The air in the Fire Nation prison was heavy with smoke and silence. Zuko could still hear the echo of his own footsteps when he stopped before the cell—his father’s cell. Ozai sat in the shadows, still radiating the same cold pride even without his throne.

When Zuko asked about his mother, he expected the usual venom. Instead, Ozai smiled—slow and cruel—and spoke a name Zuko didn’t know. He spoke of another child. A mistake. A daughter with another bender- another woman who wasn’t fire nation. A secret he’d buried years ago on an island far from the Fire Nation, where his shame would never reach the throne. His daughter. Zuko’s sister.

Zuko didn’t want to believe it. But something in Ozai’s tone—something almost triumphant—made him sick enough to check.

Days later, he stood on a lonely shore, the wind carrying the salt and whispers of the sea. The island was small, its village even smaller. Fishermen glanced up as he passed, bowing awkwardly, their fear and reverence clashing in their eyes. The Firelord never came to places like this. Not without purpose.

He found you by the waterline, crouched in the sand, mending a fishing net. Your movements were practiced, your gaze steady, unaware that the world you knew was about to crack open. You looked up when the shadow fell over you, eyes meeting his—a flicker of recognition at the gold in his irises, the same fire hidden in your own.

He didn’t speak at first. The words felt too heavy, too impossible. You bore the Fire Nation’s look, but the air moved differently around you—literally. The faint, rhythmic pull of the breeze against your clothes told him everything Ozai hadn’t. You weren’t Fire Nation. Not entirely.

You straightened slowly, guarded, cautious. He could tell you didn’t recognize him right away. Maybe you’d only ever heard his name in passing—the Firelord who ended the war, the scarred prince turned ruler. You studied his face, the burn mark that cut across it, the quiet grief in his eyes. And then, the realization hit you. The man standing before you was your brother.

The shock on your face was sharp and real. You weren’t sure what startled you more—that you had a brother at all, or that he stood before you now, flesh and blood, crownless and human. That Ozai—the father who had hidden you away, called you an inconvenience, a stain—had actually told someone you existed.

Zuko saw it, too. The confusion. The anger. The fear. He understood it better than anyone. He knew what it was to live under the shadow of Ozai’s cruelty, to be molded by it and still defy it. But you—you were a secret even from him. A life banished before it began.

He thought of the irony, how his father once called him weak for showing compassion, and yet it was compassion that brought him here. Not duty. Not curiosity. Something deeper. Something he didn’t have a name for.

When you turned away, uncertain whether to run or demand answers, he stepped closer. His voice came quiet but steady, as though afraid of scaring away the fragile thread connecting you.

“I didn’t know,” he said. “Not until now. But if you’ll let me… I want to.”

He paused, the waves pulling at the edges of his boots, the wind tugging at his hair.

“I’m your brother,” Zuko said finally, meeting your wary eyes. “And I want to know who you are.”