Destiny Altered (READ DISCLAIMER)

9 - The Rider and the Ostrich Horse

The familiar sound of a sky bison's yawn brought my attention away from my bending, and I was surprised to see Appa heading toward the shore. I could make out a waving Aang sitting on his head. Waving back, I ran to greet them both as they made landing. Aang nimbly jumped from Appa and into my hug.

"Aang, it's so good to see you. I've missed you," I said before pulling away.

"I've missed you too, Katara. When all these peace negotiations are settled, we have got to take a trip back down to the South Pole for some penguin sledding," he said with a toothy grin, and I laughed.

"Definitely," I replied with a smile of my own. "So what brings you here?"

"I have a little downtime before the next meeting, so I thought I would come by to see how you were doing. How are you doing?"

"Pretty good. You'll never believe this—well, actually, you probably will," I remembered with a smile that Aang is the Avatar afterall, "but I was visited by both the sun and the moon spirits recently."

"That's great, Katara! Although, I'm not really surprised they came to see you."

"Why's that?"

"Well… because of who you are."

"What do you mean?"

"Katara, I'm the Avatar and you're my best friend. We've had a spiritual connection for so many lifetimes now. You are an incredibly evolved bender. It only makes sense that you have a connection to the Spirit World."

I was dumbstruck by his words. I never really thought of all that before, but what I knew for sure was that I'd known Aang longer than this lifetime.

"Think about it Katara. You are my waterbending teacher. Waterbending teacher to the Avatar. You are special." We smiled at each other and relished the sweetness of our connection without words until a neglected Appa decided to nudge Aang with his snout.

"Hey, buddy," Aang said, petting his oldest friend. "So, Katara, how are things going with Azula?"

"I don't know, Aang. On some level my waterbending seems to be helping her, but on another I feel like it's making things worse. Well, maybe not worse, but harder. It's like there is a war going on inside her. She told me that physically it made her feel better, but that it did something to her mind. I don't know what it could have been though."

"Our thoughts are connected to our energy. They always ride together, like a rider on an ostrich horse. As one moves, so does the other. The energy and thoughts runs along certain pathways. Those pathways are called nadis.

"There are places in our bodies where the nadis can get knotted up and then energy doesn't flow properly. The main places where this happens are the seven chakras, which is where most people are blocked. But there are other places, especially the tops of the shoulders and hips. People don't even realize they are holding anything there until it starts to open up. By opening up some of the energy blocks Azula had, that had to have had some kind of effect on her thoughts. It may have brought things hidden deep in her unconscious mind to a more conscious level."