Chapter 2: Lies of the Fire Lord

Zuko's POV

After I had finished reading the mysterious scroll, I went to the room I knew Azula was in, not bothering to knock. I found my sister combing her hair, ready to go to bed.

"What do you want, Zu-Zu?" she asked with a bored tone in her voice, like she always did whenever she saw me. I took a deep breath before sitting down next to her and handing her the scroll and Uncle's letter.

"Uncle managed to get THIS by my doorstep somehow. I was curious so I went to check it out," I said, as I placed Uncle's scroll in her lap, which she opened and read, before handing it back to me.

"Was that all you came to tell me? I WAS planning to go to bed early today," Azula said in the same bored tone. It was hard for me not to walk out and let her be, even though I knew she would never find out the truth about her mother. No, it was my duty as her big brother, to tell the truth, even if we were only half-brother and sister. Even if I hated her, even if she made my life miserable, she was still my sister, and I had to tell her this, no matter what she would do to me, since she would most likely refuse to acknowledge the truth until she found proof.

"No, during my time in the Catacombs I found something else as well. Something that might be of your interest," I said, as I held up the scroll with the top secret messages. This made Azula's eyes gleam.

"Finally using your brains like they were meant to be used, Zu-Zu. Impressive." She smirked as she took the scroll and started to read it. I smiled, swallowing a remark about her own brain, and waited until she reached the most important part...

Azula's POV

I have to admit I was somewhat impressed when Zu-Zu came to me with the news that he had broken into the Dragonbone Catacombs and had even stolen a scroll, but when I started to read the scroll, I was horrified: it said I wasn't a Fire Nation princess, just a mere peasant chosen by the Fire Lord for my abilities...

"How can I be sure you didn't make this up, just to get rid of me?" I asked with a smirk on my face, suddenly remembering Zu-Zu knew I was the only other person suited for the throne, and Father would rather see me on the throne, than that weak, pathetic Zu-Zu anyway. He had all the reasons to write this and act like it was Father's, just to get rid of me.

"I didn't, Azula. You should know this isn't even MY handwriting," Zu-zu replied and after that he wrote something down on a piece of paper for me to compare to the writing on scroll. Even though what Zuko had written was a short message, I could immediately see that it was indeed NOT Zu-Zu's handwriting on the scroll; the his was a lot messier.

"In that case, WE go confront Father, since this is YOUR discovery," I said as I looked at Zu-Zu with a smirk on my face, since I could at least put the blame on him for having been in the Dragonbone Catacombs, where it was strictly forbidden for us to go. Even if maybe I would have to face the truth...what was I going to think? "Come on Azula," I thought, "you're NOT the same Azula mentioned in the scroll, that's impossible! Focus..."

Zuko's POV

"You seem to be awfully cool about this...you okay?" I asked, as I placed a hand on my sister's (or rather my half-sister's) knee, with a worried look in my eyes, since even though she always made my life miserable, and even though Father favored her over me, we are blood related, and I do care about her.

"I'm fine. So stop pretending that you care," Azula snapped at me as she stomped out, before going to the throne room and kicking the door open. Father was sitting on his throne with some of his councilmen around him, when Azula and I came in.

"Zuko, Azula! What's the meaning of this?' Father raged at the sight of us, of course calling my name first, since Azula was his favorite and could get away with pretty much anything. I, on the other hand, had to be careful with my choice of words, since Ozai ALWAYS scolded me whenever I did something wrong in his eyes.

"I wanted to ask you something, Father. And it IS important," Azula said, as she looked at our father straight in the eye. Immediately after hearing this, he sent away his councilmen, something else only Azula could accomplish. If it had been me standing there and demanding to talk to him ,he would have said it had to wait until later, and if I had objected to his decision (if I had even DARED to object), he would have yelled at me.

"So, what is it you want to talk about, Azula?" Ozai now asked with a honey sweet voice, not at all suspecting something was wrong. Instead he most likely thought she was going to complain about some of the staff members, or ask for something new to wear, or something like that.

"Zuko has been in the Dragonbone Catacombs to read the history of Great-grandfather to fresh up his schooling, which was the idea of that traitorous uncle of ours..." Azula started her story, of course she was putting the blame on ME. I hadn't expected anything less from her to be honest. I had expected father to scold me for going down there, but he didn't; instead he turned pale as a blanket, probably feeling where this was going.

"He also found your old sex diary. There was something written in it that I didn't understand. It said...that Mother wasn't able to get another child after Zu-Zu was born," Azula said as a smirk appeared on her face, at which Ozai sat back in his chair with a shocked look on his face. He probably hadn't ever expected Azula to find out about this, which meant he didn't know what to reply. This conversation was going to be either very short, or very interesting, especially since this was the first time I wasn't the one who was going to be in trouble.

"Oh look, it also says someone named "woman X" has given you a daughter!" She did a fake surprised gasp. "Well that's a surprise, the child's name is also Azula! What a coincidence..." Azula had a challenging look in her eyes, something I would be scolded for in her place. I would have been told it wasn't my place to speak to him like that, but not Azula, Father's little favorite. She was allowed to say what was on her mind, even if it was disrespectful to him.

"And all because she is a more talented firebender than me. That's not fair if you ask me," I thought, as I watched Father's pale face as he leaned back in his throne, looking like a defeated man, now that his dirty little secret was out. He was going to suffer the consequences of his lies...

Azula's POV

"Who is this woman X? What is her name and where can I find her?" I half-asked half-demanded as I looked at my father angrily, after confronting him with the lie he made me believe for years, the lie that Ursa was my mom. The thought that I had always believed it blindly! I knew my father was a born liar! It suddenly made sense to me why she always preferred Zuko over me: not only did she think I was a monster, she also knew I wasn't HER child, and that's why she shunned me.

"How should I know? I banished her after you were born! It leaves me COLD where she is!" Father barked at me, after which he clapped his hand over his mouth, knowing he had just confirmed my suspicions. Ursa was indeed not my birth mother, it was this woman X, whoever she was...

"Then I will find her, wherever she is," I told him with a angry look on my face, before I turned around and stomped out of the room, slamming the door shut behind me, leaving Zu-Zu alone with father, even though I knew he was probably going to take out his anger on my brother (or rather my half-brother), since he was the one who had revealed his dirty little secret. But now I wasn't interested in listening at Zuko getting scolded: all I cared about was finding out who this woman X was. Whoever she was and WHEREVER she was, I was going to find her.

"Not that I think she will be much better then Ursa. I just want to know who my birth mother is. Yeah, that's it! Love is still for the weak and I'm NOT weak! I'm not weak...I'm not..." I thought, repeating that I wasn't weak, like it was a mantra. But as I kept repeating it I felt something sting in my eye, and before I knew it something hot and wet fell on my knee, soon followed by more. I only realized I was crying when I suddenly had difficulty catching my breath. As that happened I felt a soft hand on my shoulder, and as I looked up, I saw Zuko was standing behind me, looking at me calmly.

"Listen...I know we're not the best of buddies, and we will never be. But you are family, and even if you're only half-family, I do care about you, and I want to help you find your birth mother," Zuko said as he looked at me sternly, as if he seriously meant what he said. I looked back at him with a smirk, not believing this at all: love is for the weak. That had always been my motto; only with fear and scheming could one gain power.

"Yeah sure, you just want to be rid of me...Well Zu-Zu, if this is true, I'm sure you have an idea how we could find this woman?" I asked, seeing through his little scheme to get rid of me. Zu-Zu was a really pathetic liar.

"Yes. We just look in the registers of all our servants and look who was fired around the day you were born. There can't be too many, so we might come across her name," Zuko said after thinking about this for a moment. I nodded, and we walked to the room where the registers were kept. I screamed at the guards we needed to see something in the register for a private matter and that we wanted to be alone. They stormed off and left us alone, knowing that angering the princess was a grave mistake NOBODY wanted to make. They all knew me well enough to know they would either get banished or killed if they angered me.

"Well, Zu-Zu, I got us in, let's not dilly-dally about it and get a move on." I smirked as we walked to the big register book and watched as Zu-Zu immediately went to the page where he could find a list of all the people who were fired on the day I was born. There was lots of them: Father loved to fire people just as much as I did, that was for sure.

"We sure have a lot in common," I thought, as I watched Zu-Zu skim the pages, most likely for a maid that would seem fit to him to act as my "mother". That was until he hit one name that was scratched black, leaving only one letter visible, the letter X.

"That must be her, but her name is scratched away, as if father wanted to erase her from existence," Zu-Zu mumbled as he looked at the page, before his eyes lit up and he looked at me with a smile on his face.

"Do you think you can yell us into the cell where Uncle is held?" he asked me with a smirk, which made me smirk as well, since yelling at people was the thing I did best. The scratched name did make me wonder, though: it could have been either Zu-Zu or that fat uncle of mine scratching the name...

"Can dragons fly?" I asked, as I looked at the scratched name sternly, though it wasn't fully true that I thought HE had been the one that scratched the name. I mean, I had to yell at those guards to get them out of my way. Zu-zu would have NEVER been able to do that, so he couldn't have sneaked in to scratch the name. This made me wonder who had, and why...

"Maybe Uncle. Hmm, that fat man could be in on this. He could have gotten the guards out of his way," I thought, as I followed Zuko out of the room towards the place where Uncle was imprisoned. After some more screaming, the guard let us in the cell, where our fat uncle was standing with his back turned to us. In another situation, this would have enraged me and made me burn him alive, but not now; I just waited until he noticed me.

"Uncle, I have a question: in the Dragonbone Catacombs I found something, and I want to know what you know about it," Zu-Zu said as he placed the scroll before Uncle, who picked it up and slowly read it, before his eyed widened in shock.

"Azula...is..." He looked up at me with wide eyes and a look of shock and disbelief.

"Spare me that, I know you and Zu-Zu are behind this," I commanded as I folded my arms and rolled my eyes at him, not believing that the fat man knew nothing of the scroll and its secret.

"And how do you explain your father's reaction then? He was shocked to see you knew," a voice in my head (that sounded like the voice of Ursa) told me. This made me think back to the confrontation with father; he had indeed been shocked to learn I knew the truth. IF it was the truth, which I was still doubting.

"We're not behind anything, Azula, we want to help you," Uncle Fatty assured me as he looked at me sternly, before he looked at the ground with a pondering look.

"I don't know WHO this woman X is, but I know she lives in the poor Shao Kwong village. That's where Ozai gets most of his servants, because they were very loyal to him," Iroh said as he went to the back of his cell and removed a stone, getting a piece of cloth out. He unwrapped it, revealing a crown.

"This was always meant to be yours, Zuko. This is only worn by the crown prince," Iroh told Zu-Zu as he put the thing in his hands.

"Which I am, if Azula is indeed that woman X's child," Zu-Zu realized as he looked at his uncle with wide eyes, which made me roll my eyes at him.

"Duh Zu-Zu. That's something even a turtle duck could understand!" I snapped at him as I walked to the door and opened it. "Say bye to Uncle Fat Tummy! We're going on a trip to Shao Kwong!"

"Take care Zuko," Uncle Fatty told Zu-Zu with a small smile.

"I will, Uncle. Thank you for the help." Zu-Zu smiled at Uncle Fatty, before we turned and left the cell. On to Shao Kwong...

AUTHOR'S NOTE: And with that I end the second chapter of the story! I hope you all liked it!

Please keep in mind that this is a "what if" story, so it will contain some differences from the original series as well as character bonding/changes in Azula's behavior. especially after she found out the truth about her past.

Iroh only talked to Zuko because he told his uncle about the scroll he had found. the scene with the happy reunion between Zuko and Uncle Iroh will still happen later.

That's all for now, keep reading everyone! and thanks chipter roo! for beta reading the first two chapters for me! don't forget to

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