Avatar the last airbender : The Dual bender

Chapter 13

Liling faced with different types of situations before but none like this. She never thought that someone would try to take advantage of her. The moment that Shi grabbed her, Liling hit him with an object but didn't have much effect so she placed her hands on his shoulders and tried to burn him, earning a loud shout of pain, Shi pushed her back that she knocked over a few plates.

She squeaked as a blast of heat suddenly burst beside her, and quickly rolled over sideways, she felt the stinging sensation on her shoulder, searing pain shot straight through her entire body from the one spot of flayed skin, which was bleeding a little as the skin tingled with blistering heat.

She ducked her head down, biting on her lip to keep any noise from escaping as she saw Shi's shadow loom over her. His face set in a leer as he raised his flaming fist once more.

"Please...stop..." Liling whimpered softly, doing her best to move away as her burnt shoulder ached.

Shi didn't listen. His face was alive with malice as he made to punch another ball of fire at her. Liling raised her hands up in attempt to block it with her bending.

"Someone help!"

Liling felt the blast of heat But then, just before it could even touch her something happened, a hand grabbed at Shi's clenched fist and twisted it hard.

The flame extinguished at once, its disappearing light plunging the room into darkness.

But that didn't seem to stop the person that saved Liling, whoever they were, she could still hear the thuds and crashes as well as Shi's grunts and cries of pain.

Finally after a few horrifying minutes of darkness and shouts there was a loud shout and Liling squeaked in fright as something heavy crashed a few feet away, she kept her distance and grabbed the nearest thing to defend herself in case if whoever is helping her is defeated. A male voice groaned loudly in pain and another thud sound was heard.

A light flickered into one of the person's quickly turned to face who the person that helped her and her eyes widened. There barely about a foot away with a flame dancing in his open palm was someone she didn't expect.

"...Zuko?…" Liling breathed.

Zuko just nodded as he stood there, panting catching his breath. His dark red tunic was ripped completely down the center, exposing most of his sweaty torso, there wasn't a scratch on him except the bruised and bloodied knuckles on both his hands.

Liling opened her mouth to speak but even as she tried to sit up her shoulder stung horribly. She tried to clutch at her wound only to cry out in agony as it seared under her cool touch. She looked around for any water to heal the bruise. Zuko crouched beside her, looking at her closely her pink kimono was ripped to the side revealing more of her slender leg, her hair was messed up from the slight struggle. Liling quickly adjusted her top.

As he leaned over her, she winced and hunched over a little, she glanced at a small puddle of water as she raised her good hand to inspect how bad is the wound. This time Zuko was quick to grab it before she touched it. The fire he was holding vanishing at once.

"Don't touch it!" he hissed into the dark.

"Don't just grab me like that!" Liling hissed back. "I was just checking it!"

Liling patted her hand against his chest as he dragged her up to her feet, with one hand, as the other tried to spark another flame to light the room.

She sat down with a ragged breath in an attempt to calm herself down and Zuko could not help but notice that her face was unnaturally pale, he was used to her soft color, but she looked like a ghost.