disclaimer: it's all bryke's, except what's not.

notes: written for zutara week 2015. au; katara is sixteen (and other ages are adjusted accordingly) when the story begins.

.

.

.

You might not have meant to, but it's done; you can't take it out.
You're shy about what fortune lent you—is that what this is about?
You might not have meant to, but it's done; you can't take it back.
You cry about where fame sent you without a plan of attack.
(Nickel Creek, "Brand New Sidewalk")

.

.

.

happenstance :: (noun) :: coincidental; a coincidence.

.

.

.

Around the advancing navymen, the snow falls black, mixed with the coal-smoke from the Fire Nation ships. Yon Rha doesn't notice; he's been on too many of these missions to pay attention anymore. He's here in the Southern Water Tribe on a mission sent down the line directly from Fire Lord Azulon himself: to find and capture the last Southern waterbender.

Yon Rha has served in the Southern Raiders for years now, and all of the missions are the same. They come, they attack the dwindling Southern Water Tribe, killing men and taking women, diminishing their numbers as much as they can.

Sometimes, the tribe finds out ahead of time and meets them in the water. Those battles are always more interesting, because the tribe fights more comfortably on sea than on land, but the Fire Nation navy is the best in the world, and they outnumber the Southerners, so the fights almost always end the same way.

It's been years since the tribe had a waterbender to help them in their sea battles; Yon Rha has only heard of those days, not experienced them himself. But intelligence says there's a new waterbender in the tribe—although all they know is that it's a female, and she's never helped the tribe in any of their watery wars.

There are still many waterbenders in the North Pole; the Northern water bastards hold on to their icy citadel with tenacity. The North always has been larger than the South, and meets the Fire Nation's navy more equally, although Admiral Zhao has brought several waterbending captives from that region, as well.

All of the waterbenders are the same—well-trained in their art and backwards in their ways.

The Fire Nation hasn't traveled north for some time, though. Azulon has ordered that they focus their efforts on the South, in order to wipe it out completely. After that, they'll turn their gaze northward.

Yon Rha walks through the ice-cracked snow from the empty igloo he's just left, and he thinks of the rows of cells where the waterbenders are held, deep in the belly of various Fire Nation prisons.

The system works effortlessly now, and the waterbenders wither; they are always kept far from water, with hot, dry air pumped in to remind them of their location and their station.

Yon Rha snorts and spits into the snow as he walks. He's tired of these people and their ways, tired of delving into homes and disrupting cook-fires in futile search. He wants to find the waterbender and he wants to finish the mission.

If it were up to him, he'd kill the creature when he finds her, but Fire Lord Azulon has ordered that the waterbender be brought back alive. The Fire Lord wants a trophy to show off in the streets when times of waning support arise, as they sometimes do.

Yon Rha and his men have searched most of the savages' huts before he finds her—a woman who can't be more than forty, bending over a cooking-pot. She must have a family, and her bravery against his threats is for their sake.

It disgusts him to see her offer herself to the chains that way.

Yon Rha doesn't realize something is amiss until the woman's daughter runs in.

"Mom!"

The girl has her mother's big blue eyes and round face. She's pretty, but she's still very young, and she's skittish.

"Just let her go, and I'll give you the information you want," the woman says.

Yon Rha snarls at the girl. "You heard your mother; get out of here!"

But the girl has set her feet and her stance is firmer than it was a moment ago. When she speaks, her voice is sharp. "Mom, what is he doing to you?"

The woman doesn't answer her daughter directly. Instead, she says, "Go find your father, sweetie."

Yon Rha groans internally. The woman is pathetic, and she's delaying his departure. If she's the waterbender—which he suspects she may be—he just wants to take her and go.

"Mom, you can't do this!" The girl doesn't leave, and Yon Rha turns to slap her when some of the ice in the wall shakes and shatters.

Snow blows in through an ill-formed hole in the wall. The girl looks horrified and the woman's face drops.

Yon Rha snarls. Now he knows the woman's secret. He slaps the woman across the face for her audacity—imagine, trying to fool an officer of the Fire Nation!—and grabs the girl.

Both she and her mother are crying by the time she's in chains, and black snow is all Yon Rha leaves behind him when his ship retreats with his men and the last Southern waterbender inside.

.

.

.

The prisoner is kept in one of the cells designed for benders, with special chains so she can't move her arms or legs. Judging by the display in her home, though, Yon Rha suspects she lacks the control to do any real harm. Her bending that day had been accidental—instinctual, so far as he can tell.

Not that he really cares, because his job is done as soon as he hands her over to the prison in Caldera.

Still, he's annoyed that he has to spend more time away from home than he'd like, so he stops by her cell to talk to her.

"They would have killed your mother the instant they found out she wasn't you," he tells her one morning.

She glares at him, her big blue eyes defiant in her dirty, foreign face.

"She was stupid to try to save you," he continues, relishing the anger that blossoms more and more fully on the girl's face. "Too bad she failed. Your being captured won't save her, either, not in the long run. Not when Fire Lord Azulon succeeds at wiping out your kind from the world."

Yon Rha sees fear flicker for an instant in the girl's eyes before her full glare returns. Yes, she's still young, to be able to feel anything other than resignation. Years in prison will break her of that.

He smiles thinly, and speaks as though he offers her a comfort. "But don't worry. You'll have a long life as the Fire Nation's prisoner, rotting away in a cell just like this one, if you play your cards right. Otherwise," he tosses the words over his shoulder as he turns to leave, "you're dead."

He walks down the corridor and up several flights of stairs, into the daylight, and doesn't look back. The Fire Nation capital waits far beyond sight on some distant horizon, over the crashing waves.

.

.

.

For the first several days of her imprisonment, Katara spends most of her waking hours praying to Tui and La that this is a dream. It has to be, because this is the sort of thing that fuels the nightmares of everyone in the Southern Water Tribe.

If it's only a dream, she'll wake up from it soon. She'll be home with her mom and dad and brother and gran, and the threat of a Fire Nation raid will only be the fear that hovers at the edges of all of their days, their activities, their conversations.

If it's only a dream, it won't be this reality that she's living now.

After she gives up on prayers, she tries to distract herself by clinging to any good thing that she can. At first, she's able to find some things to focus on as the hours pass.

She bled last week, so that indignity as a prisoner is delayed for a few more weeks.

The Fire Nation took her and not her mom; at least her whole family's still alive.

She can't bend well, but maybe she can practice in secret somehow. She can bide her time and hone her skills and plan her escape in the meantime.

The officer comes and spits angry words at her from time to time, making her wish she could stuff them all back in his mouth so that he chokes on his anger, but he hasn't touched her. She's known others who suffered worse at Fire Nation hands.

For most of the long, stretching days, the navymen and crew leave her alone. Twice daily, a guard passes a meal through an opening in the bottom of her cell door. She is served rice and meat that's too spicy for her to eat, so she leaves it on the side of the metal platter. The rice clumps in her throat and she longs for water, but she's only allowed a small drink that the guard hand-pours into her mouth once a day. They give her enough to survive, but no more than that.

There is a pail in the corner that she can use when she needs to, but doing anything with her hands and feet shackled is difficult.

But at least the pail is there.

As the days turn into weeks, Katara grows tired, and it becomes harder to focus on anything good, so she gives up that tactic for a while.

Instead, she plots her revenge.

At this point, she doesn't have much to work with—she's not a trained bender and her hand-to-hand combat skills are adequate, but she's not sure she could pit herself against a trained officer—but she seethes in silence while she thinks of ways she could escape.

She waits as the days stretch on, and in the growing emptiness, she makes a discovery that pleases her as much as it surprises her.

She can feel the water around the ship.

The water's call is distant, which confirms what she's suspected all along—that she's trapped somewhere deep in the ship's bowels. But she can feel it rocking, and she can feel when the smooth rolls of the open ocean become choppier as they approach the shore.

At home, she never had the chance to be still long enough to feel the water around her, even though she was surrounded by snow and ice—the tribe's life was a busy one, and the chores that kept them alive shifted from season to season, constant in their change and activity.

Now, she finds something to be thankful for in her captivity. And she vows to use this new awareness of her element to conquer her enemies, in the end.

Sure enough, her guess at the shore's proximity is confirmed when the guard swings open the door to her cell and instead of her usual tray of food, he has chains to attach to the ones that already bind her.

"Stand up," he orders. "We're in the Fire Nation now and you're going to see the Fire Lord."

.

.

.

Katara had anticipated the heat in the Fire Nation, but she hadn't thought to anticipate the humidity. When she climbs the stairs from the center of the ship up onto the deck, the humidity hits her like a wall.

Inside the ship, the fires that heated the engine had kept the air relatively dry, but the Fire Nation itself is a series of islands—she remembers hearing that at some point in her childhood—and the nation nestles itself in water.

She feels as though she's instantly sticky from sweat as well as from the dirt she already carries on her body from her long stay in the ship's prison cell, but at the same time, she welcomes the wet air into her lungs.

She's not home, but this small aspect of being near her element comforts her.

She breathes in and out and relishes the air around her, but once her guards prod her into motion, her sense of comfort is short-lived.

Her guards lead her on a walk through the wide, colorful streets of the nation's capital, where people stare at her. Some of the Fire Nation citizens shy away in disgust. Some merely watch her curiously. But some shout obscenities at her. For the first time, she's thankful for the guards around her—they keep the angrier ones from physically touching her.

"She's going to the Fire Lord," one or the other of her guards will say. "Back off."

When she looks up, Katara catches glimpses of a palace in the distance. The closer they get, the more imposing its white, gold-embellished facade looms. Once her guards confer with the palace guards and are given entrance, though, the aspect changes from light to dark.

They walk through a large stone courtyard filled with sculptures and fountains that Katara barely has time to marvel or scoff at, and she's not sure which she's more inclined to do. In a short number of paces, they pass through a doorway, go down a flight of stairs, and walk through dingy passageways that blur together in her mind.

Even in the dim underground light, she can tell that these passageways are more splendid than anything she's seen before. The Fire Nation does nothing without a full display of grandeur, at least not when it comes to the Fire Lord and his home.

Katara is frightened and angry, and she's being led exactly where she doesn't want to go. Her legs, which were released for this part of the journey after she was deemed to be of little threat, are heavy and achy with disuse and fear, but she forces each step in front of the next.

She will not show weakness to these people.

After a walk that seems endless because she doesn't know its distance, they climb to the daylight once more. They are in front of a large, ornately carved door. Dragons dance in gilt and red across its surface, and several heavily armed guards stand in front of it.

Her guards speak to them, but she can't make out the words. Her mind is buzzing too loudly with the thrum of fear.

The palace guards make a few short movements, and fire blasts from their hands into portals on the door. Locks slide open almost soundlessly, and the door slides out of the way.

In contrast to the daylight she stands in, the Fire Lord's chamber is dark, lit by large fires that line all sides of the room.

Katara walks between her guards and stares straight ahead at the throne as they approach it. A wall of flames shrouds the Fire Lord's face, and the heat in the room is overwhelming.

Around her, the guards stop and bow low. Katara stands her ground until one of them prods the backs of her knees with a spear.

She stumbles to her knees and wishes she could fight. Her breathing is erratic and she struggles not to panic. She is Water Tribe; she is a warrior. She will survive and she will escape.

"So this is the waterbender." Even though she can't see his face, she can hear the Fire Lord's voice clearly when he speaks. He sounds old, but his voice carries full authority.

For a brief instant, it crosses Katara's mind that they might kill her now, war's sacrifice before the Fire Lord's throne, but rather than a quick death, she gets an unpleasant surprise when she hears Yon Rha's voice come from behind her. In her worry, she hadn't heard him enter.

"This is the waterbender, Fire Lord Azulon. I captured her on the Raiders' most recent excursion to the Southern Water Tribe. Her mother tried to take her place, but the girl gave herself away when she bent water accidentally. She doesn't have strong control of her bending."

Katara can hear the disdain in his voice and she wants to prove him wrong. The fact that he speaks the truth rankles. All of the other Southern waterbenders were captured decades ago, so Katara has never had any training, and she's been able to figure out little on her own.

The Fire Lord laughs in response to Yon Rha's commentary, a harsh rattle of sound. "No, she wouldn't," he says. "Those savages in the Southern Tribe haven't had a proper master for years."

Katara's mind screams insults at him—And whose fault is that? It's only because your family killed or captured all of our benders! It's because of your crazy scheme of trying to take over the world. It's all your fault!

But he doesn't care, and she doesn't speak. She's no good to her family if she dies defying the Fire Lord to his face.

Fire Lord Azulon looks her over cursorily, as though she's a piece of furniture or art in which he has a vague interest, before he turns his attention back to Yon Rha. "Take her back to the prison and let her rot."

Katara's interview with the Fire Lord ends quickly.

.

.

.

When her guards lead her back through winding passageways and transfer her care to guards at the capitol prison, Katara lets them lead her to her cell and tries to memorize what she sees along the way, but the passages all blur into one. They're all dark, with echoes of fire at the edges.

The guards bring her to a cell much like the one on the navy ship. Katara settles in for what she believes will be a long time, and begins to plan how to practice her bending in secret and how she can escape.

.

.

.

For the first several days of Katara's imprisonment, life in the capitol prison is no different than life in the navy prison. The only alteration is that the guards' faces have changed.

And this time, she doesn't expect to see daylight again until she makes her escape.

One morning, after Katara has swallowed the last of her spiceless rice and pushed the platter over near the doorway, she hears feet outside her door. The steps are different from the usual measured steps of her guards, only there for duty: this time, there are several sets of feet, with different weights and measures to their gait.

Katara is as curious as she is suspicious of any unexpected change, and her apprehension only deepens when the first person she sees is one of her guards, who looks as though he's shaking in his boots. His fingers grip his weapon tightly, though, as he draws back, and the edges of white show at his knuckles.

When he speaks, his voice quivers ever so slightly. "Here is the Southern waterbender, Fire Prince Ozai."

Katara chokes on her own heartbeat for an instant when she hears the name. Even at home in the South Pole, and even in the depths of the prison, she has heard the rumors about the younger of the Fire Princes—Ozai is known for his cruelty and his power struggles. His older brother, Iroh, stepped down from the line of succession years ago, after his son Lu Ten was killed in battle, and so Ozai stands next in line for the throne after his father, Azulon.

Ozai steps into view beyond the guard, and he is sharp, and angular, and strong. His gaze is cruel as he looks at her.

Katara meets his gaze, but after he looks her over, she can see the change in his expression as he dismisses her. She can tell she is of no importance to him.

There are other people with Ozai and the guard—there is a woman, who is tall and beautiful, and also a boy and a girl who Katara guesses are around her own age. They have to be Ozai's family. They look like him, with pale skin and dark hair and yellow eyes that are keen and seem to judge her in her squalor in a matter of seconds.

The woman's face is the kindest of them all, but even she wears a mask of solemnity.

Ozai curls his lips and speaks. "That's the last of their line," he says, the words clearly directed at his offspring.

She is a lesson to be learned and a mockery to be made here, with no comfort even in isolation.

"We are going to cleanse the earth of people like her, and spread the greatness of the Fire Nation to all the world."

Katara seethes where she sits, her back ramrod-straight. She knows this is their plan; for the past century, they've been acting it out, systematically overtaking and destroying the other nations. But hearing is spoken so plainly, so openly and clinically and impersonally, makes her stomach drop to her feet.

She fights a wave of nausea, but she swallows hard and maintains her posture.

The boy looks at his father very seriously, listening to his words and nodding. He reminds her vaguely of her brother, Sokka, but this boy is taller, and his face is much more serious. When he looks at her, he looks perplexed, as though he doesn't know what to make of this strange creature he's been shown.

The girl, though, doesn't spare her father a glance. She looks at Katara with an appraisal that mimics her father's, and when the family starts to walk off, their mission of seeing Katara as a glory-trophy, a spoil of war, apparently finished, the girl stops them.

"Father," she says, in a voice that is as cool and calculating as that of the man she addresses, "could I train with her?"

The interested look that had blossomed on Ozai's face when the girl began to speak drops in disappointment. "She's a prisoner, Azula. She's not here to be trained; she's here to end her lineage."

"But couldn't I have some fun in the meantime?" Azula asks. "The report said she didn't know very much at all about bending, so it won't be very hard to beat her. She's trapped in here anyway; won't it do her some good to know that she's here for a just cause, that the people who are taking her place in the world deserve it?"

Ozai looks interested again, the mother looks disapproving, the brother looks uncertain, and Katara quakes.

Ozai shrugs. "I suppose you may. She doesn't know enough to be a threat. Just make sure she's properly guarded while you have you have your fun."

"Of course, Father," Azula says, bowing her head in respect. As an afterthought, she adds, "Thank you."

Ozai doesn't reply, only turns his gaze over his family, from his daughter to his son to his wife—and Katara thinks she sees increasing disapproval as he passes down the line.

Then he looks at Katara again, and there's no question of his disapproval.

She maintains her blank stare back at him.

He sneers. "Have her ready tomorrow morning," he instructs the guard, who has been listening in on the whole exchange with interest.

The guard has regained his composure enough to lead the family away with aplomb, but he walks by Katara's cell later, when she's eating her dinner, and leers. "Enjoy the food," he says with bitter enjoyment, "The Fire Princess wants to play with you, and that never ends well for anyone."

Katara can barely stomach her rice that night.

.

.

.

The next morning, Katara's guard is female. She's noticed that there's a fairly even mix of male and female guards, but she hasn't asked any of them about it yet. There would never be female guards in the Water Tribe, and it surprised her, at first, that a country as cruel as the Fire Nation would allow its women more opportunity than her own beloved people. It occurs to her early in her imprisonment that, if women are in the armed services, guard duty might be a way to keep them close at home, near their families, but the more she thinks about it, the more she decides there must be some hidden cruelty here she doesn't see; the Fire Nation can't be that considerate of its own people when they are so unkind to all others.

At this point, Katara is still in the 'plot in silence' phase of her escape plan, which she figures will turn into 'befriend the enemy to make them less suspicious of you' in a few months. But for now, she's still hurt and angry and doesn't feel ready to pretend.

It's not like she has a shortage of time on her hands.

Katara looks up when her guard walks in. Usually, she only sees her guards from a distance—through the small, barred window at the top of her cell door or through the small opening for food at the bottom. Today, though, her guard breaks the space between them and comes into her cell. She's carrying a bucket, a sponge, and a bundle of clothes.

"Here," the guard says, setting the items near Katara and moving to unlock her manacles and fetters. "You're going to see the royal family this morning, and you need to be clean for that." She pauses before she finishes undoing Katara's chains and looks her in the eye, her gaze clear and stern, but not unkind, from under her helmet. "I'll face the door, away from you, and let you wash, but if you try anything, your chains go back on and I'll finish the job myself. Do you understand?"

Katara nods. She will cooperate this time; she's not ready to escape, not yet. Better to have them think she's compliant. That will lower their suspicions. And it will feel so, so good to be clean.

Once the guard's back is turned, Katara strips off her dirty prison uniform—they'd taken away her own clothes back on the Fire Nation ship—and grabs the sponge. Her limbs feel achy and stiff with misuse and malnutrition, but she works as economically as possible. She finds that weeks of dirt and grime take a long time to scrub off.

If she takes too long, the guard doesn't comment. Eventually, Katara feels like she's human again. She puts on the clothes the guard brought for her—a loose set of pants and a tunic, with slippers to match. They are red, like everything in this nation, and she hates them for that, but they are made of a much finer cut than her prison uniform. The fit isn't quite right, but it's close enough.

For a moment, Katara closes her eyes and takes in a deep breath and tries to forget where she is. She focuses on the fact that she's clean, and clothed, and not in chains.

It feels good.

"You finished?" the guard asks.

"Yes," Katara says, and the guard turns to face her.

"You're going to the royal family compound," she says as she fastens Katara's chains again. "Good luck."

.

.

.

Outside of her cell, Katara's guard is joined by others, and they follow a set of passageways that can't be the same as the ones they took from the palace, but Katara can't tell the difference. It's all dark, cool stone underground.

When they are above ground again, they are not in a crowded section of town. Instead, they walk through nearly silent streets bordered by high walls with elaborately crafted gates.

They enter one gate that looks nearly like all the others, and the guards lead Katara into walled gardens. These are impressive, like the Fire Nation royal palace, but not in the same way. They feel opulent in their crafted perfection: nature doesn't grow like this. The grounds are manicured and all of the plants have been pruned into submission, but even so, it's the most greenery Katara has ever seen at one time.

Plants don't grow this freely at the South Pole, and she looks around her in wonder. She hates the Fire Nation, but they do know how to make pretty things.

They walk in quiet, through rustling leaves and the clinking of armored feet on cobbled walkways, until they reach a far part of the garden, where training grounds have been set up. The plants are culled back here, leaving only earth and stone in neat patterns where firebenders can train without setting fire to any of the lush plant-life that fills the rest of the area.

The Fire Princess—Azula, Katara remembers from the day before—is in the middle of a form when they arrive, and flames swirl around her in a large, controlled spiral until she reins them in and finishes her movement with a smooth joining of her hands as the flames disappear.

She takes a breath in to recenter herself, but she doesn't seem at all exerted by the move. Her clothes are similar in style to Katara's, but they are finer still and have obviously been tailor-made for her.

But she's a princess; Katara would expect nothing less.

Azula flicks a wayward lock of hair out of her face, then looks in Katara's direction and smiles. Her yellow eyes light up with delight. It's eerie.

"Oh, good. You're here." She turns and addresses the guards who brought Katara. "Unchain her."

One of the guards steps forward and unlocks Katara's chains, then steps back, holding them.

"You're dismissed," Azula says to all of them. "Stand by the wall."

The guards file over and take up positions, holding their spears, faces blank behind their helmets.

Azula comes closer to Katara and circles her, assessing her. Her movements are precise and measured, like her firebending was earlier. She is skilled, and Katara knows she's no match for the princess, but she stands her ground without flinching.

The rest of the family is there, too. Ozai stands at the edge of the training ground, next to someone who might be a firebending teacher. The mother stands farther back, a servant by her side with a parasol to block the sun's strong morning rays.

Katara finds it ironic that anyone in the Fire Nation hides from the sun, but their skin is so very pale here.

And the brother stands on the other side of his father, dressed in a version of the same training clothes Katara and Azula wear. He looks sweaty and uncomfortable, and Katara wonders how long the family has been here. She looks at the sky; it can't be past mid-morning, but the heat is already unbearable.

Before Katara can think any more, Azula comes to a stop in front of her. The princess' bright eyes narrow.

"Bow before your superiors, peasant."

Katara does not want to bow, but she learned from watching the men of her tribe hunt leopard seals that you don't start a battle before you're ready to fight. She's here to spar with the princess; she will pick other battles with the Fire Nation later—so she bows, stiffly and formally, imitating what she's seen the guards do in the royals' presence.

The princess curls her lip in response. "You're pathetic," she says quietly. She nods toward a nearby pool of water. "There's water for you to use. Let's fight."

With no other warning, Azula lashes out with a plume of fire. Katara jumps backward, startled. Azula narrows her eyes and strikes again, but more slowly this time, with less flame.

Katara knows Azula is testing her, discerning what her Water Tribe opponent knows about her art, and Katara draws water from the pond, but it shakes and drops in splashes on the way over.

Her face burns with embarrassment, but she plants her feet and holds the water.

When Azula strikes a third time, Katara attempts to block the flame with her water and partially succeeds. What flame doesn't fizzle in steam strikes the dirt beside her.

Azula circles her a few times more, walking, observing, and Katara stands still, holding the water between her hands and waiting for the next strike. She hones her focus in on the girl fighting her, and she feels out of breath and shaky from fear.

After what seems like forever, Azula raises her hand and sparks fire in her palm—but this time, the flame is blue.

"Azula, don't."

The young prince's voice breaks into the fight, and Azula drops her flame and flicks her gaze over to her brother, annoyed. "Why not, Zuko?" she asks.

Zuko takes a few steps forward. He's frowning, and he shakes his head. "You know you're going to beat her. Don't hurt her in the process—the blue flame is too hot and she won't be able to protect herself."

Azula purses her lips, then rolls her head as though considering her options. She stands in front of Katara for another long moment, then sighs as though this is the dreariest thing she's ever done, and when she speaks, she sounds bored and bitter. "You sound like you care about the peasant, Zuzu. That's so beneath you. But fine. If you don't want her to fight me, then you take her place."

She throws her next words at Katara. "Like I said, you're pathetic. You're not worth my time. Go wait with your guards until you're dismissed. Now I'll show you what a real bending battle looks like." She rolls her eyes. "Well, almost."

Katara crosses Zuko's path as she walks toward her guards, and when she passes him, she mutters, "I don't need you to fight for me."

He glares at her. "Yes, you do. You should be thanking me."

"I'll never thank your nation for anything," she says.

Zuko ignores her and keeps walking until he faces his sister.

Katara walks the rest of the way over to her guards, stiffly, and she feels the weight of everyone's eyes on her.

Then the siblings shift into bending stances, and the attention moves to them. Katara looks at the people around her—their mother is watching them with a disapproving expression, but Ozai's face gleams with curiosity.

The man Katara has decided is a firebending tutor—he'd called out praise for Azula's precision of movement during specific moves in her fight with Katara—watches impersonally.

Katara feels a tinge of worry building in her stomach, and based on their parents' expressions, she wonders if this is as fair a fight as Azula seems to want her to believe.

Then Zuko clears his throat, rolls his shoulders and adjusts his arms. The tutor calls out a start to the fight—something he hadn't done when Azula was fighting Katara. But this seems to be more of a training exercise than her own torture sequence.

The siblings spar with fire sparking from their fingers. They whip, roll, and evade as well as attacking. Zuko's skill nearly matches Azula's, but Katara can tell that he spends most of his time blocking rather than attacking, and in the end, he yields, looking embarrassed and frustrated.

Azula seems unsurprised as she accepts her victory with slight disgust.

"Counter Azula's side whip with a fire ball next time, Zuko." Ozai's voice comes across the courtyard, and even from her position, Katara can see Zuko's shoulders stiffen where he stands at the sidelines, wiping his sweaty brow with a towel. "Your teacher will have you practice those tomorrow."

The man at Ozai's side puffs himself up and nods.

Katara tells herself that she doesn't feel sorry for Zuko, because he's just as much Fire Nation ruler as the rest of them are, but she does wonder what he's done to make his father and sister hate him as much as they do.

It's funny, she thinks distantly, that Azula looks so much like her mother and Zuko looks so much like his father, because they seem to take after the opposite parent, as far as she can tell.

"Yes, Father," Zuko says obediently, bowing his head in deference. He shies away from the hug his mother attempts to give him. "Mom, I'm all sweaty," he mutters, but anyone can tell he's really just humiliated.

Ozai nods toward Zuko after the prince's nod, then proceeds to congratulate Azula on her win.

Azula preens like a peacock and looks entirely self-satisfied. Then she hands her own towel to an attendant and strides over to where Katara still stands between her guards. "See, Water Tribe?" she asks. "That's what a bending duel should look like."

Katara only meets her gaze evenly. Azula stares at her for a moment, then snaps at Katara's guards. "I'm done with her. Take her back to the prison."

Ozai looks on impersonally. The mother looks displeased—and so does Zuko. He frowns at the back of his sister's head.

The guards move quickly at Azula's orders, and suddenly Katara's chains are clinking again.

Katara's heart sinks; she'd almost forgotten about the chains. They feel heavier this time, after she was free of their weight for a while. She's been judged by the Fire Nation rulers for her novelty and has been dismissed as being of no account, and her chances of being free of the chains' weight again diminish with that judgment.

Once the manacles are in place, she walks between her guards back to the prison, retracing the path from earlier that morning. Katara tries to trace them in her mind, commit some track to memory, but the passageways blur one into the next, all dark and damp with large stones and torches.

Back in her cell, Katara sits boiling with anger and humiliation. She has to get out of here and help her family, her people. She's been watching her culture be slowly destroyed her entire life, and she's tired of it. The men are gone, fighting. The women are almost gone, captured.

Before long, there won't be any Southern Water Tribe left.

That's exactly what the Fire Nation wants, she thinks angrily. And that's exactly what she has to keep from happening.

Katara closes her eyes, partly to keep her tears at bay and partly because bending, even the little that she did this morning, exhausts her. She needs to learn how to channel the energy better, more efficiently. She frowns in thought. She needs a master, but that's impossible here.

She fights the tears for some time, but eventually she lets them escape. She cries for her embarrassment, for her imprisonment, for her family and her tribe. Once she regains her sense of relative calm, she listens to the gusts of dry air being pumped through the corridors and to the clack of the guards' feet as they walk on patrol, and against that backdrop, she considers how to move forward with her plan of escape.