10001 Nightmares Party

[Fic] ashes to ashes (dust to dust) (ATLA)

Summary:

In retrospect, breaking into the Earth King's palace was perhaps a mistake.

Chapter 1

Zuko ducked out of sight of another maid, hiding behind a pillar. He carefully made sure that his swords were in place and his mask secure, and once the maid was gone, kept on going. He kept to the shadows and took care to not leave any traces behind him. If he was caught, the consequences would be immense. Not the least to his uncle.

But keeping out of sight in this palace was hard. It had been hard just getting in (harder than any place he had broken into before), but now it was proving to be an even bigger challenge staying unfound.

The Dai Li were everywhere.

Zuko saw them creeping along walls and the ceiling like spiders and that was exactly what they brought to mind. Like lily spiders, they moved everywhere, weaving a web of deceit and manipulation in their wake.

But he was sure that they hadn’t discovered him yet. If they had, he wouldn’t be free to keep roaming, he would be in jail and the Dai Li would do… whatever it was that they did that was so terrifying. Zuko didn’t want to know what they did, and he wanted even less to have a personal view of it.

But so far he was safe. So far, he was undiscovered.

He crept passed another door, gently stepping on the stone floors. Zuko swept his gaze through the open doorway and, seeing an oncoming Dai Li agent creeping around a corner, walked through it.

On the other side was yet another long corridor. The palace was gigantic, somehow even bigger than it had looked from the outside. 

Sneaking quietly through the long hallway, Zuko kept a wary eye out for anyone coming. He couldn’t afford to be caught, and he absolutely couldn’t lead anyone back to his uncle. Uncle, who was happy with his new job at the teashop, who only wanted Zuko to take care of himself. Uncle, whom Zuko had let down completely by coming here, only a handful of days after they had entered Ba Sing Se.

But he couldn’t help it. He needed to know that it was worth it. That the Earth King truly was no threat to his uncle and him. He needed to know that he could rest here, without fear for his uncle’s wellbeing.

After all, uncle was the Dragon of the West. Uncle had tried to take this city. Surely, to the people living here, the fact that he had failed made no difference.

Not like at home.

He turned a corner. There, ahead of him was a door. It was big and fancy, painted green and gold. The decorations were so obvious that they boarded on tacky. Zuko winced a little when the sound of them opening was a bit too loud for his comfort.

A world of shelves opened up before him. Shelves, covered in scrolls as far as he could see. They rose all the way up to the ceiling and he had to crane his neck back to see the top of them. There were multiple levels in this library, but the middle was empty air for several floors. Zuko took an involuntary step inside and heard the door close shut behind him, now that he was no longer holding it up.

His steps were silent as he stalked further into the room, adjusting his stance so that he could walk easier between the narrow shelves. The urge to sneeze built up as he breathed in the dust in the air. 

Zuko’s gaze glanced over everything that he passed as he tried to find another way out. Mentally, he mapped the maze of shelves as he crossed between, hoping that there wasn’t a Dai Li agent hidden somewhere here that he couldn’t see. With his luck, there would be. And more than one.

He sighed. The sound was quiet, but still it built in the maze in a way that he didn’t like. The mask over his face covered it a little, but it also made it echo oddly.

Sound. 

Zuko’s head snapped up and he stood still, as still as he could. He waited with bated breath for the sound to get closer, but it didn’t move. It almost sounded like… muttering. Why would a Dai Li mutter while following a target? 

Unless it wasn’t a Dai Li.

Zuko carefully moved closer to the shelf to his right. The sound seemed to be coming from the other side of it. It was a long shelf that bent to the left when he followed it with his eyes, but he saw no other way to get around it. He carefully kept his steps as light as possible, making sure not make any noise. The sound got fainter as he moved further along the shelf, which made him hope that whoever was making it was standing still.

If they weren’t a Dai Li agent, then maybe… he could get some intel out of them. He would need to make sure that there would be no way to connect him with the break-in and find a way to keep them from talking, it wasn’t impossible.

Ahead of him, the shelf finally ended. Zuko peeked his head around it and glanced around. He couldn’t see anyone and the noise had disappeared too. Hopefully that just meant that he had walked too far and not that they had moved.

As he kept following the shelf, the noise that he had been waiting for finally reappeared. He could hear them clearer now, now that he was on the right side. It was definitely a person, and not an animal like he had half-hoped. Though that hope was stupid, what would an animal be doing in such a valuable library? The sheer volume of amount of scrolls had to be worth a fortune, even if they weren’t important subjects.

And then, they appeared. 

It was a man, somewhere in his twenties, though Zuko couldn’t pinpoint it more than that. He was sitting on the ground, more than thirty scrolls surrounding him as he read avidly. Low on his nose sat a pair of spectacles, two round glass pieces. 

As Zuko got closer, he could make out more and more details. Like the fine make of his clothes and the golden lining of his robe. The way he sat was confident, sure of himself and what he was doing. He had long dark hair trapped in a braid that had started to come loose, as some of the shorter hair was wisps around his face. He was obviously someone important.

The man also didn’t appear to notice Zuko’s presence.

Zuko could turn back. He could turn the other way around, make his way out of the palace and hope nobody ever found out what he had done. It could all be like a bad memory, like a dream that hadn’t happened. If he was never caught, he could get out of this in one piece.

But he was curious. He wanted to more about Ba Sing Se. He wanted to know how they had kept his uncle at bay for 600 long days — something his uncle was never willing to talk about. And Zuko never willing to press him about.

He wanted to know how this city, this glorious monument of the Earth Kingdom, had resisted the Fire Nation (his father) for so long. Why they hadn’t fallen.

And he wanted to know how dangerous the Dai Li were to them.

Zuko wasn’t enchanted by the teashop like his uncle, if the Dai Li were a danger to his uncle and him, then Zuko would drag his uncle out of this city by his ear if he had to. And surely, a person who could be in a place like this unsupervised had to know something.

So Zuko made yet another foolish decision. He could already hear his uncle wailing in his head, complaining about his inability to stay out of trouble. He could hear Azula mocking him for his weakness, his lack of control over himself. He was curious, too curious for his own good. He always had been.

In an attempt to be a little polite, he changed his steps. Now, every step he took came with noise, but somehow not even that made the man look up from the scroll he held in his lap.

Zuko stepped closer, angling his body so that his swords were harder to see from the man’s direction. Finally, he stopped. The man didn’t react. Zuko frowned and — coughed loudly.

The man started.

”Wh-what? Is it time for dinner?” The man’s eyes swept up and he flinched when he caught sight of Zuko’s mask. The mask of the Blue Spirit.

Zuko deliberately lowered his voice, ”I wouldn’t know.”

He scowled at the sound of his own voice, rough like tree bark. Nonetheless, the man flinched again and moved like he was going to stand, only to regret his actions at the last movement. He settled down again. ”Ehm,” the man started, ”are you here for a scroll? I know almost all the works here, if you could tell me the—”

”No,” Zuko didn’t bother listening to more. ”I am not here for a scroll.”

”Oh, then… why are you here?” 

Zuko took a threatening step closer. He made sure that a shadow formed as the man was forced to look up at him in order to meet his eyes. ”I need to know the truth.”

The man gulped. ”About what?”

Zuko… couldn’t think of what to say. He hadn’t actually thought that he would speak to another person when he came here, and so he was unprepared. It was stupid of him. Azula would never make this mistake, never get caught unprepared. Why had he even started talking with this man? Nothing the man said could be the truth, the Dai Li were everywhere and surely this man knew it too.

Changing his mind, Zuko said, ”I am here for my family’s safety. I will not tolerate it being threatened.”

There, that sounded sufficiently noble, right? Like he had actually planned this encounter and wasn’t making it all up on the spot?

The man certainly looked cowering as he bent his head and shook it slightly. ”Of course no harm shall come to your family. We are not barbarians. We would never hurt those who do not deserve it.”

Zuko, again, wasn’t really sure what to say in response. This wasn’t how he had pictured this encounter going.

Not that he had even pictured it.

”Well… make sure you don’t,” he finally snapped out, irritated with himself for screwing this up. It was such a simple thing, just threaten information out of this man, who was alone and defenseless without any weapons. Yet Zuko failed this simple task. It was, now more than ever, even more important that his uncle didn’t find out about this.

”Yes, of course.” The man nodded his head and smiled reassuringly up at Zuko. Zuko scowled, glad that his mask covered it.

His eyes drifted to the scrolls laying by the man’s feet. They looked old, and seemed like something his uncle would love. But Zuko wasn’t stupid enough to try and steal from the Earth King’s palace. His uncle would never let him hear the end of it. That was if he succeeded. And when that was the best case scenario, Zuko knew it was a mistake.

It seemed the man was observant enough to realize what Zuko was looking at, because he perked up when he noticed Zuko’s gaze. ”Oh, these? These are about the history of the Air Nomads.”

”Really?” Zuko was already sitting down and uncurling one when he noticed what he had done.

He wanted to hit himself.

Noting he learned about the Air Nomads now would make a difference. He was a fugitive, a refugee, and nothing would change that. Even if he did learn something that would give him an edge, he wouldn’t have the opportunity to use it. He couldn’t leave his uncle behind in a city that he had once tried to destroy, a city that would gladly try to destroy him. And what were the odds of the Avatar coming here? At the same time that Zuko was here?

Slim to none. No, reading these scrolls would just be indulging in a fantasy. A fantasy that he could no longer afford to keep alive. He needed to realize the truth.

Zuko was never going to capture the Avatar.

And certainly not in Ba Sing Se.

He curled his fingers tightly around the edges of the scroll, and the scroll started to dent. ”Careful!” The man’s hands covered his own. ”They’re very old.”

Zuko ripped his hands back, out of the strange man’s grip. What kind of man would just let an intruder read his scrolls? Had he no common sense? Didn’t he realize that Zuko could be an assassin, here to kill the Earth King? That he should alert the guards?

Just because Zuko was taking advantage of it didn’t mean that he approved. Still, some sense of guilt about destroying something which obviously meant a lot to this man (maybe he worked here) made Zuko bite out, ”I didn’t mean to.”

”It’s fine, it’s fine,” the man insisted and waved his hands in between them. The man was sitting right in front of him, smiling a mystifying smile.

”My name is Ku-Kei,” the man very obviously changed what he was going to say at the last second. Zuko looked suspiciously at him. So he did have some sense? Then the man asked, ”What should I call you?”

”… Li. Call me Li.” Zuko pressed his mouth together and looked away from the man’s bright green eyes. 

”Li,” the man twisted the name around in his mouth, very pleased about something that Zuko, again, couldn’t understand. Had the man called the guards, signaled them somehow, and was now just stalling for time?

The thought made him realize that he had been here longer than he was comfortable with. It was the middle of the night when he snuck in and he couldn’t tell how long he had been here. Had his uncle already woken up? Had he discovered that Zuko was gone? Scowling and swearing to himself, he rose swiftly to his feet. 

”Where are you going?” The man rose as well, one arm half-held out, as if he was going to try to stop Zuko from leaving, but thought better of it.

Zuko turned his head toward the direction he had come from. ”Back,” he simply stated.

It wasn’t home. Not yet. But if his uncle had his way, it would be.

”Well, are you—” The man gulped and peeked at Zuko, like he was shy. ”Will you come back?”

He wanted to say no. He should say no. But Zuko could never manage to do the smart thing, now could he? 

He didn’t respond. If he opened his mouth, a yes would surely slip out, and he couldn’t afford that. If the man knew that he would come back, he would tell the guards, tell the Dai Li, and then Zuko would be caught red-handed. He couldn’t afford that. Uncle couldn’t afford that.

Taking a deep, controlling breath, he felt the fire inside him shift — he started walking. He sped up as he spun around the corner of the shelf and hurried back the way that he had come, at least his mental map proving to be accurate. Something had at least been done right, even if everything else about this little excursion had been a complete failure. Well, not complete. A complete failure would be if he was caught and people realized that his uncle was here.

Zuko should get out before this was a complete failure. 

He sped up further, making sure that steps were soundless. His eyes kept flickering between the ceiling and the walls in an attempt to spot any coming Dai Li agents. When he couldn’t spot any, he breathed out silently in relief, but he didn’t slow down.

Through long corridors and winding hallways, around corners and down steep steps. Zuko finally exited the palace, the same way that he had entered. When he glanced behind himself, he couldn’t see anyone, but he couldn’t risk it. He would take the long way back, try to lose any possible tails he had picked up.

If he actually had any was irrelevant, he still had to make sure. Make sure that no-one could track him back to his tiny, ratty apartment with its shitty furniture.

His uncle insisted that they were lucky to find a place that already had furniture, but Zuko wasn’t sure hw believed him. He had found stains. Suspicious-looking stains. But nothing he said could convince his uncle that this wasn’t some great old adventure, a great chance to see the city and play tourists. He acted as if they weren’t stuck here against their will.

Maybe his uncle thought this was a fun vacation, but Zuko couldn’t shake the feeling that something was going to go wrong. It always had before, so why wouldn’t it this time? Why wouldn’t he be screwed over just when he thought that they were finally safe?

It was the reason he had broken into the palace in the first place. Why he had done such a monumentally stupid thing that he could never let anyone know about.

By the time that Zuko finally made it back to their apartment, he was exhausted. He barely managed to get out of his costume and hide it before he collapsed on the bed, too tired to even crawl his way under the covers. Sleep had not been kind to him, lately.

When he woke, the sun was already shining.

Zuko scowled up at the cracked ceiling and sat up, messaging his head while he moved. His short hair felt limp, it needed a thorough wash. He pressed his hands over his eyes, the sensation of scar-tissue something that he was long since — reluctantly — used to. For a while he had tried not to touch it, but then he realized that it didn’t matter. 

He couldn’t feel anything through it anyway. The fire had burned away all sense of touch from the area. He was lucky that it hadn’t taken his sight completely as well. What he had lost of it already gave him enough problems.

”Finally up, nephew?” Iroh asked.

Zuko winced and took his hands away from his face. He scooted over the bed, setting his feet down on the floor and stood up, trying to act as if he had nothing to hide. ”Just tired,” he mumbled.

”Well, breakfast is ready, so come and eat,” his uncle insisted. Zuko walked one and took the bowl of food from Iroh, settling down next to the table to eat it. He drank the tea Iroh put down next to him as well, even though he was pretty sure that the taste was simply never going to agree with him.

At the teashop, there was no sign of anyone coming to arrest him. He wondered, would the Dai Li grab him in secrecy or do it in public? Throughout the day, Zuko kept on looking over his shoulders, certain that someone was coming for him. He only managed to get an hour or two of sleep in total when his uncle forced him to nap during his breaks.

But it helped. 

It was hard, sleeping during the day. Everything in him said that he should be awake, that the sun was up and so should he be. But evidently, he was tired enough that his body overrode that instinct.

As the night came closer and closer, Zuko found that there was an urge in him — an urge to go back to the palace. It was pure idiocy and he couldn’t believe that he was about to make the same mistake twice… but he would. There was something there, something at the palace that made him curious. And he hadn’t actually gotten any of the answers that he had come for in the first place.

So. He would go back. Zuko rubbed his undamaged eye and sighed, feeling self-loathing fill. His mind insisted that this was a bad idea, that it could only lead to bad things. But his instincts said that he should go back. That there was something there for him.

And Zuko was weak. He always caved to the voice that was the loudest. He always went the way that would bring him the most trouble. The most pain.

It was like Azula said — Zuko never learned.

That night, after a quick nap so that he wouldn’t lose his concentration, Zuko went back to the palace. He took a different route there, just to be safe, but he had only actually found one way into the palace, and had no choice but to use it again. Using the same entrance twice in a row didn’t sit well with him, but he had no other options.

His feet hit the ground of the palace as he followed the same path as the night before. Stupid, he was here for answers, so he should go another way since he’d gotten nothing the night before, but his feet didn’t listen. 

He ended up going through the same hallways, passed the same doors and around the same corners. Finally, he reached the same door.

Foolish. It wasn’t like that man would be here, not when there had been an intruder the previous night. It was just Zuko’s sentiments, his desire to learn more about the Avatar, that brought him back here. It was simply his inability to let go of something that was so far out of his reach, it wasn’t even funny. Not that he had ever thought that it was.

Zuko edged his way further into the library and walked slowly between the shelves. He listened carefully for any noise that would reveal the presence of someone else. When he approached the part of the library where he had first heard the man the night before, he was gratified to find that he could hear nothing. Obviously, the man wasn’t here.

Chastising himself for his poor judgement, Zuko was just about to turn back the way he came and find another place in this gigantic palace to seek his answers, when something made him turn around again. He supposed, now that he had come all this way, it wouldn’t hurt to make sure?

Right, it wouldn’t hurt. He would just peek around the corner, just spend a few seconds looking around and when he inevitably found nothing, he would keep going. 

And then he would never come back here.

Narrowing his eyes, Zuko snuck further into the library, an exact replica of the path that he had taken the night before. Finally, he rounded the last corner and stood up straighter, his hands on his swords in the event of an ambush. That was really the only reason he could see for the man to come back here, although he wasn’t a fighter, so maybe he wouldn’t stick around?

There. Zuko stepped into the light of a torch, and it felt as if his heart stopped in his chest. Then it abruptly started beating again, thumping like mad. He swallowed, the gulp somehow loud in the silence.

The man — Kei, though Zuko didn’t believe that that was his real name for a second — was looking back at him. He was sitting not he floor on a padded green pillow, a matching pillow sitting unused in front of him. Between the two pillows was a torch and a precarious pile of scrolls.

”I took the liberty of preparing some scrolls about the Air Nomads, since you seemed interested,” the man said and waved his hands toward them, like Zuko couldn’t see them perfectly fine.

Zuko took a hesitant step forward. His steps were still silent, despite the fact that he was in full view of the man. A habit he had a hard time breaking, when he was wearing this costume. ”Fine,” he finally bit out and carefully sat himself down on the other pillow.

He didn’t know why he was doing this. Maybe because some part of him still harbored hope that he would have another chance to capture the Avatar. Maybe because he felt chafed in that teashop, with nothing to keep his mind occupied, nothing to distract himself from what had become of his existence. Maybe he was just lonely, and the chance of quiet companionship where nothing would be expected of him was too hard a pull to fight.

Whatever the reason, Zuko picked up a scroll and uncurled it, reading in the light of the torch-lamp. After a second, the man picked up one that was next to him and started reading as well.

Zuko didn’t know how long they sat like that, reading together with speaking with each other. What he did know was that he was on his third scroll and despite his strict training, the position he was sitting in was starting to take its toll on his back. Sitting hunched over wasn’t good for him, especially as he hadn’t been able to train like he was used to now that they were fugitives. He hadn’t practiced his firebending since they stepped onto that boat.

The idea that he was getting rusty was terrifying. He decided that the first chance he got, he was gong to devise a training regime that would allow him to keep fighting fit without revealing his bending. 

He moved his legs so that he could sit up straight and stretch his back, feeling the pain start leaving him as he leaned back. A prickling sensation made him look back again, to find that the man was staring at him, his mouth parted slightly before he licked his lips and quickly moved his gaze back to his scroll. 

Then he peeked back up again over his glasses and gave Zuko an awkward smile, ”Maybe we should move over to the chairs, if it's getting uncomfortable.”

Somehow, he managed to phase it both as a question and an order at the same time. Zuko scowled, but then he decided that this wasn’t a battle worth fighting. He nodded, once, sharply, and rose to his feet in a single fluid motion. 

The man was considerably less graceful than Zuko, when he stood as well. Zuko considered helping transporting the scrolls as the man bent down to pick them all up, and gather the torch as well, but he needed to keep his hands free. He had yet to rule out the possibility of an ambush and he needed to stay vigilant.

He let the man lead the way. They were heading in a direction of the library that he hadn’t explored, and he made sure to memorize the route they took, incase this was some kind of trap and the man was deliberately confusing his sense of direction. Zuko wasn’t going to be trapped here, in this maze of scrolls, and he wasn’t going to be caught unawares of an attack. If this was all a trap, then he was going to face it head-on and make sure he knew the way out.

”Here,” the man said and walked between two tall bookshelves. Zuko followed after him and found that there was a round table in the middle, surrounded by four chairs and the shelves were formed around it, giving the tiny oasis privacy from all directions. Glancing up at the ceiling, Zuko still couldn’t detect any signs of the Dai Li.

Zuko didn’t sit down until the man had, only then folding himself down on a chair. He pulled his swords off his back and placed them on the table within easy reach. They made the man twitch, but he didn’t protest.

Grabbing a scroll, Zuko continued reading where he had left off. 

He pretended as if he didn’t notice the way that the man would periodically look at him, staring as if he could see through all of Zuko’s disguises if he only tried hard enough. He acted as if he couldn’t tell the man had been stuck on the same scroll for far longer than what was believable. If the man wasn’t going to mention anything, then Zuko had no intention of talking either. Talking was just another way for him to slip up, to forget to disguise his voice.

Talking was another way for the man to identify him, and Zuko wasn’t going to let that happen. So he acted ignorant, pretending he was blind to what the man was doing.

Still, eventually reading in darkness got to him. Since his father… since the Agni Kai, reading without sufficient light had always strained his eye and by association, strained the other one. It was fine as long as he didn’t go too far, but headaches weren’t uncommon.

And he had a job now, a job that his uncle and his livelihood depended on. His uncle couldn’t make enough money for the both of them on his own.

When he started moving again, it didn’t take the man long to understand what was happening. ”Oh,” he said, and somehow Zuko thought he sounded genuinely disappointed. ”Are you leaving?”

Zuko didn’t answer, he simply strapped his swords to himself and checked that they were secure. The man stared at him the entire time, and Zuko had the unsettling feeling he was seeing more than Zuko wanted him to. ”I hope to see you again,” the man finally said, when Zuko moved to leave the tiny sanctuary among the shelves.

Zuko looked at down at the floor, a strange feeling of hesitance overcoming him. Then he shook it off and stepped out between the shelves. 

Notes:

I was rewatching atla for my other fic and... this happened. I am not as sorry as I should be.

(Also, the fact that the Kuei/Zuko tag doesn't even exist makes me sad.)

Chapter 2

Chapter Text

He came back again. Zuko was an idiot of the highest order, the kind of idiot that couldn’t be cured of their stupidity, because surely that was the only explanation. Why he would be back here again only three nights after the last time that he visited, stealing a moment in the night with a stranger that might not have ratted him out. It left him off balance, this feeling of waiting for the other shoe to drop.

This couldn’t last, he knew. The man would rat him out eventually, when whatever novelty it was that made him interested in Zuko wore off, he would call the Dai Li and then it would all be over. Zuko would be executed at best, because though he wanted his father to pay his ransom, he didn’t truly believe he would. Not anymore.

Not now, when they were fugitives, and living in hiding in Ba Sing Se.

Zuko had waited three days to come back, but it didn’t feel like enough time, when he eased the door to the library shut behind himself in order to keep it from making noise. It didn’t feel like any amount of time was enough, but he hadn’t been able to wait longer.

What was it about this place that kept drawing him back? What was here that he couldn’t resist, that made him cross so much distance to reach, provoke so much danger? Why would he keep risking everything to come here?

There had to be something about this place that was tempting him, because otherwise it was just Zuko. Zuko, and his horrible decisions. Zuko, and his inability to not ruin things for himself. And more importantly, for his uncle.

After all, uncle wouldn’t even be here, stuck on the run and hiding in the most dangerous place in the world for him, if it wasn’t for Zuko.

Scowling, he pressed his lips together hard and snuck further into the library. He checked the closer location first, but as expected, it was empty.  With tension lining his body, he kept on moving further into the library, crossing the same space that the man had led him before. And when he reached that place, he was rewarded by the sight of light gently flowing from between two shelves.

Moving closer, Zuko could see the man sitting on the same chair as before, studying a scroll intently and making notes on another one. There was a pile of scrolls on the middle of the table and an extra, unlit lamp waiting. Deliberately, Zuko let his next step be heard.

The man’s head snapped up. ”Li!” He smiled brightly, like he had actually been looking forwards to seeing him. 

Zuko hesitated. After a painful second, he nodded slightly back and said, ”Kei.”

The man made a face when he heard the name, further reinforcing Zuko’s thought that it was a fake one. Probably as fake as Li, that is; he probably hadn’t put a lot of effort into it. Most likely, his real name started with a K too.

Meanwhile, Li was just a really common name. 

”You’re back,” the man said, staring at him like he didn’t quite believe it. ”It’s been three days, I was starting to think you weren’t coming.”

Zuko didn’t know what to say to that. What did it matter to the man, if Zuko wasn’t coming? Unless this was a trap, and the man was simply playing the long game? Zuko shrugged and, quick as a badgersnake, took a scroll he didn’t remember reading. This one too, was about the Air Nomads. Specifically, recipes for vegetarian food. Still, there was no telling what kind of advantage this knowledge could give him, so Zuko read it carefully.

Thankfully, the man didn’t try to engage him in more conversation, and they read together in peace for some time. But this time, Zuko paid closer attention to how much time was passing, because he wanted to get some bit of sleep before going to word and Ba Sing Se was a big city. It took time to get from the palace to their dingy apartment.

He had decided that he was going to limit himself to three scrolls, two if there was a particularly long one. With this, he shouldn’t spend so much time here that he wouldn’t get some rest before he had to wake up again.

He didn’t feel compelled to speak.

The silence was comfortable. 

It took Zuko awhile to figure out, but when he did, he found that he could no longer concentrate on reading and he looked up to observe the strange man. He felt no need to talk to him. Maybe that was why he came back? Because the man demanded nothing of him?

Wasn’t that stupid. Zuko came back here, took all these risks, just so that he would be in the company of somebody that didn’t have any expectations, good or bad, for him.

He felt like a fool. An idiot. A stupid, idiotic, foolish exiled prince that wasn’t welcome in his homeland, because of a mistake he had made due to arrogance. He’d thought that because they were related, his father wouldn’t punish him. He’d thought he was more important than he was. Well, now he knew. Azula was the important one.

She always had been.

”Kei,” he carefully said, controlling his voice so that it sounded unlike him. That name was odd. It wasn’t an Earth Kingdom name, he didn’t think. Why would that name pop into this man’s head when he came up with a fake one?

Zuko continued, ”Why haven’t you told the guards I’m here?”

Stupid. He could never just keep his mouth shut.

”Well, I,” the man fumbled with his words, clearly unsure of what to say. Then he cleared his throat and smiled kindly at Zuko. ”I didn’t want to scare you.”

What? ”Why?” Zuko couldn’t understand. What did it matter if the man scared him?

”It’s my first time meeting a Spirit—”

”What?!” Zuko scrambled to his feet, the chair loudly topping over in his wake. In his shock, he forgot to disguise his voice. Staring at the man like he was insane, Zuko made sure to insist, ”I’m not a Spirit. Why would you even think that?!” 

His voice rose with the last word, his panic unmistakable.

The man looked shocked. ”Oh,” Kei frowned and looked down at his scroll. ”You’re not?”

Zuko just shook his head wildly. No, he was definitely no Spirit. 

”I just thought—” Kei took a deep breath before he looked up, straight at Zuko like he could see right through him. He smiled, a small crooked thing, ”Forgive me. I’ve offended you.”

Zuko shook his head mutely. ”I’m not offended,” he said and picked up the chair, moving it back into position and sitting himself down again. He looked pensively at Kei, wondering why the man would think that. But it also explained a lot, didn’t it? Like why the man wanted to meet him again? Why he’d waited for Zuko.

A pressure built in Zuko’s chest. He controlled his breathing ands stared at the flame of the oil lamp, taking care to not affect it. His eyes lowered and he avoided looking in the direction of the man.

He wanted to fight. He wanted to run away. He wanted to scream, he wanted to firebend. He didn’t know what he wanted. To hear the man apologize? But he already had, and somehow that hurt worse. Betrayal was a feeling he was well-used to, an old friend knocking on his door at the most inopportune of times. An old nightmare that he could never wake up from.

But this wasn’t a betrayal. He didn’t know this man, didn’t trust him, didn’t even know his real name. He didn’t even know Zuko’s real name. They were nothing to each other. 

But his chest was still heavy.

He blinked. Took a deep breath. Ignored the tiny flickering of the flame in the lamp and hoped the man hadn’t noticed it. Then he decided that this was foolish, this feeling, and it had no place in his life. ”It’s fine,” he bit out, as if that would make it true. 

It never had before.

He lowered his gaze to the table and gripped a scroll. It wasn’t the one he had been reading before, but it didn’t matter. He just needed something to occupy his mind with. Something to distract himself with. Something to take his mind off the heaviness to his bones and the exhaustion weighing him down.

Even without coming here for three nights, he still hadn’t slept very well. Now, with nothing to look forwards to and a stupid sense of loss, it hit him harder than it had since his uncle and him were driven out of the Fire Nation. Presumably for good. 

”I will get you something to eat, as an apology.” Kei rose, moving as if he was going to call for a maid.

Zuko was moving before he registered it. His hand gripped the man’s green-clad arm tightly and he swallowed nervously. ”Don’t,” Zuko got out between his clenched teeth. ”There’s no need.”

If he called a servant or a made or anyone, then Zuko being here would be exposed. The Dai Li would get him and then they would get his uncle and it would be all his fault. Because he hadn’t been able to resist his curiosity, to take his mind off of it. And Zuko wasn’t going to let that happen even if… even if… he had to take care of the man. Make sure that none would know of his existence, that he’d been here.

He gulped, the thought leaving an unpleasant taste in his mouth. But he couldn’t let his uncle’s presence in this city be discovered.

He couldn’t let his uncle down too.

The man moved his own hand to gently place it over Zuko’s where he was holding onto that arm. ”Worry not,” the man said and closed his hand around Zuko’s own. Zuko’s eyes were glued to the contact. It wasn’t skin to skin, because he was wearing gloves, but for a wild, breathtaking moment, he wanted it to be. The man continued, ”I won’t let anyone hurt you. I won’t tell them you’re here. They’ll think the food is for me.”

Zuko looked up at the man, searching desperately for any hint of deceit. The man couldn’t honestly be saying that he would deceive the staff of the palace for him, that he would risk punishment from the Dai Li.

”The Dai Li—” Zuko started and then stopped talking. Even mentioning them here felt like a bad omen. His eyes drifted back down to the warm hand still holding his own. Gently, he eased his grip and attempted to pull his hand back, but the man simply followed the motion. Kei’s hand still tightly gripped his own, their hands hanging together in the air between them.

”The Dai Li won’t know,” the man insisted. He squeezed Zuko’s hand reassuringly.

Zuko sallowed a gulp of saliva and stared down at where their hands were connected. His mind churned restlessly, trying to think of something to say that wouldn’t make the man call the guards on him. All the valid protests he could make would be too incriminating, letting the man find out the truth.

His fingers spazzed in the man’s hand, and he lowered his head. It went against everything in him, but he couldn’t afford to make too much of a fuss. ”If you say so,” he finally whispered in defeat.

He stepped back and this time, the man let his hand go. Zuko squeezed the hand shut, clenching it by his side as he walked slowly back to his chair and sat down, not letting the man out of his sight the entire time. The man gave him a kind smile and walked out between the shelves, and Zuko waited impatiently for him to come back.

He sat tensely on his chair, waited with bated breath and a hand on a sword the whole time. He couldn’t shake the idea that when (if) the man came back, he would do so with the Dai Li accompanying him.

His foot tapped on the ground and his finger caressed the hilt of his sword. His eyes drifted constantly over the walls, shelves and the ceiling, looking for any sign of an attacker. He needed to stay alert — he couldn’t let his guard down. Just because this man smiled so kindly, just because he had waited for Zuko, didn’t mean that he could be trusted.

It merely made him more dangerous. 

Zuko counted the seconds until the man came back. When he heard footsteps again, he concentrated and didn’t relax even when he could only hear one pair. That told him nothing, the Dai Li were masters of stealth.

Kei breached the shelves and smiled when he saw that Zuko was still here. ”I got soup, something easy to digest,” the man said as he put the tray down on the table in front of Zuko. Zuko stared down at it. There was only one portion and it came with a cup of water. A spoon laid next to the steaming bowl.

”It’s vegetable soup, one of my favorites. I often have it late at night, when I get lost in reading,” Kei explained. He moved around the table and sat down. He asked, ”Tell me what you think of it?” 

Zuko picked up the spoon, before a thought occurred to him. He lifted his hand up to his mask, fingering the edges of it. It was his only shield here, his only protection. He couldn’t take it off and show the man what he really looked like. He was aware that his scar was not only recognizable, but it also made him memorable. A sight so ugly was something that people tended to remember.

”My mask,” he said and let his hand fall back to the table. 

”Ah,” the man let out in understanding. He frowned and pushed up the glasses a little higher on the bridge of his nose. They were still far lower than Zuko was used to, but maybe that was just how glasses in the Earth Kingdom looked?

”Well, I can…” The man stared between Zuko’s mask and the tray before he let out a gentle smile. ”I will look away while you eat.”

Zuko had only just started shaking his head in protest and was about to explain that that wouldn’t work, when the man picked up a scroll and moved out of his chair. ”See,” Kei said, ”I’ll just sit on the floor and read while you eat.”

And then he really did sit down on the floor. Not on a pillow, but straight onto the floor itself. Sitting where he was, even if he was turned this way, it would be difficult for him to peak at Zuko, with the table and chairs in the way. Still, to be on the safe sound, Zuko only shoved his mask up as far as needed to eat and drink. It still covered his eyes and when he had to shove it up further because he couldn’t dip the cup back far enough to drink, he covered his eyes with his hand. He didn’t know if the gold color of his eyes would be visible in the weak light of two lamps, so he made certain that it wasn’t an issue.

Zuko finally sat the spoon down on the tray and for a moment, he only stared at it. Then he pulled his mask down and made sure that it was secure, a feeling of deep regret starting to fill him. It wasn’t an unfamiliar feeling.

He kept on making the same mistakes. He kept on repeating the same failed actions. He kept on making unnecessary trouble for himself.

He had heard somewhere that the definition of insanity was repeating the same actions and expecting a different result. If that was true, then he guessed that his sanity was simply a delusion, a lie that he told to comfort himself.

”Is it safe?” Kei asked.

”Ye—” Zuko cleared his throat and coughed softly. ”Yeah. It’s safe.”

The man made noise as he pushed himself to his feet and then he peeked up over the table at Zuko, only his eyes visible over the edge. His hands gripped the table and he pulled himself up completely, dusting off his clothes absentmindedly. He picked up the scroll that he had been reading, sat it down on the table rolled up, and settled back down on his chair.

Zuko looked at him, trying to see if the man had looked at him. Searching for any reaction to his scar. That wasn’t something most people were able to hide, having an almost visceral reaction to it.

There was nothing. It almost seemed like the man truly hadn’t looked. 

But that was too good to be true. 

Zuko pushed the tray with its empty dishes onto a corner of the table that they weren’t using. He picked up an unread scroll and slowly unrolled. Peeking up at the man, he observed as he seemingly continued reading, still making notes on another scroll. Zuko frowned. 

Was the man not going to say anything? Ask why he wasn’t allowed to see? Why Zuko was wearing a mask?

Was the man not going to ask why he kept breaking into the palace?

Finally, after having watched Kei for several minutes without eliciting a reaction, Zuko went back to his reading. Occasionally, his eyes would stray back to the man, but he never caught the man looking at him, despite feeling the man’s gaze on him multiple times. Eventually he gave up on that endeavor and just concentrated on learning as much as possible.

It was getting late. The sun had started making its way toward rising again, Zuko could feel it. That was something that he had never had to work on as a bender, the only thing that ever came naturally — though not more than Azula — to him; he always knew where the sun was.

And right now it was telling him that his time was up.

”I need to go,” he said abruptly, without warning. It broke the strange, peaceful silence that had settled around them and Zuko found that he regretted it. He liked the calm that enclosed the area where this man was, like nothing could shock him, nothing could touch him.

”Already?” Kei asked, a small pout starting to settle on his lips. 

The reaction made no sense to him, so Zuko simply nodded. 

The man smiled at him, ”I hope to see you soon.”

Zuko left. He walked through by now familiar hallways and left the palace far behind him, as far as he could.  When he came home, he carefully hid his costume and returned to his bed, climbing down beneath the thin blanket and falling asleep almost immediately. The long ride between the rings had tired him out.

The next morning, Iroh woke him up early. Zuko blearily looked up at his uncle, for one short blissful moment having no idea where he was, before the knowledge rushed back to him, mercilessly.

He scowled. Then he drank the tea and ate the bread his uncle presented him with, acting as if he had gotten more than the most basic need met by sleep. He ignored the look his uncle gave him, the one that said that Iroh knew he was hiding something, but was waiting for Zuko to say it first. He wasn’t going to. He already knew what Iroh’s reaction would be.

It was far better that his nightly excursions went unknown. That way, at least his uncle would genuinely not know, even if he was a really good liar. But it was always better to have every advantage that one could.

Zuko knew that better than most.

the teashop was ordinary. Most of the customers were regulars, the same batch of homemakers, business owners and common guards visiting often. By now, they were all mostly used to Zuko’s sour attitude and knew not to except stellar customer service from him. It still lead to some arguments with newbies that hadn’t visited before, but Zuko had no intention of changing his attitude. It was already humiliating enough, that he had to serve tea to make a living.

Zuko was a prince! The genuine heir to a throne. He had a destiny waiting for him beyond these walls, if only he wasn’t trapped here. If only he and his uncle weren’t dependent on these walls to protect them.

It was a disgrace, and it chafed. The feeling of his flames being locked inside his body, unable to do more firebending than breathing was simply intolerable.

Constricting.

It was constricting.

He hated it.

But there was nothing that he could do about it. He was starting to think that even if he caught the Avatar, someone else would get all the glory and honor, and eh would still be unable to go home. It felt like sacrilege, just thinking that, but in the dark of the night, when he was traveling through Ba Sing Se and nobody could see him, he couldn’t help but wonder if the Fire Nation had even noticed his absence.

Did his people miss him? Did they know why he was banished? Did they even know that he was banished at all, or had the court dressed it up in pretty words and deceived them?

His uncle was all smiles and politeness in the teashop. He did everything the owner asked of him, as if it was his honor to have the opportunity, and he apologized for Zuko’s mistakes constantly. Every time Zuko forgot who had ordered what, or he was a bit too rude, his uncle would be there, soothing ruffled feathers.

The sight always made him more irritated. If it weren’t for Zuko, his uncle wouldn’t have to do that, apologizing all the time, bending out of his way to make sure that Zuko wouldn’t offend someone important.

Swallowing the lump in his throat, Zuko went back to cleaning the table he had been scrubbing at for the past ten minutes. Someone had spilled tea and hadn’t bothered to tell him, and now it would probably leave a stain. He didn’t know how to get tea stain out of tables, and he couldn’t ask someone. It would give away his ignorance, point an arrow at his identity. So he was stuck trying to clean it himself, and it wasn’t going very well.

Once more, his uncle passed by behind his back, making loud humming noises. Zuko knew full well that he was just waiting for Zuko to give up so that he could take over, but Zuko could figure this out. All he had to do was keep using water and pressing the rag over it and it would be fixed.

It was simply… taking some time. Yes, time. But he would manage it on his own. No help necessary.

Scrubbing harder, Zuko was gratified to see that his determinate was finally paying off. The stain was getting smaller and fainter with every swipe, and Zuko felt pride fill him. Then he immediately started frowning. Getting rid of a stupid tea stain was nothing to be proud of!

Scowling harshly, Zuko swiped harder, man at himself for daring to be proud of something so ridiculous. Something so small. He could already hear Azula mocking him.

Shaking his head to get rid of the thoughts and his sister’s voice, Zuko finally stood up straight and grimaced at the pain in his back from standing bent over a low table for so long. He decided that that was as good as it was going to get and there was no use in scrubbing further. Instead he let the rag hit his shoulder and hang there while he moved over to the counter.

It was past closing time and his uncle was in the midst of putting away all of the cleaned cups. Zuko moved over to help him clean the last ones, so that they could finally get out of here, go back to their apartment, eat dinner and go to sleep.

He couldn’t visit the palace tonight. He should wait a different number of days between each visit, to make himself at least a little unpredictable. And he should take the opportunity to see if he could find another entrance to use. Always using the same one seemed like a bad idea on top of an even worse one, and he should take all of the precautions he could, if he would keep up with this stupidity.

But tonight, he wouldn’t go back. Tonight, he would get a full night’s sleep. 

It was easier said than done.

Turning over on his bed for the sixteenth time, Zuko pushed his head further into the pillow, closing his eyes tightly and breathing rhythmically. When he finally managed to fall asleep, it was an uneasy one. He woke up every once in a while and sighed deeply, even going to the bathroom once, before he fell back asleep.

Restless, he woke up with the sun the next morning. Blinking up at the ceiling, he peeked out through the window and sighed when he saw the sun was just rising. Pushing himself up until he was leaning back on his hands on the bed, Zuko took a moment to just stare around the room. He couldn’t say that he hated it, anymore.

It was protecting them, though it didn’t know it. And like uncle always said, one should always be grateful for the things one had, not long for those that one didn’t. Zuko didn’t know if he agreed, but it made sense to him.

What he had was this. This tiny one-room apartment, in this walled in city, with its high walls and spooky secret guards.

After everything he had done, this was all that he had left.

Zuko swung his feet over the edge of the bed and stood up. He swayed slightly before he moved over to the tea pot, getting the tea leaves from their cabinet. Glancing back over his shoulders, he saw his uncle still resting. Not sure he believed that his uncle was still really sleeping, with the sun up and all, Zuko still got started on making tea. He should apologize for the mess that he had made, but he couldn’t get the words out of his mouth.

But he could make tea. So tea he would make.

Hitting the green rocks gently against each other, he let the sparks hit the firewood. He was, at this point, well-used to starting fire this way. Unlike his uncle, he wasn’t going to risk their safety just for a cup of warm tea. A reason that was hardly any better than whatever reason there was for Zuko’s continued visits to the Earth King’s palace. Regardless, the punishment would probably be the same for both.

When the water in the pot was warm enough, Zuko dropped the tealeaves in. Then he stirred and tried to keep lumps from forming. It wasn’t going very well, but Zuko liked to think that he knew his uncle pretty well. Iroh would be pleased that Zuko had even just tried to make tea.

It was jasmine tea. The kind that his uncle often raved about and attempted to force-fed Zuko any time Zuko was on the edge of getting sick.

Not that Zuko usually was, if there was one thing he did right, it was not getting sick often. But Iroh liked using it as an excuse to force Zuko to drink his tea. And sometimes, just sometimes, Zuko gave in. He drank the tea — often experimental — and pretended as if he liked it.

Setting down the teapot on the table, Zuko carefully put out their only two cups. He sat himself down on the pillow and just in time, his uncle rolled out of his bed and came over ”Ah, Zuko, to think that you would give me such a lovely surprise this morning. I had no idea!” He sat down and cheerfully poured tea into a cup. Zuko accepted the cup that was handed to him and looked suspiciously down at the hot water. Was that a lump? It looked like a lump.

Breathlessly, and while frowning, he watched his uncle take a sip of the tea.

”Oh!” His uncle coughed and blew on water. ”It’s delightful, nephew!” he insisted, while even as he kept drinking it, his facing was getting sourer with each sip.

Zuko took a sip himself, and immediately felt himself gag. ”It’s horrible,” he said and put the cup down harshly on the wooden table. The water in it swayed with the motion, spilling over the edges and staining the table. Unlike at work, he had no intention to clean up this one.

”No, nephew,” Iroh’s calm voice split the rage Zuko was feeling in half. ”It merely has character. In fact, I find it quite delicious. Very… potent. Creative. Deserves an award in a competition, I’m sure,” Iroh babbled. Notably, he didn’t refill his cup.

Zuko stared down at his cup, at the lumps that were once again forming, and curled his shoulders in on himself. He couldn’t even make tea right. Anytime he tried to do something right, he always, always failed. ”No, nephew,” Iroh said and gently patted Zuko’s shoulder. ”Your gift is very much appreciated, I promise.”

He sounded upset. Zuko scowled and pushed out of his chair. ”I’m going to work,” he snapped out and immediately regretted it. 

When he glanced over his shoulder, he saw Iroh looking at him with soft eyes and a worried expression. It made something squeeze tightly in his chest, and Zuko looked ahead again. Closing the door behind himself, he closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He would do better. For his uncle, he would.

Chapter 3

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

His uncle must know that something was up. Lately, he had been observing Zuko extra carefully, and it had gotten harder for him to get away. Every morning after one of his visits to the palace, Iroh would stare at him over their breakfast, as if he was searching for something.

What, Zuko didn’t know. But he knew that this couldn’t go on. Zuko was bad at lying and his uncle knew him all too well; one way or another, the truth would come out.

He dreaded his uncle’s reaction.

It was stupid of him, he knew, to keep going back. And yet he kept going, as if there was a magnet there that pulled him in. Relentless, its grip on him never eased, and every two or three days, Zuko would be dragged back. It had been over two weeks since he first broke into the palace, and by now he had the schedule down. By now, he recognized the restless feeling in his legs that wouldn’t calm down until he went. That irritability that acted up whenever it had been too long since he had been in the calming presence of Kei.

And once more, it was back.

His feet felt jittery as he waited impatiently for the last person in the teashop to leave. A young woman, she had been coming here every day for the last few days, and would periodically peek at him. His patience kept on taking hits due to the constant surveillance, and he wondered if she knew that he was Fire Nation. If she was keeping an eye on him in search of evidence to present to the Dai Li.

His uncle kept on insisting that she only wanted to get to know him better, but Zuko wasn’t sure that he believed that. His uncle, after all, was under the delusion that Zuko needed friends, and kept on pointing suitable people out to him. Well, suitable according to Iroh.

Zuko had other requirements for potential friends, requirements beyond liking tea and being able to play Pai Sho. But his uncle kept on pointing people out, like as if he only kept on trying, eventually he would point at someone Zuko would approve of. Zuko didn’t anticipate that day ever arriving, but he didn’t want to crush Iroh’s hopes. So instead of threatening the woman with his swords to determine her agenda, he was only avoiding her. Thus, he was unable to leave the teashop until she had, and he persistently did his best not to speak with her. This was harder than it should be, as his uncle kept on trying to force him to start conversations with her. 

He scowled and wiped the counter harder than necessary, watching the wood shine from the water. Zuko glanced through the corner of his fully working eye, scowling harsher when he saw that she was still there.

”Here, nephew, let me take over,” Iroh calmly took the rag from Zuko’s grip and kept on wiping the already thoroughly cleaned counter. He continued, ”Why don’t you take a short break?”

What break, they were closing in ten minutes? Zuko barely managed to keep the words in, but from the happy twinkle in his uncle’s eyes, Iroh had heard the unspoken words. Zuko took a calming breath and turned decisively away from the woman’s direction.

”If i’m not needed, then I’ll go home,” Zuko said and started unknotting the apron. When he glanced up at his uncle who hadn’t reacted for several seconds, he was met with the sight of his uncle’s eyes twinkling so much, Zuko wondered if he was sick. ”What?” he snapped out and took a wary step back. 

His uncle beamed at him, ”You called it home!”

”…So?” Zuko pulled the apron off and bundled it up in his hands. Throwing it over the counter, Iroh smoothly grabbed it out of the air from the other side.

His uncle shook his head and laughed gently, a quiet sound in the silence of the evening that Zuko hadn’t heard for years. ”Nothing, nothing. Be careful on the way home,” Iroh waved him off and kept on watching him as Zuko left. With the feeling that he had completely missed something, Zuko walked out of the teashop, already planning how he was going to get back to the palace.

He wanted to take a different path there today, one that he had never used before. With every visit, the paranoia that the Dai Li were aware of his repeated break-ins and were just waiting for him to slip up got harder to ignore.

Tonight, he would take another path there, and hopefully that would calm down his nightmares of the horror that the Dai Li would do to him and his uncle if they were to be captured. Over the weeks, his imagination had gotten crueler and crueler and Zuko was simply waiting for it to be proven right. He couldn’t shake the feeling that something would go horribly wrong, that because of his own actions, his uncle’s life would be in danger.

And with the Dai Li hidden in every nook and cranny of Ba Sing Se, that feeling had more truth to it than he was comfortable with.

Sighing, Zuko stepped around a mother dealing with her crying child — or at least, he assumed that they were mother and child. But they were taking up a large part of the road, and Zuko nodded back to the woman when she shot him an apologetic look. 

Back at their apartment, Zuko immediately settled down on the bed, after thoroughly checking the whole place for a break-in. Deciding to take the opportunity to sleep until his uncle came back and slept himself, Zuko settled down on the bed and closed his eyes. He breathed rhythmically and mentally counted down from one-thousand. 

Slowly, he started to doze, his breathing evening out into a relaxed pace. When he finally fell into proper sleep, he wasn’t aware of it.

But he was aware of it when his eyes snapped open.

He had been falling in his dream, falling off a tower that his sister had forced him to climb, and his father had thrown him off of. And when he hit the ground, his whole body twitched and forced him into wakefulness.

Groaning quietly so as to not wake his uncle — Zuko could hear him snoring — he dragged his hands over his face and gripped his hear tightly. He clenched his eyes shut for a few moments, forcing his ragged breathing under control, before he opened them again and pushed himself up to a sitting position on the bed. Zuko had been living on a ship for three years, he was used to uncomfortable mattresses, but this one was still worse than he thought possible. How his uncle could sleep so soundly on it was a mystery to him.

Or maybe the bed was fine, and it was his nightmares’ fault that kept waking up in the middle of the night. Zuko sighed deeply and quietly moved his feet over the edge of the bed, settling down on the cold floor.

His hand rose to his face and he rubbed his eyes, standing and moving over to the hidden compartment where his costume laid stuffed into a bundle. Glancing out the window, he was met with the darkness of the night. He couldn’t see any stars, the window wasn’t positioned for it, plus there was another building not far from theirs with trees and shrubbery in between them.

From his estimate, he had gotten around three hours of sleep, which was enough for him. Missed sleep he could catch up on later, but tonight his restlessness was making him reckless.

Zuko changed swiftly into the costume, pulling the mask over his face and grabbing the sheaths for his swords. Once he was sure that they were securely attached to him, he directed one last lingering look toward his uncle before he left through the window. Up on the roof, he started the journey to the palace.

The ride through the different rings was long and complicated, and it involved him hanging on to dear life to the trains from different positions and fervently hoping that the earthbenders controlling them couldn’t detect the extra weight. 

Once in the center ring where the richest and most important people of Ba Sing Se lived, he moved stealthily through the darkness, keeping to the shadows and avoiding the patrolling Dai Li agents. He preferred to stick to the roofs if he could, because he had long since realized that most people simply never looked up. The dangers of living without the threat of airbenders landing on your land for an impromptu picnic, he supposed.

And according to the scrolls that he had been reading in the Earth King’s palace’s library, that was something that they had actually done. 

Many times.

Zuko really didn’t understand airbenders. He had thought that it was only the Avatar that was like that, but apparently everyone had been. Perhaps it was a consequence of living so high up where the air was so thin?

Their heads were literally in the clouds.

Squeezing himself into the palace, Zuko crept across the floors. When he heard the sound of an oncoming servant, he swung himself up into the beams of the ceiling and waited for them to pass, until they were out of sight. Once they were gone, he dropped back to the floor on quiet feet and kept on moving forward.

By the grand doors to the library, Zuko checked carefully to make sure that there was nobody around. Waiting patiently, he cautiously listened for the sound of anyone coming. When nothing met his ears, he opened the doors just enough to squeeze through them.

The scent of dust, stale air and old scrolls met him as the doors fell shut behind him. He stirred at the sound, reflexively glancing over his shoulders. Zuko then gulped and stalked between the shelves, easily finding his way through the maze of them. There was hardly any light, the occasional oil lamp unable to light up much space around them. Ignoring the urge to use firebending to see ahead, Zuko kept on walking.

Approaching the area with the walled off space and the table they usually used, Zuko was surprised when he was met with nothing. There was no Kei intensely reading a scroll by the lamp light, no scrolls littering the table and no lamps lighting up the small space.

He stopped in his tracks. Looking up, he searched for any sign of the Dai Li. 

Narrowing his eyes, Zuko looked around, walking out of the pocket of space and moved toward the only other place he had ever found the man, the place where they had first met.

Kei wasn’t there either.

Zuko pulled one of his swords out of its scabbard and held it loosely in his hand, ready to use it at the drop of a hand. He stood stock-still, listening for any sound that could give away an ambush. Waiting, he slowly turned on his heel before he stopped and stood motionlessly again. 

His hearing wasn’t what it used to be. It wasn’t a catastrophic loss, and it wasn’t like he had lost all hearing in the ear, but it wasn’t as good as it used to be. His hand tightened on the handle of the sword with every passing moment where he could hear nothing, detect nothing, see nothing. Nothing was out of the ordinary. Except for the fact that Kei wasn’t here.

The Dai Li couldn’t have discovered what was going on and taken him away, right? No, if that was the case, they would have already attacked Zuko. They would have captured him when he was breaking into the palace, he was sure of it.

He hoped they would have.

Zuko bit back a swear and gripped his sword tightly. Then he let his grip loosen again, spinning around on his heel again to take in everything that he could see. Spotting nothing suspicious, Zuko glared at the light of the nearest lamp and cursed in his head when he saw the flame react to his emotions. 

He took a deep breath. Frowned when he saw the flame following the motion. Another breath. Another flickering flame. Zuko scowled harshly and dragged his breathing and emotions under his control forcefully.

He couldn’t go looking for Kei. If the Dai Li hadn’t taken Kei and it was only Zuko’s paranoia acting up, then going looking could alert them to his presence. If the Dai Li had taken Kei, then they must be waiting somewhere with an ambush, and his first priority should be making sure that they couldn’t connect him to his uncle. He needed to get to a lower ring and disappear, blending in with the masses. That could only be done where the refugees were stored away, where scars like his weren’t a rarity.

Right. He had a plan. He needed to get his act together, and he needed to stop jumping to conclusions. There was no evidence to support that the Dai Li had abducted Kei. There was no sign that there had been a fight, a struggle, of any sort. Kei was probably just late, and Zuko was just overreacting.

He took a deep breath, closed his eyes for the fraction of a second to drag his bending back under his control and focused. Sheathing the sword in its scabbard again, he stalked off with strong — still silent — steps.

Narrowed eyes glanced over everything he passed, but there was truly nothing out of ordinary, nothing that could point to a fight. There was nothing he could find that pointed toward Kei getting kidnapped. Zuko was overreacting, he knew that he was. Because he wouldn’t be here otherwise. He wouldn’t be walking free in the Earth King’s palace.

He walked back to their table and sat down on the chair that had the best view of the entrance. Fingering the swords, he laid them out on the table, splaying them out in front of himself for easy access. 

Then he waited.

At some point, he cracked his neck and moved into another position on the chair, feeling his stiff muscles complaining from the strain. He tapped his finger soundlessly on the sheathe of the sword in front of him and counted the minutes in his head, whittling the time away by imagining what the Avatar and his little gang was up to now. He must be in the middle of mastering earthbending now, right? He had probably already found a master to learn from, somewhere in the Earth Kingdom.

Dragging his finger up and down the scabbard, Zuko’s narrowed eyes examined the idea closely. There would probably be plenty of eager people ready to abandon their lives and families to up and disappear with the Avatar, so that the war would end. So that the Fire Nation would lose.

They would probably relish in the idea of being a part of it, of having the chance to beat the Fire Nation down a peg — or a thousand. Of having the chance at revenge, to, for once, have the upper hand in this hundred year long war. Zuko knew that if things were different, he would never let a chance like this slip by.

He hated it. The thought of the Avatar succeeding, of him beating Zuko’s fa— the Fire Lord, of him defeating the Fire Nation after a hundred years of atrocities and war crimes… 

The whole world would be out for blood.

He hated the thought of what could happen to his home.

Zuko’s head snapped up when he finally heard footsteps approaching. He paid his full attention to the sound, listening cautiously for a second or third pair of footsteps. But it was just the one. The sound of Kei coming closer finally made something in his posture relax, and Zuko leaned back against the backrest of the chair, moving into a facsimile of a lounging pose.

”You’re late,” he snapped out as soon as Kei was within visual range.

Kei’s footsteps faltered before they picked up speed. He burst forth between the shelves and paled visibly when he saw Zuko’s stiff posture, even lounging as he was. It was a pathetic attempt at intimidation, and Zuko knew it.

Kei gulped and raised his hands as he babbled out, ”I got caught up with—there was a disturbance and my expertise was required.”

Zuko scoffed. He rose from the chair, crossed his arms and looked silently at the man. Soon, the man’s composure fell apart and Kei moved quickly to sit on Zuko’s usual chair. ”I promise I didn’t mean to leave you waiting! But no matter what I tried, they just kept on talking and it was weird, they usually don’t need me to do much…” Kei trailed off and frowned, looking at the table like it held all the answers.

”I apologize,” Kei shook his head and bowed toward Zuko. ”I’ve upset you. Do you want me to get the soup again? Or something else? I’m sure there are cookies somewhere, we could snack on them while we complain about… well, I don’t really know what, but I’ll gladly listen to you airing your grievances.”

”Stop talking,” Zuko bit out. He took a calming breath and sat back down on the chair. Frowning behind his mask, he bit down on his tongue to keep himself from saying anything more and alienating the man.

He felt like an idiot.

Obviously, nothing had happened. Kuei dressed like a noble and talked like one too, plus he was in the palace all the time so he was very obviously someone important. Even the Dai Li wouldn’t be able to make a move on him in the open, especially not if he was close to the king. It was Zuko getting ahead of himself, making assumptions and never stopping to question what he knew; like always.

He put his hands on his lap and squeezed them tightly together, feeling his fire curling through him like a warm blanket. Frowning heavily, he bit down on his lip until he tasted blood. Licking it off, he closed his eyes and took a controlled breath.

Letting it out, he sagged back on the chair, all the tension leaving him at once. He wanted the mask off so that he could rub his eyes — all that emotion made his eyes water. He wanted to go to sleep, a desperate need that was overwhelming in its intensity. He wanted… Zuko wanted to let go of his control. He wanted his fire.

Scowling, he snapped out, ”Don’t just stare,” at Kei, wincing at the man’s immediate twitch. 

”I apologize,” Kei said, once more apologizing for something that wasn’t his fault. This was all Zuko getting worked up over nothing, after all. None of it was the fault of this man.

It was always Zuko’s fault.

”Ah,” Kei let out a loud gasp Zuko looked over, furrowing his eyebrows as he stared at the man. Kei made an exaggerated face of surprise and said, ”I nearly forgot. I have something for you.”

Zuko looked over the man’s upper body. ”What?” he asked, curious despite himself.

Kei shoved his hand quickly into one of his flowing sleeves and ruffled around in it, his face getting progressively more panicked as he failed to find what he was looking for. He switched to the other sleeve and peeked into it, staring into it with wide eyes and his glasses starting to slip. His braid had started coming undone, Zuko couldn’t help but notice. It swung around Kei’s shoulder and rested over his chest as Kei moved frantically, checking all of his pockets with an increasing sense of urgency.

”Finally,” Kei said as he pulled a fistful of something out of a hidden inside pocket. ”I was beginning to think I had lost it.”

Kei stood from his seat and rounded the table, stopping when he was only a meter away from Zuko. He held out his closed fist toward Zuko, and Zuko gulped. His eyes were glued on that fist, watching with bated breath as Kei turned it over and slowly uncurled out his fingers.

”For you,” Kei said softly. Zuko’s eyes flew up to Kei’s face, staring straight at the man’s warm eyes.

Gulping, he looked down at the open palm.

It was a necklace. The chain was thin and made of gold. It took him a moment to realize that it wasn’t just reflecting the light, there were tiny shining stones weaved in with the chain, and when Kei made an encouraging noise, Zuko snatched it without thought.

It was pretty. It was light, and the chain was smooth in his hands. He turned it over and twisted it around his fingers, trying to make sure that it wasn’t some kind of trap. How one would use a necklace like this in a trap, he didn’t know. That wasn’t important. The important thing was that Zuko examined it, looking it over carefully.

”Do you like it?” Kei’s voice sounded like it came from a million miles away. Tearing his attention away from the necklace, Zuko looked up at the man.

His breath caught in his throat. ”Yeah,” he squeezed out.

He ignored the breathless quality to his voice, and looked back down at the necklace, acting like he couldn’t see Kei’s delighted smile. Squaring his shoulders, he stood up. He slipped the necklace into an inner pocket where it would be safe, and stepped up to Kei. Taking a deep breath, he hugged the man.

”Wh-what are you doing?” Kei squeaked out, freezing under Zuko’s hands.

Zuko frowned. ”Thanking you.”

This was what people did when they got gifts, right? They hugged and blabbered about how much they loved it or something, right? Ty Lee had always hugged Azula tightly whenever Azula gave her a present. And whenever uncle gave him something, he would always stare at Zuko intently. No matter how much time passed, he would keep staring until Zuko gave in and hugged him.

Kei cleared his throat, the sound loud in the quiet room. ”We-well, thank you yourself. For spending time with me. I don’t have many friends, but I will do my best.”

…Friends?

Choosing to just gloss over that (were they friends? Zuko had only ever been friends with Ty Lee and Mai, and even that had been doubtful as they were firmly on his sister’s side) he nodded and stepped back, instantly missing the warmth of the other man.

He clenched his hands only to immediately unclench them again. Moving back toward the chair, he sat down on it and stared at his swords lying on the table. His hand moved to press down on the pocket. The fabric was good enough that he couldn’t feel the necklace in there, yet a smile still grew on his face, an indescribable warmth pooling in his stomach. He forced the smile off his face and turned his head toward Kei.

Kei was still standing there, his hands in the air like he had forgotten how to move. When he noticed that Zuko was looking at him, Kei startled, twitching as his hands lowered and he cleared his throat only to start coughing. He rose a hand to cover his mouth and waved the other one in Zuko’s direction.

Taking the hint, Zuko stood and started to walk around the small sanctuary, looking over the shelves of scrolls and the few bound books that stood out, purely because they were different. He trailed a hand along the shelf, his eyes drifting over the emblems until he picked up a water nation scroll. Turing it over in his hands, he wandered back to the table.

With those water tribe peasants constantly following the Avatar everywhere (or was it the Avatar who was following them?), knowing more about their people could be useful. Zuko opened up the scroll.

He closed the scroll. Feeling heat crawling up his face, he stood to place it back on its shelf. Grabbing another scroll, he sighed when he peeked at the opening and saw that it was only about the hunting and tracking used by non-waterbenders in the southern tribe. Zuko’s eyes twitched when he saw that it was about that village, but he continued reading. He wasn’t so stupid as to have not noticed that it was the non-bender who made all the Avatar’s plans, so this was useful knowledge.

Tucking his legs up under him, Zuko started reading it intently, sparing no thought to what weird faces Kei was doing in the corner, or why the man made sputtering noises every few minutes. He assumed that it was an Earth Kingdom thing.

Licking his lips, he frowned at the brief burst of pain. Kei had finally stopped whatever he was doing and grabbed a scroll from the shelves. He sat down across from Zuko and started reading. Not even half-a-minute later, Zuko could feel his eyes on him. With a half-hearted scowl, he glanced over the top of the scroll and caught Kei frowning in thought at him.

Something fluttered in his stomach. Zuko immediately lowered his gaze again. Trying to focus on the scroll in his hands, his fingers clenched down on it and crinkled the edges. He took a shuddering breath, forcing his eyes to keep from straying.

When he felt Kei’s eyes leaving him, Zuko let out a quiet breath and sagged back into the chair. His eyes closed for half of a breath, before he opened them again and refocused. He wasn’t here for nothing. Breaking into the Earth King’s palace, consorting with a noble, sneaking into what was probably a restricted library… it all had to have a point. There had to be a reason for all of this foolishness, or his uncle would never forgive him if he found out.

Zuko was here for information. He was here to make sure that his uncle was safe in this city. He was here for ways to get an edge over the Avatar in case he ever ran into the kid again. With his luck, the Avatar was probably already in the city, just waiting for a chance to screw over Zuko and his uncle.

Pressing his lips shut, he massaged his head.

”Are you alright?” Kei asked hesitantly.

Zuko looked up. ”Yes,” he frowned. Why would Kei suddenly ask that? Hadn’t they already sorted out the misunderstanding? Lowering the scroll from his face, he glanced over Kei and asked, ”Are you alright?”

He had been making an awful lot of strange noises.

”Ahem,” Kei coughed and stared at the wall behind Zuko. ”Yes, I am fine, thank you for asking.”

”Good,” Zuko nodded and went back to his reading. After a while, the sensation of Kei’s eyes on him was back again, but he decided not to do anything about it. He was confident that nothing of his identity could be exposed just by staring at him.

So he ignored Kei’s odd behavior and focused on getting some valuable intel.

Kei’s warm gaze followed him all the way.

Zuko cracked his neck, having sat in the same curled up position for too long. When he stretched out his legs as he made preparations to stand up, he winced at how stiff they had become. He put the scroll he had finished reading on the table and stood up, reaching for his swords as he moved. Kei looked up at him, pushed up his glasses, and frowned.

”It’s getting late,” Zuko answered the unasked question. He attached his swords to their proper places and made sure that his mask was secure — and not about to suddenly fall off.

Kei stood from his seat as well, ”I will walk you out.”

Zuko snapped his head around. ”No.” He took a breath and squared his shoulders, straightening his spine, and said, ”It’s not necessary. I know where to go.”

”Oh,” Kei lowered his gaze to the floor, and his foot tapped gently on it. ”I’ll see you soon then. Be careful,” he gave Zuko a blindingly soft smile.

Zuko’s chest squeezed. He managed to get a shuddering breath into his lungs, his body shaking for some reason that he could discern. ”I always am,” he responded, ignoring the voice in his head that said: Liar.

It sounded an awful lot like Azula. Maybe he was missing her more than he thought he would. He frowned at that thought. Of course he would miss her. She was his sister. Sure, she lied all the time, and she obviously wanted to take his place as the next Fire Lord — which he guessed she had now. But they were family. How could he not miss her?

There had been a time, a long time ago, when she was only a babe, a toddler really, and she had followed him everywhere. There had been a time when she was proud of him, when she copied everything he did.

Then she became a firebending prodigy and never did it again.

He swallowed the lump in his throat and nodded to Kei. Stalking out of the library, he scaled the walls and started moving between the beams in the ceiling, invisible to those below. He ignored the burning in his eyes and the twinges in his scar. It was only a phantom pain. He couldn’t feel anything at all from his scar.

Out of the palace, in the fresh air, Zuko dragged air into his lungs like he had been starved of it. He shook, his hands trembling as he clenched them shut and forced himself not to move a muscle until he calmed down.

He shuddered, and looked up at the sky. The moon was big. He could feel the sun moving unseen in the heavens. Stars twinkled down at Zuko happily.

He exhaled.

Notes:

One way or another, I will drag you all into this pit with me. cue evil laughter

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Chapter 4

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

Zuko stared as Jet was dragged away by the Dai Li. The other boy was screaming accusations the whole way, until he was abruptly knocked out by one of the agents. Wincing, Zuko stumbled when Iroh laid a heavy arm around his shoulders and leaned close to him. ”It’s alright, nephew,” Iroh said.

”I didn’t mean for them to…” Zuko took a deep breath. He sheathed his swords and shook off his uncle’s arm. ”Let’s go back to work,” he said.

”Li, it’s alright,” Iroh insisted, even as he let go of Zuko and moved toward the teashop. ”We all know you didn’t mean to. You’re such a kind boy, Li—”

”Stop it,” Zuko snapped.

He flinched at the wounded look his uncle gave him and hunched his shoulders. ”I’m not kind,” he muttered mulishly.

He wasn’t. Kindness was helping people without expecting something in return. Kindness was going out of one’s ways in order to help someone who needed it, without anything in it for themself. Kindness was reaching out a helping hand, even when no-one wanted you to. Song and her mother had been kind. Then Zuko had stolen their ostrich-horse for it.

No, Zuko wasn’t kind. He wasn’t capable of putting the good of the world above his desire to regain his honor and go home. He was still trapped in the cage that his father had made, and that fact alone was proof of his unkindness.

But his uncle needed these delusions. Iroh liked to preach of kindness and cooperation and how it was necessary, and Zuko knew that Iroh was right. No country — especially the Fire Nation — could survive without trade, but the Fire Nation had already burned all their bridges. 

And so had Zuko.

Scowling fiercely, he stalked off to the first customer he saw and asked, ”What do you want?”

The regular looked him over and scratched at his brown beard, pulling a face and saying, ”You did the right thing, Li. Boys like that…” he shook his head and sighed deeply, his shoulders drooping. His wife patted him on the shoulder and smiled gently at him. The middle-aged man continued, ”He needs a dose of reality. The Dai Li will give it to him. And really, to attack you? He deserved it.”

Zuko whipped out his paper-pad, ”Are you going to order?”

It was his wife who answered, ”Jasmine tea for the both of us, dear.”

Zuko’s eye twitched at the familiar address, but since they were regulars who visited almost daily, he let it pass. Instead of telling them to address him properly, he walked off to the counter, dropped the order on it and approached another customer.

”And you?” he demanded, his foot tapping on the ground. 

The girl who always stared at him started and red brushed the top of her cheeks. She ducked her head and shoved a string of hair behind her air, clearing her throat. She asked, ”What do you recommend, Li?”

He frowned and looked down at her. ”Nothing. Tea is gross,” he added.

Uncle immediately started sputtering and burst out, ”L-LI! How can you say that?! My own nephew!”

Ignoring his uncle’s dramatics, Zuko again asked, ”So? Have you decided?”

The girl shook her head, her wide brown eyes stuck on Iroh behind the counter. Zuko sighed and turned around, crossing his arms and staring at his uncle, a look on his face that betrayed hos unimpressed he was. ”You’re being dramatic, uncle,” he said. ”Just because you’re obsessed with tea doesn’t mean it’s the best thing in the world.”

”Li!” His uncle folded his arms over the counter and rested his head on, his shoulders shaking like he was crying. Zuko had never seen his uncle cry in his life, but he was sure this wasn’t it. ”I can’t believe a boy I raised—!”

Zuko rolled his eyes. ”You didn’t raise me.”

”I can’t believe my own nephew would betray me so!” Iroh immediately retaliated. ”This is unforgivable. When we get home tonight, you’re gonna drink tea!” Iroh announced and stood up straight, striking a victory pose.

”Do I have to?” Zuko complained.

His uncle acted like he couldn’t hear him. Zuko saw Iroh sneak a peak at him only to then immediately start grinning wider, so he ignored it.

If his uncle dealt with their exile by forcing Zuko to drink lots of water laced with leaves, then that was fine. As long as uncle was happy, Zuko could deal with it. And if worse came to worse, he could just throw the tea leaves out and claim they got stolen because they are that good. Problem solved. Nobody would even get hurt.

Walking over to a customer who had just entered and thus not seen the mess with Jet, Zuko tried to look polite. His uncle had, despite the guilt eating its way through Zuko’s stomach, managed to lighten his mood some. Uncle was good at that. Sometimes.

”What can I get you?” he asked, just like the owner told him to. The new customer looked up at him from his seat, blanched at the sight of Zuko’s scar and stammered out, ”Pu Erh Shu.”

Zuko wrote it down, and walked over to the counter, dropping the note on it carelessly. All the current customers had already ordered or had their drinks already, so Zuko took the moment to rest. He leaned his back against the counter, his arms placed on it and supporting him.

Behind the counter, Iroh hurriedly made all of the tea. Zuko had barely gotten any rest at all when they first order was up and his uncle placed the ceramic cup on the counter with a dull thud. Straightening out, Zuko took the two steaming teas and set out to the people who had ordered them. ”Jasmine tea,” he said and placed the cups gently on the table so that the water didn’t slosh over the edge.

The husband and wife smiled at him. He tried his best to smile back, because it wasn’t their fault that Jet was an obsessed jerk who couldn’t let sleeping turtle-bears lie, and they didn’t deserve Zuko’s bad mood due to it.

Turning away from them, Zuko made his way back to the counter and leaned over it. His uncle was mumbling under his breath. Zuko elected not to worry about it once he heard the words ”tea” and ”ignorant customer” in the same sentence. Instead he leaned his weight on the counter and wondered about the fact that even thought Jet had tried to expose Zuko and his uncle, Zuko still felt bad.

Not about fighting him. That had been a foregone conclusion when Jet was on the verge of disclosing their real identities. But getting him in trouble with the Dai Li hadn’t been Zuko’s intention. And Jet had been yelling about the war; he was doubtlessly in trouble.

After all, there was no war in Ba Sing Se.

Clenching his hands together, Zuko looked up when Iroh sat another ceramic cup of tea on the counter next to him. He picked up and was just about to walk away when his uncle stopped him with a hand on Zuko’s lower arm. ”Nobody blames you, Li” Iroh said gently, his face disturbingly open. ”You did what you had to do.”

Zuko swallowed a lump of saliva and walked away. He put the tea down on the table in front of a customer and turned back toward his uncle long enough to say, ”I’m taking my break.” before he left.

Out the door, Zuko snuck into the alleyway next door and blatantly hid behind some empty crates. He hunched down on his knees and buried his head in his arms, finally giving into the urge to squeeze his eyes shut and just breathed. He couldn’t firebend, but he could let his fire wash through him, warming him from the inside out. For now, it would have to be enough.

A few shuddering breaths later, and he stood up. If he wasted too much time here, uncle would get worried and come find him. And the last thing Zuko wanted to do was worry his uncle.

So he forced himself not to think about it for the time being.

Walking back into the teashop, Zuko whittled away the time by working until it was time to close.

Uncle and him wandered back to their apartment together, walking close enough that their arms kept brushing each other by and for once, Zuko didn’t react negatively. He let it stand, knowing that his uncle was probably still thinking about what Jet had done and what it could have lead to. The price that they would have had to pay, for even a chance of getting away without their identities being exposed. If such a thing was even possible.

They approached their apartment in silence. Once home, uncle immediately started preparing the tea, fluttering around the tiny kitchen like he would die if he stopped. Zuko sat down by the table, prepared to drink whatever connotation that his uncle forced on him. It was the least he could do.

Especially when he planned to once again return to the Earth King’s palace.

Iroh sat the cup down in front of Zuko and Zuko obediently waited until his uncle had sat down across from him before he picked up the cup of steaming water. Watching the steam rise up into the air, Zuko’s eyebrow twitched as he quickly smelled it.

”Well, nephew,” Iroh said and gestured to the cup. ”Drink up.”

Zuko swallowed everything in one giant gulp.

”Li!” Uncle reached out and gripped Zuko’s hands around the cup. ”Why would you do that? Did you even manage to taste it?”

”No.”

His uncle’s eye twitched. Iroh took a deep breath and looked at Zuko with such a disappointed expression, Zuko didn’t believe it for a second. ”You have to take your time. Tea is meant to be enjoyed, sip by sip.”

”Then it’ll get cold,” Zuko very reasonably pointed out.

Iroh sighed. ”The folly of youth, I suppose. Just because you take your time, does not mean the time for something will have passed.”

A beat, then, ”Is that another proverb?”

”You know what, my dear nephew, I think it could be.”

Zuko laid down on the bed and closed his eyes. His uncle was still up, getting the rest of the place in order before going to sleep. Zuko could hear him muttering to himself, but it was too low for him to make out any words. Turning on his side, Zuko faced the wall and allowed his uncle’s voice to wash over him, bringing with it a sense of safety.

Breathing rhythmically, he slowed his breaths and counted them in his head. One, two, three, four… soon, he was no longer aware of anything.

He woke up in the middle of the night with a start. Heart pounding in his chest, he stared up at the cracked ceiling, his eyes wide. He pressed a hand over his stomach and pushed himself into a sitting position. Bending over, he rested his head on his hands.

A dream… it was only a dream. But it had seemed so vivid, the images clear as day in his mind. Yet, those same vivid images had already started to fade, and with every passing second, he lost the ability to clearly imagine it. But he didn’t lose the knowledge of what he had dreamt of. He didn’t forget what it had been about.

Moving around on the bed, Zuko shoved his hand under the side of the mattress facing the wall. His hand dug around under it for a few seconds before he gripped what he was looking for and pulled it out, the gold necklace resting in it.

Zuko was not so stupid as to go around wearing it. He had gotten it from a noble, after all, and who knew if there was some kind of secret code on it. Maybe the placement of the gems? The pattern of the braided chain? The very material of the gems and chain itself? Regardless, he wouldn’t risk it.

Now, he squeezed the chain in his hands, the tiny gems cutting into his skin. He stared at it, the gold stretching over his pale skin, and was once again reminded of the dream. It wasn’t even an outrages dream. He was only rattled by the normalcy of it.

It was simply a dream of him and Kei in the library. A dream in which they talked and read books and ate dinner together — a dream in which Zuko was unmasked.

A dream in which he was himself.

He didn’t understand why it effected him so much.

Swallowing the lump in his throat, he looked out the window, needless though it might be. No matter how much he wanted, he couldn’t go visit Kei now. And not tomorrow. Not with the mess Jet had made, not when the Dai Li were aware of Zuko. If he made a move now, it could ruin everything that his uncle had worked so hard for.

Shoving the necklace back in its hiding place, Zuko crawled back beneath the thin, ratty sheet and forced himself to ignore the urge to see Kei growing in him. He closed his eyes and let the voices of the city wash over him.

He rose with the sun. Rubbing his eyes, he let out a weak yawn and threw his legs over the edge of the bed. He dragged his hand through his hair and frowned at the shortness of it. Somedays he still couldn’t over the fact that his hair was so short, when it had only ever been long. Even when he was healing after his fa— after the Agni Kai, his hair had still been long, as was only proper.

Iroh ruffled through the cabinets. ”You know, nephew, I think we’re out of salt,” Iroh said, sounding mystified. Like he had no idea what had happened to it.

Zuko shrugged. ”We’ll buy some on the way back.”

”Might as well,” Iroh responded and sighed. After breakfast, they set out.

They lived fairly close to the teashop, all things considered. Going there took only a fraction of the time it took Zuko to reach the palace. And with his uncle leading the way, who naturally knew all the shortcuts, they were at the teashop just in time for it to open. Zuko pulled on the apron while his uncle got the fire and hot water started and then they waited. It didn’t take long for the first customer to arrive; old woman Sha, a regular. She came by every morning as soon as they opened and spent an hour just sitting around. Occasionally, she was joined by other old ladies and they would spend half the day just gossiping.

This time she came alone. As soon as she saw him, her old, wrinkled face lit up and she sped up as much as her arthritic joints could. ”Li!” she called and waved enthusiastically. ”Come give an old woman a hand, and tell how it went with that boy yesterday, the one who claimed you’re a fire bender,” she demanded and patted his hand gently as he held her arm and escorted her to her usual table.

”I fought him,” Zuko said.

She grinned brightly at him, ”Yes, yes, but I want the details,” she insisted.

”I met him on the ship over,” Zuko started. By the time that he had finished relaying the whole story, old woman Sha was sitting at her usual table and sipping tea while Zuko sat across from her. She had made encouraging noises throughout the entire story, only interrupting him once in a while to ask for more tea.

”—And that’s it,” Zuko said, sipping at his own tea. He blinked down at, a little concerned that he didn’t quite remember when he got it, but when he looked up, his uncle gazed back at him with a thoroughly amused look. Zuko scowled back at him.

Old woman Sha hummed in thought, closing her eyes as she sighed in pleasure while swallowing a sip of tea. Leaning over the table, she gave him a daring look and asked, ”Is your uncle single?”

She asked this every time she came. Zuko had long since learned that she didn’t mean it in seriousness, not for herself, rather she would introduce his uncle to all of her friends in the hope that something would happen. Nothing ever did, expect that uncle once again regaled everyone with the tragic tale of his wife’s passing. It wasn’t the true one, of course, but one more fitting for Ba Sing Se.

With more customers entering the teashop, Zuko eventually had to detangle himself from old woman Sha and do his job. He likely wouldn’t be fired, the manager liked Iroh’s tea too much, but his salary might get cut if he dallied too much and they couldn’t afford it.

Old woman Sha stayed until lunch, at which point she left for a quick break. She was back not an hour later, this time dragging two of her friends with her. While Zuko was to every corner of the shop, she and her friends gossiped behind their fans, occasionally bursting out into quiet fits of laughter. Sometimes they did this just after looking at him.

Restless, Zuko tapped his foot on the floor. His gaze swept up to the roof outside the window, and he frowned when he saw the setting sun. It was getting late. Closing time was coming closer and he was getting sick of doing this every evening. Always, it was the same. He tidied up the tables, cleaning the public area while his uncle cleaned behind the counter. Even sweeping had become a dull, lifeless activity that he could do on muscle-memory, no thinking needed. And his uncle always managed to look jovial and amused at Zuko’s pain, even after all of this time.

Biting down on his lip, Zuko glared at the floor. His uncle was almost done and then they could leave. They’d go back to their tiny apartment, like they always did. They would sleep on the same ratty beds with the same thin blankets and the same useless pillows.

Nothing ever changed here. 

But change was coming, Zuko was sure of it. He could feel in it in his bones, a rattling to his fire that wouldn’t sit still. Not moving, staying here quietly, felt like it could drive him insane. There was somewhere he needed to go.

Turning his head, he faced the direction of the Earth King’s palace. He couldn’t see it, of course, but he had the image of it imprinted on his brain. He knew what it looked like from the outside. From the inside. He knew where to go, what routes to take, how to get there undetected. He could go now. He could go, and force things to change.

But he was a covered, and he couldn’t.

Scuffing his foot harshly against the floor, he glared at it. He forced his fire under control and decided that there was nothing to it; his uneasy spirit would only put a hamper on his uncle’s good mood.

”I’m going ahead,” Zuko announced and immediately left.

”See you at home,” Iroh happily called after him.

Zuko’s eye twitched, but he didn’t respond. As he walked the familiar path home, his eyes drifted again to the skyline, to the roofs above. To the path that could easily take him to Kei. But it was too soon, and Zuko couldn’t risk it, but his legs were tingling with the need to move and his heart was beating a mile a minute and he was going to throw up.

Stopping, he stalked into an alleyway and crouched down behind a few empty crates. He shoved his head down under his arms and sat there, waiting for his heart to calm down. He didn’t even know what had set him off.

His hand moved but—of course, he couldn’t find the necklace. He didn’t have it with him, because if he was caught by the Dai Li — by the ordinary guards even — with that necklace, it wouldn’t end well. Theft would be the obvious conclusion and if it was worth enough (Zuko knew jewelry, it was worth more than enough) they might drag his uncle into it. There was plenty of paintings of both his uncle and him circulating, it wouldn’t take a lot of investigating to realize who they were.

But he missed it. It was a gift, one that had been given without any underlying message. A gift, one that he hadn’t even repaid, and he wanted to be able to wear it in the open. He wanted to be able to walk with it around his neck, without being accused of stealing.

Throwing his feet out from under him, he plopped down on the ground properly. He leaned his body against the wall behind him, his head tilted up to watch the evening sky above him.

It was inching ever closer to night. 

Soon, the stars would be out. Soon, the strength that he gained from the sun would be gone. Soon, soon, soon. 

It was always soon.

It hadn’t even been that long since he first found the Avatar. It couldn’t be more than a year. Yet, everything happened so quickly and now he was stuck in Ba Sing Se, banished from his own country. Exiled, on the run — not even finding the Avatar had made his father accept him.

Everything was slipping through his fingers. His honor, his strength, his identity — it would all be lost. Someday, he wouldn’t have any of it left. 

There would just be Li.

Banging his head against the wall, Zuko swore under his breath at the stinging pain. Cursing, he dragged his hands through his short hair and winced at the resulting soreness. He couldn’t sit here forever. He had to go back before uncle came home, or Iroh would give him one of those looks when he came back, like he thought Zuko might have been out on a rendezvous with a woman or something.

It was only made worse by the fact that technically, he was out on rendezvouses. Too many times for common sense, because Zuko was an idiot who had no self-control and always kept repeating mistakes.

But his uncle would give him a look, and he would smile that smile that said he knew exactly what was going on and wasn’t going to say a word about it, only quietly gloating, and it would be awkward and Zuko would be forced to make his uncle tea or something to distract him. The last time Zuko made tea was an utter failure and he wasn’t in a rush to repeat the incident.

Slogging around the crates, he slowly left the alleyway, picking up speed as he went. Ducking around pedestrians, Zuko weaved his way back to the apartment. Once there, he breathed out in relief at noticing uncle wasn’t home yet.

Sitting down on his bed, he rested his head against his hands and whispered, ”What am I going to do?”

His hand sneaked out and he pulled the necklace out from its hiding place. Squeezing it in his closed hand, he carefully made sure that it was out of sight of anyone peeking in through the window. Cupping it, he stared down at the glittering chain and felt his heart squeeze painfully tight in his chest. Zuko didn’t know why.

Tomorrow, he would go to the palace.

He wouldn’t be able to wait longer than that, he already doubted he’d be able to sleep. But he couldn’t go today, it was still too soon. So tomorrow, he would sneak his way there again. For safety, he’d take another route there, and go earlier than usual. There wasn’t really a lot of extra precautions that he could take that he wasn’t already using.

Sleep. If he slept now, then time would move faster and it would be tomorrow when he woke up. Nodding to himself, he decided that this was an excellent plan and laid down on the bed, his hand still gripping the necklace tightly in his fist.

Forcing his eyes shut, he was asleep within moments, the stress of the situation with Jet leaving him exhausted down to his bones. Zuko rested uneasy throughout the night, but when he woke up properly, it was morning and the sun was rising. Uncle was snoring loudly, occasionally turning on his tiny bed and making it groan worriedly.

Zuko stared up at the cracked ceiling. His hand spasmed around the necklace still in his grip. Today, he would go back. Today, his idiocy would be evident to anyone who knew him.

Today.

The rest of the day, he was simply going through the motions. Time slipped through his fingers like sand, gone before he had even managed to get his bearings. His uncle kept giving him concerned looks but Zuko evaded all of his attempts to talk about it. His feet restlessly tapped on the ground as he waited for evening to come.

Finally, the time came. Changing into his Blue Spirit costume, Zuko waited until his uncle was in the midst of going to the toilet, left a quick note saying that he was going to run an errand and disappeared into the looming night.

He took a path that cut through many different markets in Ba Sing Se. Each time he entered a mass of people, he used every trick that he could do blend in with them and lose his pursuers. That was, assuming that there were any. But he wasn’t going to take any chances, so even though he felt ridiculous, he repeated the process several times.

By the time that he reached the palace, he felt like the biggest fool in the world, not the least bit because of the complicated routines he had been doing in the middle of crowds. Night hadn’t yet truly sat in, and it showed in the amount of people still walking the streets and swarming the markets.

Sneaking past the guards surrounding the palace on all sides, he made his way to his usual entrance. There, he waited for over an hour, cautiously looking for any sign of an ambush or that he was being pursued.

There was no such thing as taking too many precautions.

When he finally entered the palace again, for the first time in days and with his heart inexplicably beating much more harshly than normal in his chest, thumping so loudly that he could hear it, Zuko felt his hands spasms by his side. He narrowed his eyes and snuck gently along the ceiling, never once dropping down to the floor.

Reaching the library, Zuko opened the door the tiniest crack that he could possibly squeeze through and hurried inside. He kept ahold of the door behind himself, forcing it to close quietly.

Zuko walked stealthily between the shelves, hurrying as quickly as he could without making a sound or knocking into something. He approached the tiny hidden area he had memorized the quickest route too with his heart thumping ever louder. He could hear it in his head, the sound so loud it drowned out everything else.

Turning the last corner, he saw the entrance ahead. Speeding up, Zuko’s hands clenched by his sides and he forced himself not to break out into a run. He wanted to make sure that Kei was okay. That there were no Dai Li agents lying in wait for him. That he hadn’t lost everything; that he still had something left. 

Something. Anything. Just—he couldn’t lose it all.

He broke out into the sanctuary. Kei started and looked up, his face distressingly open. In his hands was a scroll and on the table were three more laying open, haphazardly thrown about. Zuko stalked over to the table, pulled out a chair and threw himself down on it.

A beat, then— ”Ah, are you… okay?”

Zuko forcefully breathed out all of the air trapped in his lungs. He dragged in a deep breath and glared spitefully at Kei. The glare sputtered out almost instantly when he was faced with Kei’s wide green eyes, staring at him with worry etched all over them. Zuko slouched back on the chair and muttered out, ”Fine.”

”Oh,” Kei lowered his gaze to his scroll. His hands fiddled with the edges of it, dragging along it and tracing nonsensical patterns. Kei licked his lips and peeked up at Zuko, ”If you want to talk about something,” Kei paused and took a stuttering breath, ”I will gladly listen.”

Zuko stared at him. He looked him over, every inch of him that was visible in the low light above the table. His eyes caught on those wide sleeves, that long braid, those ludicrous glasses. He wasn’t sure what he was feeling right now, but he knew that it was a mistake. Just like everything. But he was starting to think it would be alright. Zuko was never going to stop making mistakes. But he thought that, lately, he’d been getting just the tiniest bit better at fixing them. At paying the price for them.

”There was an… alteration,” Zuko rolled the last word around on his tongue. His eyes tracked Kei’s tongue as it slipped out to wet his lips. Kei looked at him, frowning. Zuko huffed and scowled, looking away. ”I dealt with it,” he said.

”Are you hurt?” Kei asked, leaning towards Zuko as if he might be able to tell just by looking at him. He wouldn’t. Zuko was too good at this for that. Quietly, Zuko shook his head. No, he didn’t think he was hurt. Concerned, worried, distraught possibly, but he wasn’t hurt. At the end of the day, he hadn’t known Jet very well. The teenager’s hatred hadn’t hurt him.

But if, one day, Kei found out the truth and (rightfully) hated him… it might hurt a lot.

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#Fandom: ATLA #Post Type: Fic #Rating: Teen #Status: On Hiatus #Tag: AU #Tag: Age Difference #Tag: Hurt/Comfort #WC: 20000-40000