A Draw
Title: "A Draw"
Author: PrettyxSiren/kissesdahling
Rating: PG-13
Genre: fluff, drabble, romance
Spoilers: None.
Disclaimer: Avatar belongs to Bryke...unfortunately.
A/N: This is, like, the first Zutara fic I ever wrote -- not the first I posted. Un-beta'd.
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Water dripped gracefully down her barely-covered body; Zuko realized he was more gaping than gazing and busied himself with the tattered drawstring that held up his own under-trousers. She shook the water out of her hair and walked toward him and knelt at his side. He actively willed his face not to redden; he was a man, and she was so close, he could feel her breath on him as she spoke.
“Notice anything unusual about today?” Katara asked loftily.
Zuko screwed up his face, giving a genuine effort at thinking. “I dunno. Today seems perfectly usual to me. Aang and Toph are sleeping - Sokka and Suki are not. And you and I are…” he chose his words carefully, “the only ones ready for action.”
She smiled like an all-knowing snowlynx and looked up at the sky. He followed the elegant curve of her neck upward and winced as the bright sun met his eyes. But there was something different: a nearly full moon was fast-trailing behind it.
“The sun and the moon are out at the same time,” he observed, realizing where she was going with it. “This is the one time of the month when you and I are on perfectly even ground.”
She stood up and grabbed his arm, pulling him raptly to his feet. “What better way to test our own mettle, to see how far we’ve come?”
“You’re on,” he smirked.
They walked further onto the beach, away from the house and the trees that might catch fire. They took fifteen paces apart from one another and then turned, facing their opponent.
Even though it was just for fun, he was weary of striking first - and he paid for it: Katara bent the seawater like a whip and smacked him roundly on the shoulder, as though scolding him for not paying enough attention. He wouldn’t make the same mistake again.
He shot fire at her feet, pulse after pulse so that she was dancing across the sand, much of which was turning to glass under the immense heat of his flames. She solved that problem by running straight into the water and surfing out into the sea, welling up a huge swell, and then using it to blast her way back to shore in one, magnificently fluid movement he couldn’t anticipate or counter - at least not without hurting her.
She hurled right into him and knocked him over, sending them both tumbling in a tangle of arms and legs, end over end, until, finally, he was resting on top of her, pinning her arms to the sand just to be sure. Yet, despite his obviously dominant position, he knew, without a doubt, that he wasn’t the one in power here - it was her, all her. She was pure energy and he felt it surge into his own body, their physical proximity creating an endless loop of raw, throbbing power. Inexplicable, addictive, dangerous.
He tactfully moved his pelvis away from hers, so she couldn’t feel what all of this was doing to him. Indeed, he could play it cool - cooler than her, even; by now, she was breathing hard and her cheeks were pink. All of this was getting to her too, but, like him, she would never admit it.
With a low, regretful growl, he rolled off of her and pulled his knees to his bare chest to further disguise the bulge in his trousers. She stayed exactly how she was, back on the sand, arms above her head. And they both remained like that for several, long minutes.
Finally, she asked, “Call it a draw?”
“Yes.”