The Avatar - Fate of Hikari ( Legend of Hikari part 1 ATLA / LOK )

Under the shelter of the Western Air Temple

Book 1: Fate of Hikari
- Air - 
Chapter 2: Under the shelter of the Western Air Temple

The next two days before traveling to the shore it seemed like an eternity for me. I had to hide in the house in order to make sure nobody finds me. If someone asked about me, my mother would say I am sick. All of us lived this short, but long felt time in fear and hoped that we could proceed with the plan of my father. Luckily as Jiro was the leader of the military squad here, he could manipulate things in case of danger. The capital was far from this town, if the royal delegates would know my location, it would have taken days for them to arrive here. Logically thinking it through I was safe, but we never know what those brats have done with what they witnessed that day. During my home stay and for a good while afterwards, I became so lost in my mind and sentiments, that it literally turned mute. I was scared, depressed, worried and so much against leaving my family, that I could not bring myself to communicate with anyone. Not even my mother, Kyou, or my father. Even though I understood that this is the best decision, I could not settle it in my heart nor in my head just yet. I could not sleep or eat properly and most of the time just stayed in my room trying to deal with all kinds of random thoughts that even I was unable to follow. I heard Kyouya was spending time with our mom and they tried to make the most of these two days. I heard my brother laughing and also crying, because of not wanting to leave her. Chesa visited me as well in my room and I cuddled her, letting my tears flow without a sound, but with words I have not opened up to her. Our dad was away during the day. It would have been just more suspicious if he abandoned his duties. It does not matter if these days or hours seemed long or short, the time has not stopped, just truncated ahead and eventually I found myself sitting in the carriage of the ostrich horse with my family. We left exactly after sunset, before the night lights turned on. The trip involved going through the wild forest and it took at least four hours to reach the shore. The only source of light was a couple of torches to give some visibility to the road, and from the far I could sometimes see the dim lights of the active vulcans. It was a new moon so even the celestial odds were no help for us. On the other hand it helped in not to call attention, not as if anybody turned up often on this pathway. My parents asked me to try to close my eyes down for a little while, as I looked exhausted being sleep deprived. However I still was not able to rest. Kyou fell asleep in our mother's arms, and only woke up when the carriage stopped by the sea. At first there was nobody by the small pier of the port, and Chesa looked at Jirou with worry on her face.
"Do you think everything is alright? They are going to come, right?" asked him when we all walked closer to the recently calm water. As it has been requested, we had just a few belongings with us. If we were going on a holiday, I am sure I would pack all of my stuff, the entire room, even if they tell me to keep it low. However right now I did not care, I had no interest or motivation about my future, I felt lost and confused.
"We arrived a little bit earlier, don't worry, I am sure your father won't let us down." – replied our dad to his wife. I looked away with anger. – Of course, monk Yonten wouldn't let us down, he did that a long time ago. – had this thought, but I was too tired to say it out loud. At this point I never again wanted to talk to anyone.
"Papa, mama, please come with us too! At least until the temple! Please, please!" Grabbed Kyouya, my parents' hands and I could see he was about to cry again. None of us wanted to be parted from them.
"We have to stay, but as I promised you many times, hopefully soon we can see each other" stroked my brother's face, Chesa.
"You have to be strong Son! Sometimes you are more mature than your sister, and you have to take care of each other" messed up Kyou's hair Jirou jokingly. Normally I would say something sassy back to my father. Now I just could not care about this kind of playing. I even stepped further from everyone.
"Hikari, I know it is very hard for you to take all these happenings right now, but you need to know that we will always love you, and are going to be here for you." Felt my father's hand on my shoulder. "Here..." touched my palm with an object, then I looked down and saw something wrapped in a dark blue fabric. The item was long, about thirty centimetres, but relatively light. I looked up at my papa's face, surprised. "Don't open it now, but when you look at it, I want you to feel us close to you and think of me and your mother." said it with a fainting smile, then he hugged me tight. I had no more tears, but accepted and returned his embracement, and did the same with my mother. I wish I could say something to them. Actually, I almost opened my mouth to tell them I also love and am going to miss them. Before I was able to do it, we heard, we heard a deep howl from the far.
"That's the sound of a flying bison right?" Asked Kyou and all of us being distracted, we looked in the direction of the noise trying to see inside the pure darkness. Some stars were visible on this warm night, but not strong enough to give us much clue. Sometimes the wind rose and I could feel the salty smell of the water. Less than a minute after the howl, slowly in the light of the flares we could see the bison appearing and landing on the beach. My heart started to pound in a crazy way. I never saw this animal live, only in the books. It was far bigger than I imagined, and even though it just arrived down to ground so elegantly. For this very split moment I forgot about everything. All my worries and problems. I was just standing with wide open eyes and numb. I had the mixture of being afraid and amazed of this creature. I even missed to notice the air-nomad person on it, who jumped off the bison, like it was the easiest thing to do. Just a little air bending at use, and he touched the sand with his feet as lightly as his companion. He was wearing the traditional air nomad's clothing. He looked like a grown up, but still very young. The arrow on his head showed us that he was already a master. He walked towards us, then stopped and bowed at our family as his culture required.
"My name is Mida and I came to take Hikari and Kyouya, the children of Jirou to the Western Air Temple for the order of the Daivika." Introduced himself and explained his mission. I did not understand why he spoke like this. Why did not refer to me as the avatar, and I had no idea what or who that "Daivika" he mentioned. My parents returned the bow, then my father took over the conversation.
"Good evening, Monk Mida, my name is Jirou, she is my wife Chesa, and they are our children Hikari and..." looked my father for Kyouya, but he was already by the bison patting its nose with an excited look on his face.
"Your flying bison is so amazing! What is his name? Is he even he or is she? How old is he?" showered Mida with all these questions.
"Sorry, they have never seen one before..." excused Ginko's army general himself. Mida just laughed at the situation and shook his head.
"Don't worry. Luckily Opame is a very friendly girl, she is still a teenager, not even fully grown." Replied the monk to my brother who was still around Opame and the bison really looked like enjoying his attention, she even licked Kyou's cheek, who became a bit shocked from the effect, but then burst out in a loud giggle. It made me smile for a moment, but then I remembered that it is the final time to say goodbye to our parents. Even my brother stopped engaging with Opame, and ran back to us.
"Please take care of our children, make sure they arrive at the air temple safely!" Asked Chesa the monk, who reassured her and Jirou about that. I put the item from my father into my bag and at last we all hugged each other. I was too scared to look into the eyes of my parents, because I knew if I did that, I would not be able to leave. We embraced each other quite a while, but then I broke out from the loving arms and ran ahead without looking back. I did not want to let my tears out anymore, and I felt suffocating from it. I had to cease this heartbreaking moment. Mida was already by Opame, so I caught up with him. As soon as my little brother followed us, he gave instructions on how to climb on the bison, and of course helped us. We had to grab onto her fur and pull ourselves up high. First, I was scared to hurt Opame, but the monk told us we are not that heavy to cause pain to her, and also the animal's fur was very massive, strong enough to handle it. Soon we were in the saddle, which seemed surprisingly spacious. I did not feel safe standing, so sat down, then both me and Kyou crawled to the front of the saddle to see our parents one last time, but they were not there anymore. We saw their carriage and the ostrich horses disappearing in the forest. I looked at Kyouya thinking that he was going to start to cry out loud again. I was ready to comfort him. His eyes were showing sadness, but he just rubbed his nose, and turned to me with a smile which at first looked forced, but slowly became honest.
"Let's be friends with grandpa' Yonten from now on! He is going to be our only relative there who we can count on!" said it to me. I made a sulking facial expression by staring in my brother's eyes, and left Kyou at the front. How can he be so forgiving with that old man?! No way would I ever be friends with him. I was mad at Kyouya. I Carefully went to the back and tried to make a safe position, before the bison took off. I grabbed the edge of the howdah very strongly, so tight that my fingers turned white.
"Yip-yip, Opame!" We heard Mida give the order to his bison and move the reins. The air nomad creature growled and blew some heavy air out of her nose before just starting to lift from the ground. It was breathtaking to go higher and higher. I wished it was daytime and I could see the land getting smaller, or to observe the landscape. It was too dark, and only could see some even darker areas and the volcanic mountains for a short moment. Then we drifted away from land, and the sea was pure black under us. Even the sky looked brighter. Although we were heading to the summer and it was a really warm night, the higher we reached the stronger the air current became around us. It made me feel much colder. I curled up my body against the cold. "There are some blankets at the back of the saddle" Mentioned the young monk to me as he noticed my reaction. As I was not that afraid anymore to move around, I took Mida's advice and helped myself with one of those warm fabrics he suggested. I wrapped myself up in it and immediately I felt more relieved. In the meantime, Kyouya leaned out of the saddle. I was not sure if he wanted to see something or just admired the flying bison.
"Tell me Mida, what or who is that Daivika you mentioned when you talked to our parents?" Turned to the young air bending master my brother very curiously.
"Oh...the Daivika is the council of ten at the Western Air Temple. They are the ones who are deciding about everything in our community. More or less the other air temples are functioning the same, I guess. Only the most experienced and strongest air bender monks and priestesses can be part of it." Tried to explain Mida as short as possible.
"And Monk Yonten, our grandfather is in this Daivika?" asked Kyou the next question.
"Yes..."
From this point I did not pay much attention to their conversation. I also found a pillow so laid down, placing my head on it, and closed my eyes for the rest of the trip. I tried to sleep, but I still could not beat my insomnia. Not long after, my brother joined me, because Mida suggested that he should rest too.
"Hikari, are you awake?" whispered my little brother the question in my ears. I did not open my eyes, just pretended I was sleeping. He settled next to me, placing his arm over my body. "Don't worry Sister, everything is going to be alright." Heard him telling me. Although I felt really empty these days, his words warmed up my heart a little bit, and all my anger towards him faded. I put my hand on his fingers as a sign that I heard him. The fire nation land was not far from the Western Air Temple, but still took a couple of hours to get there. The sky started to grey predicting the arrival of the dawn. However, the darkness still dominated, hence when Opame landed again, we could only see the vague shapes of the monuments and buildings that surrounded us. I heard about the odd location and appearance of the Western air nomads' home, but I could not imagine it in reality. Not even recalling the drawings I saw about it. We arrived on a huge terrace-like area with roofs above, and heavy pillars around. At the front, about fifty meters from us, a giant door of a building waited for us. The door was semi opened. Mida helped us down from Opame, and gave our bags back.
"Welcome at the Western Air Temple, I have to take Opame to the stall. You just go in that door. This is the main temple. The council of the Daivika." Said the monk, staying on the bison, then he left us.
We were standing at that huge door as two children. The silence around us was rather scary at this moment. Outside we could already see pretty well. The night is over. However behind the entrance it was pure black darkness waiting. We couldn't notice any source of light.
"I am not sure if we are at the right place Hikari..." told my brother, then trying to get brave, he took a deep breath. "Let's go in. You can use your fire bending skills, so we can at least see something inside!" Suggested an actually good idea Kyouya. Without saying anything I took the first step towards the door and formed a fire ball above my right palm, using it as a torch. Kyou stayed very close to me, but together we entered this weird, mysterious place, not knowing what was going to happen to us.

To be continue...

Next chapter: The escape

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Hello! The author is here! In case you made it this far, how did you like the second chapter and the story in general? I would really appreciate your opinion/feedback, please share it with me in the comment section. For any kind of thoughts about the concept I am grateful. Thank you <3

Ps: This is how I imagine Avatar Lihua - credit for failinradish for the fan art.