Wandering Prince
Avatar the Last Airbender, Zuko SI
09
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I watched Yue move as she and Pakku sparred. She had improved at a frankly phenomenal rate since she first started learning how to waterbend for combat. Honestly, it was kind of scary how fast she picked it up. She had a real affinity for it. Of course, given her connection with the moon spirit, that wasn’t exactly a stretch of the imagination.
There were still some areas where she could use improvement, of course. Namely, Yue fought like a caster instead of what amounted to the mini-cultivators that benders were. She didn’t like to move much, if at all. Unfortunately she was strong enough that Pakku couldn’t actually force her to move, and Pakku himself leaned towards the caster fighting style, possibly due to his age, so it wasn’t a lesson she was picking up. She was getting much, much better at static defense and offense, and her control of any water in her vicinity, but what she was missing was a vital part of bender combat.
She just needs more practice, I mused, my hands slipping into my pockets as I watched. Finding the smooth, warm surface in my right pocket, my thumb ran over it, feeling the designs on the face and the subtle differences in blue jade, silver, and gold as it warmed a bit more to my touch.
The little necklace was always warm to the touch now. I’d been experimenting a bit with it, using both fire and energybending, and it had a piece of my chi stuck inside it. This close, I could barely feel it, but if I set it down and walked away from it, I could close my eyes and point to it anywhere in the city—like knowing where my own arm was.
I had finished my little project making Yue’s necklace and was happy with the result. We were coming up on the end of the two weeks we had been given to make a decision by Yue’s father and I was willing to take the dive. At the very least, going this route would buy a bit more time for Arnook, as it would solidify his position among the chiefs, and we wouldn’t have to worry as much about a potential civil war breaking out.
Now, if Yue can convince her mother to let her take a little trip away from home for a while, I mused as I watched the beautiful woman move, flowing through her waterbending forms.
Letting go of the necklace, I moved my hands into my lap and conjured a ball of green fire, slowly bouncing it from one hand to the next as I studied her. The way her movements flowed. The weight behind the water she used. As I did, my mind wandered to thoughts of oil on water…
The fireball in my hands shifted from a bounce to a roll as the movements of the flame became more fluid. It slowly built, gaining a modicum of substance to it, until it felt more like rolling water between my hands in the tub. Until eventually… it splashed. I cursed quietly and extinguished the fireball, then patted out the droplets that had started to catch on my pants. Once I was sure I wasn’t about to burn myself, I made another fireball.
Eventually, her practice for the day ended and I stood up, brushing my pants off. Yue smiled, saying a quiet thanks to Pakku for the instruction, before making her way over. “How about we get out of here?”
“Out, or out?” Yue asked with a smile.
“Out out,” I confirmed, and she nodded happily.
I had come prepared and my boat wasn’t parked too far away, so we didn’t have far to walk before we were seated and moving through the canals at a decent clip. Now that she could, Yue took great pleasure in using her own bending ability to open up holes in the walls for us, then closing them behind us, as we made our way down through the locks. We made it outside the wall and I cut the engine. We could see the ice bergs hiding waterbender patrols ahead of us and there were guard towers on the wall behind us, but at the moment we were hidden by those same ice bergs and too close to the wall for either group to see us.
“Let’s go right this time,” I said quietly, and Yue nodded as I turned the tiller to move us to starboard and Yue began using easy back and forth motions in her seat beside me to move us along silently. Standing, I moved over to my lowered mast and got ready to raise it, as I kept an eye out for the watch towers. We moved past the ice jutting out from wall and around the bend, out of sight of the wall.
“Well? How was it?” Yue asked, just as quietly.
“Sight line from the wall is spotty if we stay close to the cliff. Only the far observation tower has eyes on us and since it’s lunch time, they’re busy,” I confirmed, raising the mast and deploying the sails. “You tired at all?”
“Nn,” she shook her head as she stopped bending and the sails caught the wind. “I’m fine.”
This was our little secret, and the plan we had worked out together since first leaving the walls in the boat. On our second date, Yue took me on a romantic moonlit stroll along the top of the wall, where we had ourselves a nice little picnic and I heated food and tea for us, while we took in the sights. It was as we sat there, staring out at the moon hanging over the ocean, that Yue again voiced her thoughts on simply leaving with me. Training from my time with the Yuyan archers kicked in and I found myself observing sightlines, guard rotations along the wall, and the much reduced waterbender patrol presence out on the water—with only two boats instead of the usual six to eight they kept during the daytime.
From there, we had begun using our dates to plan a hypothetical escape, if we wanted to leave in a hurry. When we went out on my boat, we used the time to survey the area around the wall outside the city. On Yue’s dates, we walked around the outskirts of the city, climbing to the top of the inner walls with the help of Yue’s waterbending to make a path, to look out over ice sheet the city was carved into and at the waterfall pouring down. From there, we had begun to make a plan, just in case her father nixed the idea of Yue traveling with me.
“What do you think?” Yue asked as I settled down beside her.
“It’s going to be safer to stow the boat out here and walk up and over, than to try to leave by the front gate.”
“The ice sheet is dangerous, but think you’re right. We won’t be going out far anyway. If we plan our route now, it should be fine,” Yue smiled at me.
“Great. As soon as we’re out of sight of those icebergs, let’s find a place to park. Oh, and before I forget,” I reached into my pocket and pulled out the necklace I’d made for her.
Yue’s eyes went wide as she took it and turned it over, examining it intently. The stone blank I had chosen matched the blue of her eyes. I had carved waves into the outside, giving the impression of a whirlpool, with the only irregularity being slits at the left and right side, where the ribbon that would go around her neck threaded through. In the center circle, I had carefully etched in a scene of the moon in all of its phases over ocean waves—with the center, full moon eclipsing the sun behind it. The moon phases I had scooped out and filled with silver, while the sun was a ring of gold around the silver of the moon. As for the ribbon, for that I’d chosen a nice, Fire Nation approved shade of red. I figured, if people were going to be pissy about the engagement when they heard about it anyway, we might as well flaunt it.
“It’s beautiful,” Yue whispered, before handing it back to me and turning around, gathering her hair up away from her neck.
Seeing her intent, I tied it in place. “Too tight?”
“A little tighter,” she requested, and I pulled the little bit of slack I’d left in it closed, before tying it in place. Yue made herself a mirror out of ice and beamed a happy smile as she took in her reflection. “I love it.”
It wasn’t long after that when I turned us towards the cliff and brought the sails in, then lowered the mast. Yue brought us the rest of the way in to the cliff, before standing up. Her arms came up, then down, and a large section of ice flowed down into water, leaving behind a hollow just large enough for the boat. She turned us around and carefully backed us in, before raising a thin sheet of ice over the opening to hide my boat.
I provided a ball of light for us to see by using energybending, then Yue froze the rest of the water in the cave. We stepped out onto solid ice and she quickly began making a set of stairs upwards, with a rail along the side to hold onto, as we ascended up out of the newly made artificial cave. After a bit of a walk, we made it up to the surface and into the too bright sunlight, blinding as it was reflected off of the ice sheet. I dispelled my ball of chi and Yue took a moment to mark the location of our hidden stairwell, raising a couple of pillars of ice that looked like they might be natural.
“Alright, let’s keep back from the edge here,” I said, moving us a few yards inland from the edge so we wouldn’t silhouette ourselves. Then, it was an hour or so trek through the snow with Yue walking at my side, arm in arm, creating a big divot in the ice that led to the edge of the cliff, all the way back to the basin Agna Qel’a was dug into.
We approached from the north, where the waterfall fell into the spirit oasis, with Yue making us a path down through the ice that came out at the back of the oasis, which she hid as soon as we were through. Once we were out, I took a look around the warm, green area and whistled quietly.
“Amazing.”
“It is,” she smiled. “Come see,” she gestured for me to follow.
I did and she led me to the moon shaped spring in the heart of the oasis, sitting down on her knees on the grass in front of it. I dropped down beside her and took in the two fish there—one black with a white spot on its head, the other white with a black spot on its head.
“I like to come here, when I want to be alone,” Yue murmured.
I reached out and took her hand in mine and the girl smiled. “We had a pond back home that the koi and turtle-ducks shared, and I liked to sit and feed them.”
“You’ll have to show me.”
“Absolutely,” I agreed with a chuckle, before shifting my attention to the fish as Yue leaned against my side and we fell into a comfortable silence together. They provided no sudden revelations or inspiration as I studied them and thought on applying waterbending elements to firebending. After all, I already understood the complex interplay of gravitational forces between planetary bodies and water, leading to tidal forces, waves, shifts and movement within the planet itself, wind, and more.
Although, I mused, that might be the best way to start it out. Like a tide rushing in, carrying an oil slick on fire…
“Zuko?”
“Hm?” I hummed in question, turning to Yue—just in time to catch her lips as they pressed into mine.
“Mm~,” the girl smiled against my lips.
The kiss was chaste but sweet, as Yue explored and I teased her lips. The white-blonde girl’s eyes opened as she broke the kiss, resting her forehead against mine. “That was… very nice.”
“Only nice?” I chuckled. “Ouch. I’ll have to work on that. Can’t leave you with just ‘nice.’”
Yue raised an eyebrow as a blush dusted her cheeks. “I’d like that.”
Sighing, I pushed myself up to my feet and offered Yue a hand up. “Come on, we should get back before they send a search party. We’ve already been out of sight too long. And if we stay here, I’m going to do what they likely suspect we slipped off to do.”
“What’s that?” Yue asked, sending me an innocent, confused look.
I met her eyes and grinned, wagging my eyebrows. “More than just ‘nice.’”
If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
“Oh!” she gasped, covering her lips with a hand as she giggled. “They’ll think we—?!”
“You’re wearing that,” I pointed to the necklace plainly visible for all to see, “and we were alone together. Actually, probably a good thing if they do. Better than suspecting what we were actually up to. In fact…”
“Hm?” she hummed curiously as I reached up and carefully pulled her hair out of the loop she kept it in, handing her the hair ornament she used to keep it in place. Her long, white hair fell down her back, leaving it straight in the back and in the two braids she kept as the front. A little playing with it had it just out of sorts enough to give the wrong impression.
“There you go. You look properly mussed now.”
Yue’s blush grew, but she captured my arm in hers and pressed herself into my side. With a nod and a smile, she said, “Then I may as well act the part.”
She really is too cute.
We left the oasis and I walked Yue back to the palace, dropping her off so I could go see about gathering some supplies, now that the merchants were actually taking my coin. As I left however, I spotted Hahn as Yue passed him, the other man’s eyes falling to Yue’s throat, then tracking to me as a look of rage passed over his face. I turned my back on him and left.
Let’s not be here when he decides to make a nuisance of himself. I need to see about restoring Senna, then make sure she knows to have a bag packed, because we’re probably going to leave in a hurry.
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“I never thought I’d say this to one of you, but thank you,” the soldier whose scars I’d just healed nodded brusquely, before leaving the room.
“Could’ve done without the preface,” I sighed, earning a chuckle from Yagoda.
“They’re warming up to you. Give them time, my boy.”
Nodding, I stretched and stood, then offered Yagoda a hand up, which she took. “I’m going to go visit Yue.”
“I saw that necklace you gave her. Very nice,” the meddlesome woman grinned. “I’ve never seen her this happy before.”
“That’s kind of sad.”
“Water under the bridge,” Yagoda dismissed. A frown pulled her lips down as we left the area we’d been using to treat patients. “What isn’t is little Hahn’s reaction.”
“He’s a nobody,” I shrugged.
“He’s got some important friends, and now that word has come out about the betrothal, several of the other chiefs are protesting and trying to offer alternatives. They want our princess married to one of our own, because they fail to grasp the bigger picture.”
I raised an eyebrow, sending the woman beside me a curious look. “What do you think that is?”
Yagoda sent me an amused look. “Zuko, my boy. Who do you think Yue confides in, here? Her mother and myself.”
“So she told you.”
“Just so,” Yagoda nodded, before sending me a leer. Quietly, she murmured, “If I didn’t think it’d break her heart, I’d take my shot. It’s not every day you can say you bagged a prince, you know?”
Chuckling, I shook my head. “You don’t want me. I’d drive you crazy inside a week.”
“Who said anything about keeping you? I’d settle for a romp in the sack at this point. Suddenly being young again has awakened things I’d thought I’d long forgotten. Unfortunately, of all the young men who call this place home, I delivered most of them and they all know me as an old woman.” Humming, she smiled and said, “Maybe I’ll take a trip down south and visit our sister tribe. See if I can’t find some handsome young buck to break in…”
“I’m heading that way eventually,” I offered, and Yagoda shook her head.
“I appreciate the offer, but you and I? Together? On a boat, in the middle of the ocean, with nothing to do? I’d break poor Yue’s heart inside a fortnight, wearing a groove in your hips.” I laughed and she giggled. “You think I’m joking.”
“No, I’m pretty sure you’re not. That’s what makes it funny.”
We came to an intersection and paused. “Alright, go show Yue a good time. And remember, keep an eye out for Hahn. That boy’s too ambitious by far.”
“I will. Thanks for the warning, Yagoda,” I nodded and went on my way. I found Yue in the usual place, waiting for me with a smile looking out from the balcony at the sea. “So, what have you got planned for our date today?”
“You’ll see,” the girl winked, taking my arm and leading me back through the palace and outside. She stopped only to collect a picnic basket, which I wound up carrying. I recognized the route she was taking and quickly realized we were going out to the front wall again.
Sure enough, we soon stepped out on top of the wall and Yue took us out to the middle of it, where we’d be out of the way of the few patrolling soldiers and where we wouldn’t be overheard by them where they were spending most of their time in their posts, sheltered from the wind. Yue let go of my arm long enough to gesture and create a bench, then opened up the basket and took out a couple of blankets. One, she threw over the top of the ice for us to sit on, while the other she pulled over us when we sat.
I tried to take a peek in the basket only to have her pull it away and set it to the side. “You’ll see later.”
“Alright then, keep your secrets,” I chuckled, putting an arm around her shoulders as she pressed herself into my side. Making sure the guards weren’t watching or close enough to overhear, I quietly asked, “Did you pack?”
“Mm,” Yue confirmed with a nod. “I did what you said. I went to the market with Yagoda and bought a new set of clothes. I’ve never worn anything so tight before. It’s kind of embarrassing,” she murmured.
“I’m sure it’ll look fine,” I assured her. “But you needed something you can move and fight in, and robes don’t really cut it.”
“I know,” she sighed. “I also got everything else on the list. Did we need so much food? And why wine?”
“I’d rather have the option for something other than fish for a while. As for wine, alcohol is a universal trade good. It also helps loosen tongues, if you share some around a campfire.”
“I see,” the girl nodded. “When are we leaving?”
“Soon. I want to tell your father I’m leaving one day, then have us leave the night or so before. That way we’ve got a twelve hour head start—”
I cut off at the sound of boots approaching. Yue and I turned to find an unpleasantly familiar face storming up to us—Hahn, flanked by a few of his buddies. Warriors and waterbenders both, from what I could tell. We stood to face them, Yue frowning at their approach and lifting her chin, exposing her necklace. From the way Hahn’s face went red and his jaw clenched, he apparently saw it.
Hahn and his cronies stopped a few feet from us. “Fire Nation!”
“Water Tribe,” I nodded, and he and his friends looked taken aback for a moment, unsure if they should take that as an insult given I hadn’t spat it the way Hahn did. “What do you want?”
Hahn quickly gathered his wits however, as he was reminded of his reason for being here. “I’m here to challenge you for Princess Yue.”
“No,” I denied immediately. “Even if I wanted to, and I don’t, the matter’s settled. There are bigger things at play here than you and me, or even Yue.”
“It’s true,” Yue confirmed. “My duty to the tribe—”
“Shut up, woman! This is a matter of honor between men!” Hahn cut her off, before fixing his gaze back on me. “Just you and me. A duel between swordsmen. Sunup tomorrow. Or are you too much of a coward to face me, without your precious firebending? Is that sword you carry around just for show—a trinket that daddy gave you, that you didn’t earn, noble boy?”
Yue’s hand squeezed mine hard enough to pop my knuckles as she took a deep breath, her eyes closed as Hahn spoke. When she opened them, those pretty eyes were ice cold. She gestured and Hahn yelped as he found himself encased up to his mouth in ice.
“Hahn,” Yue began, her quiet voice strained with her anger. “I will not marry you. Not now, not ever. Tradition be damned. And if you ever speak to me like that again, they’ll need to sweep the frozen chunks up to bury you. I am a princess and you are one of the soldiers under my command, not the other way around. Now, leave us. You can expect me to report this rank disrespect and insubordination to your commanding officer. I’ll leave it to him to think of an appropriately creative punishment for you.”
Yue’s gaze shifted to Hahn’s friends, who were now looking unsure. “Take him and go. Now.”
I felt Yue’s body trembling through her hand as they turned and the waterbenders detached Hahn’s icy prison from the ground before pushing it away. When they got to the stairs leading down, one of them removed the ice and they hauled him down quickly, out of sight. I turned to Yue with a smile. “I’ve said it before, but you’re sexy when you’re angry.”
Yue let out a quiet breath and turned, burying her face in my chest. I caught a glimpse of tears in her eyes before she hid them as she clung onto me and trembled silently. “I’m glad you think so.”
I hugged her, rubbing her back. “Let me guess. Jitters?”
“Mm,” she nodded, clutching me tightly. “I’ve never done something like that.”
“I figured. Didn’t take you for the threatening type.”
Yue giggled and looked up, her eyes a little red as she smiled up at me. “I just asked myself, what would Princess Azula do?”
“Oh, that’s a bad idea. You really shouldn’t take inspiration from my sister.”
“You said it was sexy,” Yue pouted.
“Oh, it was,” I agreed. “But Azula doesn’t threaten. She would’ve torched him on the spot.”
Yue stuck her tongue out before putting her face back in my chest. “He’s not going to back down now. I know Hahn. He’ll find you tomorrow, regardless of what I’ve said.”
“Alright. That’s it, then,” I nodded. “We’ll leave tomorrow night.”
Yue frowned up at me. “Why not tonight?”
“Two reasons. Firstly, it gives me a plausible reason to need to leave in a hurry, assuming I win—which I plan to.”
“He’s going to cheat. He’ll have his friends with him.”
“Yep. That’s why you’re going to get master Pakku to show up a little early to watch the whole affair, out of sight. If his friends interfere, I’m going to cut loose, and I want to be sure no one thinks I’m actually trying to kill them.”
Yue nodded. “And the second reason?”
“Personal. I’d like to settle the score. Hahn’s buddies were in that little crowd at the market, waiting to jump me, so there’s a good chance he was probably there somewhere. I recognize a few of them.”
“I see,” the princess murmured.
“Come on, we should probably get back. I need to let Senna know—”
“No!” Yue shook her head. When I sent her a questioning look, she glared up at me. “I worked hard to cook something myself and I want you to try it.”
“Sure,” I chuckled, gently pushing her towards the bench. “Let’s see what you made, then.”
The smoked arctic hen was juicy and delicious, the small loaf of bread dark, fluffy, and sweet, and mushrooms that I politely tried but ultimately left to Yue—to her amusement.
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And that brings us to Hahn trying to kill me, under the guise of a duel…
“Well, Fire Nation? Are you ready? Or are you too afraid to fight me?”
I sighed, taking a last moment to look at the sunrise before pushing myself to my feet and turning to find my challenger waiting. Hahn stood in the middle of the practice area wearing a smug grin on his punchable face, one hand resting on the hilt of his sword. Amusingly, his head had been shaved bald at some point between when I had last seen him and now. A mixed group of eight other waterbenders and warriors around his age had formed a circle around the perimeter of the practice area.
“Hahn, you don’t have to do this, you know? It’s pointless. It won’t accomplish anything. The decision’s already been made and it’s out of your hands,” I tried one last time to convince him to back down.
“Tch. That’s what you think, Fire Nation. I’ll beat you and show Chief Arnook that I’m the one who should be with Yue!”
I nodded, moving into the center of the circle to join him. “Suppose you win. Do you have the power to restore limbs? Remove scars? Make the elderly young and fit again?”
“No,” Hahn looked confused. “None of that means you get to steal Yue from me!”
“She was never yours to steal,” I shook my head, before pulling my sword. “Alright, let’s get this over with.”
Hahn drew his sword and charged with a roar.
Hahn’s form was shit as he came in swinging wildly, all brute force, no finesse, looking to cave my chest in with his whalebone sword. I slid backwards on the ice, letting the swing go wide before coming in with a strike of my own, catching him diagonally, low and left to high right across the chest and ripping his jacket. I felt the pull of flesh beneath the blade and Hahn yelped, jerking back as I pursued him with the follow up swing, right to left aiming for his stomach as he frantically brought his sword up.
Hahn wasn’t incompetent, unfortunately. His anger had just pushed him into acting rashly in those first moments. With the realization that I wouldn’t cave under the initial assault and wasn’t just some unskilled noble brat he could beat like a rug, Hahn got his shit together and quickly mounted a defense and counter attack, knocking my swing aside and coming in with a thrust for my chest.
I spun with the momentum, stepping out of the range of the thrust as I split my sword. The left came around, catching his blade with a dull thunk and holding it in place as I forced him into a blade lock. It wouldn’t hold for long given that he was using both hands and I was only using one, and even without being a bender all of their warriors could use chi to enhance themselves. Thankfully, it didn’t need to.
The sword in my right hand came around following it as I completed the twist and Hahn’s eyes went wide as he realized the danger, jerking his head back and trying to backpedal. I followed but he got enough range that the strike didn’t take his head and only swiped across his face, tearing a very straight line from his left cheek, under his nose and through the corner of his lips, before catching on his opposite cheek and leaving a ragged gash as the skin folded before the blade pulled through.
Hahn yelled, spitting blood as he backed away. “What are you waiting for?! Help me!”
The battle shifted immediately as four waterbenders attacked as one and the four warriors lowered their spears, getting ready to strike. The ice under my feet shifted, turning from rough to smooth as glass in an instant. A rolling wave passed through the ice from my right, forcing me to jump over it or be thrown, at the risk of slipping on the landing. A water whip flicked at my midsection while a torrent of sharp ice spears fell from above and more rose from below.
With the intervention of Hahn’s friends, all bets were off, and this farce of a ‘duel’ was over.
I caught my myself in the air, jet-stepping into a spin as I conjured fire to my blades. It built slower than normal fire based attacks, but what came out was worth it. A wave of green fire rolled over the practice area. The waterbenders tried to shield themselves—either with ice or by pulling up waves of water, while the warriors hit the deck, trying to dive under it.
Fire hit ice and water and, instead of dissipating, rolled around them—flaming oil rolling across water. Worse, trying to disrupt it sent it splashing over the area, droplets flying everywhere and sticking where they landed, like napalm, burning brightly as they clung to skin, hair, clothes, ice weapons, and whatever surface they found purchase on.
They panicked and the screams started as clothes caught fire. I landed, planting my swords in the ice as the smooth surface melted beneath my feet, leaving tracks where I stepped as I made my own footing. I turned, directing the fire as I began the first steps of the hybrid fire/water bending form I had been working out in my head from my time observing the waterbenders.
Green fire surged, turning in on itself in a spiral around the platform—a whirlpool. Clothes flared brightly as they burned, before turning to ash. Those few metal weapons and jewelry they wore glowed red hot and were either dropped, or burned patches into flesh. Bone weapons shattered under the heat. Steam rose, shrouding the platform and leaving the surface covered in an inch or more of water as it went from a platform to a bowl—that is, everywhere but the center, the eye of the firestorm where I stood on a platform of ice starting to sweat in the heat.
When I finished stepping through the last few movements, I let the fire dissipate and took in my handiwork.
Eight men lay sprawled out, naked aside from a coating of ash and insensate but whole, in a puddle of quickly cooling water. Even Hahn’s wounds were gone without a trace. Looking down, I found a pattern of footsteps melted into the ice and hummed as I studied them for a moment.
Need to tighten up the last part of the spiral there.
“They’re not dead, I take it.”
Looking up, I found Pakku and Yue approaching, Pakku taking in the scene dispassionately and Yue looking away from the naked men. Shaking my head, I picked up my swords, put them back together, and slipped them back into their sheath. “Nope. Green fire only.”
“Why are they like this?” the old man asked, curious. “I remember the first few moments being engulfed in it, before Yagoda put me to sleep. It just felt warm.”
“Ah, well. As I keep telling people. Clothes burn. Metal gets hot.”
He took in their nude, ash-covered forms again before a quiet, “Ah,” left his lips and he nodded. “I see. You should speak with Arnook. I’m afraid to say that after this incident, you’ve likely worn out your welcome for the time being. At least, until tempers have time to cool. But first…”
Pakku created a slab of ice nearby. “Show me what you did with that fire. It moved less like fire and more like…”
“Like oil spilled on water,” I finished for him, and went on to show him the technique.
Following that, Yue and I made our way back to the palace to speak with her father. As we went, the princess quietly asked, “Tonight?”
“Tonight.”
“I’ll be ready.”