Lost Memories

Chapter II

My brother and I informed the elders of the vessels approaching. They took immediate action, gathering everyone to escape through a passage beyond the village. It was created before the warriors departed for a situation just like this. Mothers scooped up their children in the panic while others assisted the sick and elderly. Aang, Sokka, and I stayed behind to make the village look as deserted as possible. We would have whoever was on those ships believe we left with our warriors to the Earth Kingdom.

"We have to hurry!" Sokka called through our empty home. "They're almost here!"

I crawled on my hands and knees backward through the snow, trying to cover the last of our tracks in the village. My brother and Aang were already outside the wall waiting for me to escape. I was finished and ready to meet them, but I heard something. It was coming from somewhere in the village . . . the cries of a child. They were left behind in the panic, and I needed to find them.

"I'll be right behind you," I lied. "Go on ahead!" Aang and Sokka argued, my brother even screaming at me in disagreement, but his shouts went in one ear and out the other. I needed to find that child and join the rest of the village in the passage's safety.

The cries of the child grew louder as I began my search. I scoured all the huts, being disappointed by each with no sight of the child, creating as many footprints as I just covered. When I searched the horizon, the ships were closer than ever, only moments before docking and discovering the village as I panicked. That's when the piercing scream of the child rang through my ears and I knew it was coming from the healing hut. I ran as fast as I could across the village to my grandmother's hut, my lungs burning from the arctic cold.

When I arrived, the flap of the hut was open and the screams of the child were louder than ever. Relief washed over me, but it didn't stay as I turned back and looked at the dock. The gigantic monsters of ships were there, lowering their bridges . . .

I crouched into the hut quickly, shutting the flap after I entered. In the corner was a huddled child whom I immediately recognized as Kirso. Her father was a warrior and departed months ago, leaving the child with her sickly grandmother. She must have been forgotten in panic. "Kirso?" I whispered. "It's me, Katara. Remember? I healed your ankle when you tripped on the dock."

The girl stopped screaming and gazed at me, her blue eyes full of tears. My heart sank. She was too young to understand what was happening and the danger we were in, but I did. I had to find a way out of the village and to the passage with the others. "Come here, Kisro," I urged her, outstretching my arms. "You'll be okay. I'm going to take you to your grandmother."

At the mention of her grandmother, Kisro sprinted to me, crashing into my chest. Her tears stained my clothes as I embraced her, trying to soothe the child enough to escape. "It's okay, I promise it's okay," I hummed. Kisro calmed down under my touch, and I opened my coat to place her inside. She was a small girl and less than three years of age, so she had fit comfortably in my coat and was hidden away from whatever I would encounter outside of the hut.

"Now, you have to be quiet," I pressed my index finger to my lips, Kisro looking up at me for direction. "You'll see your grandmother soon." I knew I was running out of time and needed to leave the village before I was found, but how? I wrapped my coat tightly with Kisro inside and reached for the flap of the hut, opening it and half expecting a monster to be waiting on the other side. No one. I crouched through the entrance, searching for my surroundings. Dark figures stood on the dock, but they had made no move toward the village yet. I had a chance, but I had to run now.

With no hesitation, I sprinted across the village, praying to the spirits that somehow my tracks would disappear. My lungs were burning again from the cold and I was trembling out of fear, but I didn't care. I had to return Kisro to her grandmother and try to make it out of there, back to my family and friends. Each step through the thick snow felt like twenty, but I had almost made it to the wall that stood tall behind the village, separating my little world from the vast arctic. There was no soul in sight, its entrance open to me.