Blood of the North (Avatar: TLA Fanfic)

Chapter 4a: Travels

I have to chew food for the baby, but so far it has not gone hungry. For days I travel, persisting on the food from the market and food I take from small town markets along the way. It would seem that the Fire Nation has not penetrated this far into the Earth Kingdom. However, many citizens mourn the loss of the great city of Taku that was once a source of so many goods and amenities—and a port to the wider world, an arm of infrastructure that linked them to their great kingdom. Since it had been sacked by the Fire Nation, the entire region had grown disconnected and many now feared that it was only a matter of time before they were also swallowed up by Fire Nation occupation. Already having sent away so many fathers and sons, there is no chance of defense.

I can only think of Minzhe, born too young to be drafted into the war effort at the height of the first Fire Nation invasion. The way the light had played in his eyes, the way he had come alive that one day I had known him: bouncing from foot to foot, word to word. It was as if all the hope of the Earth Kingdom had lived inside of him. Now Mo Li and Bo could only mourn the terrible loss of their son I had killed. Mingyu would wish she had spoken up and sent me away. Baojia would regret his decision to allow me to stay. Bohai—pray that he came away from the fight with all his faculties—would be forever disappointed in himself for having been taken out so early, unable to defend his family. I had punched a hole in their family that could never be refilled, contributed to the awful carnage left by this war.

A thousand doubts plague me. Had I been wrong to return to the apartment? Had the city guards seen me and would they be able to make the connection between me and Bo's family? Every loose end turns over and over in my mind as I walk along rocky paths between swaying reeds. Could they follow me and catch me? Has my presence in these towns already alerted the guard? Will my flight drag the invasion north? There is no other occupation to distract me but keeping the baby clean and fed.

As I pass through one tiny town after another, I reassure myself that I am indeed traveling north. My only comfort is that I am moving toward my home. Since first entering the prison, it has been my only hope to find a boat and sail home, so it is this deep grain that guides me. Taku is lost, but there have to be other great port cities. I can stowaway on any ship or caravan to the north. I am prepared to do all it takes.

Unfortunately, theft is tougher here in these little towns where there are few customers. Shopkeepers have time to give chase and I have no partners in crime. On more than one occasion, I am beaten with a shoe or a stick and have to cry for mercy. Upon seeing the baby, most feel pity and snarl a warning: I shouldn't find myself their way again.

At one point, I have to cross a large river, but it is not hard to bend a still, warm passage while holding the baby up high and feeling the river silt carefully with my feet. It amazes me to be able to enter a body of water without risk of freezing. The current does not worry me; I can easily redirect it. The baby seems to sense our connection to the water. She laughed at my bubbles and waves.

On the other side, the underbrush grows dense and I wish I had found extra food. Deep past the treeline, as I am beginning to wonder if I will ever find my way out, I discover a tiny forest village where the people give me food. I am not sure why, they just do. Their gift gets me through the rest of the forest and I think that perhaps they prefer to give what they have rather than be responsible for anyone who dies lost and hungry in the forest.

In the town I find beyond the forest, which is larger than what I have seen so far and seems to be a collection of estates and farms, I hide in a barn, picking vegetables off the edges of the garden at night. Seeing these numerous fields rich with fruiting plants, I think I might stay here for some time. Unfortunately, the baby gets sick.

She coughs up brown and green colored phlegm and her nose and eyes begin to run. Her forehead grows hot. I am terrified. Could this be a punishment for all the men I have killed? For innocent Minzhe?

I do not want the baby to die. Regretfully, I never learned to heal with water because I was male. I now wish for my mother and grandmother—even my eye-rolling sister could do it. Now that the baby is sick I cannot stay hidden or proceed through the forest. Looking at the curved and spiked leaves of plants as if they hold the answer—a secret mixture, a cure—everything is a toxin.

The town does not have a healer, so I take the baby to the nearest farm in hopes of someone being there who could help. When I reach it, though, the man who answers the door is none too friendly. Arranging his robes, he grimaces at my robes I wear and shoos me away like a bad smell. Which I probably am, having been away from a bath for so long. I resist the urge to threaten him and move on. Whoever he is, he has never worked the fields around his home, so he cannot understand my need.

The next house contains a woman who would have helped me if not for her husband. Even as she says she will run back and find something good for the baby to eat, the man appears behind her and accuses me of being a charlatan—as if the baby beginning to squall is a puppet. He slams the door. Earth Kingdom men, it seems, are inhospitable!

The next house blesses me with an older woman who, while she speaks to me only through a screen at first, is at least kind. Her husband does not have any objections, nodding at my story and frowning to hear the baby. They do not have the means to help, but the woman tells me my best chance is to reach the ruins of Taku on the other side of the forest. There they have an apothecary. Only the healer there will be able to help. Around these parts, they have only seen such a sickness pass through their little ones once before—when the Fire Nation soldiers swarmed the valley almost a decade ago. Near Taku, there is an institute for herbalists. While it has had few new students, there is still an apothecary whose family has served there for generations.

Taking me around to the smokehouse, the old man gives me some dried meat and a large knife. To protect me from thieves, he says in a quiet, matter of fact tone. I feel guilty taking the weapon, as I have taken from this man's garden before, but I decide that if he is willing to give it, I will take it. The offer of a knife is not only a warning, it is an omen of danger ahead. Very few travelers pass through the forest anymore, not since the trade road broke down. Now it is overgrown by fast growing wild plants. Without a reliable trail, it is a hazard to wander off and be eaten by a platypus bear or trampled by a moose lion—or simply disappear. That happened plenty, too. Still, I have no choice. The woman tells me I can waste no time.

When I think they can do no more for me, the woman unfolds a piece of cloth she has been turning over in her hands since her husband and I had returned from the smokehouse. It is a twisted fabric cot that I can wear around my neck to carry the baby close to my chest. It is a relief to have free hands and I count my blessings—how fortunate that the old woman kept this cot for children who grew up so many years ago. And how generous she is to part with a relic of sons she has lost defending the kingdom.

I walk back down the road between the white walls of the estates, past the farmers who did not help me. I shoot them bitter glares, but wave back when they do. In the early light of day, I see they were field hands and not masters of the house.

After my feeble revenge, I leave the town. The forest before me is dark and foreboding, but I know that the other side will be a light that will save this little girl. After a short pause and a prayer to any spirits that may be living in the forest, I step into the darkness, unsure whether I will ever come back out.