Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“Hey, watch it,” the girl snaps as Cha Ming unceremoniously tosses her into the cell. “This is a new jacket!”

Kuzo gives the dirty, stained, ripped garment a skeptical look—new to her, maybe, but you certainly can’t tell from looking at it. And not that she looks particularly put out, either—as Cha Ming slams the cell door shut with a distinctly satisfied air.

“Should have thought of that before you tried to scam hard-working people—” the prisoner lets out an inelegant snort. “—out of their hard-earned money, missy.”

“Missy,” she repeats, rounding toward Cha Ming with startling accuracy given her cloudy, unfixed stare. “Missy? And it wasn’t a scam,” she adds after a moment, suddenly dropping to the floor, indignation gone. “It was insurance fraud.” She props one bare, dirty foot against her upraised knee. “Get it right.”

“I’ll be sure to note that in the records for your trial,” Kuzo says, shaking his head and earning himself a snort and a—a thumbs down?

“You’re mighty insolent for someone in a lot of trouble,” Cha Ming growls, crossing his arms in a display of muscle that Kuzo doesn’t have the heart to point out is utterly lost on her. It’s more about the vibe of the whole thing, he supposes.

“I am, aren’t I,” she grins, slow and wide and unsettling toothy. “You know what though, I think I want my messenger.”

Kuzo frowns. “You’re—?” Was she working with an accomplice?

“My one call?” the girl says, kicking her foot in the air. “The new Fire Lord proclamation? That every prisoner upon arrest gets one messenger to a person of their choosing? Set off and landslides in there?”

Cha Ming shoots Kuzo a sideways look. “There isn’t a…?” he trails off as Kuzo shakes his head, silently pointing a startled Cha Ming to the very official scroll waiting on his desk.

“That proclamation came in this morning,” Kuzo says, incredulous. He hasn’t even had time to read it all the way through yet!

“I know,” she grins, sharp.

“You weren’t even arrested five degrees afterward!”

“I know,” she repeats, grinning wider. “And now I want my message.”  

“Does it even apply to non-Fire Nation citizens?” Cha Ming frowns, scratching the base of his topknot as he quickly scans the proclamation, squinting to try to parse through the fancy High Caldera calligraphy.

The girl cocks her head, pale green eyes bright against her dirt-smudged face. “Do you think I’m not Fire Nation?”

Kuzo hesitates. She looks very…Earth. “…Are you?”

She holds out her hand as if admiring her nails, waggling her fingers. “No.”

“Says here all prisoners,” Cha Ming calls over, still reading over the edict. “Not seeing any residency or citizenship requirements.”

“Alright then,” Kuzo sighs, looking around for his ink brush. Agni’s toes, they haven’t even had a chance to get training on it yet, the magistrate is supposed to come by tomorrow… “What do you want to say, then?”

“Hmm.” The girl taps a finger against her chin a moment, considering, then, “I want to write it.”

Cha Ming coughs a little, surprised, and the girl raises her eyebrows.

“Is there a problem with that?”

“But you’re, uh.”

She tilts her head in Cha Ming’s direction. “Yes?”

Kuzo clears his throat. “Aren’t you…”

“Am I?” she asks, tilting in his direction now and somehow managing to catch his gaze in one of the more unsettling stare-offs of his life. Which is saying something considering how his little sister used to stare at candleflames growing up to get better at eye gaze contests.

“Well, um,” Kuzo finally says, coughing a little and breaking away under the guise of grabbing up an ink brush. “How exactly do you propose to write it? Given that you can’t, uh. See?”

“I can’t?”

“…Can you?”

Another grin. “No.”

The sigh Kuzo lets out only makes her grin wider.

“They make special inks these days, you know,” she offers, propping her head up on her crossed arms, foot kicking in the air again.

Cha Ming stares. “That blind people can see?”

“That earthbenders can see,” she says simply, expression going smug and wolfish as she adds, “If they’re good enough.”

Kuzo stares a moment, mouth working silently as he takes in the hardpacked earthen floor and stone-lined walls, the whole place designed to stymie firebenders.

“…Ah,” Cha Ming says behind him, faint.

“What, ah. What ink would that be, then?” Kuzo finally says, deciding to just…accept her docileness at face value for now. Well, now exactly docile, but. “We have the usual standard issue.” Shelves and shelves of it, and one or two pots the magistrate leaves behind whenever they lose track of their things…

“Flying Boar brand,” she says, prim, and Cha Ming chokes.

“Flying—that stuff’s worth its weight in gold!”

“Makes sense,” the girl allows. “It’s made with it.”

“Why would—we’re the fire and the guard station!” Kuzo says, feeling strangely desperate considering he isn’t the one behind bars. “We don’t have that!”

“Hm,” the girl says, wiggling like she’s getting comfortable against the dirt. “That sounds like a problem for you, doesn’t it. Seeing as how every prisoner is entitled to write or dictate a message to a person of their choosing, and per the Fire Lord’s order, any denial of such right will result in the immediate negation of the arrest regardless of circumstances.”

Kuzo opens his mouth and promptly closes it again. Is she—is she quoting?

“That would be too bad for you guys,” she adds, smirking. “Wouldn’t it.”

“You can’t…”

“I can,” she says, gleeful.

“I’ll just write it for you,” Kuzo huffs, grabbing up a piece of scrap paper and casting around for that open ink well. “The code permits for a message to be dictated, so let’s just do away with all this ridicule—”

“Ah, ah, ah,” she interrupts, suddenly rolling fluidly up to sit cross-legged. “The code permits. The code does not require.” Cha Ming looks down at the code in question, eyes wide. “I want to write it myself.”

“That’s absurd,” Kuzo protests, feeling something sputter and die in his chest as Cha Ming’s expression slowly goes to horror. “You can’t expect us to spend that kind of money on one letter.” Agni’s nails, that’s over half their annual budget!

“But how can I trust you’ll transcribe it correctly?” she asks, all faux innocent and someone must have taught her that look. “I can’t exactly read it to be sure, can I? I’m blind after all.” And sounds nearly gleeful about it.

“We’d have to send away for it,” Kuzo says faintly as he tries to calculate who in the town could even—they might have to find a coastal trader, Agni, the markup—

She snorts, waving a hand around her cell. “Does that look like my problem?”

“It could take weeks!”

“It could, couldn’t it?” she says serenely, grinning. “Good thing you have such a lovely comfortable floor here,” she adds, the earth suddenly rippling underneath her, Kuzo tensing and Cha Ming shouting in alarm as…an earthen chaise lounge rises up out of the floor, with the girl on it.

Kuzo stares a long moment, then turns to Cha Ming, lowering his voice. “This feels like another scam,” he mutters, rubbing at his temples and already feeling a headache forming.

“I’m not sure how we get out of it, though,” Cha Ming frowns, waving the new edict helplessly. “The Fire Lord…”

“Maybe we can add the cost as part of her fines to be assessed after the trial…” Kuzo says, dubious.

“Not going to do us much good if she doesn’t have any money,” Cha Ming huffs, echoing his thoughts, both of them wincing as they realize they’re in for another year of not being able to upgrade their fire mitigation protocols from sand to water.

“So?” the girl asks, pointed, like she somehow knows they’ve just come to their conclusion. “My ink?”

“We’ll get it,” Kuzo sighs.

“Wonderful,” she grins, making a show of settling in to wait and oh, Kuzo’s headache is definitely settling in, too. And probably won’t be leaving soon, either…

“Agni’s flapping—who are we sending this thing to?” Cha Ming grumbles, nearly dragging his topknot out as he shoves a hand through his hair. “Are you wanting us to get you a special bird for that too? Send it by phoenix, maybe?”

“Oh, nothing as fancy as that,” she says breezily, as if she doesn’t notice his grouchiness. “A regular hawk should do.” Her lips curl in that grin that definitely makes Kuzo’s head throb harder. “It’s just going to Caldera, after all.”

Which…is normal enough. A bit of a surprise, given they’re in the outlying islands, but certainly common. “Which relay?” he asks, trying to remember if Mai Tin’s letter had come back yet and brought its hawk back with them, or whether he should go asking—

“The palace,” she says, serene.

Kuzo coughs, stuttering a bit. That—that is less usual, certainly, but not—not entirely unheard of. It’s just that he doesn’t trust that serenity one bit. “To the care of?”

“The Fire Lord,” she says, even serener.

“The Fire Lord,” Cha Ming repeats, numb, then again, “The Fire Lord. The Fire Lord,” he finally guffaws, cackling—or cracking, maybe—holding himself over with the force of his wheezing laughter, Kuzo sighing and patting him firmly on the back.

“Mi—girl, the Fire Lord isn’t going to read your letter,” he says, grasping for patience and so, so ready for this shift to be over. It isn’t even noon. “I’m sure it works like that in the Earth Kingdom, but that’s not how it’s done here.”

“Maybe he’ll make an exception for me,” she shrugs, unbothered and picking a piece of food out of her teeth.

“…Maybe.”

“Maybe,” Cha Ming huffs, still wheezing. “Maybe. Maybe I’ll grow wings and fly, too!”

She lolls her head to look at him, eyes narrowing. “I can help with the flying part,” she says, grin suddenly sharp-edged. “Temporarily.”

“Look,” Kuzo sighs, trying to breathe his headache away and realizing that she seems quite young, just at her majority, probably. “If you don’t have anyone to write to, we can recommend some lawyers, or the magistrate. We can even send it to someone in the Earth Kingdom.” They’ll send wherever they need to, for someone to take her away. “You must have been staying with someone, right?” Please let this girl barely older than his daughter not have been sleeping on the streets. “Had some reason to visit?”

“I was making my way to a friend,” she offers after a moment’s considering.

“Well then,” Kuzo says, trying to restrain his audible excitement, “Let’s write them.”

“Good idea,” she nods along. “The Fire Lord.”

Kuzo sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose. He hates the ones determined to be difficult.

“Kid, just tell us who to really send it to,” Cha Ming says, still sounding a little hysterical around the edges but hauling himself back up to deliver Kuzo a bracing wallop on the back. “We’re not going to send it to the Fire Lord, I don’t care what joke you’re trying to play.”

She gives a flat, unimpressed look to their general direction. “So we’re breaking the new edict before the sun even sets, are we.”

“We—I’m—you’re the lawbreaker here!”

“It was just a little light fraud,” she sniffs, biting off a nail. “Not like violating a direct order from the Fire Lord, oh no, that’s all you.”

“I’m not…” Cha Ming trails off, looking undeniably queasy.

“I’m not the one who was told in the Fire Lord’s very own hand—”

Kuzo blinks. How would she—?

“—that every prisoner gets to communicate to the individual of their choice, and then chose to ignore it. No, that’s all you. But hey, you want to violate the will of a Child of Agni that way?” she gives a low, impressed whistle. “Your pyre.”

“Fine,” Cha Ming says, pulling his topknot out completely to grab onto his hair. “Fine. We’ll post it to the palace, and see what good it does you. You’ll be waiting here for a reply for the rest of your life,” he snaps, and Kuzo pulls up, horrified, as he registers the words.

“Hm,” she grins, slow and smirking. “And wouldn’t that be awful,” she muses, making aa show of examining her nails again as Kuzo watches Cha Ming freeze and look down to the scroll again, to the part where it dictated that a message and a reply or proof of failed delivery need to be received before a trial can commence.

He doesn’t think either of them make a sound in their horror, but her grin is still sharp and toothy like she heard it anyway.

–

Sheyeng can barely walk from trembling as they’re escorted—escorted—by a brisk, efficient-looking aide—an aide to the Fire Lord­—down the bright hallways of the palace—the Fire Lord’s palace. The message worth more than their life, probably—because its written in gold—is clutched so tight in their grip they don’t know if they can actually unclench their fingers from it anymore, even as they’re ushered past a pair of stern guards—oh Agni, oh Agni, oh Agni—and into a room lined with braziers pressing an unnatural heat against their skin, a reminder of the blessing given to the Children of Agni oh Agni blessed Agni that’s—that’s—

The Fire Lord glances up in a flash of sunlight off his headpiece and earrings, single eyebrow raised. “Can I help you?”

Sheyeng squeaks to suddenly find themselves pinned by that unmistakable gaze without any further ceremony, nearly falling on their face in their rush to bow and pass over the letter at the same time, hand jerking so quick and uncoordinated that they nearly throw it on the Fire Lord’s desk, right on top of his papers and nearly onto his lunch oh fuck oh Agni oh—“Please don’t kill me.”

The Fire Lord pauses, eyebrow ticking higher, and Sheyeng cringes as the guards shift threateningly behind them until the Fire Lord waves them back and cracks open the scroll, face impassive as he reads, nothing at all in his expression giving a single thing away and oh Agni’s cock, Sheyeng should be looking at the floor not right at—

“I think,” the Fire Lord suddenly says, voice mild and raspy, “That we might need to amend a recent edict.”

“Of course, my lord,” the very efficient aide immediately says, whipping an ink brush out of nowhere. “How, my lord?”

“I’m not quite sure yet,” the Fire Lord says, considering. “I’ll think about it on the way, though.”

The aide blinks. “On the way?”

“Yeah,” the Fire Lord says, pushing back from his desk to stride out of the room, aide and guards scurrying behind him and leaving Sheyeng shaking and wondering if they hallucinated the Fire Lord’s casual thanks for this on the way out. Thanks. Thanks. The Fire Lord wouldn’t—he didn’t—but if did—

Eventually Sheyeng hauls themself back to their feet, cringing a little at the boldness but using the leg of the Fire Lord’s desk to help since there’s no one around to see it, and unable to entirely resist glancing at this insane, expensive ink that they spent four weeks shipping in and nearly keeling over all over again to see, ‘I’m in your stupid jail, idiot. Food is good but it’s too fucking hot. If you please come get me. I have some suggestions on your law.’

Chapter Text

“I’m starting to think,” Toph says as the door silently opens behind her, pinging a bit of wrought metal from the window pane off into the corner of the room, “That I’m not cut out for this.”

“I wouldn’t necessarily say that,” Zuko says as he pads toward her, Toph following his progress by his heartbeat, his steps always strangely light against her earthsense for someone so solid.

“Everyone else would,” Toph says, folding her arms when Zuko makes one of his little neutral noises. “Don’t even try to tell me you think that went well.”

“…I mean.”

“You’re nowhere near a good enough liar for that, Your Fireliness,” Toph warns, the fact that she’d normally be curious enough to want to see him try anyway somehow only serving to make the twist in her gut more sour.

“But it wasn’t a total disaster,” Zuko says, leaning against the window sill next to her. “For example,” he continues, ignoring her snort. “Nothing is on fire—”

“Yeah, that would be you, not me.”

“—and there’s no risk of an international incident—”

“Again, you, not me.”

“—just brutal personal embarrassment—”

“Wow. Thanks.”

“—and King Kuei even complimented your negotiation strategy—”

“Is that supposed to make me feel better?”

“—and your mom and dad both watched you leave the room.”

Toph sighs, thunking her head against the stone wall, focusing on the comforting reverberation back at her. “Not helping, Zuko.”

“It’s better than them not watching,” he says, giving her a little nudge, that particular pain old enough for him to sound wry over. “Trust me. Especially with the way you blew that door off its hinges.“

Toph scrunches up her face, kicking the wall a bit harder this time, feeling all the ways she could make it crack. “They just keep trying to—” she cuts off, yanking another chunk of metal out of the windowpane in frustration instead, squeezing it hard enough to feel the way it heats and protests before forcing herself to loosen her grip

“I know,” Zuko says quietly, and she knows he does. “But its not your fault if they’re too blind to notice how awesome you are,” he adds, firm, and Toph snorts.

“Was calling Lord Dumb-Shit back there—”

“Dum Shi is a rather unfortunate family name,” Zuko muses.

“—an idiot too stupid to realize a good deal if it crawled up his ass and died there—”

“Evocative,” Zuko comments.

“—really an example of my being awesome? When we’re supposed to be securing a trade deal?”

“I mean.” The familiar rustle of Zuko scratching at the base of his topknot. “I thought it was pretty great.”

Toph snorts.

“And hey,” he says, grabbing her hand where its balled into a fist against the crook of her elbows, fingers strong and gentle as he rubs across her knuckles. “I’ll tell you have someone close to me once said when I was down and doubting myself.”

“What?” she asks, trying not to sigh. She’s really not in the mood right now for one of Uncle’s—

“That ‘you’re dating the greatest earthbender in the world’ and 'to fucking act like it, Hotman.'”

 Toph blinks.

“And to fuck ‘em,” Zuko adds, thoughtful and giving a little tug on her hand that she’s too startled not to follow into the welcome firebender heat of his body, “And to fuck shit up.”

“When in doubt, fuck their shit up,” Toph corrects, rote.

“Which, again, is really supposed to rhyme—”

“Yeah, yeah, shove it,” Toph says, finally breaking into a grin as she leans into him, something delighted and amused sparkling through the lingering twist of upset in her stomach. “Got some recent talents to tell me about, Zuko?” she teases, embracing the opportunity to grab the thread of her usual brashness that he’s offering. “Since I’m dating the greatest earthbender in the world, apparently? Should we let Aang formally now he’s got some Avatar competition?”

“I mean.” Zuko shrugs, a rustle of layers. “If you want to draft up a proclamation about how well I rocked your—”

Toph is cackling before he even finishes, belly-deep and loud and oh, does it feel good to do after a day of trying to be right instead of just being her, laughing again when Zuko’s heart does that particular double-hitch beat that he only ever does for her, feeling buoyed up again as she strides ahead of him back to the Beifong negotiating table, ready, to quote Zuko quoting the greatest earthbender in the world, to fuck this shit up like only she knows best.

Chapter Text

Zuko doesn’t know why he’s feeling so awkward after last night’s unthinking ease, so shy putting on his clothes when Toph can’t exactly see, so uncertain of how he’s supposed to be.

And Agni, he knows he’s overthinking it, he does. But he still feels dizzy from how fast the morning went from heart-leaping excitement at finding Toph’s solid, sleep-heavy weight against him as he woke to…well, to this.

“Why are you just sitting there?” she huffs, tone nearly brusque as she tugs on her clothes, no art or artifice to it and he’d think that was just Toph if he didn’t vividly remember every second of the way she slinked out of her clothes last night, laughing the whole time, like all she needed to put on a show was his heartbeat to guide her.

“I—” He takes a deep breath, trying to ignore the too-familiar feeling of needing to work up the courage to say something. “I had a nice time.”

She cocks her head, blank.

“…Last night.” He clears his throat when she still doesn’t react. “It was…” Amazing. Funny. Exhilarating. Silly. Just physical in a way he never imagined sex could be. Unbelievable, because he never even let himself hope that she might feel—

“Yeah, Sparrowkeet, it was a good time,” she snorts, haphazardly tying off her belt. “Now what’s a girl gotta do to get food around here?”

“Sparrowkeet?” he blinks, thrown. That’s…not what she was calling him last night, or before. “It—I can—or I can have the servants bring—”

“What, like my legs suddenly don’t work?” she interrupts, rolling her eyes. “Don’t think you were that good.”

“No, I—” Right, she doesn’t like to feel pampered, or infantilized, or anything like she can’t take care of herself. Right. “I just thought it could be nice,” he tries again, trying not to fidget, trying to make his voice a little more sure, a little more like it was last night. “To stay here. Together.”

She grunts, tugging her tunic on inside out. “I thought you wanted me to level some farmland or something. Make some terraces.”

“Well, yeah, but—”

“I’m not suddenly some fragile flower just because you fucked me, Zuko,” she cuts in, so sharp that he can’t help from rearing back from her tone.

“What—I didn’t—” He never said—why would she think—

“What happened doesn’t change anything, dude.” She rolls her eyes, somehow managing to give him an unimpressed look without ever actually looking at him, and Zuko doesn’t know if the word dude has felt quite so much like a knife to the gut before.

“You want some fainting fire lily who’ll collapse in your bed all day after a good fuck?” she’s continuing like this is some fight, stomping around for her headband, the fact that it’s on the floor by the door frozen in Zuko’s throat. “You can call Mai back.”

“That’s not—Mai wouldn’t—” He doesn’t want that, never wanted that. And Mai isn’t that, for one, even if he and her were still falling into bed together whenever they got bored enough for it to seem like a good idea.

But more importantly, Toph isn’t that, has never been that. And why would she think he wanted—why would she think he would have done anything they did last night if he—if he didn’t—

“Now where’s breakfast. I’m starving,” she says, jamming her headband onto her head like it’s any other morning, like last night they didn’t—like last night she didn’t…

…Like last night never happened, Zuko realizes, feeling suddenly so, so small. Because maybe that’s what she wants. For it to just…be nothing.

“Right,” Zuko says, squeezing his eyes shut against the sudden, hot sting, falling back on years of experience in sounding steady when he isn’t, “Right. Let me just—”

“I can find it,” she says, already shoving through the bedroom doors.

“—finish getting dressed.” Zuko blinks his eyes back open to stare at the door as it slowly swings closed, eventually registering the way his hands are twisted in his tunic hard enough to tear. He stares at that a moment, then forces his fingers to loosen, forces himself to take a slow, deep breath, forces himself to get up and get dressed and not think about the fact that he should know, he should know, that reaching for fragile, impossible things only ever makes them crumble.

–

Toph strides away from Zuko’s bedroom quickly as she can without outright running, silently thanking Oma and Shu that she’s the only one who can read heartbeats because she does not need Zuko being able to see through her right now, not like this. Not when she knows exactly how it is for a Fire Lord’s plaything, regardless of who that plaything is or how much he might like to think otherwise and fucking balls, there’s a reason she’s never let herself do something this dumb-shit stupid before.

Sure, she’s never heard rumors about Zuko like that, not outside of Mai. But Toph knows how it works, even if he doesn’t. And she’s not going to do that. She’s not going to cut herself down to fit, she isn’t going to make herself small so anyone else can seem taller, is never going to hold herself back.

Not even if it means having…If it means finally getting to have…

She grits her teeth and shoves that thought away, stomping along the corridor and sinking her earth sense down toward Caldera’s slow-beating volcanic heart, and lets that fill her senses instead of whatever too-fast, too-sharp, too-confusing, too-impossible thing Zuko’s heart is doing behind her.