Title: A Love That Couldn't Be Part 1: A Forced Love

Author: WishHe-LovedMe

Pairing: Zuko/Katara

Chapter: 1. The Legend

Summery: Katara isn't a water peasant as Zuko seems to enjoy calling her. Her birthright entails her a lot more than that. This is the story of Katara; and how she discovered her past, controls her present, and forms her future. Zutara

Disclaimer: Um, I don't exactly own Avatar: The Last Airbender, 'cuz if I did, I certainly wouldn't be sitting here typing this.

Author's Note: Okay, I know that these plots are way overused, but I haven't been able to get this story off of my mind, and I didn't even know it was overused until I checked this website just a few days ago. Well, I just wanted to get that out of the way.

The Legend

Katara awoke from a dream. In the dream, she was little—maybe five—and her mother was telling her a story. No, it wasn't a story, but sort of a legend. Katara had always loved to hear her mother tell her that story. She never tired of the story, and her mother's words never changed. It wasn't written down anywhere, and Katara never understood how her mother could tell the same story over and over again without changing even one word.

Once Katara and Sokka's mother died, Katara seemed to remember her mother's story more vividly. She could even, to an extent, picture the characters in her mind. As she grew up, and the more she thought about it, she came to the conclusion that the story wasn't just a story, or a legend, to her mother. Katara felt as if her mother had a personal connection to it.

The girl looked at the stars above her, and remembered being that young, when life wasn't so complicated…

Once upon a time there was a beautiful Princess from the Northern Water Tribe. Her mother would say, Katara always liked to think that that Princess was her mother. This Princess's name was Selena; she was always allowed to have whatever she wanted. Her father was the king, and was too busy to take care of her. Her mother was the queen, and was always standing up for Selena. You see, Selena wanted only one thing, and her father wasn't about to let her have it. Her mother understood, but would not stand up to her father, for fear of what her father would do. Her father had a nasty temper, and couldn't be bothered with what he referred to as 'Childish Wants.'

Selena wanted to find love, but her father wouldn't let her. Her father wanted her to marry a rich guy who would take over for him as king when the time permitted, but Selena wanted to marry a handsome young man who loved her for not what she had, but who she was. Katara liked that part best, because Katara had always felt that she wanted the same thing. When Selena turned sixteen, she was only a year away from marriage, but would not accept any offer. Her mother tried her best to get her the very best eligible men, but Selena wouldn't have any of it.

Her father, by this point was getting angry, and couldn't understand why his daughter wouldn't obey his orders. So he locked her up in a tower, and was only allowed to come down to see the men she could choose to be her husband. Selena would not give in to her father's ridicules punishment so she stayed up in that tower until she was seventeen.

Selena never hinted that she liked any of them, and she didn't, but she did like someone. Every time her mother said this part, her eyes lit up and she smiled a little bit. Selena was in love with a man from a different nation. The fire nation. Katara would always gasp when she heard this part. This guy's name was Roji. He was just a normal guy. Even though the guy was poor, and even though there was a war, and even though the two were natural enemies because of their nations, Selena and Roji loved each other deeply.

So deeply that Selena would climb out of her ten story tower window to see him. When Roji was to join the fire nation army and go out to war, they were devastated. Selena and Roji had one last day together before they were to be separated.

A few weeks after Roji's departure, Selena found out that she was having a baby. Desperate to find a husband for Selena before they would stop liking her, Selena's father told her that she could pick her husband. There was a man who had lost his wife when she gave birth and had a two-year-old son to take care of. She liked the man instantly, because he reminded her of Roji, they married, and her husband, let's call him Rokel, raised Selena and Roji's baby girl, and raised Rokel and his ex-wife's baby boy.

Rokel was not of any royal family, and had refused to accept the position of king. So Rokel and Selena went away to live far away where they and their children would not be discovered. Selena and Roji's baby girl, and Rokel's baby boy grew up as brother and sister, not knowing that Rokel was not the girl's father. Selena and Rokel lived in the Southern Water Tribe after that, and raised their kids to be normal kids, not knowing that the girl was the Princess of the Northern Water Tribe.