Avatar: The Book Of The Phoenix

Home Bound

The Fire Nation Capital still looked like peace if you did not know where to look.

From the palace balcony the harbor was orderly, the banners clean, the streets below moving with the ordinary business of a nation that believed the war was behind it. Sokka was not looking at any of that. He was looking at Toph and grinning like a man who had been waiting hours for this exact moment.

"I'm just saying," he said, "a well-placed boomerang to the head is a highly underrated diplomatic tool. Rokkun had the whole scary warlord thing going, and then—whack. Not so imperial after that."

Toph snorted. "You clipped him and ran. That's not a victory. That's a lucky exit."

"It was precision."

"It was panic with good aim."

Suki stood a little apart from them, arms folded, the Kyoshi paint already washed from her face.

"You were very brave," she said.

Sokka's ears went red so fast Toph didn't even need to see it.

"I mean," Sokka said, suddenly fascinated by the railing, "someone had to say something. He was talking about you like—anyway. Yes. Brave. That's me. Historically documented."

Aang smiled, but only briefly. He turned to Zuko.

"Thank you for sending her," Aang said. "Without Suki, we might have been dead. Or worse. They were already selling people on the docks."

Zuko's scarred face did not change much, but his hands tightened on the balcony stone. "I knew the risks. Xuo told me to stay out of it." He looked out at the city. "Then I heard the Nomads had docked in Republic City. After that, I knew it was only a matter of time."

The humor drained out of the balcony.

Zuko looked back at them. "Did you find anything of note at Xanadu?"

Suki stepped forward. "Xanadu isn't the point. It's a staging ground. A fortress, a camp, a market, a prison—all of it pointed in one direction. They're not trying to destabilize the Earth Kingdom. They're using it. They mean to invade the Fire Nation. A full-scale conquest."

"When?" Zuko asked, his jaw tightening.

"Next year." Suki answered.

For a moment no one spoke.

Zuko's anger came quietly, which made it worse.

"Rokkun is a lunatic if he thinks this nation will ever belong to him or the Nomads." He turned from the railing as if the view itself had offended him. "I will not let him destroy the peace we all helped build. Not after everything it cost."

Katara nodded. "Then we need to start preparing. Not later. Now. If they're gathering that many ships and riders, a year is not as long as it sounds."

"I agree," Zuko said. He looked at Katara, then Sokka. "Go back to the Southern Water Tribe. Speak to your father. When the time comes, I may need Hakoda's fleet. I would rather ask while we still have time to ask."

Sokka's grin was gone. "Yeah. He'll want to hear this from us."

Zuko's gaze moved to Aang. "I'll keep trying to reason with King Xuo. If he understands the Nomads were never going to stop at the land he signed away, he may still be an ally. If he doesn't..."

He left the rest unsaid.

Below them, the capital went on with its morning.
None of them said what they were all thinking: that peace, once broken, did not put itself back together just because a Fire Lord wanted it to.