A/N: This story started out as a distraction when I couldn't make a plot for a Vampire Academy story work. It wasn't on my list to write, I didn't want to work this much on it, and I intended it to be rather short, only a one-shot. Well, life has tricked me. Right now, with not all the corrections done, this story is seventeen pages long, and I have spent about two weeks working on it. Huh :D
Maybe the thing that has inspired me to write this fanfic in the first place was the books on Chinese women I read in the last year (Snow White and the Secret Fan; Sanghai Girls; Wild Swans). In each book there was at least one scene, or at least a reference to it, where the bride on her wedding day is brought to the groom's house on a palanquin with great fanfare. I saw it so clearly with my inner eyes, and I just had to write a Zutara story about it. For months, I did nothing – and then I wrote this. As I have said: it ended up to be way longer than I had planned it to be :D Originally, I wanted to upload it in one piece, but since it's rather long, and has very little dialogue, I decided to break it into seven parts – expect an update on every day of the week :)
Summary: A marriage, a union of two people can affects dozens. And when this marriage unites monarchs, it affects the whole nation. Zutara wedding from different POVs
Disclaimer: [Insert funny text here that tells you that I do not own Avatar: the Last Airbender]
Rating: K+
Chapter one: Lin
For Lin, the day starts long before sunrise.
She is woken up by her superior at least two hours earlier than she normally wakes, when the sky is still deep indigo, with only a little purple on the edge of the horizon, but she's not grumpy about it. It's a special day, and she gets to be a part of it. She swiftly gets ready for the day, with her roommate, smiling all along as they wash and dress themselves. They wash their faces with cold water and twist their hair into thigh chignons, as they have been told to do. But they want to do a little bit more – her roommate puts on a pair of old earrings, that once belonged to her mother; Lin even goes as far as dabbing a little lipstick to her lips, reddening them. Looking into the mirror, she feels pretty – they have, all of the palace maids on this task, not just the two of them, even gotten new robes for the occasion, brilliant red ones, made of softer material than her usual ones are, lined with gold, with elaborate embroidery on the hem of the sleeves. It's not her big day, but she almost feels like it was.
The sky turns light blue then soft pink when Lin and her roommate leave the servants' quarters and march through the gardens to get to the main building. They should behave themselves and be quiet, but they just simply can't. They giggle all the way, teasing and joking, trying to figure out what this day has for them. Her roommate wants to go out to a little pub when every task in the palace is taken care of, and flirt with some of the foreigners who has come to see the wedding; she has a thing for Earth Kingdom men, she tells Lin. She only smiles, and tell her in return that she is meeting someone that night. When finish, they start to giggle again.
A few minutes after that, but still a few minutes before the Sun peeks over the horizon, Lin is standing in a straight line with eleven other young girls, all palace maids, all in new robes and half-suppressed smiles on their faces in front of the great double doors of the chamber that holds the bride of the Fire Lord – the soon-to-be Fire Lady.
Lin's belly flutters nervously – what if she will get something wrong? What if she will tear the delicate material of the undergarments, or drop a jeweled comb? -, but she can't stop smiling; none of the young girls around her can. It's her big day, the girl's behind the great double doors, a girl not at all older than them, a girl not that much different from them. It's the wedding of the century, a day that will be remembered even decades after their deaths, and they get to be the part of it.
As the soft orange glow of the dawn starts the flood the hallway, Lady Ursa, mother of the Fire Lord, and Lady Kanna, grandmother of his bride, arrives. All twelve young maids and their superior, a middle-aged woman who has been managing all the servants in the royal palace for as long as Lin can remember, bows deeply to them. The two noble ladies answer to it with a slight nod of the head and step to the door to open it.
The day officially begins.
The bride, Lady Katara – this is the way they have been told to address her, even though she could be addressed as Princess Katara, since her father is the chief of the Southern Water Tribe, but she doesn't like that, or even as Master Katara, since she is a master of her element – is already wide awake, sitting on the edge of her bed, her shoulders relaxed, her legs dangling from the side of the bed, waiting for them. She doesn't look tired, but Lin reckons that she slept less than she did. She knows she wouldn't be able to sleep well on the eve of her own wedding.
Lin takes her in; she is not the stereotypical Fire Nation beauty, but a beauty nonetheless. She is not tall and white-skinned and all edges, but petite in figure and her skin is tanned and she is all curves and smiles. She stands, and the servants bow again and she reciprocates the gesture shyly; she doesn't seem to be comfortable with so many maids at her service.
The following hours are a blur for Lin. She has so many tasks - she prepares baths, using scented oils and petals of different flowers, which make the whole bathroom smell like a meadow in the summer heat. She brings forward perfume bottles, sniffing at each one, until her nose can't take anymore; she doesn't even know which one they use in the end. She holds out towels, warm ones, and she marvels on how soft they are. She sorts out brushes and jewels, trying to take in every single gemstone, the way they sparkle in the sunlight, and every single engraving, trying to remember all of them. She is slightly ashamed of it, but she imagines how they would look against her skin. She hardly speaks, only when it's necessary, but listens to what the two ladies and the bride talk about.
Lady Katara lost her mother years ago, when she was only a young child; they don't talk about it in the palace, but Lin knows that she died because of the Fire Nation. And that's why Lady Ursa is there – to fill the role of the mother of the bride. She brushes Lady Katara's hair and fastens the ties of her underwear. Lady Kanna, as the bride's closest living female blood relative is there for the same reason, but she doesn't do anything, just sits in the corner with a soft smile on her dark, wrinkled face, giving wise advices on marriage in general. Lin listens eagerly – she will marry someday, maybe, too. When they start to talk about the wedding night, and not even in euphemisms, but in a straightforward manner, Lin blushes; she notes with surprise that Lady Katara does too.
At some point, after they have talked over everything, from the pride of men to the joys one can find in bed, silence falls upon them. The servants don't have anything to do, really, just to wait. It's Lady Ursa who is at work – she is braiding, relentlessly, Lady Katara's long, curly hair, twisting the braids into knots and buns. The servants are only watching silently, patiently.
After some time, Lady Kanna grows bored of the silence, and starts singing. It startles Lin – she grew up during the reign of Fire Lord Ozai, when every kind of dance and song were as good as banned. In a few decades the Fire Nation lost half of its culture, songs and dances and tales forgotten in the heat of war. Lin's great-grandmother used to live on one of the outer islands, and she wasn't that much touched by this 'modernization' as was the capitol. Lin remembers visiting her when she was a child – she would sing to her, old songs about bravery and love, but only in hushed tones, afraid that someone would hear it. Lin was nine when she died, and she has hardly heard anybody sing every since then – at least not until Fire Lord Zuko took the throne, but notes are still strange and foreign.
The song Lady Kanna is singing is harsh, but sweet and pleasant. When she finishes, she tells them that she learned it in her youth, when she was still living at the North Pole, and that they used to sing it to young girls on their wedding day. Lady Kanna smiles as she starts another song and Lin smiles back at her.
When she finishes the third, Lin, feeling bold, asks her if she would teach them the first song she sang. The old woman chuckles, then starts the first song again, stepping after each line, repeating them until the servants have them memorized. In half on hour, everybody in the room, servants and ladies alike, are singing.
The Sun is about halfway to its peak, and they are almost done. Everything seems to be at place, Lady Katara's dress is on and perfect, in her ears and on her neck and wrists gold and gemstones glimmer, her hair is done in an elaborate do, her feet are covered by delicate, hand-sewn shoes. Yes, everything is done, except one thing, and that one thing is waiting for Lin to be done.
A bunch of white lotus lilies is handed to her, with instructions to pin them into Lady Katara's hair. She is so very nervous as she steps behind her – she has never been given such an important, such an intimate task -, and her hands shakes so much that she almost drops the flowers. Lady Katara notices it, Lin sees it in her eyes as their gazes lock in the mirror Lady Katara is sitting in front of. Lin's hand shakes even more as she pins the first flower, hoping that it goes the right place, hoping that the pin won't scratch the Lady's scalp, hoping that the flower won't fall out or wither too soon.
She is so careful, but so nervous, and she drops the second flower.
They – she and Lady Katara – reach for the white flower at the same time, and their hands touch for the briefest moment. Lin draws her hand back quickly, apologizing, but the Lady only smiles, almost chuckles, saying that nothing happened. She leans down again and picks up the flower, handing it to Lin, and her fingers touch Lin's hand again. She notes with surprise that her fingertips are not at all softer than her own ones.
They are really not that different after all, Lin realizes as she takes the flower and pins it into Lady Katara's hair.
Her hand doesn't shake anymore.