A/N: This is my newest project, the story of Fire Lord Ozai. It's still coming along (very slowly), but I really wanted to post the prologue. I hope you all like it! I will finish Under Your Stars before continuing with this one, I just want to get an idea of how many people are interested in this! Enjoy!
Sun sparrows flitted around the vacant courtyard, their heart wrenching songs heralding the end of another long, hot summer day in the Fire Nation. The last orange rays of the sunset glinted off the gold on the Fire Prince's crown. He walked slowly, his mind clouded with the events of the past week.
"Your Majesty! Your Majesty!"
The Prince of the Fire Nation spun, nearly elbowing the young runner in the jaw. He glared. How dare this boy interrupt his peace!
"Your Majesty, I beg your forgiveness," the boy panted. "But the Princess has just gone into labor."
The soon-to-be father rolled his eyes. As if he needed anything else to worry about! "Go," he ordered, flicking his fingers at the boy as if he was a pesky fly and not his eldest son.
As the boy's footsteps faded, the Prince resumed his musings. She would go into labor now! Of all times for his next heir to arrive, it would be today! Well, as long as it was a healthy, strong boy, there was really nothing to worry about. Soon, very soon, he would be able to ascend the throne his father, the Fire Lord, so closely guarded. A ghost of a smirk crossed his wrinkling face, making him seem even more sinister.
He turned back into his office, his mind preoccupied once again with thoughts of the war he was now fighting. Finishing off the Water Tribes would be easy, he knew, but keeping his non-benders warm at the poles was costly. He scribbled a few notes on a spare piece of parchment.
"My Prince."
His head snapped up, flames blazing behind his golden eyes. "I already know she's in labor," he snapped.
The voice emerged from the shadows. "Yes, I sent your son to find you. I assumed that you would come with him to see her." A thin, oily-looking man was grinning down his long, hooked nose. His teeth looked pointed and almost animalistic. "Apparently I guessed wrong. Are you still worrying about those water peasants?"
The Prince grunted. "I just had some final thoughts on the matter. I'll be in to see my wife shortly." Even he did not trust this man, who was his closest adviser. The man gave off a malicious, hungry feeling. It gave him shivers.
"As you wish, sire," said the greasy man, bowing low and backing out the main doors of the Prince's office.
The man waited a few moments in his large chair before rising to open the hidden panel behind his desk. He emerged in a little used corridor. Walking quickly, he passed the courtyard below his father's room. Soon, soon, he told himself. He paused in front of the doors to the Fire Princess's rooms, nodding to her two guards as he yanked the door open.
Screams pierced his skull the instant the door was shut. His wife lay, panting and covered in sweat, under a tin sheet. The birthing women were bustling between his howling wife and the steaming bathroom. "Breathe, breathe!" one woman encouraged, while the doctor chanted "Push! Push!"
"My Lord!" One woman had sense enough to acknowledge the man who nearly ruled her country and kept her family in a house.
"How is it?" he demanded. When the woman hesitated, his heart faltered for a moment. "Well?"
"Well, sire, you see-" She bit her lip as his wife released another blood-curdling cry of pain. "There is too much blood. The doctors are doing all they can, but they doubt that every one can be saved."
The Prince nodded. Yes, he had been warned about this possibility long ago, when they had first learned she was pregnant the second time. Her first child had left her weak and sickly, so the healers had predicted that this delivery would be much harder than the first. He spun around, flinging open the door to bark at the two guards. "You two! Go fetch the water bender!" The men saluted and jogged off while four of his own guards came to replace them. He nodded, satisfied at their quick obedience.
"Sir!" He stopped, facing his captain. "My Lord, are you sure it's wise to bring that peasant?" he questioned. Only he could ever second guess the Fire Lord son's orders and live to tell the tale. "She is still being uncooperative-"
"Water benders are weak," he cut in. "Especially their healers. They can't stand seeing anybody suffer, not even a member of the court of the Fire Nation. She won't be able to say no." He shut the door again, having reassured the men and himself.
Again, and again, and again his wife wailed, the doctors running to and fro, the blood staining the sheets and filling the whole room with its rusty smell. A small, long-dormant part of his heart told him to go to her, to hold her hand as she cried out, to give her calm words of encouragement that everything would be all right even though everyone knew it most likely would not be. He pushed those thoughts away, locking them up in the darkest recesses of his heart. He could not, would not, show that he could be weak of heart. He stood, stiff, near the door as the breathing became more labored and the blood continued to flow.
At long last, the door flew open, and in came the two guards. Between them, bound and gagged, was a young woman of not even 16 clothed in a tattered blue dress. Her silvery eyes shone defiantly, her wild black hair making her look like the crazy tribal women of legends. She took in everything, from the Fire Nation Prince to the running doctors and midwives to the shrieking woman on the bed.
"You." She pulled her eyes away from the laboring woman. Her silver orbs still unnerved him every time she held his gaze. "Can you heal her?" The woman's eyes grew wide. "Can you save her and the child?" Her look of shock became one of horror. He knew he had her cornered. She could never refuse to save the infants who had never had a chance to live. Her eyes flitted between his wife and him for a few more moments before she nodded once. At the snap of their lord's fingers, the guards removed the gag and the rope from her hands. A leather collar was wrapped around her neck, the bigger of the guards holding the other end. "Go."
She walked to the screaming mother, pulling water from the bathroom as she drew closer. It never ceased to disgust him, how these dark-skinned, primitive people who lived in fur tents on chunks of ice could control the most beautiful of all the elements. "Shhh," the healer soothed his crying wife. "Soon it will all be over. Just breathe. That's it. Breathe for your children." Her voice seemed to ripple and flow like the water of a small stream as it passes over smooth stones. He could understand why the tribes had fought so hard to protect her, the one they called the Speaker of the Moon. The water she controlled swirled over the future Fire Lady's dissented stomach, filling the room with its strange blue glow. The screaming decreased, and her breathing became even, but still shallow.
"There. That's better. Now, puuuush!" The woman gave a wordless cry, her body curling up, and she collapsed back onto her pillows. More screaming, higher pitched and desperate, filled the air. The midwife wrapped it in a gold towel to clean it.
"Good job. She's perfect. Now once more..." His wife began pushing again, her screams silent.
She? So it had been a girl? But the water tribe brat had said that there was another...
One final heave, and the second child emerged. "There." The water tribe woman was standing now, her eyes glistening. "Your next son." She pointed to the newest bundle crying out in a midwife's arms. "But was it worth the price?" she demanded. He only stared, confused. "I can't save a woman who wishes to be dead."
His eyes flew to his wife. Her eyes were closed, her breathing shallow and slow. Too slow. "You can't just let her die!" he growled. "You are said to be the best healer there is! You can save her! Or are you really not that good?"
She drew herself up taller. "I just explained it to you. I cannot even attempt to save those who do not wish to be saved. You now have a beautiful daughter and a strong son; rejoice in that."
Skin collided with skin. The water tribe girl flew across the room, into the far wall. A trial of blood followed her head as it slid listlessly to the floor, her moon eyes closed forever. Even now, with her unnatural voice silenced forever, the words she had spoken all those months ago still rang in his ears:
It had already been decided. You will have another son, more powerful and cunning and ruthless than you could ever imagine. More committed to the war than Sozin himself. But he will come at a great sacrifice to you. A price that you will unwillingly pay. A debt that you will pay off with with you life.
"My Lord, your daughter." He blinked to look at the small, squirming bundle being held up to his face. "The new Fire Princess." She yawned, her eyelids cracked as she peeked at her sire. He noted that she was perfect, flawless in every way. But she was a girl, and he knew how weak girls were.
"No," he said, turning away. "She is not mine." He looked instead at his wife. Her face still glistened with sweat as her breath became shallower and shallower. The girl would look like her mother, he was sure. Long black hair, and dark, perceptive eyes. He could already see that she had her mother's nose and mouth. No, she could not stay here and grow up while he watched her become a miniature of the woman he was losing fast. "Send her away tonight to the Earth Kingdom. Let a family there worry about her." He walked to his wife's side, his fingers weaving between hers. Her hand felt like ice, even though the room was at least 80 degrees. The door opened and closed again, sending a cool gust of wind towards him. "Good-bye, my love. I'm afraid I'll never be good enough to join you in heaven." His lips brushed against hers as she took her last breath.
"Father?"
The Prince turned. His elder son had been the one to walk in. His father reached for the bundle containing his newest family member. "Come, my son," he coaxed. "Come. Iroh, meet your new baby brother."
Fire Nation Prince Azulon held the small, whimpering child against his chest. "Your new brother, Ozai."