Stratus | Avatar: The Last Airbender.

Chapter Two | Families.

"Ugh! I can't find anything to eat! I can't live like this!" Zuko whined, stomping his feet childishly. "I wasn't meant to be a fugitive, this is impossible."

I looked over at him, tearing my eyes from my scroll. He looked good with his new haircut, really good.  I chuckled as Iroh stared at a flower, Kaze lay on the ground, resting.

"Finally want to ask for help, palace boy?" I teased from my seat on a rock, rolling the scroll back up. I got up, producing a small knife from my sash before I began to wander off into the deep forest. "Don't do anything stupid."

Finding food was easy in the vast forest, I leapt up into a tree, slowing my breathing as I let my eyes flutter closed. I waited for a few minutes, listening to every sound the forest had to offer. Suddenly, my eyes snapped open as I heard a rustling in a bush a few yards away and I skilfully made my way through the trees until I was just above it.

I stared down at the bush, waiting for the animal of sorts I'd heard to reveal itself and it did moments later. A bunny hopped out of the safety of it's burrow and I brought my hand back silently, letting out a breath as I steadied myself. I threw the knife at the bunny, impaling its head, wincing as it let out a strangled squeak before it died. 

I jumped down to retrieve it, pulling out the knife. I found a couple more rabbits before returning to the others, food in hand. When I entered the clearing we'd taken refuge in, Zuko shot up into stance as I hummed softly, assuming that it could've been fire nation soldiers. 

He stared at the rabbits in my hand, three to be exact. His uneasy eyes flickered up to mine.

"I'm used to hunting my own food." I shrugged as I sat down on my rock, skinning the rabbits. Zuko grimaced and looked away. Iroh was sniffing a flower. "Iroh, what are you doing?"

"It's the rare white dragon bush." He explained, Zuko wandered over to look at the flower, I glanced up from the rabbits to look at it. It was pretty, I guess. "It's leaves make a tea so delicious, it's heartbreaking. That or it's the white jade bush and its poisonous."

"We need food, not tea!" Zuko groaned, slumping down in front of me, watching me prepare the rabbits for cooking. I glanced up at him before carrying on with my work, ignoring my bloodied hands. "You don't mind doing that?"

"I did at first." I shrugged, tossing the bits I didn't need to Kaze as a snack. "I hated myself when I first had to kill something, but in the north pole, food was rare and anything you got could be counted as a blessing."

Zuko nodded, watching me as I went to find sticks to cook the rabbit on, I found some eventually and sat back down in front of Zuko, who had sprawled himself out on the grass in my absence.

"Mind if i borrowing your amazing gift?" I asked jokingly as I held the rabbit on stick up. Zuko nodded, leaning up to hold the rabbit as he blew a stream of fire onto it, cooking the food instantly. "Thank you."

I handed Zuko some of the rabbit, eating a bit myself and saving some for Iroh and for later.

"Your hair looks really good like that." I commented, biting into the warm food, savouring the taste. Iroh was still over in the middle of the clearing, debating whether the flower was poisonous or not. Zuko paused from eating and blushed.

"Thank you..."

He wandered off after he'd finished eating, claiming he was going to catch some fish, yeah, I laughed and told him it'd never happen. Let's just say he got very competitive and promised to come back with three gigantic fish. Ah, he was such a fool...

"Iroh." I groaned, lifting my head of the rock as Iroh began to brew the leaves." Don't do it."

"It could be a white dragon bush!" He protested, watching it brew. I rolled my eyes, before closing them. I listened to the wind for a while before I heard a yelp.