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The heat in the main hall of the Fire Nation Capital palace was always suffocating during the summer banquets. It was not the comforting heat of a fireplace, nor the clean fury of the midday sun. It was a human heat, heavy, impregnated with the smell of expensive perfumes, plum wine, and the nervous sweat of nobles who tried, at all costs, to impress the young Fire Lord.
Zuko was exhausted.
He was standing on the upper steps, near the throne, watching the sea of red, gold, and black silk moving beneath him. He seemed, in everyone's eyes, the very image of authority: his back straight, the flaming crown perfectly aligned in his topknot, his face a mask of imperial seriousness. But, on the inside, he felt stiff and awkward, as if he were observing the very moment from the outside, oblivious to it, separated from his own body by a soundproof glass wall.
It was not his first time feeling bitter surrounded by that court. He was not drunk on wine — he rarely drank, keeping his mind sharp — but he felt inebriated by the excess of lights, by the crimson carpet rolled out across the hall, by the flattering voices that buzzed like insects. He had lost political battles in the council that very morning. He had lost his patience with a stubborn minister. And he knew, with the resignation of someone who grew up under Ozai's shadow, that it would not be his last defeat.
His good eye wandered through the crowd, and the scar seemed to pull less when his gaze finally found the only anomaly in that ocean of fire.
Katara.
She wore blue, of course. A deep shade, like the midnight ocean, adorned with silver details that caught the light of the chandeliers. She was talking to the Earth Kingdom Ambassador, holding a glass of water with the elegance that only a master bender possessed.
She was his safe haven in that sea of alienation.
Zuko remembered what she had told him the night before, when he confessed how suffocated he felt by all those gala events, by all those peacetime awards and honors that felt empty.
"Ignore it, Zuko," she had said, her voice soft but firm, while healing a small cut on his arm, the result of excessive training. "The Fire Nation, the world, is so much more than these vanity shows. That noble who veiledly insulted you? He is no more important than an insect on a ship's window. They will see you climbing, they will judge your every step, but they won't truly care until you get close enough to threaten their power."
She always knew how to lessen the weight of the world that rested upon his shoulders.
Now, watching her from the other side of the hall, Zuko realized an uncomfortable truth about the people surrounding them. Some of those nobles and ministers did not know why they were wolves. They just howled for the sound of it, snarling for status and territory without understanding the purpose of their own ferocity. They followed the pack.
But Katara did not. Katara was no wolf. If Zuko had to describe her, he would not find enough earthly words. The irony is that, often, Zuko felt that some people, even Katara herself, would never know how truly beautiful and magnificent they were until a crowd pointed it out for them. She carried the salvation of the world in her water hands, but still blushed when a peasant thanked her on the street.5
A muffled rumble echoed from outside. Zuko blinked, snapping out of his thoughts. The festival outside had begun.
A sudden glare invaded the high windows of the palace — a blinding flash of fireworks bursting in the skies of the Caldera, illuminating the hall in shades of white and gold. At that exact instant, as if she felt the weight of his gaze across the crowded room, Katara turned her head.
Through the incandescent flash of light, her blue eyes met his. She noticed Zuko's stiff posture, his exhausted expression. And then, ignoring all royal protocols, she smiled and let out a small laugh, subtly rolling her eyes toward the verbose noble she was talking to.
Zuko's chest lost its tension. That life was so hard. Ruling was a daily ordeal that sucked his soul. But, seeing her laugh for him, even from the other side of that immense hall, he felt less far from himself. He felt anchored.
Later, when the formality of the banquet began to dissolve into groups of conversations and music, Zuko managed to escape to one of the wide balconies that circled the upper palace. The night air was a blessed relief, carrying the smell of ozone and damp earth. The weather had turned; a summer storm was rapidly approaching, sweeping away the smoke from the fireworks.
He leaned against the soapstone parapet, loosening the collar of his ceremonial robes.
"It isn't exactly the Southern Water Tribe, is it?"
Her voice came from the left. Zuko didn't need to turn around to know it was her; he knew the sound of her footsteps and the way the air seemed to cool subtly, in a pleasant way, when she approached.
"Not even close," Zuko murmured, finally turning his head. Katara leaned on the parapet next to him, looking at the illuminated city below.
"I feel like I'm on alien ground when I'm out here, you know?" she confessed, sighing. "At home... in my village, everyone knows each other. Here, I feel like every step I take is being calculated by ten different people."
Zuko nodded, understanding weighing in his gaze.
"And I am the Fire Lord, but I feel like an ignorant college kid who should just be studying, with my windows open, without having to decide the fate of entire nations."
Katara turned to him, the soft smile playing on her lips. The wind messed up the dark strands of her hair, releasing them from her northern hairpins.
As he watched her, a bizarre and poetic thought crossed Zuko's mind. He felt like a man lost in the dark vacuum of space, floating without gravity, without direction. A lonely astronaut. And she... she was the Moon. Bright, unattainable, dictating the tides and controlling the chaos of the world with a silent presence.
I stare at you, he thought, the words stuck behind his teeth. I would sing to you, if I had the voice for it. I just circle you.
It was the naked and raw truth. He was the sun of that nation, but in his own internal universe, he only orbited Katara. His whole life, ever since he was banished, seemed to have converged on her. She had been the fury that hunted him, the compassion that saved him, the light deep in the Crystal Catacombs, and the partner who helped him take down Azula. He gravitated around her, unable to pull away, even knowing he had no right to land on her surface.
A thick and cold raindrop fell exactly on Zuko's nose.
He blinked, surprised. Another drop hit Katara's shoulder. Suddenly, the sky roared, and the rain poured down over the palace.
Screams of surprise came from inside the ballroom. Zuko and Katara looked through the tempered glass doors. The ancient architecture of the palace, flawless for containing heat and retaining power, had its flaws. The steel and ceramic roof of one of the hall's extensions had given way to the sudden torrent. Rain began to leak through the ceiling, dripping heavily and hitting the patrons, the nobles, and the ministers directly on the head.
The pandemonium that followed — lords running to protect their expensive silks, ladies screaming while their makeup ran — was comical.
Katara covered her mouth with her hand, her shoulders trembling as she tried to hold back a genuine and completely unrefined burst of laughter.
"You know," she said, wiping a tear of laughter from the corner of her eye and pointing to the mess inside. "Look at this, Zuko. Even the spirits are trying to warn you."
He stared at her, confused and enchanted at the same time. The rain fell on them on the balcony, soaking Zuko's clothes and making Katara's blue fabric stick to her skin, but neither made a move to go inside.
"Warn me about what?" he asked, his voice low against the noise of the storm.
Katara's expression softened. The amusement gave way to that overwhelming empathy that always disarmed Zuko. She reached out her hand, not touching him, but pointing to the hall and then to his chest.
"That all this... this farce, this pretense, this cruel politics... all this isn't for you. You are better than them. You have a real heart."
Zuko clutched the damp cloth of his cape. He clenched his jaw, swallowing the emotion that threatened to close his throat. He bit his own tongue so he wouldn't say what he really wanted. This isn't for me, Katara. I wish you were for me.
But he just clung to his own seat in that endless carousel of responsibilities. He clung to his role.
He was no monster, like his father. But, suddenly, Zuko felt like an aging wolf. He was only twenty years old, but the war, the hunt, the hatred, the scars — physical and invisible — had drained his youth. He was a predator who had completely lost the taste for blood. He didn't want to fight anymore. He didn't want to hurt anyone. He was tired.
A tired, anxious, and scared wolf in the dark. And even the most anxious pups need the Moon. They howl for her in the dark to feel that they are not alone.
I howl for you, Zuko thought, the rain washing the excessive heat from his body, cooling the burn mark on his face. I circle you. And I will keep circling, no matter where you go.
He knew, with a cutting clarity that hurt more than the stabbings of the Fire Lord, that she would not belong to him. There was the world to heal. There was the Avatar, with his invisible ties and intertwined destinies. There was the Southern Water Tribe, which needed its greatest healer.
Gravity would pull her away from the Fire Nation eventually.
"Come, Fire Lord," Katara said softly, breaking the silence and snapping Zuko out of his trance. She finally touched his arm, her fingers warm despite the cold rain. With a simple movement of her other hand, the rainwater that soaked them was guided away, contouring around them like an invisible umbrella. "If you catch a cold, the council will blame the South Pole delegations."
Zuko allowed himself a half-smile, the first true smile of the night.
"I can't let them start a diplomatic incident over a sneeze," he replied.
As he accompanied her back inside, dry in the middle of the storm thanks to her power, Zuko looked at Katara's profile.
The reality was simple and terrifying. He could confess everything. He could break the rules of his own court, defy the world, ask her to stay, fight for her like he had fought for his own honor. Or he could stay silent, swallow his feelings in the name of duty and friendship, and watch her leave when the time came.
If he spoke, the rejection or political circumstances could push her away permanently. If he didn't speak, life and their diverging paths would take her away anyway.
If he was going to lose her either way...
If he was going to lose her either way...
If he was going to lose her either way...
I'm gonna lose you either way, the voice in his mind echoed, somber, but strangely peaceful.
He was no longer the angry boy who demanded that the world give him what he thought was his by right. He had learned that to love something was, most of the time, to let it exist in its own state of glory. Katara was the untamable water. She could not be contained in a forge.
As they entered the now damp hall, where furious nobles tried to dry their clothes and complained about the weather, Zuko returned to his place. The court looked at him, awaiting orders. But the Fire Lord paid no attention to them.
His golden eyes found Katara, who was walking back to the ambassadors, laughing at the absurd situation. She looked back, over her shoulder, and winked at him through the confusion and the frantic crowd.
Zuko's chest filled with a melancholic quietness.
He accepted his fate. He would not try to pull her from the sky. He would just be grateful to exist in the same orbit. He would continue to see her from afar through flashes of light. He would continue to smile in secret when she pointed out the hypocrisies of the world. He would be the peaceful wolf resting under her silver light.
He would circle her today. He would circle her tomorrow.
Even if he was going to lose her either way, the light of that Moon had been the most beautiful thing the emptiness of his world had ever seen. And that, for Zuko, was enough.