Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

June had been a bounty hunter for as long as she cared to remember. To ask if some of her catches haunted her was to be the same kind of moron that asked why she spent so much of her money on booze.

To say that the ex-prince was haunting her, though. Now that was getting into bad joke territory.

As if him dying in the most dramatic manner possible⁠—freezing and drowning and eaten by a shark?⁠—wasn’t inconvenient already, him coming back was putting the whole camp on edge. The guards were jumping at shadows. Given that the days were getting shorter and shorter, and they were working into the night now, some of those shadows were prisoners.

Just about the only people not jumping were the ex-prince’s ex-crew. Especially that one guy who kept telling spirit stories from their travels. Stories the rest of his crew invariably backed up, because they were lying little shits. And they kept smirking at her when no one else was looking, like there was a joke she should already know. She smirked back, because she could be a lying shit, too.

But she was getting real sick of a fake ghost getting people real bruises. How did she know it was fake? Because the only real things in this world were those that could get picked up by a shirshu’s nose. And that had only ever led her to bodies; never ghosts.

So when the spooky guy started in on another story over dinner

And the guards were staring uneasily at the darkness outside

And some of them started gripping their weapons while looking inside

She was as done with this as she was getting. And what was the point in being a fake noble, if she couldn’t order idiots around?

Lady June stood up in the middle of the mess tent. Slapped her hands down on a table.

(A guard had just come in, and the cold wind rushing in the door sent her fancy coat billowing nobly around her.)

“So you all think there’s a ghost,” she sneered. “So what? he’s our ghost. Stop fucking worrying about it.”

Which at least shut them up long enough for her to eat her water-and-salt soup in peace.

And that might have been the end of it

Except that that was the night the guards started screaming and didn’t stop (until they did, until everything was silent) and the tops of their ice prisons opened up and bled clothes down the walls.

Fucking drama queen ghost.

…But it really was warmer, when she slipped on a third coat. (Over her other camp-issued one, and under her fancy coat. Lady June had standards.) Maybe she should have worked harder to get that kid a second one when he was still stomping all around, demanding that the prisoners deserved them.

(At no point, then or now, did she consider returning his own coat. Because it was Her Coat, now.)

And then, after the guards all got defrosted and replaced by other guards, and they’d herded the prisoners back to work⁠—then, people started nodding at her. And half-bowing. Why. Why were they doing that. She raised her chin back, and gave them her most modest smirk, but it didn’t stop it from being deeply weird.

“You were right,” one of them whispered. “He’s our ghost.”

“Of course,” she said back, nice and haughty, because when someone says you’re right, that was the only reply. And if she knew one thing about nobles, it was that they were always right. Lady June was no exception.

“We have received no reply to your letter,” the Chief guy said, doing that thing big men did where they pretended to confuse statements with questions so if you answered⁠—or didn’t⁠—they had an excuse to be angry with you, either way.

Of course they hadn’t gotten a response. Letters from bounty hunters didn’t typically rank gubernatorial attention. But June was hoping that some overworked secretary, sitting some place much warmer than here, was going to make an exception if she sent enough of them. Particularly given her recent dealings with the actual governor.

Regular June’d had dealings with him, that was. She was Lady June, while she was in front of these men. Lady June had all the confidence in the world, and the powerful family to back it up. One that cared about their daughter, she tacked on, while she was imagining things anyway.

So Lady June looked at Chiefy and his not-a-question, and raised an eyebrow. “Making you wait puts you in your place. What, did you think most of these prisoners matter to the Fire Nation? Did anyone even ask for them back, or were you the ones that sent the first letter?”

Oh boy, those faces said everything.

She waved a hand, smoothing that all away. “But you’ve got me, now. And I,” Lady June bluffed, “matter. They’ll reply. Let’s get your response in order.”

“We don’t even know what they’ll say,” one guy said.

She re-raised her eyebrow, and turned it on him. “Don’t you?”

Which got the smarter ones all talking over each other like they did. She just had to stand there, and smile like they were forgetting something.

The raised eyebrow worked a lot less well on the camp cook, who pointedly did not put more in her bowl.

“You really think we can live on this?” she said. They had a charming little stare off, right up until one of the guards prodded her along.

“Thank you for trying, my Lady,” someone said. Like she’d been doing it for all of them, not just her own sad little lunch.

“Someone has to,” she replied, in her best Lady June voice.

This apparently gave her fellow prisoners expectations about her, and how much she cared about anyone that wasn’t her. So when the guy who kept saying the creepiest things got his leg snapped under a sideways sledge, when they all knew that made him a slow-motion goner, they started looking at her. Like Lady June had done anything for them, ever. Like any noble ever had. But maybe she could swing a decent meal out of it.

“Tell your chief,” she said, to a guard, right in front of those lookers, “that I will speak with him over dinner tonight. He can choose: his place, or mine.” She let a mirthless smile curve her lips.

And hey, audacity win: they really did lead her into the city around the next meal break.

Audacity lose: they led her to his office. And as much as she channeled her inner shirshu, she couldn’t catch even a whiff of food here.

“You invited yourself to dinner with me,” the Chief said, sitting while she still stood, and looking deeply unimpressed. “Are you trying to seduce me?”

Straight to the point, then.

And clearly uninterested. Which saved her a whole lot of eyelash fluttering. Last time she’d had to pull that, she’d gotten an eyelid cramp.

“No,” she said. “I’m trying to get doctors into the camp. We’ve got a man with a broken leg. More than one case of frostbite, too. And there’s a cough spreading.”

“I was not under the impression Fire Nation nobles cared about our more worthless prisoners.”

He had her there.

“Will that be all?” he asked, doing the opposite of what he’d done last time: now he was asking a question, and making it a statement.

“Will we get a doctor?”

“Don’t try to arrange dinner again,” he said.

She was going to call that a maybe.

…And of course, the creepy guy had died while she was gone. Fell through the ice, just like a certain useless prince. And she’d missed dinner in the camp.

“You tried,” someone said, like it was the dead guy part she was upset about; like she needed consoling.

She didn’t. She needed a refund, needed to invoice someone for the time she’d put into fake caring for the guy, needed to make it an open tab because one guy drowning⁠—no shark this time, at least⁠—didn’t negate that they really did need doctors in here, before people started dying in even more preventable and potentially contagious-to-her-own-self ways.

Huh. Lady June was the kind of noble that could feel moral outrage. Gross.

The person who’d taken it upon themselves to talk to her had two black-tipped fingers on their hand. They were doing some fiddly work fixing the ships; something that mittens only got in the way for.

“Still,” they said. “Thank you for⁠—”

“Stop thanking me,” June snapped. “I’ve done literally nothing for you.”

Apparently these people loved a humble noble. The next person who looked at her like her lackluster attempts at humanitarianism were endearing, she was going to punt straight over the camp wall and into the ocean. At which point they’d probably thank her for their freedom. Incredibly gross.

The ex-prince’s crew continued smirking.

“Your governor finally deigned to write back,” the Chief guy said, as she stood before their council once again. They didn’t even offer refreshments. Stingy clients were the same everywhere.

Apparently the prince’s sister was being sent. That “coming to negotiate in person” sounded vaguely ominous to June, but these guys were debating whether it was some kind of slight, that the Fire Nation was sending a woman.

A teenage girl, if June’s memory served, but she wasn’t about to correct them.

“Wasn’t she Fire Lord?” one of the councilors asked.

“I believe the entire royal family has been Fire Lord,” said Arnook, looking like a man who was nursing a headache.

“Does she even have the authority?” another said.

“To speak for the colonies?” June interrupted. “She does. More so than the Fire Lord in Caldera, at the moment.”

Because the last June had seen, the colonies were all for their double teenage Fire Lords. Good thing they’d gone in for redundancy, given what had happened to their prince. Hopefully the siblings hadn’t been close.

“If I might suggest,” June interrupted again, while they were debating the girl’s actual title and how good any deal with her and the colonies might be, given the very obvious civil war writing on the wall. “It’s traditional to offer a host gift.” It was absolutely not. “A sign of goodwill. Which will, of course, be reciprocated in better starting terms once negotiations begin. Might I suggest releasing all the female prisoners when she arrives? It will be a powerful show of your trading power, and free up supplies and guards to focus on the male prisoners. Who are, of course, doing most of the heavy lifting.”

Most importantly: June was a singularly important subset of “women.”

“And it would set you free, without any bargaining at all,” the Chief guy said, catching on real fast.

“And place me in a better position to act as liaison to your interests. Or do you think this Fire Lord turned princess is going to trust the word of someone still held prisoner? You could be making me say anything.”

“You told us these prisoners were useless,” Arnook said. “That you’re the only real bargaining chip we have.”

Some idiot waterbending guard had let their only real bargaining chip get eaten by a shark.

“I’ve seen how you feed us,” June said. “We’re only going to drain your resources more, as it gets colder. You don’t have enough to keep us all. And you should know from your own records that most of these women are lower ranked.” Not that she’d taken a head count. But she’d never heard of a female general, so she was pretty sure sexism in the Fire Nation took the form of The draft is for everyone, but promotions are for men. “Do you want a good start to these negotiations? Do you want all the supplies and contracts you’re going to ask for? Or do you want frozen bodies? Make the women into their problem. Make me into an asset.”

“We’ll discuss it,” Chiefy said.

June didn’t delude herself into calling that one a maybe.

Still. When she got back to camp, when people started looking at her again, she held her chin high.

“Azula herself is coming for us. No one is allowed to die until then. Understand?”

Some of them actually smiled, the idiots.

“Yes, Lady June,” they said, like they were returning a fondness, instead of following the only order she could give.

(The northern council was right: Azula was coming for exactly one of their prisoners.

It was extremely fortunate that no letters had been sent concerning a certain idiot’s death, or she would have been coming for all of them.

The targets of this pronoun are left as an exercise for the reader.)

Certain someones who wished the prisoners fed⁠—not to name mask buddy names⁠—could not just give them food. Food wasn’t sitting around in warehouses to be shipped elsewhere, like it was in the Earth Kingdom and Fire Nation, who’d spent a hundred years feeding their front lines. The Northern capital certainly stockpiled more food than any Water Tribe village Katar⁠—a certain someone had heard of, but it wasn’t like stocking up ahead of winter was an unfamiliar concept. Anything stolen from the city could mean families going hungry.

But if the food just happened to swim its way into camp… that wasn’t stealing from the community. That was contributing.

So it wasn’t so much a heist, in the end. Unless one counted the (temporary) theft of a shark.

The Greenland leopard seal shark waited just off the coast, most of its bulk hidden under an ice shelf, with only its nose above the surface. Penguin-sheep baaed in the waters all around. The herd had to return to land sometime, and it was camped directly under their favorite slope. It took in a breath through its nose, and blew bubbles out of its gills. It waited. And waited.

And noticed, immediately, as the ocean went strange. Water no longer flowed over its skin, but halted entirely, like it was in a bubble of perfect stillness.

The bubble stayed. The stillness didn’t. It was accelerated forward⁠—

Which was even more alarming for the penguin-sheep it was being accelerated towards. Particularly as the water itself seemed to be pulling them straight back towards it.

The shark did not think in a way recognizable to humans. Nonetheless, when life gives you penguin-sheep…

The shark stopped struggling against the bubble, and opened its mouth.

Ice cracked, and a new tunnel under the camp opened.

Outside the igloo of one Lady June, the guards were jumping at shadows even more loudly than usual.

June needed another pillow. One to shove over her head. The pillow currently under her head was a rolled up spare shirt, and it was staying right there between the cold ground and her beauty sleep.

“Do they ever shut up?” she groaned.

“Do you?” grumbled back her attendant.

“SHARK,” someone screamed.

“TEETH,” screamed another.

“HEL⁠—”

The shouting stopped again.

Baaing replaced it.

…The baaing also stopped.

“If it bleeds shirts again, don’t wake me up,” June said.

“If it bleeds shirts again, I’m suffocating you with them,” replied Engineer Hanako.

“Make sure to use the ones in my size. Your size would take forever.”

Engineer Hanako was already awake. No time like the present to sharpen more shivs.

When the morning shift came, they found the evening shift pinned to various surfaces. Again. The hole that had claimed two of their prisoners was open. Again. And gaping wider than ever.

No human footprints appeared around it; only bloody drag lines, over the impressions of something very large, and very old.

Spikes ringed the hole, like teeth in an open maw. On each was neatly skewered a dead penguin-sheep.

A very full shark slept contentedly off the coast, blowing the occasional bubble from its gills.

“…Are those for us?”

“Of course they are. He’s our ghost.”

“Is it ghosts, now?”

The penguin-sheep had obviously been left for the prisoners. Like the clothes.

The guards did not find this obvious.

“Get a sledge,” one of them said. And then they ordered the prisoners to start taking down and loading the carcasses, which was fine.

And then they started to pull them out of the camp, which was not.

“Those are ours,” one of the prisoners said.

It still might have ended there, except that the ice creaked under the sledge, and the prisoner dragging it tried to leap away, and one of the day guards shoved them back. Another guard was already bending the ice thicker, but that just led to more creaking.

“We’ve already lost two here,” someone muttered. “Do they want us all dead?”

And the guard who’d shoved the prisoner back. That guard heard them, and snorted.

Which was about the time the riot started. People forgot about that creaky ice and surged forwards, shoving at guards, who shoved back with hands, then fists, then waterbending, and any second now someone was going to break out their firebending. June reached down the back of Hanako’s pants and grabbed herself a shiv, hiding it up her own sleeve and keeping her back to the shorter woman’s, but this was one of those rare times that stabbing someone wouldn’t improve her life. If this kept up, people were going to die and it wouldn’t even help her.

And there went the firebending, some kind of out-of-practice fireball, and that guard was levitating one of the giant ice teeth⁠—

“Stop,” June said, shoving the idiot firebender out of the way. Back into the crowd of prisoners, hopefully to be forgotten. As for the guard: she faced him, arms outstretched.

“Your Chief is in the middle of negotiations with the Fire Princess. Who is on her way here. How is it going to look, if your prisoners are freshly beaten when she gets here? If your noble liaison is impaled?” That was her. She was the noble liaison. Currently un-impaled, and liking it, but if this guy thought he was scarier than half the people she’d beaten to bounties, she still had a shiv up her sleeve with his name on it.

One of the head guards pulled the idiot with the icicle away.

It didn’t fix anything. They still had to watch the guards drag all that food away; all they’d won was the right not to be forced to do it themselves. And all these other idiots had tipped their collective hand; shown that they weren’t good little broken-spirited prisoners. That when it came down to it, they were going to fight.

June felt cold even under her third coat.

She had no idea how long it would take that princess to get here. Didn’t know if the girl would turn right back around, when they couldn’t produce her brother. She had even less idea how many prisoners would still be here, when the girl arrived. The North knew⁠—thought they knew⁠—that everyone here was expendable. Except for June. And with the ships nearly done, expendable was going to be even more contagious than the cough going around.

Lady June was protected by her position.

Her non-existent position. Which was going to get revealed as soon as the princess arrived, seeing as she didn’t have a prince on hand to placate her with.

“I’ve got to get us out of here, don’t I?” June asked.

She certainly didn’t see anyone else doing it.