more of the f!Tarrlok fic
Nov. 3rd, 2019 05:47 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
anghrainetitle: the edge of darkness (5/6)
verse: the edge of darkness (bloodbending backstory+f!Tarrlok)
characters: Noatak, Tarrlok; Sura (Yakone's wife)
stuff that happens: Noatak and Taraka have a brief respite before their final test.
previous sections: one, two, three, four
CHAPTER FIVE
That night, Noatak dreamed.
He dreamed that he and Taraka were stumbling through the snow, running from a pale, massive, slavering monster. At the last minute, Noatak realized he’d never outrun the monster, not with Taraka’s slower pace holding him back. He shoved her at the monster, and fled. Her terrified screams followed him as he made his escape. He dreamed, too, that they were children again, waterbending snowballs at each other and shouting. He couldn’t see their mother but he heard her, clapping and laughing; there was no sign of their father. He dreamed that he couldn’t stop growing, just got taller and taller. When he turned around, he saw that Taraka had grown with him, though she was still a head shorter, and both their parents were shrinking, first Sura and then Yakone, until they disappeared into nothing. Taraka’s face turned solemn, tears rolling down her cheeks and flooding the village beneath them.
Hand-in-hand, Noatak and Taraka stepped over mountains, crushing hills and cities beneath their feet, until they reached a river. The river splashed around their ankles, and Taraka began to look cheerful again, giggling as they ran towards the sea. Even as giants, the ocean soon came to their necks, the powerful currents almost tearing them apart. Noatak wouldn’t let her go, though; he tightened his grip on her, and felt her nails digging into his flesh, clinging to him.
Soon enough, a raft—proportionate to his new size, somehow—floated by. He clambered on top of it, pulling Taraka after him, then both collapsed. Noatak peered around as well as could, but there was no one there. No pirates, no Water Tribe fleet, no blind mother or cruel father: just him and his sister and the boundless sea. He’d almost forgotten what it was to be happy, but it rushed over him, flooded him like a tidal wave. There was nothing quiet or contented about it; he felt as if he were drowning in joy. Noatak took two great gulps of air.
A glimpse of Taraka’s arm steadied him. He could see deep bruises where his fingers had been, and scratches from where their fickle element had sliced at her.
“You’re hurt,” he said, horrified.
“So are you,” said Taraka, sitting up. She lowered her hands into the ocean and when she pulled them out, they glowed brightly. She healed her arm (I have to be dreaming, she’d never heal herself first), then reached for him.
“Thanks,” he said.
Taraka just laughed and looked up at the sky. It’d gotten dark, somehow—it’d been noon before, but he was sure it would make sense if he thought about it—wait, no, this was a dream, it had to be a dream. The moon shouldn’t be full, should it?
Noatak gazed upwards, and the dark sky faded into a deeper blackness. He sat up, blinking around. Scraps of pale light came in through a narrow gap to his right, a few dim shapes emerging out of the uninterrupted darkness. There, that must be the small table where Taraka kept her scrolls and lotion, and those, their pile of weapons. He took a deep breath. The dreams were already receding into vague, disconcerting memory. This was reality: the deep bite of the air, his enemy and father sleeping a short distance away, beside his weak, traitorously unobservant mother. And Taraka—in the dark, Noatak felt, more than saw, her empty bedroll. He scrambled to his feet and ran outside.
Taraka stood a short distance away, staring up at the sliver of the moon. That seemed familiar, and not just from the night they’d plotted under his cliff, but he couldn’t quite put his finger on it.
“Taraka,” he said, his voice thick with sleep. He tried again. “Taraka, you shouldn’t be out here. It’s too cold.”
“It’s your fault,” she said crossly, folding her arms. “You woke me up.”
He recalled enough of his dream to pause in bewilderment.
“You were having a nightmare.”
“Sorry,” Noatak said.
Taraka looked astonished. “I hope it wasn’t too bad?” she asked, as solicitous as she’d been irritated a moment before.
“I don’t remember much of it,” he said honestly. “You’d better go back to sleep.”
She turned, then hesitated. “Shouldn’t you?”
“I have to go think. I’ll be there in a few minutes,” he said, and pushed her towards the tent.
“Brood on your cliff, more like,” she muttered, but obediently picked her way back, so he ignored her.
He kept a close eye on Taraka over the next few days. There wasn’t anything unusual about that, nor anything in her behaviour. She no longer smothered him in devotion, as she once had, but she was still unmistakably affectionate. Her face brightened when she glanced away from Yakone and towards Noatak, the hard, blank look in her eyes vanishing. She still fussed over him, too, pleased whenever he didn’t rebuff her, and behind it, visibly anxious.
On the last day—what was supposed to be the last day, at any rate—their mother sent them to the market. They were walking home when Noatak caught sight of a group of girls laughing over something. He recognized Zianka, pretended not to notice any of them, and glanced at Taraka. Her eyes were already narrowed under scowling brows, her lips pressed together.
Noatak leaned over and whispered, “You can’t really stab her in the middle of the village.”
“I wasn’t going to,” Taraka muttered. “I just—”
“Don’t like her, I know.”
When they got home, they expected to find Yakone working outside, planning the final hunting trip. They were supposed to leave just after breakfast. Instead, their mother was hanging clothes by herself, mouth pursed into a small, preoccupied frown. It relaxed into a smile when she caught sight of them.
“There you two are! I was starting to worry.”
“Taraka spent ten minutes haggling with the fish merchant,” said Noatak, setting his basket down, and bending the snow beneath it to carry it to his mother.
“Thank you, Noatak. Taraka, I’m glad you’re so prudent, but you don’t need to worry about money. We live quietly enough, but remember, your father still has a small fortune left from his years in Ba Sing Se.”
Noatak and Taraka exchanged a glance.
“I know,” said Taraka. “I just don’t like being cheated.”
“And you like winning arguments,” Noatak said. Taraka’s guarded expression turned wry.
“That, too. Where’s Dad?”
“He’s taken a bit ill, I’m afraid. Nothing serious, just a bad cough, but he won’t be able to take you on your hunting trip.”
Noatak stiffened, instantly suspicious.
“Oh!” said Taraka, sounding disappointed. It might even have been sincere; he rather thought it wasn’t. “Well, at least we’ll be able to stay and help with—”
“He wants you to go by yourselves.”
Noatak glanced from his mother to his sister. “Ourselves? Just me and Taraka?”
Sura frowned again. “Yes. He’s worried that our stores of meat are running low, with a bad winter coming. And he doesn’t want you catching anything from him, either, so he thought it might be better if you were gone this weekend.”
Noatak didn’t believe it for an instant, but he didn’t mind, either. It’d be best, of course, if they could have passed this last test today and had it over and done with, but still. They’d be out of sight and earshot, completely beyond their parents’ reach, for three days.
“I’ve set aside enough supplies for you.” Sura chewed on her lip. “Your father was sure you could manage together, but—”
“We’ll be fine,” said Noatak quickly.
Taraka’s mouth was curving into a slow, incredulous smile, her eyes shining. She barely covered up her obvious delight before their mother’s worried glance turned to her.
“You’re certain you can manage, Taraka?”
“Yes,” she said. “And Noatak won’t let anything happen to me.”
Noatak opened his mouth, then shut it again. Her blind trust both irritated and soothed him; he felt burdened by it, but he also felt as if a tilting world had righted itself, his place once again clear to him. So what if Taraka should be capable of defending herself? He was her older brother. It was his duty to protect her. It would always be his duty.
In any case, there was no point to arguing about it. They could argue any time. Three days of freedom might never come again, until they escaped entirely.
Taraka and Noatak took turns changing in their tent, putting on their warmest clothes, packing their bags and grabbing the spears. Sura kissed them goodbye and wished them good luck; from inside the tent, they heard a dull, hacking cough. Noatak shouted a loud farewell before heading off, Taraka in tow. His nerves ran high all the way out of the village.
They both shot suspicious looks over their shoulders as the last tent faded from sight. Nothing happened to stop them, however, and Taraka’s carefully unconcerned look shifted to infectious excitement.
“We’re free for the whole weekend,” she said, practically dancing. “No Dad, no Mom, no anyone. And no bloodbending!” Her bright expression faltered. “Or is there? Do I need to practice for next time?”
He hesitated, but he didn’t have the heart to watch her twist herself up over bloodbending, not this time, when she was already doing so well. Maybe—everything—had made him weak; maybe he just wanted to be quiet and content for three days. He didn’t really care.
“I won’t make you,” said Noatak, shrugging. “I think you’re doing fine, honestly. If I weren’t around, you’d be the prodigy.”
Taraka, far from offended, just laughed and shook her head. “We’ll have to hunt properly, and—oh! You shouldn’t bloodbend either!”
“Why not?” he demanded, feeling the familiar scowl tugging between his brows.
She clapped her gloved hands. “Because it’ll be harder. It’s more fun that way.” She grinned over at him, her eyes fierce.
So much of the time, she seemed his natural counterpart, the La to his Tui, and he automatically thought of her as his opposite. Sometimes, though, he saw long strains of himself in her, or Taraka in him, and he was forcibly reminded that they were not immortal spirits locked into an eternal cycle, just brother and sister, with a few great differences and a good deal else in common.
“It would be more exciting,” Noatak said. He cast her a sideways look. “I’m guessing you didn’t tell Mom you were thinking of ways to make things harder?”
She tried to look penitent, but just ended up laughing. “I might not have mentioned that part.”
They kept talking until they made camp, their conversation not merely prosaic but urgently so. It was early afternoon by then, and Noatak walked around the tent to find Taraka sprawled out on the other side of it, making a winged spirit in the snow. He lowered a hand to help her up.
“How old are you, six?”
He caught the mischief in her eyes too late. She yanked on his arm and he tumbled down beside her. He could, of course, have easily used waterbending to hold himself upright, or to instantly slide to his feet, but he didn’t bother making the effort.
“I guess so,” Taraka said, giggling.
Noatak folded his arms behind his head and stayed where he was. After a few moments of silence, Taraka sat up. He wasn’t looking at her, and there was no change in her blood to tell him anything, but he could feel her mood darkening.
“I keep expecting to turn around and see him here,” she whispered.
“Me, too,” said Noatak. “But he’s not. Nobody’s here.” He glanced up at her, squinting; the sun was just behind her head. “Can’t you tell?”
Taraka frowned in concentration. Then her expression cleared. “You’re right. It’s just—”
“Hard to believe things could not be unpleasant for more than a few minutes?”
“Exactly,” she said.
Noatak waited until she’d gazed away, clearly distracted, and melted the snow under his hand. He bent the water right at her head, splashing her face and soaking her hair and hood. Taraka sputtered.
“There you go—something unpleasant’s happened,” said Noatak. “Now you can get on with things.”
She glared at him. Then, bending the water away from herself, she smiled again and laid back down. “You’re so thoughtful.”
After a few minutes of quiet, she said, with a note of reluctance, “We should probably start heating some water for dinner.”
“We can boil it,” he replied lazily.
Taraka stretched, then cupped a globe of water in her hands and held it above her chest, absently playing with it. Noatak looked over at her. With no troubled anxiety or insincere agreeableness lying over her features, her face was peaceful. Her hands moved carelessly through the simple forms, the motions smoother, more graceful, than they ever were under Yakone’s eye. The steady beat of her heart was a soothing counterpoint to his.
Abruptly, he sat up. “What do you want to do in Republic City?”
Taraka blinked. She set the sphere aside. “When we get there? Find work, find a place to live—”
“No, not that,” he said impatiently. “Once we’ve made our fortunes and everything. It’s a big city; there are all kinds of opportunities.”
Taraka’s eyes turned to the grey sky, her brows knitting together. “Do you remember that time Dad went to the Earth Kingdom and came back with a bottle of jasmine scent for Mom?”
“You want perfume?”
“It’s pretty,” she said, a little defensive. “And if we’re talking about a fortune, I don’t want a tiny bottle to keep for five years. I want the very nicest and I want to wear it every single day.”
“What else?”
Her lips pursed. “Powder and face-paint, like the ladies in the capital wear, and ivory beads in my hair, and—and a fountain!”
He said, “Don’t you want silk clothes, too?”
“Yes!” Then she considered. “It’s pretty close to the South Pole, though, so it might be too cold. Maybe linen or wool.”
“You’d think of that,” said Noatak.
“What do you want?” she asked.
“I’m … not sure. I want to do something important.”
“You don’t want anything”—she gestured vaguely—“small?”
He thought it over. “A radio. I heard one when Dad took me to the capital, and it sounded like they were right there. And it might be nice to go to a restaurant and not make my own food.”
Taraka got to her feet and walked over to their pot, boiling the water with a twitch of her fingers. “As if you do anyway.”
As much out of sheer perversity as anything else, he helped her cook that night’s stew, ignoring the Yakone-sounding voice in his head that said the work was beneath him. They practiced their waterbending as the moon rose: a waxing gibbous, almost full—he thought it would be, on the third day, and felt a burst of anticipation. Taraka, always quick to spot an advantage, blasted him six feet back.
Noatak recovered in mid-air, using her water to slide down, land lightly on his feet, and toss sharpened icicles in her direction. She dodged out of the way, spinning an undoubtedly razor-edged wheel of water towards him. He’d have to ask her where she’d come up with that, though it’d be more effective as a sudden attack then halfway through a duel. He was too fast for her to land another hit, and her defense too strong for him to break; he could have probably upset her stance with some ice, but he was tired, and magnanimously agreed to call it a draw.
Taraka pushed her hair out of her eyes. “That was great,” she said, still breathless. Noatak dried off his leggings and shoulders.
“You did all right,” he said.
She grinned as brightly as if he’d delivered lavish praise. That was the problem with her; mere acknowledgment was well in excess of whatever dim hopes she cherished. Noatak felt, at once, contemptuous over her lack of vision, and angry and guilty over her pathetic expectations, which clearly encompassed him. He’d done everything for her—but he knew, too, that he’d been less and less able to shield her from Yakone in recent years.
Much later, he would realize that the slow, unconscious withdrawal of his sympathies, and complicity in bending, had far more to do with it. Even then, their world had still been divided into everyone else, and the two of them. But Taraka had no reason to suppose that he would listen to her concerns or even comprehend them. He should have listened, Amon realized, she had been utterly right about their bending, yet he wouldn’t have known how to console her had the thought of trying ever occurred to him. His final abandonment was not the beginning of his failure but the end.
verse: the edge of darkness (bloodbending backstory+f!Tarrlok)
characters: Noatak, Tarrlok; Sura (Yakone's wife)
stuff that happens: Noatak and Taraka have a brief respite before their final test.
previous sections: one, two, three, four
“You’re certain you can manage, Taraka?”
“Yes,” she said. “And Noatak won’t let anything happen to me.”
Noatak opened his mouth, then shut it again. Her blind trust both irritated and soothed him; he felt burdened by it, but he also felt as if a tilting world had righted itself, his place once again clear to him. So what if Taraka should be capable of defending herself? He was her older brother. It was his duty to protect her. It would always be his duty.
“Yes,” she said. “And Noatak won’t let anything happen to me.”
Noatak opened his mouth, then shut it again. Her blind trust both irritated and soothed him; he felt burdened by it, but he also felt as if a tilting world had righted itself, his place once again clear to him. So what if Taraka should be capable of defending herself? He was her older brother. It was his duty to protect her. It would always be his duty.
CHAPTER FIVE
That night, Noatak dreamed.
He dreamed that he and Taraka were stumbling through the snow, running from a pale, massive, slavering monster. At the last minute, Noatak realized he’d never outrun the monster, not with Taraka’s slower pace holding him back. He shoved her at the monster, and fled. Her terrified screams followed him as he made his escape. He dreamed, too, that they were children again, waterbending snowballs at each other and shouting. He couldn’t see their mother but he heard her, clapping and laughing; there was no sign of their father. He dreamed that he couldn’t stop growing, just got taller and taller. When he turned around, he saw that Taraka had grown with him, though she was still a head shorter, and both their parents were shrinking, first Sura and then Yakone, until they disappeared into nothing. Taraka’s face turned solemn, tears rolling down her cheeks and flooding the village beneath them.
Hand-in-hand, Noatak and Taraka stepped over mountains, crushing hills and cities beneath their feet, until they reached a river. The river splashed around their ankles, and Taraka began to look cheerful again, giggling as they ran towards the sea. Even as giants, the ocean soon came to their necks, the powerful currents almost tearing them apart. Noatak wouldn’t let her go, though; he tightened his grip on her, and felt her nails digging into his flesh, clinging to him.
Soon enough, a raft—proportionate to his new size, somehow—floated by. He clambered on top of it, pulling Taraka after him, then both collapsed. Noatak peered around as well as could, but there was no one there. No pirates, no Water Tribe fleet, no blind mother or cruel father: just him and his sister and the boundless sea. He’d almost forgotten what it was to be happy, but it rushed over him, flooded him like a tidal wave. There was nothing quiet or contented about it; he felt as if he were drowning in joy. Noatak took two great gulps of air.
A glimpse of Taraka’s arm steadied him. He could see deep bruises where his fingers had been, and scratches from where their fickle element had sliced at her.
“You’re hurt,” he said, horrified.
“So are you,” said Taraka, sitting up. She lowered her hands into the ocean and when she pulled them out, they glowed brightly. She healed her arm (I have to be dreaming, she’d never heal herself first), then reached for him.
“Thanks,” he said.
Taraka just laughed and looked up at the sky. It’d gotten dark, somehow—it’d been noon before, but he was sure it would make sense if he thought about it—wait, no, this was a dream, it had to be a dream. The moon shouldn’t be full, should it?
Noatak gazed upwards, and the dark sky faded into a deeper blackness. He sat up, blinking around. Scraps of pale light came in through a narrow gap to his right, a few dim shapes emerging out of the uninterrupted darkness. There, that must be the small table where Taraka kept her scrolls and lotion, and those, their pile of weapons. He took a deep breath. The dreams were already receding into vague, disconcerting memory. This was reality: the deep bite of the air, his enemy and father sleeping a short distance away, beside his weak, traitorously unobservant mother. And Taraka—in the dark, Noatak felt, more than saw, her empty bedroll. He scrambled to his feet and ran outside.
Taraka stood a short distance away, staring up at the sliver of the moon. That seemed familiar, and not just from the night they’d plotted under his cliff, but he couldn’t quite put his finger on it.
“Taraka,” he said, his voice thick with sleep. He tried again. “Taraka, you shouldn’t be out here. It’s too cold.”
“It’s your fault,” she said crossly, folding her arms. “You woke me up.”
He recalled enough of his dream to pause in bewilderment.
“You were having a nightmare.”
“Sorry,” Noatak said.
Taraka looked astonished. “I hope it wasn’t too bad?” she asked, as solicitous as she’d been irritated a moment before.
“I don’t remember much of it,” he said honestly. “You’d better go back to sleep.”
She turned, then hesitated. “Shouldn’t you?”
“I have to go think. I’ll be there in a few minutes,” he said, and pushed her towards the tent.
“Brood on your cliff, more like,” she muttered, but obediently picked her way back, so he ignored her.
He kept a close eye on Taraka over the next few days. There wasn’t anything unusual about that, nor anything in her behaviour. She no longer smothered him in devotion, as she once had, but she was still unmistakably affectionate. Her face brightened when she glanced away from Yakone and towards Noatak, the hard, blank look in her eyes vanishing. She still fussed over him, too, pleased whenever he didn’t rebuff her, and behind it, visibly anxious.
On the last day—what was supposed to be the last day, at any rate—their mother sent them to the market. They were walking home when Noatak caught sight of a group of girls laughing over something. He recognized Zianka, pretended not to notice any of them, and glanced at Taraka. Her eyes were already narrowed under scowling brows, her lips pressed together.
Noatak leaned over and whispered, “You can’t really stab her in the middle of the village.”
“I wasn’t going to,” Taraka muttered. “I just—”
“Don’t like her, I know.”
When they got home, they expected to find Yakone working outside, planning the final hunting trip. They were supposed to leave just after breakfast. Instead, their mother was hanging clothes by herself, mouth pursed into a small, preoccupied frown. It relaxed into a smile when she caught sight of them.
“There you two are! I was starting to worry.”
“Taraka spent ten minutes haggling with the fish merchant,” said Noatak, setting his basket down, and bending the snow beneath it to carry it to his mother.
“Thank you, Noatak. Taraka, I’m glad you’re so prudent, but you don’t need to worry about money. We live quietly enough, but remember, your father still has a small fortune left from his years in Ba Sing Se.”
Noatak and Taraka exchanged a glance.
“I know,” said Taraka. “I just don’t like being cheated.”
“And you like winning arguments,” Noatak said. Taraka’s guarded expression turned wry.
“That, too. Where’s Dad?”
“He’s taken a bit ill, I’m afraid. Nothing serious, just a bad cough, but he won’t be able to take you on your hunting trip.”
Noatak stiffened, instantly suspicious.
“Oh!” said Taraka, sounding disappointed. It might even have been sincere; he rather thought it wasn’t. “Well, at least we’ll be able to stay and help with—”
“He wants you to go by yourselves.”
Noatak glanced from his mother to his sister. “Ourselves? Just me and Taraka?”
Sura frowned again. “Yes. He’s worried that our stores of meat are running low, with a bad winter coming. And he doesn’t want you catching anything from him, either, so he thought it might be better if you were gone this weekend.”
Noatak didn’t believe it for an instant, but he didn’t mind, either. It’d be best, of course, if they could have passed this last test today and had it over and done with, but still. They’d be out of sight and earshot, completely beyond their parents’ reach, for three days.
“I’ve set aside enough supplies for you.” Sura chewed on her lip. “Your father was sure you could manage together, but—”
“We’ll be fine,” said Noatak quickly.
Taraka’s mouth was curving into a slow, incredulous smile, her eyes shining. She barely covered up her obvious delight before their mother’s worried glance turned to her.
“You’re certain you can manage, Taraka?”
“Yes,” she said. “And Noatak won’t let anything happen to me.”
Noatak opened his mouth, then shut it again. Her blind trust both irritated and soothed him; he felt burdened by it, but he also felt as if a tilting world had righted itself, his place once again clear to him. So what if Taraka should be capable of defending herself? He was her older brother. It was his duty to protect her. It would always be his duty.
In any case, there was no point to arguing about it. They could argue any time. Three days of freedom might never come again, until they escaped entirely.
Taraka and Noatak took turns changing in their tent, putting on their warmest clothes, packing their bags and grabbing the spears. Sura kissed them goodbye and wished them good luck; from inside the tent, they heard a dull, hacking cough. Noatak shouted a loud farewell before heading off, Taraka in tow. His nerves ran high all the way out of the village.
They both shot suspicious looks over their shoulders as the last tent faded from sight. Nothing happened to stop them, however, and Taraka’s carefully unconcerned look shifted to infectious excitement.
“We’re free for the whole weekend,” she said, practically dancing. “No Dad, no Mom, no anyone. And no bloodbending!” Her bright expression faltered. “Or is there? Do I need to practice for next time?”
He hesitated, but he didn’t have the heart to watch her twist herself up over bloodbending, not this time, when she was already doing so well. Maybe—everything—had made him weak; maybe he just wanted to be quiet and content for three days. He didn’t really care.
“I won’t make you,” said Noatak, shrugging. “I think you’re doing fine, honestly. If I weren’t around, you’d be the prodigy.”
Taraka, far from offended, just laughed and shook her head. “We’ll have to hunt properly, and—oh! You shouldn’t bloodbend either!”
“Why not?” he demanded, feeling the familiar scowl tugging between his brows.
She clapped her gloved hands. “Because it’ll be harder. It’s more fun that way.” She grinned over at him, her eyes fierce.
So much of the time, she seemed his natural counterpart, the La to his Tui, and he automatically thought of her as his opposite. Sometimes, though, he saw long strains of himself in her, or Taraka in him, and he was forcibly reminded that they were not immortal spirits locked into an eternal cycle, just brother and sister, with a few great differences and a good deal else in common.
“It would be more exciting,” Noatak said. He cast her a sideways look. “I’m guessing you didn’t tell Mom you were thinking of ways to make things harder?”
She tried to look penitent, but just ended up laughing. “I might not have mentioned that part.”
They kept talking until they made camp, their conversation not merely prosaic but urgently so. It was early afternoon by then, and Noatak walked around the tent to find Taraka sprawled out on the other side of it, making a winged spirit in the snow. He lowered a hand to help her up.
“How old are you, six?”
He caught the mischief in her eyes too late. She yanked on his arm and he tumbled down beside her. He could, of course, have easily used waterbending to hold himself upright, or to instantly slide to his feet, but he didn’t bother making the effort.
“I guess so,” Taraka said, giggling.
Noatak folded his arms behind his head and stayed where he was. After a few moments of silence, Taraka sat up. He wasn’t looking at her, and there was no change in her blood to tell him anything, but he could feel her mood darkening.
“I keep expecting to turn around and see him here,” she whispered.
“Me, too,” said Noatak. “But he’s not. Nobody’s here.” He glanced up at her, squinting; the sun was just behind her head. “Can’t you tell?”
Taraka frowned in concentration. Then her expression cleared. “You’re right. It’s just—”
“Hard to believe things could not be unpleasant for more than a few minutes?”
“Exactly,” she said.
Noatak waited until she’d gazed away, clearly distracted, and melted the snow under his hand. He bent the water right at her head, splashing her face and soaking her hair and hood. Taraka sputtered.
“There you go—something unpleasant’s happened,” said Noatak. “Now you can get on with things.”
She glared at him. Then, bending the water away from herself, she smiled again and laid back down. “You’re so thoughtful.”
After a few minutes of quiet, she said, with a note of reluctance, “We should probably start heating some water for dinner.”
“We can boil it,” he replied lazily.
Taraka stretched, then cupped a globe of water in her hands and held it above her chest, absently playing with it. Noatak looked over at her. With no troubled anxiety or insincere agreeableness lying over her features, her face was peaceful. Her hands moved carelessly through the simple forms, the motions smoother, more graceful, than they ever were under Yakone’s eye. The steady beat of her heart was a soothing counterpoint to his.
Abruptly, he sat up. “What do you want to do in Republic City?”
Taraka blinked. She set the sphere aside. “When we get there? Find work, find a place to live—”
“No, not that,” he said impatiently. “Once we’ve made our fortunes and everything. It’s a big city; there are all kinds of opportunities.”
Taraka’s eyes turned to the grey sky, her brows knitting together. “Do you remember that time Dad went to the Earth Kingdom and came back with a bottle of jasmine scent for Mom?”
“You want perfume?”
“It’s pretty,” she said, a little defensive. “And if we’re talking about a fortune, I don’t want a tiny bottle to keep for five years. I want the very nicest and I want to wear it every single day.”
“What else?”
Her lips pursed. “Powder and face-paint, like the ladies in the capital wear, and ivory beads in my hair, and—and a fountain!”
He said, “Don’t you want silk clothes, too?”
“Yes!” Then she considered. “It’s pretty close to the South Pole, though, so it might be too cold. Maybe linen or wool.”
“You’d think of that,” said Noatak.
“What do you want?” she asked.
“I’m … not sure. I want to do something important.”
“You don’t want anything”—she gestured vaguely—“small?”
He thought it over. “A radio. I heard one when Dad took me to the capital, and it sounded like they were right there. And it might be nice to go to a restaurant and not make my own food.”
Taraka got to her feet and walked over to their pot, boiling the water with a twitch of her fingers. “As if you do anyway.”
As much out of sheer perversity as anything else, he helped her cook that night’s stew, ignoring the Yakone-sounding voice in his head that said the work was beneath him. They practiced their waterbending as the moon rose: a waxing gibbous, almost full—he thought it would be, on the third day, and felt a burst of anticipation. Taraka, always quick to spot an advantage, blasted him six feet back.
Noatak recovered in mid-air, using her water to slide down, land lightly on his feet, and toss sharpened icicles in her direction. She dodged out of the way, spinning an undoubtedly razor-edged wheel of water towards him. He’d have to ask her where she’d come up with that, though it’d be more effective as a sudden attack then halfway through a duel. He was too fast for her to land another hit, and her defense too strong for him to break; he could have probably upset her stance with some ice, but he was tired, and magnanimously agreed to call it a draw.
Taraka pushed her hair out of her eyes. “That was great,” she said, still breathless. Noatak dried off his leggings and shoulders.
“You did all right,” he said.
She grinned as brightly as if he’d delivered lavish praise. That was the problem with her; mere acknowledgment was well in excess of whatever dim hopes she cherished. Noatak felt, at once, contemptuous over her lack of vision, and angry and guilty over her pathetic expectations, which clearly encompassed him. He’d done everything for her—but he knew, too, that he’d been less and less able to shield her from Yakone in recent years.
Much later, he would realize that the slow, unconscious withdrawal of his sympathies, and complicity in bending, had far more to do with it. Even then, their world had still been divided into everyone else, and the two of them. But Taraka had no reason to suppose that he would listen to her concerns or even comprehend them. He should have listened, Amon realized, she had been utterly right about their bending, yet he wouldn’t have known how to console her had the thought of trying ever occurred to him. His final abandonment was not the beginning of his failure but the end.