The Rise of Kyoshi (Avatar, The Last Airbender)

There was a struggle in Kyoshi’s chest that had nothing to do with how hard she was running, notes of longing and fear played in one chord. She tamped the feeling down, not wanting to confront what it meant right now. In any case, it was a poor time to be distracted.

Soon they exhausted their supply of houses to leap over. They reached the shanties in the outskirts, causing more confusion for the residents who’d seen Kyoshi and Rangi head inward for the night but now flee for their lives in the opposite direction with three other people in tow.

Lek raced for the copse of trees without being told, perhaps understanding that there were only a few places you could hide a ten-ton bison. Kyoshi reached the copse in time to catch the boy as Pengpeng roared and blasted him backward with wind.

“Easy, girl!” She coughed, her lungs burning from the run and inhaled building dust. “They’re with us.”

Walking across the sky must have been a highly efficient technique, because no one else seemed as tired as she. Rangi leaped onto Pengpeng’s neck and unwound the reins from the saddle horn. The daofei climbed onto the bison’s back, gripping her fur with strange familiarity. Once they were settled, Rangi took Pengpeng up above the treeline.

Lek was ecstatic. “A bison!” he screamed, drumming on the saddle floor. “A real bison!”

“Calm down!” Rangi said. “It’s not like you can’t see them near any Air Temple.”

“He’s just excited because we used to have one of our own,” Wong said. “Cute little fella named Longyan.”

Despite their need to move quickly, Rangi paused, leaving Pengpeng swooping around in a gentle, idling circle. “Wait, how?” she said. “Only Air Nomads can tame bison. The animals won’t listen to strangers if they’re stolen.”

“We didn’t steal Longyan,” Kirima said. “He was Jesa’s bison.”

Rangi squinted in confusion and turned to Kyoshi. “But wasn’t Jesa . . . your mother?”

Kyoshi winced. She spotted a reprieve from the awkward conversation, albeit only a temporary one. On the ground below them, waving his hands, was Lao Ge. He’d managed to escape the dozens of men who had him surrounded and made it to the hiding spot in better time than anyone else.

The daofei didn’t look one bit surprised to see him. Rangi took Pengpeng low and Wong leaned over, clasping hands with Lao Ge and swinging him onto the saddle, again with the smooth ease of practice. “I thought we might finally be rid of your stinking hide,” Lek yelled.

“Not quite so easy,” Lao Ge said. “Is anyone else thirsty? I could use—”

“Shut up,” Rangi snapped. She fixed Kyoshi with her gaze again. “Does that mean what I think it means? About your mother?”

She looked hurt at another secret being kept from her. But Kyoshi had honestly, sincerely forgotten to bring it up. It hadn’t been relevant until now.

“Yes,” Kyoshi said sheepishly. “My mother was an Airbender. I’m half Air Nomad.”

She felt terribly guilty. She’d forced Rangi to absorb a lot in the past day. Finding out that Kyoshi wasn’t the fully Earth Kingdom girl that Rangi had assumed this whole time was yet another small weight added to the pile.

But hearing that a despicable criminal and gang boss was an Air Nomad would have been enough to shock and confuse anyone. People around the world looked up to Airbenders as enlightened paragons who were free of worldly concerns. They belonged to a benign, peaceful, monastic culture that was so spiritually pure that every single member had bending ability.

Rangi resembled a child who’d just been told that the sweets tucked underneath her pillow had been left by her parents instead of the Great Harvest Spirit. Kirima and Wong detected the awkwardness between them and remained silent. Lek wasn’t so observant.

“What’s everyone looking sour for?” he said, slapping Rangi and Kyoshi on their backs. “We finally have a bison again! Our best days are ahead of us!” He thrust his fists into the air and let out a whoop. “The Flying Opera Company is back in business!”

They camped along the bank of a dried-up creek, hiding themselves by virtue of being way out in the middle of nowhere. If the officers in Chameleon Bay knew what direction they’d gone in, it still would have taken at least a day by ostrich horse to catch up. They didn’t bother hiding the fire Rangi blasted into the ground for them. It burned larger than they needed, sputtering and crackling from unseasoned fuel. They ate the last of the dried food.

Kirima and Wong fell asleep first, without asking about shifts. Lek waded in the waterless creek, picking up a few polished stones that caught his fancy before he settled in for the night.

Rangi was holding a grudge over how badly the day’s events had gone—almost getting arrested by the local police, the daofei insinuating themselves into their camp, the revelations about Kyoshi’s heritage—so the two of them engaged in a silent, petty contest of wills to see who would fall asleep next. Kyoshi had the advantage, knowing that there was probably a nightmare waiting for her. She made sure Rangi was truly out cold before laying the good blanket they’d kept hidden from the others over the Firebender’s shoulders.

Kyoshi walked along the river, wobbling over pavestone-sized rocks that had once been underwater, until she found Lao Ge sitting under a gnarled tree. Half its roots had been washed clean in some long-ago flash flood, while the rest clung tightly to the bank. The tree’s efforts were in vain. It was dying.

Lao Ge’s eyes were closed in meditation. “You’re very loud,” he said.

She frowned. She’d practiced stepping lightly for years as a servant, to move like a whisper so as not to distract guests.

“I mean your spirit is loud,” the old man said. “It rings in the air. Sometimes it screams. Like right now—your body may be all the way over there, but your spirit is grabbing me by the shoulders and howling in my face. If you went to the Spirit World in your current condition, you’d cause a typhoon the size of Ba Sing Se.”

“I know who you are,” Kyoshi said. “It took me a while to figure it out, but after seeing you fight so many men at once, it was clear.”

He opened one eye a crack. Kyoshi had a theory that people who liked meditating practiced that gesture to look good-humored and wise.