Disclaimer: I'm not sure why exactly I need to put a disclaimer saying I don't own Avatar the Last Airbender, but pretty much every other fanfic has this so...yeah...here's mine. I do not own Avatar the Last Airbender or any of its affiliated characters. Also, enjoy the story!

Prologue

The full moon filled the dark sky with a bright, eerie glow. Once, Katara had been taught that the moon was her friend, that she and her people received their strength from it. Trapped in a foreign land, it was the last remaining vestige of her home; but now, its presence only taunted her, reminding her of everything she had lost: her mother, her father, her brother. Even herself. When she'd needed the Moon Spirit's strength the most, it had failed her. Now, she hated it.

Her long, unkempt hair stuck to her bare shoulders as she crawled desperately through the dense bush of the countryside. The humidity was unbearable here, even at night, but she barely noticed. Katara was weak. It had been days since she'd had real food. Unfamiliar with Fire Nation plants, Katara had been too scared to try to scavenge, fearing that she'd eat something poisonous, but now she was regretting that choice as her stomach angrily howled.

Water, as well, had been hard to come by. Her lips felt as cracked and dry as the great deserts of the Earth Kingdom. Every noise sounded like the drip of a waterfall or the babble of a brook, but no matter how long she walked, the water she so desperately needed remained elusive. With every step she lost hope of ever making it out of the Fire Nation alive. How ironic for a waterbender such as herself to die from dehydration. She was sure the Spirits would have a good chuckle at that.

Before, she prayed to Tui and La every night, giving thanks for her life and her bending, but it had been so long since her last prayer, years probably. The gratitude and respect she once felt towards the Spirits had long since dried up in the harsh reality of her imprisonment in the Fire Nation. It wasn't just her tongue that was dry, but also her soul. In the beginning, she had tried to stay resilient, never giving up hope that her father and Sokka would break free of their own chains and rescue her, but as weeks turned to months and months to years her optimism festered and she was left with nothing but resentment.

The coal mines of the Fire Nation were notorious for their harsh conditions and brutal labor. An average slave lasted only four to six years working underground before he died from either exhaustion or breathing ailments. The women were lucky to survive for more than a year. Though not as secure as other prisons, such as the famed Boiling Rock, the coal mines were still nearly impossible to escape. Given minuscule rations and beaten for the smallest of infractions, prisoners of the mines were thought to be physically incapable of escape.

Katara could still remember the cataclysmic night that had started it all. It had been a staggering twenty-five moons since her village was burnt to the ground and her tribe enslaved. Katara had been a child, only eleven, when she'd arrived at the Fire Nation coal mines as a war slave. In two year's time much had changed; she was slowly becoming a woman, something she would have looked forward to in the Southern Water Tribe. In the mines, however, this meant that Katara was entering dangerous waters. Female slaves were treated like little more than chattel among the mine guards, to be passed around for sport and pleasure. As her womanly figure emerged, Katara began to notice the lingering eyes of the guards.

Late one night, under the faint light of a crescent moon, Katara had tip-toed out of the barren tent that she shared with a large group of female prisoners. Though she was not permitted to be out during night, and risked punishment by doing so, her full bladder had been too persistent to ignore. Crawling between the rows of slave tents, Katara had been halfway to her destination when she heard it. Muffled screams came from a large tent to her right. The rich red canvas and brocade tassels indicated that it belonged to a guard, one of the higher-ranking officers. Katara stood frozen, the need to relieve herself completely forgotten, as the screams turned to pleas and loud, raucous laughter bubbled up in response. Her body quaked uncontrollably as she fell to the ground, her hands held tightly to her ears, trying to block out the sickening noises.

After a few minutes, the door to the tent was pulled open and a body met solid ground with a hard thump. Katara couldn't see anything past the shadows of the tent opening, but a sneering voice carried over to where she lay hidden.

"Get out of here, whore!" the voice commanded before the canvas door fluttered closed. Slowly, Katara crept towards the body, the shape of a woman appearing as she neared. Olive skin and almond-shaped eyes stared back at Katara from behind strands of dark hair. Her eyes had adjusted to the dark, allowing Katara to make out a smattering of bruises along the woman's arms, as well as deep cuts to her lip and face. However, the most glaring injury came from the woman's pelvic region, where blood had pooled around the ripped clothing. At the sight of this, a great need rose up within Katara; she desperately wanted to help this woman, but she didn't know what to do. Laying a hand on the woman's forehead, she leaned closer.

"W-What's wrong?" Katara stuttered, fear rising up from her belly and causing her to stumble over her words. However, the woman didn't notice Katara's stammer. She only continued to stare vacantly up at the starless sky. Tears collected in Katara's eyes as she struggled to help. Glancing around fervently, she saw something in her peripherals. A trough of water rested outside another large tent where the guards' komodo rhinos were kept. Suddenly, a tentative idea bloomed in Katara's mind.

Quickly, she crept over towards the trough, finding an empty bucket lying on the ground. Back at the woman's side with a bucket of water, Katara prepared to do something she had sworn she would never do again: waterbend. In her tribe, she had been the last waterbender—a secret that Katara's mother had given her life to protect. When the fire nation had attacked her tribe, it had not been at random; they had been searching for the last waterbender of the Southern Water Tribe. Katara's mother had sacrificed herself, claiming to be the last waterbender, and Katara had never seen her again. Since the loss of her mother, she had vowed to never bend again. But glancing at the injured woman, Katara knew she must break that promise.

Her hand glided over the water, feeling tiny tendrils of it nip at her fingers. Even after so long, the water responded to her like an obedient dog. Back in her tribe, Katara had heard the elders whisper of great waterbenders from the Northern Tribe that used their bending to heal. Though she had never had any real waterbending instruction and knew that healing was a hard skill to master, Katara would try anything if it meant helping the ravaged woman. Glancing down, she saw that the woman's eyes were now closed; panicking, Katara lightly shook the woman. Her almond-shaped eyes blinked open as if she was coming out of a daze.

"What's your name?" Katara asked, trying to keep her awake. A lengthy pause swelled until Katara could barely stand it.

"Jyoti. That's my name," the woman exhaled quietly. "What are you doing to me?" she questioned with a tinge of alarm in her voice. She tried to sit up, but Katara placed a soothing hand on her shoulder.

"I…I'm going to help you." Katara hesitated, unsure if revealing her waterbending would do her harm or good. A bitter, wheezing laugh bubbled up from Jyoti's cracked lips, causing more blood to flow from the wound there. The noise sounded so wrong to Katara's ears, full of tart acidity.

"Don't. I'm better off dead," Jyoti rasped. Her eyes took on a faraway look as she glanced up at the sky. A frail hand reached up and touched Katara's cheek.

"Such a pretty little thing…" Jyoti whispered, as if she was talking to herself. Katara grasped the woman's hand so she could lift it off her face, but she was suddenly yanked down forcefully, inches from Jyoti's face. Up close, she could see that the woman's eyes were a startling shade of green, crisp and striking, but filled with a crazed madness.

"They'll just love you," she crooned softly.

"W-Who?" Katara asked, unease erupting in her stomach. Another sluggish laugh rang out at her question.

"The guards," Jyoti hissed, her face filling with unconstrained malice, "Soon enough, one will take you to his bed. Every night you'll fight, struggle, and pray to the Spirits, but it won't matter…unless…" the woman's voice drifted off, the anger and hate washing away, leaving a blankness that was somehow worse than the insanity. Katara gripped Jyoti's arm tightly, rousing the woman into sentience.

"Unless what?"

"Unless you escape." The words, whispered quietly, hung in the night air as if frozen. Fear slithered around Katara's gut, clenching it in a vise-like grip that left her paralyzed. Jyoti was a madwoman, of that Katara was certain. Nobody escaped the mines.

"Impossible," Katara breathed. Though Jyoti's prediction of her future was terrifying enough to make Katara break out in a cold sweat, she wasn't delusional enough to believe she held any chance of escape.

"Impossible?" the woman echoed. "No. Not with this." A hard metal object was quickly pressed into the palm of Katara's hand. Glancing down, she saw a rusty skeleton key sitting in her palm.

"What―" Katara began, only to be interrupted.

"It unlocks an old tunnel in the mine shafts. Centuries ago, the first to mine these mountains dug many escape tunnels, in case of cave-ins. The tunnels led through the mountain and spilled out into villages in the valley. This is the only one still accessible."

Katara stared at the woman, shocked. "How did…who gave you…what?" she breathed quietly. Her hands felt heavy with the weight of they key lying there. The bucket of water lay beside her, all notions of healing completely forgotten. Katara leaned down close to Jyoti's face, finally gathering her thoughts. "How did you find this out?"

The vicious look returned to Jyoti's face. "From him," she hissed, jerking her head towards the guard's tent.

"A high-ranking guard told you how to escape and gave you the means to do it?" Katara questioned suspiciously.

"Of course not," Jyoti wheezed, "He claimed me when I first came to the mines, a years ago. I was nineteen. Every night that he took me I wanted to die. I even tried a few times. Then, I started looking for a way to escape. I searched his tent when he fell asleep one night and found the key. Later, I found a piece of parchment with the map of the tunnels printed on it."

"Why tell me, then? Why give me your only chance of escape?" Katara interrupted. Jyoti's spring green eyes filled with pain, anger, and…despair.

"Tonight was to be the night I escaped. He must have sensed my hope, or seen it in my eyes. His fists were harsher than usual, his tongue cruel and mocking. Now, there's no way I'd make it through the tunnel like this," she gestured to her injuries, "Not to mention I'd leave a convenient blood trail for them to follow."

"But I could wrap your wounds and help you through the tunnels. We can both―"

"No," Jyoti murmured, "Even if you helped me, neither of us would make it out of the tunnel before the he noticed the key missing. Not with me slowing you down." The woman turned her head back up to the sky and Katara could sense that she was miles away from the harsh Fire Nation mines. "I have nothing left to offer this world," she whispered. "But you do. I see it in your eyes. What's your name, girl?"

"Katara," she answered. Jyoti smiled, a soft curling of the lips that turned her heart-shaped face stunning.

"That's a beautiful name. You're Water Tribe, right?" Jyoti asked. She nodded yes. "Well, Katara of the Water Tribe, can you do me one favor?"

"What?" Katara asked, eyes intently boring into Jyoti's.

"Make them pay."

Even now, nearly a month after that night, the words were a heavy weight on Katara's heart. Jyoti had handed Katara a bag of stolen rations and the map, then told her to leave. Before Katara had a chance to argue, Jyoti had taken out a red-lacquered dagger with the Fire Nation insignia on it, closed her eyes, and ran the blade across her throat. She had watched helplessly as blood poured from Jyoti's neck. Katara's tears had mixed with the blood as life left the woman and her body drained of color, but even in death a small smile graced Jyoti's beautiful face. She had finally found peace.

Katara had fled the mines using Jyoti's tunnel, eventually finding her way out of the mountains and into a small valley town. From there she followed the coast and headed East. She had traveled at night and slept during the day, making sure to stay well clear of villages and towns, any place with people. She had been able to make Jyoti's stolen rations last her for a couple of weeks, but now she was out of food and starving. Disoriented and weak, Katara's thoughts rambled. She couldn't help but replay Jyoti's last words over and over in her head. Make them pay. Make them pay. Make them pay.

Katara's mind was so jumbled that she wasn't watching her feet. One of her toes tripped over an exposed root, sending her tumbling down a steep hill. She braced for a hard impact, but instead, something soft cushioned her body from the fall. Dragging her nose out the dirt, Katara looked around with wide eyes. Surrounding her was a massive field of flowers. Even at night she could make out their stunning red color. She plucked one from the ground, admiring its soft petals.

"They're called Fire Lilies," a raspy voice echoed from behind her. Startled, Katara swung around. A weathered old woman stood hunched over among the flowers, the full moon glowing brightly behind her. Katara noticed the woman's red robes and the small flame headpiece that secured her topknot. She was Fire Nation. Katara scrambled backwards, away from the old woman.

"I won't hurt you, child," she assured, slowly inching towards a wary Katara. "You look thirsty, would you like some water?" The old woman reached into her robes and pulled out a waterskin. Her eyes locked on the precious container of water as if under a trance. Katara, her body too parched to care, greedily bended the water straight from the waterskin and into her mouth without a second thought. The cool liquid was a balm to her dry lips. It slid down her throat, rejuvenating Katara from the inside out. Only once she'd drank her fill did Katara's mind process what she'd done. Horrified, her eyes flew the old woman, the old Fire Nation woman who had just seen her waterbend.

"You're a waterbender," the woman breathed, amazement filling her face. Katara's whole body shook as she broke out in a nervous sweat. But before she could run, the old woman gave a twirl of her long, gnarled fingers. Katara watched as the remaining water in the waterskin jumped out and separated into three tiny balls that chased each other around in a circle before dissolving into snowflakes. Astounded, she looked to the old woman.

"Who are you?" Katara wondered in awe. She'd never met another waterbender before, and to find her first one in the middle of the Fire Nation? Katara couldn't believe it. She watched as the old woman's face split into a wide smile.

"My name is Hama."

Author's Note: Hi there, welcome to my first story. Please try and take it easy on me, it has been a while since I watched ATLA. Obviously this story takes place in an alternate universe, but I am going to try and weave in some parts of the original ATLA story. I haven't figured out the whole plot exactly yet, so I'm open to suggestions, although I do have a general direction that I want it to head (Zutara :D). If you catch any truly terrible spelling/grammar mistakes or major plot holes that don't match up with the Avatar world, let me know!