“Sooo~… why are we collecting these stones?”

Lyra stood on the shore of the river, pawing through rocks with her hoof and using her magic to levitate the wax-like stones Iroh had pointed out to her.

Iroh knelt beside the pile of stones, striking one with another occasionally and discarding most. “I do not have a blade with me, so I will be making one with the right kind of stone. Its just a matter of - AHA!”

Lyra turned to see Iroh holding a stone aloft that was about half the size of his head.

“So what now?” she asked as she trotted over to watch Iroh work.

“GRAH!” Iroh brought the stone down on another as hard as he could, grunting with the effort. A large shard broke off the side of the stone, along with several smaller fragments.

Gingerly, Iroh picked up the shard avoiding the sharp edges. He turned it and ground one side along the original stone a few times to blunt one side for safer handling.

“It is not a steel knife,” he said, looking back up at the intrigued unicorn, “but it is sharp enough to do the job I need it for. Next, I’ll cut down and trim that sapling over there.”

Iroh and Lyra walked downstream a small way to the sapling Iroh had pointed out. Lyra lay down nearby to watch as Iroh rapidly ran the sharp edge of his makeshift flint knife across the wood not far from the ground.

A few minutes later, Iroh judged the bottom had been weakened sufficiently. He stood and walked to the other side of the sapling to his cut. With a heave, he stomped his boot on the sapling hard enough for the small tree to snap and fall to the ground.

Lyra was fascinated as Iroh methodically hacked the remaining fibers the connected the wood to its stump, then stripped it of all of its small branches and twigs. The old man stood as he tested the weight of the pole which rose to his shoulder when standing.

“Now to sharpen it,” he said to Lyra, “then we can get to the fishing part.”

Iroh walked back over to the rockpile and struck a new piece of flint from the stone the two had found. In short order, he was hacking away at one end of the pole, sharpening it into a spear point.

Lyra yawned as she stood and Iroh stretched out his back from the strain of work.

Walking back and forth at the side of the river, Iroh took a moment to spot a fish. He hefted the spear behind him and threw.

He hit nothing but water.

Iroh grumbled as he waded forward a short distance to retrieve his spear. “If at first you don’t succeed, try, and try again,” he joked to his spectator.

Another throw.

Sploosh!

Wade out to the spear, wade back out, look for fish that haven’t been frightened away.

Miss horribly, and wade back out again.

Lyra couldn’t help but start to share his frustration. “Spearfishing looks hard. Do you just need something pointy to catch the fish, or does it have to be a spear?”

“There are many ways to catch fish, Miss Lyra,” Iroh said with a frown as he concentrated on spotting his next target,” A net, or a hook on the end of a very fine string are much favored over a spear by my people, and I am beginning to see why.”

“Oh, ok. So what do you want me to do with these fish, by the way?”

Iroh’s neck crackled loudly as his head snapped towards a grinning Lyra, a quartet of fish floating in a pale yellow aura next to her. He glanced down at the spear in his hand, then back to the unicorn.

“How long ago did you realize you could just float them out of the river?” he ground out.

“Ummm… sometime when we were collecting rocks?” Lyra winced.

Iroh sighed, at least an hour's worth of work for next to nothing. “Just. Just float on of them over here.”

Lyra did as he asked, only to shriek in surprise and nearly drop all the fish when he stabbed his spear through the fish with a lot more precision than he had shown in his throwing.

Iroh pushed the fish farther down before turning back to Lyra. “Next, please.”

In short order, four fish were skewered on the spear. He leaned the spear against a tree while he turned to place all the branches and wood shavings he had made into a small hole he kicked into the stones that made up the shore of the river.

With a gesture, Iroh formed a small ball of fire in his hand and dropped it onto the wood. He stood there and maintained it until he felt the green wood catching and sustaining the fire on its own.

Grabbing a convenient Y shaped branch, he set the fish over the fire to cook. “Hah…” Iroh looked up at the sound. Lyra was standing nearby, her eyes wide and jaw hanging open, looking for all the world like a child who had just been told that the walls of Ba Sing Se were made of chocolate.

Iroh smirked. ‘Question explosion in 3… 2...’

“D-do that again,” stuttered Lyra, her eyes fixed on his hands.

‘Ah, coffee pots! Thought I had her pegged on that one.’

Lyra walked forward cautiously as Iroh generated another small fireball in his cupped hand.

“No spark or magic glow other than the fire itself. You don’t have some kind of tool hidden up your sleeve, do you?” Iroh looked on, bemused as Lyra’s horn lit up in order to draw his sleeve up his arm, exposing his forearm.

“Is it something to do with the thickness of your forelegs? Wait! does that mean you can generate fire with your feet as well?”

“Yes, I can.” Iroh took a short step to the side and kicked a blast of fire over the river, where it would do no harm.

“But your feet are covered!” Lyra complained, falling back on her haunches. “How am I supposed to work this out if your fire doesn’t follow any of the rules!”

“What rules would those be?” Iroh wondered aloud.

“If I was to try making a fireball like that with my horn covered, I would either blow the cover off, or it would blow back into my face! Not that that matters as my talent is different anyway.”

“If I may ask, what exactly is your talent? Zecora told me earlier that unicorn magic is different according to their jobs.”

“Well that’s easy enough, it’s right here on my flank.” Lyra turned slightly to show off her cutie mark. “As you can see, my talent is in playing the lyre. Of course, what our talent is and what we like to do are two different things.”

“What exactly does your talent let you do?” Iroh asked, “How does it let you play a stringed instrument with hooves?”

“How about I make you a deal,” Lyra wheedled, “I’ll help you study unicorns if you help me study humans.”

“Sounds like a good deal to me,” Iroh smiled as he leaned over to inspect the fish, the smallest of which had finished cooking, “Unicorn magic for human fire bending.”

“Deal!”

Iroh sat down cross legged, a large stone cradled in his lap and one of the shards from the flint in his hand. “I hope you do not mind going first because it is dinner time for me.”

With that Iroh started eating the first of the fish, using the rock shard as a small knife.

Lyra was a little disgusted, but at the same time intrigued by the fish. “Uhh. Sure, no problem. Where should I start?”

“Your magic,” Iroh said around a mouthful of the fish, “what does it do, how does your talent make it different.”

“Right. My magic…” Lyra paused a moment to gather her thoughts.

“My magic is pretty much the same as most other unicorns, make light, levitate stuff, things like that. The way my talent makes it different is I have finer control with my levitate spell. I can move lots of things at once and with some good control, so it lets me do things like pluck the strings on my lyre to make music.

“The biggest thing about unicorn magic, is we tend to specialize, it’s not unusual for a unicorn to learn only four or five spells and be content with that. Some of us learn more, especially when our talent and our personal career don’t overlap well.”

Iroh looked up from his fish to ask a question. “Any good examples?”

“Sure. There is a seamstress in town who has an insane amount of fine control, like threading a hundred needles in less than thirty seconds fine control. Her talent is finding gems, but she has learnt a whole bunch of spells to help her with her work in her shop. Clothes changing, measuring, lighting, cutting, uncutting, cleaning and a couple of the girls and I have speculated, but we aren’t sure whether she teleports that fainting couch of hers or not.

“Come to think of it, another good example is the town librarian. Her talent is supposed to be magic itself, but I think it might be something like organisation or making lists or something. What I do know is that she has a whole lot of power, more than any unicorn I can think of outside of the princesses and she studies constantly. I think she might know more spells than the rest of Ponyville combined, the only problem is I don’t think her control is very good, heck her magical disasters make mine look tame in comparison.”

Iroh put the rock to one side as he reached to pick up his third fish. “Disasters?” he asked with a grin, “Any particularly interesting ones?”

“Well…” Lyra looked down with a blush, “There was this one time I shaved a gryphon.”

“A wha?” Iroh interrupted, his mouth full.

“A gryphon. Looks like a pegasus, but with the front end more like a bird and the back end more like a cat,” explained Lyra.

Iroh nodded and rolled his hand in a ‘please continue’ gesture.

“The short version is he was mean and heckling one of my performances, so I shaved all the little hairs off of his feathers. He was so embarrassed, he ran away screaming. I lost the gig, but I kept the feathers.”

“Wha di’ ‘ou…” Iroh swallowed, “What did you do with them?”

At this, Lyra gave a malicious grin, “I used them to stuff my pillow.”

“Pfff!” Iroh stuttered around his fish before rearing back and laughing heartily at the mental image.

A few mouthfuls later, Iroh declared himself full and stood so he could clean up the smouldering coals from the fire he had built and bury the waste from the three fish he had eaten.

“What are you going to do with the last fish?” Lyra asked.

“I will have to leave it here for an animal to eat. Fish does not keep well, and I would make myself sick if I tried to eat it later,” he replied as he tamped down the dirt over his waste.

“It is starting to get late, it is probably best that we get back to Miss Zecora’s home before it is too late for you to get home yourself.”

Lyra looked up and noted the sun had shifted significantly over the canopy of the forest, for all it could hardly be seen. “Right, let’s get moving then.”

She glanced back at the fish left on the rock by the riverside, before turning to follow Iroh. As the pair turned the path, there was a chunk missing from the side of the fish.

“You have been awfully quiet since we left the river. Is there something on your mind?” Iroh asked Lyra as they approached the end of the path leading to Zecora's home.

Lyra swallowed thickly, before giving a strained smile. “You said you were worried about me getting home. What about you? Where’s your home?”

Iroh sighed, “That is where things get complicated. My home is a different world to this one, and I am still trying to figure out how I got here and why. The last thing I remember before waking in that hospital was hiking with my nephew.” At this, Iroh paused to look up to the canopy above him.

“I hope that wherever he is, he is safe. He is a good boy, and strong, but oh so impulsive.”

He shook his head as if to free himself of the melancholy thoughts. “Come, it is not much farther I believe.”

Behind him, Lyra finally allowed herself a small shudder, before hurrying to catch up.

Carefully avoiding the large blue flower patch as they had been warned, the pair approached the wooden door set into the large tree and knocked.

The door was quickly flung open by a very disgruntled looking Bonbon. "Where have you been? It's so late now we won't be able to make it out of the forest before night!"

"Ummm... Oops?" Lyra gave a nervous grin. "It took a little while to get the fishes."

"So, was it worth it? Did the spear fishing live up to your expectations?" Bonbon grumbled at her impulsive friend.

"Oh the spear fishing wasn't so good," Iroh chuckled from his place next to Lyra, "but the horn fishing was much better."

Bonbon immediately recognized what Iroh meant. "You caught the fish with magic didn't you?"

At Lyra's happy nod, Bonbon rolled her eyes. "Next you'll be telling me you ate some of the fish too."

"Of course not," Iroh disagreed, "she only sat and talked with me while I ate."

Lyra's guilty expression told a different story, one that was an open book to Bonbon. 'You're an idiot. Do you even know what happens to ponies who eat meat?"

"N-no... what?" Lyra cringed.

Bonbon's face took on a slightly dark demeanor, she smirked at her roommate. "I think if you like experimenting so much, you should find out for yourself." She turned to Zecora, standing next to her. "Please don't tell her, it's more fun if she finds this out the hard way."

Zecora caught the mischievous glint in Bonbon's eye and sighed dramatically. "I will start to prepare the elixir, one so doomed will need a fixer."

"Doomed?" Lyra's eyes were wide, her ears laid way back. She did not like the sound of this...

“Boy!” Jeong Jeong shouted to Zuko, “Come over here a moment.”

Zuko halted the exercise he was going through and walked towards the elder firebender. “What is it? And don’t call me ‘Boy’.”

“You have not yet earned the right to be called a man, in my eyes. You are close, but not yet. Now, do you know if your uncle had a patron spirit?”

At Zuko’s confused look, he elaborated, “Did he ever tell you of his dealings with any of the spirit world?”

“No, he never told me anything about it. I did hear somewhere that he visited the spirit world after my cousin died, but I don’t know any more than that.”

“Bah, it was a faint hope you would know anyway. Something out there is incredibly angry, and I can’t help but think it has something to do with your uncle’s disappearance. For now, back to your exercises.”

“Why do I even have to learn the movements for earth bending anyway?” Zuko grumbled, “It’s not like I will have much use for them.”

“Show me the wall raising technique.” Jeong ordered, his eyes hardening.

“Fine.” Zuko made a short series of movements, his form a little sloppy in his frustration.

“That doesn’t look like wall raising to me…” Jeong did not sound amused.

“Well how do you do it then?” Zuko ground out.

Jeong turned to one side and deliberately took a stance. “Like.” STOMP! “This!” THRUST!

Zuko’s eyes widened and his nostrils flared, standing in front of the old man was a curtain, no, a WALL, of flames thick enough he could not see through it.

“Just because you cannot earthbend,” Jeong lectured with a grim smile, “does not mean you cannot adapt their techniques for your own use. I’m surprised you do not know this, especially since your vaunted uncle does the same with the water styles.”

“Now get over there and get to work. If your focus is good enough, I will start you on meditation tonight. If you are to succeed your uncle, it is time you learned his discipline.”

Author's Notes:

No editing on this chapter either :( looks like I'm flying solo for a while, so please excuse the (hopefully) slightly lowered quality of the work.