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When Zuko was first exiled he felt unmoored and the steady rocking of the waves only served to remind him about how he had been cast adrift. He spent those first weeks in agony and every time Uncle came close to him to tend to the burn on his face he heard echoes of his father’s voice. Suffering shall be your teacher, suffering shall be your teacher.
Recovery was a long arduous task but eventually Zuko learned. He started slowly at first, his depth perception was off now, he had to relearn how to walk, then he relearned his swordsmanship, then his fire bending. The feeble fires he had produced before were sparks in comparison to what he could achieve now. But he's still no match for Azula and so he works harder. He has to work harder, he has to be better and he has to capture the Avatar.
It's an impossible task, he heard the crew whisper when they thought he couldn’t hear them, but they were wrong. Father wouldn’t have set him an impossible task, he just wanted him to learn his lesson. This was for his own good. Even if he was angry about it.
These days Zuko is always angry. He's bitter and jaded and with every fruitless lead and empty rumour Zuko feels that anger grow inside of him. Dead-ends about the avatar acting like dry wood for the inferno in his veins. They have been out on the sea for a year now, a year of nothing but blue ocean, stinging disappointment and the steady presence of his Uncle as Zuko let his rage slowly consume him. He couldn’t even tell who he was angry at anymore. His crew for being incompetent, himself for being a failure. Maybe he was angry at his Uncle who treated him kinder than his own father ever had even in the face of Zuko’s worse rages.
Or maybe he's just angry at the world for dealing him such a bad hand.
Zuko let out an angry huff before shouting at the captain to set a new course.
He would regain his honour.
He has too.
*
Time works differently at sea. Palace life is a distant memory. Zuko is now used to hard beds and cold meals, choppy storms and calloused hands from years of hard gruelling work. Sometimes he thinks he’s happier here, on a ship with a bunch of military rejects as an exiled prince then he ever was at the Palace with his father.
He doesn’t like to dwell on those thoughts too often.
He carries on blindly, rage fuels his relentless determination as he chases every rumour, every lead and carries on again and again after every dead end. Zuko has always been determined, where he was once driven by misplaced idealism he is now driven by desperate overwhelming need. A need to reclaim his honour, to prove to his father he is a worthy son.
And so he ignores Uncles warm coaxing and the crew’s complaints about wanting a break and keeps going, keeps moving forward.
And if at night he feels hopelessness creep into his veins and despairs over the thought that maybe father didn’t want him to succeed after all he doesn’t mention it.
He had a mission and he would do it. Whatever it takes.
But his resolve begins to waver. His steadfast stubborn ideals begin to break every time they pull into a port and are met with no news of the Avatar. A little piece of him breaks every time he sees a family, a father and son happily laughing in the streets and he’s reminded that he never had that anyway. Finding things that he misses from home is becoming a harder and harder task when all his happy moments now seem to take place on the deck of a ship, his uncles’ tea in his hand and his crew bellowing sea shanties by his side. And sometimes there’s an ache that’s bone deep when his Uncle treats him more like a son than the Fire lord ever did. With every cup of tea, with every comforting hand after a nightmare, with every unwavering moment of unconditional support and encouragement more questions arrive.
He starts to question if he ever wants to return to the Fire lord.
And then he questions when he stopped calling the Fire lord ‘father’
He doesn’t mention these doubts to anyone. He already has no honour, a traitor’s mark on his face. He doesn’t think he can fall much lower. Doesn’t think about how much he’d like too.
So instead he sets a course for the South Pole.
It is probably telling that he had never actually imagined himself capturing the Avatar. The Avatar had always been a faceless figure to him, a title, a spirit myth that he had chased with an unhealthy fever.
But then he finds the avatar.
And the avatar is just a kid, twelve years old and terrified (just like he had been) and apparently he was a pacifist, raised to be a pacifist which meant the Air Temples had no army and his nation, his nation had just gone in and slaughtered an entire race of people. And the last one is in front of him, the last avatar is in front of him and he’s so close to regaining his honour but something about that word makes him feel dirty now in a way it didn’t used too.
When the avatar escapes somehow with the help of the two water tribe siblings and an Agni damned sky bison Zuko puts up a half-hearted resistance. Zuko was born with venom behind his teeth and a fire in his heart, he was a fighter but seeing the avatar, 12 and alone and frightened makes him question what he’s even fighting for anymore.
The avatar escaped and Zuko lets him. But not before the avatar dunks half of his crew into the frigid south-pole waters.
It’s later that night when his Uncle finds him stood on the deck staring up at the night sky. Uncle stands next to him, a warm and steadying presence and Zuko feels like he had three years ago in his first weeks of exile, unmoored and cast adrift.
“I don’t know what to do anymore Uncle” Zuko speaks softly into the night around him, uttering those words should feel like a weakness but Zuko feels no shame well inside him, just a desperate need for direction.
“Then it is time to ask yourself Prince Zuko, who are you and what do you want?” says Uncle beside him calmly as if he hasn’t asked two of the hardest questions in the universe. Who is he? Does he even know that anymore?
He is an exiled prince, a traitor to the state, a failure, every thought he had felt like a small act of treason and he's no longer honour-bound, not in the traditional sense. He's a fire bender, a child of Agni’s, he's a nephew and a sailor and he has no idea what he wants from life other than the fact that it is not what the Fire Lord wanted.
“I don’t know anymore” Zuko says hopelessly and he can’t decide if he's addressing his uncle or the dark expanse of ocean and night sky around him, speaking his doubts into the universe.
“Well I always find when one doesn’t know where to go anymore it is best to begin with a cup of tea”
Uncle explains his new hair-brained plot and Zuko honestly has no idea what the old man says to him to get him to agree but he finds himself nodding along anyway. There’s a happy glint to Uncle’s eyes that Zuko doesn’t recall ever seeing so strongly before and as his Uncle wanders off to set their plans in motion he brings him into a hug.
“I’m proud of you Zuko” he murmurs voice choked with emotion. Zuko. Not nephew, not Prince Zuko, not an exiled prince or traitor. Just, Zuko.
His uncle disappears below deck leaving Zuko leaning against the rails. And there, amongst the dark night sky and the inky waves of the ocean something in Zuko burns brighter than it ever had before.
*
He doesn’t know how his Uncle managed it but soon after their conversation their little war ship is converted into a travelling tea shop called ‘the Jasmine Dragon’ When Zuko asks about the name Uncle teaches him how to brew jasmine tea and the Breath of Life with equal pleasure.
Zuko finds it hard to believe how well their business is actually doing. It’s been weeks of travelling from coast to coast and the Jasmine Dragon was slowly becoming the most gossiped about tea shop across the Earth Kingdom. It’s easy to forget it used to be a war ship, now filled with Uncle’s weird taste in interior decorating Zuko struggles to see the ship he had spent the last three years of his life on.
Zuko still feels a bit lost, still feels a pang of bitterness every time he has to serve a happy laughing family but every day it gets easier. Zuko’s not built to work in a tea shop. He’s all sharp lines and coiled tension, built on grit and blood and venom but with every cup of tea he brews it’s easier to forget he is a child of war. He embraces his role as a tea server, a simple fire nation boy trying to escape the terror of his nation. Sometimes he doesn’t even have to pretend.
Word reaches him and his crew, his brilliant crew who jumped aboard Uncle’s crazy plan instead of jumping ship, that commander Zhao had managed to lose the Avatar. They all get a good laugh out of that, Zuko had never liked the prick.
Zuko smiles and brews tea and every day he feels a bit of that old rage and anger leave him. He doesn’t know if this is exactly what he wants but he does know that it makes him happy. And that’s enough for now.
*
Of course things were going too well for him. Zuko knew his bloodline must be cursed by the spirits just on the basis of how much trouble seems to find him, he was unlucky that way. He flinches slightly as the fire lords words echo about his head (lucky to be born, lucky to be born) but Uncle lays a comforting hand on his shoulder because he knows, because Uncle always knows, and they carry on walking down the pier.
They had docked in a small market town and Zuko had been trading with the stall owners as his Uncle sweet talked passer-bys into coming to their tea shop. Uncle is probably the reason the Jasmine Dragon has half the customers it does. For one thing he made truly wonderful tea, it had converted Zuko from hating to the stuff to serving it for a living, and for another everyone liked Uncle. It's easy for the man to draw in customers and so he left the hard bargains to Zuko who enjoyed the time of being able to shout at people over their incompetency.
They had just been returning to the ship when Uncle had worriedly exclaimed about losing his pai-sho tile piece and drags Zuko behind him as they hunt for a replacement. Zuko knows Uncle is up to something but Uncle is usually always up to something so Zuko allows it.
He didn’t see the harm in his Uncle sending him on useless errands until the problem literally hits him in the face. The second he turns away from a distraught tea stall owner he is practically bowled over by the Avatar and his water tribe friends.
It would be so easy to give chase, Zuko thinks as he watches them race around the corner. It’s his chance to capture the avatar, another chance fallen right into his lap to reclaim his honour and re-join his family and some part of him desperately wants to give chase. But then he looks back and sees uncle looking happier than he had in years bargaining for some rare tea leaves and decides the avatar can wait. His honour had waited three years; it could wait a bit longer.
*
It’s an easy life. They sail around the earth kingdom and don’t stray too far into Fire Nation waters and they sell tea. Zuko appreciates the simplicity of it more than he can say. He knows Uncle does as well and at every port they leave with a few more allies (‘you can say friends Zuko’) and he thinks this, nights with his Uncle and his crew and putting smiles on people’s faces as he hands out tea and sneakily donates extra to the poorer side of town, might be what he wants. He feels more and more like that idealist kid he used to be every day.
Of course it’s the Avatar that interrupts his peace.
News reaches the Jasmine Dragon that the Avatar has been captured, is being held in the Pohuai stronghold. A fire nation victory is assured.
Zuko should feel happy. His nation is on its way to victory and their biggest foe had been defeated. But that thought doesn’t make Zuko happy. It actually makes him feel a bit sick but he doesn’t want to analyse that right now. Not when his crew look miserable and there’s a bleak look in Uncle’s eyes that Zuko hadn’t seen since those early days of exile.
Zuko doesn’t give it any thought before strapping his dual swords behind his back and grabbing a Blue Spirit Mask as he sneaks off the ship.
Breaking into the Pohuai strong hold was said to be impossible.
But Zuko had always had a way of ruining people’s expectations.
*
Zuko didn’t want to say breaking out of the stronghold had been easy, in fact he knew he had pulled some moves that would make Uncle want to throttle him (Except Uncle would never do something like that. He’d chastise him and say a stupid idiom and ask Zuko to be better and it was so unlike what Zuko had been raised with it made his eyes burn every time it happened)
The Avatar is sat beside him, the pair of them breathing heavily as they sit in the thicket of trees. When Zuko’s recovered enough he goes to stand up and try to forget he has ever done something so stupid in the first place. Zuko doesn’t want to think about why he went and saved the avatar, failing to capture him is one thing but actively saving him is another, is an act of treason that Zuko doesn’t want to contemplate. Because it was one thing preferring a life without his overbearing father and royal expectations and it was a whole other thing to help in aiding the inevitable destruction of the fire nation.
But he can’t deny that something loosens in his chest when he sees the avatar (just a kid) alive and safe.
“Do you think in another life we could have been friends?” he hears the Avatar ask behind him, so young and optimistic and naïve. Zuko wasn’t going to answer but he does anyway because tonight has just been one string of impulsive bad decisions
“Do you think I want to be a traitor to the crown?”
Zuko leaves Aang there and ignores the small part of him that treacherously whispers yes.
*
Uncle doesn’t say anything when he sees Zuko the next morning but he lets Zuko sleep in and there are knowing smiles on the crew’s faces that make him wary. Zuko ignores it and pours tea for an elderly grandmother who smiles and laughs as she talks to Zuko.
He doesn’t think about what the Avatar is doing
He doesn’t.
Or at least he wasn’t until commander Zhao strides onto their ship as if he owns it and patronises uncle with a stupid smug smile on his face that makes Zuko just itch to punch it off of him-
Uncle sends him into the kitchen to brew more tea. It was probably the best for everyone.
He exits the kitchen with a pot of steaming jasmine tea because he’s nothing but proud of what he and uncle had managed to achieve, to get people to look past fire nation and to bring small amounts of joy where ever they could. Some things are more important than war.
He arrives just to hear the tail-end of the conversation and Uncle is speaking in his special customer service voice which means Zhao is five seconds away from being ripped into shreds.
“Sadly you can’t enlist this crew or ship in your endeavour to capture the avatar, we have a business permit you see and so cannot be used in armed battle, I hope you understand” says Uncle disingenuously.
Everyone can hear the snub in his Uncles words and Zhao turns an interesting shade of red as he stares down Uncles happy smiling face
“I’ll capture the avatar and then we’ll see what your coward nephew does without his honour then” he snarls viciously and spits into the pot of tea Zuko had just brewed.
“Traitor Prince” Zhao snaps as he barges past him to leave their ship.
The crew cheer when he’s gone.
Zuko brews more tea.
*
They keep sailing and they keep brewing tea and Uncle connects with more of his ‘old friends’. Zuko is not dumb, he knows his Uncle is reaching out to his old connections, he just doesn’t want to think about it. Doesn’t want to think about the war that is coming and doesn’t want to think about what will happen when he has to pick a side.
Zuko has become something of an expert in avoiding his problems.
If only his problems had the same decency to avoid him.
They had docked into another earth kingdom port, they stayed mostly in Earth Kingdom waters these days and he knew his Uncle was quietly hoping for an admission into Ba Sing Se where this is no war. That would be nice. They set up shop in the small town but business is lacking and it seems that most of the town had travelled further inland for more business. Apparently fire nation warships were bad news for everyone if they didn’t come harbouring tea.
They could clamber back on the ship and find a new town to settle down in for the next week but his crew are tired and hungry and Zuko knew they were dying for a rest from the choppy waves. So Zuko offers to travel to the market a few towns over and come back with supplies, it was the least he could do to make up for being a monumental brat all these years.
Uncle looks worried as he packs Zuko a bag for his travels and fusses over him as the crew teases him about being ‘a big boy now’. Zuko doesn’t admit it but the gentle teasing actually makes him feel better, less like Prince Zuko, an enemy of the state and more the actual kid he is going off to run an errand. It’s the little moments he finds he treasures the most.
He sets off alone down the road bracing himself for a long few days. That was the trouble with your shop also being a ship, inland travel was impossible. It’s boring and long but steadily he makes his way to the next town over camping out beside dirt roads with his swords under his pillow and an odd craving for company that he had never quite felt before.
The monotonous routine of his journey carries on until it doesn’t. Because there, just off the beaten dirt road was a rather obvious trail of fur, bison fur. The fur from the avatar’s stupid flying bison to be exact. It’s not of any of his business what the Avatar is up to Zuko thinks as he carries on plodding along the path like the very dull ostrich-horse he is. Not his business at all he thinks as he hears a rather loud disturbing ‘boom’ coming from the direction of the trail.
It’s not his business until it is.
He follows the trail.
*
Its Azula facing down the avatar because of course its Azula because his life can never be simple.
“Do you really want to fight me?” Azula says patronisingly and Zuko is already regretting his decision before he ever goes through with it but he’s hot-tempered and reckless and the avatar has never looked more like a child than when he’s facing down his little sister. His insane, sadistic, terrifying little sister.
“Yeah, I really do” Zuko challenges as he jumps out of his hiding place with the scraps of a plan and fire in his eyes.
“I was wondering when you’d show up Zuzu” she says calmly and that somehow serves to annoy him more. Because he can remember when she used that nickname when she couldn’t even say his real name, when he was her big brother, her hero but now was not the time to drown in memories of the past. Not when Azula’s eyeing him like prey and the avatar is looking at him in a show of alarm but not nearly as worried as Zuko would have liked.
“Back off Azula, he’s mine!” he snarls because the only way he can think of protecting the Avatar is pledging to capture himself.
“Really Zuko?” Azula asks with a laugh “last I heard you were playing traitor in a tea-shop”
Zuko doesn’t allow himself to show his discomfort but it’s pointless, Azula already knows she’s hit a nerve
“I’m not going anywhere” she states sliding easily into a fighting stance a vicious grin on her face. There’s a beat of silence, of stillness, before Azula attacks sending a burst of blue fire in their direction. And then Zuko is trading angry vicious blows with his sister and the avatar, ducking and weaving beneath punches and bursts of flame. Zuko attacks and attacks again, his burning orange flames against Azula’s frighteningly blue and some part of him removed from the fight wonders how he came to this, to trading blows with the little sister he had sworn to protect before he’s swept into the fight again.
He’s still desperately fighting, fire burning in his veins, when he’s knocked out.
Consciousness is a slippery beast but when Zuko woozily comes around it’s to see his Uncle’s face which can’t be right because Uncle is meant to be safe in their tea shop and not here in a war zone. But Uncle, hallucination or not, is urging him to his feet and Zuko can’t argue with that logic. He staggers to his feet and instantly tries to shake off the grogginess as he catalogues the fight around him, the adrenaline in his veins urging him to take action.
Uncle cuts off Azula before she can escape from the avatar and all his friends who Zuko assumes must have arrived when he’d been knocked-out. He never thought he’d be thankful for the presence of the irritating water-tribe siblings but any extra help against Azula is appreciated.
“Well look at this, enemies and traitors all working together” she says coolly from where she’s surrounded “I’m done, I know when I’m beaten. You got me. A princess surrenders with honour” she says staring directly at Zuko, a small smile on her face and venom in her eyes.
A beat passes, and then another.
And then before anyone can react Azula has shot a blast of seething fire at Uncle who falls to the ground. Zuko is vaguely aware of Azula escaping but he can’t take his attention of Uncle. Uncle lying on the ground barely breathing and not dead but oh Agni so close to it. Zuko doesn’t know what to do, he doesn’t know what to do. He’s never felt this panicked in his life and his crew are miles away and Uncle is hurt right now. Lying on the floor hurt because all he ever does is protect Zuko and all Zuko ever does is screw up and-
“Zuko, Zuko I can help” the water-tribe girl says, Katara if he’s remembering right but Zuko doesn’t respond. Doesn’t know how to respond.
“Let me help Zuko” she pleads again gently and Zuko looks up to face them.
He’s surrounded by enemies on all sides. They all know him as that fire bending jerk who tried to capture them that one time, they have no reason to help him. But Katara offers to help anyway and his uncle is just lying there and he doesn’t know what to do-
Time and time again he had chosen war first, chosen to fight and fight and fight until there was nothing left. This time, this time he chooses peace.
He says yes.
And he walks away from the avatar with his Uncle who’s tired and weak but alive. He tells himself it’s a tactical retreat to avoid thinking about the alternative.
When they finally make it back to the ship Zuko fusses over Uncle so much that the man can’t even make his own tea as Zuko bullies him into bed rest. They don’t talk about what happened and if Zuko hugs Uncle a bit more, a bit tighter these days they don’t mention it. They don’t mention a lot of things.
Zuko goes back to making tea.
At least Azula can’t beat him at that.
*
They make it to Ba Sing Se where there is no war. Until the war comes to them.
They leave the crew and the ship for the few weeks they’ve been invited into Ba Sing Se for. The upper ring because apparently their tea is just that good. Things are calm, peaceful for a while but some part of Zuko aches to be back on their familiar ship instead of an empty shop in unfamiliar territory. He knows Uncle feels the same. There’s something odd about this place. Something not quite right but Zuko puts it down to the fact that he’s so unused to peace-time experiencing it makes his skin crawl.
It begins with a missing person poster, or more accurately a missing bison poster. And somewhere between freeing the Avatars’ bison and accepting an invitation from the king it ends with him and Uncle surrounded by Dai Li Agents and Azula and Zuko wonders once again how they reached this point. Did it begin with accepting their invitation to Ba Sing Se? Did it begin with the tea shop, the Jasmine Dragon, which set Zuko down this path? Or did it begin with thirteen year old Zuko screaming under his father’s wrath? Or perhaps this moment was one that did not have beginning but was rather one of those moments that was always meant to be an end.
“Did I ever tell you how I got the nickname ‘the dragon of the west’?” Uncle asks slowly reaching for their abandoned tea.
“I’m not interested in a lengthy anecdote, Uncle” Azula says scornfully.
“It’s more of a demonstration, really” said Uncle and Zuko couldn’t stop the twitch of a smile on his face. Uncle lives up to his name and breaths fire, raging roaring flames that allow them to make their escape. Uncle blasts a hole in the wall jumping down from the ledge but Zuko lingers on the precipice
“Come on you’ll be fine” Uncle shouts and there’s something pleading in that tone that makes Zuko stop in his place. Every time Zuko was in trouble Uncle had always been there to help him, sacrificing everything for him every time. Zuko hears Azula’s raging behind him but instead of letting his pride get the better of him, instead of turning around and facing her, he jumps down.
He runs.
*
They run out of Ba Sing Se, they run back to their ship, back to their crew and it all looks the same but everything has never felt so different.
He’s once again standing on the deck of the ship, the gentle rocking of the waves is still the same but now Zuko has a different choice to face.
“You’re not the man you used to be Zuko” Uncle says softly beside him as they both stare out at the sea.
“You are stronger and wiser and free, more than you’ve ever been” he carries on turning to face Zuko who wants more than anything to look away “You have come to the crossroads of your destiny and it is time for you to choose”
Uncle looks like he wants to say something else there but decides against it. Instead he grips Zuko’s hands tightly as if to make sure that this is one problem Zuko won’t avoid.
“Who are you Zuko and what do you truly want?”
The same two questions but now Zuko feels like answering differently than he had back then. Or maybe it wasn’t a different answer, maybe it had just taken him this long to realise. He didn’t want a fire nation victory, not when all the fire nation stood for was war and terror, he didn’t want to return to the Fire Lord and he didn’t want a part in the war but he would hate fighting for the Fire Nation even more.
“I may not have my honour” Zuko says slowly “but I do have tea”
The smile Uncle shoots him is enough to make it all feel worth it.
It’s a nice feeling, choosing good.
There will be a war and Zuko is betraying his nation but things aren’t that bad anymore. There’s hope.
*
And then they hear the news that the Avatar is dead, that Azula killed him and everything just seems that bit worse.
*
Where once Zuko fed his anger when they travelled he now nurtures hope. Hope that the Avatar is alive and with every rumour he hears about an earth bending girl fleecing stall owners or two water-tribe siblings that hope grows.
It's hope that Zuko clings onto when he sees he destruction the fire nation brings, hope that keeps him serving tea to strangers with a kind smile and a promise that things will get better even if it does feel empty.
It's hope he feels, bright and burning, on the day of the comet when the Avatar reveals himself. When everyone knows that the Avatar is still alive. Alive and without a fire bending master because what fire bender is going to teach the destruction of their nation.
He is. Obviously.
He plans to leave that night, his bag is already packed and his swords are by his side. He doesn’t say goodbye to Uncle because he honestly doesn’t think he’ll be able to leave if he does. (He thinks his uncle knows anyway because Uncle always knows)
And so he begins tracking the Avatar again.
Some things never change.
*
He finds the Avatar.
Things are tense first, Zuko apologises from trying to kidnap him and apologises again for faking trying to kidnap him but the avatar (“call me Aang”) waves his apologies off as if he knows every time that Zuko has helped him out in the past, even when he shouldn’t have.
Teaching fire bending isn’t easy, Zuko’s style was fuelled by rage and anger and fury even if now it’s the righteous kind it doesn’t suit Aang at all. Toph is curiously the one he gets along with the most and Zuko feels an odd sort of respect for the earth bender but the water-tribe siblings are still hesitant. Not that Zuko can really blame them that much. But it still makes nights around the camp fire awkward and when Zuko slinks off at night he can’t help but wish for the gentle companionship of his Uncle and their crew instead of these uncharted territories. He longs for home.
And then he and the Avatar go on a quest to find dragons and his life gets that much weirder. But at least the lessons are easier after that.
Tensions slowly ease around the camp fire with each ‘field-trip’ he goes on and slowly, slowly Zuko begins to think perhaps he’s made a new home here, with these people. A new family who hug him and cheer him on and joke with him and are actually happy to be around him. On the good days it’s easier to ignore it is a war that brought them all together.
Zuko’s not in a tea shop anymore but he still makes some damn good tea. He makes tea when he an Sokka actually make it out of the Boiling Rock alive, makes tea the night after Azula finds them and Zuko is forced to finally reconcile the image of his little sister and the girl who would relish in killing him. He makes tea the night Sokka first claps him on the back with a teasing grin, makes tea the night he falls asleep by the camp fire and wakes up with the others surrounding him using him for his heat. He makes tea after Katara’s failed attempt at revenge, when she finally lets go of her grudges and welcomes Zuko into this little family they have built for themselves.
It’s Uncle who makes them all tea the night before Sozin’s comment. When he sees Zuko he immediately draws the boy into a hug.
“I was so worried” he murmurs as they hug.
“You should have known I’d come back to you” Zuko says, it’s the only thing he could offer but from the way Uncle hugs him tighter he knows it’s enough.
Zuko looks around at the family he has found, at the home he has built and reminds himself that this is what he’s fighting for. They all sit there in silence as they sip from the steaming cups.
*
He’s here once again fighting against Azula but this time there’s something more final to it and Zuko feels like he already has one foot in the grave when he sees that blood thirsty look in her eyes. He fights like he has never fought before, they are almost matched now that Zuko finally has something to fight for. He redirects blows and sends waves of fire at Azula as they dance along the court yard. Each burst of flame is powered by a thought, thoughts of the dragons, of his family, of those early days at the tea shop, of his nation. Of everything he is trying to protect.
Azula is defeated.
It feels like a hollow victory.
*
And then Zuko is stood in an empty palace, his palace now he supposes. Azula is escorted down to the dungeons by the guards because he refuses to deal with that right now and he clings onto his Uncle for the life of him. He has his friends, no, his family by his side and he finally has his honour but-
“I think it’s time for some tea don’t you?” he says and everyone laughs around him.
And at last Zuko finally feels at peace.