For a second, Kubo stared at her. "Things that we shouldn't wait around to be found by," he said.

He thought he'd gotten that across.

Okay, well, Azula was Azula, and he'd learned that. Things would go her way or they would go awkward and dragged and full of contention, and really, neither of them had time for that. Besides, Kubo reminded himself, she was a warrior in a way he was not. Maybe she had a better reason for asking than just not trusting his judgement, or maybe her not trusting his judgment was a better reason in a way he couldn't see.

"There are really big animals that have better senses of smell than sight," he said. "They wanted to eat me. I met Stephen - one of us, a Legionnaire - and he had turned into a monster. He tried to convince me to join him. I think he tried to convince me to be turned into a monster too, but I got away. He looked -"

Kubo paused, his empathy striking him again.

"He looked hurt," he said. "He was bleeding. Like transforming had . . . had actually hurt him the way that . . ."

The way that it must have hurt his father, when his grandfather transfigured Hanzo into a creature not entirely a man and not entirely a bug, the way that broken limbs and split skin and bones exposed must look without magic to smooth that pain over.

"Like you'd expect," he finished, not wanting to go into too much detail.

"If we don't go, something will smell us or hear us soon," he pressed.