Teo was one of the first to wake and thus noticed Kouji curled up near Zuko’s feet with his shirt pulled up over his head. Zuko was still awake, still too pale, keeping an oddly protective eye out for the younger boy. Noting this, the paraplegic arched an eyebrow, and quietly moved to Katara. He wouldn’t wake her up, but Zuko’s wound had to be taken care of soon.

She woke up about fifteen minutes later. “Morning,” she mumbled, sleepily.

“Hey,” Teo replied, keeping his voice down. “Zuko got a puppy.”

“…a puppy?” she asked, confused.

He nodded to where Kouji slept by the prince.

“…that’s sort of cute,” she said, allowing herself a tiny smile — quite an achievement, considering Zuko was one of the people involved.

“Yeah, it really is. Maybe the kid’ll get him to act like a human being instead of a superman.”

“Maybe.”

“…uh, Katara? I know you don’t like the guy, but could you look at his side when you have a moment? He’s really pale, even for Fire Nation.”

She frowned, chose not to say anything, and set about making breakfast. Teo shrugged and started getting people up. The Duke, as usual, mumbled something to the tune of “five more minutes” and pulled his blanket up over his head. Teo laughed and pulled the blanket down. “No, now. We have to leave soon; we’ve spent too much time here already.”

“Fiiiiiine,” the Duke complained, and wriggled out of his bedroll.

Teo moved onto Haru, who woke immediately, and Li Shang, who swore at him. He roused Sokka, Toph, and Aang, but hesitated on approaching their guest waterbender. Noting his hesitation, Aang went to wake her up. He shook her gently.

She came awake in an instant, and gasped, then seemed to remember where she was.

“We need to get moving,” he whispered, apologetically. “D’you want breakfast?”

“Please,” she said quietly, getting slowly to her feet and groaning a little bit.

“Are you okay?” he asked, with a worried frown, as he passed her some food.

“Just sore,” she said. “I’m… not used to sleeping on ground.”

“Oh,” he said, relieved.

She smiled apologetically at him and ate. He grinned back and went to help load Appa. Kouji continued to sleep at Zuko’s feet; Teo hadn’t had the heart to wake him.

Zuko finally gently nudged him awake, whispering that it was time to go. Kouji murmured something to the tune of the Duke’s normal morning call, but opened his eyes and got up anyway. The prince smiled slightly, and pulled himself up with the aid of his tree. Eventually, everyone was loaded up, even Li Shang, who was much more alert and thus had been bound hand and foot by Haru.

“All right, yip yip,” Aang said, as they were flying that day. Appa moaned and took off, a little slower than usual, due to the increased number of passengers.

Kouji came completely awake and eagerly stared over the side while Leilani whimpered and clung to the nearest person so she didn’t have to see how high up they were.

Zuko settled into his corner of the saddle, stubbornly clinging to consciousness. Teo was designing something, holding firmly onto the parchment in his lap so it wouldn’t fly away; Haru had fallen asleep again, paying for his two nights without sleep.

And so, the day passed quietly. Aang landed them a couple hours before sunset, and they all started to unload. Leilani was the first one down, so eager was she to be off the bison, but from there she did lend assistance in setting up camp and getting things down. Zuko was the last down — he’d started bleeding again at some point and was, as a result, somewhat dizzy.

Kouji stuck by the prince like the puppy Teo had called him earlier, worried and trying not to show it even as he helped set up the camp. Once the camp was set up, Zuko settled himself against a tree again, chalk-white, eyes closed. Kouji scampered off without anyone noticing and returned quickly with water for the prince.

His eyes drifted open when Kouji came back. Wordlessly, the boy offered him the cup. “Thanks,” he whispered, and drank the water. His hands were cold.

Kouji frowned, wondering if he ought to tell Katara anyway. “What’s wrong?” Zuko asked, noting the frown.

“Your hands are cold.”

“Oh. Yeah, guess they are.”

“I… I don’t think that’s a good sign…”

“Prob’ly just from bloodloss.”

“…that would be falling under bad things, Prince Zuko.” There was worry to his tone now.

“M’still conscious an’ functioning,” Zuko pointed out.

“You’re cloud-white, slurring, and you’re cold.” Too prove his point, Kouji reached up and put his hand against Zuko’s forehead.

Also cold. “Sorry…”

Kouji took a deep breath. “K-Katara!”

“Yeah?” she called from the other side of the campsite.

“Need a bit of help here!” Kouji rationalised his action by the fact that Zuko was much worse than he’d been last night.

“What is it?” she asked, getting up.

“It’s Zuko.” He didn’t look at the prince.

“…what about him?”

“He’s too pale, and cold.”

She sighed, and headed over to check him out.

“M’fine,” he insisted, when she got there.

“You’re not,” Kouji insisted, tugging on his shirt to get to the bandage underneath. Katara said nothing, just helped Kouji with the shirt.

The bandage underneath was soaked in blood.

“This is not fine!” Kouji yelped.

“No, it’s not,” Katara said, firmly, before Zuko could respond. She carefully unravelled the bandage and pulled water out of one of her flasks to get started. Kouji meekly offered to help the waterbender.

“Could you get me some more water, Kouji?”

He nodded eagerly and ran off to fetch; Leilani followed and helped him bring it back. Katara was still fixing the hole the rhino’s horn had left in Zuko’s side, muttering under her breath about idiot brats. Kouji did whatever Katara ordered, happy to help. Some feet away, the fettered soldier watched all this, looking amused.

At length, she’d repaired most of the damage. She wrapped it in a fresh bandage, just in case, and went back to where she’d been sitting before, still clearly irritated. Kouji brought Zuko some more water, then fled to the other side of the camp, settling himself behind Haru.

Zuko frowned after him, a little puzzled as to why he’d run away.

Teo and the Duke had wandered off, apparently in search of sustenance for eleven people. Sokka, after a minute, went after them to help.

Haru ignored the child behind him in favour of discussing earthbending techniques with Toph and asking her about using bending to see. Kouji listened very intently to that conversation, almost to the exclusion of everything else.

Katara, meanwhile, had wandered over to Leilani. “How’d you fix his head?” she asked, indicating Shang.

The older girl considered the question for a long moment. “It’s… hard to explain,” she said apologetically, indicating that Katara should sit. She did, settling down next to the older waterbender. There was another moment of silence, then Leilani said, “Early in my training, I was taught that the human body was comprised mostly of water. I think the implication was that I would eventually be trained with regards to it, but my training was… interrupted.”

She winced, and went on, “Two years ago, they brought me a man who’d taken a very bad blow to the head. They didn’t even know if I could do anything about it — it was an act of desperation. I remembered then what I’d been taught as a child, and decided to try and use that.”

Katara’s face had gone a shade paler, and she hugged her knees to her chest. Clearly, she had some sort of bad experience with the type of bending Leilani described. The older bender paused, noting this, but continued. “First I tried to ascertain the damage — there was a … a swelling, on the inside of his head. I had to make it go down. I used water on the outside, to manipulate what I needed to happen inside. I… I’m still not sure how it worked.” She smiled ruefully. “I could very well have killed him, or reverted him to a child’s mind. But instead he got better, and I slept after for a day.”

“Oh.”

Leilani sighed. “I’m mostly self-taught,” she admitted to the younger girl. “I’m continuously amazed by half of what I do.”

Katara nodded.

The other bender fell silent, then, “If you don’t mind my asking… what island are you from?”

“I’m from the South Pole,” Katara answered. After finding waterbenders in the swamp, she was only a little surprised to find that there were waterbender islands, as well. The other girl, however, looked shocked to find that benders could come from the Poles.

“Wow, really? What’s it like there?”

“Lots of ice.”

Blue eyes widened. “Ice? Really?”

Katara nodded. “Yeah.”

“…that sounds really weird. No offence.”

“None taken,” the younger girl said, laughing a bit.

“Is it very cold there?”

“Yeah. All year round. Sort of like it’s always hot here.”

Leilani shuddered. “I don’t think I could live there.”

Katara smiled. “I can understand why you think that.”

A sheepish smile. “Yeah… there’s not really a lot of difference in temperature between Ina-Pele and the Fire Nation.”

“What’s it like, on your island?” Katara asked after a brief silence.

“Quiet,” Leilani answered. “Even peaceful. A bit boring for the kids, which was why we were so excited when the Fire Nation first came. It was something new, with people and things we’d never seen before.”

“And then they took you away?” Katara asked, after shooting a brief glare over at Zuko.

Leilani shook her head. “It wasn’t like that at all,” she said softly. “They didn’t even know I was a bender for a week.”

“Still.”

“It was my own fault,” the older girl told her. “My parents and my teacher had told me not to let them know what I was, but then one of the soldiers got hurt, badly hurt. If I hadn’t healed him, he might have died.”

“And that’s when they kidnapped you?”

“That wasn’t until two days later,” Leilani replied. “One of the soldiers offered me a tour of the ship; I was the only kid who hadn’t seen it by then. By the time I noticed we’d cast off, I couldn’t even see home anymore.”

“That’s awful.”

Leilani nodded. “I think that the captain of the ship was the one who ordered me kidnapped. The other ranking officer was clearly upset by it.” She frowned, trying to remember that man’s name.

“Or at least gave a good show of it,” Katara muttered under her breath.

Leilani scowled at her. “He saved my life,” she said hotly. “And he stayed with me when I cried. And he didn’t tell Zhao that I tried to swim back home.”

“…Sorry,” Katara said. “I just… have bad experience with that sort of thing.” She glared at Zuko again.

“I can tell when people are pretending. Or I could, then. Iroh meant it.” That was his name! Iroh!

Katara blinked. “Oh. That… makes sense, then.”

“…it does?”

“Yeah.”

Leilani tipped her head to one side. “Because it was Iroh?”

Katara nodded. “Yeah.”

“You know him?” She sounded eager for details.

“Not really. I’ve only met him a couple times. But he always seems like a decent person.”

“I think he is,” Leilani said softly, then added, “but I might be a little biased.”

Katara shrugged. “Yeah… but I guess I kind of am, too…”

“Because of the war?”

“Yeah.”

Hesitantly, Leilani reached out to grip Katara’s shoulder gently. She smiled a little at the older waterbender, who smiled back before letting go. After a moment, she asked, “Could you show me how to bend like you do?”

“Sure!”

Leilani grinned happily and rose to her feet. “Thank you, Katara!”

“You’re welcome,” she replied, getting up as well.

Shang watched the two waterbenders move away from the group, idly scratching his chin and waiting for someone to notice he’d wriggled free of the ties on his wrists. Zuko had, and, as soon as Katara was out of sight and, therefore, not going to yell at him, pushed himself up and headed over to sit next to the soldier.

The younger man glanced at him and arched an eyebrow. “Should you be doing that?”

“Should you be untying yourself?”

At this, Li Shang grinned. “I get bored easily. And I hate sitting still for more than two seconds at a time.”

Zuko smiled slightly in return. “Right, then.”

“Is this the part where I get some sort of offer?”

“Nope. You have nothing I want at the moment.”

“Well, I have combat experience. And natural talent.”

“Good for you.”

Shang shrugged and stretched.

“If I were you? I wouldn’t be so obvious that you got free,” Zuko suggested, leaning back and closing his eyes.

“If escape was my intent, I wouldn’t be. As it is not, I find this amusing.”

“You’re not going to try and run?” he asked, surprised.

“Why would I? I get fed here. Not to mention I’m willing to bet the earthbenders could catch me right fast. And I have other reasons.”

“What other reasons?”

Shang’s grin was all tooth. “I’m a Li,” was all he’d say.

Zuko eyed him somewhat suspiciously for a minute, then decided to drop it. The younger man reached out and grabbed his toes, stretching his leg muscles before leaning back and sighing. “You seem to have lost your shadow,” he said after a moment.

“Kouji? Yeah, I know.”

“Gonna get it back?”

Zuko shrugged. “Dunno. He can come back if he wants. If he doesn’t, I’m not going to make him.”

“He thinks you’re mad at him.”

“…why?”

“Probably over the cute waterbender.”

Zuko just stared at him, confused. The soldier rolled his eyes and spelled it out for his prince. “Look, you’re trying to play tough and act like you don’t need healing. He went and got you that healing, most likely against your wishes. So, he’s afraid you’re mad at him.”

“…Okay, first of all, I didn’t need healing. And I asked him not to tell Katara or the new girl that I’d started bleeding again. When he got Katara, he never mentioned blood. So, technically, he didn’t do anything I’d asked him not to do.”

“Does he realise that?”

“I don’t know. I haven’t talked to him.”

“Do you think you should?”

“…I guess, probably.”

“So get going,” said the private cheerfully.

The prince nodded, pushed himself back up, and meandered over to Kouji. “Hey.”

The boy immediately abandoned eavesdropping on Toph and Haru and looked up at the prince a little apprehensively. “Hi.”

“Hey.”

Kouji shifted a little and glanced at the ground.

“…Shang says you think I’m mad at you.”

“…you’re not?” Grey eyes glanced back up at him.

Zuko shook his head. “No.”

Kouji’s face lit up like fireworks, but he only said, “Oh,” calmly.

The prince smiled a little, glad that had been settled quickly. “So, um… what are we doing, anyway?” Kouji asked him after a moment.

“Just… hanging around, while Sokka and Teo and the Duke go for food, I think.”

“Not that,” said Kouji. “I mean… why we’re travelling. Why I had to go with you.”

“…Oh.” Zuko was silent for a long moment. The younger boy looked up at him, curious and patient and not really expecting an answer.

“…we’re doing what needs to be done,” he finally hedged, not wanting to say it right out.

“And what is that?”

“It’s what needs to be done,” he repeated, almost as if reassuring himself of this fact.

“…but what needs to be done?”

Clearly, the kid wasn’t going to make it easy on him. “Lots of things need to get done,” he pointed out.

Kouji sighed and gave up. Zuko sighed as well, relieved the subject had been dropped.

Around that time, the trio of hunters returned, each carrying the spoils of their search. It was Aang’s turn to make dinner, and he went over to see what they’d found. There was, of course, plenty of meat due to Sokka’s culinary inclinations, but they had also had the foresight to collect food for Aang as well.

Aang thanked them, and went to put the food together. After a moment, Kouji wandered over to help. “Thanks!” the older boy said brightly.

Kouji grinned back at him. “You’re welcome.”

Between the two of them, they managed to put together something edible, and passed it around to the others. Leilani thanked them quietly, while Haru, still debating some of the finer points of bending with Toph, merely nodded. Teo tore into his food while Li Shang made a half-assed attempt to look as though he was still bound.

“How’d you manage to get untied?” Sokka asked, somewhat outraged, as he rebound the prisoner.

Shang gave him an innocent look. “Older cousins.”

The younger man just glared, muttered something rude under his breath, and finished re-securing Shang.

“Hey, my mom was a paragon of virtue! Surely you mean my aunt.”

“Shut up and stop wriggling.”

“But where’s the fun in that?”

Finally, Sokka managed to get him tied up, with much tighter and more inventive knots than before.

Shang regarded these with a grin. This would definitely be entertaining.