game of survival ~ zuko

1 - farewell

"There is no surrender, there is no escape"  game of survival, reuelle

~

Gaya had not seen much of the world before she travelled to Ba Sing Se.

When she was about two, a newlywed couple found her wandering by the docks of an Earth Kingdom village. A toddler with deep brown eyes, and no caretaker in sight. No one in the seaside town had known who she was or where she came from.

The couple took her from the seaside of the Earth Kingdom, back to their home in the middle of a forest. Sitting at the edge of a lake lay a cosy cottage with a vegetable garden and a few cow-pigs.

Mala and Pang, the newlyweds, were too old to have their own children... but they raised the sweet girl they found with all the love they held in their hearts. Mala taught their little girl, whom they named Gaya, how to brew healing and calming teas. Pang took her to the nearby town for groceries and taught her how to navigate through the vast woods around their lake.

Gaya never longed for anything, as she discovered her perfect world around the cottage barefoot and hair braided back. She had a carefree youth, which made her kind and generous to the many in the town who did not seem as carefree as she was.

When Gaya was eight, she first asked her father for the reason. At the age of eight, Gaya learned of the Hundred Year War. After that revelation, Gaya took an interest in her father's training.

He practiced slow moves, each morning by sunrise and each evening by sunset... but when time asked for it, those same slow moves could be deadly.

Gaya was ten when her father let her practice with his sword for the first time. She had an affinity for it. The clash of steel against steel was like a song to her soul. Her father saw it, her instinctive movements that usually took years to train, and trained her each day.

It was as if her father had known that the unthinkable would one day happen. Because even though they could turn their back on the war... the war did not turn their back on them. And neither did the Earth King's Army.

She was training by the shore when five armoured men on ostrich horses appeared from the woods. While her body followed the currents of the lake, the men spoke with her mother. It wasn't until Gaya heard her cry out, that she broke her concentration.

"Mom! What has happened?" She appeared by Mala's side and put a gentle hand on her shoulder. She then looked at the soldiers, who appeared slightly appalled by her.

It was not the first time that Gaya had noticed she looked different from the people in town, or from her parents. But her kindness, and Pang's insistence, made everyone overlook the almond shaped eyes, pale skin and straight lengths of ebony black hair.

Pang would have to leave them. To, despite his greying hair, fight a war for a King they had never seen in their entire lives. And he would not have time to say his goodbyes.

Gaya ran towards the forest, where her father was gathering wood for their nightly fire. Tears had already fallen down her cheeks and with a few looks from his daughter to the men waiting for him, Pang knew what was awaiting him.

Her father merely took her in his arms and hugged her closely. "My daughter, don't weep for an old man like me. All will be as fate meant it to." He pulled away and wiped the tears from her cheek. The lines around his eyes crinkled with a sad smile, "I see such happiness in your future. You are a wonder, Gaya, a true wonder to a world so broken and divided."

He took a step back and reached around his neck, where his great-grandfather's jade necklace sat. It was a polished stone, the shape of a droplet. Gaya had always played with it when she was little, enchanted by the pure green colour of the pendant. "Here, by the traditions of our family, this stone is passed down from son to son. Your mother and I may not have had sons, but fate brought you to us. You deserve this pendant just as much as any son of ours might have, my daughter."

With those words, he tied the necklace around her neck, and gave her forehead one last kiss. Gaya bit her lip, in order to keep her tears at bay. "Look after yourself and your mother for me, my little leaf."

And that was the last time, Gaya ever saw her father.

~

chapter one :)