Risho of the Black Snow (ATLA Fanfiction)

Prologue: The Two Headed Rat Viper

                    Haona knew he'd made a mistake the moment the helmet came off. 

The firebender didn't look as menacing without it- didn't look as ruthless as her fighting style had originally led him to believe. The warrior hardened his heart. This was the enemy. This woman was evil, her pathetic appearance was nothing more than a ploy. She wanted to make him let his guard down. She thought he was dumb enough to fall for it. Haona jammed his hilt into the woman's armour. 

She thought wrong.

The firebender stumbled back, digging the heels of her boots into the snow so as not to fall over. She caught her breath, and Haona watched in horror as the woman regained her strength. Two daggers materialized in her hands. Fire! Hot, pure, fire. Haona fought the instinct to drop to the ground. Where were their waterbenders? Hadn't they seen the black snow? 

Haona had been hacking ice into bricks when it had started. Madara and Norrek had grown up and married and they'd asked him to help them build their house, and he was doing his best when his work had become coated with black ash. As was the drill, Haona, the benders and the men of the town had painted themselves for battle. Their mission? Protect the young waterbenders at any cost. So far, they'd been doing a fair enough job. As long as they had benders and brave warriors, Haona had thought the firebenders wouldn't stand a chance. Haona had thought the Southern tribe was invincible. He wasn't so sure anymore.

The woman lunged at him like an angry polar-bear dog. Knives of fire bright and steady. Haona braced himself- but he wouldn't go down without a fight. He was Water tribe! And he knew that one way or another, water would always beat fire! As the firebender lunged for his chest, neck and face, Haona kept his sword low. Like a two-headed rat viper, she would be her own demise. She would see her enemy go down, but would lose herself in the process. Haona was Water tribe! He would not die in vain!

He watched her come near, the anger contorting a face that would likely be pretty, had she been smiling. But then, her face changed back to the one she wore earlier. Wide, terrified eyes. Red nose. Tears and snot frozen to her face. Haona's warrior heart clenched. Enemy, he told himself. Fire is destruction, fire is death, fire is-

Haona felt a flash of pain in his face, felt his parka burn away. He knocked his head on the frozen when he fell, and the agony ricocheted through him- spread like a crack running through ice. Haona screamed, put his pleas for help came out as cries of pain. He moaned. The bright sky had blinded him and help was nowhere to be found. The firebender was going to finish him. He had failed.

Haona closed his eyes, and waited for nothingness.

Instead, he was greeted only with noise; just a few steps away, a bleeding girl was crying. Haona listened closer because he thought he could hear words amidst her sobs. There was a song in her suffering.

Leaves from the vine,

falling so slow,

like tiny fragile shells,

drifting in the foam,

Little soldier girl, come marching home...

Haona's gut tied in knots. She sounded like a child! What had he done? He realized with a start that he was the victim of the rat-viper. He had poisoned himself with the blood of a scared young girl. Fire Nation was irrelevant. He'd hurt a creature with a voice as sweet as sea-prunes. He'd made a mistake. The burns on his face and chest where nowhere near as painful as what was going on inside of Haona. If he could have one wish, Haona would take back his sword- put it back in the sheath where it belonged- out of the firebender's rib cage. But Haona didn't have a wish, so he cursed himself instead. 

There were no take-backs. He would be a monster forevermore. If he wasn't already, Haona would be a hideous, grotesque dark spirit when he reached the spirit world. The other spirits would look at him without pity in their eyes and tell each other that he got what he deserved. And Haona would agree with them.

 But there was still room in his life for good. 

Not redemption- but Haona knew that light was still inside of him.

So after his victim pulled herself together to sing: brave soldier girl comes marching home, Haona repeated the entire song with her again and again until they slipped away together.