Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, locations, and items within the Avatar: The Last Airbender universe are the property of their original creators. This piece of fiction was written purely as fan entertainment, the author of which intends no copyright infringement, and receives no monetary compensation for its creation.
Crown Prince Iroh stood, his head bowed low, while tears slowly seeped from his closed eyes. He barely heard the words of the Fire Sages as they performed the funeral rights for his wife of many years. His large hands gripped the shoulders of his son, as Lu Ten silently watched the pyre that held his mother's earthly remains set ablaze. He held on to his Fire Nation stoisisum as tightly as he could, but the sound of his eight year old's whimpered 'Mom' was the final blow. The proud frame of celebrated the Dragon of the West crumbled, and he collapsed to his knees, hugging the boy to him as if he was the last solid thing in the world.
Princess Ursa watched the heart breaking scene as she stood next to her husband. She glanced between the man who stood so emotionless that he might as well been made of stone, and the one who knelt so crushed that she expected at any moment he would turn to dust and blow away on the evening breeze. How was it possible that these two men had been born of the same parents? They were complete polar opposites. Prince Iroh talked softly of things like philosophy and teas, while his younger brother Prince Ozai was consumed only with conquest and power.
Looking once more at the man she'd been forced to marry, she wondered if he would so much as shed a tear for her passing when the time came. A cold, that had nothing to do with the winter night, crept around her as the Fire Lord and his younger son turned without a word when the funeral ceremony ended. She went to follow, but hesitated as the heart wrenching sobs of her brother-in-law reached over the crackle of the pyre's flames. Chest tight, she went to him, gently laying a hand on the stiff white shoulder of his ceremonial mourning robes.
Iroh turned blood shot, tear stained eyes up to her, clearly surprised by the soft compassionate face that looked down at him. He blinked at her several times as he tried to clear his grief clogged mind. "Princess Ursa?"
It had been only three months since the girl with the soft gold eyes had been brought to the palace to marry his younger brother. It had been an arranged marriage between his family's war depleted coffers, and her father's rich merchant gold. While it was common practice for powerful families around the world to enter such arrangements, Iroh still felt sorry for the caring tender girl being settled with someone as cold and hard as his brother.
He had told his lovely Yin Xue as much during his younger brother's courtship as he'd sat at her bedside waiting helplessly as her illness slowly pulled her away from him. He could almost hear her soft voice as she spoke to him. 'Not everyone can find love, as we did, before they marry, my dearest. But love can bloom even in the bleakest lands, if given a chance.'
As he looked up at the girl's open countenance Iroh prayed, for her sake, that his darling wife was correct. "Can I do something for you Princess?"
Ursa was momentarily confused by her brother-in-law's question, until she realized it it merely an unconscious response of a naturally selfless man. The terrible injustice of the last few days was never more evident than that moment, and it truly broke her heart. She wanted to do something, say something that would erase the desolation from his eyes. There was nothing, but time, that could ease the pain he was feeling, she knew that. But that didn't mean she couldn't at least be there for him; he didn't have to go through everything alone.
With that in mind, she smiled sympathetically, "Forgive me, my Prince; the ceremony has ended, the night is late, and the wind is bitter. Would it not be better to bring your son in doors?"
Iroh looked down at the boy in question who rubbed his wet eyes sleepily with the back of his hand, than up to the fire that silhouetted the form of his love. He didn't want to leave his wife's side even knowing in his heart that what was being consumed by flame was merely an empty shell. However, seeing Lu Ten fight back a yawn, Iroh nodded and scooped up his son into his arms. Despite the boy's token protest about being too big to be carried, the child curled against his father's strong chest and closed his eyes.
Ursa didn't try to speak to Iroh, but walked beside the widower, and silently held open the palace doors for him to pass with his tiny burden. When they reached the little boy's room she pulling down the covers on the bed and stepped back so that the father might lay the already slumbering boy down. The young princess continued to stand quietly watching as the man renowned as one of the greatest fire generals of all time tenderly remove his son's boots and then tuck him into a warm cocoon of blankets.
When he had gently smoothed the deep burgundy covers over Lu Ten, and kissed his round angle-like cheek, Iroh stood and turned to study his sister-in-law. Golden eyes met rich whiskey colored ones, and though they had only met a short time ago, the look that past between them was one of total understanding that normally took years to develop. He held out a ruff callused hand to her, and she placed her dainty fingers in his without hesitation.
Holding her hand, he wordlessly drew her with him to the hall and closed the doors behind them. Once there, he turned to her again, bowed gallantly and brought the hand he held to his lips for a chase kiss on her knuckles. His deep voice was slightly more worn than usual, still he whispered, "Thank you."
Letting go of her hand, Iroh straightened into the posture of a professional solider, spun silently on his heel, and walked away. Later that night, when Ursa stood in her own bedchamber looking out the window into the palace's courtyard she would swear she saw a shadow kneeling by the soft glowing embers of Princess Yin Xue's funeral pyre. Years later, after everything else would seem like a dream, she would still remember the soft sound of weeping brought to her on the back of the wind, and the vow she made to bring him happiness again.
アエ 父の日 恋仲
Iroh spent the next few weeks in a kind of a daze moving through each day with mechanical purpose. He rose from bed, ate his meals, and participated in War Council meetings more because it was expected of him than from any true desire. It was only when he attended his son's afternoon firebending training that he felt anything, but frozen emptiness in his chest.
A sad smile touched the General's lips as Lu Ten slipped while attempting a rather advanced firebending set, and landed on his backside on the hard packed earth. Moving away from the spot where he watched, he sent his son's tutor a look that said he would handle this. Kneeling down by his son, who still sat where he had fallen with his head hanging low, so that he would be at eye level with the boy he said in gentle voice. "That was a good try, my son."
"I'm never going to get it." The small boy looked up at his father with eyes so much like his late mother's that the old General's heart ached. "I'm not strong enough, it's too hard."
"Firebending is not only about strength of muscle, but also strength of heart." Iroh stood and held his hand out to the boy. Gently pulling his son to his feet the General settled into the beginning posture of the set the boy had just attempted. "This is a strength that comes from within each of us, and that, my son, you have more of then you know."
Demonstrating the move with the grace that came from years of practice and the skill of a master, Iroh released a flash of deep red flame that momentarily turn the air around him and the young firebender to a summer's day. Taking a step back he gave Lu Ten some room, crossed his arms over his broad chest, and nodded for the boy to try again. With a face gone serious with concentration, the small boy mimicked his father's example and completed the maneuver this time.
Iroh beamed with pride, even if it was true his son's movements had been a bit too jerky and the flame which they had produced was less then awe inspiring. "Well done, but to truly master anything you must practice hard, and never give up no matter how difficult things seem at the time."
"Yes, Father." Lu Ten bowed at the waist to his father a smile running from ear to ear.
Nodding his approval, he indicated to the instructor to resume the lesson, and left the training field. It wasn't until Iroh was past his son's view that he let his shoulders sink in exhaustion. Despite his words to the boy about never giving up, he felt suddenly very tired, and wanted nothing more than to do just that.
"That was a nice thing you said to him, you are a good father, Crown Prince Iroh."
Looking up, Iroh wasn't fast enough to hide his surprise at seeing his brother's wife out in the courtyard so early. Still he recovered his manners and bowed to the warm eyed girl, "You do me a great complement Princess, but my Lu Ten makes it easy to be a good father. He is an excellent son. He takes after his mother a great deal."
Princess Ursa heard the sad turn in the older prince's words, and it redoubled her resolve to help him. "I've heard the servants telling stories about the Princess, she sounds like a wonderful person. I wish I could have gotten to know her myself."
"You would have liked her, everyone did." Iroh's throat tightened, as images of his late wife ran through his mind's eye. Her smile, her laugh; it hurt to remember those things, and know that he would not experience them again. Still he couldn't forget them, he wouldn't allow himself. It was better to have the bittersweet memories of his wife, than to lose everything of her.
He looked back at the girl, her warm golden gaze open and waiting. It dawned on him what she was trying to do, and he was strangely grateful. The other inhabitants of the palace had treated Yin Xue's passing as some kind of taboo. Either they talked about it in whispers as he passed, or else they completely ignoring it, and her, as if she had never existed.
They didn't understand his grief, no one really could, and yet Princess Ursa was different. She wasn't trying to understand what he was feeling, she simply excepted it, and him. Iroh smiled despite that twisting in his heart, "Would you like to know more about her?"
Ursa smiled encouragingly, "I would love to, if you would tell me. Would you like to come with me to the sitting room? I was going to order some tea; it is a bit more chilly this morning than I expected."
Iroh again felt the nostalgic pang of memory. It had been his lovely Yin Xue that had passed her deep appreciation of finely brewed tea onto him, yet he had not given the drink much thought in the last weeks. Now he very much wanted to immerse himself in the sweet aroma, and smooth flavor.
Once more, he held out his hand to her, an honest smile touched his tired eyes as she laid her cool hand in his. "It would be my pleasure my dearest Sister, especially if there is ginseng tea involved?"
"I think together, that might be arranged." Ursa let a short quiet laugh, as the Prince effected an over exaggerated look of pleasure, before almost pulling her down the path like an eager child.
She knew that his actions where forced, a performance for her sake, still she took it as a good sign. After all, the more he stepped out of his pain, the easier it would become, and, with time, he would no longer have to force his smiles. Or at least she hoped so, as her thoughts turned to another prince.
If she could help Iroh mend his broken heart, then perhaps she could thaw Ozai's cold one. They were brothers, could not truly be so dissimilar could they? 'Perhaps,' she thought, 'Ozai needs time as well. After all we have known each other for such a short while.'
Yes she was sure that was it, she simply needed to give her husband time to grow use to her. Soon the younger prince would come to care for her just as his brother had cared for his own wife. For now, however, she turned her attention back to the man beside her who had slowed them to a more sedate pace. Determined to draw Iroh out of the gloom that had followed him around since the funeral she struck up a conversation.
As they walked Princess Ursa asked Iroh varying things about the grounds they crossed, and the palace. The Crown Prince answered her at first without much thought, but the more the girl's softly spoken questions came, the more easily did his answers. Looking over his shoulder at the girl who had so recently come to live with his family he could not help the gentle smile that melted his grief stricken frown. He wanted to thank her for what she was doing, but he could not find the right words, so he gently squeezed the girl's hand. She didn't look up at him, or say anything, but returned the pressure of his hand in a silent,'You're welcome.'