I was with Lu Sen when she went into labor. It was premature but not dangerously so. Well, at least not for the baby. The Fire Lord's grandchild should be fine, but his mother... The petite princess had never been so weak. Her skin had always been pallid, but it'd never been gray. It took everything she had to croak, 泥on't let Iroh in."

"Don't speak, your highness," the head midwife advised. "Save your strength for the next-"

"Ohhhh!" she groaned, squeezing my hand as hard as she can.

I could barely feel the difference.

"Lady Ursa, I think you should-"

"No!" Sen protested, reaching for me with her other hand also. "Don't leave me," she cracked, turning to my would-be ouster with pleading eyes. "Please, may she stay?"

The midwife blushed deeply, her sense of propriety mortified by such a question. A princess asking for her permission? As though her highness was somehow answerable to her! The very idea made the very sturdy woman feel faint.

"Why, of course! If your highness insists..."

"I'll never leave you, Sen," I whispered out of the others' earshots. "I promise."

And I didn't.

For fourteen hours, I sat with Iroh, waiting.

Waiting...

Waiting.

The waiting was enough to send him-the most patient man I would ever knew-off on pacing marathons every ten minutes. I would sit as his feet burned a hole in the floor, quite literally. For a while, I sat there and let him worry, not knowing how to comfort him other than to simply be there and exist with him, at his side until the end. Finally, his anxiety moved me to speak out, to take his mind off her. I actually asked him to play Pai Sho, and he did. The master player was so distracted that he lost tile after tile. Shocked, and somewhat horrified, at his surrender, I ended our game before he could let me win, calling for more tea. He'd already gone through two pots. Once he went through four, I realized too late that he should probably get some sleep. Despite his tea overload, my brother was convinced to rest eventually, and I fell asleep with him.

By the time I woke up, he was pacing again.

"Iroh!I groaned, sitting up to bang my head against the wall backing me.

If he heard me, there was no indication of it.

"IROH."

At last, he turned to me with dazed, half-mad eyes. His response was so hoarse no one other than I would have heard it.

"Yes?"

I softened at his brokenness. For once, such weakness didn't sicken me. For once, I shared in his pain.

Sen was going to die. I knew it with every fiber in my being. I accepted it as inevitable. As with everyone else I took for granted, everyone else who loved me more than I loved them, the sweetest, tenderest heart to ever beat would be taken away.

Iroh didn't know it. He was too busy fearing and fighting it to realize its truth. He didn't want to know it. He refused to.

Yet it haunted him no less.

"Sit down," I both commanded and requested, more gentle than I thought possible.

He obeyed blindly-in that moment he would carry out any order-and sat in silence. I considered patting him on the back or something, but I was never one to initiate human contact. It went against everything I knew, taking me so far out of my comfort zone—

Iroh fell asleep on my shoulder.

"All right, your highness. Last push. Ready?" the midwife I considered to be the "nice one" encouraged.

"PUSH!" the head midwife urged.

And push she did, with more strength than anyone knew the drained princess was capable of.

"Get Iroh," Sen cracked out before fainting, the death written all over her gray face having finally reached her eyes.

I nodded to one of two messengers, and he left to fetch the Crown Prince. The other, per Azulon's instruction, couldn't budge "until a son is born."

The Fire Lord didn't specify what should happen if a daughter came instead.

"It's a boy!" a midwife declared in delight as the baby left out his first cry.

The second messenger sighed his relief and left.

Not long after I rocked her back to consciousness, the first messenger must've reached Iroh. The general shot in like lightning to relieve me of my hand-holding duty. I retreated to the corner, not wishing to intrude on such an intimate moment, as Iroh's eyes filled with both total devotion...

And total anguish.

"My lotus flower..."

"Your highness," the midwife interrupted with a bow, cradling the babe in her arms.

Sen reached out to hold him, determined to do so however weak she might be.

"He's a boy."

She never looked so healthy.

The blue jewels that were her eyes flamed with a light that left everyone in the room breathless while she struggled to sing to her 斗ittlest soldier at her son, the petite princess seemed immortal, invincible, like a spirit of joy itself.

"You've never been so beautiful," Iroh informed her as he beamed with a grin wide enough to break his skull.

"My littlest soldier boy..." the princess whispered with a first-and last-kiss to her son's head.

Even the deepest, truest motherly love couldn't sustain her for much longer. She looked to me and passed her most precious love into my care once I rushed back to her side.

"Iroh..." she half-sighed, half-moaned. "I never told you my favorite tea."

The anguish returned, and he shook his head desperately, tears stinging his eyes.

"Don't, don't... Don't talk like that, lotus. There'll be years for-"

"Let me finish," she gasped, death dulling her brilliant eyes. "Sing to him for me, won't you? Sing to him. Play with him. Teach him the ways of tea and Pai Sho and bending, even if fathers aren't allowed to mentor their sons, even if your father will reprimand you for it. And let him know that, for however briefly I loved him, I loved him enough for a thousand lifetimes, with an eternal flame, with more love than words can say. Love him as you've loved me. Love him more than you love me."

"That's not possible," he swallowed back a sob.

"Yes, it is," she promised, tears in her colder-than-ice eyes also. "I'm so sorry, my love. I'm so sorry I couldn't be strong-"

"You are stronger than any woman this world has ever known," he insisted with a firmness I'd never heard before, a firmness that could move armies, that could tear down the walls of Ba Sing Se.

"Oh my brave soldier boy... My soldier boys... It's Jasmine, love. Jasmine is my favorite tea," she confessed with the softest of smiles, closing her own eyes so he wouldn't see them empty.

Ursa looked away to see me lurking in the doorway. The other servants and midwives had left.

Her eyes were brimmed with tears, but mine couldn't be drier. As much as I loved my sister-in-law, I couldn't cry for her. As much as I knew she was dying, I couldn't bear the grief. I couldn't muster—

"Give him to the nurse," I advised, glancing at my nephew.

Nephew. This is my nephew.

What nurse?

"You should take him."

"I can't. Ursa, I can't..."

"Then wait with me," she begged. "Ican't be here for..."

Their last words.

Her last breath.

We waited outside, trying to drown out Iroh's wails with our thoughts. Did the baby need milk yet? Where was his nurse? Who would his nurse be? Was he cold? Was he hot? Was I exposing him to germs? Why wasn't he crying? Should he be crying?

Would I ever stop crying?

The streams were silent but unceasing, marking my cheeks as my heart screamed.

"You should take him in now," I told her once his weeping lessened.

Ursa nodded and went in while I left, refusing to cry, refusing to feel.

"Iroh?"

If he heard me, there was no indication.

"Iroh, take your son," I pleaded with the man still kneeling at her bedside. He'd knelt there five thousand times, and he couldn't fathom not kneeling there a five thousand more. He couldn't fathom that it was the last. "Shower him in all the love and warmth... You need him. Even more than he needs you," I sighed.

As if on cue, the littlest prince began to cry. Instinctively, his father rose and took him from me with indescribable care and caution. He seemed to believe that one breath could shatter the illusion that was

"He has her eyes," Iroh muttered as the baby blinked.

I nodded and smiled, tears flowing once again, before leaving the princes to their grief.

As I walked for the door, he spoke again.

"Lu Ten."

When I raised an eyebrow in confusion, he turned and explained.

"His name is Lu Ten."

Sen's funeral, like every other in the Fire Nation, was held after sunset.

Countless subjects came to weep over the beloved princess they would soon forget. Their presence only reminded me of the court gossip, the whispers, the lies...

Ever since the Crown Prince began to bestow more than his usual flattery on her, there'd been a thousand rumors. With that illness, the spirits could claim her at any moment. General Iroh only noticed her out of pity, out of his need to save everyone. He only loved her famous tea. She was a secret firebender who lived to bend, but the last time she made one spark, she was bedridden for a month. She was barren. She was too weak to do more than kiss her husband. She'd had five miscarriages.

It always shocked me that so many of the rumors were true.

Because it was a member of the Royal Family, and because he was technically Head Fire Sage, Azulon led the service. His presence only reminded me of her tea. Being a spoiled, power-tripping monarch, Azulon felt free to demand practically anything he wanted practically whenever he wanted it. He had enjoyed Sen's first tea ceremony so much that, up until her last pregnancy, he would order her to serve his every tea whim. It was an odd exchange to witness. The contrast screamed irony...

She the image of frail youth, he the definition of ancient strength.

The Fire Lord only tolerated her, despite her talent for tea, because she pleased Iroh. Her weakness irked him, but she fit his mold for what a Fire Princess should be in beauty, charm, education, and propriety. Her prior failure to produce an heir had disgusted her, but no one else could make Iroh smile like she. Besides, he assumed that her death was imminent and that there'd be plenty of time to find her replacement.

Overall, Azulon felt a general sense of indifference toward her.

But why would that prevent a stirring eulogy?

It renewed sobbing fits in over half the female audience. He praised the princess for her loving heart, her generous compassion, and her total selflessness. He claimed to mourn her death as a great tragedy, as heart breaking, as far too soon, but he shifted tone quite effortlessly. Her death was a sacrifice, a final act of motherly devotion. She left us with the hope she had so longed for. It was all she ever wanted. Motherhood both cost Sen her life and completed it. Her memory would live on through this prince, this legacy, this promise to the world that the Fire Nation would reign forever...

The Fire Nation would conquer all.

While this hypocrisy sickened me, Iroh didn't seem to hear it.

He didn't seem to hear anything.

The prince stood as if in a trance. Even with all the distance between him and the crowd I was a part of, I could feel his agony. His eyes-though dry-were dead, his body more compliant than clay, and his mouth was slammed shut. He saw nothing, he said nothing, he felt nothing... And that nothingness was eating him alive.

He needed her. He loved her more than I could ever imagine, however deeply I missed her, however truly I cherished her friendship.

In that moment, I would do almost anything to bring Iroh back to us, to remind him of life, of his infant son sleeping in the palace...

To remind him of her.

Iroh heard it first. From the look on his face, I thought he'd finally snapped. Then, of course, I thought his madness had infected me, but it hadn't.

Even I couldn't imagine the reality of her voice.

"Leaves from the vine," Ursa sang out from the crowd, bringing tears back to Iroh's eyes.

But these tears, finally, were not of sorrow.

"Falling so slow," Maylin joined in my song, followed by Zhen, "like fragile, tiny shells," and then a random stranger, "drifting in the foam."

And then another, and another, and another...

"Little soldier boy, come marching home."

I did not think to join them. I was too moved. Had I tried, my voice would've cracked. Two of the last dry eyes there would've done more than moisten. For once, my heart was full. It hurt, of course, but it was, somehow, a sweet pain, gentle and tender as the woman for which it ached.

"Brave soldier boy comes marching home," Iroh belted through the tears.

Yet even his voice was drowned out by the collective crowd's.

The Fire Lord identified the singing girl instantly and, at first, stared at her with merciless calculation, but any qualms he had vanished once everyone else joined in.

He moved to light the funeral pyre, but Iroh thrust himself on top of it, sobbing "Lu Sen, Lu Sen," over and over again, without restraint, mortifying the last man anyone should mortify.

He could've tolerated some tears, even approved of them. It was an appropriate occasion, and the people should believe that their Crown Prince cared.

But they should also believe that he was in control.

And in Azulon's eyes, there was almost nothing worse than a prince displaying his deepest emotions-his deepest weaknesses-for all the world to see.

For once, the golden son appalled the father.

"Lu Sen, Lu Sen, Lu Sen-"

I couldn't quite hear what he said/threatened while leaning over and "resting" a hand on his shoulder, but those eyes of fury said it well enough.

Iroh silenced himself, rose, and lit the pyre himself.

I would never him say her name again.

Sorry it's taken so long for me to update. Hope it was worth it! Depressing as this chapter was... If you read, please review!