The Beginning

I was born on the back of a sky bison. My mother always said that explained everything, rolling her eyes at the other adults, who nodded quietly. I’m not sure what she meant by that. Anyway, our caravan was coming back from a trip to the Southern Water Tribe. I wasn’t due yet, but out I came. Miles of water in every direction, and my parents panicked as could be.

But everything turned out great! I mean, I’m still here, right? That story’s pretty boring anyway. My gran loves to tell it, but I usually fall asleep.

There’s a better one, about the time I got lost in the swamp. I was just a little kid then, maybe about eight, and I’d been following this butterfly mouse that had the brightest blue wings ever! Next thing I knew, it was getting dark, and the nice open forest had changed to a dank swamp. I didn’t know the area at all, because the caravan had never been there. We traveled all the time, so I didn’t really know any place very well.

At first it was wonderful! There were all these fireflies, and I pretended I was in the Spirit World. But then I was getting a little scared. There were all sorts of strange noises, splashing and croaks and growls. At one point, I heard this horrible shriek! I looked around, but all I ever saw was this funny little bird.

By the time it got really dark, I was really lost and hungry. I was only a little scared, though, because I was sure that Nini—my parents’ sky bison—would find me the next morning. This part of the story is a little dull, because nothing much happened except I shivered a lot and cried a bit.

But then I heard someone talking to me! I looked up and there was the strangest person I’d ever seen. And that’s saying something, because our caravan has been to some really strange places, like that village where they juggle geese. It was a man dressed in barely anything, which made me giggle, and his hat was made of leaves.

He had a lady with him too, and she started fussing over me something fierce. I guess I was pretty dirty, and I had been crying. But the best part was that Bao and Anh—those were their names—took me back to their village and gave me dinner. Then the next morning, they took me to the edge of the swamp, where Nini and my parents found me. Boy, were they happy to see me! I didn’t even get yelled at, they were so surprised to see Bao and Anh!

The best thing that happened to me so far is getting my Airbending. I was so surprised the first time I did anything, because I was way past the age most kids start. My mom just said it must have had something to do with me being born early, which never made any sense to me. Unless somehow I had to balance out that extra time being alive with extra time not Airbending.

Anyway, as soon as I started showing off what I could do, my parents packed me off to the Eastern Air Temple. I thought it would be fun, learning how to fly and stuff. Mostly, we meditated. But I have some great friends there, like Gyatso. He taught me how to skip class, and which of the teachers make the best pies, and how to Airbend a pie off a windowsill without anyone noticing!

It wasn’t always boring, but it was so hard to stay in one place instead traveling all the time. And it was even harder to sit in class and meditate. Learning wasn’t so bad—there’s some great stories about Avatar Kyoshi!—and the martial arts were really fun. Still, the longer I stayed at the Temple, the harder it was not to ask to go home.

Just when I though I couldn’t take it anymore, my saviors came! My saviors, of course, were my Aunt Kin Li, and my cousin, Kara. I didn’t know they were relations at first, I was just trying to sneak off to meet some other kids at a waterfall a few miles away—we were going to see who could fly closest without getting wet!

But one of the monks caught me, and he took my glider staff. Busted! I couldn’t join the other kids, and I knew I’d get extra chores for ducking class. Then this lady appeared out of nowhere, grabbed my glider from Monk Jinpa , and bundled me onto her sky-bison. It was so exciting! I thought for sure the monks would catch us, but Aisa sure was a champion flyer!

I was going to thank the lady and ask her to drop me off at the waterfall, but then she said she was my aunt. I was pretty surprised. I mean, I know that my mom had a sister, but I’d always thought she died. No one really talked about her in the caravan. Gran was telling a story once, and she was all caught up in it. She turned to my mother and said, “Sing Li, do you remember, it was then that your sister—“

But I never heard the end of that story. Gran shut up real fast, my mom was sort of angry and sad at the same time, and everyone else looked uncomfortable. Especially my dad. I know why now, of course. Because Aunt Kin Li ran away with my mom’s first boyfriend.

That was one of the best summers ever. The monks finally caught up to us, but not before Kara and I got to spend months together, free as the wind! She and my aunt had spent a lot of time traveling too, and we had so many years to catch up on. I was sad to go back to the Temple, but they promised to come back the next summer. The monks were glad I hadn’t actually been kidnapped, but not glad enough for me to get out of classes.

So it went, me spending the summers with Kara and my aunt and the rest of the year learning Airbending. I even have my very own sky bison, Shishu. She’s wonderful, one of my best friends. She and Aisa were so much fun to watch! Until two years ago. They were late coming to meet me, and I was getting worried. I wondered if they were in prison—Aunt Kin Li wasn’t the most upstanding citizen. Don’t get me wrong! I loved her, she was my aunt—but I learned some really shady stuff during those summers.

But it was worse than that. Much, much worse. Aunt Kin Li was dead. She’d hanged herself, because she’d gotten in trouble with a spirit. Aisa was dead, too, from an illness the spirit sent. And Kara is still in trouble. She’s got all these weird marks, like tattoos, from when the spirit possessed her. It’s still chasing her, trying to get revenge for something Aunt Kin Li was pretty stupid about. It’s not fair—she wasn’t a bad person, she was just greedy and a bit short-sighted. She and Aisa shouldn’t have died, and Kara shouldn’t have to suffer for a mistake.

I couldn’t leave Kara all by herself. I just couldn’t. So I snuck back to the Temple grounds and gave a note to Gyatso for the monks. I didn’t want them to come after me. I couldn’t just spend a summer with Kara and then leave her. So we’ve been traveling together even since. It hasn’t been easy, but it’s usually pretty exciting.

Someday I’ll go back to the Temple, but I won’t leave Kara until she’s gotten Jovo off her back. Shishu and I, we’re pretty much all the family Kara’s got, especially since my mom won’t even say Kin Li’s name. But Kara’s got a pretty good lead—she says there’s a village in the Fire Nation, some sort of relief effort for that awful plague. And that’s where the answer may lie. So, that’s where we’re going.