"So, Sparky, who are you betrothed to?"

Toph's question as the group lounged on the veranda after a hard morning of training took them by surprise. Sokka made a sound that started out as a laugh before shifting to a snort as if he wasn't sure what his reaction wanted to be; Aang just giggled outright as if it was the most ridiculous thing he'd ever heard.

Zuko side-eyed the blind earthbender, unsure if she was trying to get a raise out of him. From one noble to another it was a pretty harmless question though, and he was idly curious to see if they could connect the dots, so he simply replied, "The former governor of New Ozai's daughter." You might remember her as the dark-haired warrior with all the knives, he thought to himself wryly. He was a bit disappointed that the group seemed more caught up on what Toph had said than his reply; he'd clearly underestimated the extent of their interest or knowledge of current affairs, despite the fact that they'd been traveling the world for the last six months. He had hoped that they'd at least taken time to read the news bulletins in the villages he knew they'd been to - that should have given them a good overview of the war's status in the Earth Kingdom. Statuses that could change rather quickly, he knew. Speaking of which, he hadn't seen an updated version of his 'Wanted' poster since facing his father on the eclipse. The exact wording would let him know what duties and obligations that impacted, but it would be a miracle if he weren't charged with high treason, meaning…

"That contract might not be valid anymore, actually." Strangely he wasn't certain how he felt about that, so he deflected the question back to Toph. "What about you?"

Toph opened her mouth to answer but didn't get a chance because apparently this was all too much for the Water Tribespeople to take in.

"What do you mean, you're betrothed? Both of you?" Sokka had found his voice and sounded both highly entertained and confused.

"Wait so you don't get to choose who you marry in the Fire Nation?" Katara added, equally confused but quickly rationalizing with, "No wonder everyone there is so angry all the time."

Zuko's good eye narrowed at this but before the firebender and the waterbender could get into another argument or cold-shoulder competition, Toph broke in.

"Of course not! Rule number one of high society, you don't get to say diddly-squat about what happens when you come of age." Her voice gave the last few words the mocking tone of an elder.

"That's not right!" cried Katara.

Toph ignored her, instead asking Zuko, "How old are you anyway? You sound tall enough to be fifteen or whatever age Fire Nation nobles get married at."

"It's seventeen, not fifteen," Zuko replied absently to the unasked question. He wasn't happy about how he'd left Mai - with a letter of all things, like a total coward, since he'd needed something she could burn later so she wouldn't be implicated in his treason - but he thought he had done his duty. He'd done his best to get to know her as more than Azula's friend and their childhood playmate; he'd been pleasantly surprised at how much he really did like her and care for her, and he thought they had both progressed from being utterly terrified of having to join their lives together in less than a year to carefully optimistic that it could actually work out. At the very least, they'd discovered they made a formidable pair in the sparring ring, between her long-range attacks and his dao for fending off anyone who managed to close the distance. If only she'd been at his side during his hunt for the Avatar…

Something else tingled at the back of his mind now, from his Avatar-chasing days, and he asked the waterbender cautiously: "But aren't you betrothed too?"

Katara coloured and exclaimed, "No, of course not!", mingling with a similar protest from Aang and Sokka.

He wanted to let it go but needed a little puzzle piece to fall into place, and he had never been afraid of getting burned, so he asked, "Then why are you wearing a Northern Water Tribe betrothal necklace?" If the North and South hadn't been planning on an alliance, he had some political scenarios he needed to re-think. And without Uncle Iroh at his side, he thought with a pang of guilt, that was going to take quite some time.

"It was my mother's!" Katara snapped, and Zuko was annoyed because he knew that already, and said so. It wasn't uncommon to use heirlooms if the suitor couldn't carve.

"What do you know about Water Tribe traditions anyway?" Katara continued, and he couldn't help but laugh, especially because he knew it would annoy her.

"I was Crown Prince, I was educated," he emphasised, perhaps a bit mean but he'd seen Toph roll her eyes at the others in exasperation too sometimes, when they forget the things she knew from being raised in a great house, as much of a prison as it was.

"Father would never make us marry people we didn't love," Katara huffed in reply, and he knew that was meant to hurt him so he let it pass over him like smoke, even though it stung for a moment because maybe he did love Mai, and now he wouldn't get a chance to find out. Even if it had all been set up by Azula to get him disinherited or killed at some later point.

"Yeah, that's not how things work in the Water Tribes!" Sokka supplied, undoubtedly thinking of Suki, who was probably grateful she'd missed out on this particular conversation due to a minor case of heat exhaustion. "So much for high society," he said.

"It's just politics," Toph broke in. "Like I'm supposed to marry this merchant's second son or something to ensure that my parents have a constant supply of metal bolts. And that they have a constant supply of wiggly grand-babies," she added somewhat bitterly.

"No wonder you ran away from home," Katara said, sympathetic to the younger girl's plight.

"Yeah, I would run away too if someone forced me to marry Zuko!" Sokka exclaimed.

Zuko scowled, and consciously kept his hand from rising to his scar; he hadn't paid much attention to his appearance before his banishment, but he knew he took after his mother and she had been beautiful. Certainly her face wouldn't scare away small children, he though bitterly.

"I don't understand," Aang broke in. "What's the big deal about marrying someone anyway? I know people do it sometimes when they're in love, but you can be in love and not be married at all so why does it even matter?"

"You're kidding, right?" Zuko said. "How do you produce legitimate heirs if the parents aren't married?"

"Air Nomads don't need heirs. They don't even need possessions!"

"Air staff, bison whistle, marbles, Appa's saddle … " Toph listed pointedly.

"And we don't need parents either! Well, I guess we do at the beginning or else we wouldn't get born. But not like you guys do. And how do you even get babies without Air Temples anyway?" Aang burst out.

A stunned silence fell over their little group. Katara reddened and looked away, while Sokka's expression was caught between embarrassment and disbelief. Toph spread her hands wide like she couldn't understand the connection between babies and temples; Zuko pinched the bridge of his nose and wondered, for not the first time that day, how this group of children had managed to elude him for months.

"Most cultures don't have nation-wide baby-making festivals every spring," he grit out, only to be greeted by more scandalised looks. Which made sense, he remembered belatedly. No one else had spent the better part of three years poring over records of the Air Nomads and past Avatars for minute clues, and their only Air Nomad had definitely not been old enough to attend said festivals.

"Festivals? That sounds like fun!" an oblivious Avatar chimed in.

Toph snickered, and Sokka moaned. "My poor, poor teenaged brain, don't do this to me Aang. Eeewww. Must. Scrub. Brain. NOW."

Katara looked like she would give anything to earthbend herself into a hole in the ground. Zuko couldn't help a tiny smirk at that; maybe now she had a better idea of what it meant to be involved with a twelve-year-old Air Nomad.

"Monks. And nuns," Sokka muttered. "Do you even know what those words mean in every other nation? Kind of like, the opposite of um, festival-readiness …."

Not helpful. Although it did make Zuko want to laugh. "Listen, Aang, if we're still around in three years come and ask - "

Uncle Iroh, he wanted to say, but the entire Air Nation race might depend on their lone survivor knowing these things, and Uncle's poetry-and-proverbs explanation of how to secure the succession had been far less informative his own covert reconnaissance on what the sailors did on shore leave, even if it hadn't made Zuko want to burn his other eye out as much.

"- me," he choked out instead, because he didn't know what other adults the airbender had in his life, and he sure as hell shouldn't have to get The Talk from Sokka. Besides, between Ozai, Azula, and whatever bounty hunters fancied his head, Zuko gave his survival probability of the next three years a single-digit percentage.

"Really?" the Avatar brightened. "Thanks, Sifu Hotman! I can't wait to hear all about - "

"Training grounds. NOW," Zuko shouted, filled with a sudden need to burn, slice, or just plain hit things. He wistfully eyed the airbender's retreating back, imagining how it would look if he could set it on fire just a little…

Blinking, he shook it off and stood up to follow. "We're doing Hangetsu Nidan, until you get it perfect, and then we're doing it on ice." The amount of balance and chi required to do so would leave no breath to waste for talking.

Sokka stood up too and muttered something about target practice, but then suddenly froze. "Wait a minute. New Ozai, as in, Omashu?"

Took you long enough, Zuko smirked to himself, barely pausing his step.

"Their kid is like, two!" an outraged Katara yelped, and Zuko rolled his eyes, re-adjusting his mental evaluation of their current-affairs savvy back to 'woefully inadequate'.

"Wait, there was an older girl too … oh, no way. No freezing way! You're engaged to crazy knife lady?" Sokka exclaimed, starting after Zuko.

Jealous much, Zuko thought smugly. If Suki was anything to go by, strong warrior women might be Sokka's type - but Mai would sooner pin him to the wall like a tapestry than listen to Sokka's version of humour.

"Tui and La, I have so many questions…and someone I can finally use all my sword innuendos on… how do you two even …"

Glancing back, Zuko plucked a throwing star from inside his outer robe and hurled it at the approaching teen, pinning his sleeve to the boulder Toph had been lounging on. Mai could have given Sokka a haircut from this distance, which Zuko had been sorely tempted to try as well, but this should be enough to get his point across.

"No more questions."

A/N: Cross-posting from AO3

…. Azula's reaction to finding out how Zuko's sex education occurred: "Oh, Zuzu, you could never learn things the easy way, now could you?"

Zuko: "It's not my fault I do everything the hard way."

Both Fire Nation royals don't understand why, after that, Zuko gets propositioned all night. They leave the party early and set something mostly harmless (Zuko insists) on fire on the way home.