(Zutara) Hold it Gently; My Heart Burns For You

Bato of the Watertribe

Zuko isn't quite sure what happened as her and her beast bound away.

~ ~ ~

He's pretty sure he's got it figured out by the time he finds her again. The tavern she's chosen to hole up in for the night is seedy and dank. A place filled with cheap ale and cheaper company. Zuko remembers such places from when he was fifteen.

Lieutenant Jee had just joined his personal retinue following a discharge from his previous unit due to substance abuse. Apparently, the lesson did not take. Looking to start off in his new superior officer's good graces, he insisted to the fifteen-year-old Zuko that bonding with the crew over drinks would be a quick and easy way in to earning their respect. Really, it was Jee's attempt to normalise his habit, make it seem nothing out of the ordinary to the spoiled prince. He probably thought he'd hit the jackpot in a commander looking to drink away his doubt, bitterness, and loathing.

Zuko responded by banning all alcohol on his ship. If his crew wanted to waste his hunt for the Avatar getting pissed out of their minds, then it had to be on the shore. And if they were too drunk or hungover to make it back by the time they set sail, Zuko saw it as no great loss.

Bodies shove and push against him as he marches through the press, pushing and shoving right back. Uncle simpers and commiserates in his wake, but Zuko only has words for the woman collecting her coin at the low table in the centre of the throng. The smoke makes his head hurt, so he focuses on the spiralling black snake inked into June's pale shoulder. It writhes with each armful of coin she drags towards her.

She looks up from her pile, a sly half-smile slashing her mouth as they approach. "Must not have lost my charms after all."

"Something even your beast couldn't sniff out, I'm sure," Zuko responds, taking the seat she doesn't offer.

"My Shirshu," she corrects, "can sniff out anything."

"Good." He reaches over and plucks a coin from her pile. Arms full, she watches him warily. "Your monster made extensive damage to my ship."

"Well I'd love to help you out, but as you can see, I'm a little short on money." She eyes him pointedly until he returns the pilfered coin to her pile. She grins, licks her bottom lip. "Drinks on me."

The crowd surrounding Zuko cheers. Her attempts to remind him how outnumbered he and his uncle are do not faze him. When she lifts her drink to take a sip, he snatches her wrist before she can taste a drop. "Money isn't what I had in mind."

"I'm not that kind of girl." She leans into his space, curling her hand so she can put the cup down and trace a finger along the inside of his wrist. Her eyebrow raises in interest when she bumps the ridges of his scar. "At least not sober. As for a bounty hunter, well, I'm not above using my charms."

"As persuasive as I'm sure you are, I doubt that will work on our intended quarry," Uncle chuckles from behind Zuko. His eyes have not left June once.

"Seems to be." She winks playfully to Uncle, but she's all lidded eyes and raspy innuendo to Zuko. Whatever she needs to get the job done, he supposes. While Zuko's limited experience with women all start in the same smoky tavern setting as this, the women don't usually already have the coin when he finds them.

"I need you to find someone." He cuts to the point.

"Thought you already did that part." The intent leaves her eyes when he doesn't share her smirk. "Wait, you're serious? You're not here to-"

"No." He looks around, at the men watching, more the pile of coin than them. Still, Zuko's never been a fan of spectators. "Outside."

Moth's buzz around a greasy lantern, their wings parescoping the glow. Through the film of dirt, the light is oily and dim, but it catches the glass as light always seems to do. June leans against her beast and, even in the dim light, it is clear to all gathered the mirth is gone from her dark eyes. They zero in on the necklace Zuko holds up. "What happened, your girlfriend run off on you?"