The Pawn |Katara

TWENTY-ONE

The Fire Nation had come alive in the short while Zuko's friends lived in it. It had only been two days after the celebration of the war's anniversary, about three days after all of them had arrived, and still it was enough to have the grand halls singing with laughter and chatter once more. Zuko knew it had been years since the palace had felt this alive. Both he and Mai were rather quiet and withdrawn, as while Fire Lord Ozai was still ruling, laughter wasn't the most frequent sound in the building – a childhood of terror could not be eradicated easily. Zuko could only compare the sound to the time his mother was still around. 

Akira, on the other hand, had been rather young when he had first started playing with Zuko but not this young. He didn't remember what it felt like to be around the palace when Ursa had been around although he had been there. He had been in her presence for only a short yet memorable year and so the sudden noise was almost bothersome. Enough so that that morning, three days after Jaya's and Aang's appearance in the palace, he woke up not by the light of day but by laughter and noise.

He groaned softly, turned on his other side and attempted to sleep once more when a shrill cry made him open his eyes. He sighed and slowly pushed himself off of the bed. Laughter erupted from some place outside and he realised a bit later than he would have if he were properly awake that it was a man and a woman laughing. He brought himself to get out of bed and headed to the balcony, where he knew the noise was coming from. He pushed the curtains—light in colour and with small flames stitched on them for decoration—to the side and walked through, let them move with the caress of the wind behind him. He walked to the edge of the balcony, placed his hands on the marble railing, and looked down.

Sokka and Jaya were at the lake that was located in the middle of the garden Akira's balcony was looking at. They were at the shallows, up to their knees inside the lake and they were splashing each other, their giggling and laughter echoing in the silent halls of the palace and reaching him clearly. He smiled to himself at the sight and retreated to his room. There was no use acting like he was going to retire now. The best thing he could do was start with his day.

So Akira got dressed, not in one of the formal uniforms of the Fire Nation he tended to favour when he left his home to attend to any business Zuko or Mai assigned him with, but in a regular one, a simple outfit this time, a pair of dark pants and a deep red shirt he secured beneath his pants that left his collarbones bare. He imagined that if he ever were to wear a necklace, perhaps this would be the perfect shirt to wear it with. As it was, though, Akira had no necklace to adorn his body with. So he settled for leaving his neck bare, reached up to set half of his hair into a knot the way he had grown accustomed to over the years. And after wearing his shoes, he left his room and headed over to the garden where Jaya and Sokka still were, if he could judge by the happy sounds that had yet to cease.

The palace seemed to be partly asleep as he walked through the corridors as silently as he could given the small clunk his shoes made as he walked, encountering no servant on his way. It wasn't long later that he was heading out into the light of day, into the garden, only to realise the company had grown ever since he had last checked. Now Jaya and Sokka had been joined by Katara and Toph and the splashing game had started to get more heated. Toph was splashing pretty much anywhere while Jaya and Katara had teamed up to attack Sokka who was trying his best to defend himself to no avail. Akira couldn't help but chuckle as Sokka cried out in protest.

"That's not fair! Not fair at all – Toph you are supposed to be helping me!"

"Akira's here," Toph called out, paying no heed to Sokka's indignant shout and veiled accusation that she was being no help at all. Katara and Jaya stopped splashing Sokka at the announcement, giving him a moment of reprieve. Jaya hit back moments later twice as ferocious.