where nothing is red
Start by wiping the blood off of his chin and pretending to understand.
Repeat to yourself, "I won't leave you, I won't leave you," until you fall asleep and dream of the place where nothing is red.
When is a monster not a monster? Oh, when you love it.
— Caitlyn Siehl
prologue
Princess Azula is no longer a princess.
But that does not mean she will ever submit to the meaningless girl standing in front of her. A firebender does not learn from a nonbender; a princess does not kneel before a peasant. Whether or not she wears a crown.
Ty Lee looks at a loss for words, for which Azula is thankful. The former princess has no idea how an enslaved gladiator could be so bubbly. Monsters are not cute and playful; Azula would know.
"I expect you to serve me, not the other way around," Azula says, clasping her hands behind her back. "Do you understand? Your loyalty is to the royal family and it always will be."
Ty Lee thinks about her answer for a heartbeat before replying, "Yes, princess."
Azula smirks.
Perhaps this slavery situation will not be as insurmountable as she thought.
chapter one: caregiver
Years before a princess stood before a peasant as an equal, a playground fight seemed like such a little event. Ty Lee would have never anticipated that a spat between seven-year-old girls would be the defining moment of her life. It set her on a course that she could not change or run from.
The other girl hit her first. Ty Lee hit her back.
The other girl hit with a light punch. Ty Lee broke the girl's nose.
The other girl collapsed. Ty Lee stood there, mute.
She had found a talent that could not remain hidden for long.
Her family had nothing, and Ty Lee was not a very well-behaved girl. Usually, being cute and sweet made up for any trouble she got herself into, but when soldiers knocked on the door of her small home, they made an offer that Ty Lee's parents could not pass up.
The price they sold Ty Lee for was enough to save them. They had other daughters, and Ty Lee was expendable.
Now, a year later, she sits on the floor of her bedroom. She shares it with others who train beside her in this academy. It is a school where you learn how to die for your family's life and your superiors' entertainment.
Not exactly where most adorable and kind little girls end up.
Ty Lee stands small in a large room filled with weapons and kids giving each other bloody noses. She breaks into a sweat from the heat and her own nerves.
"You will be put to the ultimate test when you turn sixteen," says the buffest trainer at the academy. "Many of you will not live past that age. You've been condemned or sold and this is the small price to pay."
Death does not sound like a small price to Ty Lee, but she tries to keep a positive attitude.
What else can she do?
The closest thing she has to a parent is a person who knocks the winds out of her over and over as they practice fighting.
A year after Ty Lee begins training, a boy kisses her on the lips.
She reacts by shoving him away, because he is not her crush and she is not going to be his girlfriend ever.
Ty Lee punches him once so that he falters, and then pushes him directly into the glass. It cracks behind him and breaks when she lands another hit. He falls back and yelps when he hits the floor. Ty Lee jumps over the broken glass, scraping the side of her finger, and sets her foot on his chest. She slides it up to his throat and the panic in his eyes makes her stop and release him.
"Don't … touch me, or something," Ty Lee says breathlessly. She sounds like a pretty and perfect airhead, but she is standing over a boy with more than one broken bone.
"I won't. I won't touch you or something," he stammers. Ty Lee nods and decides to run from the scene.
She just wants somebody to hold her and tell her it's okay, but nobody is going to do that. She doesn't have anybody who cares enough as she slips through the cracks amongst people who are just like her.
It's not any better than home.
On the same day, Azula watches a room burn around her. She did not mean to do what she did, but it is done and she cannot take it back. If she gets in trouble for this, she will lose her mind.
She does not even check on her sparring partner whom lies among broken glass and crackling fires. Azula needs to escape far too desperately to care about other people.
For as long as she can, she sits in her room. She does not know what the repercussions will be, and she does not want to face them. Always, she has been the perfect daughter.
Azula looks up, panicked, as her door opens. Her father enters the room and she forgets how to breathe.
"I saw what happened. You shouldn't have run," Ozai says and Azula wrings her hands. "You should be proud of what you did. I am proud of you, despite your example of cowardice."
Ozai has never told her that. He has never said he is proud of her or that he thinks she is any good. She always can be better in his eyes, and that makes her best not good enough.
"Thank you," Azula says. She hugs him.
It feels awkward in a family where that never happens, but he accepts it and she thinks that he cares about her for once.
All it took was an accidental murder and destruction of royal property.
The two girls meet for the first time at the age of nine. It is not a potential friendship or even more than a brief encounter. Azula is a princess and Ty Lee is a slave of the state.
They meet outside of the gorgeous new arena. Azula is bored and Ty Lee is exploring the construction site. Ty Lee walks across the boards like a balance beam and uses the other dangerous fixtures as her own gym. She wants to be as good as the amazing warriors who fight there.
"Who are you and what are you doing here?" asks a girl about her age. Ty Lee trips from the beam and barely catches herself on it. She drops down, nursing a fresh splinter.
"Oh, I'm Ty Lee is all," she replies. "I was watching the fights but I…"
She doesn't really know why she ran away from the others.
"Let me try that," Azula says, climbing up the wall.
She walks to the edge and Ty Lee looks up. Ty Lee really, really hopes that this girl doesn't fall and die. Azula does not get hurt; she walks across as if she was born to do it.
"Wow," Ty Lee says, smiling at her. "You're really good at this."
"I know." The girl walks down, using the crates of raw materials as steps. "Anything else to do here?"
Ty Lee smiles and nods.
When Ty Lee is twelve, she walks into a room that makes her choke and cough. She has never smelled something as strong as this incense. Weird drawings on the wall depict human bodies with dots in scattered places. They look like they belong in a healer's home, not the chambers of a former warrior.
The woman who approaches her has perfume that is even more pungent than her candles. She wears clothes unlike the other trainers Ty Lee has studied with; she dresses in layers of shimmering scarves.
"I heard you were coming," says the master. "Prove yourself to me, and you will survive long enough to die of old age."
Ty Lee finds that hard to believe, but she cannot help but hope.
Hope keeps her alive more than water or obedience.
"What do you want to teach me?" Ty Lee asks sweetly, smiling.
"An art that most people in this world can't master," says the older woman. "Do you want something to drink? Some tea?"
Ty Lee hates tea, but she smiles and nods. It is her default response to uncomfortable situations.
She thinks she likes this new trainer; she makes Ty Lee remember what having a mother was like.
On the princess's sixteenth birthday, Ty Lee throws a punch and Azula throws a party.
Azula stands in the expansive royal balcony with a gathering of people she hates but calls friends. She does not do friends. Mai is the only person she has taken a liking to.
It is Mai who stands beside her and tries to be interested in the fights.
"I am bored to tears," Mai says, looking Azula up and down. "These are all the same. Stabbing, burning, crushing by rocks. None of them are exciting."
"I haven't even been watching," Azula says with a cavalier shrug. "I think there are more interesting things to do with prisoners of war and the less fortunate than myself."
"You are crown princess of an empire. I think everyone is less fortunate than yourself."
"A charmed life is a dull life. You know that." A loud scream interrupts Azula's thoughts, and she turns to lean in the other direction. Mai watches for a moment over her shoulder and then returns her attention to the more ruthless arena called nobles-at-a-party. "She looks familiar."
"Who?" Mai asks dryly.
"Her. That one just walking out right now," Azula says, squinting at the young woman. She wishes she were closer.
"She's screwed. Look at the earthbender. She's like a kitten or something and he will crush her in seconds," Mai says. It will be a fast and boring battle, but she turns around anyway.
"Maybe," Azula replies.
Far beneath the princess's party in a circle that smells of blood and dust, Ty Lee cannot believe that her first fight is against a champion. He has so much more to lose than she does, and he is very muscly. She watches anxiously. Nothing can calm her nerves at the moment, and the crowd does not make that any better.
It begins too quickly and she dives away from the ground that he rips up from under her. She was trained for this; she was trained to bring down people much stronger than her, but there is a huge difference between training and risking her life.
She dodges and flips out of the way and slides past a large rock.
Everything slows down around her.
She lunges upwards and runs directly at him. He could snap her in half, but she has to attack at some point. His punches are strong, but hers are faster, and now is her moment. She at first cannot remember where to hit, but it comes back to her as his fist flies at her face.
It stops in midair. He crumbles and hits the ground, gasping for breath once.
Ty Lee smiles and she cannot stop herself from laughing before she hears the crowd's demands.
She sets her foot on his throat and breaks his neck.
chapter two: beggars and thieves
Azula wakes up to someone seizing her arm. She throws a burning fist through the darkness but her father stops it in midair, stifling the fire.
"What is it?" Azula whispers, her eyes flashing wide. This is not normal. He looks nervous. This is not normal.
"Come with me and do not ask questions," he orders, grabbing her. Her hand twitches towards her dresser and he pulls her away. "Do you think we have time for that?"
"No?" she suggests, uncertain how to reply.
He drags her to the window and opens it. Azula's heart begins to pound. She has feared nothing for the entirety of her life, but this feels catastrophic.
"Get outside," he orders and she obeys without hesitation. Ozai trained her well.
Azula drops down onto the damp grass and feels a chill. The night is too cold. Unnervingly icy. Everything feels wrong. Her father follows her.
"I know you said not to ask questions but—"
"But nothing. You will not ask questions. We are leaving the city and you are coming with me," Ozai orders brusquely. He takes hold of her again and sets off into the pitch black night.
Azula glances up at the stars before he jerks her forward.
The princess is awake at sunrise; she did not sleep last night. She can see the fires from her position atop the Caldera. It was not an easy climb, but her father did not let her stop until they were somewhere hidden with a good view of the city. They were now in a perfect place.
Ozai did not rest for a moment either.
"Can you explain this to me?" Azula asks as she watches the fires burn below. Their own soldiers are attacking some invisible enemy.
It occurs to her as soon as he gives her one look that the invisible enemy is their own people.
"We're safe," Ozai says.
Azula looks up at him. "How did you know when to escape?"
"I was in on the plan," he says and she is not surprised. Of course he would try to overthrow Azulon. She would do the same. "My allies double crossed me, and so I went to get you and get out of sight."
"Just me?" Azula should not ask.
"Are you unhappy that I rescued you?" father demands.
Azula shakes her head.
"Thank you," she whispers, and averts her eyes.
Azula makes for a magnificent thief.
She refuses to stoop to the level of beggar, and so she just takes what is rightfully hers. Everything in the city belongs to the Royal Family, no matter what Commander Zhao insists. She has a price on her head, her family is imprisoned, and she has been reduced to ashes.
Father says they will take back the city.
Azula believes him less and less every day.
She is scaling a wall in the nighttime, breaking into the Battle Academy. Houses became tiring; she wanted to do something riskier. Maybe she wanted to get caught. Maybe she was tired of hiding with Ozai.
Princess Azula seizes everything of any value as she creeps through the dark corridors. She avoids the barracks and dives down another level towards the holding cells. Prisoners can be silenced and have no credibility when questioned.
"You're the princess," says a voice that is oddly familiar.
Azula looks around and then her eyes lock on a girl in a cell. It is the gladiator Azula had always liked. She wonders if the girl in pink still battles, or if she got herself into trouble. Maybe she is a loyalist. Azula hopes she is a loyalist.
"So what if I am?" Azula replies with a cocky glint in her golden eyes.
Ty Lee shrugs at her.
"Why are you here?" she asks.
Azula does not know if she should gift this slave with a response or not. She makes her decision.
"Because I want to be," Azula purrs. "I am royalty and can do as I please."
"I know," Ty Lee says softly. "I thought maybe you were dead. Nobody ever has found you."
"And they never will. You will keep your mouth shut or I will murder you," Azula says.
"I won't say anything," Ty Lee replies.
"How did you get locked up? Do you still fight?" Azula asks, cinching her bag and walking towards the steel bars.
"I still fight in the arena. I got locked up for fighting outside of the arena," Ty Lee replies honestly.
"How cute." Azula has nothing else to say.
She turns to leave and bumps into someone's chest.