A/N Sorry for this seriously half-assed chapter. My mental and physical health hasn't been great these past couple weeks and I just wanted to get something out.

Fire Nation summers were divided between a season of oppressive heat and a season of torrential rains. Before the rainy season, Caldera celebrated a festival honoring Proyosk, the legendary fisherman prince, sponsored by the city's fishermen's guild. A ceaselessly changing tide of people swept through Ryba, Caldera's fish market district, which had been converted into a festival ground.
    Katara held onto Jet's arm to keep from being swept away.
    Jet rushed over to claim a shady bower at one of the refreshment pavilions set up throughout the festival grounds before someone else did. Katara looked around. Someone was bound to come and tell them this seat was already taken. Finding an empty spot, especially out of the relentless Fire Nation summer sun, was nothing short of a miracle. When no one spoke up after several minutes, Katara settled herself on a seating cushion.
Their spot faced the rolling mountain, a sloping wooden structure people rode down on wheeled carts. Despite the grueling sun and oppressive heat, a line snaked around the rolling mountain several times. Katara cooled herself with her souvenir paper fan. She wouldn't wait in that line for all the world.
Jet turned his head toward the rolling mountain. "Have you ever ridden one of those before?" he asked Katara.
"Every year during the Winter Solstice Festival," said Katara. Like the Proyosk Festival, the Winter Solstice Festival held before the start of blizzard season, was a final hurrah before lousy weather forced everyone to stay indoors. "Except, back home, we build them out of ice and snow and slide down on sleds. And we call them breakneck mountains."  In this heat, a breakneck mountain would have melted into a small lake by now.
To a girl like Katara, who'd grown up on the tundra of the South Pole, the heat of a Fire Nation summer felt like walking through a furnace. Only her paper fan provided any relief.
The piece of straw Jet held between his lips bobbed when he smiled. "I'd like to try it sometime. Maybe next year?"
Katara fluttered her fan. Maybe she could bring Jet to the Winter Solstice Festival as her husband next year?
"Katara!" 
The other patrons of the refreshment pavilion moved aside so Mai and Prince Zuko could pass. The people next to Katara and Jet recognized the prince and let him have their table. Katara moved over to give her friends more room, and Mai went to her side. Prince Zuko saluted Katara and acknowledged Jet with a nod. Jet greeted him with a stiff bow and put his arm around Katara's waist.
"Where's Ty Lee?" Katara asked Mai. While Katara had gone to the festival with Jet, Ty Lee went with Mai and Prince Zuko. Had Ty Lee wandered off with a suitor, or had Mai and Prince Zuko gotten rid of her so they could be alone?
Mai laughed. "She and Lord Ruon-Jian went to watch a puppet show." 
Katara giggled. The courtship between Ty Lee and Lord Ruon-Jian was becoming serious, and her parents expected a proposal soon. Ty Lee had earned a reputation as a flirt, and no doubt her parents were eager to marry her off before she did something to disgrace the family. Lady Ursa undoubtedly used her influence to get her plaything a good husband. 
"Mai," said Prince Zuko. "Don't you think Miss Katara looks wilted? Sir Jet must not be taking proper care of her." 
Mai chuckled, Jet glowered, and Katara resumed fanning herself. It would be best to change the subject. "Is it always so hot this time of year?" she asked Prince Zuko. She was sweating to death even in her light ramie summer yukata.
"I heard, this year's been unusually cold," said Prince Zuko.
"No..?"
Zuko laughed. In the rare moments when he let his stoical, princely mask slip, his face radiated like the sun.
"Shaved ice!" A boy pushed a shaved ice cart toward the pavilion. He stopped to wipe his sweat-soaked brow with his sleeve.  "Shaved ice."
Jet leaned toward Katara. "Are you thirsty?" he asked her.
"Yes," said Katara. Her mouth was as dry as a desert.
Jet waved for the boy to bring his cart over to them. "Two, please."
"I'll take two as well," said Prince Zuko.
The boy filled four bowls with shaved ice. He drizzled cherry syrup over the ice, squeezed lime juice, and finished by sprinkling grated ginger. Nothing was more refreshing in this heat than shaved ice, but Katara had to gulp it before it melted into a watery, cherry-flavored slush.
The bells of Agni's shrine rang nine times, the hour of the monkey, and Katara finished her shaved ice as she and Jet made their way to Kashi Street to watch the Fishermen's Guild process with their oars, painted with the names of their boats, and the six-foot-tall statue of Proyosk.
"Hail Proyosk," Katara chanted along with the rest of the crowd, waving her bowl, careful not to spill its contents. At the bottom, underneath the dregs of the shaved ice, was a block of jelly tinted to look like a pond with candy goldfish swimming inside it. 
Jet put his hand on Katara's shoulder and said something she couldn't hear over the cheering crowd. "Excuse me," she said.
Jet raised his voice, but it still got lost in the crowd.
"What?" said Katara.
He pulled her into a quieter alley and told her what he'd been trying to do before Mai and Prince Zuko cut in. Lord Tasha, Jet's father, had given his consent for their marriage, but was unable to give Jet the money to pay off Katara's debts to Lord Ukano, all thanks to Jet's spendthrift older brother, Sandro.
Katara kissed him. "Don't worry," she said. "Things will work out. Fortune smiles upon us."
"I hope you're right," said Jet, squeezing Katara's hand.