He sat solemnly on the cold metal floor of his cell. His eyes closed, bound topknot draping eerily still down the back of his head. Somewhere on the other side of the small brig, another inmate's chains clanked against the iron bars, but he did not hear it. He was lost in deep meditation.
Wardens came and left, occasionally accompanied by the sound of a metal plate clattering across the metal floor, and still he sat just like that. For hours. His hands were bound tightly, palms facing each other, in a single steel glove. No one ever saw him eat, and for the first several days he was there, he did not eat at all. When finally hunger drove him to eat, he did so only during the darkest of watches, refusing to give them the pleasure of seeing the Fire Prince on his knees, eating like an animal. They only knew that his dishes were empty during the next rounds.
He didn't know how long he'd been confined. There wasn't enough light available to mark the passing of days, but if he measured by the number of meals he'd received, he had been there nearly a month. The hair around his topknot had grown out and was tickling the tops of his ears. A shaggy growth of hair hung from his chin and upper lip.
It had been three days since the ship's progress had been stopped. He could only assume they had put into port somewhere in one of the territories held by his father. He hoped it would give Iroh time to catch up.
Loud voices echoed in the hallway outside the cell block. Excited voices. The door to the brig was thrown open and at least four pairs of boots stomped through the corridor and disrupted his reverie. The door of the cell next to his slid open with a metallic hiss, and a dark bundle was deposited on the cot.
"Someone to keep you entertained, Your Majesty," Zhao sneered.
Zuko returned to his meditation without a second thought for his new neighbor.
An hour, possibly two, later, Zuko was disturbed again by the steady sounds of sobbing on the edge of his hearing. He opened his eyes and glared through the bars at the lump lying on the cot. Through the dim light, he made out the form of a woman.
"What are you crying about, woman!" he demanded.
"Nothing," came her soft reply. He knew her voice. The Waterbender girl.
He sneered in disgust. So weak. An hour inside of a Fire Navy ship and she was broken. No wonder her tribe had been so easy to conquer. If only she'd shut up so he could continue with his meditation.
"Then be quiet," he ordered, "If I have to spend another month in this cell, I'll go insane if I have to listen to your blubbering, waterwitch."
She did not respond.
When Zuko next woke, it was to the sound of the Waterbender's cell being opened. He cracked open one golden eye to see what Zhao was up to, but made no movement or sound.
"You, girl!" Zhao demanded, "Get up!"
He grabbed her where she had been sleeping and hauled her up roughly by her hair. He shoved her against the metal bars that separated her cell from Zuko's.
"Where is the Avatar!" he demanded.
Zhao turned the girl's head so she could see the cold metal bars next to her face. Zuko could see the girl's eyes, wide awake and filled with terror. His heart sank in that moment. She would tell Zhao, and any hope he harbored for restoring his honor was lost. But, the girl remained silent.
"Tell me, or by Agni I will make you regret it!" Zhao slammed her head back against the bars, causing an echo that reverberated throughout the cellblock.
The girl let out a whimper, but said nothing.
Zhao released his hold on her hair and motioned to one of the wardens. The burly guard threw her over his shoulder, and the entire company left, carrying the girl with them.
Zuko had returned to his customary position, seated and meditating. The daily meal grew cold on the floor behind him. He ignored it. Again the sound of boots rattled against the metal floor, and again, the girl was deposited in the cell next to him. This time, she was dumped unceremoniously on the floor. Zuko waited until he heard the last of the wardens exit the brig and the heavy door clanged shut behind him before he turned to look at the girl.
She lay unmoving on the floor of her cell, facing him with her cheek pressed against the floor. Zuko crawled to the bars that separated their cells. A faint coating of mist appeared and evaporated on the cool metal next to her nose, in time with the shallow rise and fall of her chest. Blue eyes stared at him. No, not at him. Through him. A single tear formed and trickled down the side of her bruised face, disappearing into her dark brown hair above her ear.
Zuko retreated to his cot and leaned back against the hull of the ship that served as one of his cell walls. She had given up the Avatar. She was a peasant, she had no training in torture endurance. She had no military training. And she was weak, a bender of a weak element. And she had proven her weakness by giving up her friends, Zuko was certain of that.
He remained in that position for several hours. When the clanging and movement of the other prisoners stopped, and their ragged breathing slowed, Fire Prince Zuko climbed off his cot and knelt before his plate. He glanced at the water peasant in the next cell. She was still catatonic, but breathing. He bent down at the waist and placed his face over the plate. With an exasperated sigh, he ate.
"What's your name?" she asked, her voice rasping and weak.
"I don't have one," he answered, relieved that she hadn't seen his scar or recognized his voice.
"What am I supposed to call you, then?" she persisted.
"You don't. At all."
"How about, 'Koinu?' It suits you."
"How does that suit me?" he was getting irritated.
"You eat like one," she whispered.
"Like one what?"
"A puppy-dog."
"You saw that?" He felt the palms of his hands getting hot.
"Yes, but I won't tell. Why are your hands bound like that? Are you a firebender?"
Zuko grunted in reply.
"I'll take that as a, 'yes.' Would you like me to help you?"
"You? Help me?" Zuko was confused. What could an incarcerated, half-pulped waterbender do to help him?
"I can help you eat," she whispered her offer, "So that you don't have to eat like... that."
Zuko was taken aback by her offer. "No, thanks. I'd rather eat like a dog than accept food from a coward and a weakling."
"Fine," she said, rather curtly, "eat like a dog, firebender."
The cell block fell quiet for a few merciful hours.
She was awakened from a sound sleep by a sudden pain in her abdomen. She opened her bleary eyes to see Zhao looming over her, his boot planted firmly in her gut. He grabbed her by the hair on the front of her head and wrenched her neck back painfully.
"Alright, wench, let's try this again. Where is the Avatar?" He boomed.
Katara choked back a cry. Crying just made it worse. They were like sharks and her tears were like blood in the water. She looked him in the face, concentrating on the set of his chin. If she concentrated on something hard enough, she wouldn't feel. Wouldn't hear. Wouldn't speak. Most importantly, she wouldn't speak.
The room spun as she was hauled up out of her cot and thrown over another warden's shoulder. She bit her lip to keep from screaming out in pain when the back of her head struck the metal doorframe as she was taken out of the brig again.
They stopped moving. A door was unlatched. More movement. A door was re-latched, and she was rolled off the guard's shoulder and dropped to the floor. Another knee was forced into her back, and her hands were bound. A sharp sting to her right cheek, and she opened her eyes.
Zhao's hot breath surrounded her. All she could see was his face, an inch from hers.
"Do we have to do this again, witch?" he asked, a wicked smile curling across his face.
She said nothing.
"Again! Where is the Avatar!"
Silence.
Strong hands picked her up and threw her across a desk, pinning her shoulders down. Half-rolled parchments flew off the desk and floated to the ground. An inkwell crashed into the wall and shattered. A faint clinking noise overhead caught her attention. She stared at the tiny chandelier suspended from the ceiling over the desk. Focused on it. On the flame. Nothing but the flame.
Her legs were wrenched apart.
The flame danced and swayed to a song she couldn't hear. Maybe if she listened carefully...
Rough hands reached up under her tunic and grasped her bare hips.
The flame ducked and jumped and she realized that it was keeping time with the beating of her heart.
Pain stabbed her like a knife up from her most private regions, ripping up into her abdomen. She squirmed and bit down on her lip. Then, she felt nothing.
She was floating again. Up to the candle in the chandelier. She drifted past it, and the flame joined her, dancing and twisting to the sound of her heartbeat drumming in her ears, they floated. She dimly registered a burning pain on the inside of her thighs, a wetness streaking from the corners of her eyes, a sting to her left breast. As long as the flame danced, she didn't have to feel it.
Cold. She felt cold again. The flame was gone and every part of her body ached. She sat up carefully, holding her body at an angle to keep her weight off the bruises on her buttocks and thighs. She wiped a crusty trail of salt off the side of her face where her tears had dried.
She glanced around.
She was back in her cell. Her neighbor, the surly firebender, was sitting cross-legged on the floor on the other side of the bars. His food was sitting untouched by his cell door, as hers was sitting by her door.
She curled up on her cot and brought her knees up to her chest. Her last thoughts as she drifted off to sleep were of flying. Not with a flame, but on a great, warm, wonderful hairy beast. And laughter. Laughter of a boy too young to be caught up in this evil game.
Zuko waited until her breathing became slow and shallow. He unwound his legs, and with cat-like grace, he stood in one fluid movement. He couldn't bend, but he could still practice the movements, and he was going to need to stay in top form if he was going to get revenge on Zhao for this disgrace.
He leaned against the bars separating him from the waterbender girl. His golden eyes examined her as closely as the grey light allowed. More dark shadows crossed her face than the day before. Angry welts were rising on her wrists. Zhao's determination to beat Zuko to the Avatar was painted all over this girl's body, yet...
Obviously the girl had told Zhao nothing.
This peasant... This worthless girl from a dead Water Tribe... Had defied Zhao. A handful of words were all she had to say to spare herself from Zhao's lashings and beatings, but she chose to stay silent. Why? How?
Obviously the exiled Prince was missing a piece of the equation. Maybe she just didn't know where the Avatar was. No, that was nonsense. She'd been with him ever since he first discovered the Avatar was alive. Her pitiful affections for him at the other boy would have kept her tagging along behind them. No, it was something else, and Prince Zuko resolved to find out what.