Chapter Text
There was already a candle burning in the kitchen when Kya entered. Between the flickering flame and the moonlight streaming through the window over the sink, she could make out Korra and Asami sitting across the table from each other. Their hands were clasped tightly on top of the table. Kya couldn’t see their faces, but their auras gave off waves of sadness.
Before she could decide whether to interrupt or go to the dining hall, Korra leaned back, wiping her eyes and said, “You can come in, Kya.”
“Oh, sweetheart, I didn’t mean to interrupt.” She knew the young woman had been having nightmares for years and figured this was probably related. Both women were in their pajamas and Asami looked more concerned than upset herself. “I was just going to make some lavender tea…it helps with sleep. Would you two like some?”
“That would be wonderful, Kya,” murmured Asami before Korra could decline the offer. The two shared an exchange of facial expressions in the darkness, before Korra’s shoulders slumped and she cast her eyes down to the table. Asami reached out again for her girlfriend’s hand.
Kya smiled to herself. They made a nice couple and if there was someone who could understand the trauma Korra had been through, it was Asami, who Kya was sure had ghosts of her own. They all did, it seemed. The dark spirits always made their way into the depths of the mind late at night. She pulled the kettle down from a shelf and with one hand bent the water to fill it up. With the other hand she grabbed the tin of lavender tea.
Asami materialized by her side, grabbing three teacups from the same shelf. Kya made a motion with her hand and the young woman understood, taking down a fourth cup. She glanced over her shoulder at Korra who was still staring at the wood of the table as if she could bend it. It must have been bad tonight. Kya’s heart broke a little more. To be so young with so many scars.
“Do you want to talk about it?” asked Kya gently as she waited for the tea to heat on the stove. Korra’s face snapped up in surprise. “You don’t have to. Some people say it makes them feel better…but for others it’s easier to just try to forget the dream.”
Korra’s blue eyes flickered towards Asami. In the candlelight, Kya could see the tear tracks on her dark cheeks. Asami walked over and placed her hand on Korra’s shoulder. Gently, she said, “Kya’s right. You can talk to us. Was it Zaheer again? The poison?”
“No…” Korra’s voice was raspy from crying. “Not really…I don’t know. I couldn’t…”
“Sometimes our dreams are an interpretation of our fears, not an exact recreation.” Kya didn’t often have nightmares, but during her travels, she had worked with victims of war, abuse, and oppression. Some of the healing needed was more spiritual than physical.
“I guess…normally I’m fighting Amon or my uncle or the Red Lotus. Tonight, I was just walking through Republic City and suddenly everyone was gone. Everyone. I was alone…and I was just running up and down every street, but I was so alone…” Korra buried her face in her hands and Asami wrapped her arms around her shoulders, holding her close. Korra’s muffled voice came from beneath her arms, “It wasn’t even that bad of a dream. I feel so stupid for crying like this.”
“Everyone reaches their breaking point,” murmured Asami. She brushed her fingers through Korra’s short brown hair. “Like Kya said, sometimes our fears materialize as something else. And you’re not alone. I promise you never will be again.”
“Thanks, ‘Sami.” Korra wiped her eyes again and Kya turned away to give them a moment of privacy. The water was almost to the correct temperature, so she pulled the kettle off the heat and spooned in the tea leaves to let them seep.
A shadow crossed the kitchen door and Kya looked up to see a yawning Suyin creep into the kitchen. “Looks like I’m not the only one having trouble sleeping. Is that lavender?”
“Yes, would you like a cup?” Kya was reaching for another teacup before the other woman could answer. “What’s keep you up?”
“Nightmares,” replied Su with a sigh. She gave a little wave of her hand, as if waking in the middle of the night was nothing to worry about.
“Seems to be a lot of that going around tonight,” muttered Korra. But her tears were gone and Asami’s hand was held firmly in her own.
Suyin crossed the kitchen to give Korra a hug. “Oh, I’m so sorry. We’re lucky to have each other, though. Although I think Bataar would like to get some sleep. I used to have night terrors as a child, but I grew out of it. However, after everything that happened with Junior and Kuvira, I’ve been waking up at all hours.”
Kya began to bend the tea into the cups, careful to leave the leaves in the bottom of the kettle, and said, “I remember that. You were probably five or six, but you would wake up the entire island when you stayed over because it felt like an earthquake.”
“At least I grew out of that. Although Bataar swears sometimes he can feel the bed move,” said Su with a chuckle and she accepted the cup of tea. She took a deep breath to inhale the smell of lavender. Kya set the other two cups onto the table for Asami and Korra. She could feel Korra’s mood lifting as she listened to them talk. Su was right, it was good that they had each other.
“What about you, Kya, anything you want to talk about?” Asami cradled her cup in her hand. It was a nice gesture, to ask how she was feeling, but Kya wasn’t awake because of her own dreams tonight.
“It wasn’t me. The tea is for Lin…sometimes she can’t go back to sleep after a nightmare, but the tea usually works.”
Su’s eyes widened in surprise. “Lin? She never had nightmares!”
Kya regarded the younger woman for a moment. Su was right, Lin never had nightmares as a child. But Tenzin had mentioned once or twice that she had developed some after being on the job for a couple of years. But Su wouldn’t know anything about that. “She won’t talk about them. But I’m pretty sure tonight was about Amon. She had to get her feet on the ground pretty quick.”
Both Korra and Asami nodded in understanding. Lin didn’t like to talk about it, but she did let Kya comfort her after a nightmare now, which was progress. Kya could tell when the dream was about her bending, because she needed to touch the element as soon as possible, as if to remind herself that she had gotten it back.
Su took a sip and then asked, “Amon? The Equalist? I read the reports…but I don’t understand…”
The realization dawned on Kya like a cold splash of water. Su had no idea what had happened to Lin. The thought both saddened and infuriated her at the same time. Every step the sisters had made in repairing their relationship was shadowed by years apart. It didn’t surprise Kya to know that Lin never told Su that she had lost her bending. It was a weakness that she would have never exposed; a piece of her life too traumatic to relive. Part of her was angry that Su had severed their relationship so badly that Lin couldn’t trust her with the information.
It was Korra that told her, because Kya was trying to find the right words. “Amon took Lin’s bending.”
“What?!” The outrage and grief in Su’s voice was satisfying. Lin had suffered and neither Toph nor Su had been there to comfort her. Su’s green eyes found Kya, as if asking for confirmation. When Kya didn’t answer, Su said, “I had no idea. She never…”
“She doesn’t like to talk about it,” shrugged Korra. “I don’t either. I mean, I unlocked my airbending, but when I thought I was never going to be able to bend the other elements, I had no idea how to handle it. I was the Avatar who couldn’t bend. It was devastating. And for Lin…”
“She lost everything.” Kya had found her voice. Lin had pushed everyone away when she lost her bending. Lin’s identity was in the earth and metal; it was the worst time of Lin’s life.
Su had to sit down while she processed the information. “How? How did he get to her?”
“She sacrificed herself to let Tenzin get away with his family,” said Kya, a piece of her heart breaking all over again. She remembered Tenzin telling her and their mother in a corner of the hut while the rest of his family slept. The guilt he had felt was heart wrenching.
“Amon wanted me, and she wouldn’t give me up,” added Korra.
The candle on the table flickered as the room fell into silence. Kya knew she should be getting the tea back to Lin, but she needed to make sure Su understood the woman her sister had become. Korra and Asami sipped at their tea, but Su sat frozen in her chair.
“That’s Lin, though, isn’t it?” Su’s voice was soft and contemplative. She wiped a single tear from her eye. “All she ever does is protect the people she loves. Even if it hurts. All she ever wanted was for everyone to be safe…for me to be safe. And I threw that all in her face.”
The emotional response caught Kya by surprise. At least it seemed that Su knew what she had lost by pushing Lin away. She was lucky to be back in Lin’s life and she knew it. So, Kya picked up her two cups and started to the door, saying, “I should get back to Lin.”
Before she could exit the kitchen, however, a fifth woman entered the room during the midnight hours. Pema looked like she had just woken. Her hair was tussled, and Kya was pretty sure she was wearing her husband’s robe instead of her own by the way it dragged on the ground.
“Oh, sorry, ladies,” she said as she took in the scene. “I just-”
“Had a bad dream?”
“Hmmm…” Pema’s eyes flittered over the room as if she were looking for someone. “Yes, a bit of one. I just needed to check on the kids, but Ikki isn’t in her room and I can’t find her…”
“I’m sure she’s around here somewhere,” reassured Asami. She walked over to the sink to dispose of both her and Korra’s cups. “We can help you look.”
“No, no, it’s not important.” Pema shook her head, but Kya could see the fear was still eating away at her. Like Asami, Kya was sure that Ikki was fine, but Pema had been so close to losing her children so many times that she didn’t blame the woman for needing to check up on them.
“Come on, sometimes she slips into my room,” said Kya. “Goodnight ladies.”
Su, Asami, and Korra all replied with their goodbyes. Asami and Korra left, hand in hand, back to their room. Su remained at the table, staring into her cup, as if the lavender would bring back the years she lost with her sister. Kya led Pema down the hall to her and Lin’s room, carrying the tea. Pema shuffled along silently beside her.
The door was cracked open, so Kya used her foot to push it the rest of the way. Her heart soared at the sight in front of her. Lin was laying on her back with her eyes closed and chest moving up and down slowly with each calm breath. Spiraled out on top of her was a dark haired eleven-year-old. Ikki was clinging to Lin, her face buried in her chest. Lin had an arm draped protectively over the little girl’s body. Both were sleeping soundly.
Kya turned to Pema, trying to blink the tears out of her eyes, and offered her a cup of tea. “She’s not going to need this tonight, so you should have it.”
Pema took the tea without question and looked as choked up as Kya felt. Pema asked, “Do you want me to take her back to bed with me?”
“No, dear, we’ve got her.”
Pema left and Kya closed the door softly behind her. She crept to the bed and climbed in as quietly as possible. Bending over, she pressed a kiss to her lover’s forehead and then her niece’s. Neither moved, both lost in sleep. It seemed that the dark spirits that had visited Air Temple Island tonight had been vanquished. Love had a way of doing that.