[fic] Something to Hold Onto, Chapter 10: A Chance To Hold On
Title: Something to Hold Onto [10/13]
Word count: 9,300
Pairing: Jet/Zuko
Rating: A very hard R for language, violence and sexual content
Summary: Since the day the walls of Ba Sing Se fell, the Freedom Fighters have struggled to protect what remains of the city and its people. Jet and his second command, a mysterious boy named Li, have spent the summer piecing together an army, hoping for a chance to take the city back for good. But Li is also Zuko, and the time for that secret is quickly running out. Soon, he'll have to decide exactly who he is, what cause he's going to fight for and where his heart lies.
This chapter: Eight minutes.
Notes: In addition to the ongoing efforts of kittyjimjams and jlh to keep this story in shape and my brain from exploding, this chapter I also have hoshizora to thank for his services as "does this fight scene make any sense?" beta and froglartbge for being my messenger hawk consultant. The lovely Holly Mongi and burntcitrine are responsible for this chapter's illustrations, which are linked to in the text as well as at the end!
I will try my best to have Chapter 11 up by this time next week. But if it comes between posting it quickly or writing it properly, I'm afraid I'd rather go with the latter. Fingers crossed, etc! Thanks to those of you who have been reading for being SO PATIENT and so kind, I really appreciate it! <3
:: Previous Chapter ::
"Jet?"
He cracked one eye open, the other squashed against Zuko's shoulder. He could see the pale glow of early morning under the canvas flap that served as a door.
"Jet, you awake?" The flap was pushed aside a little, and Roo peered through the gap. There was another shape behind her that might have been Dao, but Jet's vision was still blurry with sleep.
"Yeah," Jet grumbled. He sat up a little and rubbed his eyes with the heel of one hand. "What?"
"Someone's here to talk to you," she said. She sounded both nervous and excited, and that was enough to wake him up the rest of the way.
"Tell 'em I'll be right there," he said, and the flap fell back into place as she scurried off to do so. Jet groaned and stretched his arms above his head, the bones of his spine realigning themselves with a series of loud cracks. Zuko's arm was draped across Jet's stomach, and once Jet sat up he'd sort of curled himself into a ball around the lower half of Jet's body, his head tucked somewhere near Jet's tailbone and one knee drawn up over Jet's legs. Jet poked him in the ribs and was rewarded with a muffled groan.
They'd all stayed up until the small hours with Zuko's uncle and Piandao, honing their plans and shifting men between units. Iroh had made them all tea, strong and fragrant, to keep their minds sharp. But they'd had one day of fighting behind them and another still to come, and eventually their exhaustion had won out.
The inside of the tent was dim, but Jet could see the outlines of other bodies. Longshot and Smellerbee were only a few feet away, making one big lump together. Ping lay with his face to the wall, the blanket pulled up over his head and his feet sticking out past the bottom. Jin's cot was already empty, and Xue Sheng's didn't seem to have been slept in at all.
Jet began to disentangle himself from Zuko's limbs, made more difficult by his own reluctance and Zuko's groggy efforts to hold on. "C'mon, Ping, you too," said Jet as he pried Zuko's fingers from his shirt. "Whatever it is, you should probably hear it."
Ping grunted and pushed himself up, the blanket falling away. His hair was a mess, flatted on one side by his pillow and sticking straight out on the other. He grunted a vague affirmative as he scratched his chin, rough with wiry black stubble.
Jet extended a leg and nudged what was probably Longshot's back with his foot. "You guys should start getting the men organized. Or you know. Awake."
"Ugh," Smellerbee groaned. "You saw how much those kids drank last night."
"Bring Iroh's sungi horn." Jet poked Zuko again, right in the armpit this time, and he gave a satisfying squawk as he pushed Jet's hands away. "Seriously, Zuko, they're waiting on us."
"They're waiting on you," Zuko grumbled. But he sat up and combed a hand back through his unruly mop of hair, watching blearily as Ping groped around for his shirt.
Within a minute or so, the three of them were mostly dressed and sufficiently presentable. Su Dao had waited for them in front of the tent, looking much less rattled than he had the day before, and as they followed him across the camp Jet tugged the bindings on his forearms into place. "Remember, you're not hung over," he said. "You're grizzled warriors eager to see some action."
"Sure," Zuko mumbled, the end of it dissolving into a yawn. Ping seemed to be concentrating on the mechanics of walking in a straight line.
The messenger was young and scrawny, dressed in nondescript brown robes that looked too big for him. Roo was perched beside him on an upturned bucket, smiling as she chattered. "I'm probably the fastest," she was saying. She held a stick in one hand and was drawing patterns in the dirt, squares inside circles. "That's why Jet called me Rabbaroo, 'cause I'm so quick. And 'cause I can make this face," she added, scrunching up her nose and curling her lip.
"I see," said the messenger, bemused, as he watched her sniff at the air.
"Hey, Roo, we've got it from here," said Jet. His voice was kind, but Roo had been around the longest of all the runners and she knew when she was being dismissed. She hopped down from the bucket, took Dao's hand and dragged him back toward the cooking fire.
Jet turned his gaze toward the messenger, all business now that the runners were gone, and the younger man stood a little straighter. "I have a message from Commander Quan," he said.
The words hit Jet like cold water, startling him out of what remained of the morning's haze. "All right," he said, slow and careful despite how hard his heart was beating. "Let me hear it."
"There will be no Dai Li agents at the palace," said the messenger, "by order of General Zha."
"What about the rest of the city?"
The boy shifted his weight. "I don't have a message for you about that," he said. "There will be no Dai Li at the palace. That's the message I was given for you. That's all I can say."
Jet wanted to grab his shoulders and shake him, demand to know what the hell was going on, if they'd be drowning in Dai Li agents or if Quan had changed his mind. But Jet knew this kid couldn't help him, whether he wanted to or not. Probably no one had told him the whole truth of it - the Dai Li knew better than most how dangerous information could be.
"Tell Quan my offer stands," said Jet, his words clipped. "If you help us, we'll have your back, whatever happens later. If you don't, you're on your own. We'll let this city tear you traitors apart."
Jet would've left it at that - let the kid go and assumed Quan couldn't be counted on. But Ping stepped forward, tall enough that he threw the young Dai Li into shadow. "I have a message for Quan as well," he rumbled. He looked a little frightening, hair mussed and face unshaven, his gaze furious. "He was there in the crystal catacombs, just as I was. He saw Princess Azula kill the Avatar in cold blood. Ask him if that woman is who he wants to serve. Ask him if helping her destroy this city is how he wants to be remembered."
Wide-eyed and very pale, the messenger gave a single, stiff nod. Then he turned and shot up the hillside on a wave of bent earth, pebbles clicking down the slope as he dropped out of sight over the ridge.
"I didn't know you saw that," said Jet. "You never mentioned it."
"I don't enjoy remembering that day," said Ping. "But we can't afford to forget what we did. What we allowed to happen." He frowned and shook his head. "Never again."
Zuko was still looking at the place where the messenger had stood, his gaze distant. "No Dai Li at the palace," he murmured. "On Zha's orders."
"What d'you think it means?" asked Jet.
"That he doesn't trust Quan," said Zuko. "That he knows something's up, and he's scared. On the defensive. Probably all the strongest Firebenders in the city will be there." He snorted in disgust. "Men like Zha only care about their own skin."
"So he doesn't know about the eclipse," said Jet. "Right? Or he'd have to use the Dai Li. He might not trust them, but he isn't stupid."
"Hard to say for sure but…" Zuko looked up at Jet, a smile pulling at his mouth. "No. I don't think he knows."
"Shit," said Jet, shaking his head. "Shit I just…really? We actually managed to…"
"Yeah," said Zuko.
"The palace is the essential target," said Ping. "If we control Zha, we control the city."
"Shit," said Jet. Then he laughed, a little giddy with disbelief, and swept Zuko into a hug, clapping him on the back. Ping watched them, amused, until Jet reached out and pulled him in, his arms around both mens' shoulders. "We can do this," he said. "We're gonna do this."
"We can," Ping agreed.
Zuko leaned closer to Jet, bumping their foreheads together. "We will."
Jet found Xue Sheng in one of the smaller tents, bent over a complicated diagram with a brush in his hand and his nose almost touching the parchment. The floor around him was covered in maps, all held open with small stones placed at their corners, glowing buttery yellow in the lantern light. He looked up at the sound of Jet's entrance, squinting in the sunbeams that spilled through the open flap.
"You been here all night?" Jet asked. He kept his eyes down as he crossed the room, seeking out gaps in the carpet of scrolls.
Xue Sheng pushed his spectacles up his nose, frowning as if offended by the suggestion of sleep. "I don't have to fight today," he said. "And this needed to get done." He picked up the diagram he'd been working on and held it out for Jet to take. "New reconnaissance came in last night. They've started using that guardhouse again, and they destroyed two of the bridges over the canal."
"Good work," said Jet. He let the parchment hang from his fingers - he could see some of the ink hadn't quite dried. "Now get some sleep, all right? You've earned it."
Xue Sheng lay down his brush and sat back on his heels. "I don't think I'll be able to," he said quietly. "Not until this is over."
"You'll know either way by sunset," said Jet with deliberate levity. "If we're not back by then, it's because we're dead."
"I know. But I wasn't just thinking about you," said Xue Sheng. "Master Piandao and I were talking last night, after you…left. He thinks it will take at least three days for word to reach us from the Fire Nation. I doubt I'll be sleeping much before then." He frowned thoughtfully, as if something had just occurred to him. "Has anyone talked at all about what we'll do if the Avatar isn't successful? Assuming we can retake Ba Sing Se and assuming not all of our forces are needed to hold it, it might be wise to send reinforcements to aid whatever remains of the invasion force. They'll need-"
"Woah, Sheng," said Jet, holding up his empty hand. "Let's just worry about this afternoon, okay?"
"Xue Sheng," he said, "and some of us don't find any comfort in being willfully short-sighted."
"Well, if you're gonna be awake until then, you'll have plenty of time to think about it," said Jet. He rolled up the map, sloppy but good enough to be getting on with. "As for me, I'm gonna start with breakfast and go from there."
"How is it you're the leader?"
"No one else wanted the job," said Jet, though the cheer was wearing thin. He turned and started back the way he'd come. "See you in a few, if you can stop thinking long enough to eat."
"Jet…" Xue Sheng's frown was serious, the lines of it tense with whatever he needed to say. Enough to make Jet pause beside the door. "I might not have another chance to talk to you."
Jet rubbed the back of his neck. "C'mon, let's not-"
But Xue Sheng interrupted him, and Jet was too surprised to put up much of a fight. It hadn't been so long ago that this man had cowered whenever Jet walked into the room. "I haven't always been a very good Freedom Fighter," he said. "And we don't always agree. Most of the time we don't. You're reckless with yourself and your men. You're stubborn, even when it's obvious that you're wrong. Which you are, constantly, I'm surprised you haven't gotten us all killed." He pushed his glasses up his nose again, scowling at the map-covered floor. "But…being here in this camp. You and Zuko. What you've done." He met Jet's gaze directly, then, determined and unwavering. "I'll write a paper about it, when this is over."
Jet laughed and shook his head as he pushed the tent flap open. "All right. If that's what you want. You can start working on it tonight while you're sitting here not sleeping."
"Good luck," said Xue Sheng, curt but sincere.
"Thanks," said Jet. He let the flap drop back into place, then followed the smell of eggs and jasmine tea.
"You sure you wanna wear this?" Jet tightened the straps that held the studded gauntlets in place, the leather cracked and stiff. He'd put his armor on while Zuko checked to make sure he had all the pieces of his own - he'd had to take it all apart for cleaning, and there was still greasy soot along the seams. "I saw your uncle and his friends getting ready. They've got their own uniforms, you know? You could-"
"I'm not in the order," said Zuko. He stood patiently still as Jet moved on to the other arm. He could hear the crowd outside their tent, already much louder than it had been when they'd started gearing up. "I'm a Freedom Fighter. So I'll dress like one."
"I guess you are, at that," said Jet. Finished, he thumped Zuko's leather-clad shoulder and flashed a wide, white grin. "Look at you. Big damn hero."
Zuko felt his cheeks flush, and moved to check the fastenings of his scabbard to cover for it. "You're going to tell them about the eclipse, right?"
Jet sighed. "Yeah. Hate that we had to hide it from them to begin with, but…couldn't be helped I guess."
Zuko rested his hand on the hilts of his swords, hung just below his hip. "They'll understand," he said. "They trust you."
"Maybe some of them do." Jet went to the door and parted the canvas flaps, just enough to see through. A thin line of sunlight hit his face, one eye and one cheek illuminated and the rest cast into deeper shadow. "That's a lot of colonists."
"Only a dozen. Maybe fifteen."
Jet frowned. "Still."
"Uncle told them to listen to you, so they will."
"Yeah." The flap closed, and Jet ran a hand back through his hair. "Zuko…I think you should maybe say a little something when I'm done."
"Why?"
"I get that the colonies are different, but…" His hand fell to his side, the thumb hooking into one hilt. "They're Fire Nation, you know?"
Zuko looked down at his Earth Kingdom armor, all green and brown leather and brass fastenings; at the worn hilts of his swords, forged somewhere on the plains. And at his own hands, pale and long-fingered, the hot flow of his chi pooling in them even as he thought about it. "Yeah, I know," he said quietly.
"Hey." Jet reached out to lift Zuko's chin, ducking to meet his lowered eyes. "Nothing you can't do, right? It's gonna be fine."
In this light, Jet's irises were very dark - flecks of brown in deep umber. His skin had paled a little that summer, with so much of their lives taking place at night, but when Zuko lay his hand on Jet's cheek the contrast was still there. He was glad for that; he liked that Jet was different, in some ways if not the important ones. Zuko had grown up in a world of yellow eyes and skin that never saw the sun, all pomp and artifice and cold detachment. He didn't see much use in that world anymore. He had never really belonged there, besides.
They were alone in the tent, so Zuko closed the small distance between them. Their armor creaked as he pressed their chests together, his arms around Jet's neck. Their clothes and hair still smelled like burning wood, but Jet's mouth tasted of jasmine, and Zuko savored it as long as circumstance would allow - slow, lingering kisses that left him a little hot and breathless.
Jet kissed the corner of his eye; the end of his nose. "C'mon," he said.
Jet bent down as they walked out of the tent, found a suitable stalk of grass and tucked it into the corner of his mouth. Everyone else had gathered at the center of the camp, around the remains of the cooking fire, the space barely large enough to hold them all. Near the edge of the crowd, Zuko opened his mouth to ask to be let through, but even as he formed the words a man in a blue and white uniform noticed them coming. He stood aside, and the movement sent a ripple through the others. By some silent consensus, a path to the center opened.
Jet didn't break his stride, outwardly at ease as he walked down the corridor of men. But Zuko felt very strange. Hundreds of eyes followed them as they passed, a low murmur rising and falling just outside what Zuko could properly hear. He had always tried to avoid special treatment. He wasn't a prince anymore, not in any way that counted; certainly not here, in the city his sister had ruined. He hadn't done anything to deserve this kind of respect. He wished he hadn't agreed to speak.
There was no staircase here; no kitchen table to stand on. The gap in the crowd held only a smoldering fire and a barrel half-full of rainwater, high enough to reach Zuko's chest. Jet surveyed it for a moment, as if gauging its integrity. Then he hopped up on top of it in one smooth, graceful movement, boots planted on either side of the rim.
"We have a big day ahead of us," he said, his voice clear and carrying. "Bigger than some of you know. You're my men, my soldiers and my friends, but I've had to hide something from you. A secret that might make all the difference today. I don't know how, but we kept it - from General Zha, from the Dai Li, from everyone. And now I can finally tell you."
Zuko tried to listen as Jet explained about the eclipse - how it would impact their own plans and how, across the ocean, it might decide the fate of the Fire Lord himself. But his own thoughts were too loud and insistent to allow for anything else. Jet wanted him to speak, but though his mind raced through half-formed niceties it all amounted to nothing. During his exile, he'd spent much of his time in the colonies, the only harbors that weren't closed to him by war or politics. But he'd kept the same distance from them as he did from everyone, and they'd regarded him with a mix of pity and detached curiosity. Why would these people care what he had to say?
He scanned what he could see of the crowd, but he couldn't even tell where the colonists were. In the sea of scavenged armor and patched clothes, the White Lotus men stood out easily. But the starched uniformity of their blue and white robes blurred the differences that had seemed so clear last night. He looked for a cluster of the familiar Fire Nation topknots, but couldn't find more than one or two at a time. Where was he supposed to look when he spoke? If he had to make a fool of himself, why couldn't he have done it quietly - taken the handful of colonists aside and sympathized with the pain of what they had to do?
There was a sudden burst of cheers, and Zuko jumped a little as he refocused on Jet and what he was saying. Jet's leg was close to his shoulder, and he reached for it as he listened, his fingers tracing the ridges of cloth bindings. The touch calmed him, and Jet's voice coalesced into words again. "I can't promise you that we'll win," he was saying, low and serious. "I can't promise you that all of us will be here tonight. But whatever happens today, remember that we did something. We fought back. We didn't lie down in the dirt and wait to be forgotten." Jet paused, then, and Zuko could feel the wave of tension that passed through his body, the muscles in his leg contracting. "I can't promise you," he went on, quiet enough that the crowd seemed to hold its breath to hear him. "But you know…I think we will win. Because we have to. Because this city needs us. Because the Avatar's counting on us. And I don't know about you…" Zuko could hear the grin creep back into Jet's voice; could almost see the high arch of his eyebrows, raised in good humor. "…But I'd hate to disappoint him."
The crowd erupted with approval, swords raised and helmets waved in the air. The older men looked a little startled at the sudden chaos, but they were smiling, and some of the loudest shouts and whistles came from soldiers in White Lotus robes. Jet hopped down from the barrel, light as a cat, and clapped Zuko on the back. "You ready?" he asked, leaning in close to be heard over the noise.
Zuko looked at the crowd and tried to swallow the hard lump of panic in his throat. "Shouldn't you…introduce me or something?"
Jet reached up to brush Zuko's hair out of his face, tucking it behind the scarred ear. "They know who you are," he said softly.
Zuko had no trouble getting up on top of the barrel, but he felt ridiculous once he was there. From this height he could see the entire assembly, dozens of soldiers in robes and armor. There were little pockets of sameness, friends clustered together and whispering behind their hands, but mostly the groups had bled into each other. The faces Zuko knew best were scattered all over - Xue Sheng and Piandao mingling with last night's musicians; Jin and Uncle speaking with the cook who'd made them all breakfast; Xiao Si Wang standing shyly beside a group of robed women, Roo seated on her shoulders. The runners had climbed up on top of the largest tent to get a better view, and one of the younger Waterbenders sat among them, listening patiently to something Dao was saying.
Zuko stood on the barrel feeling stupid and awkward. He tried to think of something - anything - to say, before the window of opportunity closed and the crowd's attention wandered. But as the silence stretched on, the men quieted and turned to watch him, their faces expectant. Zuko looked back at them, sick with nervousness and dizzy from the racing of his heart, his mind wiped clean of everything but the desire to get back down again.
A hand pressed against his ankle, just enough pressure to be felt through his high leather boot. Like an anchor, holding him steady in the current.
"I…" The word cracked, and he felt his cheeks burn as he licked his lips and tried again. "I'm not sure what Jet wants me to say to you. I think he asked me to speak because…well, some of you are Fire Nation. Firebenders, like me. And I think I'm supposed to talk about how I understand what you're going through. What it's like to fight your own people. I'm supposed to tell you that it's worth it. That it's the right thing to do, even if it's hard. And…" His eyes moved over the crowd, rapt faces all turned toward him. He swallowed, and when he went on his voice had steadied a little. "It is. It's all of those things.
"I almost left, once. I didn't think it mattered if I stayed or not. And you know…it's easier to be selfish, really. It's easier to think you aren't important. That someone else will fix things if you don't. But I was wrong to think that. We're all important. We can all do something, even if it takes a while to…to figure out what that thing should be. Where we're needed." He felt Jet squeeze his ankle. He wished that he could see Jet's face.
"None of us have to be here," he said, quiet and serious. "No one's making any of you stay. You're here because there's something awful happening in this city. Something that should never have happened at all. It's wrong, what my sister did. What my father did. My grandfather. My great-grandfather." He thought of the university - of the walls, the streets, the place where they had lived. He thought of ruined villages and razed temples, orphans and widows. His throat tightened but he went on, pushed down his grief and forged it into words. "It's wrong, and we're here because we can't stand it anymore. Because our hearts are telling us we have to stop it.
"Jet wanted me to stand up here and talk to my people. He meant the colonists, but…" Zuko held his arms apart, chest tight and voice hoarse. "All of you are my people. Everyone who made the choice to stay and do what's right. Everyone who wants for things to change. We're all Freedom Fighters today. We'll free Ba Sing Se from General Zha. The Avatar will free the world from my father. It's…" He looked down, then; met the brown eyes that watched him and smiled. "It's like Jet said. We'll win because we have to."
A wall of sound rose from all around him, the roar of shouts and whistles and cheers so loud that he could feel it in his bones. But his eyes stayed on Jet. He jumped down from the barrel, and Jet's arms were around him before he'd even straightened. The others closed in, hands thumping him on the back and ruffling his hair, voices calling out promises of victory, but Zuko barely noticed. He cupped Jet's head in his hand. He felt the stalk of grass tickle his ear. He said, "I want to stay," and Jet hugged him so hard his ribs ached.
"How much longer?" Jet whispered, his expression difficult to read behind the special glasses Xue Sheng had made for them - wooden, with narrow slits to see through.
Zuko glanced up, though the sun was still too bright to look at for very long. What had begun as a sliver of darkness had widened to cover a third of its pale, yellow disc. He could feel the shift beginning; the fire in his belly calming by a fraction, just enough to notice once he knew to look for it. "A while," he murmured. "Maybe a half-hour. Probably less."
The disused watchtower where they crouched was strategically minor and meant for only one guard. In the heat of mid-afternoon, the little room was stifling with six bodies crammed inside of it. Zuko wiped at the sweat on his brow and shifted to try and give Xiao Si Wang more room. "What about the guards?" he asked. He was squatting too far from the window to see anything but sky.
Longshot craned his neck, thick brows creased over his glasses. "The same," he said quietly, and Zuko felt a little thrill of hope. They were a hundred or so yards from the palace complex, and pairs of unarmed Fire Nation soldiers were stationed every fifty yards or so along the high, smooth wall. With Ping's help, he and Jet and Wang and Smellerbee and Longshot could easily get past the wall, and unarmed guards meant no spears or arrows would come at them while they were exposed.
The palace was in keeping with the rest of Ba Sing Se - walls within walls and massive in scale. It had been built to repel invading armies, the path from the main gate to the palace itself a wide, flat courtyard with little cover aside from a few dozen flags and stone columns. The Freedom Fighters had realized, early on, that a direct assault would be suicide - they'd never make it across all that open space. They weren't an army. They would forge their own path.
A few months ago, it would have been possible to move through government buildings and bureaucrats' residences undetected, staying hidden all the way to the outer wall of the complex. But Azula had ordered a perimeter three hundred yards wide to be razed, broken only by watchtowers like the one they now hid inside.
Zuko lay his hands on the dusty floor and leaned forward, taking some of the weight off the balls of his feet. They'd timed their arrival with the changing of the guard, and that had been over an hour ago. His knees ached and his muscles were starting to cramp. Xiao Si Wang was tucked into a little ball beside him, head tilted up toward the sun. Smellerbee and Longshot, closest to the window, moved only to check on the guards below. Ping and Jet were bent over a map they'd drawn in the grime, whispering as they pointed.
"I still think we should avoid the moat," Ping murmured. "Too easy to get trapped down there."
"Yeah, but Sheng thinks they've barricaded the servants' entrance," said Jet. "See? Over here. So we might have to go in the front, unless we want to just blast a hole in this wall-"
Ping shook his head. "Too thick. And there's iron in the concrete."
"The moat would keep us out of sight, let us get pretty close."
"There may be archers. We'd be an easy target."
Zuko closed his eyes and took slow, even breaths. The fire inside him had dimmed even further; smoldering coals instead of the warm, steady flame he was used to. He had known to expect this, but it was strange to actually feel it happening. Like the night the Moon Spirit had died, only colder; emptier. He wondered if the guards had noticed it, too; if they would understand what was happening. He wondered if they were afraid.
Zuko watched the sun and thought of that morning, most of it a jumble of last-minute planning and the scramble to ready so many men for battle. There hadn't been much time for well-wishes before they left the camp, but Uncle had pulled Zuko aside, held his shoulders and looked up into his eyes.
"Are you certain you don't need me to go with you?" Uncle had asked.
"We've been doing this for months," Zuko had said, kind but firm. "Extra people would just throw us off. We'll be fine."
Uncle had sighed. "You're right, of course. And I know it is better this way. For you to do this on your own." He'd blinked, and a few tears had escaped down his wrinkled cheek. "But I cannot help but worry that-"
"Uncle…" Zuko had given up on decorum, then, and pulled the old man into a hug. "I've been through worse than this."
"This city has already taken one son from me," Uncle had rasped, his face against Zuko's chest.
Zuko hadn't known what to say. He had patted Uncle's shoulders and thought back through the years of his life, to when he had been a boy in the palace, unmarked and unburdened. He remembered strong, warm hands on his back; the smell of tea leaves and old cloth; a comforting girth too wide to wrap his arms around. He remembered how it had been once his mother had gone; how the days when Uncle was away stretched out into lonely eternity. And he remembered the first night on his ship, how he had lain awake on his hard, metal bed and listened to the engines; how the door had creaked open and the end of his mattress had sunk under another man's weight; how Uncle had sat with him, still and silent, until he had finally drifted off to sleep.
"I'll be careful," he'd said. But Uncle had looked drawn and worried as Ping sped their team away from the camp. And now, crouched in this too-small watchtower with his comrades beside him, he understood a little of how Uncle must have felt. He knew how foolish he'd often been, gambling his life unthinkingly and rushing forward without a care for the consequences.
Today he knew exactly what he was doing, and exactly what was yet to come. He had the time to think how easy it would be to lose these people, how a stray arrow or a lucky spear could take any of them from him, and how helpless he might be to stop it. He felt his chi draining away, the strength leaving his hands as the sun disappeared, and was afraid.
The sun had shrunk to a crescent, now, the cloudless sky darkening to the deeper blue of evening. Zuko held out a hand, palm up, and concentrated. A flicker appeared a few inches from his skin, barely more than smoke.
"It's time," he said quietly.
Jet looked up from the map on the floor. "The sun's not gone yet," he said.
"We're all worried eight minutes won't be enough time," said Zuko. "The guards' Firebending is weak enough now for us to get past them. By the time we reach the palace they won't be able to bend at all."
"You're certain?" Ping asked.
Zuko closed his hand into a fist. "Yes."
Ping stood and walked between them to the window, his eyes on the guards and the wall behind them. "Ready?"
"Yes," they all said in quiet unison - except for Longshot, who only frowned and nodded.
They watched as Ping set one foot on the window ledge, arms braced on either side of the frame as he judged the distance to the ground. Then he pushed off, hard, and landed midway between the guardhouse and the wall, the ground sinking beneath him and then rebounding, driving him forward on a wave of rock toward the closest pair of guards. Zuko leapt down after him, rolled through the impact and was on his feet again in time to see Ping send the second guard flying. Jet was beside him, swords in hand, and he could hear the others running behind. He could also hear the shouts of the guards as they abandoned their posts and came charging toward the fight. They carried spears that Zuko somehow hadn't seen before.
But Zuko barely had the chance to be surprised before more immediate concerns pushed it aside. Ping swung his arms forward, fingers splayed, then jerked them backwards as his hands snapped into fists. Two great blocks of stone tore free of the wall, rumbling toward Ping and then pushed to either side, his palms flat and perpendicular to the ground. The guards were swept off their feet, and before they could recover Ping ripped a slab of marble from the top of the hole he'd made, large enough for six people to stand on. He leapt up onto it as soon as it landed, Zuko and Jet and the others close behind. Xiao Si Wang was in the rear, slicing through the shafts of spears thrown after them, and once both her feet were on the sledge Ping rocketed them forward, through the gap in the wall and into the compound beyond.
"What the hell was that?" Jet asked as they sped past the servant's quarters, empty and abandoned. He had to shout to be heard over the grinding of stone.
"They hid their weapons in the dirt," said Bee.
"Shit! Did they-"
"Archers," said Wang, her swords held ready and her feet planted wide. The buildings here were only one story, and as Zuko looked up he saw the outlines of men against the darkening sky. He couldn't hear the twang of bowstrings over all the noise, but he saw an arm drawn back, and his blades flashed in what remained of the sunlight as he knocked the first arrow out of the air. Beside him, Longshot pulled one from his quiver; notched, drew and shot it in one continuous motion. It found its mark, and a man clutched his shoulder and fell out of sight as Longshot reached for the next.
The barrage came thick and fast, its deflection made harder by the movement of the sledge and how close together they stood. Zuko tried to keep his elbows tucked in and his cuts short and precise, just enough to turn the arrows away from himself and from Ping. Even so, his elbow caught Wang in the ribs and one blade nearly tangled with Jet's, the hilt grazing the back of Ping's neck.
An arrow slipped between Zuko's swords and struck the leather armor on his shoulder. The angle was lucky and the tip cut a shallow path through his skin, but the shaft stuck straight out, in the way and jostling painfully as he knocked the next volley aside.
"Corner!" Ping shouted, and Zuko braced himself as the sledge careened around the royal stables, weaving between troughs and paddocks. Ahead, the wall to the inner courtyard loomed, a line of soldiers with pikes standing ready before it.
Zuko took both swords in one hand and tore the arrow from his shoulder as he turned another away from Ping's back. Then they were at the wall, and the sledge shook more violently as it rumbled forward, Ping's attention divided between the stone ahead and the stone below. Ping jerked his hands upward and a section of wall flew into the air, the muscles on his forearms standing out as he guided it in a high arc over their heads. He released it once it was clear, his focus shifting forward again, and the sudden jerk of acceleration nearly threw Wang off her feet. Zuko caught her arm, held it until she'd found her stance again, and only then looked to see what lay ahead.
He couldn't be certain how many men stood between them and the palace. This close to the ground, they looked like a wall of spears and red armor. There had to be hundreds of them. A thousand. They stood between the high, narrow columns, their formation as wide as the palace steps. There were archers atop the columns themselves, on the edge of the palace roof, at the head of the stairs.
"Hold on," Ping rumbled. Zuko flung one arm around Jet's shoulders, crouched down and hooked the other through Ping's leg, Smellerbee and Longshot doing the same on the other side of the sledge. Only Wang remained standing, her ankle tucked into the crook of Zuko's knee to keep herself steady as she cut spears and arrows from the air.
Zuko felt Ping tense and caught a glimpse of his hands reaching down toward the paving stones as they flew by. Then the sledge bucked beneath them as Ping dragged a crude hood of stone over their heads, angled so that their platform became a wedge. A moment later, Zuko felt another jar of impact, and saw the first line of soldiers left in upended heaps behind them.
The path they cut was narrow and their rear was still exposed. Wang's twin swords were a blur, the arrows thick and fast and uninterrupted. Jet and Zuko braced themselves against the new stone behind them, catching what she missed, but the sledge was even more cramped than before, and with the sky as dark as twilight, now, their targets were harder and harder to follow.
Zuko couldn't see the sun anymore, but he could feel it disappear, his insides turned to ice and his chi completely still. "It's started," he said, and in his mind the candle clock was lit, eight minutes notched into its side.
Their sledge pushed through the ocean of soldiers like a ship through the frozen sea, shattering their formation, but even those who fell were soon back on their feet again and ran with their spears in Ping's wake. Longshot stood beside Wang, Smellerbee's arms wrapped around his legs to hold him steady, and picked off the men who came too close. For every spear Wang blocked, a handful of arrows slipped through her blades, more than Jet and Zuko could manage even if they weren't careening across a dim courtyard. Flecks of stone hit Zuko's cheek from the impacts of near-misses, and the sledge trembled as a shaft dug into Ping's calf
"Can't do this in the palace," Ping grunted. "Be on foot."
Jet pulled the arrow out, and Zuko knocked another away from Ping's head in the moment of distraction. "We'll never get through," said Zuko. "Too many of them, we can't-"
"The roof," said Jet as they shot across the narrow moat, the rumble quieting for the instant they were in the air.
"Stairs first," said Ping, and they all braced themselves as the sledge tilted, a wave of stone pushing them up the wide, steep incline. Zuko glimpsed the army behind them in the gaps between his friends, a churning sea of men that bristled with iron points as it surged after them.
"That's gotta be most of the non-bending Fire Nation in the city," said Smellerbee, her surprise obvious even with her voice raised.
"Going up," Ping barked, and they all crouched, ready to spring. He stomped one foot, the impact driving a column of stone up out of the ground, hurling them past the massive columns and the elaborate portico.
Zuko leapt off the sledge at its zenith, the wind whistling past his ears, and hit the roof feet-first with a sharp crack of breaking tiles. Jet landed just beside him, hooks catching hold of the ridge ahead, and Wang grabbed his shirt as she scrambled for balance on the slope. Up ahead, Ping ran along the terra cotta as if there were no incline at all, his bare feet sure and solid. He swept his arms in a wide arc, ripping a path through the tiles, then swung the cloud of clay shards above his head before dragging it across the line of archers on the ridge. They shouted in alarm and slid away down the side of the roof, but Zuko didn't wait to see if they went over the edge. He was already past where they'd stood, jumping over the eves to the next tier, knowing that in the first instant of exposure he could find himself with a chest full of arrows. But the next volley was badly timed, and he knocked it easily aside as he skirted around the gable to the next long stretch before the main bulk of the palace.
The closest archers threw their bows away to draw short swords and rushed in to block the way forward. Zuko saw Jet's hooks flash in his peripheral vision, glanced over and saw those swords pulled out of the soldiers' hands and thrown to the ground far below, the men shouldered aside once they'd been disarmed. Zuko caught a thrust between his own blades, pushed it down and away and kicked his attacker in the chest, the man's arms pinwheeling as he tried to find his feet again.
On the next tier, still a hundred yards away, another line of bowmen took aim. Longshot felled them one at a time, notching and firing as he ran, but there were too many, and their arrows came thicker and faster as the gap between them and the Freedom Fighters closed. Zuko heard an angry shout of pain behind him, and when he glanced back over his shoulder in a lull between volleys, he saw that Smellerbee had a fresh gash along one cheek.
Just ahead, Ping spread his arms to either side, palms cupped. Soon the air was full of dust and the sound of breaking ceramic as parallel swaths of tile were torn loose, swirled into red-brown snakes that trailed behind his hands. Then Ping brought his arms sharply forward, the streams of tile lashing around, whip-like, to knock the archers' feet from under them, reminding Zuko more of Waterbenders than any Dai Li he'd ever seen.
The multi-tiered heart of the palace loomed ahead of them, and soon all Zuko could see was the green plaster of the outer walls and the undersides of overhanging eves. He tried to remember Xue Sheng's careful maps, the route he'd painstakingly memorized, but up here he'd lost all sense of where they were or even how much farther they had to go. He followed Ping blindly, along the perimeter of the central tower and past the sheltered gardens of the Earth King, a maze of gabled rooftops stretching out ahead of them.
Jet ran with swords held out to keep his balance, as close to Zuko as their reach would allow. "You okay?" he asked between breaths raw from exertion.
"I'll be fine," Zuko panted. He could feel the cold settling deeper into his chest, but now he took some comfort in it. They had enough time, he was certain. There was only so much farther it could be. "It's just…weird."
Jet veered toward him for a moment, slapping him on the shoulders with one fist clenched around a hilt. "Don't worry," he said. "Just like old times, right? Nothing you can't do." He grinned, warm and easy despite the chaos before and behind them, and Zuko felt the chill retreat a little.
"There," Ping shouted, and though he didn't point there was no doubt what he meant. Ahead, a circular ridge jutted up from the rooftop, at least twenty yards wide and made of iron. As they ran closer, Zuko could see it was an enormous window, strips of lead holding thousands of discs of green glass in place. He had never seen anything like it before, and he understood why Ping hesitated beside it for a long moment, as if reluctant to disturb something so beautiful.
Then Ping clenched his jaw and his arms swung around, cords of muscle taut in his neck as he bent a river of tiles up into the air, arcing high above their heads before slamming down on the center of the window. The leaded glass gave way, the torrent of shards pouring through it and hitting the floor far below them with a crash that Zuko could feel through his feet. Then came the startled shouts of soldiers, and Ping said, "Head for the back of the room," before jumping through the hole he'd torn. Zuko could see the curved bulk of the Earth King's throne, the dais and the polished marble floor on which rows of armored men stood, their formation disturbed by the scramble to avoid the flood of clay and glass Ping had rained down on them. Ping's landing sent a ripple of raised stone across the floor, sweeping the soldiers off their feet and out of Zuko's sight.
It was as much of a opening as they were going to get, but even the throne was much too far of a jump without bending, and Zuko's hands shook a little from pent-up momentum as he waited for Ping to raise a platform for them. Jet leaned in past the twisted remains of the window, lips pursed as he took in the details of the room and Ping's efforts to clear it. Then he spotted the gauzy hangings draped between the rim of the skylight and the columns beside the throne, and a grin spread across his face.
"Bee, Wang - you go first," he said, gesturing with his sword as he stood aside for them. "The rest of us might be too heavy."
The girls reached down, took handfuls of fabric and started to lower themselves toward the floor, one arms-length at a time as if the hangings were a ladder. Longshot watched their progress for a few seconds, frowning slightly beneath his eclipse glasses, then hooked his bow over his shoulders and reached for the second hanging. It held, though Zuko could see small tears around the bolts that anchored it. There was a third section of drapery, but he and Jet would have to go one at a time.
"Go on," said Jet.
"I'll follow you," said Zuko.
Jet blew out an impatient breath. "We don't have time for-"
"I'm not leaving you behind me," said Zuko, quiet but severe. He must have sounded as unshakable as he felt, because Jet didn't protest again. He nodded as he hooked his swords onto his belt, and Zuko watched him lower himself past the sharp wreckage of lead and glass and onto the green hangings below. His movements were effortless, reminding Zuko of how the other boy had grown up, coming of age in the branches of trees. They were five or six stories up, at least, but Jet seemed to barely notice.
Zuko noticed, but there wasn't time for him to worry about it now. Longshot was the first to get clear of his hanging, and as Zuko started down it he could feel the small changes in tension as it tore under his weight, each rip bringing him a little closer to having his bones shattered by the floor. Sounds of battle rose from beneath him, Earthbending and the clash of swords, but he kept his eyes on the column up ahead. Then his hand finally touched the cool marble, wide enough to be awkward to hold onto but not so much that he couldn't manage, and in the few seconds it took to slide down to the ground he took in the scene around him.
Ping was in front of the throne, a half-circle of granite carved to resemble a badgermole. The chamber's massive bronze doors had been thrown open, and in addition to the men already inside a hundred more soldiers, at least, were trying to push their way in from the hall, spear-tips glittering in the eerie green lantern light. Ping raised walls out of the floor and sent them rumbling toward the doorway, men falling before it and swept back the way they came. But there were soldiers too far inside the room to be dealt with in this way, closing in from the sides, and though Ping's arms flashed through bending forms, throwing jagged waves of stone in all directions, Zuko could tell he wouldn't be able to hold his position for long.
Zuko jumped the last ten feet, tore the now-useless eclipse glasses from his face and launched himself into a sprint. He could see Jet and the others up ahead of him, the back of the room all but lost in shadow. He heard Ping break off his defense behind them, and a moment later the Earthbender sped past him on a rolling crest of floor, crouched low as velocity whipped his robes around his legs and arms.
The dark outline of a much-smaller doorway came into focus. Ping stopped a few yards short of it, whirled around and dragged high barriers of stone up toward the ceiling, forming a crescent that butted up against the rear wall. He left a gap a few feet wide, just enough for the rest of them to dart through. Zuko could hear the soldiers running behind him, gaining ground on his own exhausted stride. He grit his teeth and forced one last burst of speed, dove through the gap and heard Ping close it behind him, plunging their makeshift enclosure into even deeper darkness.
Zuko reached down into his tunic and pulled out the glowing green crystal that hung around his neck. The others did the same, standing around the door so that Ping had enough light to see by as he examined it. They were breathing hard, and the shadows moved with the rise and fall of their chests.
Ping had told them of a metal bunker in the rear of the throne room, meant to protect the Earth King in case of an assault on the palace. They'd all assumed that Zha would lock himself inside the moment he realized his Firebending was gone. But Ping had never seen the interior of the chamber, nor come particularly close to it - he had only entered the throne room two or three times in his entire life. Now he ran his hands along the iron door, over rivets that formed patterns of squares within circles, and frowned. "Locked from the inside," he said. He banged it with his knuckles, listening carefully to the sound. "At least six inches thick. Mostly solid."
"Can you get through?" asked Jet.
"Eventually."
Another bang came from behind them, and Ping looked up sharply from the door. "They've found something to ram the wall with," he said. He brought one foot down hard on the floor, drove the heels of his palms out and up to raise another barricade behind the first. Then he turned back to the door and pushed his arms out to either side, parting the wall to reveal the solid iron beneath. "We'll have to break it down," he said. This close, Zuko could see how exhausted he was, face dripping with sweat and hands shaking as they wiped it away. But their work was far from over, and Ping barely allowed himself a moment to catch his breath before he sunk into another stance.
Two stomps in quick succession flipped a section of marble flooring out of the way and lifted a chunk of the granite beneath to shoulder height. Then Ping dug his heels down into the floor, grit his teeth as he compressed the stone to even greater density between his hands, then flung it against the gap between door and wall. The stone cracked in half on impact, but Ping reformed it as he pulled back for another strike. He did this over and over again, the noise ringing in Zuko's ears. All of their eyes were fixed on the spot that Ping had chosen, now covered in dusty marks. The stone shattered and coalesced, broken then whole, but the iron distorted with agonizing slowness. It had been built to keep out Earth and Fire armies alike.
Their little half-circle of space was hot and deafening, stone against iron inside and the Fire Nation's battering ram beyond the makeshift wall. Zuko looked between the faces of his friends, eerie green and lit from underneath. Longshot and Smellerbee were grim and serious, watching the wall as the first, small cracks appeared. Xiao Si Wang was very pale, hands gripping the hilts of her swords, and though she kept her face blank Zuko could see the anxious fear in her eyes and in the pulse that fluttered on her throat.
He felt Jet's hand on his back; looked up into a face pinched with worry, the high arches of his brows drawn together. "How much longer?" Jet asked, quiet in the pause between bangs.
Zuko closed his eyes and tried to make sense of what his body was telling him, sifting through the tangle of distractions. His heart pounded from worry and exercise, and so much of him felt like it was on fire: his lungs, the aching muscles of his limbs, the gash in his shoulder. But underneath all of it, behind his navel, was the flickering birth of a different sort of warmth. The candle had burned to its last notch.
"Soon," he said. He opened his eyes and looked up into Jet's. "We're not going to make it."
:: Next Chapter ::
The illustrations for this chapter, and the artists who drew them, are as such:
By burntcitrine:
Jet began to disentangle himself from Zuko's limbs, made more difficult by his own reluctance and Zuko's groggy efforts to hold on.
By Holly Mongi:
Jet kissed the corner of his eye; the end of his nose. "C'mon," he said.
Word count: 9,300
Pairing: Jet/Zuko
Rating: A very hard R for language, violence and sexual content
Summary: Since the day the walls of Ba Sing Se fell, the Freedom Fighters have struggled to protect what remains of the city and its people. Jet and his second command, a mysterious boy named Li, have spent the summer piecing together an army, hoping for a chance to take the city back for good. But Li is also Zuko, and the time for that secret is quickly running out. Soon, he'll have to decide exactly who he is, what cause he's going to fight for and where his heart lies.
This chapter: Eight minutes.
Notes: In addition to the ongoing efforts of kittyjimjams and jlh to keep this story in shape and my brain from exploding, this chapter I also have hoshizora to thank for his services as "does this fight scene make any sense?" beta and froglartbge for being my messenger hawk consultant. The lovely Holly Mongi and burntcitrine are responsible for this chapter's illustrations, which are linked to in the text as well as at the end!
I will try my best to have Chapter 11 up by this time next week. But if it comes between posting it quickly or writing it properly, I'm afraid I'd rather go with the latter. Fingers crossed, etc! Thanks to those of you who have been reading for being SO PATIENT and so kind, I really appreciate it! <3
:: Previous Chapter ::
"Jet?"
He cracked one eye open, the other squashed against Zuko's shoulder. He could see the pale glow of early morning under the canvas flap that served as a door.
"Jet, you awake?" The flap was pushed aside a little, and Roo peered through the gap. There was another shape behind her that might have been Dao, but Jet's vision was still blurry with sleep.
"Yeah," Jet grumbled. He sat up a little and rubbed his eyes with the heel of one hand. "What?"
"Someone's here to talk to you," she said. She sounded both nervous and excited, and that was enough to wake him up the rest of the way.
"Tell 'em I'll be right there," he said, and the flap fell back into place as she scurried off to do so. Jet groaned and stretched his arms above his head, the bones of his spine realigning themselves with a series of loud cracks. Zuko's arm was draped across Jet's stomach, and once Jet sat up he'd sort of curled himself into a ball around the lower half of Jet's body, his head tucked somewhere near Jet's tailbone and one knee drawn up over Jet's legs. Jet poked him in the ribs and was rewarded with a muffled groan.
They'd all stayed up until the small hours with Zuko's uncle and Piandao, honing their plans and shifting men between units. Iroh had made them all tea, strong and fragrant, to keep their minds sharp. But they'd had one day of fighting behind them and another still to come, and eventually their exhaustion had won out.
The inside of the tent was dim, but Jet could see the outlines of other bodies. Longshot and Smellerbee were only a few feet away, making one big lump together. Ping lay with his face to the wall, the blanket pulled up over his head and his feet sticking out past the bottom. Jin's cot was already empty, and Xue Sheng's didn't seem to have been slept in at all.
Jet began to disentangle himself from Zuko's limbs, made more difficult by his own reluctance and Zuko's groggy efforts to hold on. "C'mon, Ping, you too," said Jet as he pried Zuko's fingers from his shirt. "Whatever it is, you should probably hear it."
Ping grunted and pushed himself up, the blanket falling away. His hair was a mess, flatted on one side by his pillow and sticking straight out on the other. He grunted a vague affirmative as he scratched his chin, rough with wiry black stubble.
Jet extended a leg and nudged what was probably Longshot's back with his foot. "You guys should start getting the men organized. Or you know. Awake."
"Ugh," Smellerbee groaned. "You saw how much those kids drank last night."
"Bring Iroh's sungi horn." Jet poked Zuko again, right in the armpit this time, and he gave a satisfying squawk as he pushed Jet's hands away. "Seriously, Zuko, they're waiting on us."
"They're waiting on you," Zuko grumbled. But he sat up and combed a hand back through his unruly mop of hair, watching blearily as Ping groped around for his shirt.
Within a minute or so, the three of them were mostly dressed and sufficiently presentable. Su Dao had waited for them in front of the tent, looking much less rattled than he had the day before, and as they followed him across the camp Jet tugged the bindings on his forearms into place. "Remember, you're not hung over," he said. "You're grizzled warriors eager to see some action."
"Sure," Zuko mumbled, the end of it dissolving into a yawn. Ping seemed to be concentrating on the mechanics of walking in a straight line.
The messenger was young and scrawny, dressed in nondescript brown robes that looked too big for him. Roo was perched beside him on an upturned bucket, smiling as she chattered. "I'm probably the fastest," she was saying. She held a stick in one hand and was drawing patterns in the dirt, squares inside circles. "That's why Jet called me Rabbaroo, 'cause I'm so quick. And 'cause I can make this face," she added, scrunching up her nose and curling her lip.
"I see," said the messenger, bemused, as he watched her sniff at the air.
"Hey, Roo, we've got it from here," said Jet. His voice was kind, but Roo had been around the longest of all the runners and she knew when she was being dismissed. She hopped down from the bucket, took Dao's hand and dragged him back toward the cooking fire.
Jet turned his gaze toward the messenger, all business now that the runners were gone, and the younger man stood a little straighter. "I have a message from Commander Quan," he said.
The words hit Jet like cold water, startling him out of what remained of the morning's haze. "All right," he said, slow and careful despite how hard his heart was beating. "Let me hear it."
"There will be no Dai Li agents at the palace," said the messenger, "by order of General Zha."
"What about the rest of the city?"
The boy shifted his weight. "I don't have a message for you about that," he said. "There will be no Dai Li at the palace. That's the message I was given for you. That's all I can say."
Jet wanted to grab his shoulders and shake him, demand to know what the hell was going on, if they'd be drowning in Dai Li agents or if Quan had changed his mind. But Jet knew this kid couldn't help him, whether he wanted to or not. Probably no one had told him the whole truth of it - the Dai Li knew better than most how dangerous information could be.
"Tell Quan my offer stands," said Jet, his words clipped. "If you help us, we'll have your back, whatever happens later. If you don't, you're on your own. We'll let this city tear you traitors apart."
Jet would've left it at that - let the kid go and assumed Quan couldn't be counted on. But Ping stepped forward, tall enough that he threw the young Dai Li into shadow. "I have a message for Quan as well," he rumbled. He looked a little frightening, hair mussed and face unshaven, his gaze furious. "He was there in the crystal catacombs, just as I was. He saw Princess Azula kill the Avatar in cold blood. Ask him if that woman is who he wants to serve. Ask him if helping her destroy this city is how he wants to be remembered."
Wide-eyed and very pale, the messenger gave a single, stiff nod. Then he turned and shot up the hillside on a wave of bent earth, pebbles clicking down the slope as he dropped out of sight over the ridge.
"I didn't know you saw that," said Jet. "You never mentioned it."
"I don't enjoy remembering that day," said Ping. "But we can't afford to forget what we did. What we allowed to happen." He frowned and shook his head. "Never again."
Zuko was still looking at the place where the messenger had stood, his gaze distant. "No Dai Li at the palace," he murmured. "On Zha's orders."
"What d'you think it means?" asked Jet.
"That he doesn't trust Quan," said Zuko. "That he knows something's up, and he's scared. On the defensive. Probably all the strongest Firebenders in the city will be there." He snorted in disgust. "Men like Zha only care about their own skin."
"So he doesn't know about the eclipse," said Jet. "Right? Or he'd have to use the Dai Li. He might not trust them, but he isn't stupid."
"Hard to say for sure but…" Zuko looked up at Jet, a smile pulling at his mouth. "No. I don't think he knows."
"Shit," said Jet, shaking his head. "Shit I just…really? We actually managed to…"
"Yeah," said Zuko.
"The palace is the essential target," said Ping. "If we control Zha, we control the city."
"Shit," said Jet. Then he laughed, a little giddy with disbelief, and swept Zuko into a hug, clapping him on the back. Ping watched them, amused, until Jet reached out and pulled him in, his arms around both mens' shoulders. "We can do this," he said. "We're gonna do this."
"We can," Ping agreed.
Zuko leaned closer to Jet, bumping their foreheads together. "We will."
Jet found Xue Sheng in one of the smaller tents, bent over a complicated diagram with a brush in his hand and his nose almost touching the parchment. The floor around him was covered in maps, all held open with small stones placed at their corners, glowing buttery yellow in the lantern light. He looked up at the sound of Jet's entrance, squinting in the sunbeams that spilled through the open flap.
"You been here all night?" Jet asked. He kept his eyes down as he crossed the room, seeking out gaps in the carpet of scrolls.
Xue Sheng pushed his spectacles up his nose, frowning as if offended by the suggestion of sleep. "I don't have to fight today," he said. "And this needed to get done." He picked up the diagram he'd been working on and held it out for Jet to take. "New reconnaissance came in last night. They've started using that guardhouse again, and they destroyed two of the bridges over the canal."
"Good work," said Jet. He let the parchment hang from his fingers - he could see some of the ink hadn't quite dried. "Now get some sleep, all right? You've earned it."
Xue Sheng lay down his brush and sat back on his heels. "I don't think I'll be able to," he said quietly. "Not until this is over."
"You'll know either way by sunset," said Jet with deliberate levity. "If we're not back by then, it's because we're dead."
"I know. But I wasn't just thinking about you," said Xue Sheng. "Master Piandao and I were talking last night, after you…left. He thinks it will take at least three days for word to reach us from the Fire Nation. I doubt I'll be sleeping much before then." He frowned thoughtfully, as if something had just occurred to him. "Has anyone talked at all about what we'll do if the Avatar isn't successful? Assuming we can retake Ba Sing Se and assuming not all of our forces are needed to hold it, it might be wise to send reinforcements to aid whatever remains of the invasion force. They'll need-"
"Woah, Sheng," said Jet, holding up his empty hand. "Let's just worry about this afternoon, okay?"
"Xue Sheng," he said, "and some of us don't find any comfort in being willfully short-sighted."
"Well, if you're gonna be awake until then, you'll have plenty of time to think about it," said Jet. He rolled up the map, sloppy but good enough to be getting on with. "As for me, I'm gonna start with breakfast and go from there."
"How is it you're the leader?"
"No one else wanted the job," said Jet, though the cheer was wearing thin. He turned and started back the way he'd come. "See you in a few, if you can stop thinking long enough to eat."
"Jet…" Xue Sheng's frown was serious, the lines of it tense with whatever he needed to say. Enough to make Jet pause beside the door. "I might not have another chance to talk to you."
Jet rubbed the back of his neck. "C'mon, let's not-"
But Xue Sheng interrupted him, and Jet was too surprised to put up much of a fight. It hadn't been so long ago that this man had cowered whenever Jet walked into the room. "I haven't always been a very good Freedom Fighter," he said. "And we don't always agree. Most of the time we don't. You're reckless with yourself and your men. You're stubborn, even when it's obvious that you're wrong. Which you are, constantly, I'm surprised you haven't gotten us all killed." He pushed his glasses up his nose again, scowling at the map-covered floor. "But…being here in this camp. You and Zuko. What you've done." He met Jet's gaze directly, then, determined and unwavering. "I'll write a paper about it, when this is over."
Jet laughed and shook his head as he pushed the tent flap open. "All right. If that's what you want. You can start working on it tonight while you're sitting here not sleeping."
"Good luck," said Xue Sheng, curt but sincere.
"Thanks," said Jet. He let the flap drop back into place, then followed the smell of eggs and jasmine tea.
"You sure you wanna wear this?" Jet tightened the straps that held the studded gauntlets in place, the leather cracked and stiff. He'd put his armor on while Zuko checked to make sure he had all the pieces of his own - he'd had to take it all apart for cleaning, and there was still greasy soot along the seams. "I saw your uncle and his friends getting ready. They've got their own uniforms, you know? You could-"
"I'm not in the order," said Zuko. He stood patiently still as Jet moved on to the other arm. He could hear the crowd outside their tent, already much louder than it had been when they'd started gearing up. "I'm a Freedom Fighter. So I'll dress like one."
"I guess you are, at that," said Jet. Finished, he thumped Zuko's leather-clad shoulder and flashed a wide, white grin. "Look at you. Big damn hero."
Zuko felt his cheeks flush, and moved to check the fastenings of his scabbard to cover for it. "You're going to tell them about the eclipse, right?"
Jet sighed. "Yeah. Hate that we had to hide it from them to begin with, but…couldn't be helped I guess."
Zuko rested his hand on the hilts of his swords, hung just below his hip. "They'll understand," he said. "They trust you."
"Maybe some of them do." Jet went to the door and parted the canvas flaps, just enough to see through. A thin line of sunlight hit his face, one eye and one cheek illuminated and the rest cast into deeper shadow. "That's a lot of colonists."
"Only a dozen. Maybe fifteen."
Jet frowned. "Still."
"Uncle told them to listen to you, so they will."
"Yeah." The flap closed, and Jet ran a hand back through his hair. "Zuko…I think you should maybe say a little something when I'm done."
"Why?"
"I get that the colonies are different, but…" His hand fell to his side, the thumb hooking into one hilt. "They're Fire Nation, you know?"
Zuko looked down at his Earth Kingdom armor, all green and brown leather and brass fastenings; at the worn hilts of his swords, forged somewhere on the plains. And at his own hands, pale and long-fingered, the hot flow of his chi pooling in them even as he thought about it. "Yeah, I know," he said quietly.
"Hey." Jet reached out to lift Zuko's chin, ducking to meet his lowered eyes. "Nothing you can't do, right? It's gonna be fine."
In this light, Jet's irises were very dark - flecks of brown in deep umber. His skin had paled a little that summer, with so much of their lives taking place at night, but when Zuko lay his hand on Jet's cheek the contrast was still there. He was glad for that; he liked that Jet was different, in some ways if not the important ones. Zuko had grown up in a world of yellow eyes and skin that never saw the sun, all pomp and artifice and cold detachment. He didn't see much use in that world anymore. He had never really belonged there, besides.
They were alone in the tent, so Zuko closed the small distance between them. Their armor creaked as he pressed their chests together, his arms around Jet's neck. Their clothes and hair still smelled like burning wood, but Jet's mouth tasted of jasmine, and Zuko savored it as long as circumstance would allow - slow, lingering kisses that left him a little hot and breathless.
Jet kissed the corner of his eye; the end of his nose. "C'mon," he said.
Jet bent down as they walked out of the tent, found a suitable stalk of grass and tucked it into the corner of his mouth. Everyone else had gathered at the center of the camp, around the remains of the cooking fire, the space barely large enough to hold them all. Near the edge of the crowd, Zuko opened his mouth to ask to be let through, but even as he formed the words a man in a blue and white uniform noticed them coming. He stood aside, and the movement sent a ripple through the others. By some silent consensus, a path to the center opened.
Jet didn't break his stride, outwardly at ease as he walked down the corridor of men. But Zuko felt very strange. Hundreds of eyes followed them as they passed, a low murmur rising and falling just outside what Zuko could properly hear. He had always tried to avoid special treatment. He wasn't a prince anymore, not in any way that counted; certainly not here, in the city his sister had ruined. He hadn't done anything to deserve this kind of respect. He wished he hadn't agreed to speak.
There was no staircase here; no kitchen table to stand on. The gap in the crowd held only a smoldering fire and a barrel half-full of rainwater, high enough to reach Zuko's chest. Jet surveyed it for a moment, as if gauging its integrity. Then he hopped up on top of it in one smooth, graceful movement, boots planted on either side of the rim.
"We have a big day ahead of us," he said, his voice clear and carrying. "Bigger than some of you know. You're my men, my soldiers and my friends, but I've had to hide something from you. A secret that might make all the difference today. I don't know how, but we kept it - from General Zha, from the Dai Li, from everyone. And now I can finally tell you."
Zuko tried to listen as Jet explained about the eclipse - how it would impact their own plans and how, across the ocean, it might decide the fate of the Fire Lord himself. But his own thoughts were too loud and insistent to allow for anything else. Jet wanted him to speak, but though his mind raced through half-formed niceties it all amounted to nothing. During his exile, he'd spent much of his time in the colonies, the only harbors that weren't closed to him by war or politics. But he'd kept the same distance from them as he did from everyone, and they'd regarded him with a mix of pity and detached curiosity. Why would these people care what he had to say?
He scanned what he could see of the crowd, but he couldn't even tell where the colonists were. In the sea of scavenged armor and patched clothes, the White Lotus men stood out easily. But the starched uniformity of their blue and white robes blurred the differences that had seemed so clear last night. He looked for a cluster of the familiar Fire Nation topknots, but couldn't find more than one or two at a time. Where was he supposed to look when he spoke? If he had to make a fool of himself, why couldn't he have done it quietly - taken the handful of colonists aside and sympathized with the pain of what they had to do?
There was a sudden burst of cheers, and Zuko jumped a little as he refocused on Jet and what he was saying. Jet's leg was close to his shoulder, and he reached for it as he listened, his fingers tracing the ridges of cloth bindings. The touch calmed him, and Jet's voice coalesced into words again. "I can't promise you that we'll win," he was saying, low and serious. "I can't promise you that all of us will be here tonight. But whatever happens today, remember that we did something. We fought back. We didn't lie down in the dirt and wait to be forgotten." Jet paused, then, and Zuko could feel the wave of tension that passed through his body, the muscles in his leg contracting. "I can't promise you," he went on, quiet enough that the crowd seemed to hold its breath to hear him. "But you know…I think we will win. Because we have to. Because this city needs us. Because the Avatar's counting on us. And I don't know about you…" Zuko could hear the grin creep back into Jet's voice; could almost see the high arch of his eyebrows, raised in good humor. "…But I'd hate to disappoint him."
The crowd erupted with approval, swords raised and helmets waved in the air. The older men looked a little startled at the sudden chaos, but they were smiling, and some of the loudest shouts and whistles came from soldiers in White Lotus robes. Jet hopped down from the barrel, light as a cat, and clapped Zuko on the back. "You ready?" he asked, leaning in close to be heard over the noise.
Zuko looked at the crowd and tried to swallow the hard lump of panic in his throat. "Shouldn't you…introduce me or something?"
Jet reached up to brush Zuko's hair out of his face, tucking it behind the scarred ear. "They know who you are," he said softly.
Zuko had no trouble getting up on top of the barrel, but he felt ridiculous once he was there. From this height he could see the entire assembly, dozens of soldiers in robes and armor. There were little pockets of sameness, friends clustered together and whispering behind their hands, but mostly the groups had bled into each other. The faces Zuko knew best were scattered all over - Xue Sheng and Piandao mingling with last night's musicians; Jin and Uncle speaking with the cook who'd made them all breakfast; Xiao Si Wang standing shyly beside a group of robed women, Roo seated on her shoulders. The runners had climbed up on top of the largest tent to get a better view, and one of the younger Waterbenders sat among them, listening patiently to something Dao was saying.
Zuko stood on the barrel feeling stupid and awkward. He tried to think of something - anything - to say, before the window of opportunity closed and the crowd's attention wandered. But as the silence stretched on, the men quieted and turned to watch him, their faces expectant. Zuko looked back at them, sick with nervousness and dizzy from the racing of his heart, his mind wiped clean of everything but the desire to get back down again.
A hand pressed against his ankle, just enough pressure to be felt through his high leather boot. Like an anchor, holding him steady in the current.
"I…" The word cracked, and he felt his cheeks burn as he licked his lips and tried again. "I'm not sure what Jet wants me to say to you. I think he asked me to speak because…well, some of you are Fire Nation. Firebenders, like me. And I think I'm supposed to talk about how I understand what you're going through. What it's like to fight your own people. I'm supposed to tell you that it's worth it. That it's the right thing to do, even if it's hard. And…" His eyes moved over the crowd, rapt faces all turned toward him. He swallowed, and when he went on his voice had steadied a little. "It is. It's all of those things.
"I almost left, once. I didn't think it mattered if I stayed or not. And you know…it's easier to be selfish, really. It's easier to think you aren't important. That someone else will fix things if you don't. But I was wrong to think that. We're all important. We can all do something, even if it takes a while to…to figure out what that thing should be. Where we're needed." He felt Jet squeeze his ankle. He wished that he could see Jet's face.
"None of us have to be here," he said, quiet and serious. "No one's making any of you stay. You're here because there's something awful happening in this city. Something that should never have happened at all. It's wrong, what my sister did. What my father did. My grandfather. My great-grandfather." He thought of the university - of the walls, the streets, the place where they had lived. He thought of ruined villages and razed temples, orphans and widows. His throat tightened but he went on, pushed down his grief and forged it into words. "It's wrong, and we're here because we can't stand it anymore. Because our hearts are telling us we have to stop it.
"Jet wanted me to stand up here and talk to my people. He meant the colonists, but…" Zuko held his arms apart, chest tight and voice hoarse. "All of you are my people. Everyone who made the choice to stay and do what's right. Everyone who wants for things to change. We're all Freedom Fighters today. We'll free Ba Sing Se from General Zha. The Avatar will free the world from my father. It's…" He looked down, then; met the brown eyes that watched him and smiled. "It's like Jet said. We'll win because we have to."
A wall of sound rose from all around him, the roar of shouts and whistles and cheers so loud that he could feel it in his bones. But his eyes stayed on Jet. He jumped down from the barrel, and Jet's arms were around him before he'd even straightened. The others closed in, hands thumping him on the back and ruffling his hair, voices calling out promises of victory, but Zuko barely noticed. He cupped Jet's head in his hand. He felt the stalk of grass tickle his ear. He said, "I want to stay," and Jet hugged him so hard his ribs ached.
"How much longer?" Jet whispered, his expression difficult to read behind the special glasses Xue Sheng had made for them - wooden, with narrow slits to see through.
Zuko glanced up, though the sun was still too bright to look at for very long. What had begun as a sliver of darkness had widened to cover a third of its pale, yellow disc. He could feel the shift beginning; the fire in his belly calming by a fraction, just enough to notice once he knew to look for it. "A while," he murmured. "Maybe a half-hour. Probably less."
The disused watchtower where they crouched was strategically minor and meant for only one guard. In the heat of mid-afternoon, the little room was stifling with six bodies crammed inside of it. Zuko wiped at the sweat on his brow and shifted to try and give Xiao Si Wang more room. "What about the guards?" he asked. He was squatting too far from the window to see anything but sky.
Longshot craned his neck, thick brows creased over his glasses. "The same," he said quietly, and Zuko felt a little thrill of hope. They were a hundred or so yards from the palace complex, and pairs of unarmed Fire Nation soldiers were stationed every fifty yards or so along the high, smooth wall. With Ping's help, he and Jet and Wang and Smellerbee and Longshot could easily get past the wall, and unarmed guards meant no spears or arrows would come at them while they were exposed.
The palace was in keeping with the rest of Ba Sing Se - walls within walls and massive in scale. It had been built to repel invading armies, the path from the main gate to the palace itself a wide, flat courtyard with little cover aside from a few dozen flags and stone columns. The Freedom Fighters had realized, early on, that a direct assault would be suicide - they'd never make it across all that open space. They weren't an army. They would forge their own path.
A few months ago, it would have been possible to move through government buildings and bureaucrats' residences undetected, staying hidden all the way to the outer wall of the complex. But Azula had ordered a perimeter three hundred yards wide to be razed, broken only by watchtowers like the one they now hid inside.
Zuko lay his hands on the dusty floor and leaned forward, taking some of the weight off the balls of his feet. They'd timed their arrival with the changing of the guard, and that had been over an hour ago. His knees ached and his muscles were starting to cramp. Xiao Si Wang was tucked into a little ball beside him, head tilted up toward the sun. Smellerbee and Longshot, closest to the window, moved only to check on the guards below. Ping and Jet were bent over a map they'd drawn in the grime, whispering as they pointed.
"I still think we should avoid the moat," Ping murmured. "Too easy to get trapped down there."
"Yeah, but Sheng thinks they've barricaded the servants' entrance," said Jet. "See? Over here. So we might have to go in the front, unless we want to just blast a hole in this wall-"
Ping shook his head. "Too thick. And there's iron in the concrete."
"The moat would keep us out of sight, let us get pretty close."
"There may be archers. We'd be an easy target."
Zuko closed his eyes and took slow, even breaths. The fire inside him had dimmed even further; smoldering coals instead of the warm, steady flame he was used to. He had known to expect this, but it was strange to actually feel it happening. Like the night the Moon Spirit had died, only colder; emptier. He wondered if the guards had noticed it, too; if they would understand what was happening. He wondered if they were afraid.
Zuko watched the sun and thought of that morning, most of it a jumble of last-minute planning and the scramble to ready so many men for battle. There hadn't been much time for well-wishes before they left the camp, but Uncle had pulled Zuko aside, held his shoulders and looked up into his eyes.
"Are you certain you don't need me to go with you?" Uncle had asked.
"We've been doing this for months," Zuko had said, kind but firm. "Extra people would just throw us off. We'll be fine."
Uncle had sighed. "You're right, of course. And I know it is better this way. For you to do this on your own." He'd blinked, and a few tears had escaped down his wrinkled cheek. "But I cannot help but worry that-"
"Uncle…" Zuko had given up on decorum, then, and pulled the old man into a hug. "I've been through worse than this."
"This city has already taken one son from me," Uncle had rasped, his face against Zuko's chest.
Zuko hadn't known what to say. He had patted Uncle's shoulders and thought back through the years of his life, to when he had been a boy in the palace, unmarked and unburdened. He remembered strong, warm hands on his back; the smell of tea leaves and old cloth; a comforting girth too wide to wrap his arms around. He remembered how it had been once his mother had gone; how the days when Uncle was away stretched out into lonely eternity. And he remembered the first night on his ship, how he had lain awake on his hard, metal bed and listened to the engines; how the door had creaked open and the end of his mattress had sunk under another man's weight; how Uncle had sat with him, still and silent, until he had finally drifted off to sleep.
"I'll be careful," he'd said. But Uncle had looked drawn and worried as Ping sped their team away from the camp. And now, crouched in this too-small watchtower with his comrades beside him, he understood a little of how Uncle must have felt. He knew how foolish he'd often been, gambling his life unthinkingly and rushing forward without a care for the consequences.
Today he knew exactly what he was doing, and exactly what was yet to come. He had the time to think how easy it would be to lose these people, how a stray arrow or a lucky spear could take any of them from him, and how helpless he might be to stop it. He felt his chi draining away, the strength leaving his hands as the sun disappeared, and was afraid.
The sun had shrunk to a crescent, now, the cloudless sky darkening to the deeper blue of evening. Zuko held out a hand, palm up, and concentrated. A flicker appeared a few inches from his skin, barely more than smoke.
"It's time," he said quietly.
Jet looked up from the map on the floor. "The sun's not gone yet," he said.
"We're all worried eight minutes won't be enough time," said Zuko. "The guards' Firebending is weak enough now for us to get past them. By the time we reach the palace they won't be able to bend at all."
"You're certain?" Ping asked.
Zuko closed his hand into a fist. "Yes."
Ping stood and walked between them to the window, his eyes on the guards and the wall behind them. "Ready?"
"Yes," they all said in quiet unison - except for Longshot, who only frowned and nodded.
They watched as Ping set one foot on the window ledge, arms braced on either side of the frame as he judged the distance to the ground. Then he pushed off, hard, and landed midway between the guardhouse and the wall, the ground sinking beneath him and then rebounding, driving him forward on a wave of rock toward the closest pair of guards. Zuko leapt down after him, rolled through the impact and was on his feet again in time to see Ping send the second guard flying. Jet was beside him, swords in hand, and he could hear the others running behind. He could also hear the shouts of the guards as they abandoned their posts and came charging toward the fight. They carried spears that Zuko somehow hadn't seen before.
But Zuko barely had the chance to be surprised before more immediate concerns pushed it aside. Ping swung his arms forward, fingers splayed, then jerked them backwards as his hands snapped into fists. Two great blocks of stone tore free of the wall, rumbling toward Ping and then pushed to either side, his palms flat and perpendicular to the ground. The guards were swept off their feet, and before they could recover Ping ripped a slab of marble from the top of the hole he'd made, large enough for six people to stand on. He leapt up onto it as soon as it landed, Zuko and Jet and the others close behind. Xiao Si Wang was in the rear, slicing through the shafts of spears thrown after them, and once both her feet were on the sledge Ping rocketed them forward, through the gap in the wall and into the compound beyond.
"What the hell was that?" Jet asked as they sped past the servant's quarters, empty and abandoned. He had to shout to be heard over the grinding of stone.
"They hid their weapons in the dirt," said Bee.
"Shit! Did they-"
"Archers," said Wang, her swords held ready and her feet planted wide. The buildings here were only one story, and as Zuko looked up he saw the outlines of men against the darkening sky. He couldn't hear the twang of bowstrings over all the noise, but he saw an arm drawn back, and his blades flashed in what remained of the sunlight as he knocked the first arrow out of the air. Beside him, Longshot pulled one from his quiver; notched, drew and shot it in one continuous motion. It found its mark, and a man clutched his shoulder and fell out of sight as Longshot reached for the next.
The barrage came thick and fast, its deflection made harder by the movement of the sledge and how close together they stood. Zuko tried to keep his elbows tucked in and his cuts short and precise, just enough to turn the arrows away from himself and from Ping. Even so, his elbow caught Wang in the ribs and one blade nearly tangled with Jet's, the hilt grazing the back of Ping's neck.
An arrow slipped between Zuko's swords and struck the leather armor on his shoulder. The angle was lucky and the tip cut a shallow path through his skin, but the shaft stuck straight out, in the way and jostling painfully as he knocked the next volley aside.
"Corner!" Ping shouted, and Zuko braced himself as the sledge careened around the royal stables, weaving between troughs and paddocks. Ahead, the wall to the inner courtyard loomed, a line of soldiers with pikes standing ready before it.
Zuko took both swords in one hand and tore the arrow from his shoulder as he turned another away from Ping's back. Then they were at the wall, and the sledge shook more violently as it rumbled forward, Ping's attention divided between the stone ahead and the stone below. Ping jerked his hands upward and a section of wall flew into the air, the muscles on his forearms standing out as he guided it in a high arc over their heads. He released it once it was clear, his focus shifting forward again, and the sudden jerk of acceleration nearly threw Wang off her feet. Zuko caught her arm, held it until she'd found her stance again, and only then looked to see what lay ahead.
He couldn't be certain how many men stood between them and the palace. This close to the ground, they looked like a wall of spears and red armor. There had to be hundreds of them. A thousand. They stood between the high, narrow columns, their formation as wide as the palace steps. There were archers atop the columns themselves, on the edge of the palace roof, at the head of the stairs.
"Hold on," Ping rumbled. Zuko flung one arm around Jet's shoulders, crouched down and hooked the other through Ping's leg, Smellerbee and Longshot doing the same on the other side of the sledge. Only Wang remained standing, her ankle tucked into the crook of Zuko's knee to keep herself steady as she cut spears and arrows from the air.
Zuko felt Ping tense and caught a glimpse of his hands reaching down toward the paving stones as they flew by. Then the sledge bucked beneath them as Ping dragged a crude hood of stone over their heads, angled so that their platform became a wedge. A moment later, Zuko felt another jar of impact, and saw the first line of soldiers left in upended heaps behind them.
The path they cut was narrow and their rear was still exposed. Wang's twin swords were a blur, the arrows thick and fast and uninterrupted. Jet and Zuko braced themselves against the new stone behind them, catching what she missed, but the sledge was even more cramped than before, and with the sky as dark as twilight, now, their targets were harder and harder to follow.
Zuko couldn't see the sun anymore, but he could feel it disappear, his insides turned to ice and his chi completely still. "It's started," he said, and in his mind the candle clock was lit, eight minutes notched into its side.
Their sledge pushed through the ocean of soldiers like a ship through the frozen sea, shattering their formation, but even those who fell were soon back on their feet again and ran with their spears in Ping's wake. Longshot stood beside Wang, Smellerbee's arms wrapped around his legs to hold him steady, and picked off the men who came too close. For every spear Wang blocked, a handful of arrows slipped through her blades, more than Jet and Zuko could manage even if they weren't careening across a dim courtyard. Flecks of stone hit Zuko's cheek from the impacts of near-misses, and the sledge trembled as a shaft dug into Ping's calf
"Can't do this in the palace," Ping grunted. "Be on foot."
Jet pulled the arrow out, and Zuko knocked another away from Ping's head in the moment of distraction. "We'll never get through," said Zuko. "Too many of them, we can't-"
"The roof," said Jet as they shot across the narrow moat, the rumble quieting for the instant they were in the air.
"Stairs first," said Ping, and they all braced themselves as the sledge tilted, a wave of stone pushing them up the wide, steep incline. Zuko glimpsed the army behind them in the gaps between his friends, a churning sea of men that bristled with iron points as it surged after them.
"That's gotta be most of the non-bending Fire Nation in the city," said Smellerbee, her surprise obvious even with her voice raised.
"Going up," Ping barked, and they all crouched, ready to spring. He stomped one foot, the impact driving a column of stone up out of the ground, hurling them past the massive columns and the elaborate portico.
Zuko leapt off the sledge at its zenith, the wind whistling past his ears, and hit the roof feet-first with a sharp crack of breaking tiles. Jet landed just beside him, hooks catching hold of the ridge ahead, and Wang grabbed his shirt as she scrambled for balance on the slope. Up ahead, Ping ran along the terra cotta as if there were no incline at all, his bare feet sure and solid. He swept his arms in a wide arc, ripping a path through the tiles, then swung the cloud of clay shards above his head before dragging it across the line of archers on the ridge. They shouted in alarm and slid away down the side of the roof, but Zuko didn't wait to see if they went over the edge. He was already past where they'd stood, jumping over the eves to the next tier, knowing that in the first instant of exposure he could find himself with a chest full of arrows. But the next volley was badly timed, and he knocked it easily aside as he skirted around the gable to the next long stretch before the main bulk of the palace.
The closest archers threw their bows away to draw short swords and rushed in to block the way forward. Zuko saw Jet's hooks flash in his peripheral vision, glanced over and saw those swords pulled out of the soldiers' hands and thrown to the ground far below, the men shouldered aside once they'd been disarmed. Zuko caught a thrust between his own blades, pushed it down and away and kicked his attacker in the chest, the man's arms pinwheeling as he tried to find his feet again.
On the next tier, still a hundred yards away, another line of bowmen took aim. Longshot felled them one at a time, notching and firing as he ran, but there were too many, and their arrows came thicker and faster as the gap between them and the Freedom Fighters closed. Zuko heard an angry shout of pain behind him, and when he glanced back over his shoulder in a lull between volleys, he saw that Smellerbee had a fresh gash along one cheek.
Just ahead, Ping spread his arms to either side, palms cupped. Soon the air was full of dust and the sound of breaking ceramic as parallel swaths of tile were torn loose, swirled into red-brown snakes that trailed behind his hands. Then Ping brought his arms sharply forward, the streams of tile lashing around, whip-like, to knock the archers' feet from under them, reminding Zuko more of Waterbenders than any Dai Li he'd ever seen.
The multi-tiered heart of the palace loomed ahead of them, and soon all Zuko could see was the green plaster of the outer walls and the undersides of overhanging eves. He tried to remember Xue Sheng's careful maps, the route he'd painstakingly memorized, but up here he'd lost all sense of where they were or even how much farther they had to go. He followed Ping blindly, along the perimeter of the central tower and past the sheltered gardens of the Earth King, a maze of gabled rooftops stretching out ahead of them.
Jet ran with swords held out to keep his balance, as close to Zuko as their reach would allow. "You okay?" he asked between breaths raw from exertion.
"I'll be fine," Zuko panted. He could feel the cold settling deeper into his chest, but now he took some comfort in it. They had enough time, he was certain. There was only so much farther it could be. "It's just…weird."
Jet veered toward him for a moment, slapping him on the shoulders with one fist clenched around a hilt. "Don't worry," he said. "Just like old times, right? Nothing you can't do." He grinned, warm and easy despite the chaos before and behind them, and Zuko felt the chill retreat a little.
"There," Ping shouted, and though he didn't point there was no doubt what he meant. Ahead, a circular ridge jutted up from the rooftop, at least twenty yards wide and made of iron. As they ran closer, Zuko could see it was an enormous window, strips of lead holding thousands of discs of green glass in place. He had never seen anything like it before, and he understood why Ping hesitated beside it for a long moment, as if reluctant to disturb something so beautiful.
Then Ping clenched his jaw and his arms swung around, cords of muscle taut in his neck as he bent a river of tiles up into the air, arcing high above their heads before slamming down on the center of the window. The leaded glass gave way, the torrent of shards pouring through it and hitting the floor far below them with a crash that Zuko could feel through his feet. Then came the startled shouts of soldiers, and Ping said, "Head for the back of the room," before jumping through the hole he'd torn. Zuko could see the curved bulk of the Earth King's throne, the dais and the polished marble floor on which rows of armored men stood, their formation disturbed by the scramble to avoid the flood of clay and glass Ping had rained down on them. Ping's landing sent a ripple of raised stone across the floor, sweeping the soldiers off their feet and out of Zuko's sight.
It was as much of a opening as they were going to get, but even the throne was much too far of a jump without bending, and Zuko's hands shook a little from pent-up momentum as he waited for Ping to raise a platform for them. Jet leaned in past the twisted remains of the window, lips pursed as he took in the details of the room and Ping's efforts to clear it. Then he spotted the gauzy hangings draped between the rim of the skylight and the columns beside the throne, and a grin spread across his face.
"Bee, Wang - you go first," he said, gesturing with his sword as he stood aside for them. "The rest of us might be too heavy."
The girls reached down, took handfuls of fabric and started to lower themselves toward the floor, one arms-length at a time as if the hangings were a ladder. Longshot watched their progress for a few seconds, frowning slightly beneath his eclipse glasses, then hooked his bow over his shoulders and reached for the second hanging. It held, though Zuko could see small tears around the bolts that anchored it. There was a third section of drapery, but he and Jet would have to go one at a time.
"Go on," said Jet.
"I'll follow you," said Zuko.
Jet blew out an impatient breath. "We don't have time for-"
"I'm not leaving you behind me," said Zuko, quiet but severe. He must have sounded as unshakable as he felt, because Jet didn't protest again. He nodded as he hooked his swords onto his belt, and Zuko watched him lower himself past the sharp wreckage of lead and glass and onto the green hangings below. His movements were effortless, reminding Zuko of how the other boy had grown up, coming of age in the branches of trees. They were five or six stories up, at least, but Jet seemed to barely notice.
Zuko noticed, but there wasn't time for him to worry about it now. Longshot was the first to get clear of his hanging, and as Zuko started down it he could feel the small changes in tension as it tore under his weight, each rip bringing him a little closer to having his bones shattered by the floor. Sounds of battle rose from beneath him, Earthbending and the clash of swords, but he kept his eyes on the column up ahead. Then his hand finally touched the cool marble, wide enough to be awkward to hold onto but not so much that he couldn't manage, and in the few seconds it took to slide down to the ground he took in the scene around him.
Ping was in front of the throne, a half-circle of granite carved to resemble a badgermole. The chamber's massive bronze doors had been thrown open, and in addition to the men already inside a hundred more soldiers, at least, were trying to push their way in from the hall, spear-tips glittering in the eerie green lantern light. Ping raised walls out of the floor and sent them rumbling toward the doorway, men falling before it and swept back the way they came. But there were soldiers too far inside the room to be dealt with in this way, closing in from the sides, and though Ping's arms flashed through bending forms, throwing jagged waves of stone in all directions, Zuko could tell he wouldn't be able to hold his position for long.
Zuko jumped the last ten feet, tore the now-useless eclipse glasses from his face and launched himself into a sprint. He could see Jet and the others up ahead of him, the back of the room all but lost in shadow. He heard Ping break off his defense behind them, and a moment later the Earthbender sped past him on a rolling crest of floor, crouched low as velocity whipped his robes around his legs and arms.
The dark outline of a much-smaller doorway came into focus. Ping stopped a few yards short of it, whirled around and dragged high barriers of stone up toward the ceiling, forming a crescent that butted up against the rear wall. He left a gap a few feet wide, just enough for the rest of them to dart through. Zuko could hear the soldiers running behind him, gaining ground on his own exhausted stride. He grit his teeth and forced one last burst of speed, dove through the gap and heard Ping close it behind him, plunging their makeshift enclosure into even deeper darkness.
Zuko reached down into his tunic and pulled out the glowing green crystal that hung around his neck. The others did the same, standing around the door so that Ping had enough light to see by as he examined it. They were breathing hard, and the shadows moved with the rise and fall of their chests.
Ping had told them of a metal bunker in the rear of the throne room, meant to protect the Earth King in case of an assault on the palace. They'd all assumed that Zha would lock himself inside the moment he realized his Firebending was gone. But Ping had never seen the interior of the chamber, nor come particularly close to it - he had only entered the throne room two or three times in his entire life. Now he ran his hands along the iron door, over rivets that formed patterns of squares within circles, and frowned. "Locked from the inside," he said. He banged it with his knuckles, listening carefully to the sound. "At least six inches thick. Mostly solid."
"Can you get through?" asked Jet.
"Eventually."
Another bang came from behind them, and Ping looked up sharply from the door. "They've found something to ram the wall with," he said. He brought one foot down hard on the floor, drove the heels of his palms out and up to raise another barricade behind the first. Then he turned back to the door and pushed his arms out to either side, parting the wall to reveal the solid iron beneath. "We'll have to break it down," he said. This close, Zuko could see how exhausted he was, face dripping with sweat and hands shaking as they wiped it away. But their work was far from over, and Ping barely allowed himself a moment to catch his breath before he sunk into another stance.
Two stomps in quick succession flipped a section of marble flooring out of the way and lifted a chunk of the granite beneath to shoulder height. Then Ping dug his heels down into the floor, grit his teeth as he compressed the stone to even greater density between his hands, then flung it against the gap between door and wall. The stone cracked in half on impact, but Ping reformed it as he pulled back for another strike. He did this over and over again, the noise ringing in Zuko's ears. All of their eyes were fixed on the spot that Ping had chosen, now covered in dusty marks. The stone shattered and coalesced, broken then whole, but the iron distorted with agonizing slowness. It had been built to keep out Earth and Fire armies alike.
Their little half-circle of space was hot and deafening, stone against iron inside and the Fire Nation's battering ram beyond the makeshift wall. Zuko looked between the faces of his friends, eerie green and lit from underneath. Longshot and Smellerbee were grim and serious, watching the wall as the first, small cracks appeared. Xiao Si Wang was very pale, hands gripping the hilts of her swords, and though she kept her face blank Zuko could see the anxious fear in her eyes and in the pulse that fluttered on her throat.
He felt Jet's hand on his back; looked up into a face pinched with worry, the high arches of his brows drawn together. "How much longer?" Jet asked, quiet in the pause between bangs.
Zuko closed his eyes and tried to make sense of what his body was telling him, sifting through the tangle of distractions. His heart pounded from worry and exercise, and so much of him felt like it was on fire: his lungs, the aching muscles of his limbs, the gash in his shoulder. But underneath all of it, behind his navel, was the flickering birth of a different sort of warmth. The candle had burned to its last notch.
"Soon," he said. He opened his eyes and looked up into Jet's. "We're not going to make it."
:: Next Chapter ::
The illustrations for this chapter, and the artists who drew them, are as such:
By burntcitrine:
Jet began to disentangle himself from Zuko's limbs, made more difficult by his own reluctance and Zuko's groggy efforts to hold on.
By Holly Mongi:
Jet kissed the corner of his eye; the end of his nose. "C'mon," he said.