Avatar: The Book Of The Phoenix

Buried Secrets

Dawn came gray and sharp over the coast.
They were brought to the inner courtyard before the cookfires had fully caught. Oghuz was already there, wolves at his heel, expression carved out of last night's leftovers. Rokkun arrived a moment later with Azula beside him. She looked as if she had not slept. He looked as if sleep were a luxury he had decided against.

"The caverns run under the east wall and open toward the old quarry," Rokkun said, no greeting, no feast-table charm. "We believe the Earth Kingdom men came through there the night my sons were taken. If Taijuk helped them, he left a trail. We find it."

Zuko met his eyes. "And if we don't?"

Rokkun's smile was thin. "Then we keep looking until we do."

Aang adjusted the strap of his glider staff. "Then let's start."

They were given an escort: six Nomads, Oghuz at the front, Zenah pointedly absent. The party moved off the courtyard, past the rider yard and the lingering smell of last night's fire, to an iron grate set into the cliffside brick. Cold air breathed up from below, wet stone and old smoke.

Katara glanced at Zuko. "Careful."

"I know," he said.

Oghuz hauled the grate open. The dark looked back at them.

One by one, they went down into Xanadu's bones.

The grate opened on a mouth of cold air.

Zuko went down first after Oghuz, then Aang, Katara, Sokka, Suki, and Toph. Rokkun came last of the leaders, two chained wolves tight at his side and six Nomads at his back.

Azula paced far behind. No one asked why. The look on her face in the courtyard had been answer enough.

The stair was old brick at first, then older stone, then no stair at all—only a sloping throat of rock slick with seep-water. Torches caught on wet walls and made the dark recoil in pieces. The wolves strained forward, claws ticking, noses low.

Sokka eyed the narrowing passage. "Cozy. Love what they've done with the place."

Rokkun did not smile.

"Watch your step," he said. His voice carried differently down here, stripped of the feast-hall drawl. "These caves were here long before Xanadu. Before the outpost. Before any of us. The stronghold was built on top of them, not through them. Men have gotten lost in the lower branches and not come back."

Toph pressed her palm to the wall and frowned.
"The stone's old. Split in places. Somebody's moved through here recently, but the tunnels go farther than they should."

Aang lifted his torch. The flame leaned toward a deeper dark, as if the cavern itself were breathing.

"Then we stay together," Katara said.

Rokkun gave the wolves more slack. Their chains chimed once, then went taut as they pulled toward the east fork.

"We follow what they find," he said. "And if this place decides it wants one of you, you call out before it finishes the thought."

He started walking.

The rest of them went after him, into the dark that had been waiting under the fortress the whole time.

Rokkun took the point with the wolves, a low flame cupped in his palm. The light crawled over wet stone and then fell away again, never quite enough. Oghuz came behind him. The rest followed in a loose line, torches popping, footsteps doubled back by the walls until it sounded as if another party were keeping pace just out of sight.