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“Of course not. We’ll get you some gloves if you want, but in this country your hands are nothing to be overly surprised about. Half the attendees tonight have dueling scars hidden here and there underneath their clothes.”
“You don’t.” Rangi’s skin was unmarred everywhere Kyoshi had been lucky enough to see it.
Rangi snorted. “That’s because I don’t lose duels.”
She pushed herself out of the chair and twirled, swishing her dress so she could inspect her own hem from all sides. Rangi wore a formal silk gown that gave her the swept, elegant appearance of a stamen emerging from a flower of blood-red petals. She looked lovelier than a garden after a brisk rain.
“I know it sounds frivolous and wasteful, but appearances matter here in the palace,” Rangi said. “Fire Nation nobles dress and act to represent their clan affiliation and rank. Our peers notice our smallest choices and assign meaning and intentions to them.”
She smoothed a crease in Kyoshi’s skirt. “Deep in the bowels of the Earth Kingdom, no one was watching us. That’s how we got away with half the antics we did. Here in the Fire Nation, everyone is watching you. I want you to remember that. Everyone. Is. Watching.”
Kyoshi’s stomach gurgled from the mounting stress. “So, it’s not going into battle,” she said. “It’s worse.”
Rangi didn’t disagree. “Your clothes will pass for now, but as the festivities progress, you should choose different looks. And it goes without saying, but no face paint during the length of the holiday.”
Kyoshi was going to protest, but Rangi poked her in the chest. “The paint is for pulling jobs with our sworn brothers and sisters,” she whispered, her eyes glistening with memories. “Not for mingling among abiders and square folk who don’t understand the Code.”
Kyoshi stared at her. Then slowly, deliberately, she enveloped the smaller girl in her embrace and kissed her on the forehead. Rangi squeezed back tightly.
There should have been no doubt in Kyoshi’s mind. The Firebender hadn’t officially taken the oaths, but the Flying Opera Company were her friends too. And Rangi’s friends were as sacred as honor to her. Kyoshi had gone so long without her center she almost forgot what it felt like. Rangi made her human again, balanced and whole.
“You better get your fill of this now,” Rangi murmured as Kyoshi brushed her lips against her. “When we’re in public, you cannot touch my head or my face or my hair.”
But those were Kyoshi’s favorite parts. “Really? You’ve always let me.”
Rangi unraveled herself from Kyoshi and fixed the arrangement of her hairpins. “That’s because back in the Earth Kingdom it didn’t matter, but here, touching someone’s head outside of your closest family is one of the most disrespectful gestures imaginable. It’s best if you avoid touching anyone in general, including me. I hate it as much as you do, but now that we’re actually inside the gates of the palace, we have to follow decorum.”
She eyed Kyoshi with suspicion, having been on the receiving end of many kisses to the scalp due to their height difference. “I mean it. Hands off from the neck up.”
“I get it, I get it!”
A knock came from outside the room. “Avatar, Mistress Rangi, it’s time to go,” Jinpa called. From his carefully measured pitch, it was obvious he was trying to give them as much clearance as possible. They joined him in the hallway.
The monk had chosen the version of Air Nomad traditional robes that pinned up at one shoulder and left the other uncovered. His arm and the side of his torso were exposed in a bare sweep down to his waist, revealing a surprising set of muscles on the lanky young man.
“What?” Jinpa said at their silence. “Too pastoral?”
Rangi shrugged. “Usually people don’t go shirtless in the royal palace, but there’s bound to be exceptions for national dress. It’s fine.”
Kyoshi was glad her fans had escaped commentary. They rested in her sash, passable as court fashion unless she thumped someone with their heavy weight. It was ironic that she first thought them less useful than a blade. She’d need the comfort they provided, given the daunting task ahead.
She exhaled through gritted teeth. “All right. Let’s go meet the Fire Lord.”
“You two are worthless,” Kyoshi whispered, doing her best to direct her ire equally between Rangi and Jinpa, who kneeled on either side of her. “You’re both fired.”
“Lord Zoryu promised me it would be twenty to thirty people, at maximum!” Rangi said through a tightened smile. “A small gathering!”
“Does this look like a small gathering to you?!”
Over five hundred pairs of golden eyes stared at the Avatar and her companions as they perched on a raised dais that had been erected with unbelievable speed in the same formerly empty gardens they’d observed from above on Yingyong. It seemed like the entire assembled nobility of the Fire Nation was present, standing at attention, watching Kyoshi their one and only objective.
In a banked row off to the side, percussionists bellowed over their mallets thundering against drums the size of wine tuns. Erhu players sawed at their instruments with such ferocity that a pile of destroyed bows lay behind them. They tossed the casualties of their performance over their shoulders and drew fresh ones from nearby quivers without missing a beat. The speed and martial intensity of the music was at odds with the calm, almost meditative stillness of the listeners. Kyoshi wouldn’t have known if they were enjoying it if not for the slight approving nods she caught here and there from the members of the court nearest her.
She should have known something was wrong from the start. Chancellor Dairin had ambushed them outside their quarters and whisked them through a series of baffling passages, explaining there had been a last-minute change to the program. Now here they were, being deafened and honored in equal measure.
Having supported a few grand events as a servant, Kyoshi knew that hosts only pulled out the stops like this if they had something to prove. But there was nothing for the Fire Lord to be insecure about, unless he thought she was evaluating him on how lavishly he feted her. She would assure Lord Zoryu this kind of reception was unnecessary, if she ever made it to his side.
Right now the Fire Lord was very far away, on the other side of the sea of nobles, nested on a platform that mirrored Kyoshi’s. In the distance she could only make out the gold-on-black edging of the royal armor shoulder pieces he wore over his robes and a couple of his most prominent features. She could tell the Fire Lord was a young man with a pointy chin and a tall forehead, and that was about it for now. Squinting for more details would have been rude, and detectable by the entire gathering.
