Work Text:
Light hasn’t woken Katara for days. Day and night don’t define her sleep schedule anymore; instead her consciousness is inseparably tied to the faint heartbeat that never lies far from her reach. Even when she has to rest, her palm lies over the jagged mark on his skin, rising and falling with each of his shallow breaths. And sometimes, in his (and her) weaker moments, she reaches out with her bending, just far enough to sense his blood. To make sure it still feeds life into his weakened heart.
After all, light hasn’t woken him in days, either. Nothing has.
So when sunlight streams across her closed eyelids, the first thing she notices is that he’s gone.
She’s out the door and down the hall before any other thought can occur to her—but this hall isn’t familiar, the doors she shoved through weren’t Zuko’s, why wasn’t she there—?
“Nngh…” Her frantic pace catches up with her exhausted body, and she stumbles against a thick pillar. The marble leeches some of the remaining warmth from her; she’s already so cold because for the first time in days he wasn’t beside her.
“Zuko!” She finally calls out, for all the good it will do. The palace feels as deserted as a tomb.
(Might become one, if she isn’t there to keep his heart in one piece.)
But then distant footsteps smack against the hard stone, faster, louder, closer.
“Lady Katara?” A young servant girl—Katara knows her name, but her head is still spinning; it won’t come to her—rushes over and steadies her by the elbow. “Are you alright?”
“Zuko.” Fear overrides any sense of decorum. “Where is he?”
“In his room, my Lady.” Her voice trembles. “I just left him briefly to check on you.”
“Me?” Katara blinks. “Why was I—what happened to me?”
“I think you were trying to get food, or maybe water. You collapsed.” The girl’s arm wraps around Katara’s back, as if to remind her how close she is to collapsing again. Deep breaths; she can’t get back to Zuko if she passes out. “Yan brought you to the closest room where you could recover. The magic you did on the Fire Lord—”
“Waterbending,” she corrects automatically.
“Um, right—it must have taken much of your strength. You should rest, too.” But her voice is too soft, more suggestion than demand, and Katara is a wave ready to sweep such a fragile obstacle aside.
“Not tired.” It isn’t quite a lie. Her mind is more awake than ever, now that blood has finally circulated back to her head. “I need to see him.”
Because who knows how long she’s been asleep, anything could have happened, and no one else can feel the stutter of his heart like she can. No one else can steady its uneven beat.
“Of—of course, my Lady.”
The girl—Lia, Katara finally remembers—escorts Katara the short distance back to Zuko’s room. Apparently her search for nourishment hadn’t taken her far from him. She realizes too late that she never did get food, or water. Her twin waterskins hang deflated at her hips.
But while that should be her most pressing problem, it isn’t.
Zuko’s door is open.
When she desperately reaches out with her bending, she can’t sense a heart beating inside. She can’t sense anything, not even the sluggish response of blood left at a standstill. That, at least, is some comfort. He’s not here, but he’s not—not gone.
“Oh,” Lia breathes. Terror shocks through her again.
“What do you mean, oh? He’s—the physicians just moved him, probably, right?” She refuses to believe anything else, because that would mean he might—he might be gone where no healing abilities can reach.
Dead, she forces herself to think, because she’s brushed death too closely in these past few days to treat it like a fantasy now.
“He was right here, I swear. I just gave him his morning medicine...” Lia flutters around the room, as if Zuko has just decided to play a game of hide-and-explode and will pop out of the desk drawer at any moment.
Katara doesn’t argue, doesn’t yell, even though she wants to know how Lia could abandon him for even a moment.
How could I abandon him for even a moment? She vaguely remembers calling for a servant, her own frantic impatience, a few whispered assurances to Zuko’s unconscious form before running off to fetch water herself…
But she never came back. She never came back, and now he’s missing. Are there servants still loyal to Ozai and Azula in the palace? The structure had been nearly deserted before Katara rounded up those who had been about to leave in banishment. They had all seemed relieved that Zuko survived, but still—
Her feet take off before she can think. She’s going to find him. She can find him, all she has to do is reach a little further—it’s not the full moon, it’s broad daylight, and it hurts, brushing her consciousness across every source of water she can reach, holding out for that one familiar pulse—
Thump-thump. Thump-thump.
She doesn’t need directions; his heartbeat is her compass, pulling her out of the dim corridors, towards a sanctuary of fresh afternoon light. Into the gardens.
Where he’s lying shirtless in the grass, his pants pushed up around his calves as his bare feet dangle in the pond. Sunlight glimmers in his hair, on his pale chest, on the soft curve of his lips. The panic that had stormed inside her dims to a faint drizzle, dries up in the warm sunshine. Part of her feels foolish for overreacting, while the other part wants to scoop him into her arms and tell him never to scare her like that again.
“It’s okay,” he says, his voice still gravelly from days of disuse. “There’s water here. She’ll come.”
Who are you talking about? She almost asks, but she realizes his words aren’t directed at her. His hand comes up over his chest, but instead of resting on his lightning wound, it cradles a small turtleduck perched there. She hadn’t noticed the animal in the shadow of his palm, but now that she does, she can’t bring herself to step forward and startle it—or him.
“I wonder why she left… did I say something stupid in my sleep…?” He mumbles.
“Quack,” the turtleduckling replies, and he lets out a long sigh that ruffles its feathers. At least that means his lungs have strengthened again.
“I know. I say a lot of stupid things. I… I think I thanked her. She saved my life, and all I could say was thank you?”
Katara’s eyes widen—he’s talking about her. To a turtleduck. And seems to think that this turtleduck is talking back. Is he delirious? He’s only just woken up, and Lia did say he took some kind of medicine…
“Quack-quack.”
“You’re right. What do you say when someone saves your life?”
Katara feels herself melt a little at the softspoken question. She’s been asking herself the same thing—hoping that by the time he woke, she’d have the words she needed. But here he is, lying just a few paces away, and she’s still speechless.
“I should have told her… no, that would’ve been stupid too...”
“You should’ve told me what?” She steps out of the shadow of a column.
“Katara!” He tries to sit too fast; the little turtleduck quacks and tumbles into the pond. She’s more concerned with how he groans and lies back down—falls back down, really.
Crisp grass crunches beneath her feet as she moves to support him, her hand on his bare back. Which is fine. She’s had to touch his bare torso plenty of times during his healing sessions. Those must have paid off, if he made it all the way out here on his own.
“Hey, it’s okay. I didn’t mean to scare you.” She bends a stream of water from the pond with her free hand, lowering him back to the grass with her other. He sighs in relief when she holds the glove of water to his scar, even before the element begins to glow. Relief trickles through her as well—half from the fact that his heart feels stronger than before, half just from soaking in the warmth she’d missed last night.
“Katara,” he says her name again, and that warmth spreads farther through her. She pretends it’s just because the sun is beaming directly on her now. “You’re here. You came back.”
“It’s not like I meant to leave,” she assures him—and finds that the full force of his smile is even brighter than the sun. She’s an iceberg drifted too far from the poles; she’s going to melt in it. How can he smile like that after everything he’s been through?
Maybe it’s the medicine, she thinks, diverting her attention to his eyes. They look lucid enough, but it’s difficult to be sure when he’s wearing that—that expression she can’t name, because if she does she won’t just melt, she’ll catch fire.
“You’re staying?” He asks, sounding a little out of breath. How difficult is talking for him? He should be resting inside, not laying out in the grass. But he is a firebender. Maybe soaking up the direct sunlight is good for him. It feels good even to her, after days curled up in the dark.
“Of course I’m staying.” She pools more chi into her palm, letting the water there glow brighter. Beneath the scorched skin, his heart beats much more rhythmically than before, but every once in a while it still stutters. “You’re not done healing yet.”
“Oh.” His face falls a little at that response, and she frowns in sympathy.
“I’m sorry I couldn’t… I can’t fix everything.” She bites her lip, lets the water flicker out and bends it away before dizziness can take her. She really should have gotten food last night. This is her shortest healing session yet, and she can only hope that it will hold his heart steady a while longer.
“Don’t be.” His hand reaches for hers, as if she’s the one who needs comforting. Selfish as it feels, she lets him take it, tries to ignore the fireworks tingling where his fingers weave between hers. That’s… he’s delirious. It doesn’t mean anything.
“It’s going to scar,” she blurts, if only to ignore her thoughts.
“I know.” And that’s how she knows he’s delirious—because he smiles, again. His eyes are still fixed on her face, with that look that she knows can’t be lucid but makes her heart beat fast anyway.
“Are you okay?” He asks while she’s still caught in that amber gaze. His free hand—the one that isn’t holding hers, he’s still holding her hand—comes up and brushes a strand of hair from her face. It’s long since fallen out of the two loops she normally wears. “You’re taking time to rest too, right?”
“Yeah, I—I’m fine,” she says, though his touch draws out her bone-deep exhaustion, reminds her of how much she missed his warmth when she awoke. Reminds her that she’ll probably miss it every night now that he doesn’t need her constant care.
“You’re a bad liar,” he says matter-of-factly.
Her nose scrunches. “I am not—” Ohhh. Her indignation melts away as his hand combs through her matted hair. For someone who displayed such amazing power just days ago, he’s remarkably gentle.
“You are. It’s okay. I’m a bad liar, too.” He frowns as his fingers catch in a particularly difficult tangle, but he works it out patiently.
Just… delirious, she reminds herself. Possibly drugged.
“Please, Katara. Don’t hurt yourself taking care of me.”
Only that’s such a Zuko thing to request, when he’s the one lying there after taking lightning for her, that she almost believes he’s lucid.
“You did it first,” she reminds him in a whisper. She’s leaning over him now, pulled a little closer by his hand in her hair. The other is still twined with his, bracing herself against the soft ground.
They’ve been closer before. She’s practically slept on his bare chest—but she’s not running on fear and adrenaline now, and he’s not unconscious. It’s not the same.
She wonders if they ever could be the same, after this.
“I’d do it again.” His thumb cradles her cheek, as gently as he’d held the turtleduck earlier. “I was… Katara, I was so—”
His hand is shaking. His voice, too. Gone is that sunshine smile, and she’d do anything to bring it back.
“Zuko, I’m okay. I promise.”
This time she isn’t lying, because as long as he’s still here, she knows everything will be fine.
“I was so scared.” He finally whispers. His grip tightens on her hand. She’s hesitant to unweave her fingers from his—but she has to.
She needs both arms free to throw around him.
“You don’t have to be scared anymore, Zuko,” She says into his hair. She’s pretty much on top of him, but she’s slept nearly like that before—and while it isn’t the same, it feels more natural than ever. “We won. We won, Zuko.”
“Did we… did we all win? Aang, did he—”
“Yes.” She recalls the letter that came when she was so exhausted the characters seemed to swim across the page. But the words Aang and defeated and Fire Lord had stood out. “He won.”
“Then Father… Then Ozai’s dead.” He clutches her tighter. Her hand rubs soothing circles against the soft curve of his shoulder blade, the one part of his back that isn’t pressed into the ground.
“I guess so.” She hadn’t read the letter carefully, but she can’t imagine a way Aang could have defeated Ozai without killing him. Aang had come through, somehow, in spite of all evidence that he wouldn’t. The news had been as much of a relief as seeing Zuko conscious today.
“Are you… he is your… I mean…” She tries, unsure of how to put it.
“I’m glad,” he breaths against her ear. “He’s gone. I… I just can’t believe it.”
“Me either.”
When the conversation fades, nothing is left to distract her from the way her head is tucked between his chin and collarbone, the way he’s shifted onto his side to better accommodate her embrace. The way he still smells like sweat and lightning, as he has ever since that fateful day.
He takes a deep breath into her hair, and she wonders what she smells like. Probably about the same.
“Katara…” He murmurs her name again, and she can’t help shivering in spite of his warmth. He’s holding her. Consciously. Unless he is still delirious, but the way he’d spoken of Ozai...
“Yeah?” She asks, bracing herself for whatever he might say next.
“I just… I want you to know—”
He startles and pulls her more tightly into his chest. She’s careful to brace her hands on either side of his fresh scar, not wanting to cause him any more pain.
“Zuko? Are you alright?”
“Oh—yeah, it’s, uh, nothing.” He quickly releases her from the embrace, and whatever he was going to say is lost to the moment. “I just wasn’t expecting the rain.”
“Rain?”
She frowns and rolls onto her back. Sure enough, with her face exposed to the sky, she can feel a few cool droplets dot her face. He must have felt it sooner, being, well, shirtless and all. But it doesn’t make any sense.
“It’s still sunny,” she says in disbelief. “How can there be rain and sun at the same time?”
He props himself up on one arm and smiles. “You’ve never seen a sunshower before?”
“Sunshower? Isn’t that kind of an oxymoron?”
“Not as much as you’d think.” He flops back too, then raises a palm to catch the steadily increasing rain. “They’re pretty common in the Fire Nation.”
She could have bent them an umbrella—or even stopped the drizzle altogether—but he seems to enjoy the unnatural shower. She doesn’t mind it either—being surrounded by her element is always a comfort—but she still squints upward in confusion. The only clouds in the sky look too white and too far away to reach them. The sun, oblivious to its irony, keeps on shining.
“Water and sunlight,” Zuko murmurs, hand still held high, unbothered by the way his hair is now plastered to his face. Hers frizzes outward as it dampens.
“Water and sun, huh,” she echoes with a smile tweaking her lips. “You trying to make a point?”
The right side of his face flushes red. “Uncle would probably make a proverb out of it.”
She folds her hands over her stomach and gazes at him from the corner of her eye. “Oh, yeah? What would he say?”
He clears his throat. “Sometimes rain falls in life, but the sun will always… er…” He coughs, dropping his Uncle voice. “I’ve never been good at impersonations.”
She chuckles at that. “Maybe he’d just say… even the most impossible things can meet. The rain and the sun are both good apart, but together…”
“Together?” He asks, his eyes lighting when his head tilts towards her. His arm falls to the grass beside him—beside her. Whatever fears had been holding her back from facing this moment wash away with the rain.
“Together,” she says while taking his hand, “they’re even more beautiful.”
His eyes go wide, and she can practically hear his thoughts—can feel the rapid beat of his heart, which tells her enough. He’d better not undo all her hard work by getting too excited. Even if her heart is pounding just as quickly.
“I’ve never been good at interpreting proverbs, either.” He sits up, wincing just a little at the effort. “Does that mean…?”
She sits as well, her knees and the ends of her soaked tunic tucked beneath her. And then, because she can’t resist teasing him a little, she says, “Zuko, I’ve been sleeping on your bare chest for the last few days. I think you can figure it out.”
He glances down, as if just remembering that he’s still shirtless. But despite his blush, he places his hands on her hips and pulls her closer.
“Wait,” she says suddenly, startling him. But he still doesn’t let go—not that she wants him to. Not unless his mind is only half in it. “You’re not—you’re not just delirious from pain or whatever medicine Lia gave you, right?”
He blinks before laughing a little. “Is that what you thought?”
“Well, you were talking to a turtleduck.”
“They’re good listeners,” he defends, looking over his shoulder for the small animal. It swims in cheerful circles around the pond, rain streaming off the grooves in its shell. “...I, uh, might have been a little out of it at first.”
His thumbs brush over the fabric at her hips, and she’s all too aware of how it clings to her. At least her tunic is thick and opaque, even when weighed down by the rain.
“But you’re not now.” It comes out half as a question.
“I don’t know. Maybe I am. I’d probably be freaking out otherwise.”
Her brow furrows. “Why?” He’s not still in pain, is he? He sounds alright, if a little nervous.
Despite that nervousness, a grin pulls at his lips.
“I’m about to ask a master waterbender if I can kiss her in the middle of the rain,” he flips the teasing tone back on her. “I think you can figure it out.”
The blood rushes to her face, but she doesn’t give him time to stare. She’s already looping her arms around his neck as his rise up to her waist, pulling her flush to him. His skin is slick, and she almost slips and pulls him on top of her in her haste to meet his lips. He just laughs and steadies them both before sinking into the kiss, a kiss that feels as wonderful and impossible as sunshine mixed with rain.
She’s not sure how much time passes before she pulls back to rest her forehead against his. Water runs in waves off her tangled hair, which falls on either side of their faces, like a curtain between them and the rest of the world. He’s staring at her with the same expression he wore earlier—the one she was sure came from delirium.
“Oh no, don’t fade out on me now.” She frowns. “I’m not kissing you just for you to forget about it.”
He blinks, but the look is still there. Summer warmth, campfire embers, dawn after a moonless night. The gentle heat that feels so natural she can’t believe she ever tried to deny it. That’s not mindless delirium. It’s...
“Trust me, I’m not forgetting anything.” He places the lightest kiss on her jaw, where the rain pools and trickles off. “I love you, Katara.”
His eyes have already said it, but those four words still ignite a fire that could evaporate the rain from her skin.
“I love you too, Zuko,” she says, and knows her eyes reflect the same truth.
He holds her tighter, and when a few too-warm drops of rain roll down his cheeks, she kisses them away.
“Will you stay?” He asks. For all the water around them, his voice is still dry.
This time she realizes he doesn’t mean for the day, he doesn’t mean until his body heals. But that wouldn’t have been long enough for her, anyway.
“Of course,” she answers. “I’m not going anywhere, Zuko.”
After all, she is the rain, and he is the sun. Together, they will turn the ashes of their world into something beautiful.