Phoenix Fire (Avatar: The Last Airbender) #Wattys2016

||Chapter 7 : The Southern Raiders Part Two||

Lea's POV

I looked around, feeling a little anxiety coming at me but stayed strong. I was in some sort of maze, there was 4 different colors for each individual lane surrounding me, One was gray, one red, one blue, and one brown, I furrowed my brows and looked up to see a gloomy sky, but also something flying up high above me

I gasped at the sight of the Legendary Bird, Agni Kai, The Phoenix, Bird of Fire, it swooped down and landed fight in front of the red lane, I backed away from the legendary bird slowly but steadily, making sure I don't tumble over in fear

"Stay calm my child, I am here not to harm you." My breath hitched when Agni Kai spoke

"W-What do you want with me?" I asked him nervously, his black eyes roamed over me curiously before answering

"It's not what I want with you, but what you want to learn and control." I furrowed my brows at him, not knowing what he meant

"Control?" I asked him and he nodded

"Power resides inside of you, power of fire so powerful, it takes many years to obstruct perfectly to be used of good or evil."

"I don't understand what you're saying." I told him, bowing my head slightly in respect

"There were many before you, but was lost at the hatred of their loved ones and casted away to the deepest depth of the earth, where they rotted away until not even their bones could be found." I gulped nervously after hearing him say that

"There is a legend, only Fire Lords are told, one child, yet alone, can dwell in a secret unknown, thy secret be passed upon until it's unneeded, yet gone." He told me and I looked up at him through my eyelashes

"Does my brother know about this legend? After all, he is next in line to be Fire Lord after Ozai leaves the throne." I asked him

"He does not know the legend, Ozai was supposed to tell him of it when he turned 15, but due to the fact that he was banished before then he never got the chance to know, but your father and uncle does from their father and so on." I clenched my fists when he called Ozai my father

"Will he be able to know now?" I asked Agni who nodded his big head

"Your Phoenix, Kai will help you understand more about who you really are, your powers will come soon, they are almost at the tip of completion." I nodded at him

"I'm asking you this, and this only, would you use these power unknown to you to help Avatar Aang and end the war, or help your sister, Princess Azula in defeating your brother and his friends, including the boy named Shinya." He asked me, my thoughts pondering over the decision I was about to make, only for me to wake up. My eyes flew open when I heard muttering, I rubbed my eyes a bit before looking over to see Zuko well awake, and packing his things

"You're going to go through this aren't you?" I asked him having him sigh at me

"I want Katara to finally trust me after I chased them half of the time, and leaving them when they needed me the most, leaving them in the dark." He looked over at me and I knew he was serious, his gold eyes told me he was

"I have a idea of who killed her mother, and know where he is." He stated and I nodded getting up and walking over to him, I crouched down next to him

"I'm sorry that I snapped at you last night." I apologized to him and he hugged me which he hasn't done in a long time since we were little

"I'm sorry too, I shouldn't have pushed you that far, I didn't know what you had to go through while I was gone with Uncle." He told me and I nodded. I looked over at Kai who stood on her little perch, staring back at me with her head titled to the side

"Kai." She flew over to me and Zuko, sitting on his lap

"I left her back at what we used to call home, not just because she would raise suspicion, but because I was in a hurry. About 3 months after you guys left Ozai had started treating me differently without Mom around, and I knew why, because I was a non-bender, weak and useless, he didn't want any of his children to be like that but I was, I stopped dancing after Grandfather died but after I met Shinya, he told me I could interpret my dancing into my fighting, and it has worked so far, anyways back to the point, when Uncle gave me the Book of Forms there was a parchment inside, the reason I was up that day after I danced for the last time, was because I ran back to the throne room and listened to the conversation Grandfather and Ozai had, I heard somethings I shouldn't had but still did, after that I remembered something in the Book of Forms that slipped out but I quickly hid it in the best place ever to put it, under my pillow." I emphasized pillow and he had a small smile on his face, trying not to grin like a idiot

"Back to the point, when I looked at it, I found out what it was and gave it to Kai so she could burn it, she did burn it but I know every single time I give her something she burns it always somehow magically appears out of no where." I looked down at Kai, smiling at her who knew exactly what I was talking about

"Kai, can you give me back the parchment you 'burned' so many years ago?" I asked her and she stared at me for a few seconds before coughing the parchment up, I did hot potato with it while Zuko watched me, amused. I blew on my hands and the parchment before looking at it to see if you could still read the writing on it, you could so I gave it to Zuko

"I don't know who this belonged to, but I know that they were from Ba Sing Se because that's where Uncle got all of our gifts from, I searched everywhere to find the person the Book of Forms, only to find out a person part of The Order of the White Lotus was it's owner, I never found them and soon gave up. But, I did find out that Uncle was part of the order and probably knew the owner of the book fairly well and spoke about us a lot to the person who owned the book resulting in you getting a dagger because of your interest in combat, Azula 'liked' dolls, which was not true but was funny at the same time, and me, reading books." I clarified with Zuko and he nodded

"He or she probably knew who I really was and slipped the parchment in his or hers finest creation ever before dying. After looking for the original owner for about a year, me and Shinya were thought to be siblings out on the streets for a few months until they started calling us thieves because we stole our food and the things at our hide out, we never had to steal any scrolls for bending since we had the Book of Forms."

"He has bending?" Zuko asked, clearly he didn't see him stop a roof top from falling on top of me yesterday

"Earth Bending, but he prefers to use a bow and arrow but since his weapons were taken he would have to use his bending more often." I explained to him more

"You have been quite busy since the last time I saw you." He told me and I chuckled

"You too, and by the way, you had a spy on your ship at the beginning because we were notified if anything happened, for instance, you 'accidentally' burning Uncle's Tea." His face flushed red and I laughed so hard that I started crying, holding my belly

"But I bet Uncle threw him off the ship about 2 months when on your searched for Aang, because we didn't hear from him since." He kissed my forehead unexpectedly, resting his hands on my shoulders

"Look, I love you and I know that I wasn't always there for you like I should have been, but I'm going to protect you from now on, do you understand me?" He asked me and I rolled my eyes at him

"Yes, I understand, Prince Zuko." I dragged out his name

"Princess Lea, the unbanished Princess, yet against her father's ambitions." We high fived each other, we both stood up, Kai flying back over to her stand

"Keep reading that parchment, it really means something, more than words." He nodded

"By the way, are you still with the fire nation?" He asked me

"Does it look like I am? My hair is not down to my butt thank you very much. Oh and by the way, you look WAY better without that stupid pony on top of your head." He laughed at me and nodded. After a couple of minutes I saw the sun was about to rise

"You should probably get going before Katara leaves without you." I told him and he nodded, kissing the top of my head

"We will be back, see ya sis." He climbed out of the tent and out of sight.

To Be continued

<EDITED, October 17 2016>