Traitor - Zuko X Reader

Chapter 9

The warm glow of the candles that surrounded my mother's chambers danced on my skin as I sat on her bed. She sat behind me, gently combing my hair with my favorite wooden comb that Iroh had made me for my ninth birthday. Later that evening, my mother and I were supposed to attend a gathering of fire nation nobles being held at the palace. There was going to be a large feast that would adjourn into the ballroom for a dance. It was to be a very elegant event, so I asked my mom to do my hair for me.

"So, are you excited for the party my dear?"

I smiled, "Yes! Ty Lee is coming and I can't wait to be able to show her my handstand. I've been practicing since the last time she visited."

My mother began to weave some strands of my hair together into two small braids, "What about Zuko? Aren't you excited to see him?"

I scrunched my eyebrows, "I see him almost everyday, mother. What is different about today?"

"Oh nothing," I could hear the smile in her voice, "Just that I think he will ask you to dance tonight."

My face heated up, "Mom! Zuko and I don't like each other like that!"

She laughed as she placed a flower-shaped brooch in my hair, "Well, you never know. Maybe one day you two will marry!"

I felt my entire body heat up and I tried to play it off, "You're crazy, lady."

I felt her shift behind me and just as I turned to see what she was up to, I felt her hands begin to attack my sides. My laughter echoed throughout the room and I begged her to cease her tickle-attack. She finally released me and smoothed the back of my hair. Her touch was always so gentle and her eyes mirrored it as she gazed down at me with a content look in her eyes. Although behind her mask of content, I could always feel her unease begin to appear the longer she stared. It would linger in the room, even after she left to go get ready herself. As I put on my dress for the party, I began to wonder what could be the reason for her look of guilt she masked with a face of calm. We had the perfect life here in the palace. Besides the occasional rude comment from the fire lord and Azula, we were both well-respected and loved here. There was nothing to be worried about here, right?

Suddenly, a large splash of water hit me right in the face, waking me from my nap. I quickly rose from my sleeping position in the sand and looked around for the culprit. My eyes immediately moved to Sokka who was looking everywhere but me as I glared at him.

"Sokka! What was that for!?"

"You were talking in your sleep, figured I'd wake you up," He shugged from the leaf he had strewn himself across.

I huffed and made my way into the water, "A simple yell of my name would've worked fine you know!"

He didn't respond as he continued floating in the lake we had found. I glanced over to Katara who was in the middle of showing Aang how to properly stance himself to create a water-octopus. I would see Aang's cheeks redden and smirked to myself before wading around in the water.

It had been about a week and a half since we parted ways with Pakku. He had left Katara and Aang with useful gifts of healing water and water bending scrolls, while he told me and Sokka to 'take care'. Since then, Aang almost killed a bunch of earth kingdom soldiers after they put Katara's life at risk to make him enter the Avatar state. The entire debacle was a waste of time and it ended with me having to chew out the soldiers for putting a literal child's life in danger just so they could use Aang as their own personal spirit-weapon.

I was glad we could all finally relax, as there was no more Zhao to worry about and there had been no sign of Zuko coming after us. We had been on edge for a few days after the attack at the North Pole, waiting for him to show his face and try to take Aang, but the attack never came. This both eased my anxiety about Aang being kidnapped in the middle of the night but also caused a new anxiety to form over what had happened to Zuko. I let him escape, but had no idea of knowing if he ever even made it out of the pole.