Katara leaned against the door after slamming it in Zuko's face. The nerve of him! Assuming she'd be impressed by all this? Trying to win her over with people and animals? Who did he think he was? Katara sighed. She was here, there was nothing she could do about it. She turned around and her jaw dropped.
The room was enormous. There was a huge room with several couches and tables. She thought back to what Zuko had been saying. This must be the receiving room. The room was decorated in all red. Katara saw two doorways. After going through the right one, she found the living room. It had a few bookcases, empty. There were a few day couches and a fireplace. Katara assumed this was the living room. There was another door beyond that. Katara poked her head it. Her jaw dropped again.
This was the bedroom. But unlike the other rooms, decorated in red, the whole room was soft blue. There was a gargantuan four poster bed with blue and white curtains. The were wide windows along one whole side of the room, flooding it with natural light. A gold tassel hung near the windows. Katara pulled it. Curtains made of heavy blue cloth spread across the window, blocking out all the light. Katara pulled the tassel again. The curtains retreated. She opened the door leading
There was a small room to the left. She opened the door to see a magnificent bathroom. The tub, sunk into the floor, was large enough to swim in. It had several tile shevles, Katara assumed to sit on as you bathed. This room was also blue. Fluffy purple towels were draped on a rack near the tub. There was a beautiful sink on a large pedastal. Cabinets lined a wall. Upon opening them, Katara found dozens of jars of creams, lotions, make-up, shampoo, conditioners, and soap.
Katara went back into the bedroom. She went through a set of double doors to see the walk-in closet. Lamps were hanging from the ceiling. This room was a confusing mixture of red and blue. At either end of the closet, there were three mirrors offering every angle that Katara could want to look at herself. There were also a few blue couches in front of the mirrors. Half of the closet held blue Water Tribe clothing, and the other half held red Fire Nation clothes. Katara wondered who did all this. Surely these rooms, reserved for the wife (she shuddered) of the Fire Lord, were all red before?
Katara felt slightly impressed at whomever had ordered this done.
"Iroh," she decided. It was definitely Iroh. She walked back through to the receiving room and took the other door. It simply led to the day room, which was a little small and plain.
She sat on one of the couches. A girl of only twelve came into the room. She threw herself on the floor and bowed as far as she could. Katara felt awkward.
"You have to give me permission to rise," the girl whispered. Katara quickly told her to rise. She did.
"Forgive the intrusion, Princess Katara, but the banquet begins in a few hours, and you must be ready." Katara remembered that on the ride back to the palace, Iroh had mentioned something about a banquet.
"All right," she said getting up. "What is your name?"
"My name?" the girl said. "No one has ever asked me my name here. Do I even have a name?" Her brow furrowed. Katara felt uncomfortable, to say the least. "IIA!" the girl yelled. "I remember! It's Ila!"
Katara nodded feeling very odd. "I will go get the water for your bath." Katara followed the girl, Ila, and she noticed that the servants had all appeared out of nowhere. Ila tapped the oldest one on the shoulder. "Matron, the princess wishes to take her bath."
The woman, the matron? snapped her fingers. She pointed to two dozen girls. "Fetch the princesses bathing water!" The two dozen girls were out the door in a flash, and began to file back in, each of them carrying two large buckets of water which they added to the tub. They didn't splash a drop of water. Katara blinked as dozens of girls paraded past her with water.
Ila cleared her throat, reminding Katara that she was there. "Princess Katara, I will help you undress. It is one of my duties."
Katara laughed. "Oh, I don't need help, I can get undressed!" Ila laughed too. "But you are a princess!" Katara went into the bathroom to wait for the tub to be filled. Ila dashed into her closet then popped back up next to Katara.
"At least let me get your robe, Princess Katara."
Katara was feeling very creeped out. In the Southern Water Tribe, things were done on their own. When the palace was built, and Katara really became a princess, there were workers still building it, and there were some servants te help clean. Even though, Katara had still gone with Gran Gran to wash clothes, sew, and help the women of the village. Since Katara was a Master Waterbender, and a Healer, she fixed most of the injuries. Of course, there were some things that Gran Gran did that Katara couldn't. Gran Gran knew the signs of pregnancy and how to birth a child. These were things Katara had a basic idea to do, but wasn't much help if a problem arose.
The two dozen girls bowed together. "Your bath is ready, Princess Katara," the chanted in unison. The girls filed out of the room, leaving Katara alone. She sighed in relief. Suddenly, five more girls appeared.
"We are here to help you with your bath," they told her at the same time, in one voice.
"I can do it alone, but thank you," Katara said as politely as she could. Looking surprise, the girls backed out. Katara went back to the cabinets and found some bath salts. She picked jasmine and added them. The soothing scent of jasmine filled the steamy bathroom. She picked jasmine scented shamoo and set it near the edge of the tub. She took off her clothes and got in the tub. The water was just the right temperature. She sighed in relief. The tension in her neck and shoulders slowly went away. She lathered her hair, glad to be clean after two weeks on a ship.
She got out of the bath and bended the water off. She slipped on the robe and walked back in her bedroom. The servants were all gone. Katara sighed in relief.
"Did you have a nice bath, Princess Katara?" Ila asked. She had come out of seemingly nowhere.
"Ila!" Katara cried in shock.
"Who's Ila?" Ila asked. Katara couldn't help giving her a strange look.
"You said that was your name."
"Oh yeah!" Ila laughed. She followed Katara as she went into the closet.
"Princess, your hair is dripping," Ila pointed out. The water in Katara's hair was dripping onto the floor. Katara nonchalantly Waterbended the water out, and bended the water into a vase of flowers in the closet. Ila's eyes widened it surprise.
"Magic trick! Oh, please do it again!"
"It's not magic, it's Waterbending," Katara told her. Katara walked to the blue half of the room and selected an evening robe. Ila wrung her hands.
"Princess Katara? I hate to intrude, but maybe you should pick something from the other side of your closet."
"Why?"
"This baquet is to celebrate your arrival, and to formally annouce your betrothal to Prince Zuko! It would be very bad form, very rude, to wear blue," Ila said slowly.
Katara briefly considered shocking the whole Fire Court by wearing a blue dress. She decided against it. "What should I wear?" she asked Ila. Ila picked out a red dress. It looked fine. "Are you sure?" Katara asked, remembering that Ila was very odd. Ila nodded enthusicastically. Ila scampered out. Katara put on the dress.
She heard voices outside. Katara left the closet to see a few more servants in her room. They all bowed upon seeing her. There was one servant bowing slightly before the others.
"I am here to do your hair and makeup for the banquet, Princess Katara. These are my apprentices. Pay them no mind."
Katara was steered back to the bathroom where the woman tsked. "So much steam! Your hair will frizz!" Katara used Waterbending to disperse the steam.
"Is that better?" The woman looked shocked.
"Yes, it is better. Now sit."
Katara sat on a stool in front of a mirror. The woman and the other servants around her flitted back and forth, serperating this, tying back that, lifting that, spraying water there. After a while, she saw that the woman doing hair was a true master.
She had done Katara's hair in a bun, the Fire Nation style. But she had also braided the hair that normally made loops and tied them back to the bun, making the style both Fire Nation and Water Tribe. While her hair was being done, one of the apprentices had been doing Katara's makeup. Her eyelids were painted blue, her eyebrows had been plucked, and her eyes had been lined with black paint.
The woman smiled at her masterpeice.
"What's your name?" Katara asked. The woman bowed.
"I am the Hair Mistress," she said before leaving. Katara felt awkward again. Ila bounced back in.
"Prince Zuko is waiting to escort you to the banquet."
Katara sighed and went into the receiving room. Prince Zuko was waiting sulkily. His eyes bulged when he saw her. He cleared his throat.
"Um, I am to escort you to the banquet."
Katara nodded. "Lead the way," she said slightly sarcastically.
They walked in an awkward silence to the banquet.
"You, uh, look…nice," Zuko said in a sad attempt at conversation.
"Thank you."
The silence returned.
They reached the banquet hall. Two enormous double doors were opened by servants. Zuko and Katara walked in and sat at the table. Iroh sat at the head of the table, with Zuko sitting on his right, and Katara next to Zuko. Azula sat next to Katara.
Azula seethed. Why was the Water Peasant here? Not only in the palace, but sat with higer rank than she! And she was wearing Fire Nation clothes, which Azula could tell were finer than hers.
The twelve course dinner began. Before everyone ate, Iroh stood up. He held up his glass of wine.
"Befor we eat, I would like to make an announcement! I would like to welcome Princess Katara, of the Southern Water Tribe, to the Fire Nation, and to my own family." Iroh beamed at Katara. "I am happy to announce the betrothal of Princess Katara and my nephew, Prince Zuko!"
The napkin Azula was playing with under the table ripped in two. Everyone turned to look at the couple. Iroh sat back down, and the feast began. Katara was starving. When the hors d'oeuvres were brought out, Zuko saw her eyeing them hungrily. Part of him wanted her to humilate herself by eating too much at the first few courses, but the other part of him remembered a long time ago, when he did the same thing. He leaned over to whisper in Katara's ear.
"There will be twelve courses. Don't have too much of any one course, otherwise you'll eat too much and be sick."
Katara nodded.
Azula motioned a page to come to her. She told him quietly to relay a message to her uncle. After the page had to run back and forth a few times, Azula was able to excuse herself. Mai, seeing Azula leave, did the same.
Mai followed Azula back to her room.
Azula kicked over tables and shoved anyone in the halls out of her way as she went back to her room.
"I can't believe it!" she roared. Mai slouched into a chair and waited out the storm.
"He's marrying her?" Azula yelled. "This ruins EVERYTHING! What if they have brats? I'll never get the throne now!" Azula screamed again. Mai sulked as well.
Before Mai was sumoned back to the Fire Court, she was having boy trouble in her parents' house. The trouble? They all wanted to marry her. Most of the self-absorbed suitors ended up pinned to the wall by shuriken.
Mai had been excited to come back to the Fire Court, not only because she escaped all the men, but also because she would get to see a certain one again. Mai sometimes wondered how a girl like her, independent, ever worried so much about a boy.
"What are we going to do?" she asked Azula.
"Everything we can."
