A/N: Some Quick Facts About This Fic
Chapters: 8
Pairing: Azula x Ty Lee.
Rated: T for moderate sexual content, suggestive dialogue, mild coarse language and violent references.
Notes: This is a revised repost of a fic I worked on years ago. I lost love for the story and stopped writing it, especially when I became so busy with my premed studies, but I've been going back to writing and I want to finish and be more active with my fanfictions. I reread it and pulled out my old outlines and started to fall in love with it again. I'm resuming writing this fic and I'm posting what good material I already have as this first chapter. Everything else will be 100% new, fresh, and going steadily in the direction I originally intended for the fic. Thank you for clicking, for bearing with me, and I hope you enjoy the show.
COUNTERCLOCKWISE
Don't make me cry by myself
I can't hurt anymore
Don't make me fall on my knees
When I'm begging you for more
"Nothin' But Trouble" — Lily Lane
Chapter One: Just Another Day
Ty Lee once caught a firefly for Azula.
They were eleven. It was the one time Ty Lee taught Azula a trick and escaped unscathed. Azula possessed her own powerful, cerulean fire and royalty always ignores insects; it made perfect sense that the pursuit of a glowing bug left the princess clueless. Ty Lee held it prisoner in a bell jar and Azula watched in secret awe as it illuminated their sleepover.
Ty Lee tried to be poetic and told Azula she reminded her of a firefly. Azula burned brightly, she claimed, and Azula was so beautiful that anyone would want to capture her to gaze at her forever.
Nine years later, Ty Lee caught Azula too.
Two decades later, Azula has learned that she is like that firefly… but not for the reasons that dear Ty Lee claimed. Azula is confined in a transparent prison, starved for love and gradually losing luminescence as she suffocates.
They both regret the second capture now but cannot take it back. As they lie side by side in the sweltering night, they find themselves as far apart as their silky bed will allow.
Maybe the children that slept between them pried them apart over time. Or more likely, time and pain made them drift away from each other.
"We never talk at night," suddenly and softly complains Ty Lee, running her hands over the soft but lightly damp sheets. Sticky sweat clings to her skin in the humid air but she tries to ignore it just as she pays no mind to the singing insects outside.
The air in their bedroom smells sweet and stale.
"That's a shame," Azula coldly replies. Ty Lee stirs beneath the solitary sweaty blanket. "Should I ask you about the same day you have lived over and over for years or would you prefer a dry account of my day counting taxes for my brother?"
"I… ugh." She voices her frustration because she stopped fearing Azula years ago. Ty Lee sits up and decides to go for it. "I don't know why we're doing this."
Azula rises as well and turns to her. The darkness shrouds all but the glint of her rotund eyes.
"Complaining about a problem without posing a solution is just called whining. Then again, you usually just pout so perhaps I should be happy about the complaints."
"I have a solution," offers Ty Lee in a tiny voice. She feels afraid to be bold with her wife, even after losing much of her fear of Azula.
"Oh?" asks the golden-eyed princess, ready for some idiotic suggestion.
Ty Lee barely audibly squeaks, "We could get divorced."
Pause.
Azula vehemently insists, "I would never do that."
Ty Lee's chestnut eyes flash wide. "Why not? You're mean to me and really unhappy and hate me and think I'm ugly and stupid and—"
"You are very beautiful," Azula interrupts, now glaring at the shadow shrouded ceiling.
Ty Lee half-pleadingly whispers, "Azula…"
"I do not believe in divorce, as a princess who cannot revoke those vows to the fire spirits and her country. I made a vow, and I would never break it."
"You really do think you're better than everyone else, don't you?"
Azula scoffs, almost impressed by the ignorance of her lovely but vapid wife. "Did you only just realize that character flaw?"
Ty Lee replies honestly, "I usually ignore the negative things about you."
Bitingly, Azula retorts, "Well, for things you ignore you certainly bitch about them often."
Silence.
Ty Lee whispers, "Okay, if you don't believe in divorce, do you believe in trying to fix things?"
Azula sighs. "We have. I know you have some fetish for repairing the broken but I am sick of wasting my time."
"I'm good at repairing the broken, Azula. You'd be nowhere and nothing or dead without me and the patience that is now gone."
"I want to go to sleep," is the only response Princess Azula conjures up.
Ty Lee says nothing; she simply lies back down.
[X]
Azula wakes up and revels in the few daily moments of bliss during which she forgets where she is, who she is and what she is. Then, Azula remembers absolutely everything and sighs as she sits up in bed and rubs her gilded eyes.
Something about today feels significant, but Azula ignores it. She stands up and gets dressed like a zombie while the sun rises, pink light shining above the edges of the caldera. Slowly, she washes her face, does her make-up, ties up her hair and walks to get tea and begin the day.
The work of the royals never ends.
Azula forgot that Uncle invited himself to stay for a few months. Zuko wanted his presence and Iroh never could deny the child he always preferred.
As Azula remains silent, Iroh holds a cup of tea out to her. It smells and looks like the green variety. Azula never could tell if she liked it or not.
"It has matcha," sings Uncle and an agitated Azula almost burn his face off. How can people be happy anymore? Over the past years of being stuck in the same place, I have learned that there is nothing good in this world. "You love matcha."
"I tolerate matcha," Azula snarls, glaring at the red glass cup. He does not set it down or rescind the generous gesture.
His eyes twinkle sickeningly as he says, "You said it makes you tolerate green tea, and I prefer lemon in mine, which you do not. I made it for you on this special day."
"I have enough guilt trips in my life already, Uncle." Princess Azula grabs the tea anyway.
Iroh says as Azula sips her tea, "Happy anniversary, Azula."
She scowls at the foolish statement. So that is what he meant by special day. Azula forced herself to forget; she dreads today as much as it once thrilled her. Even Ty Lee never gets excited about their anniversary anymore.
"Right," Azula icily replies, lacking better words.
"You should take today off," he jovially says, making her want to throttle him. "I am here and can fill in for you. Spend the day with your family."
"That will not be necessary. I will keep my normal schedule."
"Why?" Iroh asks, furrowing his brow.
"Because it is just another day," coldly states Azula.
Ty Lee interrupts, arriving in the room at the worst of times, "Just another day? Maybe I should've married him instead of you."
Uncle inexplicably laughs. "If I had known I was on the table, I would've courted such a lovely lady as you much more vigorously."
Azula snarls through bared teeth, "If you hit on my wife one more time I will rip your throat out and feed you to wild dogs."
Ty Lee makes an odd face. She then warmly smiles, starry-eyed for a heartbeat. "You do still have a tiny romantic streak left."
Azula rises and turns to face Ty Lee. "We could have an anniversary breakfast. We could reminisce over the good times. They are so few that I will not even be late to my brother's first audience. Then we can think constantly about the endless bad times like I usually do."
"I wanted to go out tonight to the bar where I asked you to marry me," Ty Lee says, almost bouncing up and down. She knows her hopes will be dashed but they soar anyway.
Iroh interjects without invitation, "I thought Azula asked you."
Ty Lee giggles and says, "I asked her and she said she had to publicly ask me or it'd make her look bad."
"Right," Azula curtly says, trying not to cringe at the memory of her young and reckless self. "I should go. This is going to be a long day."
As she walks away, she hears Ty Lee sigh and murmur to herself, "It always is."
[X]
After Azula gets her tea and walks off to go run the Fire Nation Empire with Zuko, Ty Lee stands across from Iroh at a loss for words. She smells tea, which makes her even queasier, and she feels heat rising inside of her at the same time as pressing against her skin. Both of those factors contribute to how much she wants to vomit.
But Ty Lee offers him a fake smile. She cannot remember the last real one she gave, so it is nothing personal towards the teashop owner. Iroh being around is not a bad thing, in Ty Lee's opinion. He brightens this drab palace up.
"That was harsh, even for my niece," uncomfortably remarks Iroh as he hands Ty Lee a cup of tea. "She probably doesn't mean it. I am sure she treasures your anniversary."
Ty Lee cannot even summon the energy to tell him that he could not be more wrong about that. Azula means every cruel word she says. It took Ty Lee far too long to learn that.
"I'm sure she's just… overworked," Ty Lee says, struggling not to sound defeated.
Iroh studies her eyes. They lost all of their luster at some point in the past few years. She always was so bright, a brilliant fire burning in a thousand cheery colors. Now, she looks like someone drained the life out of her.
"You are probably right," lies Iroh, smiling. Ty Lee weakly smiles back.
"I have to get Azusami up for school. She never can wake her own self up. I never did either at twelve, though," Ty Lee says, then realizing her words. Her words about a daughter who is not a firebender, which is probably why she does not wake with the sun.
It only makes this anniversary sting more.
[X]
A few minutes later, on the other side of the palace, Ty Lee viciously shakes her thirteen-year-old daughter Azusami awake. Her raven hair whips around as Ty Lee uses progressively more force. She lies in a bed with bright red sheets, in a room with bright red walls, and an open window that lets the muggy, heavy air in too much for Ty Lee's tastes.
Azusami does not react to any of those surroundings, but she steadily breathes.
"I know you're not dead so you better get up, young lady," Ty Lee shrilly says, cheeks flushing from fury. Then she sits down on the bed and chokes back tears as she begs of her baby girl, "Please just make today easy on me."
Azusami at last groggily opens her beautiful almond-shaped eyes, long, dark, thick eyelashes fluttering, and slowly sits up. She yawns. "It's your anniversary, huh?"
"How do you know that?" Ty Lee asks, taken aback.
Azusami rolls her eyes like a typical tween. "Cuz I heard your argument last night."
"You did?" Ty Lee asks, blanching. Her poor little princess.
Azusami again rolls her eyes, presumably going for some kind of world record. "It was loud. I bet the whole palace heard it!"
Overhearing the shouts of her child, Azula stops her walk down the hallway. She sets her back against the wall and decides to listen in on her daughter shouting about the fight she heard.
"I'm sorry," says Ty Lee, so softly that Azula barely can hear.
Azusami indignantly snaps, suddenly filled with energy, "Don't be sorry. It's mother's fault."
Ty Lee sheepishly says, "It isn't all her fault. I was fighting too."
"It's always her fault. I hate her. She's selfish and awful," Azusami passionately hisses with fire in her cognac eyes. "And she doesn't even love us so I don't know why we even try or stay here!"
"We stay here because this is our home," Ty Lee insists, trying to be unafraid. "And also we don't ever give up on family and your mother is our family."
"That's not a really good reason. I'm just your kid, so she's not my family," says Azusami, now truly enraged. "I'm not her kid and she's made that really clear."
"She's still your mother," Ty Lee sharply says, catching her daughter's golden gaze at last. "I loved her, Azusami. I loved her a lot. And so I'm never leaving."
Her beloved daughter states without hesitation, "I don't think she ever loved you."
Azula's heart pounds in her chest as she presses her back harder against the wall. She begins to think she may regret eavesdropping on this conversation. Ty Lee probably will say something horrible, since she has become overbold and overconfident and no longer values and fears Princess Azula the way she ought to. Azula merely waits for the comment she feels certain will be incriminating and infuriating.
But, it is not that exciting. Ty Lee barely makes a sound, much less says something that shows how little regard she has for Azula's power. How little regard for their former love.
"Yeah," Ty Lee replies in a wounded whisper, because she does not know if Azula ever felt love for anyone else or from anyone else—regardless of how many people care so deeply about her—and Ty Lee can see her marriage falling apart before her eyes.
Azula does not know if she should make her presence known.
Then Azusami says, "I wish she was dead," and Azula decides she should keep silent.
"She loves you. She's not good at showing it," says Ty Lee in earnest. "Get ready for school, and fast; you're running late."
Azusami reluctantly gets up and starts getting ready for school. Ty Lee walks away and bumps right into Azula.
"Is something wrong?" nervously asks Ty Lee, wringing her hands.
"I heard all of that," says Azula to her wife. She sounds… defeated. That never is a good tone when it comes to Princess Azula of the Fire Nation.
Ty Lee averts her eyes, blushing. "Oh. I'm sorry."
"It does not bother me," Azula states, trying to sound assured. "I need to get back to work."
"Right," Ty Lee quietly replies, offering a small smile.
They part ways as hastily as possible.
[X]
Later that afternoon, Azusami freezes in place upon arriving back at the palace. She takes a few gulps of the perfumed late-spring air and tries to steel herself. Her mother—not her mom—her mother waits for her, sitting on the black stone steps.
"Am I in trouble?" asks Azusami, rubbing her palms on her coarse dark red uniform. "I don't remember doing anything."
Azula demands, "Why do you automatically assume you are in trouble?"
Azusami rolls her eyes, prompting Azula's fingers to angrily twitch. "Because you're sitting here waiting for me where mom usually does."
"Does she seriously always wait for you to come home? My own mother didn't even do that for Zuko, and my father certainly never would…"
Azusami rolls her glimmering golden eyes. Again with the poor attitude. Azula can hardly stand it.
"Yes, you have shitty parents," says the young princess.
"Language, Azusami," snaps Azula, clenching a fist.
Azusami loudly and forcefully sighs. "And now I am in trouble."
"You are not in trouble," insists Azula, her patience dwindling ever rapidly. "I wanted to spend time with you. We do not spend much time together. Of course, you could make the first move."
Princess Azusami contemplates her reply for a moment before deciding upon the truthful, "I'd be a bit nervous."
"About what?" Azula crossly demands, now truly tiring of this. All she wanted was to show her daughter she could make an effort, and now she has to deal with this obnoxious flightiness Azusami must have inherited from Zuko.
But, instead of continuing to quiver in her boots as Azula anticipates, Azusami laughs, a very cold cackle she inherited from her mother. Then she explains with illustrative hand gestures, "Firstly, rejection. You would reject me immediately. Secondly, you've done nothing but yell at me for thirteen years."
"Do you honestly think that about me?" Azula asks, frowning.
Azusami blushes and rubs her toe on the ground. "N…no. I mean, you probably were nice to me when I was a baby but I don't remember it."
Azula's lip contorts into a displeased snarl. "You sound like your Uncle Zuko. Always whining about how our father didn't love him enough." Her eyelashes flutter when she realizes the weight of her words. "Except, our father didn't love him. I love you very much. I love you more than my own life and that is significant."
"Right," Azusami replies, then her heart drops into her stomach. "I love you too, I mean. I do love you too. I do."
She has to say that. Maybe she means it. She does not know at the moment.
"Do you want to have tea with me?" asks Azula, averting her eyes.
"Can I say no?" anxiously asks Azusami, cautiously watching her mother.
"Yes," Azula coldly replies, and Azusami thinks she might be in trouble.
Then again, Azula does not look hurt by it. Azusami doubts she even has feelings.
The young princess strides inside and shuts herself in her bedroom. Azula composes herself, rises, and returns to her work.
The Fire Nation appreciates her, unlike her ungrateful mess of a family.
[X]
As Azula intentionally works late to avoid confronting her anniversary, that hot and damp night, Ty Lee goes to a bar to celebrate her own anniversary. Azula does not want to come, an answer that does not surprise Ty Lee. No one recognizes the princess, thankfully, without Azula by her side, and so she just sips warm sake and looks enviously at the couples.
A beautiful girl who looks part Water Tribe walks up to Ty Lee.
"Did you go through a break-up?" she asks, cocking her head to the side. "You keep looking at all these disgustingly cute couples and you look really sad about it."
"Just my wife," says Ty Lee, uncertain how to voice the words. She used to find it so easy to talk to anyone and everyone and make new friends, and wonders what happens to her. "The two of us had a pretty bad fight yesterday morning and the aftershocks are still there."
The Water Tribe girl asks, "How bad a fight?"
Ty Lee smiles to herself and says, "We could've sold tickets."
The young woman with the glistening Water Tribe eyes raises her freshly filled glass, the liquor pouring down over her shaking hand.
She declares loudly enough for the whole bar to hear, "To marriage; why we build bars."
Ty Lee grins and happily toasts to that.
The other woman does not leave her side all night.
[X]
Azula sits on the floor of her bedroom, surrounded by lit melting candles as she does her work with a pen and well of ink. The characters on the paper lose their meaning as her eyes become progressively more tired.
Her wife stumbles home. Azula holds her tongue.
"You're up late," Ty Lee slurs, trying to stay steady but failing. Her heart feels faint in her chest, her head feels fuzzy and the room spins.
Azula rolls those golden eyes that Ty Lee fell in love with a long time ago. "You're home late."
"I would've invited you to our anniversary celebration but you made it really clear that you hate bars and drinking and other kinds of fun," says Ty Lee's wife.
Azula resists the urge to throttle her.
"Did you have fun with people other than me?" asks Azula and Ty Lee suddenly looks pale.
Ty Lee slurs, defending herself too fervently for someone lying, "You know, jealousy is a really ugly emotion."
Azula is a liar. It is no crime to lie to a liar, Ty Lee thinks at the time, her mind quite addled by all of tonight and her anniversary. She can say whatever she pleases.
"You should come to bed," says Azula, slowly rising to her feet. She gently takes Ty Lee by the arm and guides her to the bed. Ty Lee lies down and closes her eyes. She feels so sleepy. Impossibly, impossibly sleepy.
"Are you mad at me?" Ty Lee manages to ask as she feels her chest collapsing from the sheer weight of the air.
"No," Azula says, uncertain if she speaks the truth or not.
"Okay," Ty Lee tiredly replies, and she remembers nothing after that.
Azula lies awake for a long time.
[X]
In the morning, Ty Lee remembers everything. It significantly exacerbates her dreadful headache. She gets up and tries to find Azula, bleary-eyed and nauseous. When she walks into the main room, Iroh offers her tea. Azula already has a cup of it in her hand.
"I need to talk to you," Ty Lee pipes up. Iroh stares. "Alone, if that's okay."
He does not need to be told twice; Iroh does not want to be around for this conversation that looks very likely to explode.
Ty Lee walks to a chair and sits down. Azula hesitates for a moment, but then takes a seat across from her wife. She stares into Ty Lee's eyes, waiting for the worst.
She does not expect good news at this point.
Azula cannot recall their last purely happy conversation.
"Last night I slept with somebody else," Ty Lee whispers, squinting in the morning light. "She was really pretty and I slept with her and I cheated on you and I've… I've done that more than once."
"I might be cruel, and I might be often cold to you, and hurt you in heat, but I have never cheated on you," Azula says in full honesty. "I have not touched another woman in—"
"I—Azula—please—I realize there's probably nothing I can say that can make this right, but I… there's something you need to know." Ty Lee sinks onto her knees. She looks like a peasant begging to avoid the death sentence. "I asked you to marry me because I was in love with you, just like I'm in love with you now. You were right. I don't fear you anymore and I stray too often and I'm… I'm just as bad as you but in a different way. But I love you. I love you. When I look back on our marriage, the time we spent together, I see that I need you. I never saw that until I knew I was losing you. I'm on my knees begging, princess. Please give me another chance."
Azula cannot hold back the tears that silently stream from her eyes. Ty Lee cannot believe she lets her see them and it feels like someone took a knife, stabbed it into the acrobat's chest and twisted the handle. Years ago, Ty Lee saw her cry every day; her madness was the center of her life then. But now, she always is so emotionally detached.
But, despite Ty Lee's painful confession, all Azula does is coldly reply, "It is too little, too late."
"Oh," whispers Ty Lee, closing her eyes and hanging her head.
Azula stands up and vacates the room.
She must leave fast, for she cannot bear to have Ty Lee see her crying this way.
Chapter Two: Near Death Experiences
Azula purrs, "Well, I am far prettier than Fire Lord Sozin, so it is not difficult."
The man with the ridiculous slender black beard laughs. Azula smirks. They both stand on the fringes of a grand gala in honor of one of the holidays years ago Zuko considering abolishing before Iroh of all people stopped him.
Her wife always was fantastic at entertaining people; she makes friends easily. They used to be an inseparable power couple at every event and outing, but these days they always uphold separate conversations on opposite sides of the room.
"It is not that. You are a very clever woman," says the guest.
"I know," she confidently replies, and she bids him goodbye.
And promptly runs into her dolled up daughter. Azusami does not look interested in this affair, but that does not surprise Azula.
"Why do you willingly subject yourself to this?" Azusami asks.
"Because I have far more political training than your uncle, since I was the one actually groomed to be Fire Lord."
"I don't mean that," Azusami snaps. "We could leave. Let's leave."
"I enjoy this, and you ought to. Your cousin does."
"My cousin has a reason to pay attention during lessons that don't even matter because I won't be a politician ever since it's stupid and this country is a mess that I don't want to clean up," Azusami grumbles, crossing her arms. She slouches and pouts. Azula considers correcting her posture and expression but decides not to waste her time.
"Perhaps when you are older you can get out of these—"
She sees it and stops talking, since her entire body tenses the way it did when she was a soldier. Azula burns an arrow flying towards her face in midair. It crumbles to ashes and blows away on the breath of the wind. The chaos then erupts and tears her from her focused zone of self-defense.
The assassins nearly claim her.
They do escape in the madness that these unskilled and stuffy politicians cause.
[X]
At night, Azula casually unwinds herself as if it were any other day, and like no one tried to murder her at a dull party. Her wife watches her with dazed eyes.
Ty Lee rubs her arm and gazes at the woman she almost lost. Azula notices her stare and turns around, locking eyes with her wife. Ty Lee unabashedly studies her from head to toe, like she did a long time ago.
"I thought I was going to lose you forever."
Azula coldly retorts, "And that matters why? You want to divorce me. It is the same thing."
Ty Lee's gut churns. "I don't know. So maybe we should do something to fix everything."
"Fix everything?"
"Fix us. And once upon a time, my everything was us."
"People change. Situations change. I doubt we can do anything about how cold and miserable this entire affair has become."
Ty Lee parrots but with different meaning, "People change. Situations change."
Examining the look in Ty Lee's eyes, a rush of adrenaline runs through Azula, and she walks towards her. Those doe eyes drift from desire to uncertainty in the space of a single blink. Without hesitation for the first time in a thousand years, Azula straddles her hips on the bed. She feels how fast her heart beats and remembers that Ty Lee has one.
Her hands grip the sides of the bed, unwilling or unable to touch her. She fights it out of fear that this could only screw things up further. When Azula cups the sides of her face, she caves in and decides this is worth the possible fallout.
Ty Lee sees Azula straining to keep herself composed and her heart beats even faster. She wants to say something clever or sexy but decides she does not want to break this moment. Right now, it feels like maybe the past years never happened.
Azula's hands spread over her hips, feeling the warmth of her skin through silk. Ty Lee rubs her wife's smooth back and begins to slip off her clothes. They lean close, their lips a breath apart. She inhales deeply and picks up the strong scent of perfume she usually finds repugnant, but right now could not love more.
Their noses awkwardly bump, as if they are teenagers again.
If someone told Ty Lee that the Earth ceased spinning for these moments, she would have easily believed them.
Azula's fingers remain on her waist, gripping her and grounding her to this world. They break for a moment to strip away garments. Her lips find Ty Lee's neck, hungry kisses ricocheting off her collarbone down to her chest.
They pretend none of it ever happened. That decades never came to pass. It works for them both, somehow.
Her tongue slides across her wife's breast with a deliberate sweep and Ty Lee makes a half-forgotten noise in the back of her throat. Azula lifts her lips to kiss Ty Lee again and she gasps into her mouth. They catch eyes mutually aflame with this need.
Ty Lee risks breaking everything by saying, "Lie down, please, princess."
She calls her princess for the first time since the short months after they first were wed, making it clear that they are pretending tonight.
Azula feigns contemplating it, toying with her, and at last complies. Ty Lee tumbles on top of her, laughing carelessly for the first time in so long.
Ty Lee bites at the sensitive flesh of her inner thighs, slowly teasing her tongue in curlicues towards her center. Her hips buck on their own accord, and she pulls them back down against the bed.
Her wife's tongue feels like the slide of a silk scarf, and the sudden contact makes her jerk again, but her strong arms keep Azula grounded in more ways than one. She finds a maddeningly slow rhythm. It is more than Azula's long-forgotten senses can take when she slips one finger inside of her. For a moment their eyes meet, and they do not think about what they miss.
Azula puts her weight on one arm, using the other to run her fingers through Ty Lee's messy hair. Suddenly, something stirs in the pit of her stomach and it spreads through her entire body at a hundred times the intensity that she remembers. It feels like lightning pulsating through her entire body. She lets her head drop back, rolling her hips as she feels an intense orgasm wash over her entire body.
After that, they break apart and the warmth fades with every step they take as they prepare themselves to go to sleep.
Ty Lee looks in the mirror and despite the glowing golden flush on her cheeks, sees the face of a woman who has forgotten how to smile.
When she lies down, she makes a frightening decision.
"I don't want to hate you anymore," whispers Ty Lee.
Azula does not know how to reply.
[X]
The next morning, as soon as the royal guard leaves Azusami in front of the school, she slips around the corner and out of sight. She meets Junsu outside behind the school. He goes to the boy's school across the street and is sixteen while she is thirteen, but she does not care. Junsu makes her happy, even if they must sneak around the way they do.
Junsu kisses her and she feels a burst of warmth. She wraps her arms around him and kisses him again before they both step back.
"Sozin Memorial Meadow or what?" asks Junsu.
"Sozin Memorial Meadow," Azusami says, adjusting her bag on her shoulder. It hurts.
"I heard they were going to name it in honor of the fallen Earth Kingdom soldiers."
"Well, my Un—Fire Lord Zuko is planning on naming it Soldier's Field. It would apply to soldiers from every nation," says Azusami and Junsu snorts.
"This is the worst regime in the history of the Fire Nation."
"I could not agree more," Azusami earnestly insists. "They should be stopped."
"Isn't your mom like grand advisor?"
"She's my mother, not my mom, and I don't really give a fuck what her job is."
"Hey, Azusami," says Junsu, taking her arm and turning her to face him. "I think you should sleep somewhere other than the palace tonight."
"Why?" Azusami demands, wrinkling her nose.
He says with an oddly cryptic expression, "That assassination attempt on your mother just makes me worry about you."
Azusami knows he is lying, so she just placates him by saying, "I'll stay at a friend's if that makes you feel better."
"It does," says her boyfriend as he wraps his buff arm around her waist.
They walk through the streets of Caldera until they at last reach the sprawling splash of green in the red and grey city: Sozin Memorial Meadow. The two of them waste no time reaching the fountain they often sit on the edges of. It is a fountain of water, not fire, and that makes it particularly unique. Or at least it did when the world was at war.
They talk about everything and nothing and share a solitary kiss.
"Do you want to go to the lake?" asks Junsu and Azusami nods.
"Anywhere but school," she states. Or home, she adds in her head.
He stands, takes her by the hand, and the two young lovers walk through the forest to a secluded nook near the artificial lake. Azusami sits down beneath a tree.
"We're alone," she says, taking a deep breath. "It's so pretty and we're alone."
Junsu kneels across from her, then leans in and kisses her. She slips forward to press her lips fiercely against his again. He takes her in his arms and his lips graze against her neck, making her shoulder shoot up. He gently pushes her back against the tree and she exhales softly.
She sucks on his lower lip as he envelopes her entirely in his arms.
With her eyes closed, she runs her hand over his muscled back. She sighs sweetly again, then she jumps and their foreheads bump into each other.
"What?" he asks, sitting back on his haunches.
"I heard something," she says, glancing around. "Why don't we go further in the woods."
He would agree to anything at this point, seeing as she was the most beautiful girl in the entire world and she was willing to make out with him in Sozin Memorial Meadow. She takes him by the hand this time and they begin to run through the woods, helping each other over the treacherous roots that threaten to trip them.
They come to a stop by the large tree they tend to hide near, but this time they do not pounce on each other beneath its shadowy leaves. Azusami clamps her hand over her mouth to hold back her scream of terror. Two soldiers stand guard by the tree.
The two lovers made it a mere hour without the army finding them. Azusami huffs.
"So we skipped school," Junsu says, shaking his head. "No big deal. Kids do it."
It does not help, seeing as one of the soldiers grunts, "The princess is waiting for you."
Junsu blanches; Azusami sneers.
[X]
Near the fountain, making a debacle, Azusami crosses her arms over her chest and rolls her eyes. The soldiers escorted her to her mother, of all people, as if Azula even cared where she was. Junsu was dragged along with her and now stands with the stoic soldiers.
Princess Azula bitterly admonishes, "You scared me to death! I had every guard at my disposal out looking for you!"
Azusami pointedly rolls her golden eyes again and states firmly, "Mother, I think that's your problem, not mine."
"I think your problem is that ridiculous boy!" Azula snaps.
"That couldn't be further from the truth!" Azusami screams, setting her hands on her hips.
Azula fervently rattles off, "He's a waste of time. He is a slacker, he cannot even bend, he obsesses over those pointless strategy games that suck the lives out of—"
"He's like one of those geniuses who no one understands until they're dead!" Azusami shouts.
Those soldiers nearby squirm at the look in Princess Azula's eyes. It could murder the average person but it does not make Azusami budge an inch.
"He will be dead if he sneaks you out into the woods again!" Azula declares, her voice frightening the woodland creatures. She pivots and demands of Junsu, "Does he understand?"
The bright red boy stammers out, "Yes. I understand. I want to go home now."
"Take him, and keep him away from my daughter," Azula regally orders, nostrils flaring.
Azusami glowers, but knows she has lost. For now.
[X]
Ty Lee sits in the courtyard at an old stone Pai Sho table with Iroh. He will be in the Fire Nation a while longer and Ty Lee enjoys spending time with him. But, today, she can only lament her anniversary and the pain it brought.
"We had a happy ending. I thought we had a happy ending," Ty Lee sadly says, toying with one of her weathered tiles.
Iroh thinks for a moment before replying, "Happy endings are only a pause. They are not true endings. There are only three: revenge, tragedy and forgiveness. Revenge and tragedy go hand in hand every time. Forgiveness, however, redeems all things and liberates the future."
Ty Lee contemplates that statement in greater detail than she considers her next move in the game. She knows she will lose anyway. Maybe that applies to both her marriage and this round of Pai Sho. She always loses. Always loses her trembling, adored, beautiful mad, mad, mad girl.
She sets a tiger-monkey tile on the table.
"I don't think she'll forgive me. She still hasn't forgiven me for things that happened when we're fourteen. I don't think I'm gonna get any of that for stuff that happened a night ago," Ty Lee says, frowning.
"A night ago?" inquires Iroh and Ty Lee blushes bright pink.
"I slept with somebody other than her," whispers Ty Lee. "I slept with her too, but I just—she never cheated—she's been a terrible and cruel person but she's never cheated on me. She selects her kinds of honor, I guess."
"Your relationship is messy." Iroh makes an easy move that confirms Ty Lee's suspicion that she would be annihilated today. "But it was bound to be from the start."
Ty Lee passionately insists, "We deserved better."
Iroh sighs, letting his eyes lock with Ty Lee's for a moment. He gravely responds, "Most people deserve better than what they receive."
Ty Lee picks a random tile without even looking. She nods.
"We deserved better than hating each other but it was gonna be that way. We just pretended it wouldn't," Ty Lee says, punctuating her words with a deep sigh.
Iroh calmly states, "I think you do not see that the reason you are together is because under the shallows of resentment, your love is deep."
"Our love is blind. Mai always said we brought out the worst in each other."
"After what you did for my niece, saving her from herself when she was at her lowest, I cannot imagine that to be true." Pause. He makes his move. Ty Lee sees certain defeat in her future, not that she was not expecting it. "And she helped you become the remarkable person you are."
Ty Lee cannot help but smile, even if it is small.
"You're right," she admits in complete earnest.
Iroh wins the game in one move.
[X]
That evening, Azula sighs and sits down on the floor, her back against her bed. Ty Lee sits across from her, leaning against the wall.
"She is completely out of control," Azula says, breaking the silence.
"I know," Ty Lee softly replies, shaking her head at the thought.
"I have no clue what to do about her," Azula states, clenching and unclenching her fists.
"Neither do I," Ty Lee states, banging the back of her head into the wall three times.
Azula's eyes flash wide and Ty Lee furrows her brow, stunned. Swiftly, Azula seizes Ty Lee by the arm and pulls her away from the scuttling creature on the floor. Another joins it, and another, and Azula hits them with fire. They stagger backwards, but it does not kill them.
"Get up on the bed," Azula orders and Ty Lee does not hesitate to obey.
It takes ten bolts of lightning to take down the venomous beasts. Azula edges forward and examines one of the scorpion-armadillos. Someone painted a symbol on their backs.
"We should show Zuko," Ty Lee says, staring at what draws Azula's eye.
Princess Azula nods and strides out of the room to find her brother.
[X]
They put it off until the morning. The creatures go under lock and key and Azula and Ty Lee go back to their bedroom.
"You saved me from the horrible monsters," Ty Lee says, her heart still pounding from the attempt on her life.
Azula smoothly remarks, "Well, with you out of the way they would move on to me next."
Ty Lee laughs, then Azula does, and they stand there like complete maniacs for several moments. Then they catch their breath.
"I wouldn't want you to die," Ty Lee says, beginning to faintly smile.
"And you think I want you to die? Even if I do find you very boring and exhausting and exasperating and petty and shallow, I will not let anyone harm you on my watch."
A smile creeps onto Ty Lee's face. They become aware of how stifling hot the summer room has become, but a certain friction between them strengthens the warmth. Ty Lee begins to get up but Azula grabs her by the arm and pulls her back into a fierce kiss on the lips.
"I don't regret this," Ty Lee whispers, mostly to herself. Azula understands but she would never lower herself to saying such things aloud. "I don't—"
Azula cuts her off with another kiss, aggressively switching their positions so that her back presses against the soft mattress. Her lips find Ty Lee's neck, using the tip of her tongue to swipe the sweat from her pulse point.
They begin to continue but Azula freezes it. Ty Lee pulls back.
"This is making things worse," she states.
Ty Lee hopefully suggests, "We're just going through a rough patch."
Azula bitterly replies, "But what if rough patches are all we have left?"
Ty Lee purses her lips and tries not to think about that.
Chapter Three: Memory Pain
Several years before the bitter anniversary, Azula smirks smugly to herself as she guides Ty Lee to the Caldera pier. The Kyoshi Warrior worries that Azula is planning to drown her today; they have become so close that perhaps Azula will push her away in the most horrifying fashion possible. She has helped the princess through her pain, helped her climb out of the pit of sorrow, the well of tears.
She turns to Ty Lee as the salty sea breeze stings their cheeks. Ty Lee breathes it in while she enjoys studying the ships.
"Let's play a game," Ty Lee suggests, resting her head on Azula's shoulder. "Let's make up where we think they're going like they did when we were young and stuff."
"I have a better idea," purrs Azula, stepping away from Ty Lee and grabbing her by the arms. She positions Ty Lee in front of her and reaches into her pocket. She withdraws a glowing, shining, red and green carved gem. "I know red and gold is the tradition, but my stupid uncle and awful brother convinced me to be more romantic and give you a memory of our first kiss. Aren't they ridiculous? Anyway, I only agreed because it made it look more like a flower and you're the kind of tacky girl who likes those."
Ty Lee takes the gem, agape. She could not be more stunned. Her princess just proposed to her. Her princess just proposed to her!
"I—I—I will obviously say yes!" Ty Lee exclaims with a huge smile. "I've dreamed about this moment forever and ever and ever and ever and ever and—"
Azula cuts her off with a passionate kiss.
[X]
Azula brushes her fingertips across the sharp points of the engagement gem she gave Ty Lee years and years ago. She stands in their bedroom and it rests atop a set of drawers. Azula wonders why they still keep it on display, as if they consider it to be a fond memory. Are they that adept at pretending? Yes.
Ty Lee walks into the room and lies down in bed while Azula still gazes at the gem, not bothering to turn to face her. She picks up the engagement gem and feels its weight in her hand. It faintly glows green in the shadows.
"How was your day?" Azula halfheartedly asks.
"Good," honestly replies Ty Lee. Often it is easier to talk when her wife faces the other way.
"That is good," says Azula, setting down the engagement gem.
She walks to the bed and lies down a trillion miles away from her wife, or at least it feels that way. Ty Lee catches sight of what Azula was examining and must bite back tears.
Hesitantly, Ty Lee touches Azula's hand. It does little to relieve the iciness between them.
"Do you want to go to the pier tomorrow?" Ty Lee asks. "We haven't gone in ages. We could even take Azusami if you want; she's still really mad at us."
Azula contemplates it for a moment. She runs all possible scenarios in her mind.
"I am busy tomorrow," she says.
"Oh," Ty Lee breathes.
"Mhm," Azula softly replies.
They lie there in silence until they fall asleep.
[X]
Azula smirks at Ty Lee and Ty Lee smiles widely back. They stand at a party where they will soon announce their engagement.
Both women look beautiful. Ty Lee is stunning and Azula struggles to focus on politics. The things she wants to do to that perfect woman.
Azula gives up on her conversations and strides over to her fiancée. "Our announcement is not for a while. Care to step outside? I find it sweltering in here."
She sounds crisp, polite and precisely like a princess, but the true meaning is not at all the way she was trained to speak and behave as a girl.
Ty Lee smiles and nods. Azula takes her by the wrist and they walk into the hallway. They find an abandoned room and Azula kisses Ty Lee's neck, then her lips, then brushes down deeper down on her lover again.
Ty Lee lies back on a fancy antique table, smiling faintly to herself. Azula straddles her, her knees pressed against the hard wooden desk. She removes her shirt and Ty Lee cannot take her eyes away. She raises her hand up and brushes the back of her knuckles up past her navel and to her breasts. Azula leans down, sliding over her, easily making Ty Lee moan and their chests press against each other moments before their lips do.
Azula sucks on her lower lip.
It is perfect.
[X]
At yet another party due to the Summit Week held annually since the end of the war, Azula watches Ty Lee set her hand on the arm of some hideous and miserable man. Ty Lee smiles brightly and bats her eyelashes at him.
Azula turns to a rather comely woman with light brown hair and a Water Tribe complexion. She lets the girl speak to her but does not listen to her. Then, she goes into a half smile the moment Ty Lee looks her way.
See, Azula's expression says, I can smile too.
Ty Lee does look beautiful, but Azula has forgotten how to imagine her as anything but one of Azula's failures, one of things she screwed up, something she wants to forget about but at the same time wants to make right. She does not even know who the person was that she took by the wrist and passionately kissed and snuck up with.
Maybe they slept together the other night, which was lovely enough, but it does not help the problems in their relationship. Maybe it makes even more of them.
Azula continues pretending to care remotely about the Water Tribe woman with bright blue eyes. She glances over to Ty Lee and sees her arguing with Azusami, right in front of every single person of political importance. Azula purses her lips at her wife and daughter. What a perfect, beautiful, miserable, hollow, sorry excuse for a family she has. It is all the glory she ever imagined when she gave Ty Lee that engagement gem.
The Water Tribe girl says, "It was nice to meet you, Princess Azula."
But Azula is too deep in her bitter thoughts to respond.
But, again, she fakes a goodbye smile at the girl when Ty Lee looks her way.
[X]
The Caldera Gardens are renowned for their incredible, breathtaking beauty and diverse flowers stolen from around the world during conquests. After the war, no one had the heart to remove the pillaged plants, and so, they added an Avatar monument to make it symbolize diversity instead of oppression.
Today, shrugging off wedding planning and leaving it in the hands of an experience royal and noble event planner, Azula and Ty Lee instead walk through the peaceful gardens under the bright sun. Fire fountains stay safely away from the flowers and waterfalls feed them. The gorgeous sculptures capture their attention each time they pass one.
Ty Lee never can get Azula to hold hands with her, but she still is impressed by the romantic date amongst fragrant flowers.
Reaching towards a flowering shrub, Ty Lee begins to pick one before pricking her finger on a thorn. She cries out in pain and sticks her finger in her mouth, sucking on it while blinking back tears.
"You have had much worse injuries," Azula says at first, but then she struggles to resist her fiancée's beautiful wide, sparkling, pleading eyes.
"How can I rescue you?" Azula asks, starting to smirk. Ty Lee looks so eager.
"You can kiss me," Ty Lee suggests, removing her hurt finger from her mouth.
"That is disgustingly sweet and I shall have no part of it," says Azula.
Ty Lee sets her fingertip on her lower lip and bats her thick eyelashes.
Azula exaggeratedly sighs and makes a grand show of kissing her fiancée where she points.
[X]
Ty Lee takes Azusami to the Caldera Gardens on a dreary afternoon. Azusami rolls her eyes whenever Ty Lee looks at her, making it as clear as humanly possible that she is opposed to this outing. Ty Lee can hardly stand it.
"I'm just trying to spend time with you," Ty Lee explains, furrowing her brow. Azusami resists her mom's pout. "We don't know each other anymore."
"Because I'm not a child anymore!" Azusami scares the birds away from their perches in the exotic trees.
Ty Lee picks a flower and wistfully stares at it. Azusami tries to figure out why boring Earth Kingdom flowers make her mom come so close to crying. She ultimately decides not to think about it.
"You'll always be my child," says Ty Lee, stuffing the flower in her pocket.
"Not really since as soon as I'm old enough I'm running away to marry Junsu and I'm never coming back! Not even for holidays or ever! Not even when you're on your deathbed!" Azusami shouts, setting her hands defiantly on her hips.
"You are so much like your mother," Ty Lee says, to which Azusami wants to reply not enough to make her love me, but, instead, the young princess angrily tears flowers from a bush, throws them to the ground and stomps on them while glaring viciously.
"Do not ever tell me that I'm anything like her or I'm running away right this instant and never ever coming back!" she screams, and Ty Lee stands there, so peaceful and still that it makes Azusami feel like a terrible person.
Ty Lee watches her only child storm out of the Caldera Gardens with a soft, sad expression on her beautiful face. She cannot think of a reason to follow her or will her legs to move.
She just hurts.
[X]
Shortly before Azula and Ty Lee's wedding, they break up. Ty Lee runs away, going off to be comforted by friends on Kyoshi Island. Compared to Caldera, she kind of hates it. She lived in such a nice place for so long while she healed Azula.
Every day, she notices how much she hates how Kyoshi Island smells. Ty Lee misses the scent of burning incense and fire lilies on the breeze. Here, she only smells the ocean, mud and sweat. Not appealing to the nose at all.
Meanwhile, across the ocean, Azula misses the way her fiancée smells: like cinnamon fire gummies and far too much perfume.
But Azula cares too much about her pride to go reclaim Ty Lee. Therefore, it is Ty Lee who crosses the sea and returns to the city in which she was born to talk to Azula about what happens. They never successfully communicated with each other before they break up, so maybe they can do it now.
After Zuko lets her in, Ty Lee begins to talk to her fiancée, palm resting on the reddish desk in the bedroom they previously shared, supporting her weight.
But, before she can say much, Azula cuts her off with a kiss. It takes them both off guard, since the break up had seemed so permanent. And it speaks more than words ever could.
'I miss you,' it declares.
'I'm sorry,' it says without hesitation.
'Please love me again, I cannot live with you,' it begs.
All of this at once, in one kiss, in one moment, with hearts pounding.
"Will you still marry me?" Ty Lee asks as the kiss breaks.
"Of course I will," purrs Azula, glad she did not have to be the one to aks.
They memorize each other's features in the red light of the sunset.
[X]
Azula and Ty Lee have broken up a thousand times, especially during the course of their marriage, but have never stayed that way. Something always crashes them back together no matter what they do to try to escape. Ty Lee considers running for god this time tonight as she lies awake until sunrise, staring at the ceiling until her eyes burn. She listens to Azula breathing, so loud she cannot hear her own.
Finally, Azula sits up and Ty Lee does too, adding an exaggerated stretch.
The women share an empty kiss. It feels like pressing your lips against a statue, cold and stoic and bitter.
They break apart and try not to be sad. Neither will admit to defeat to the other.
"I should go," says Azula, standing up and stretching.
Ty Lee rises onto her knees on the bed and sits on her haunches.
As Azula begins to leave, she makes up her mind in a flicker of a second and turns to kiss Ty Lee. Their lips brush against each other for only a fleeting moment before Azula leaves.
It is a half-finished goodbye.
[X]
The two newly married women, together, drink tea on a chilly, misty morning.
Together, they sit at a stone table in the courtyard.
They do not need to say anything to be comfortable together and that is the best part of their relationship. The golden sun barely penetrates the light grey clouds while Ty Lee keeps staring at her beautiful Azula and wondering what the princess thinks about. Azula often disappears from this world and looks through—not at—whatever is in front of her, eyes fixed on a certain point while her thoughts consume her. Today, she looks at a shrub with its soft, shining red leaves and woody stem.
It makes Ty Lee feel warm to gaze at her new wife.
"Azula," Ty Lee whispers, tenderly bringing her wife back to reality, "what are you thinking about?"
She feels daring enough to ask for the first time in history today.
Azula blinks several times. "Nothing you would care about," she purrs.
"I'd care about it," softly insists Ty Lee, sipping her tea. "I care about everything about you."
"I know you do," Azula smoothly replies, although she faintly blushes.
"So, what were you thinking about?" Ty Lee inquires.
"It is a secret," Azula prettily replies.
"I can keep it."
Azula laughs. "No. You cannot keep a secret to save your life."
Ty Lee smiles into her hot cup of matcha green tea.
"You're right," she happily admits.
[X]
The two women, apart, drink tea on a chilly, misty morning.
Azula intently studies her work, yet at the same time does not pay attention to it as she out to. She sits outside with her parchment, pen and ink (which has stained the sides of her fingers). As she pretends to work, she listns to the birds sing in the damp trees.
The pale white sun makes no effort to penetrate the dark grey clouds.
Ty Lee has her hot cup of matcha green tea in hand when she walks out into the courtyard and closely studies how Azula looks right through her papers. She looks lovely and lonely, but Ty Lee does not feel warm when she gazes at her like she used to.
"Azula," Ty Lee says weakly, yanking Azula back to reality, "what are you thinking about?"
She cannot remember the last time she asked that.
Azula sets down her pen and takes a sip of her tea.
"Freedom," she replies, both cold and vulnerable at the same time. "Why do you suddenly care about my thoughts?"
Silence.
"I never stopped caring."
Azula desperately wants to say, 'I never did either,' but the truth is overridden by her pride and her bitterness.
Instead of spilling her heart out, Azula remarks, "It is cold it, isn't it?"
Silence.
"Yeah," at last whispers Ty Lee. "Yeah, it is."
Chapter Four: Ember Island
Ty Lee is no longer afraid of monsters because she once loved one.
Loved a monster because she had a beautiful soul underneath smoldering eyes and sharp claws. Loved a monster enough to transform her into a human.
But Ty Lee wonders if Azula forgets the person she became as she watches her viciously tear a pamphlet from Azusami's hands. The movement is a tad more violent than it needs to be. Azula flips through the pages while Ty Lee stares from the sidelines.
"Where did you get this?" demands Azula, fiercely eyeing her daughter. Azusami remains the only person in the world not intimidated by that notorious look.
"School," Azusami replies with an indignant roll of her eyes and a small, spoiled pout. She cannot believe her terrible mother.
Azula waves the pamphlet furiously. "This is treason, you know?"
And Azusami recites rehearsed words. "It's the right of the public to criticize their leadership. Something Fire Lord Zuko apparently made a law."
Azula smoothly and bitterly retorts, "He also made a law that states symbols and promotion of the previous regime is outlawed. This certainly breaks that."
Huffily Azusami says, "Maybe I'll ask him to change it."
Azula pointedly sighs and wonders how she will handle this. If Azusami is this bad at such a young age, she does not want to imagine what she will be like a few years down the line.
"You are far too young to be this political," says Azula, locking eyes with her daughter.
"I'm the child of a politician. What do you expect?" Azusami mirthlessly laughs. Ty Lee begins to chew on her nails.
Azula leans in close and snarls, "I expect you to stay away from insane extremists who even remotely believe in the lies your forefathers told to stay in power."
"You can't call them lies. You're such a hypocrite!"
"I of all people can. My father's regime and rhetoric ruined me. You cannot understand because you were not there."
"Maybe not being there gives me a better perspective because I have no emotions involved."
"He would make you miserable. You're outspoken and you can't bend."
"Well, that's exactly why you make me miserable so it wouldn't be much of a change."
Ty Lee intervenes, since Azula looks like Azusami just slapped her in the face.
"'sami, that's insecurity talking. Your mother loves you."
"That isn't what you say when she's not listening."
Everything erupts at that moment. All three members of the immediate family scream vitriol at each other in a jumbled mess.
It ends when Azula takes a step back and burns the pamphlet to ashes.
"I have important work to do stopping terrorists who write these things from killing you."
"You don't stop terrorists; you collect taxes."
Azula's hand twitches to attack the girl, but she manages to compose herself and leave the room. Azusami seethes.
Ty Lee tries not to cry.
[X]
Later that day, Azula sits across from her brother with a huge stack of ominous reports recently delivered by messenger hawk from various Fire Nation provinces. They have a lunch around them but neither has eaten a bite.
Honestly, ruling a country never looked so stressful when they were children.
"This is the most trouble I've seen in years," says Zuko, running his fingers over the parchment in front of him. "I don't know why people are suddenly so vicious. I can't say there have been any policy changes."
"Maybe it is someone young. Adolescents who long to change the world with no knowledge of how they are wrong," she replies, thinking partially of her own daughter. Thinking mostly of her own daughter, actually.
Zuko states yet again, "I don't know what to do other than heightening security in public spaces and waiting for them to either tire or openly strike."
Azula stares at him for a moment. His dry idea, these problems that do not feel like hers, this room and how the scarlet walls suffocate her. She has only one thought and it will not leave her head no matter how fiercely she attempts to push it out.
She crisply announces, "I need to leave."
Zuko narrows his eyes. "This lunch?"
"This palace, this job… this everything," Azula hastily explains. "My family is broken and I could not possibly care less about nationalist extremists who want to string us up."
Zuko stares at her in silence for a moment. He tries to figure her out. When dissatisfied with her personally life, she tends to throw herself into her work, not run from it.
"You could go to Ember Island."
Azula rolls her eyes and shuffles papers pointlessly. "Ember Island?"
"Why not? It might be the escape you three need and no one is using the summer palace."
"Maybe," says Azula. "Or maybe it will worsen things."
"I can't say it'll fix your family issues but it'll help with your burnout and I need you. You're much better at fixing this kind of thing than I am."
"I know. That is why you need me." Azula winks.
She finishes her tea in one gulp and stands up to leave.
[X]
As soon as Azula leaves her family, Azusami clenches her fists. Ty Lee tries to stop herself from just throwing her own child out of a window.
"I don't want to go on vacation!" snaps Azusami, glowering at the wrong mom.
"We're going," Ty Lee replies, grinding her teeth.
"You just do whatever mother wants but you haven't realized she's impossible to please."
Ty Lee insists earnestly, "I want this too. Our family needs it."
"Our family needs to disband."
Losing it in a flicker of a second, Ty Lee shrieks, "Don't say that!"
Azusami scowls while she continues packing.
[X]
The next day, Azusami sits in class, surrounded by other girls with parents of wealth and political influence. She hates that after school today she will be heading to the summer palace without Aunt Mai or Izumi, the only tolerable royals. She has only her mothers with her this time.
"… and Azusami," says her teacher, making the princess sit up, assuming she is in trouble, "this was your great-great-great-great grandmother."
That sounds remarkably boring and therefore she stops paying attention again.
After class, her best friend Kaede leans beside her in the hallway. They are waiting for Junsu and Azusami has told some very pretty lies to cover up their after school activities.
"Do you have any more of those manifestos?" requests Azusami. "My mother caught me with mine and burned it."
Wordlessly, Kaede reaches into her red leather bag.
"How many do you want?" she asks, frowning at her own stash.
"Just two," says Azusami and Kaede obliges. "She's a hypocrite. She can't act like she doesn't agree with these points about the real royal regime of Sozin and Azulon and Ozai."
Kaede asks, "Who?"
"My mother," snaps Azusami, crushing the pamphlets in her angry grip.
"Right," remarks Kaede, trying not to roll her eyes or say something sarcastic. "Most admire her."
Azusami says, used to dealing with people who admire the woman, "Most have not met her."
"Good point." Kaede shrugs. "Is your guard late?"
"I told them I had detention," says Azusami, examining her nails. "I am certain it doesn't surprise my mothers."
Kaede shrugs again. After that, Azusami loiters outside of the Academy with her best friend while she waits for the arrival of Junsu.
"Why are you late?" she demands. After he remains silent, she adds, "I'm sorry; my home life has drained every last ounce of my patience."
Junsu reaches into his deep uniform pocket.
"I was late because the idiot jeweler was late delivering this." He holds out the pure ruby engagement gem.
Azusami does not at first accepts it when she sees it in his palm. "My parents will never let you marry me. At least not when we're so young."
"Then we don't tell them; you elope with me."
A smile spreads across the princess's face as she accepts the gem and kisses the corner of his mouth.
"I have to go to Ember Island tonight, and I think that gives us a great opportunity. It'll be way easier to escape there than in this awful city. Plus, it gives me an excuse to be packing."
"You're extremely smart," says Junsu and Azusami smirks.
"I'll send you a letter with the time and place."
He kisses her. "Deal."
She smiles as her guard arrives to whisk her away.
[X]
On the moonlit journey to Ember Island, Ty Lee picks up her paper fan by the wooden handle and waves it rapidly near her face as she stands on the deck of the ferry. For nighttime, it is absurdly hot out. Azusami sits under one of the lanterns jotting notes of ideas for her own addition to the underground popular political literature. Azula toys with a candle as far as possible as she can get from her family.
Ty Lee ponders what she might need to delve into once they arrive.
Perhaps the one thing she always loved most about Azula.
It was the way fire lived within her kiss, and Azula had a mysterious way of melting every last part of Ty Lee with it.
Eyes welling at the memory of a time when she felt that flame every day, she turns to Azusami and tries to direct her attention elsewhere.
"That's a pretty necklace, 'sami," says Ty Lee, smiling as warmly as she can.
"It's an heirloom. Aunt Mai gave it to me," says Azusami, holding it up. Ty Lee studies the beautiful golden piece of jewelry with admiring eyes.
Silence.
After a long while, Azusami looks up from her work and locks eyes with Ty Lee. "You can't fix your marriage by going on an island vacation."
"Our family needs time to start getting along again. I like Ember Island so we might as well do it here," Ty Lee says, and she thinks it might be where she realized she was in love with her wife. It is the absolute perfect place and that presumably is why Zuko suggested it.
"My point isn't the locale; my point is that there is no point in trying," says Azusami.
"I don't see it that way," Ty Lee says through clenched teeth.
Cavalierly, Azusami shrugs and remarks, "Optimism is a synonym for stupidity."
"Then I guess I'm as much of an airhead as people make me out to be."
"Maybe." Azusami returns to debating her word choice.
She will not have to deal with her mothers for much longer.
[X]
Azusami goes right to sleep once they arrive. Azula and Ty Lee stay up a little later, and Ty Lee brews tea. They do not say a word until they sit down on the front steps of the palace with hot cups of tea in their hands.
Azula remembers this exact place. And Zuko. And a vacation in which she realized she might have feelings for someone for the first time and how much that terrified her. She wishes she could go back in time and tell that girl everything.
Tell her…
Tell her something.
No failure. No madness. No broken marriage.
"I guess we should start," Azula says. "Where would we even begin?"
Ty Lee has to agree that finding the right starting words is hard. She decides to ask, "So, why did you fall in love with me?"
Silence.
Azula sips her tea and thinks while Ty Lee trembles with anticipation.
"When we were young I'd call it infatuation. I do not know if I loved you until after the war. When I was with you—after we settled our copious differences—suddenly I wasn't a broken person anymore. Not the poor, pitiful Mad Princess. I was just me. I was whole again. I was a person, like I always secretly wanted to be."
Ty Lee has no words, so she just kisses her wife. No fire, nothing that melts her. That hearth became cold long ago.
But perhaps this is a start and a start is better than nothing.
[X]
That afternoon, Azula restrains herself from starting another fight with Azusami. She does not want her daughter leaving this palace alone, but Azusami insisted and Ty Lee has no backbone. Before she leaves, Azula memorizes her clothes and her necklace and everything about her. She needs to be prepared for the worst; her daughter may attempt to run away yet again.
Azula turns and glowers at Ty Lee. "Should we let her go to town alone?"
"Why?" Ty Lee asks, feigning ignorance because she wants so desperately to get rid of her daughter for a few hours.
Azula says, "Because these extremists are out there. They would easily abduct her."
"She can take care of herself. It gives us some time alone, right?" Ty Lee smiles.
"That is tempting, I must say." Ice cold. Azula meant to be less outwardly frigid than she feels inwardly but she failed. Oh well.
They could fall in love again. Maybe they could fall in love again with a single kiss, even if that did not work before.
The two women lean in and press their lips against each other. Quickly, they move closer and their hands fumble as they wander over each other's familiar but forgotten bodies. The fact that it all was once known and once beautiful only heightens how pleasurable it is.
They kneel across from each other as they pull off their own clothes, slowly, a bit awkwardly, one article at a time while occasionally making fleeting eye contact. Once naked, they pounce on each other in the candlelight.
In one sense of the word, they love each other again.
Lips hit and press and might as well shatter into a thousand shimmering pieces from the enthusiastic force of the damp kisses. Azula's nails dig into Ty Lee's soft fawn skin, leaving brutal and beautiful marks. And Ty Lee kisses both of her wife's breasts before they sink to the cold and sandy stone floor.
Azula's knees press against the ancient obsidian tile as she straddles her soft, hot wife. The smoldering gaze as they lock eyes could melt glaciers.
They enjoy perfection in the sweltering summer.
[X]
Azusami paces back and forth beneath the boardwalk, toying with her necklace. He promised to meet her there and he has yet to show up. The sun begins to set and she clenches her fists, seething with rage. Finally, she sees her boyfriend approaching through the shadows.
The young princess runs forward and throws herself into his arms.
"I'm so happy to see you. I'm packed; let's get out of this place." She feels weight lifted from her chest and a sudden vibrant yellow happiness spreading through her warm limbs, blossoming outward from her heart.
"Yeah," says Junsu, stepping back with an odd gleam in his amber eyes. "Do your mothers suspect?"
"They know I'm gone but probably won't notice for ages; they're trying to sort out their broken marriage like it'll work."
The smile Junsu flashes unnerves Azusami. "They'll know faster than you want."
"Why do you think so?" she quietly asks, trying not to be afraid.
"Because my friends wrote them a letter."
Azusami makes the most reasonable assumption she can. "There is no reason they have to know we're getting married. I don't care if they ever find out because this isn't about us."
"It's not about us at all," he says and she feels her skin prickle. No, this is wrong. Something is all wrong about this. "It's about the Fire Nation."
"How?" Azusami demands.
"Because we're not getting married. I just needed to get you out of Fire Lord Zuko's reach for long enough. Trust me; you're very pretty and I like you a lot, but I care much more about restoring our country than I'd ever care about a girl."
"I—" Azusami raises a fist to punch the man approaching behind her, but no one ever taught her how to fight. A tongue of flame touches her neck and she gasps, breaking out into a sweat.
"Cuff her," orders Junsu.
Azusami screams as metal clamps over her wrists and a blindfold wraps around her gilded eyes, but it does her no good.
Her mother always said to trust no one.
Perhaps she was right about at least one thing.
[X]
In the night, at the Summer Palace, the ocean sings a soft, haunting tune as it laps against the shore. Ty Lee and Azula sit beside each other, holding drinks.
"Are we mending?" Ty Lee asks, frowning. Being here is not enough. She thought the dark blue sky and reddish walls and golden sand and a half-remembered vacation from over a decade ago that took place in another world, another universe perhaps.
Azula replies, "Not that I have noticed."
Ty Lee gathers her courage and suggests, "I think—I think we need more than this. We need a reason to fix things. What reason do we have?"
Azula waves her drink, sloshing some of it onto her hand. "Azusami, assassins. What more do you want?"
"Those two things have been around since before our marriage crumbled."
"Then I suppose this is one of those rare occasions on which I am clueless."
If it were not so bitter, Ty Lee would call that admission of weakness progress. But, with Azula, progress does not exist; maybe it never will.
"I don't know either."
"That is unsurprising."
Ty Lee tries not to be hurt; she just smiles at the former love of her life.
"Maybe we should say goodnight," she says, and hollowly, as a force of habit, she adds, "I love you."
"You cannot leave me like that," snaps Azula, and Ty Lee freezes in place.
They meet eyes for a fleeting moment, in agreement for once. Azula stands and paces. Ty Lee watches. Suddenly, Azula turns to her.
"When did you become such a sideline person? You've always craved attention."
"I married you."
"Is that supposed to be an answer?"
"I guess. I guess I got more muted."
"And you used to call me the cure to all your problems, not the other way around."
"I used to be more of a romantic."
"I preferred you that way."
"Azula, I saw you as a glamorous idea, not a real person."
"So? I still am an idea to most people. Why must you be different? Is it that obsessive need to feel special of yours?"
Sadly, Ty Lee murmurs in premature defeat, "Maybe."
"Or maybe you loved me because I was broken and it made you feel special and important to be the only one to fix me. That is the foundation we built our romance on. Perhaps it was as unstable as my mental state."
"Let's build a new foundation."
"You are far too enthusiastic about repairing our marriage."
"You don't believe in divorce. I don't have another choice."
"One of us could die."
"Azula, please, please, take me seriously. I don't ask much from you."
Azula scowls since Ty Lee has a point. She has been an altogether submissive wife until their recent anniversary. Azula is a fair politician in her own eyes.
"I suppose I could call it progress that we are discussing this in the first place."
Silence.
Someone knocks on the door and Ty Lee rises to answer it.
"That better be Azusami. She isn't supposed to stay out this late," Azula coldly says and Ty Lee rolls her eyes while her wife does not look.
Ty Lee opens the door and sees no one. She looks up and down as Azula walks to stand by her side. Suddenly, Ty Lee notices the sealed folded paper, an alien courtship gem, a lock of raven hair and an heirloom necklace that Azusami was wearing earlier.
Azula makes her assumptions quite quickly and starts running to catch whoever left it. Ty Lee picks up the letter, in a daze, and reads a note from the extremists causing such a stir. She stands mute as she hears a male yelp and crash.
"Don't kill him!" Ty Lee screams, bolting out.
"I am not going to!" Azula shouts, dragging this poor boy to his feet and shoving him down onto the pavement leading to the palace.
He gasps for breath as two of the three deadliest women in the history of the Fire Nation stand above him, Azula's bare foot resting on his neck.
"Where is my daughter?" Azula demands.
"Nowhere you can find her."
"Now, you know that is wrong. I have a particular talent for finding people, if you have not read a single history book about the end of the war."
Ty Lee kneels down and locks eyes with him. "You are going to tell us what happened. I'm going to ask you a few questions and if you don't answer, I will slowly remove parts of you, and they will be parts you miss."
He lies there, gasping for breath like a dying fish on a dock.
"She means it," Azula smoothly says.
"Your daughter," he says, trying to work up his courage, "ran away, but didn't know what she was running into. We have her, and expect—"
Azula interrupts, "To get things you will never receive. Where was she last?"
"Meeting her boyfriend under the boardwalk," he says without a threat of pain.
"You are either very afraid or very overconfident."
"Neither—I know you both need to know the story or you won't take us seriously. And you should take us seriously because it won't take long for us to get everything we want and for you to die as a traitor."
Azula kneels beside him. Ty Lee prepares to punch whoever she needs to disable.
"I believe you have a fundamental misunderstanding of what the word traitor means," Azula purrs. "Do you have any other helpful information?"
He says with a growing, foolish, reckless smirk, "Yeah. In my own opinion, Fire Lord Zuko is a coward and so she's going to die."
Silently, Azula rises. In a blinding flash, she hits him right between the eyes with a bolt of lightning and turns to her wife.
She orders in a tone Ty Lee has not heard in well over a decade, "Get your shoes."
Ty Lee does not hesitate to obey.
[X]
Less than an hour later, the two princesses stand under the boardwalk. Visible footprints remain, but when Azula and Ty Lee followed them, they became covered up after a few yards. They doubled back to beneath the boardwalk and found no other evidence but some freshly burnt wood and few scattered strands of Azusami's hair that must not have made the cut. Azula runs her fingertips again and again over the sand while Ty Lee shivers in the cold night air.
"If anyone is equipped to find her, we are," Azula says, standing.
"Well, the thing is, we were soldiers a really, really long time ago. When's the last time one of us fought someone for real? And, I mean, we tracked down the Avatar like forever ago."
"Speaking of trying to find the Avatar, we need to speak to my brother. He cannot come with us, but he can help," Azula says. "I also need to look at more of my old information about these people; it will be useful."
"Right," Ty Lee says. "I hate myself."
"Why?"
"Because while she was being kidnapped I was sleeping with you."
"We could not have known. She tried to elope. Stop beating yourself up and get moving so we can find her."
"You don't have a heart, do you?"
"I do not waste time agonizing over my actions."
"When you were sick you did."
"Thanks to you, apparently, I am not that sick anymore. Now come on."
"She wouldn't have done this if it weren't for us."
Silence.
"No. She wouldn't have done this if it weren't for me. She inherited the family spite, and she turned me into the monster of the marriage."
Quietly, Ty Lee says, "Sometimes you have been."
"And you cheated on me not two weeks ago. I suggest you shut up and come commandeer a ferry with me to get to my notes about the terrorist cell."
As Azula turns away, Ty Lee gently grabs her wrist.
"I haven't heard you like this in a long time."
"Well, these are strange circumstances."
"No—I mean—I mean you remind me of the girl I knew, the girl who conquered Ba Sing Se."
"I never needed that girl again until now."
And they hastily stride away from the crime scene.
[X]
Azula sits across from Zuko while Mai attempts awkwardly to comfort a hysterical Ty Lee. She spread out the files, every letter, every sketch, everything about the people who kidnapped Azusami.
"You are oddly calm about this," says Zuko.
"I am not calm; I am focused. I do not care about crying over my daughter. What I care about is locating her and executing the people who sent—not only assassins after my family—the people who abducted my child."
"Don't you feel guilty."
"Why would I feel guilty?"
"Because you treated her a lot like father treated me. She couldn't bend. She was more like Ty Lee and me than you. She—"
"Father taught me many things, and while most of them useless in my new profession, the most important is that regrets are unprofessional."
"Speaking of, he's on the list I made for you of people to talk to at the Boiling Rock."
Azula snatches it from him. "I best be going then. Ty Lee!"
"I arranged for you to go tomorrow morning," says Zuko, recoiling at Azula's glare. He finds it fiercer than any he has seen in decades.
But she bitterly states, "Fine," and leaves the room with the list gripped tightly in her sweaty hand.
[X]
The two married women lurk in their bedroom while they wait for daybreak. The Boiling Rock and the list Azula still holds seem more important than anything else in the Universe.
Ty Lee glances at Azula.
Azula glances at Ty Lee.
Ty Lee glances at Azula.
Azula glances at Ty Lee.
They do not know the words to say. This seems unfair. They both have lost enough, more than enough, and they wonder what they did to deserve such penance.
"I don't know how we're supposed to sleep tonight," Ty Lee whispers, sitting down on the bed.
"We have not slept for two straight days. I imagine that is how," Azula says, lying down but not closing her eyes.
"Do you remember when we were together every single night and we were on such a beautiful adventure and we really thought we were doing the right thing?"
"I suppose."
"Do you remember our first kiss, back in Ba Sing Se?"
"No," lies Azula.
They fall into the ocean of silence that stretches between them and both drown in it.
A/N: The next chapter will be shorter (a normal length of 4k - 5k words). It also will be coming very soon. Definitely by the first week of December or earlier. I regained my love for this story and I have already started writing the chapter. I'm almost halfway done with it but I'm also doing NaNoWriMo and stuff so I'm dividing my time between projects. Thank you for bearing with me if you read this story before, and thank you for reading if this is your first time. I'm eager to get back into fanfiction and to start again with this revised beginning. Thank you again and I hope you're enjoying the show