if he had forgotten that fact in more recent years. That the years in his eyes, like Sokka's, didn't match the age of his body. Just then, he stared up at Hakoda with all of the vulnerability he'd never shown in his court, and the chief let that sink into his bones as he kept his voice even, "I'm not," Hakoda struggled, "not fond of you, Zuko. You are close with my children, you helped save me from prison, you fought alongside us in the war. I have plenty of reasons to be kind to you. Have I… not been?"

"No!" Zuko yelped, then reeled himself back into his own head. "No, it's not— not that you've been unkind, sir, it's just—" The Firelord scrubbed his hands over his face, and grumbled a noise from his throat that made Hakoda's eyebrows knit together in concern.

"I need you to like me enough for what I want to ask of you. I need the rare good things I've done to outweigh the bad enough to deserve this. Spirits know that I don't even think I deserve it—" He glanced up at the chief, and his fingertips dug into his own cheek as he did. "And that's not something I should be saying to you— ugh, I'm awful at this."

Hakoda laid an open palm on Zuko's shoulder. He flinched at the contact, and Hakoda felt his worry bubble in his gut alongside the hatred for the former Firelord which grew more and more every day. Still, after a beat, the boy managed to drag in a few shivering breaths, cycling them into plumes of steam that evaporated into the air around them; made thick enough already by the urgency and secrecy the Firelord had requested.

"Son, whatever you want to ask; ask."

Zuko stared at him, swallowed something thick that Hakoda named as all his fears, and let the thought role out in one, steady stream.

"Chief Hakoda of the Southern Water Tribe, I'd like your permission to ask your son to marry me."

When Hakoda didn't immediately respond, Zuko must have taken his gathering of his own thoughts as confusion.

"I know this might be coming as a shock to you, considering we haven't been very public with our relationship— not public…at all, really— but we have been seeing one another for quite some time, and I—" Zuko finally took a breath, and those wide golden eyes looked into Hakoda's with a level of trust and pleading that he had only seen once before; on himself, in his reflection, just before asking Kya's father, Siluk, a similar question, "I love him, sir. Something I wasn't quite sure I was capable of after— after my family."

"And I know what we have done to the world is unforgivable. What we did to your family. I know that I don't deserve Sokka. But for some reason, he fell in love with me. Maybe even as hard as I've fallen in love with him. If you were to give me the chance to join your family, sir, I would spend every day for the rest of my life proving myself worthy of the honor."

And the tent fell into silence. Between Zuko's nerves making themselves known in the way his fingers drummed against his own ribcage and Hakoda's jaw clenched tight as he sorted through his thoughts on the matter, neither made the move to speak up first. Though, Hakoda supposed there was nothing more for the boy to say to him; Zuko had already laid his soul bare on the floor of the tent the person he loved had run around on as a child. All that was left was Hakoda, and for the first time, the chief took notice of an odd feeling below his ribs.

Hope. Happiness, even. Something warm and brilliant that reminded him of when he'd asked Kya to marry him. When she'd first told him she was pregnant with Sokka, then Katara. When he saw his children again after setting off to war. When he finally traipsed over the line of friendship into something deeper with Bato. When Aang came to him asking after Katara.

Zuko was right. The Fire Nation had taken many things from him and his family. Kya's life. Katara and Sokka's right to a childhood, to privacy, to lives outside of public scrutiny. His chance to see them grow up, to raise them the way he was meant to as their father.

But the Fire Nation, against all odds, had also given them something great. From it, a boy who had been hurt beyond reason stood up to bring the world to peace alongside Hakoda's children. Alongside the avatar and a pair of young women from the Earth Kingdom who had only ever lived on the right side of history.

And even as the smoke cleared, Zuko continued to prove himself to be exactly what he said he would be. A fair leader. A good man. A loyal friend, and a committed partner to Hakoda's boy— if one that he hadn't expected.

Hadn't all Hakoda ever wanted for his children been to find someone that made them as happy as Kya had made him? As Bato made him now?

Hadn't this young man proven himself time and again to care for nothing more than Sokka's safety, even at the cost of his own happiness? He'd heard him say as much, after all. Not in the outpouring that the Firelord had offered in that tent, but in the one that Hakoda had never been meant to witness. Where he'd opened his heart to Sokka to tell him his deepest fear; that their choice to tell the world that they had chosen each other would place him squarely in harm's way.

And Sokka— his brave, stubborn, brilliant son who thought through every event with a strategist's mindset, Sokka— had been willing to take the blows.

He loved Zuko enough to lay a target on his own back.

What kind of father would Hakoda be to keep something so pure from his son?

"You're right." He started, regretting the starting sentiment only for a moment, and only by the way it set a crestfallen look onto Zuko's features. "The Fire Nation has done horrible things in my lifetime. And in that lifetime, I was convinced that I would only live through more tragedy at their hands."

"I— I understand, sir. I knew it would be a difficult decision for yo—"

Hakoda held up a palm.

"What I didn't expect was the way that the angry, confused boy who sprang me from the Boiling Rock would grow into one of the greatest leaders of the generation. To be the person who complements my son in every way." Hakoda smiled, reveling in the gradual brightening of Zuko's eyes until they lit with a flame similar to the glimmer in his own chest. Until they looked hopeful again. "Where you were wrong, my boy, is when you claimed to not deserve Sokka. Since I've come to know you, I've watched you meet him on the battlefield, in meetings of the nations, even in your ability to handle his horrible sense of humor."

Zuko let himself laugh just this once, and Hakoda found himself just that much more excited for the future. That much more confident in his determination that Zuko was everything Sokka needed. That he'd changed. That he was more than the once-loyal son of Firelord Ozai.

He was one of their own, now. He was family.

"There's no need for you to earn your way into this family. You were welcomed into it the moment Sokka chose you, and you will be part of it in my eyes until we have all long returned to the spirits. Do you understand?" Hakoda reached out, both hands firm on the Firelord's shoulders so that they were at arm's length. From the short distance, Hakoda could see how Zuko's eyes were glossing over with unshed tears. His mouth was set into a thin line that didn't budge, except to draw his lips between his teeth in a useless attempt to stem the flow from his eyes.

"You have my blessing. As the chief and as a father."

Zuko's arms shot out then, yanking Hakoda into a tight wrap that the older man blinked owlishly at for a handful of moments before he found it within himself to return the sentiment, patting a wide-spread hand against the Firelord's back.

When Zuko reeled back from the hug, he took on a koalasheepish half-grin.

"Thank you, sir. You have no idea how much this means to me. How much Sokka means to me."

"Please, Zuko. Hakoda is just fine."

"Hakoda. Thank you." He chuckled to himself, and reached a hand back to scratch carefully at the back of his head. "I'll have to move fast, now. Sokka got his hands on a carving knife months ago."

The chief stood back for a beat, taking in the welcome presence of another soul able to see the things that he could see. At least, in terms of those that were being hidden from him. He should have expected as much, Hakoda supposed, considering Zuko was a leader embroiled in treachery and the ever-present perseverance of Ozai's supporters.

"I'm surprised it took him as long as it did, considering you two have been dancing around each other since the end of the war." Hakoda snarked with a smirk of his own. The flush that Zuko's cheeks immediately took on filled him with impish glee. It was good to feel like he was still spry enough to pull one over on the kids.

"You knew?" Zuko asked, and Hakoda nodded along, ushering him out of the tent with a loose hand on the boy's back.

"I suspected. Now, let's get you reconnected with the village. Someone here is dying to see you again."

Zuko followed along, and as the chill of the snowy landscape bled back into his skin and through his overcoat, Hakoda found himself rather grateful for a certain green-clad warrior who had clued him in to something he'd overlooked for far too long.

All that was left now was to see which of these boys managed to propose first. And that was something Hakoda wouldn't miss for the world.