This started out as an Advent Calendar, but updating daily during such a busy season wasn't really possible (but I dreamed). So it's just 24 drabbles, each one describing a kiss that gradually shows the progression of Azula and Ty Lee's relationship, starting during S2 and ending post-canon.
"You expect me to put that in my mouth... and tie it with my tongue?" Azula did not bother to hide the contempt in her voice, but Ty Lee simply grinned, batted her eyes and ignored it.
"It's the ultimate test of a good kisser," Ty Lee said with a cocked eyebrow. Something very darkly seductive was glowing in her eyes and Azula chewed on her lower lip.
"I'm confident in my kissing abilities. I don't need a piece of fruit to tell me," Azula replied finally, after far too much deliberation for something as ridiculous as this. But this budding romance felt like walking across a battlefield and attempting not to get smashed to death with a rock or disemboweled with a sword.
They were fourteen. It was early spring and they had just returned from the Earth Kingdom. Azula was not exactly in the mood for these games, after narrowly missing the Avatar and her brother. But there she was, with her feet kicked up on a stone, decrepit Pai Sho table with Ty Lee clutching a bowl of cherries.
And then Ty Lee held out her hand, hoping this was suave somehow miraculously, and asked Azula to tie it with her tongue. But, Ty Lee was realizing, she might as well have been telling Azula to... well... telling her to do anything generally would have this response.
"I'll do it first," Ty Lee declared and Azula realized there was no easy way out of this.
Ty Lee popped it in her mouth with relative ease and seemed to be focusing intently. It was almost as if she was thinking deeply. Azula had to admit she enjoyed the shallow conversation once in a while, as much as she was not a fan of boys and trends. It broke her thoughts, broke everything constantly swirling in her mind, to match Ty Lee's vacancy.
And after sticking her fingers through her lips, Ty Lee withdrew the cherry stem. It was tied rather impressively. Azula did not bother to hide the fact that she was impressed.
"I'll try it," Azula sighed. She had played this game with her brother before, albeit without the incredible sexual tension. She enjoyed watching as he floundered and she just tied one with her fingers and kept it behind her teeth before putting in an untied one, swallowing it and withdrawing the previously tied one.
But Ty Lee was not as gullible as Zuko.
Azula plucked a cherry from the stem and put it into her mouth. She instantly wished she had somehow distracted Ty Lee and pulled the same trick and hoped for the best. Because while she could walk on air and run up walls, tying this with her tongue was surprisingly difficult.
Ty Lee instantly was filled with fear as she realized the princess could not do it.
"I give up," Azula said coldly and Ty Lee felt a brief rush of relief. She feared much worse retribution than Azula setting the saliva soaked stem on the table. "I suppose I'm not a good kisser, as I thought I was."
Not that anybody ever had kissed Azula. Not that anybody needed to know that she had never been kissed.
"Well, it's not entirely effective. I'd give it like, sixty percent chance of being right. There's only one way to be like one hundred and ten percent right," Ty Lee said brightly, undeterred by the way Azula looked like she wanted out of the situation desperately.
"Yes, and this method is...?" Azula asked, feigning interest.
But suddenly, she was much more interested. Because she was just kissed on the mouth. Her eyes were wide open as Ty Lee's were calmly closed, as if this was a simple decision for her.
It felt like a wash of warmth. Like something was right. Too right.
They broke away, realizing briefly what had just happened.
"I think you're the best kisser," Ty Lee said with a small smile. But her heart was beating out of her chest.
Azula only blinked.