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Fire and Rain	By : Keyriethenightbringer Category: Avatar - The Last Airbender > AU/AR - Alternate Universe/Alternate Reality > Het- Male/Female Views: 2035 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: ATLA and its characters do not belong to me. I make no money from this work.

Chapter List
- 6
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- 8
They traveled for a week before they found another village, but did not stop there. The Fire Nation had taken it as a strategic base of operations for an attack on Ba Sing Se. Though it was still on the other side of the mountains from the Earth Kingdom capital, it was the closest village in the area small enough for its acquisition by the Fire Nation not to be noticed. Iroh and Kea hid in the dense underbrush by the village entrance, watching Fire Nation soldiers kill their boredom by bullying the townspeople.
            “Bastards,” Kea hissed, curling her lip.
            Iroh put a restraining hand on her shoulder.
            “They’re standing between me and my new shirt.” She raised her arm to show the tear in her green tunic she’d had to spot-repair with a fishbone needle and thread from her pants. When she glanced back at Iroh, it was not icy anger he saw there, but chagrined amusement. He relaxed. “What should we do?” She asked.
            “Move on.”
            “What?! Just leave these people here to be bullied by the Fire Nation?”
            “No. We warn the next village we come to and advise them to get help from their neighbors to drive the Fire Nation out.”
            “But wouldn’t that just bring a bigger army down harder on this village?”
            Now a different part of Iroh’s mind engaged: the brilliantly sharp strategist that had earned him so much power and glory during his military career. “No. Even if they think they need this village, they will not try to take it back. There are more villages on the other side of the mountains closer to Ba Sing Se. They are in a more strategic position, but the generals will be wary of acquiring villages on that side of the mountains because those villages will have learned from the last time.”
            “The last time being your siege?”
            Iroh nodded.
            “So even if we drive them out of this village, they’ll just take another one?”
            “One that has a better chance of fighting them off. We cannot help everyone. We are only two.”
            “Two of the most powerful benders around besides the Avatar.”
            “And two of the most wanted besides the Avatar.”
            Kea sighed. “Could we get in there somehow and help them? Warn them? Take out a few Fire Nation soldiers?”
            “It is not worth the risk. We would be more helpful to these people if we stayed alive to warn the neighboring villages and get them to collaborate.”
            “Have I mentioned how irritating you are when you’re right?”
            “It might not be easy,” he said, half to himself. “If the Fire Nation chose this village, it must be because it is in an isolated area far from other villages. I am not as familiar with this area of the Earth Kingdom as I am with the land farther north. On the other side of the lake which Serpent’s Pass bridges.”
            “Should we go north?”
            Iroh shook his head. The three deep grooves in his forehead, cut over years into the landscape of his face by stress, worry and turmoil, deepened in thought. “There is nothing north of here but impassable mountains. Serpent’s Pass is north and east.”
            “So we go northeast?”
            He shook his head again. “We would have a better chance of finding a village if we turn back west.”
            “But we just came from there and didn’t see any villages.”
            “We came from southwest. If we go due west we may find something.”
            “The forest is thicker there.”
            “Trust me.”
            “My sister used to say that to me right before she got us in trouble.”
            “I like your sister.”
So they detoured. Fortunately for the overtaken village, Iroh and Kea encountered another village within a day’s walk. Unfortunately for said village, they had learned of their neighbor’s plight several weeks before and the village elder refused to send his men to aid his neighbor. When Iroh asked why, the elder puffed self-righteously and blustered something about a financial sleight involving a basket of fruit.
            Kea, overcome with righteous anger of her own, brought most of the water in the communal well down on top of the elder before being urged out of the village by Iroh and several dozen highly irritated townspeople with pitchforks.
            “And I still didn’t get a new shirt,” Kea grumbled after they were away safe in the woods northwest of the village.
            “You don’t need one. In fact, you need less of that one.”
            “You’d like it if I wore that stupid dancing costume I had on the day we met, wouldn’t you.”
             Iroh treated her to his most charming grin. “Oh yes, please.”
             Kea chuckled. “Down boy. Have a cold shower.” she lobbed a water ball at Iroh’s head. He pointed a finger at it and it evaporated in a whoosh of flame.
            They headed further northwest in search of a village that would aid its hurting neighbor. It took them nearly three days to find one. Before they approached the elders, Kairakea beelined to the nearest stall selling clothes and, fully ignoring Iroh’s suggestions, chose a dark green sleeveless tunic that wrapped around the waist with a sash and a long-sleeved belted shirt to go under it. She traded the decorative slippers she used in dances for a sturdier traveling pair and enough coins to buy them both tea and noodles.
            “Maybe you should dance before we meet with the elders,” Iroh said as they ate in the busy shop. “I want to get my shopping done before we get chased out of town.”
            “I promise I won’t waterbend all over the elders this time,” Kea said. “What shopping do you have to do?”
            “I want to get a new mouthpiece for my Tsungi horn and some Pai Sho pieces. I have lost a few.”
            “I would have thought teacups would be more important.”
            “Those too!”
            “I’m glad you profit so richly from my hard work,” Kea said, sarcasm dripping from her voice.
            “Careful, Kairakea, you’re starting to sound like my nephew.”
            “I’m also starting to see why he was in such a crabby mood all the time.”
            “Just because I have my priorities in order doesn’t mean you must judge me for it.”
            Kea snorted into her noodle bowl. “Play your Tsungi horn and buy what you need from whatever you get. I’m going to talk to the elders.”
            Three hours later, she found Iroh at the same shop where they’d parted, but with two big differences: Iroh was now in a store uniform behind the counter, and the shop was standing room only. She threaded through the crowd and reached Iroh, baffled. “What did I miss?”
            Iroh told her the story between trips to and from the stove, where six large pots of tea were in different degrees of completion. “After you left, the owner of the store came to me and asked how the tea was. I told him it could use a little less ginseng and a few more minutes to steep. So he took my advice and now it’s the house special! Everybody loves it!” Iroh grinned and held out a cup to her. She took it, tasted, echoed Iroh’s grin.
            “Just when I thought your tea couldn’t get better. Maybe you really should open your own tea shop.”
            Iroh puffed his broad chest with pride. “So how did it go with the elders?”
            Kea’s eyes lit up. “Better than I could have imagined! Not only will they help, they’ll get another village to come too. They also knew of a refugee camp a day or so west of them that’s full of Earthbenders. They’ll get as many of those as they can.”
            “Excellent news.”
            “Um, Iroh?” Kea’s smile faded as she glanced around her furtively. She leaned over the counter to whisper. “You aren’t firebending that tea, are you?”
            “Of course not. Good tea takes time.”
            “How long were you planning to, er, work here?”
            “Until you got back.” He shrugged.
            “Do you have enough money to get what you need?”
            “I already did. Oh!” Iroh ducked under the counter, rummaged in a cubby there, and came up with a folded piece of dark green cloth. “I got you these.”
            “If this is a dancing costume, I’ll—“ She let the garment unfold as she held it up. “Oh. Oh, Iroh, thank you!” It was a new pair of pants. In her hurry to replace her torn shirt, she’d forgotten that she’d frayed the hems of her current pair of pants to close the tear in it. She leaned over the counter and kissed his rough, bearded cheek. “You’re a pip. I’m going to try them on—be ready to leave when I get back!”
            Kea trotted back into the shop a few minutes later, beaming. Iroh, also still beaming from the kiss, congratulated himself. The pants fit her perfectly, hitting just below the knee. Maybe next time she’d let him pick something less… there.
            They left the village much more peacefully than last time, and attracted no hostile attention as they veered south and east through the forest. Kea was about to ask Iroh if they could make camp when he pointed ahead of them to a clearing in the forest. “Hot springs!”
            “You sprung your what?”
            Iroh began to frantically shed his clothing, bouncing and grinning like a child. “Hot springs! Places in the earth where water is naturally heated by volcanic gases! They’re wonderful!”
            Kea’s eyes grew more alarmed the more clothes Iroh shed. He got down to his loincloth, and Kea averted her eyes until she heard a healthy splash.
            “Aaaaaahhhhhh,” Iroh purred as he sunk down into the steaming, bright blue water.
            Kea stood on the bank of the small, steaming pool, trying to decide if she should be amused or bemused. She settled for being both, and watched Iroh’s entire being relax as hers had when she’d first tasted his tea. She sat on the slight ledge the bare rock made over the water, dipped a finger in. It wasn’t boiling hot, but it was warmer than any bathwater she’d had in her life. It positively baffled her.
            I guess I’ll have to get used to being baffled as long as I’m with Iroh, she thought with a smile. Now the question became Do I join him? They teased and flirted, but she wasn’t completely clear how far into that territory Iroh’s affection for her really went.
            Come on, Kairakea. Iroh’s a big boy. He will behave himself if you want him to.
            But do I really want him to?
She shrugged and began to undress, watching for Iroh to open his eyes. But he never did as she stripped down to her loincloth and the wide strip of blue cloth she tied across her breasts to keep them from bouncing. She folded their clothes into piles near the pool, tested the water with a foot, then eased herself down into the surprisingly deep, delightfully warm water.
            “You keep outdoing yourself, my dear General,” she said as she felt herself fill with warmth and peace. Now Iroh did open his eyes. “First the white jade tea, then the Genmaicha tea, now this… you better be careful or I’ll start expecting this sort of thing.”
            He wanted to say, Imagine what I could do with a massage and a kiss or two.
            Instead he said, “Is the water warm enough for you? I could heat it up.”
            “It’s perfect.”
            Iroh treated himself to the limited but still pleasing view of her above the waterline. She’d leaned her head back to rest on the edge of the stone and copied the position of his arms spread out on the rim. That left her neck, shoulders and chest open to view. Only the tiny top swells of her breasts were visible above the water, and though he felt sure she had something to cover them, he liked to imagine not. He traced the line of her collarbone with his eyes, up to her strong shoulders and down her arms. The very tips of her fingers rested on the water's surface as if she were tickling it. Its giggles were tiny ripples.
            “I just thought of something,” she said lazily, not moving her head. “What if next time we’re attacked, you heat the water I bend to boiling and we scald our enemies.”
            That reminded Iroh with troubling immediacy that they were hunted. On the heels of that thought was a thought for Zuko and a prayer for his safety. Following that was a wish for Lu Ten, then for his wife. Iroh wondered what she’d have to say about Kairakea. He’d done more than his fair share of flirting, especially in the last ten years. But he had never considered going any further, hadn’t even wanted to, until Kairakea.
            He could no longer remember the sound of his wife’s voice, but could recall her face, her smile, with near-perfect detail. Despite their arranged marriage when she was sixteen and he almost thirty, she’d loved him with all the fire and passion as if they’d fallen in love before marriage. He’d been as captivated by the idea of a woman loving him as by the woman herself, so he loved her all the more. But, in retrospect, if things had not gone the way they had, the illusion would have broken and the marriage would have gone sour. As it was, he never saw her that much. He’d been pulled away to war only months after the wedding. He’d gotten news of his son’s birth (and his wife’s death) on the battlefield. He returned home to mourn his wife and raise his son alone. During those years several sets of parents approached him with marriage proposals for their daughters, but Iroh’s priorities lay with his son and his country. He was Crown Prince Iroh, to be Fire Lord, and Lu Ten after him. He had no time for another wife. And didn’t want to endure the possible heartbreak, even if it gave him another son.
            “Iroh? Are you all right?” Kairakea’s voice spun him back to the present. Her crystalline blue eyes rested on him worriedly, her head cocked.
            “Just woolgathering.”
            She sat back, satisfied. “Would you please heat the pool? I think the volcano’s broken.”
            Iroh squared himself, inhaled, pressed his hands together, and blew out a thick cloud of steam, like the puff from a dragon’s nose. The water warmed instantly. Kea giggled. “I think I’ll keep you around.”
They soaked in the hot springs until the last gasp of twilight. Kea rose from the water first, giving Iroh a respectable view of her small, firm bottom as she hauled herself out. She’d almost forgotten he’d jumped in completely naked, but remembered just in time and turned away with butterflies in her stomach.
            They set up camp by guttering firelight; a breeze had picked up and was scudding thick cotton-ball clouds across the nearly moonless sky. The breeze had a bite. Iroh urged the fire higher as Kea tossed more logs on. She had already wrapped herself in her blanket.
            “I’m very glad I bought that half-kimono,” she remarked.
            “Winter will be here soon,” Iroh said. “Just in time for us to cross the mountains.”
            Kairakea stared at him. “You say that like it’s a good thing.”
            “It won’t be so bad if we can get some Water Tribe parkas.”
            “Because those are a cinch to come by. Just ask the next shopkeeper we run into.”
            Iroh shrugged helplessly. “I suppose we’ll just have to huddle together for warmth.”
            “Spirits forbid,” she drawled sarcastically.
            Sure enough, Iroh woke the next morning to find Kea clinging to him again. This time she was shivering. He looped his arms around her and gave her his warmth. Kea woke once while Iroh dozed. She found absolutely nothing wrong with being enveloped by his thick, strong body. She nuzzled deeper into his woodsmoke-fragrant tunic and drifted back to sleep.
- 6
- 7
- 8
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Fire and Rain