“Nothing, I was just acting like Sifu for a second there.” The smile faded from his face. Yun plunked the back of his head against the wall at the thought of Jianzhu. “It’s him I’m really worried about.”
That seemed backward. The student anxious about the well-being of the teacher.
“I didn’t realize it when I first met Sifu, but determining who should train the Avatar and how is a cutthroat business,” Yun said. “You’d think the masters of the world are these benevolent, selfless old men and women. But it turns out that some of them simply want to use the Avatar’s power and reputation to profit themselves.”
Jianzhu had told her something similar in the infirmary, that whoever taught the Avatar held immense influence over the world. Kyoshi regretted what she’d said to Kelsang the day before. He might have had reasons for wanting her to be the Avatar, but material gain was certainly not one of them.
“It’s especially bad in the Earth Kingdom,” Yun went on. “We call the prominent elders ‘sages,’ but they’re not true spiritual leaders like in the Fire Nation. They’re more like powerful officials, with all the politicking they do.”
He held up his hands, comparing his clean one to the one stained with ink during the battle with Tagaka. The color still hadn’t faded from his skin.
“But that’s partly why Sifu and I have been working so hard,” he said. “The more good we do for the Four Nations, the less chance that another sage tries to take me away from him. I don’t think I could handle having a different master. They would never be as wise or as dedicated as Sifu.”
Kyoshi looked at his darkened hand and wondered if she couldn’t hold him down and scrub the ink off his skin. “What would happen to the work you’ve done if—if—” She couldn’t finish the thought out loud. If it wasn’t you? If it was me?
Yun took a deep, agonized breath. “I think nearly every treaty and peace agreement Sifu and I brokered would become null and void. I’ve made so many unwritten judgments too. If people found out that it wasn’t the Avatar who’d presided over their dispute, and only some street urchin from Makapu, they would never abide by the outcome.”
Superb, Kyoshi thought. She could be responsible for the breakdown of law and order around the world and the separation of Yun from his teacher.
That was the worst prospect of all. For as long as she’d known him, Yun had staunchly refused to talk about his blood relations. But the reverent way he looked at Jianzhu, despite any arguments or bouts of harsh discipline, made it very clear: He had no one else. Jianzhu was both his mentor and his family.
Kyoshi knew what it was like to founder alone in the dark, grasping for edges that were too far away, without a mother or father to extend a hand and pull you to safety. The pain of having no value to anyone, nothing to trade for food or warmth or a loving embrace. Maybe that was why she and Yun got along so well.
Where they differed, though, was how long they wallowed in sadness. Yun sniffed the air and his gaze wandered until it landed on a porcelain bowl resting on top of the chest. It was filled with dried flower petals and cedar shavings.
“Are those . . . fire lilies?” he said, a wide, knowing grin spreading across his face.
Kyoshi flushed beet red. “Stop it,” she said.
“That’s right,” Yun said. “The Ember Island tourism minister brought a bunch when he visited two weeks ago. I can’t believe you simply shred the flowers once they dry out. I guess nothing goes to waste in this house.”
“Knock it off,” Kyoshi snapped. But it was too hard keeping the corners of her lips from curling upward.
“Knock what off?” he said, enjoying her reaction. “I’m just commenting on a fragrance I’ve come to particularly enjoy.”
It was an inside reference that only the two of them shared. Rangi didn’t know. She hadn’t been there in the gifting room eight months ago while Kyoshi arranged a vast quantity of fire lilies sent by an admiral in the Fire Navy, one of Hei-Ran’s friends.
Yun had spent the afternoon watching Kyoshi work. Against every scrap of her better judgment, she’d allowed him to lie down on the floor and rest his head in her lap while she plucked deformed leaves and trimmed stems to the right length. Had anyone caught the two of them like that, there would have been a scandal that not even the Avatar could have recovered from.
That day, entranced by Yun’s upside-down features dappled with the flower petals she’d teasingly sprinkled over his face, she’d almost leaned down and kissed him. And he knew it. Because he’d almost reached up and kissed her.
They never spoke of it afterward, the shared impulse that had nearly crashed both of their carriages. It was too . . . well, they each had their duties was a good way to put it. That moment did not fit anywhere among their responsibilities.
But since then, whenever the two of them were in the presence of fire lilies, Yun’s eyes would dart toward the flowers repeatedly until he was sure Kyoshi noticed. She would try unsuccessfully to keep a straight face, the heat coloring her neck, and he’d sigh as if to mourn what could have been.
Today was no different. With a wistful blush on his own cheeks, Yun stared her down until her defenses broke and she let out a giggle through her nose.
“There’s that beautiful smile,” he said. He pressed his heels into the floor, sliding up against the wall, and straightened his rumpled shirt. “Kyoshi, trust me when I say this: If it turns out not to be me, I’ll be glad it’s you.”
He might have been the one person in the world who thought so. Kyoshi had to marvel at his forbearance. Her fears were unfounded—Yun could still look at her and see a friend instead of a usurper. She should have believed in him more.
“We’re late,” Yun said. “I was supposed to find you and bring you to Sifu. He said he has something fun planned for us this afternoon.”
“I can’t,” she said, out of ingrained habit. “I have work—”
He raised his brows at her. “No offense, Kyoshi, but I think you’ve pretty much been fired. Now get up off that maybe-Avatar rear of yours. We’re going on a trip.”
THE SPIRIT