Chapter Text
The grass was soft under Chaishu's fingers, and the trailing sleeves of his robes dragged as he felt around for the tray of young flower bushes. The feeling was foreign and unwieldy. He didn't normally wear the flowing robes that were common in the Fire Nation; they were always in the way and interfering with his hands.
Besides, it wasn't as if he could see them.
But here, working in the palace, and the Fire Lord’s private garden no less, he wouldn't dare wear anything else. People had been banished or even executed for less, even those far more well-regarded than he.
Carefully, he pushed the dirt down around the bush he had just planted, securing it in the ground. He felt for the grassy edge of the flowerbed and followed along it. One finger-length from the border, and one finger-length from previous flower. He stuck one finger down to mark the place, reached to his right and felt for the tray with all the sprigs in. They were lined up in rows of six, and he was assured that they were all the identical, so he didn't have to worry about colour. He picked one up and rested it next to the small hole as he widened it enough to fit the plant's roots and attached dirt, before placing it in gently, and filling the hole.
The pattern was repetitive, easy to relax into. Every now and then he would scoot over to reach the next plant. The ground was damp and the soil soft after the recent rain, making the task far easier than if it had been done during the scorching summer that had just passed.
He was so engrossed in the careful task that the first he knew of someone else's presence was them kicking him in the side as they tripped over him.
On instinct, Chaishu curled up and put his arms over his head to protect it. As he did so, he heard, and felt, the tell-tale crunch of the bushes he had painstakingly planted, now crushed underneath him as he rolled.
“Are you okay?” A gravelly voice asked from beside him. “I'm sorry, I was rushing, and I didn't even see you there. Stupid of me considering.... well, you are wearing red robes. Should be obvious, huh.”
Slowly, Chaishu uncurled and sat up. He looked towards the voice, now a blobby shadow against the dim light that passed for his vision. As he did so, something hit him in the forehead, then quickly retracted. Must have been the stranger's hand. He wanted to say: 'well done asshole, you just kicked a blind person – by the way, watch where you're going, idiot.'
Instead, because this was a much bigger concern, he said, “What are you doing here?”
The stranger, perhaps they thought they were clever, answered, “What are you doing here?”
Chaishu’s jaw dropped, and he fought to keep his voice low. “This is the Fire Lord's private garden! You need to go before anyone catches you.”
“Why?”
Chaishu took a steadying breath, expecting the Fire Lord to come marching through at any second, shouting and growling and spitting fire like the stories he had heard. “Are you simple? Nobody is supposed to be here. If the Fire Lord catches you, he'll... You shouldn't be here.”
“You're here,” the stranger - boy? Man? - pointed out. Obviously, he was simple.
“I am gardening,” Chaishu retorted, suddenly reminded of the plants he had just crushed. He turned around and felt his way back along the line to see how many he had to replace. There seemed to be far more than the one or two that he had rolled on.
“Oops,” the stranger said, possibly only just noticing the damage. Damage caused by an extra body. “Sorry.”
“Sorry!? I'm going to have to replace them all. What if someone comes through while I'm doing it? Especially...”
“The Fire Lord?”
“Guess you aren't so simple after all,” Chao muttered, feeling himself back along the row to where the ruined plants stopped and the unruined plants began, intending to work himself back along the line and then continue planting.
“Let me help you.”
“I don't need your pity. Or 'charity'. Worry about yourself if the Fire Lord catches you here.”
“At least let me replace the damaged ones, since it was my fault.”
Chaishu hesitated. “What if you're caught?”
“What if you’re caught?”
“You-”
“Look, I'd feel terrible if I ruined your work and didn't at least replace the bits I messed up. I promise I'll take all the blame if you get in trouble.”
Resolve wavering, Chaishu finally gave in. “Fine. You can help. But don't stay too long, ok? You might feel bad for ruining the plants. Imagine how bad I'd feel if this got you executed.”
“Executed for sitting in a garden?”
“Executed for sitting in the Fire Lord’s private garden.”
“This is the family’s garden.”
“As far as I know nobody except the last Fire Lord has used this garden for years. Maybe over time it's just become his private garden. Besides, he doesn't have any family, so it's his private garden anyway.”
“Oh. Where should I put the… I'm just gonna put the old plants in a pile over here. By the tray, I mean. I guess we can dispose of them later.”
“Sure,” Chaishu said, hoping that the stranger was doing a decent job.
They sat for a minute or so, silently working. Finally, the stranger said:
“You're blind.”
“No shit.”
“I deserved that,” the stranger said, sounding embarrassed. “Sorry, I was just trying to break the ice. Because, I have another blind friend, and she sees through her bending.”
“Boohoo for us non-bending types,” Chaishu said, digging his fingers just a little bit too harshly into the ground. “I would burn myself too many times to consider firebending, even if I could.”
“She's actually not a firebender. She's an earthbender.”
“You've met an earthbender? Do you work in the prisons?”
The stranger laughed. “No. Just travelled a lot.”
“In the Earth Kingdom?” Suspicion rippled under the surface of his mind. “Are you a noble?”
“Not really,” the stranger replied.
“Not really? That's kind of a yes/no question.”
“Then no.”
A pause. “Are you sure?”
“No. I mean, yes,” the stranger corrected. “I’m sure that I’m not.”
Chaishu wasn’t entirely sure the stranger wasn’t a liar, but let it slide. After all, no nobility would deny their status. And none would stoop so low as to help a blind boy garden. A few more minutes passed in silence, before the stranger spoke again.
“So…”
“Go on.”
“Sorry, this is kind of awkward.”
“Believe it or not, I'm used to awkward,” Chaishu said, enjoying the stranger’s discomfort just a little bit too much.
“Ha, I guess so. I was just wondering, why are you doing this alone? I mean, I've never seen you around in the gardens before, so I thought you'd be an assistant, or a trainee, or something. I thought there would be more gardeners working on the Fire Lord's personal garden.”
Chaishu sighed. This stranger was odd. He responded in entirely different ways than Chaishu could expect. But he wasn’t cruel, or at least he didn’t give that impression. It was more likely that he simply didn’t understand.
“I'm disposable,” Chaishu finally answered. “And desperate. Not many people want to hire blind guy. And I need the money, and nobody else wants to tend to these gardens. Because of what happened to the last guy, you know.”
“What happened to the last guy?”
“He...I think the Fire Lord disliked his decorations. He was executed.”
“Ozai did that? To a gardener?” The stranger sounded surprised. He must have been from out of town. Nobody from the Caldera would bat an eyelid at ex-Fire Lord Ozai doing something like that. Nor refer to him without his title. “That's awful.”
“That's the Fire Lord. So now, any jobs that someone can point me where to go and then leave as quickly as possible, I do. I clean a bit in the palace as well. Work in the laundry room. Carry messages sometimes. Turn the spit in the kitchen.”
The stranger was silent again, this time for longer, and Chaishu found himself surprisingly comfortable with the silence. He even felt disappointed when the stranger announced that he was done.
“I don't know if I was as precise as you,” the stranger said. “But that's all the ones I messed up. And we weren't caught by anyone.”
“Thanks. As long as the Fire Lord doesn't come marching through here in the next few minutes, it seems you're in the clear. That was...actually really nice of you.”
“You're welcome. It was nice meeting you. Um, I've just realised that I don't know your name.”
“Chaishu. And yours?”
“Lee.”
“It was nice meeting you too, Lee.”
Lee's soft footfalls fell away. Chaishu guessed that Lee had bowed to him at some point. Everyone was obsessed with bowing. At some point Lee would probably remember. A small smile crossed Chaishu’s face at the thought of Lee remembering that he had bowed to a blind person.
'Lee' did remember. Later that day, in bed, and the embarrassment of it caused him to be awake half the night thinking about it. At least no-one else had seen him, he reasoned. Especially Chaishu.