Chapter One: Not Knowing Why

The nervousness in the young boy swelled up as he stood by the door and heard sobs emanating from inside the room. It was a wooden door, crudely furnished, but deemed fit enough for the ship of a banished 11-year-old prince.

His father, Fire Lord Ozai, had told him—promise him in a letter—that he would be given a new ship when he turned 16. A nicer ship with which to roam the world, wander everywhere but to home.

Wander was the word Katara liked to romantically describe his situation with. Not banished.

Not your father hates you and never liked you and wanted you to disappear after your mother left.

She would describe it as wandering... in this romantic way.

She would clasp her hands together and those bright blue eyes would just seem to obliterate the world with the amount of shine and sparkle they would simply exude as she would get caught up in those erroneous notion.

But much as Zuko would want to shut her down—to growl at her and remind that he was, indeed, banished and forbidden from returning home—in the back of his mind, he had wanted to strive to believe it.

He had wanted to believe it. That he was journeying simply on wanderlust.

Because no 11-year-old boy should be forced to journey simply because his father can't stand the sight of him, the sight of his face, which was so eerily similar to that of his mother's.

It was when He was 9 and she was 8 that she'd first suggested it—wander-lust. She couldn't remember much from her water tribe home (presumably a water tribe upbringing at least), but she said that it was a word that left an inkling on her tongue; a reminder.

A water tribe word that meant a desire to explore, to be free of the world and all worldly attachments. To let go of responsibility—release it—and roam around the world with the desire to search, explore, dive deep into the treasures of the world and learn more and more about everything on earth.

Wanderlust. That's how she described his banishment. That was when he was 9 and she was 8, and it had been one year since they'd found her lying on the deck on the shore of a banking.

When he was 8 and she was 7, she had been found lying on the rough metal edges of a port dock. Right in front of his ship, as if they had been waiting to find her. Zuko only had vague memories of the time, but her hair had been unhealthy and askew and splattered all over her.

Iroh would recall that her clothes had been torn and she had seemed as if she were a vengeful water spirit having risen out of the sea—a small but vengeful water-maiden perhaps shirked and gone awry. There was seaweed stuck all over black wavy hair spread about her figure on the group. She lay limply, seeming dead and beyond hope. Perhaps already a martyred and murdered waterspirit.

But when Iroh had touched her, the second his first finger gently poked her child forearm, he had felt a light.

A light of fire and that was when he had known she was alive.

He had taken her on his ship (which was Iroh's own ship until Zuko had received a one from his supposedly benevolent father, on his ninth birthday), and nursed her back to health.

And slowly, the death-ridden look of her position and posturedied out on the infirmary bed. And before the ship knew it, a delightful new voice had graced the ship—one of a lovely young girl.

The moment Iroh realized the 7-year old girl and the happiness that she introduced to the otherwise solemn ship, had he received perspective on how grim their journey thus far truly had been. It was at that moment that the middle-aged general decided to keep her. It was that moment of delightful insight that something new roused within him: the frown fell from his face, the armor fell from his chest, the bitter worries and disapproval with what his younger brother was doing with his kingdom and the constant worry with what his younger brother had done to his nephew... just disappeared.

It had all disappeared once he realized the joy that Katara innately introduced the ship, the belief that something more—something better—could exist.. was when Iroh gave up and sat down and took off his grim jet-black armor. It was at that moment that he sat down at a Pai Sho table and took a sip of tea and his eyes sparkled like a new light.

When he began to see Zuko as not a pity case—not the poor benefactor of his magnanimity and unfortunate circumstance of his brother's wrath, but rather a new light in the world.

It was the sound of the laughter that had gotten to Iroh that day, nearly a week after they had finally got around to finish treating Katara.

Katara was important to them all. Zuko knew this. And this was why he trembled with fear and confusion as he heard the indelible slaught of sobs coming from the other side of the door—her door. Coming from her.

The wood was rot and rotting from the winds of the sea that had penetrated it for three years, but no worries—his father said he would be treated a new one soon.

Unfortunately, the currently rotting wood on her door made it so that he could hear all her sobs clearly.

And darn it, he was too afraid to go in and ask why.

He knew something important had happened; Katara didn't usually cry. And when she did, she would not hide away from him and cry like this. She would cry when he'd hurt her in a game or something. She would cry loudly and scream at him angrily. Not.. not in the never-ending hopeless, heartfelt way she was doing now. Not in the type of way that would inspire fear within him like it was doing right at this moment.

He was afraid to go in. She was not angry; she was sad.

Imagine that: him. Zuko. Crown Prince of the Fire Nation (or previous, whatever). Afraid to go into simple Katara's room?

He had never been afraid of Katara. They had been playmates since she had first found a home on his Uncle's ship.

And since he was a few months older, naturally, he was the leader. He had always been in charge of what they played and what the rules were and he was supposed to tell Katara what to do.

He was nine months older, anyway. So it was justified.

But now he was afraid to go in. He gulped deeply, standing outside the door.

He could go in there and tell her to shut up and stop crying... or he could wait until she stopped and then demand to know why she had even been crying.

But somehow, neither of those choices seemed particularly nice or amenable.. Or applicable to this situation. He was scared. She sounded scared.

She had ran into the breakfast/dining room that morning as Iroh and Zuko had been eating breakfast. Her face had a look of frantic surprise on it and her eyes were erratic and she had completely ignored Zuko and rushed past the table to Iroh's side to whisper something into his ear.

General Iroh had raised his eyebrows and then told her to go back to her room and then shortly thereafter left the room.

Zuko had looked up from his plate and blinked blankly at him leaving. What had just happened? He hadn't been paying attention

After watching his Uncle leave, without another thought, he finished up his eggs and meat and then left, wanderedout onto the deck to find his helmsmen, whom had acquiesced to his sincere and nervous request for two firebending practice partners in the mornings. It was still nine and his 11-year-old forehead was heavy with sweat accumulated from training with full-grown men, when he once again wandered away from the deck to find Katara. The training with his crew members had finished, and now he begun to wonder where Katara was.

By this time, she would normally be up (she was such a sleepyhead) and they would be ready to go to his room and look at maps and his books and decide on their future plan of action. They would play around with the stuff in his room—he had never really appreciated all of the various knickknacks that his second-aunts and second-uncles would send to him overseas until after Katara came—and create stories and games and plan their adventures. It almost kind of sort of made him excited about having so much more time to do stuff before he inherited the throne. (And Iroh was convinced that he would, despite his current situation).

Best of all with having Katara as a playmate was that she always knew what to say or do. On some level, he kept up a discouraging sense of optimism for his future. On the other, he maintained a steady balance of desire and neutrality for his presence.

Katara always knew what to say or do. She could make him forget for a while about all the bad aspects of his banishment. Make him stop wondering why he was banished.

Even though he was the oldest, he wasn't sure he would have much to lead if Katara weren't there to tell him about the stories and what adventures they could go on anyway. They had recently been creating a tale of a desert wanderer in the Eastern Hemisphere Desert, and had been planning their (tentative) jungle trip to the Swampy Marshes of Earth Kingdom. (They had yet to inform Uncle of this plan and decision).

(Katara always said that it was better to plan first and do later. They would bring it to Uncle once they were sure exactly how many foggy swamp grass leaves they would need to eat to survive for four weeks in the jungle).

Katara was Zuko's best playmate. He would sighed lamentedly on the days Iroh that would take her outside to the town for a treat when they happened to be docked near a town.

Zuko generally hated going out, so he never went. The first time he had gone out, in the first week he had been banished when he was eight, every villager and marketeer in the open-market had stopped speaking and turned and gasped at him.

The banished prince! That's the banished prince!

He is here. It wasn't just a lie! The rumoured banished prince of the Fire Nation.

Oh my, that scar.. my he's only eight. I wonder what he did.

You know firebenders—they're ruthless. Just imagine how this little one got so ruthless that even his family had to kick him out.

I heard he's going to be Fire Lord again someday, I heard it was just a dispute over his father... when his father dies...

Prince Zuko is his name, isn't it?

Everyone had heard the rumours and recognized him. Cleared a pathway through the street for him. Through the years, he had stayed sullied up in his ship whenever they would dock for new supplies near a large port with a town and bazaar and city. His uncle would bring him back things. The public eye had definitely not seen the prince in ages and he had no desire to show his ugly face to the world ever again... not with the stigma he would face, though that rationale was much too complex for his 10-year-old mind to decipher.

All Zuko did during those times that the port launched was sulk in his study room and wait for Katara and Iroh to get back. There would be only two helmsmen still on the ship; his uncle would only keep them there to keep on eye on Zuko, for everyone else would be wanting to be out in town. It was eerily silent and quiet those times on the ship, but he was just sit there and wait.

Aside from those days that Katara would disappear with Uncle into the time, Zuko and Katara followed a regularly leisurely routine.

They were kids; they did essentially whatever they wanted but routine and stability was also quite rather nice.

Katara enjoyed having breakfast with Iroh and Zuko, and so would force herself awake at "the most ungodliest of times!" to eat it with the two firebenders blearily.

Personally, Zuko didn't understand the sense behind her motives. She would be drooping her chin off into the bowl of cereal and snoring into her milk-filled spoon while Iroh would be giggling and Zuko would be staring unamusedly at her.

Or, she would show up unreasonably happy with crust coating the sides of her large eyes, coupled with lots of eye boogers.

Zuko wasn't much of a conversationalist in the morning either, so he would usually just listen to Iroh chuckle and Katara's inconsistancies with half his mind.

And then, eventually, he would walk off to find whichever two helmsmen had volounteered to spar the 11-year-old boy that day, and Katara would sleepily trinkle back into her room like a tired ghost and plop back down on the bed to sleep a bit more after her breakfast with her two favorite firebending royals.

Seriously, Zuko would think as he'd pass by her room during training to get a drink of water, What is the point in getting up to eat breakfast early with us everyday anyway?

But after his training was over, she would be up from her after-breakfast nap, smiling and bright.

And he would be energetic and ecstatic and with blood pounding in his bones, heart beat rising from his excercises.

They would go to his "study" room and look over his things and try and read the map and materials and work on a new story, or perhaps come up with a new game with which to play. Katara would try every so often to get him to come out to the market with Uncle Iroh and her, and he would adamantly decline the request (for reasons Katara would never understand of course—).

And after their afternoon was over, it would be time for Zuko's lessons with his private tutor.

He would have to sit through three or four hours of history lessons, cultural texts, politics lectures, tea ceremony ettiquette (yes! tea!), court politics mantra, mathematics review, economics teaching, ancient literatur, and confucious analects.

It was a boring, mundane, trivial task. And Zuko wondered why his tutor didn't just become Fire Lord if he knew everything so well. And the boring tea ritual was the worst part of every week..

In moment of anger and frustration whenever he'd fail to grasp another complex mathematic concept, Zuko would ask himself why the hell he'd have to learn court politics anyway if he wasn't even in a court. He was a banished prince, not a part of current day court nobility. His sister, Azula was in the court. He was not. He was not his father's favorite. He looked like his mother.

He was banished out.

Yet, he ignored the unspoken notion that he may not gain the Fire throne in the future and worked diligently on his lessons in the hopes that someday, in the future, his father will call him back and name him The Fire Lord.

For now, as Katara said, he was simply pursuing a wanderlust. Of his own being and volition. Doing everything that he could not possibly do within being confined to the position and throned seat of the Fire Lord. It was a privilege, a sanctity, rather than some cruel and unusual punishment.

"Hah!" Katara had said when he'd first brought up his concerns to her."What do you care about Azuka? She doesnt get to pursue her wanderlust like you do! She's stuck dancing in pretty little pointy shoes and pretending to say things she doesn't care about! Oh!—I want to see the polar bear-platypuses!... Hmm... Is it platypi? Let's go to the north pole next!"

Yep. Katara always made him feel better.

After his lessons, which he worked diligently on because Katara and Iroh had convinced him he would soon become Firelord, he would go back to the dinner/breakfast/dining hall of the small ship to have dinner with his Uncle, Iroh, and Katara. Sometimes he'd invite Jee too.

He would never invite his tutor though. This guy was inscrutable.

So Zuko had become worried when instead of finding her in his room after his firebending practice like he always did, she was instead sobbing in her room in a way he had never seen heard before.

He was too afraid to open the door and wondered back to breakfast time when he had been too silly and beacon to notice that she had disappeared after whispering something urgently to Uncle Iroh.

Zuko wasn't sure why, but he was upset. Knowing that he was scared was not a very fun thing.

Katara hadn't come to continue their novel or work on their future plans of travel and itinerary, or check out the new snow globe his captain had brought for the two of them them from a trader at the last market he'd stopped at during a midnight pit stop.

And he wasn't sure what to do about it.