A/N: Hello again, sorry it's been so long since the last update. Please Review!! I NEED to know how I'm doing.
Chapter 3: Stranger
Somewhere else in the Earth Palace, four people invaded the grounds.
"Toph," Aang ordered before digging, "you and Sokka help the Earth King. Iroh and I will go get Katara and Zuko."
--
The small Earthbender and Water Tribe boy nodded and entered the Royal Hall where the Earth King sat. The room was empty accept for two Kyoshi warriors.
"Hey," Sokka asked, "Where's the Earth king?" One of the Kyoshi warriors who wore a braid hopped up to Sokka with a familiar agility.
"There's no need worry about him, cutie," she said, "He's safe with us."
"We need to see him," Sokka said confused at the girl. He knew her from somewhere. He had no time to register this as the Kyoshi girl was launched into the air from a moving shift of the ground. Toph moved in.
"Something's not right," Toph said not breaking her fighting stance, "These guys are about as much Kyoshi warriors as you are a bender."
"HEY!"
-"What? It's true!"
Just then Mai hurled several sharp daggers at them; Sokka whipped them back with the fling of his club and boomerang. The girl barely dodged the knives.
"They're Azula's friends!" Toph cried, recognizing them with her sharp senses and taking on a fighting stance. Ty Lee and Sokka took on parrying each other for a moment.
"It's like we're dancing!" she teased him. Toph attempted to take her down with an earthbending move but the girl's speed was too much. She simply leapt into the air one moment, and in the next she stood between them. In three quick critical blows, she had paralyzed them both. Sokka and Toph fell to the floor.
"Well, that was boring…" Mai drawled apathetically.
"It's about to get very interesting in a moment."
Mai and Ty Lee gasped.
Sokka, from his debilitated position on the stone floor, looked up in the direction of the voice. He saw the upside down figure of a young woman with long black hair in a Dai Li uniform. She stood still, resolute. Sokka also noticed the metallic glint of a sword hilt at her hip.
"Kasai!" Ty Lee cried, "You're supposed to be helping Azula!" Azula? Sokka thought, Terrific. She's with them.
"What are you doing?" Mai asked brow rising. Kasai did not answer right away.
"Something I should have done a long time ago," Kasai said softly taking a defensive stance. She slowly drew her broadsword and held it at Mai and Ty Lee.
Ty Lee gasped in utter shock.
"You've got to be kidding me," said Mai sighing.
"Kasai! Have you completely lost it?" Ty Lee asked wide-eyed and incredulous.
"No, I haven't," said Kasai, "For the first time, I've found it!"
"You're not making sense," said an unimpressed Mai.
"If you don't step aside and let these two go," Kasai said slowly changing her stance, "I will be forced to make you."
"What?" said Mai.
"No!" said Ty Lee.
"Huh??" said Toph.
"Let them go now," Kasai warned, crimson eyes flashing, "Or I will not hesitate to fight you!"
Ty Lee was just not registering.
"But…You can't," she murmured feebly. Kasai's eyes softened in sympathy for the confused girl. But she was not to give in.
"She's betraying us, Ty Lee," Mai explained, "It was only a matter of time"-
-"It's only a matter of time before they wake from paralysis!" Kasai alerted them.
"Fine," Mai glared suddenly irate, "If you want to fight, then that's what you'll get."
"NO!" TyLee shouted.
She hurled more daggers at Kasai's heart. In two swift flashes of metal, Kasai had hit them away from her unscratched. Kasai ran toward Mai swirling her sword around her but was easily being dodged.
"Is that the best you can do?" Mai taunted dodging every one of Kasai's swings.
"You move pretty fast in such heavy armor." Kasai barked, dodging a random blade hidden in the other girl's sleeve.
Mai managed to leap away from Kasai again and fired arrows at her. Kasai sensed the hesitation in Mai's movements and jumped into the air, her body twisting around the arrows in one movement. Sokka watched on as much as he could from his position on the ground, in awe. Her sword came out and stuck on of the arrows, and it shot right across Mai's sleeve, the emerald cloth sliding to the floor, along with the weapons it held. Ty Lee gasped.
"Whoa," Sokka breathed.
"You guys!" Ty Lee cried attempting to interfere the bout, but only narrowly dodging, "This is seriously SO not in tune with the universe! All this in fighting is So BAD for your karma! AAAAH!" she cried as Kasai's blade barely missed her.
"Get out…Of the way… If you aren't…fighting!" Kasai barked as she parried against Mai's small blade.
"Stay out of this Ty Lee!" Mai threatened coolly. TyLee had no idea what to do. She couldn't believe this was happening in the first place. She thought Kasai was their friend. Well, her and Azula's friend. Now, it was as if she had never changed at all. She was the same as always…
A rebel: a dangerous thing to be if you're a citizen of the Fire Nation.
"Not so great without your little kitchen knives, are you?" said Kasai as she began to take the hand in the fight.
Mai said nothing but smirked. Kasai didn't like that look. Mai had swift hands. They turned for one second then revealed a poison needle. A metallic flicker was the only warning she had before Mai attempted to plunge it into her.
--
Silence.
Then a cry and the loud clang of metal.
Kasai blinked.
Mai was thrown back in pain, clutching the hand that held the needle. She was glaring in separate direction. Kasai turned to see.
Sokka stood, fully mobile, his arm outstretched from having thrown the boomerang. Toph stood beside him, slowly waking from her motionless state, loosening up her small limbs. Sokka's boomerang whipped back to his hand.
"Feels good to be back!" said Toph, cracking her knuckles.
She brought her hands forward. Boulders shot from the ground and rolled beneath the other two girls, whipping them off their feet. Mai and Ty Lee tumbled over before either could properly respond. Two swift movements later and Toph had them bound to the floor with pieces of earth.
Kasai watched the girl in awe. This child couldn't be any older than twelve years old, yet her earth bending had to be on a master level. She was truly something. Kasai sighed heavily and withdrew her swords.
"Thank you so much I had no idea" –
- "Hold it!" Sokka drew his weapons and held a stance.
"You're working for Azula! Why are you helping us?" Toph demanded taking stance as well.
"W-Wait! Wait!" Kasai stuttered, "I'm on your side!" She held up her hands.
"What makes you think we believe you? You just turned on your own 'friends'!!" Sokka exclaimed.
"To help you! To save the avatar!!" Kasai uttered.
"What do you know about Aang?" cried Toph.
"I know that he is in danger! Please, there's no time. We have to hurry!!" Kasai shouted.
The pair glared at her uncertainly, then at each other. This girl was a complete stranger. Why should they trust her? She was Fire Nation.
"What do we do?" Sokka murmured sideways toward Toph.
"She's…telling the truth…"Toph muttered amazed. "She honestly wants to help us!"
"Yes!Yes!" Kasai urged. "Come on! I know where the Earth King is being kept."
"This better not be a trap." Sokka warned. Kasai stared earnestly into his eyes. Ocean blue. Familiar blue eyes…
Sokka was taken aback slightly by the look in her eyes…and her striking beauty. Her eyes were different, too. Such a rich, dark crimson…
"I swear it is not."
--
"The underground passage leads this way," Kasai panted as they sprinted down the dark corridors. "It's where all the prisoners are held. The king should be down there."
"What about my sister?" Sokka asked. Kasai blinked at him. Of course. Those eyes. The waterbender girl.
Why didn't she realize sooner? Kasai inhaled sharply as they ran.
"She should be down there, too."
"You don't sound so sure," said the little earthbender at her other side. How could she possibly know that?
Kasai did not answer, she just kept running…
--
They were in range of the underground area before the ground literally shot up before them creating a wall of earth.
"What's THIS?" Kasai shouted at Toph.
"It's not me!" she said.
"DAI LI!!" Sokka cried whipping around and drawing his weapons.
Several Dai Li men shifted behind the three. One shot a boulder directly at Sokka. Out of nowhere, Kasai launched herself in front of Sokka in a direct precise kick, knocking the boulder away quickly. It hit the wall with crushing force.
Kasai landed in front of Sokka and drew her swords. She glanced at him over her shoulder.
"I totally had that," He muttered bitterly. She smirked.
"Sure you did."
"I see you're always on your toes, Kasai, as usual." A voice said behind the wall of Dai Li men.
"Azula!" Kasai growled.
The Fire Princess stepped out of the surrounding fighters nonchalantly. She examined Kasai with unreadable eyes. Kasai stood battle ready. As she gazed at them, Azula's expression melted into amusement.
"What's this?" she leered, "Oh! You were planning to turn on me? Hn, too bad I already knew that." She snapped.
Immediately members of the Dai Li threw their stone-made hands to bind the three so swiftly, there was barely time to react. Sokka, Kasai, and Toph were pinned to the ground.
No!
"LET US GO!!" Toph cried from the heap on the floor.
"In all the time we spent together, Kasai, "Azula said in mock disappointment, "I never expected to send you back to the Fire Nation in chains…"
"Usually I would give you some time to regain your senses properly, but what's the point?" Azula stepped over Kasai now, "You're going back home anyway…"
Kasai said nothing. She glared up at the princess defiantly. Azula chuckled.
"It just isn't fair, is it?" she said in false empathy. "Take her to the chamber." She ordered the Dai Li.
She was separating her from Sokka and Toph. Azula wasn't stupid. She knew that they were more vulnerable individually. Kasai struggled against her restraints in vain.
"I'll – I'll get us out of this!" Kasai shouted at Sokka as she was dragged away, "I will save your sister, you have my word!"
And with that, Sokka watched her disappear into the endless crowd of Dai Li. He growled as he and Toph were taken in another direction.
You have my word.
--
"Come on!" She shouted, "I promise you won't get into trouble." Kasai held up a tiny hand in formality.
Zuko looked up at her skeptically.
"Are you sure??" He asked, fiddling with the small sheath that held his uncle's dagger.
"You have my word, Prince Zuko."
He still looked worried, but took her hand anyway. The two of them climbed out of the palace in secrecy and into the pale moonlight.
--
SLAM!!
The iron doors shut before her bounds were released from her wrists and ankles. Darkness wrapped around her eyes in the small cell she was inside of, save for the small barred window high at the door.
"AZULA!!" She found the door and slammed at it relentlessly. No answer.
"AZULA" –
"No need to shout," came a voice from right outside the door. Kasai froze.
"…"
"What, now you're not speaking?"
"…"
"You brought this upon yourself. You're so selfish, Kasai. Honesly, I thought you wanted to see your darling Zuzu again" –
"DON'T - CALL HIM THAT!"
"Here I was, ready to send you home from a job well done, and yet you continue to contradict me." Kasai could hear malice in Azula's voice, "Well, you can forget about him, your home…I will make sure you have nothing left."
"…I already have nothing…"
"You know you're right. For once," Azula went on coldly, "…Now I will send you home in chains to save you the embarrassment of returning to your family."
"…."
"Need I remind you why I let you join my group? Did you actually think I believed your little tragic story? Did you really believe you could snake your way through my plans? Outsmart me? Undermine my authority?"
Kasai could hear the impatience in Azula's voice.
"You will pay for your treachery," she said sharply," I will make sure of it. Do you here me? I will destroy you."
She waited. Azula shifted and started to walk away, but stopped.
"This truly is tragic, you know. You could have been a part of a great victory. A step in our great country's triumph."
Kasai snorted.
"Hn. You could have been FireLady…"
Kasai's fists clenched.
--
Kasai waited for Azula to leave before slowly dropping to her knees.
I will destroy you.
The tears came, damn them. Sodden and hot.
--
"Heard of it this morning…"
"My husband witnessed the whole ordeal."
"You would never believe such an occurrence would happen…Especially among the royal family!"
"Let alone the Crown Prince, saying that to his own father, the FireLord!"
"Unspeakable…"
"Disgraceful…"
Disgraceful…
Kasai sat silent among the bejeweled women drinking tea, gossiping about the latest scandal to hit the Fire Nation. It was the worst. Kasai swallowed hard, deaf to all the chatter around her. Numb.
Disgraceful
"May I be excused?" She abruptly sat up, mildly startling the women around her. The woman next to her, Aunt Wen, looked up at her incredulously.
"I just need a bit of air, please," Kasai lied, "the incense is getting to me…"
That's it. Just pretend you're as delicate as a firelily…
"Take my fan with you dear," Wen offered haughtily. Kasai put on a mask of gratitude and bowed respectfully before walking quicker than she should have to the outside court yard.
"Oh the poor dear…" she heard a random woman coo. As if she truly cared.
None of them did.
Bursting through the golden doorways, Kasai sprinted through an endless garden. The day was mockingly beautiful, the bright, harsh sun baring its unfriendly smile on her. Just like everyone smiled at her. A false, mocking, ugly smile…
She reached a pillar and sank her weight against it…
Kasai promptly burst into tears.
Everflowing, searing hot, angry and miserable all at once.
She was 14 years old ...
And she had just lost everything.
--
Three years later…
--
Kasai sat in the Fire Lord's throne room, hands clenching the material of her clothes. Ozai's flames roared around them in the room, only further intimidating the young woman. She bowed her head low and sat there on her knees, chewing her lower lip.
Silence.
Ozai sank back in his chair.
"Kasai…Why have you come here?"
Silence.
She swallowed hard.
"I…I don't know…"Her voice was unusually hoarse.
The flames promptly erupted before her, screaming. Kasai gasped, but dared not to look up at him.
"You don't know…?" Lord Ozai mused serenely, "What could possibly have drawn you here then?"
Silence.
"You come here, announced by messenger, unsupervised, and with completely no idea why you asked to speak directly to your Fire lord? Tell me, was it a whim?"
"No – I – "
"Then tell me, Kasai, what it is you are here for, but by all means take your time. I have nothing I would rather be doing at this point!" Ozai hotly interjected, flames lashing around him.
"Please, My Lord," Kasai stuttered, "I am here for a reason."
"Then by all means, my dear," Ozai said calmly," Speak it."
Kasai inhaled shakily.
"My Lord," She bowed again, "I wish to aid Princess Azula in her quest to capture the Avatar and to apprehend Prince Zuko."
--
A/N: The next chapter will have a lot of flashbacks. I 'm going to try to order them so they make sense. You will get to learn more about Kasai. Reviewplz!!
