Guest: Thanks!

openbookworm: Eeeeyup. I have a lot of OCs.

Wicked Neko: All questions shall be answered!


Zhao was one person Shizi could go her entire life without ever speaking to again. She really, truly hated him, and his massive sideburns. The only thing bigger than those was his ego.

She mumbled such to her prince in passing, while she was bowing beside him in greeting to the Commander. She hid a smile while he stifled a laugh between coughs. Zhao looked between them, suspicion furrowing his brows.

"So good to see you," Shizi lied through her teeth, her smile plastered on firmly. She stood exactly three steps from her prince. Like hell she was letting any further space between them with Zhao, so full of contempt and unbridled greed, right there. Not when they were surrounded by potential enemies.

Enemies. When had she begun thinking of crown soldiers as enemies? As threats to her prince?

Sometime between the day the Fire Lord crippled his son and their third week on the ship, when she had caught a message leaving to the Crown Princess to report their rate of failure. Suspicion had started to garner and if she didn't feel the same on occasion she might have thought each and every crewmen who mumbled light curses of Zuko was the same as him.

It wasn't as if she didn't share some of their complaints on those long nights when she sat in the boiler room, trading cards and jibes and bits of value. A few days of chores, a few coins, they were all the same as far as the crew of a long-at-sea ship was concerned.

It was true that her prince was rough and loud and foul tempered. It was true that his orders were sometimes irrational and this trip was(Used to be) just a fool's errand. It was true that the ship was shit, the crew was bored, and rations didn't always stay the level that was safe.

Complaints didn't make for treason.

"What brings the Fire Lords own brother, and his son, to my harbor?" Zhao asked.

Iroh gestured behind them without taking his hands out of his sleeves. "Our ship is being repaired," he explained. The vessel, tiny compared to those to either side, was beaten badly.

"My, that's quite a lot of damage. What happened?" the new Commander looked over their shoulders.

"Yes," Zuko agreed, his face twisting. "You wouldn't believe what happened." He didn't want Zhao knowing about the Avatar, but there was a fact that Zuko often forgot.

He was an atrocious liar.

"Uncle," he slid the conversation clumsily into an equally bad liar, "Tell him what happened."

"Ah, but Shizi recalls it much more clearly than I do," he turned it over to her and Shizi grimaced under her faceplate. Talk about traitors.

"Everyone on the ship got smashed," she said flatly, "they thought we were chasing the Avatar into the Southern Lights but we hit an iceberg. You should hear the guys talk about it."

Iroh looked a little disappointed. "Yes, that's right. That why she's the only one who recalls it! Shizi was the only one who didn't partake in the drinking. Besides, my nephew, of course."

He wouldn't be allowed alcohol for another three years. Nor would she, but no one cared about peasants.

"Half of the men will still swear up and down we were ambushed by the Avatar," she added for good measure. She realized, no one had told the crew not to tell Zhao about the Avatar, and it wouldn't occur to them not to spread the word. Zhao was supposed to be on their side, after all. Why would they hide information from him?

Fuck.

"Is that so?" Zhao narrowed his eyes and Shizi worried that he saw through them.

"Yes, it is," Zuko said clumsily. Shizi idly wondered what their country had with 'z's. Zhao. Zuko. AZula. OZai. SoZin. ShiZi.

She also wondered why no one had ever taught her prince any tact. Wasn't all politics about lying? She barely counted as noble and she knew that. She could lie through her teeth and catch truth under her tongue.

Swords weren't the only weapons and person needed to know how to use, after all.

"Well, you must regale me with all the antics of your crew," Zhao leaned in, too close for someone addressing their prince. Shizi tensed. "Join me for a drink?"

She couldn't see it, but she knew the tone that entered her prince's voice when his eyes narrowed.

"I can't. We're leaving," he tried to turn, a valiant effort if ever Shizi saw one, but Iroh caught his arm and the girl wanted to scream.

"Prince Zuko," he scolded, "Show Commander Zhao your respect." To the newly appointed officer he bowed, enough to be respectful without showing Zhao that he was considering him equal. "We would be honored to join you. Wouldn't we, nephew, Shizi?"

"Of course," She said automatically. Her bow was significantly lower. She may have been a member of the Royal Procession, but Zhao was an Commander and this was his port. Extra care had to be taken when that was accounted for.

"I didn't think you would be joining us, Royal Guard." The words were a title, as good as any rank, and it should have been a complement to hear them. But from Zhao it sounded like a mockery.

Shizi lifted herself, her chin went high. Defiant.

"Where the prince goes, so do I," she said firmly.

Zhao gave her a look that made her skin crawl. "Of course. What was I thinking?"

Iroh cut in smoothly with, "Do you have any ginseng tea? It's my favorite."

Shizi glanced at her shaking prince, weary of the fire that licked around his fingers. He didn't lash out, he just growled and kicked at the ground before storming after his uncle. Shizi was reminded of a child.

Not that he wasn't. Zuko was barely 16, Shizi had only recently passed 17. They were both young. Teenagers, if not children. He had grown, he had been scarred, marked, and forced to survive but at his core he was still a prince, one who had never had to work for his food, who had never known a life outside protection from outside forces.

His greatest enemy his entire life had been his own sister, and while sad it did not make for maturity or a calm heart. It left him with no need of self control outside of palace walls and little respect for people beneath him.

He was still a child, in many ways. A tall, anger filled child.

A child that had had to grow too fast and hadn't grown enough.

Shizi followed him, three steps behind.


Her hands were clenched into tight fists. Shizi stepped up, her eyes flashing as she put herself at her prince's elbow.

"You should watch your tone, Commander," her voice dripped venom. How dare he demand anything of their prince? How dare he accuse Zuko of any measure of treason?

Never mind that all three of them were technically committing it. Her most of all. She was the one who wove the lie, who embroidered embellishment upon the tale. Really, she was in the most danger of them. The other two were royalty. A Crown Prince and a renown General, brother to the Fire Lord.

She wasn't even real nobility.

"Shizi."

The command wasn't sharp. In fact it was totally calm, which was the strangest thing of all. The girl looked down at her prince before she bowed her head and took two steps back.

"It's like you said, the Avatar probably died a long time ago. We haven't found him, outside of drunken skirmishes," Zuko looked right at Zhao and Shizi was inexplicably proud of how straight faced he was. How calm, how in control.

Her heart settled.

This was her prince, her future Fire Lord. This was the boy she had followed on a impossible mission. This was the boy she would take any pain, any humiliation, sacrifice anything for, if it meant keeping him safe. This was boy who had stood up in the Fire Lord's war room and spoke against cruelty against his people.

This was her pride.

Shizi smiled under her mask and followed after him.

"Commander!" A man ducked into the tent, towards Zhao. "We interrogated the crew-"

Shizi didn't let him get another word out.

"How dare you?" her voice dropped, so low, so vicious, into such a growl that the soldier spun to her, his chin lifting, and even Zhao drew up.

"You interrogate the crew? You would doubt the word of the Prince of the Fire Nation, your prince, to your country, and go behind his back to get the answers that were so freely given? What kind of disrespect-"

"I disrespect no one worthy of respect," Zhao snapped, "All I see here, is a banished prince and his simpering guard, not worth my time or the courtesy I already paid."

"When he is Fire Lord-"

"He will never be Fire Lord," Zhao cut in, and Shizi was prepared to rip him apart for his third interruption. "His sister will be crowned and he will be what he always is, an unwanted prince. His own father doesn't want him, the proof is on his fa-"

"His father will welcome him home when he finds the Avatar that your navy has failed to find in a hundred years! And you will show him respect, or I will make you."

She didn't know where her fury came from. Zhao, she was willing to bet. Her prince and the months of pent up frustration, she would wager.

"Is that a challenge?" Zhao narrowed his eyes at the girl and she stood straight under his eyes.

"If you think you can make it," her voice was vicious.

His mouth carved a thin line across his face. "An Agni Kai, at sunset," he stated.

Shizi was caught. She had issued the challenge, she couldn't back down, but an Agni Kai…

"Very well." She heard herself say.


"I can't believe you're doing this."

Zuko stared down at her, at Iroh's side. Shizi had one fist on the ground, her armor and weapons traded for traditional Agni Kai clothes. Zhao wore the same as she, without the red band around his chest.

"This was a mistake," Iroh intoned.

"I know," Shizi promised. Her head was bowed, her hair locked in a hair piece. "I couldn't let him talk that way about Prince Zuko."

"Trying to protect my honor won't do any good if you lose while fighting for it," her prince hissed, and she closed her eyes against the words. She was barely a firebender, and Zhao was a master. She knew they were right but it was too late. It had been too late as soon as the words of acceptance had left her mouth. Too late as soon as she issued any challenge, for what other one would Zhao put forth.

Her muscles tensed under the red metal band around her upper arm and Shizi stood. She looked at them, her gaze even.

"I will not loose," she swore, and that was that. She had no weapons, no armor. She felt naked. But that would not keep her from fighting. Not for her prince.

Shizi turned with Zhao to face him, letting the strange vest-poncho fall off of her shoulders so she could step forwards. Her price was at her back, watching. Waiting.

The girl walked forth, her shoulders back, her chin lifted.

She attacked first. It was weak, pathetic. Honestly, Shizi could barely heat tea, let alone bend her way out of a box. It was no surprise when Zhao blocked each of her strikes and started pouring his own fire onto her.

The fury that had clouded her judgement earlier melted off, falling from her shoulders. She did not get power or a hazy from fighting. Shizi gained clarity and focus, calm and understanding. Her eyes drank in his movements, perfect, and his fire, powerful, as she dodged with a series of maneuvers that were overtly complex. She was a weapons mistress, one that was collecting burns faster than she collected knives. She did not need firebending. Except for this one time.

This one, cursed, time.

Her arms stung where they turned red, her cheek cried with a blister. She was pretty sure her hair was burning. Zhao was pushing literal waves of fire onto her and it was all she could do to side step, to jump, to duck. To catch it with her own bending and redirect it weakly, not even managing to protect her own hands.

Iroh and Zuko were shouting at her but she didn't hear. Her focus was entirely on Zhao.

How could she do this? How could she win an Agni Kai as an abysmal bender?

An abysmal bender…

"Benders rely too much on their element. Take that away and what do they have? Fight a waterbender in the desert and they are powerless, fight a firebender on a glacier and they grow weak," Master Tamotsu said. He had her hand twisted wrong. The fire at her fingertips, already weak, had died. "Even the bad ones think that bending will get them by."

"I don't have anything else," Shizi snapped. She tried to get out of the hold but he grabbed her jaw and placed a thumb above her eye. Shizi froze at the subtle pressure he applied.

"You barely have this," his voice was cold, but not cruel. Like steel settled against her skin. "You will never master firebending, little lion. But there are other strengths you might find. The body has weaknesses shared, bender or otherwise. The knees, the elbows, the eyes," he tapped her lid for emphasis and she flinched. "If you learn them, you won't need to bend at all to win."

...but one hell of a fighter.

Shizi shoved herself forwards, launched herself into a wall of fire. She focused enough not to be roasted entirely before she was dropping, skidding underneath a kick Zhao aimed at her head.

It was perfect. He was only on one leg, and she had all her limbs. Shizi planted her hands and used momentum to smash Zhao's knee out, sending him crumpling to the ground.

She threw herself onto him, before he could raise more fire, and placed one hand on his throat. Just her fingertips, while she sat on his chest.

Her other arm was back, fire curling around her knuckles. It was most firebending she could do at all.

Her chest was heaving. Zhao stared up at her, horrified, before he closed his eyes and looked away. Resigned.

"Do it," he snapped.

Shizi almost did. She almost placed her hand across his eye and heated the skin until it bubbled and he screamed. She would teach him to mock her prince.

Then she looked up, saw that same prince staring at her through a scarred eye, and settled for clocking him in the jaw.

Zhao went limp and Shizi stood, triumphant.