fire in your eyes • zuko

xxii

The bow Nava was given wasn't a Yuyan one, but it would have to do, she decided. She tested the string by pulling it slightly and wasn't too pleased with it. Maybe she could purposely botch this plan without actually doing anything malicious.

She followed behind Azula and Ty Lee as they went to talk to The Warden of The Boiling Rock. She stayed outside, flanked by some soldiers as Azula spoke with him. Right before they went to leave, an announcement was heard over the intercom.

"All prisoners to the courtyard,"

"What?!" The Warden exclaimed. "Who authorized this?!"

Azula clicked her tongue.

"It appears we are in for a bit of a fight, ladies," she said. "Remember what I told you, Nava, and remember the consequences. Follow me."

Azula led them outside and back towards the gondolas they'd come in on. They got to the top just as a gondola was pulling away.

The Princess grabbed a pair of handcuffs clipped to a guard's waist and used her firebending to propel herself onto the cord, where she hooked the cuff around it and pushed herself forward, towards the gondola.

Ty Lee cartwheeled onto the cord and balanced on it, following Azula up the track.

Zuko squinted past his sister and at the deck and felt his heart jump to his throat.

"Nava's down there," he breathed. "But she – she's firing an arrow. Duck!"

A wooden arrow flew over the top of Sokka's head just as he ducked.

"I thought you said she was in prison!" he cried as another arrow embedded itself in the carriage's roof.

"I said Azula got her out, but I didn't know she would make her fight!"

"Hello, brother," Azula said breathlessly, ducking out of the way of a punch from Suki. "Do you like my little surprise?"

Back on the ground, Nava fired another arrow, purposely missing Zuko and nicking his sister's ankle. The Princess thought nothing of it.

Nava watched the group of them fight for a few minutes before The Warden stuck his head out of the gondola.

"Cut the line!" he screamed and was immediately pulled back in by another prisoner.

"He wants us to cut the line," a guard said from beside Nava.

"But if we do, there's no way he'll survive," another said.

"Neither will they, and he knows that."

A couple more guards ran up with a large saw. They began to cut the line, and as they did, the carriage up above started to rock precariously to one side.

Azula and Ty Lee jumped from the gondola to another one that was making its way in.

Nava lowered her bow to watch Zuko's gondola. Bile rose in her throat as the line began to give, but another appearance made her jump. A girl in dark red robes, Mai, she remembered, had thrown a pair of stiletto knives at the guards, effectively pinning their wrist-guards to the structure.

"What are you doing?" one of them demanded.

"Saving the jerk who dumped me," Mai responded.

Nava dodged a female guard that tried to grab her and aimed her bow at the guards that were going for Mai. She shot an arrow into one's hand and shot the other in the shoulder. They both keeled over at the pain as more guards surrounded the two of them. Nava and Mai made eye contact. Nava gave her a small nod and she returned it.