Ilah is everything his mother wasn't.
Beautiful, gold-eyed, honey-voiced, and as dangerous as the Capital could make them. She knows how to pour tea with a musician's hands, and adds the correct amount of poison that no one would suspect foul play. How to dance to just the correct tunes, and knife words into her partner's breast so he died. How to act the beautiful shadow, while she is his dark partner in crime.
She is a sun-lit diamond pretending to be a shadowed doll, and with that she is perfectly happy.
Azulon encourages her, marries her in a sun shower in the middle of winter, and gives her two sons that are everything he could have dreamed of having. His father died of a broken dream and a worn-out rivalry, and Azulon has no wishes to do the same.
So he tempts Ilah into dizzying new heights, pulls her after him (never, ever lets her lead) and leads her to the dreams his father tried to shatter in his mother. Peace is a foreign concept to a boy born in a war, and he doesn't wish for it any more than Ilah, by his side.
And then she dies.
It was a smooth birth, the midwives tell him. But she was too old.
He wants to rage at the sun and the stars, tell them that Ilah could never be too old; she is his wife, his lover; she should have stood for countless eons by his side so that they could ravage the world into pieces. (together…)
He stares at the baby girl they give him, and wants to burn her delicate mother's features to ash. Ilah wanted to name her Kimiko (noble child, Ilah whispers in his bed. I will name her for she will be my heir.) but Azulon says furiously, "I name you Yowamushi!"
(The girl dies in the middle of the night, and Azulon scatters her ash on her grandmother's memorial. It seems oddly fitting.)
Coward, he names his daughter. Coward, she dies in the dark. Of them all, it is only his son- Ozai- who weeps over her grave.
"A poisonous gift," Iroh murmurs at his side, standing before Miwa's headstone of angel's with outstretched wings. "She reached beyond the grave to break you, Father."
He claps a hand to Azulon's side; presses cold fingers against his arms. "Do not let her win."
Then Iroh is gone, and Ozai is all that is left of them, kneeling on his grandmother's grave amidst his sister's ashes, and Azulon cannot forget this even if he wanted to.
That image stays with him- Ozai mourning what Azulon can't. And Azulon does not (cannot) forgive him that.
Through the years, that image stays with him, and he watches, a dragon waiting for his prey.
When Ozai is old enough for tutors, he hires only the best, and watches his son shine, cut-glass... Then he breaks him down (Ozai looks like his mother reborn. Azulon feels no regret.) again and again; Azulon mocks his younger son, unrestrained, and most family dinners end with tears on Ozai's face. It is only when Iroh is there that Azulon does not hone his tongue, but he can see the acidic poison on Ozai's face when he sees Iroh's fond love of their father when Ozai can feel nothing but hatred.
A vicious smile slashes itself across his face when he sees Ursa in Hira'a.
Iroh married for love. Ozai will marry for duty.
And he can see the possibilities, of this young woman, who will break Ozai down even as she builds him up.
After all, Ozai never played chess. He can never see the endgame, when the opening moves were still being played. He plays in the moment, and Azulon… he is a chess master. His plans are complete, with this one, young woman-
Ozai will crash. And burn. And the moment he does… Azulon would use Ursa to tear from him every shred of honor he once coveted.
(What? Azulon murmured when he tasted the poison in his tea, and showed no surprise. Did you think I was such a fool, little Ursa?)
Okay... very few people seemed to like my Sozin's wife oneshot. Hope this one's a little better:) But I did get a question- why did I start this series.
Answer: There are many reasons I began this series, starting with the fact that so few people pay attention to the Fire Ladies! In many ways, the Fire Nation can be analogous to imperialist Japan, or pretty much any war-central culture, and I am using Japan, the Mongols, Mughals, and yes, the British conquerors. Historically, women in the Mughal empire did not have many legal rights; they were curtailed to the point that the royals weren't allowed to show their faces in court, and were expected to hide behind a gauzy curtain. Polygamy was also very common, in both Japan and the Mongols, which is something I will probably explore in a spin-off fic (about Mai).
But what began this series is that while these women were hidden from the world, they still had the power over the mundane things in their lives; power in the household, to put it another way. Sozin's wife (Miwa) is an epitome of such a woman, content with nothing more than what she has, but strong enough to stand up for what is right. Ilah, on the other hand is not- she is ambitious, blood-thirsty, and vicious. I know that these fics are coming from their husbands POV, but that is what works best right now; Ursa's should be better.
Sorry for the late update; we began to backsplash my kitchen, and what should have been a ten-hour job turned into a three-day one... Suffice to say, I'm not happy with the construction workers.
Reviews inspire me...
-Dialux