Chapter 4: The Workshop Shed
The morning air was a slap of pure, blinding cold. Zuko welcomed it. It burned the fog from his lungs and sharpened the world into crisp, aching focus. The path to the workshop shed was a trampled line through fresh powder, his boots sinking with each step. He carried the echo of Sokka’s kiss like an ember in his chest, a fragile, glowing thing he was terrified of smothering.
He pushed the shed door open. The interior was a chaos of creative salvage. Light, dust-flecked and silver, streamed through gaps in the metal roof, illuminating floating motes. Half-finished kayak frames hung from the ceiling. A workbench was buried under sketches of strange machines, chisels, awls, and blocks of pale wood and darker bone. Leaning in the corner, incongruously sleek and deadly, were the pieces of his own Fire Lord armor.
The smell was salt, pine pitch, old smoke, and underneath it all, the faint, familiar scent of his own pipe tobacco from the night before last. It smelled like Sokka.
“You’re early.”
Zuko turned. Sokka stood in the doorway, backlit by the glacial sun, his wolf tail a little messier than usual. He held two steaming mugs. He looked as unsure as Zuko felt—a rare sight.
“Couldn’t sleep,” Zuko admitted.
“Tell me about it.” Sokka stepped in, letting the door creak shut. He handed Zuko a mug. It wasn’t tea. It was something dark and bitter smelling. “Seal-bark brew. It’ll grow hair on your eyeballs. Good for focus.”
Zuko took a cautious sip. It was vicious. It was perfect.
Sokka busied himself at the bench, clearing a space. His movements were brisk, efficient. “So. Carving.” He picked up a block of off-white, creamy material, smooth and dense. “This is what we have. Whale ivory. Salvaged, old stuff. Good for learning. Hard, but not unforgiving.”
He placed it in Zuko’s free hand. It was heavier than it looked, cool and solid.
“The first thing,” Sokka said, not meeting his eyes, instead focusing on selecting a tool, “is to see the shape inside. You don’t force it. You find it.” He chose a small, sharp gouge and a mallet with a head wrapped in leather. “Today, we’re not making the necklace. Today, you’re learning what the tools do. How the material feels.”
Zuko nodded, setting his mug down. The silence was a live wire.
Sokka came around behind him. “Here. Hold the ivory in your left. Gouge in your right. Like this.” His hands closed over Zuko’s, repositioning his grip. His chest was a solid line of warmth against Zuko’s back.
Zuko stopped breathing.
Sokka’s voice dropped, close to his ear. “You don’t fight it. You guide. Gentle, like you’re holding something precious. Let the tool do the work.”
His breath ghosted over Zuko’s neck. Every nerve ending from his scalp to his heels was suddenly, acutely aware of the point of contact—Sokka’s fingers laced with his, the press of his body, the low murmur vibrating through him.
Zuko’s hands were trembling. He willed them to stop. He focused on the ivory, on the pale, unmarked surface.
“Now, just a tap. To feel it.” Sokka’s hand over his own lifted the mallet and brought it down with a soft tok.
A tiny, perfect curl of ivory peeled away.
“See?” Sokka whispered. His voice had gone rough. “You’re a natural.”
Zuko’s mind short-circuited. The intensity was too much, this careful, agonizing tenderness. He needed to shift the balance, to regain some footing. He needed to breathe.
He let out a slow breath and set the gouge down on the bench with a deliberate click.
“What’s wrong?” Sokka asked, his hands falling away.
In answer, Zuko reached up. He found the simple leather tie holding his topknot. He pulled it, slow and deliberate, feeling the strands loosen. He shook his head, and a cascade of black hair fell free, sliding over his shoulders and down his back.
He knew. He knew from a hundred stolen glances across war room tables and campfires. He knew the way Sokka’s eyes would snag on the rare times he wore it down, the way his jokes would falter for half a second. It was a weapon, and he’d never dared use it.
Now, he did.
He picked up the gouge again, his movements languid. He leaned back, just a fraction, until his shoulders settled against Sokka’s chest once more. He felt the entire length of Sokka’s body go rigid.
“Is this better?” Zuko asked, his tone flat, innocent. “The tie was distracting.”
He tilted his head, just so, as he examined the ivory block. His hair, loose and heavy, brushed against Sokka’s jaw.
Sokka made a sound—a choked-off, strangled thing in the back of his throat. His hands, which had been hovering in the air, came down convulsively to grip Zuko’s hips, anchoring himself.
“You,” Sokka accused, his voice strained and hot against Zuko’s ear. “You are doing this on purpose.”
Zuko didn’t smile. Not quite. But he could feel it wanting to break through. “I’m learning to carve. You said to be gentle.”
He guided Sokka’s hand back to the tool, covering it with his own. This time, he was the one who placed Sokka’s fingers. He was the one who applied the faint, guiding pressure. He leaned into the touch, his hair creating a dark curtain around them, a private world smelling of ivory dust and Sokka’s soap and cold air.
Sokka’s breathing was ragged. His attempt at instruction dissolved. “The, uh—the grain. You have to go with the… spirits, Zuko.”
Zuko brought the mallet down. Tok. Another curl fell. He shifted slightly, the movement causing his hair to sweep across Sokka’s collarbone.
Sokka groaned, a deep, defeated sound. He dropped his forehead to the juncture of Zuko’s neck and shoulder, his nose pressing into the loose hair. His grip on Zuko’s hips tightened. “This is unfair warfare. I’m unarmed.”
“You’re the one with all the tools,” Zuko murmured. He set the tools down again, his hands now free. He half-turned in the circle of Sokka’s arms, just enough to see his profile, the flutter of his closed eyelids, the tension in his jaw.
Sokka lifted his head. His eyes were dark, the blue almost swallowed. All pretense of a lesson was gone. “You have no idea,” he said, the words raw, “how long I’ve wanted to do this.”
He didn’t kiss him. He buried his hands in Zuko’s hair, fingers sliding through the thick waves, fisting gently at the nape of his neck. He just held him there, foreheads touching, breathing the same air, while the dust motes danced around them in the slanted light.
“Show me,” Zuko said, the command a whisper.
Sokka didn’t need to be asked twice. He kissed him, and this kiss was nothing like the ones before. It was not a shock of confession or a soft beginning. It was deep and consuming, a claiming. It was Sokka, finally without the joke, without the mask. It was all want, years of it, hot and desperate and sweet with the taste of the bitter bark brew.
Zuko yielded to it, his own hands coming up to grasp Sokka’s parka, holding on as the world narrowed to the warm cavern of Sokka’s mouth, the scrape of his stubble, the solid reality of him. The workbench dug into his back, a dull pressure beneath the whirlpool of sensation.
Sokka broke the kiss, trailing his mouth along Zuko’s jaw, down the column of his throat. “You’re going to be the death of me,” he muttered against his skin.
“Good,” Zuko breathed, arching into him.
The shed door flew open with a bang.
They sprang apart, guiltily, like children caught raiding the sweets. Zuko’s hair was a disaster. Sokka’s lips were swollen.
Hakoda stood in the doorway, a large gutted fish in one hand. He didn’t look surprised. He looked deeply, profoundly amused.
“Workshop shed,” Hakoda stated, his voice bland. “Behind the smokehouse. Mid-morning.” He looked from his son’s flushed face to Zuko’s, and a slow smile spread under his beard. “I see we have different definitions of ‘mid-morning.’”
“Dad!” Sokka’s voice cracked.
“Chief Hakoda,” Zuko said, straightening his tunic, his Fire Lord formality a pathetic shield.
Hakoda stepped fully inside, ignoring them, and hung the fish from a hook on a ceiling beam. “Carry on,” he said, his tone suggesting they do nothing of the sort. “Don’t mind me. Just storing lunch.” He wiped his hands on his trousers and turned to leave. At the door, he paused, glancing back at the ivory block and tools forgotten on the bench.
“A word of advice, Zuko,” he said, his eyes crinkling. “If you’re going to distract the craftsman, maybe don’t use the sharp tools. Safety first.”
The door shut behind him, leaving a silence twice as loud as before.
Sokka stared at the closed door, his expression one of utter horror. He slowly turned to look at Zuko.
A laugh burst out of Zuko—a sudden, helpless, sharp sound that felt like it had been trapped in his ribs for years. It broke the tension, shattered the embarrassment.
Sokka’s horrified look melted into a rueful grin. Then he was laughing too, a loud, wheezing sound that filled the small shed. He slumped against the workbench, holding his stomach.
“Oh, spirits,” Sokka gasped between laughs. “The look on your face. Priceless.”
“My face?” Zuko shot back, still chuckling. “You looked like you’d been caught training a penguin to steal.”
They leaned against the bench, shoulders shaking, the absurdity of it all washing over them. The fear, the years of silence, the monumental confession—all momentarily reduced to being scolded by Sokka’s father while in a compromising position over a piece of whale ivory.
The laughter faded, leaving a comfortable, breathless quiet. Sokka nudged Zuko’s shoulder with his own. “So. Wanna actually learn how to carve something? Maybe a simple fishhook? Something less… symbolically loaded?”
Zuko looked at the ivory, then at Sokka’s smiling, open face. He reached out and took his hand, lacing their fingers together. His hair was still down. He left it.
“Yeah,” Zuko said, squeezing his hand. “Show me.”