Liàng finally had a moment to himself, and was using that moment to compose a message to the Dragon of the West.  In the five years since Iroh had first ordered him to keep an eye on the Róng Yào, he had managed to become part of the jingoistic organisation, keeping his half- Earth Kingdom heritage a secret from his ‘comrades’.  And now, after five years, the Róng Yào  were on the move.

Carefully he penned the times and locations of the three planned strikes, hoping his message would find the general in time.  “What’re you doing, Liàng?” Azami, one of his ‘comrades’ asked, poking her head in. “Who’re you writing to?”

Damned nosy woman.  “My mother,” he lied glibly.

“…I thought you said she was dead,” she said, tilting her head and frowning.

“Step-mother.”

“How come you never mentioned her before?”

The smith-spy shrugged.  “No need to, and nobody asked.”

“Huh, guess not.” She didn’t look entirely satisfied with his answer.

“Did you need something, Azami?”

“Not really. Just wanted to see what you were up to.”

“Well, now you know.”

“Right.” She smiled at him, and slipped out, as quietly as she’d entered.

That had been close.  Liàng finished the letter and sealed it, taking care not to sign it.  He didn’t want to find out what the Róng Yào would do to traitors. 

He didn’t have to wait long to find out. Azami had relayed her suspicion to her superiors, and the letter had been intercepted.  When they came for him, the smith played innocent.  They hadn’t come this far to be incautious with a potential mole — they moved to capture him regardless.

“Look, I’m sure this is all a misunderstanding,” said Liàng calmly.

“We can’t take that chance, Liàng,” his cell’s leader replied, just as calmly. “You know that.”

“I am aware,” was the answer.  “So where are we going?”

There was no verbal reply, only rough hands ‘escorting’ him to another room.

The carefully clean state of the room, and the objects scattered on the table in the centre, made it all too clear what the purpose of the room was.

That changed things.  Liàng was strong, but he wasn’t entirely certain how he’d hold up to the tools in the room.  Predictably, he balked at the door.  “Hold on just a moment.”

“We have to be sure, Liàng,” the cell leader said, calmly, continuing to drag him forward.

“Not like this!”  He shook the leader off.

“It’s the only way,” he replied, almost apologetically.

Golden eyes narrowed.  “No.”

Equally golden eyes remained flat and impassive, and he summoned reinforcements.

The situation was rapidly devolving from bad to worse.  Liàng’s shoulders tensed, and he made ready to fight his way out.  When he resisted, the Róng Yào soldiers took that as indication of guilt, and fought to kill.  The smith fought back grimly, using all his strength and throwing them away from him; he was at a disadvantage, however, as he refused to kill.

And he was outnumbered.

Without pausing, Liàng stepped to one side, grabbed the table, and hurled it at the soldiers.  This didn’t hold them up for long — one of the soldiers destroyed the table with a quick fireblast.  It was, however, enough to give the smith space.  He planted his feet, moved his arms, and fire sprouted from his hands, which he then wove into a wall between him and his assailants.  He narrowed his concentration, and the heat intensified as the flames turned blue.

This sparked some confusion — the rebel soldiers weren’t aware of his talent. It was just enough to get him out of there.  He took the chance and fled, first trying to get far enough away from them, then covering his tracks.  Pursuit was disorganized at best, and took a minute to get organized.

By the time they got their act together, it was too late — Liàng was long gone.  Pursuit was organized, but failed to track or catch him.

Liàng sighed in relief.  It had been close — and Iroh would definitely not be pleased — but now at least he could report what he knew.

And see Lady Mai.

Now all he had to do was cross the Firenation under the respective radars of the Róng Yào rebels and the Zhōng Chéng loyalists.

Oh, yeah.  This is going to be fun.

It seemed that fate was on his side — he ran into supporters of neither militant group on his trek across the nation.  Liàng blessed whatever spirits were looking out for him as he neared the capital.

 

About three days from the capital, he ran across another pair of travellers — two young men, a little younger than the smith himself, one of whom kept his hood up, shadowing his face.

Wary, Liàng slowed his pace, drawing his own cloak tighter around him.  If these were more Róng Yào…

The two men seemed to be carefully not-watching him, as wary of his allegiances as he was of theirs.  This did not serve to comfort him at all.  However, he nodded to the travellers, earning a nod and a glare in return, and passed them by.

And that was when the pursuit finally caught up with him.

One of the two travellers shouted a warning, and Liàng threw himself to one side, barely avoiding the flare of fire that instead caught a nearby tree.  He swore viciously as he rolled to his feet.

The other traveller — the hooded one — moved to engage Liàng’s attackers.

“Idiot!” snapped the shorter of the two as he flanked the hooded man.  Liàng rolled to his feet and drew the fire away from the tree, treating it like a stream, and sent it roaring past the strangers to slam into the nearest of the Róng Yào.  He made certain that the blow wasn’t fatal.

Between the three of them, they made short work of the half-dozen rebels. One killed — probably by the hooded man, he’d been surprisingly ferocious (and how his hood had managed to stay up that entire time was anyone’s guess) — three unconscious, one fled, and one, while still conscious, unlikely to be getting up any time soon.

The non-hooded man knelt by the conscious rebel and checked his pulse, then bound him hand and foot.  “I think we’re going to have to backtrack,” he said to the hooded man.  He swore under his breath, but nodded.

“Backtrack?” Liàng asked carefully from where he was tying the unconscious men up.  “Where?”

The hooded man didn’t respond, limping over to the third unconscious man to bind him, as well.

“None of your business,” said the other.  “Why don’t you run along now?”

“Can’t do that,” Liàng replied.  “I’ve a vested interest in these gents.”

“They were aiming for him,” the hooded man pointed out quietly, checking the knots on his prisoner.

“And I’d like to know why.”  Brown eyes settled on Liàng, who merely shrugged and offered no reason.

The hooded man also turned to study the smith, but he didn’t say anything more.

“What are you going to do with them?” Liàng wanted to know.

The hooded man turned to his companion. “We can’t take them back. Too many. And I’m not killing them cold.”

“Nobody’s killing anyone,” Liàng said quickly.

The other man looked from smith to Hood.  “Why not?”

“We can’t keep track of all four of them. There’s only two of us. Besides, we’re travelling light. Don’t have the supplies to deal with prisoners, let alone prisoners that’d triple the size of our group.”

“I could keep some,” offered Liàng.

“Not to be rude,” said No Hood, “but go away.”

Hood said nothing, levering himself up from where he’d crouched to tie up his prisoner.

Liàng’s eyes narrowed, and he crossed his arms over his chest, flexing ever-so-slightly.  Muscle strained against his shirtsleeves. “Make me,” he said to No Hood.

Hood limped over to stand beside his companion — how the hell did that hood stay up? — and stared at Liàng.  The smith stared right back at them both.  Hood shifted slightly after a few minutes, but didn’t leave off staring — or so the smith had to assume.

The silence stretched on, and Liàng began to drag his foot through the leaves littering the ground.  Hood stared at the drawing, then turned to his companion.  No Hood blinked, and he now glanced sharply at the smith.  “Iroh’s?”

Liàng nodded.

“How’d you get caught?” Hood asked him.

He winced.  “Slipped up on my story.  Stupid mistake.  They decided it’d be better to be safe than sorry when it came to the duckmole in their midst.  I have a strong aversion to being tortured.”

Hood stiffened and swore. And not under his breath this time.

No Hood offered the smith a hand.  “Sergeant Li Shang, palace guard.  We’re taking these clowns back to Iroh anyway.”

Now Liàng smiled and accepted the hand.  “Liàng.  And what a coincidence — that’s what I was going to do.”

Hood didn’t seem entirely inclined to offer his name or take down his hood. “So, we’re going back,” he said, sounding somewhat annoyed, instead.

“We have to,” Li replied.  “The General will want to ask these bastards a few questions.”

He considered a moment, then seemed to come to a conclusion. “You two take them back, then. I’m going on ahead.”

“There is not enough ‘no’ in the world,” Li snapped at him.

“We’ve been over this and over this. And I still haven’t changed my mind. And I won’t, no matter how much you disagree,” the other snapped back.

“And you’re not going on your own!”

“It looks like I’ll have to.”

“I’m not letting you.”

“You have to help Liàng get these men to the capital,” Hood pointed out, somewhat acidly. “I have to do what we discussed.” Hood was still hiding his identity due to the potential of other listeners.

“You are not going on your own!”

“Look, if you’d just get me a wagon or something—” Liàng started.

“Too risky,” Hood cut him off. “One man to guard four prisoners on the road isn’t nearly enough. It’s barely enough in an actual prison.”

“And it’s too risky for you to go alone,” snapped Li.  “Look, once we get these guys to the General, we can hit the road again.”

“Too much time wasted.”

“Guess what?  There’s no choice.  And maybe they’ve found it.”

“I’m not taking that chance,” Hood said coolly, and turned around, clearly intending to press on with or without his companion.

Li was having none of it.  Quickly he lunged forward and caught his companion by the arm.  “And I’m not taking the chance that someone will see your face and kill you!”

“I’ll get a mask,” he shot back, pulling his arm away from the other’s grasp.

“What part of ‘no’ is hard for you?  The N or the O?”

“Call it both.”

Li glared at him.  “If I have to cart you over my shoulder all the way back to the palace, so help me, I will!”

“I’m not going back until I’ve found what I’m looking for,” Hood hissed.

“Look,” Liàng interrupted. “You’ve tied the bastards pretty strong.  Find me a cart and I can transport ‘em back no problem.  Your bodyguard is right,” he said to Hood.  “It’s way too dangerous for you to be out on your own.”

“…Fine,” Hood snapped. “I’ll go find a—”

“No, I will,” Li replied.  “You stay here with Liàng.”

“Fine,” he said, and settled in to help guard the four prisoners.

The bodyguard melted into the trees, and Liàng dragged the prisoners together.  The hooded man limped over and tied them together, to make for greater ease in transport, and greater difficulty in escape.

“Thanks,” said the smith softly.

The younger man shrugged, keeping a carefully close eye on the still-conscious rebel.

Time passed, then Li returned with an ostrich-horse and a cart.  “Right.”  The hooded man pushed himself to his feet again, and started hauling the rebels — all now unconscious, the fourth having blacked out not long before — to the cart.

Liàng pushed himself to his feet and helped.  “Thanks again for the assist,” he said to the men.

Hood shrugged. “No problem.”

Li pulled Liàng close and whispered to him for a few minutes, then let go.  Liàng arched an eyebrow, but nodded.  “I’ll keep an eye out.”

“You told him?” Hood asked, abruptly.

“The palace is compromised,” Li said calmly.  “He has a right to know he may need to watch his back when he’s reporting in.”

He relaxed slightly. “Yes, of course.” There was clearly some other secret, one that Hood didn’t even want Iroh’s agents knowing.

Liàng eyed him, then murmured something to Li, who flushed.  “Get going, smith,” he ordered.  Liàng grinned and got the cart moving.  The hooded man didn’t wait to watch him go, just turned and headed off on his own quest.