A/N: This chapter is over 14k words long! Needless to say, this is a personal chapter-length record that I don't think will be broken any time soon.
WARNING: Numerous implied rapes, and a secondhand account of a traumatic childbirth.
PAST
When she came to, Shiza found herself in Rin's arms. It didn't appear that she'd been unconscious for more than a few seconds, since the crowd was still roaring at top volume.
"He's dead," she moaned. "He'sdeadhe'sdeadhe'sdead. And it's all my fault." She'd only wanted to befriend the poor boy…and look where it had led.
"Okay, first of all it's not your fault; that's just silly," Rin replied. "And secondly, he's not dead. See?"
Indeed, as Shiza was restored to her senses, she saw Zuko's arm move a little as he was lifted onto a stretcher. Ozai had already vacated the area.
Rin helped her to her feet, and muttered, "Let's just get you out of here." Then, in a louder voice, "Hey, all of you, move it! Let us pass! My sister needs medical help!" The two of them slowly made their way out of the arena. Once they reached the fresher air of the hallway, Shiza was able to walk mostly by herself.
After they reached Shiza's rooms, Rin helped her change into a clean nightgown and get into bed, and sent Zoren's nurse to fetch Dr. Huang.
"So…do you want to talk about it?" Rin asked as she sat at the bedside, bouncing Zoren on her knee. The baby was still somewhat groggy from being abruptly awoken from his nap.
Shiza grimaced. "No." She didn't even want to think about it, was still in the stage where she was in denial that every aspect of her life had been a lie.
Shortly thereafter, Dr. Huang arrived, gave her a cursory examination, and scolded her for overexerting herself. He told Shiza to stay in bed for the rest of today and maybe tomorrow, with which she was all too happy to comply. She even allowed him to dose her with a special sleeping draught, formulated to be safer for her unborn child.
Just before she drifted off, she mumbled, "Rin?"
"What?" her older sister responded. She was handing Zoren back to the nurse and making preparations to leave.
"…Thank you."
Although Shiza's eyes were closed, she heard Rin's sigh. After a few seconds, she responded with a curt, "You're welcome." The last thing Shiza was aware of was the door closing.
Ozai summoned her the very next night…because of course he did.
"Dr. Huang tells me that you were taken ill at the Agni Kai," he said from his place at the table. He peered up at Shiza over the rim of his sake cup.
Shiza was standing before him at attention, like a naughty child who was about to get the scolding of a lifetime. She gulped, and her toes curled in her slippers.
"It was the smell," she said. "Everything smells so much stronger when I'm pregnant." At least it wasn't a total lie.
Ozai's eyes turned flinty. All he said was, "I see. You are fully recovered now though, I assume?"
Shiza nodded. When Ozai was finished with his drink, he rose from his cushion and made his way over to stand behind her. His fingers felt like talons as they gripped her arms hard enough to bruise, and his arousal pressed equally insistently against her back. He turned her face towards his and claimed her lips aggressively, forcing his tongue into her mouth. After his hands finally released their hold on her arms, one of them greedily clutched her breast, while the other rested on the large protrusion in her middle. Shiza submitted to him as always. But she knew that he knew how she truly felt; he had to. Any pretense that this was a romantic relationship was gone forever.
The following night, the Fire Lord left her alone, so Shiza donned a hooded cloak and set off for the infirmary. Today, Rin had shared the good news that Prince Zuko had stabilized. Shiza had even had the kitchens prepare an individual-sized ash banana cake for his breakfast tomorrow in case he felt like eating.
However, the instant she cracked open the infirmary door, Prince Iroh shot up from his seat beside Zuko's bed and ran over to her.
"Lady Shiza. You are not supposed to be here," he said in an urgent whisper.
"I'm sorry. I know it's late," she said while bowing. "I only wanted to stop in for a few seconds to see how he was doing…"
Prince Iroh cut her off with a brusque, "You do not understand. Prince Zuko has been exiled from the Fire Nation. You must not be seen with him! It's for your own safety."
Shiza began to ask him what he meant, but then she recalled the anger that had been in Ozai's eyes as he beheld their picnic.
It's all your fault. Your fault.
"All right," she said, blinking away tears. "Can you at least make sure he gets this?" She held out the ash banana cake. Prince Iroh nodded and took it.
When Shiza got back to her rooms, all the tears she'd been holding back for the past two and a half days came flooding out of her at once, and she cried herself to sleep.
A week later, she gathered with the rest of the court to hear the terms of Zuko's banishment read. By standing on her tiptoes, she was able to catch a brief glimpse of the prince, facial features completely obscured by the blanket draped over his head, as he entered the palanquin that would take him away from the palace. Prince Iroh was his sole companion.
Although Shiza knew that this would possibly be the last she ever saw of him, she had no tears left to shed.
The birth proved to be another difficult one, and Father only permitted Mother and Rin to attend. However, this time Shiza spat out the opium when Dr. Huang's back was turned, so she felt more in control and didn't need the help of the forceps. Her second son was born at ten in the morning after a twenty-hour labor, sporting the round face of a Sei'naka and a head of hair that hilariously stood up on end. Shiza's heart felt every bit as flooded with love as it had been with Zoren.
She found herself hoping that Ozai wouldn't do an in-person visit this time. Although he acknowledged all children whose mothers were of noble birth, if he sent a courier with said acknowledgement instead of showing up himself, the mother was expected to leave court as soon as she'd healed. So far during his reign, Shiza and Naoko were the only mothers who had been given the (supposed) privilege of staying.
However, her hopes were dashed when he did, in fact, show up. Shiza wasn't sure why he'd even bothered, since his visit was even shorter than it had been the first time around. All he did was look at his newest son for a few seconds without holding him, frown, and proclaim the infant's name to be Teza. Shiza knew that this had been the name of Fire Lord Sozin's dim-witted youngest son, who had died in a drunken komodo-rhino accident at the age of twenty. Even she was aware that being named after this person was not an honor. She was puzzled as she tried to think of how even Ozai could manage to find fault in a two-hour-old baby. However, he had not specified how he wanted the name to be spelled, so Shiza used a different character for the "za": the same one that was used in her own name.
Merely a few weeks later, while Shiza was still recovering (although thankfully no major infections this time), another event of significance occurred for their family: Rin got married. Her husband, a man in his mid-twenties named Wei, was a rising star in the colonial bureaucracy, and he seemed quite taken with Rin from what Shiza observed at the wedding. Her sister, who was delighted to be wed at long last, would live a life of comfort and influence. The only problem was that she'd have to move across the sea.
"So…I guess we're not going to be seeing each other for a while," Rin said the day before she departed, while she stood in Shiza's parlor.
"M-hm," Shiza answered. She was sitting in her favorite chair, feeding Teza. Zoren sat at her feet, attempting to imitate her by pressing his beloved stuffed platypus bear to his chest.
"There's something I need to tell you, although you're not going to like it," Rin admitted. "I've heard…certain rumors. I'm sorry to spring it on you like this, but I kept putting it off waiting for the right time to speak up, and now's my last chance."
"What rumors?" Shiza asked. Teza had finished feeding, and she propped him against her shoulder to begin the process of burping.
Rin looked down and bit her lip. "They're saying that Teza isn't the Fire Lord's child."
Shiza was lost. "That's stupid. Who else's could he possibly be?"
"They think he's Prince Zuko's."
It took a few seconds for Shiza's brain to register this. When it did, she wanted to scream, which she barely managed to suppress because she didn't want to scare the babies.
"That's disgusting! We were friends. How could anyone ever think that I would…he was twelve when I got pregnant with Teza. He was a child!"
"So were you," Rin pointed out.
"That's different," Shiza said automatically. But was it, really? "And anyway, I wasn't twelve. How is that…is that even possible?!"
"They seem to think it was. I didn't ask for details."
Teza had successfully been burped, and Shiza took the opportunity to hold him in the crook of one arm while she used the other to rub her forehead. The gossipmongers at court had twisted her innocent friendship with the prince into something completely vile. Were they just trying to smear her name to cause her to fall from favor…or did they genuinely think that every single male-female relationship where the participants were remotely of childbearing age and unrelated had to involve sex?
"Does O…the Fire Lord believe this?" she inquired. Rin shrugged, but Shiza believed she already knew the answer. If he did give these rumors credence, even if only as a convenient excuse, it would explain a lot of things that previously hadn't added up. All this time, she'd assumed that Ozai had been mad because he thought that Zuko's friendship with her was distracting the prince from his firebending lessons…
"Well, what do you think I should do?" she asked, unable to keep the quaver out of her voice.
"Keep your head down. Don't make a big deal about it," Rin advised. "If you deny everything, they'll see that as proof of your guilt. Just try to survive. I'll try to see if I can do anything to help…but I'll be living far away and my hands are kind of tied."
At least they parted on fairly good terms. With Rin, that was never a given.
She was all alone now. Father still wanted nothing to do with her, and whatever Mother's private feelings may be, she would not contradict her husband. And the palace was no longer the safe haven that Shiza had once seen it as. Every day, it seemed like, she fit in another piece of this painful puzzle.
Seeing the full reality of her situation was like waking up from an overly long daytime nap. One planned to sleep for a short time, and felt warm and comfortable under the covers while drifting off, only to wake up five hours later groggy, soaked in sweat from the blankets, and mouth tasting like someone had poured toxic waste from a munitions factory into it. Now that her eyes had been opened, she realized that Naoko had been right this entire time. No one had ever respected her; they'd just seen her as the Fire Lord's little plaything. She could imagine the men who had so solemnly bowed in her wake starting to laugh as soon as she was out of earshot. And Ozai himself had been lying to her the entire time she'd known him about basically everything. Probably the only things he'd liked about her had been her childlike appearance and shy, submissive nature. Any improvements she thought she'd seen in his behavior were either products of her imagination, or perhaps even him catching onto her and playing along for his own amusement.
She followed Rin's advice and focused on survival. When her clothes started wearing out, she mended them herself if possible rather than annoy the Fire Lord with too many requests for more money. She never directly addressed the rumors surrounding Teza's parentage, except for sometimes subtly emphasizing their two sons when updating Ozai about their development. When the Fire Lord wanted her, she lay there and pretended that this was happening to someone else, and that she was safe in her rooms playing with her children. Sometimes he let her get away with this; other times, when he was feeling especially spiteful, he'd pleasure her so she'd be forced to focus on him.
She knew that he wanted her to conceive again. Nevertheless, she was careful to take measures to prevent that. Given her history of complicated labors, she didn't want to risk her own life to have more children. If she were to die, her sons and new baby would be entirely at Ozai's mercy. She even got Dr. Huang to agree that any further pregnancies would be high-risk for her, so Ozai could never say that she was hiding it from him. Predictably, the Fire Lord was somewhat displeased by this development, yet he continued to send for her. She guessed that now that he could no longer seduce her into being his willing whore, he had decided to take pleasure in tormenting her instead.
She'd used to love mornings with Ozai. Sometimes she'd wake up nestled in his strong arms; other times, she'd be alone in bed as he got in some early morning practice or scribbled down notes at his desk. Either way, he'd always be back with her soon. He particularly delighted in drawing the bed's thick curtains shut and satisfying his (and her) lust as the servants walked around the rooms, bringing in the breakfast tray and setting out clothing and the equipment necessary for morning ablutions. Every now and then, he didn't even bother with closing the curtains all the way.
Shiza had been so embarrassed the first time he'd done this, holding her hands over her mouth to make sure that not a single sound escaped. However, there was a certain thrill to it. And she'd quickly learned that the louder she was, the more likely Ozai was to allow her to eat breakfast with him after.
This particular day, though, she refused to make any sounds other than some involuntary gasps as she was pushed into, and counted the seconds until it was over.
"You despise me," he whispered into her ear after he was finished. Well, that wasn't exactly anything new; Shiza wondered why he was bringing it up now. Perhaps he meant it as a test. She didn't think that simply agreeing with him would go over well, but she had never been a good liar like Princess Azula either.
In the end, she settled for a careful, "Does it matter whether I do or not?"
The Fire Lord paused for a few seconds. Finally, he responded with, "No."
Every time that she thought she'd gotten used to things, said things proved her wrong by getting even worse.
First had come her awful realization at Azula's twelfth birthday party. As someone who knew Ozai almost as well as the back of her own hand, who was hypervigilant to even the most minuscule changes in his demeanor, she could detect the things that probably no one else in the room except Azula noticed. Things such as how the Fire Lord's fingers dug into his daughter's shoulder with what was ostensibly an affectionate touch, the gleam in his eyes that had nothing to do with paternal pride as he whispered to her, and, most damning of all, the subtle adjustments he made in his posture when he was sexually aroused.
As soon as it was socially acceptable to leave, she ran to her rooms and threw up. (And she had never been so glad in her life to be currently menstruating; otherwise she may have had fears of potential failure of contraception.) How had she missed this?! Nearly an entire year of wondering who Ozai's new favorite was, and it had been there in front of her face all along. Azula had always written off the bruises littering her body as coming from her firebending training. And Shiza had believed her. This had been the one depth to which she'd assumed Ozai hadn't sunken…but Shiza had misjudged him yet again. And there was absolutely nothing she could do about it.
She recalled something Naoko had said to her a few months ago during one of their dinnertime "discussions."
"Don't think you won because you have two children!" she'd yelled, gesturing with a cup full of wine. "They're both boys, so it doesn't count! Everyone knows that the Fire Lord likes daughters better."
By this point, most of Naoko's insults tended to run together, and it was hard for Shiza to recall what she'd said when. This, on the other hand, had stuck with her, for reasons that were unclear at the time yet evident now. It was amazing how close Naoko had come to figuring out the truth without ever realizing it.
The next morning, while Shiza was dressing Azula, the princess demanded to know why Shiza kept staring at her. Shiza, never possessed of a quick wit, couldn't think of a good answer, and eventually stammered herself into silence as Azula glared at her.
Then, the following year, there was the whole mess with a girl called Mari. Mari was from a wealthy colonial family, and had been sent to the home islands to get a proper education. Her host family were regulars at court, and at some point, they had introduced Mari to Ozai. Although Shiza hadn't seen the seduction that followed, she had a pretty good idea of how it may have played out from her own experience. Mari would obviously have been lonely and homesick, and Ozai would likely have told her how he himself had often been sent away to isolated country estates as a child. He'd certainly mentioned this plenty of times to Shiza when he went off on tangents during his evening tirades, making it seem like his parents had banished him for no reason. She was starting to suspect that this wasn't the case.
Regardless of exactly which strategy he had used, though, the inevitable occurred. Poor Mari had only just turned thirteen, and Ozai managed to impregnate her anyway. However, there was something he hadn't anticipated…she was made of slightly sterner stuff than Shiza had been, and didn't fall in love with him. In her despair, she had written to her parents, who actually cared about their daughter and were furious at the Fire Lord. Over and over, they had attempted to either bring her back home or go to the palace themselves, but Ozai had forbidden it. Thus, Mari had been entirely without her loved ones when she went into labor.
That, too, had been a disaster. Again, Shiza hadn't witnessed it herself, but had heard the shocked whispers from those who had. Mari's labor had ended up lasting more than three days. Dr. Huang, for reasons unfathomable to Shiza, didn't do any surgical intervention. His trusty forceps had failed him, and he'd ended up having to break the baby's collarbone so its shoulders could fit through Mari's underdeveloped pelvis. Any permanent effects that this trauma might have had on the baby, a girl named Fuyuko, couldn't yet be determined. However, the impact on the mother was immediately obvious. Shiza had called on Mari with a little gift, knowing how much Zuko and Mai's visit had meant to her, but the younger girl stared straight ahead with dead eyes, never acknowledging Shiza's presence.
Ozai had no use for a concubine who was thus "ruined," so he finally allowed Mari's parents to collect their daughter and granddaughter. Apparently, this episode was where the nobility drew the line, and most of them removed their own daughters from court. However, their concern did not extend to young servant girls, of whom there were hundreds for Ozai to choose from.
(Sometimes she wondered how old–or young–Ozai had thought she was when they'd first met.)
Shiza quickly learned that her brain could only process so many horrible things before she was forced to numb herself. After enough times of hearing high-pitched screams coming from Ozai's bedroom (he wasn't bothering with covering their mouths anymore), or seeing sobbing girls Azula's age or even younger being hurriedly escorted through side halls with bags of hush money, she no longer felt horrified like she knew she ought to. Instead, she simply felt exhausted…and guilty that she couldn't feel more.
The sooner she learned to cope with the fact that she could do nothing to help them, the better.
Somehow, life went on. Shiza kept her mouth shut and her eyes averted. She had been promoted to the position of Senior Lady-in-Waiting, which meant that she no longer had to concern herself with daily minutiae such as herbal tea and flower gathering. As long as she wasn't with Ozai, she was expected to report to Azula in the morning for dressing, hair, and makeup, and in the evening to oversee the princess's preparation for bed. This freed up much more of her day than she'd previously had to spend with her sons.
Zoren was at the age where he got into everything if not carefully watched for every second, and where ninety percent of his vocabulary seemed to consist of the words "No!" and "Why?" Two months before his third birthday, he bent actual fire for the first time. He then promptly set his own tunic ablaze on purpose, learning the hard way how quickly flames could spread. Thankfully, Shiza had gotten to him before he was seriously hurt, and after a short time of crying much more in fear than in pain, he returned to his usual mischief.
Her sweet boy was still there under the rebellious toddler, though. One afternoon, after a particularly taxing night with Ozai, Shiza had been curled up in her bed while the nurse saw to the children. She'd heard the door creak open and the familiar noise of little feet padding across the floor, and looked down to see Zoren standing at her bedside, offering her a cookie. This was the special cookie he got when he'd been a particularly good boy that day. He got such a big smile on his face whenever he earned one, and now he was giving it to her. She tried to explain that this was his cookie, but he'd have none of that.
"Noooo. You eat," he insisted. In the end, they reached a compromise by agreeing to split it in half. Afterwards, he climbed up on the bed with Shiza, his golden eyes filled with a look of poignant concern that the origin of those eyes could never hope to replicate, and they napped together.
Teza was a sweetie, too, and unlike his brother didn't get into trouble much. His favorite activity was going to the pond to see the turtleducks. Whenever Shiza walked past him, he almost invariably lifted his arms up as a sign he wanted to be held and cuddled. Although he and Zoren had typical sibling squabbles, their relationship was close overall.
Shiza did worry about Teza sometimes. He was slow to hit developmental milestones, not taking his first steps until he was fifteen months old and not truly talking for several more months after that. He was also very sensitive to certain textures of both food and clothing, and rarely smiled. He had been the inspiration behind Shiza's invention of the Tickle Monster, because it was one of the few things that could reliably make him laugh. None of this made her love him any less, of course; she was just concerned what Ozai might do if he found out.
After all, she knew what he did with offspring that he deemed weak…
Zoren's third birthday passed pleasantly, with a low-key celebration. Shiza had invited the nurse, along with her children's older half-siblings Lanying and Azen, to partake in the festivities. (She'd invited Eri as well, so Naoko couldn't complain and said that her daughter had been left out, but felt no surprise when the invitation was declined.) For food, Shiza had ordered a wide variety of kid-friendly dim sum dishes from the kitchen, and had also bought a few small birthday gifts. Zoren had been particularly enthralled with his five new pairs of big-boy underwear. (Shiza knew it wouldn't be too much longer until he'd be utterly humiliated by such gifts. Right now, though, he was still at the stage where he'd gleefully update anyone who listened with his successes in toilet training.)
The next day was a different story. Much earlier in the morning than her sons were used to waking up, someone pounded loudly on the door. An exasperated Shiza opened the door while holding a crying Teza on her hip.
"What is this about?" she snapped. "My children were still sleeping."
The person who had knocked turned out to be Ozai's oldest son Ichiro, who was right around Shiza's age. His interpersonal skills were almost nonexistent, and he offered nothing in the way of an apology.
"I'm here to pick up your older son," he grunted.
Shiza's brow furrowed. "Zoren? What do you want with him?"
Ichiro sighed as if Shiza were the stupidest person he had ever encountered in his entire life.
"To take him to the dormitory, of course," he replied.
The dormitory? It wasn't like she was unaware that this would be coming eventually. Ozai had set it up shortly after he became Fire Lord, and his baseborn children were sent there full-time if they had been proven to be firebenders by the time they were around three. The key word was around. She hadn't realized that they were going to be so literal about it this time.
"I…I haven't had time to prepare him," she said, fighting the urge to slam the door in Ichiro's face. "Can it wait for a few weeks?"
Ichiro shook his head. "Fire Lord's orders. If you have an objection, bring it up with him."
There was no way that she could take him in a fight. He was tall and muscular and a firebender, while she had roughly the combat skills and strength of a toothpick. Although she'd grown a bit since she was fourteen, she was still under five feet tall. She had had no choice other than to surrender her son.
That night, Ozai summoned her, and she used the opportunity to plead her case as Ichiro suggested it. He refused to listen.
"I have been more than lenient with you with regards to how you coddle your children," he said. "And now, it is time for…"–he paused here, seemingly having forgotten his own son's name–"Zoren to learn how to be independent. The other children do well enough without their mothers."
"But he's only three…" Shiza whispered. Ozai scowled.
"Enough. I don't want to hear one further word from you on this matter. Stop wasting my time and fulfill your duties."
He gagged her that night, presumably so she'd stay quiet. He needn't have bothered; Shiza was already speechless from anger.
Over the following months, she came to know much about life in the dormitory. The boys slept in one room, and the girls in another, in narrow beds that were all in a row. All except the youngest were expected to make their own beds and pick up after themselves, and in the mornings, each were assigned their own extra chore to do that day. Thankfully, there were servants to do the laundry, the heavier cleaning, and most of the cooking. Meals were served communally, at a long table; Shiza had to admit that, if nothing else, everyone was always well-fed here. Much of the day was spent exercising…outside if the weather permitted it, and in the dorm's inside track and sparring room if it didn't. The dormitory also included a classroom for the older children on the premises, so they could get a basic education in addition to their physical training. The routine scarcely varied, although most of the dorm's residents were too young to fully appreciate how mind-numbing it was. It was as if they were practicing for some enormous event sometime in the future; what that might be, Shiza wasn't certain.
All aspects of dorm living were overseen by Anshi. She, and her younger siblings Ichiro and Zhilan, were the first cousins of Naoko, although Zhilan was the only one of them who looked even remotely like her. Anshi seemed competent enough, although often overwhelmed by the massive responsibility of raising an ever-increasing number of children. And she had the added stress of Ozai's "inspections." These were usually unannounced, and as soon as he entered the dorm, every single person had to (sometimes literally) drop whatever they were doing and kowtow until told otherwise. If Ozai found anything not to his liking, he would scold Anshi about it in front of everyone. The children were always to address him as "Fire Lord" if he asked them questions, never "Father." Every morning after breakfast, they recited the Fire Oath as if they were ordinary Fire Nation schoolchildren. Zoren had no idea of the truth of the matter, and Shiza wasn't sure how many of the kids did know.
All of that aside, her older son adjusted surprisingly quickly to the dorm, and Shiza relaxed ever so slightly when it became clear that he even enjoyed it most of the time. He liked running around in the fresh air, and, always eager to please, even looked forward to his assigned chore of the day. But there were also hints that not everything was as it should be. Shiza winced every time he called her "Ma'am" instead of "Mommy," and one time it was all she could do to keep her smile on her face as Zoren regaled her with the story of how he'd given new arrival Nozomi a nosebleed in the sparring ring. When he'd first moved into the dorm, she had attempted to bend the rules, picking him up for sleepovers every night. However, Ozai had caught on to this in a matter of days, and had forbidden her from signing Zoren out more than once a week. Shiza was certain at first that she would never be able to endure this. However, she eventually got used to it just as she did everything else.
Over the next year, things weren't great, but at least they were stable. About six months before Sozin's Comet, Princes Zuko and Iroh had been declared traitors to the crown, and Princess Azula had been sent after them. As long as Shiza forbade herself from thinking about that, though, she could actually pretend she was happy for brief stretches of time. She was now allowed to visit Zoren at the dorm during his hour of free time, and used these opportunities to prepare Teza for his impending move there. Ozai had been bothering her a lot less than usual as well.
In fact, the Fire Lord had been in such a good mood lately that Shiza had decided to risk asking permission to increase her overnights with Zoren to twice a week. She headed over to his private office, knowing that this was the time of day the Fire Lord looked at correspondence when he didn't have a war meeting. She raised her hand to knock on the door, only to stop short when she heard a child's voice coming from inside the room.
"What that?" the child asked. Shiza could narrow down the speaker to either Nozomi or Eri, but would hazard a guess that it was the latter. Everyone knew that Eri held an exalted position among the bastards, and she couldn't imagine Ozai allowing any other of his small children in the room.
"I don't know, Eri," Ozai replied, quickly proving Shiza's guess correct. "Shall we open it and find out?" There came the sound of a scroll being unrolled, and then a sigh of irritation.
"The southern colonies that got hit by that out-of-season typhoon are asking for aid again," he explained, as if talking to someone his own age instead of a child barely older than Teza. "And this after I have already sent money. Twice. Now Eri…do you remember what we do with annoying letters asking for more money?"
"BURN IT!" Eri shrieked. Shiza could imagine Ozai wincing as the child shouted right into his ear, and it made her smile a little.
"You are correct," he replied. "Shall we burn it together?"
"Yeah!" Shiza could just hear the little whoosh as the paper went up in flames. What was even going on in there? On the surface, it seemed like some relatively innocent father-daughter time (albeit with dubious moral lessons), but with Ozai, that didn't ring true.
Meanwhile, the Fire Lord had opened up another letter. "Hm. An explosion in the Fire Fountain City commercial district. When will those idiots remember that the place is built on a natural gas deposit? Perhaps they should talk with the southern colonies; then both their problems would be solved. What do you think about that, Eri?"
"Burn it?" Eri asked hopefully; it was clear that she hadn't understood a word her father had just said.
Ozai chuckled. "No, not this time, unfortunately. Your mother's father oversees that land, and we don't want to anger him. Not over something like this, at least. We'll set this aside for the time being. Would you like to pick out which scroll I should look at next instead?"
Eri rummaged around for a few moments before saying, "'Dat one!"
"An excellent choice," Ozai told her. "That is from the Princess Azula...see her seal?" There was silence for a few minutes as Ozai opened the letter and began to read.
Finally, he remarked, "Good news. She's crossed the Mo Ce sea safely, and has been traveling up and down the coast of the colonies."
"'Zula getted the traders?" Eri asked.
"Got. And traitors," Ozai corrected. Then, "No, not yet. But she does think she found a good lead, and will be investigating that. Perhaps she is working on it even as we speak."
"Mama no…" Eri began, before presumably realizing that she'd made a grammar mistake and searching for the correct word, "doesn't like 'Zula."
"Yes, yes, I know," Ozai sighed. "Your mama still has her heart set on becoming Fire Lady, but she will never be one. But perhaps, many years from now, you might. What would you think about that?"
From the tone of Eri's voice, she had responded enthusiastically in the affirmative. Shiza, however, was too busy jamming her fist into her own mouth to hear the exact words. She ran off, leaving Ozai to keep pouring his sweet poison into his daughter's ear.
Fire Lady? Had she heard that correctly? Fire Lady? The Fire Lord was planning to marry his own daughter?! In her darkest of moments, she had wondered if Ozai refused to remarry because he was waiting for Azula to be developed enough to safely bear children, but how did this fit in? Was Eri meant as a backup in the event that Azula failed him? Or was he planning on having multiple daughter-wives at the same time?
On the way back to her rooms, she'd happened to run into Naoko. She'd tried to warn her, but the taller woman had refused to listen. Really, Shiza, what were you expecting?
After she made it to her bedroom and spent considerable time screaming into her pillows, she was able to think things through a little more rationally. She decided that Ozai was most likely not molesting Eri right now; that would be a little extreme even for him. Although the girl's physical well-being didn't appear to be immediately in danger, the emotional grooming was obviously well underway.
How much longer would she be safe, though? How much longer would any of them be safe?
Over the next few days, Shiza did manage to score a small victory. The next time Ozai requested her in his bed, she'd tried a new tactic. She'd shown up at his room with her hair in pigtails, attired in the type of loose short nightdress often worn by small girls. Her goal was to please the Fire Lord enough to get him to grant her more time with Zoren. She had definitely succeeded in the first part of the plan; his jaw had actually gone slack for a moment as the guards let Shiza in. And while she hadn't gotten permission for twice weekly overnights as she wanted, Ozai had allowed her to keep Zoren until suppertime the next day every other week. Shiza tried to console herself with that as she spent much of the next day huddled in the bathtub, scrubbing herself over and over again until her skin was raw. She hatedhatedhatedhated him.
However, she continued to put on a brave face for her children. On the first of Zoren's extended visits, the three of them spent the evening playing board games and eating fire gummies. The next day, Shiza took Zoren and Teza to the lake, where they did some splashing around and took the barge out. She was trying to take things one day at a time, and this day had been a good one so far.
When she and Zoren arrived at the dorm, dinner was in the process of being laid out on the table, and things seemed pleasant and cozy. However, the children had scarcely had time to take a bite or two of their food before Ozai's manservant ran in to announce an inspection. Honestly, couldn't he have at least waited until his children had had time to finish eating?
The instant the Fire Lord walked in, Izumi froze, pupils dilating in terror. Then the quiet, gentle girl abruptly let out a terrified shout.
"NO! NO!"
Shiza had never seen a face display such sheer panic before, not even Zuko's at the Agni Kai. Anshi's frantic efforts to calm the now wordlessly screaming Izumi were all in vain. After a couple of minutes of this, Ozai harshly berated his eldest daughter for not having better control over her charges and left.
It took several minutes, but Anshi and Shiza managed to half-drag and half-carry Izumi into her bed. Back in the dining room, Shiza heard Kenzo and Ruanyu attempting to calm the confused and upset younger children.
"Shit," Anshi muttered. "Shitshitshit." Then, to Shiza, "Could you stay with her for a bit?"
"Sure," said Shiza. Izumi was sobbing so hard that her whole body was shaking, and she held onto Shiza's neck for dear life.
"It's all right," she murmured. "No one is going to hurt you here." If only she could guarantee that…
In the other room, she heard Anshi say, "Uzeko. You are our fastest runner. Go to the palace and find Zhilan. Tell her to bring her erhu." A couple of minutes later, she returned to the girls' bedroom with a bottle of a very familiar reddish-brown liquid.
"Look, 'Zumi, see? I brought you your sleepy medicine," she said softly. After the liquid was administered, the two of them sat with Izumi as her sobs faded to hiccups.
"You've been giving her opium?" Shiza hissed.
"It's the only thing that works!" Anshi answered defensively, her voice similarly in a whisper.
Zhilan and Uzeko arrived in good time, out of breath from the run. Zhilan set up her erhu and played quiet music until Izumi fell asleep. By the time she finished playing the last piece, her own eyes were red.
"What was that all about?" Shiza demanded as Anshi walked her to the front door. She tried to open it, but Shiza stood in front of it, blocking her. She resolved to stay there until she got some answers.
"She's not right in the head; you know that!" Anshi protested. "Sometimes these things just…happen. There's no way to tell for sure exactly what's running through that brain of hers…"
"Oh, I think you know," Shiza retorted. "I think we both know."
Anshi sighed in resignation, looking in every direction to make sure that no children were listening in. "All right, all right. They came for her a month ago, the night after Princess Azula left. I was in the boys' bedroom leading their evening meditation. By the time we realized she was missing, it was too late. The next morning, they brought her back, and…she hasn't been able to tell us exactly what happened, but we know it was bad. Let's leave it at that. We were just making progress in getting her to eat regularly again and sleep through the night…and now this. Back to Square One."
"Pardon me for asking, but…is there any chance that she could be pregnant?" Shiza inquired. She hated that she had to ask this, but when Ozai was involved, it was always a concern.
To her relief, Anshi shook her head firmly. "None." For once, not everything that could possibly go wrong had gone wrong…not that this would be of much solace to Izumi.
As Shiza began the trek back to the palace, her head was spinning. Izumi had always been an oddity among the bastards. She was a pretty child, with her large eyes, long lashes, and head of dark brown lustrous hair, but the fact remained that she was a nonbender. No one had quite understood why she was living in the dorm in the first place, when Ozai had multiple nonbending sons who didn't live there. She also lacked the muscle coordination to learn more than the most basic katas, so while her half-siblings were in training, she was permitted to sit a short distance away with her beloved poetry and books, in her own little world. She even communicated mostly through writing poems, and really only Zhilan and Azula were good enough at interpreting them to hold actual conversations with her. Certainly, Shiza was hopeless at it; she could barely read, much less analyze poetry.
Now, everything was clear. Ozai had brought the pliant and defenseless Izumi to the dorm for the sole purpose of sexually abusing her someday. She was ten months younger than Azula, so she'd be the obvious choice to replace the princess if Azula happened to be absent. But then something had gone wrong, and he'd cast her aside without so much as a second thought, as if she were one more in the flood of nameless servants.
But they never were actually nameless, were they? It had just been more convenient for her to think of them that way.
What was wrong with her? Ozai would want her to do that, to be so detached about all this. Every last one of his victims had a name, and interests, and a life that had been cruelly shattered, just like Izumi. Shiza had kept her head down and minded her own business for too long, paralyzed by the magnitude of all she couldn't do. It was time for her to focus on what she could do: snap out of her funk, take action, and get her children to safety. Then, perhaps, the rest would follow.
First, she submitted an official request to leave court. She got no response, but she had expected that. So she began making trips to the Izayoi as often as she could, bringing small amounts of supplies each time: a few rations of nonperishable food here, an item of clothing there. Packing the boat with everything at once would raise suspicion. She took the boys out sailing every chance that she got, to accustom them to the open water. In the middle of the night, she'd sneak into the palace's training arena and run laps around the track, attempting to build up her stamina. It was impossible for her to know for sure when the escape would be attempted; she was aware it might take her months or even years to get just the right opportunity.
Teza turned three in late spring. They celebrated it several days early so Zoren would be able to join in. Since noise and activity made Teza anxious, the party was only the three of them eating some of Teza's favorite foods for dinner in her rooms. The day after her younger son's actual birthday, Ichiro paid another visit, and Teza duly joined his older brother in the dorm. Shiza had been cautiously optimistic that he wouldn't mind it; he loved his routines and schedules, and dorm life was nothing if not strictly scheduled.
Unfortunately, this was not the case. He spent most of his time there clinging to Zoren for dear life. His older brother did his best to protect his younger brother, but the fact remained that Teza was too slow and too clumsy to keep up. In addition, he had shown no signs of firebending yet, not even sparks. (Which begged the question of why Ozai had wanted him to stay in the dorm in the first place. Shiza didn't think that he was planning to abuse Teza in that way, so perhaps it was simply yet another means of punishing her indirectly.) When she picked her sons up each week, Zoren was his normal perky self, but Teza's eyes were often puffy from crying.
"Just hang in there, buddy," she'd whisper, stroking his hair as he fell asleep during the overnight visits. "I'm trying to get you out of there as soon as I can."
One thing was now clear: she did not have the luxury of waiting years to flee.
A few weeks after Teza's birthday, there was some good news for a change: Azula had brought Ba Sing Se to heel, Zuko had had a change of heart and killed the Avatar, and they were coming home together.
Shiza had never given much thought to the Avatar before. This was partly intentional. One night, soon after Ozai had claimed her, he'd mentioned that he'd spent two years looking for the Avatar when he was a teenager. Shiza had asked why finding the Avatar was so important. This was in the days before the famine incident, so she hadn't been as guarded with her tongue. He hadn't quite gotten angry that time, though he did firmly tell her not to worry her little head about it, because it was nothing that a child like her could hope to understand.
However, one would have had to be very oblivious indeed to not notice the excitement and tension when the Avatar returned. Shiza had heard that, instead of an old man like they'd all been thinking, he had been merely a child, younger even than Princess Azula was. She felt weird when she pondered the implications of that too long, so she tried to focus on the positives.
Zoren was eager to (re-)meet his half-brother. Shiza knew that it was highly unlikely that he actually had any memory of Zuko, but she thought that he'd convinced himself that he did. Now that it was safe to display such things again, Shiza got out a sketch of Zuko with Zoren that had been drawn a few months before the prince's banishment, which she had kept hidden away in the closet. She had it framed, and Zoren kissed the glass every time he walked by it. Teza, on the other hand, didn't really comprehend what was going on.
The day that the royal siblings' ship pulled into the harbor, Zoren was beside himself with excitement. He kept running back and forth from the toy chest to the door, putting all of his favorite toys in an increasingly large pile to show Zuko, until Shiza told him that Prince Zuko had been on a long boat ride and would probably be tired, and that maybe it would be a good idea for Zoren to pick one toy to show him and save the rest for later. He ended up choosing the stuffed platypus-bear, just as Shiza had predicted he would.
Finally, Zora and Teza's nurse returned with the news they'd been waiting for: Zuko was home, sitting by the turtleduck pond, and was interested in seeing them. Zoren was all ready to rush out the door right then and there, but Shiza made him stay put for one final talk.
"You remember what I told you, right?" she asked. "About how Prince Zuko won't look exactly the way he does in the picture?"
Zoren nodded. "You said he had a big boo-boo on his face."
"That's right, smart boy!" Shiza said. "And remember the other thing I said: that you are not under any circumstances to point at it or ask him about it or say mean things about it."
"What's 'circumstances?'"
"Uh…well…" –she wasn't quite sure how to put it into words– "It means just don't do it. Ever."
"Okay."
As promised, Zuko was at the pond. His back was to them, and he appeared to be deep in contemplation. Shiza had to do a little throat-clear to get his attention. Then he was turning around and standing up, and she saw his face for the first time in over three years.
His scar was…actually not quite as bad as she'd imagined it, albeit still very prominent. She forced herself not to shudder as she remembered how he'd gotten it, lest he think she was repulsed by him. That wasn't the only thing that had changed about him, though. For one, he'd grown. While he was nowhere near his father's height, he still stood more than half a head taller than her. He was also thin to the point that Shiza was worried for his health, and there was a haunted look in his eyes that didn't completely go away even as he smiled down at Zoren. He'd obviously been through a lot in those three years, but so had she. She wondered what he might think about how she had changed.
She and Zoren bowed to Zuko, despite his insistence that they didn't have to do that. Then Zoren ran over to him and hugged him tightly around the waist.
"Uh…hi there," Zuko said. It was clear that he didn't know how to react to small children launching themselves at him. Shiza waved as well, but he didn't seem to notice.
"I'm Zoren!" her son said after he let go. "And this is Platty the platypus bear. And you're Prince Zuko. Mommy showed me you in the picture. Anshi said you vanquished the Avatar." He pronounced these two new vocabulary words with great care.
It was clear that Zuko wasn't comfortable with this subject.
"Yeah. Well…you've certainly gotten big. You were just a baby when I last saw you."
Zoren giggled. "I'm not a baby! I'm four!" He held out the correct number of fingers to demonstrate. "And I can firebend, and count to a hundred, and I can use chopsticks, and I weigh thirty-six pounds!"
"Those are some major accomplishments," Zuko replied.
"And…and…guess what else?!" Zoren asked.
"I dunno. What?"
Zoren pulled up his pant leg, revealing a large, scabbing-over scrape on his knee. "We match!"
Oh no.
"I'm so sorry, Prince Zuko," Shiza immediately said. "Zoren, you apologize right now."
Zoren frowned.
"But it wasn't the circumstances!" he protested, in an affronted voice that would probably be hilarious when she looked back on this much later. Technically, he was right; he hadn't broken any of the rules Shiza had made. That meant it was all on her for not being clearer.
"No, really. It's okay," Zuko said. And it was true, he didn't look upset so much as simply puzzled. Was he so used to people being disgusted by him that he didn't know how to react to a child's unconditional acceptance?
"Please forgive him," she requested anyway. "He was trying to say something nice. Weren't you, Zoren?"
"Uh-huh!" Zoren confirmed. "And also, Mommy matches too! Because of her wrist!"
Shiza's face flooded with color. Even after all this time, she was still extremely self-conscious about her burn scars. She knew that Zuko of all people wouldn't care, but still preferred not to talk about it.
"Thank you so much for your time, Prince Zuko, but it's getting late. I have to go get Teza from the nurse and take both boys back to the dorm."
Zuko looked directly at her for the first time this entire conversation. "That's your younger child's name? Teza?" He raised his one remaining eyebrow. Naturally, he'd be fully aware of that name's context.
"Yes. He's very shy, so I didn't bring him this time." Perhaps it was better for Zuko not to be seen with him much anyway, the rumors being what they were.
Had Zuko heard those rumors too? No wonder he wanted nothing to do with her.
Princess Azula appeared much the same as ever. When Shiza reported to her rooms for work that evening, the princess acted as if they had been separated for a day, rather than three months. Shiza, on the other hand, had forgotten how soul-crushing this job could be at times. She had no illusions as to what Ozai would ask of his daughter that night, and hated how Azula saw nothing wrong with dressing in in revealing underthings that she was much, much too young to wear. All the princess did was look askance at Shiza when she voiced her concerns. She'd have to get back in the practice of not letting her emotions show.
Prince Zuko also took some getting reaccustomed to. Unlike his sister, he had changed drastically. He had always had an air of melancholy about him, but now it was more like a constant cloud. He continued to avoid talking directly to Shiza or even looking at her. She had to remind herself that he didn't know the truth about the ash banana cake. As far as he could tell, she had abandoned him just as the others had. Also, Prince Iroh had been imprisoned, so she was sure that this was difficult for Zuko as well. Just a couple of weeks after he got home, he went off on a short trip to Ember Island with Azula and her friends. Shiza had been hoping that this might do him some good, but he came back seeming as much out of it as he'd been when he'd left. (And people were saying that he'd helped burn Admiral Chan's house down? What?)
Currently, there were only two people who could make Zuko smile. One of them was Mai. The two of them appeared to have picked up where they had left off, although the reinstatement of their betrothal had yet to be officially announced. The other was Zoren. No one could resist his infectious grin and his lively chatter…not even Zuko. Her older son would happily trail after his half-brother all day if allowed. He insisted on wearing his hair in a topknot at all times, imitated Zuko's gestures, and would even mouth along silently with his words. Every other sentence out of Zoren's mouth seemed to start with "Prince Zuko said…" or "Prince Zuko did…" They even posed for an updated portrait together.
It was all perfectly adorable, and Shiza was glad that they continued to share this special bond. However, this did have the unfortunate effect of bringing Zoren to the Fire Lord's attention at exactly the point when Shiza was trying to keep a low profile.
One afternoon around the summer solstice, she was walking with her children in the gardens, bag of vegetable peelings from the kitchen in hand for feeding the turtleducks, when their paths crossed with the Fire Lord's. Shiza instantly sank into a kowtow while pulling her sons down to do the same. If they were lucky, she thought, he'd just walk on by them and they could all get on with their day.
Luck turned out to be not on their side that day. Zoren came out of his kowtow without being given permission, and ran over to the man he didn't know was his father before Shiza could stop him.
"Look! Look what Prince Zuko showed me!" he exclaimed. A small tongue of flame emerged from each of his fingertips. Giving a little frown of concentration, he was able to maintain all of them at exactly the same size for several seconds before they flickered out.
"It's all in the breath," he added sagely, as if their ages had been swapped.
Ozai gave him a curt nod. "Good."
"Did you hear that, Mommy!?" Zoren cried out as he ran back to her and Teza. "He said 'good!'"
"And why wouldn't he? You're such a grown-up boy," Shiza replied while smiling down at him. He looked so proud that she simply didn't have the heart to scold him. Yet her mind was racing as she looked at Ozai walking past them. Although Zoren appeared to see the Fire Lord as simply the cool and/or scary guy who came to the dorm sometimes to do the inspections, he had picked up on all of his siblings' desperate struggle for the man's approval. Ozai was well aware of this, of course, and used it to his advantage.
What plans might he have for Zoren now that her son had proven himself not just amiable, but talented?
It was the day before the eclipse, and everything was in an uproar. No one seemed to know exactly what the plan was for the next day. No matter how horrendous tomorrow might be, though, Shiza at least had something to look forward to. This evening just so happened to be the one she took her kids for an overnight visit, and the week she got to keep them the next day. She was hoping that Ozai would grant them an extra day together, since there wouldn't be much time for fun tomorrow.
When Ozai called her to his office after his war meeting, she didn't really think anything of it. The time of day and location of the meeting made it less likely that he had sex on his mind, and she was hopeful that maybe she could get the arrangements for tomorrow directly from the source.
She walked into the room to find the Fire Lord sitting at his desk. Countless papers with diagrams incomprehensible to Shiza were strewn across the desk's surface. Her eyes were naturally drawn to them anyway, but she ignored the impulse to take a closer look, doing the expected kowtow at Ozai's feet.
"Rise," he ordered her, sounding almost bored. "I have some good news for you."
"Yes?" Shiza asked, eyes fixed on the floor. She remained wary, knowing that she couldn't take him at his word.
"I have decided to grant your request to leave court," he informed her. "You may take your younger son with you."
At first, she sagged in relief. Then, the second half of what he'd said registered. Timidly, she inquired, "What about Zoren?"
Ozai's posture stiffened; although Shiza couldn't see it, she knew he was setting his jaw the way he did when someone said something he didn't like. "He stays here."
This couldn't be happening! Shiza blinked in disbelief. She made a sound of protest, but he simply talked over it.
"Don't start with that. You should be thanking me. Others have not gotten such generous bargains. I could have had both of your children taken away from you if I so pleased," he said. Was there actually a hint of genuine surprise in his voice that she wasn't grateful, or was that all in Shiza's imagination?
Ozai went on, "Now here is what you are going to do. Tomorrow, you will tell no one of this plan. You will assist Princess Azula with getting ready for the day, and then you will be escorted directly to your own room in the bunker as previously arranged. Your children will be in another room with the other residents of the dormitory. Once the all-clear is given, you will have one hour to say farewell to Zoren. After that time has passed, you will immediately collect your younger son and return to your room to pack your things. A palanquin will take the two of you to your family's house at sunrise tomorrow. I have spoken with your father, and he has generously allowed you to live there."
Shiza's mind reeled as the Fire Lord sat there, as still and intimidating as one of the many statues in his image, awaiting her response. Certainly, she had been concerned about Zoren's future, and had been expecting that Ozai would try to drive a wedge between them. But…to order her to leave him behind entirely? She hadn't been anticipating this, and she knew she should have. Her preoccupation with her escape plans had left her complacent.
She thought of the way Zoren threw his head back when he laughed, his zest for life, his surprising insights. She considered Teza, who would be devastated at the loss of his beloved older brother. Then she recalled a third boy, who was introverted like Teza and craved affection and approval just as Zoren did. She thought of what had happened to that boy.
A spike of defiance drove through her, giving her resolve. Her hands, hidden by her flowing sleeves, clenched into fists. Ozai had made the mistake of a lifetime. He was used to her being passive and malleable, but there was no question of her going along with his schemes this time. She couldn't abandon Zoren to the mercies of this terrible man. She wouldn't!
"No!" she cried out. After her outburst, there was total silence. She had never told him "no" about anything before, unless it was a statement of fact in response to a question.
Ozai continued to not speak as he slowly got out of his chair and walked over to her. Then his hand had her chin in a vise grip and forced it upward; a mockery (or perhaps simply a logical conclusion?) of that moment in the gardens nearly six years ago. She was expecting him to yell at her; what he actually did was much more chilling.
"I will break you, you know," he hissed. Then he abruptly released her, and she fled.
Somehow, she got out of there in one piece. She knew she had no choice…she'd have to attempt her escape tomorrow. Things were far from ideal. Teza still had to wear diapers during the night, and she had nowhere near the optimum amount of supplies stowed away on the Izayoi. There was no time to form a cohesive plan; she'd have to make it up as she went along.
Her first stop was to her rooms. She took out needle, thread, and a small piece of fabric, and made a quick alteration to the robe she would wear tomorrow. Then it was off to the messenger hawk mews. She found one which had been trained to go the correct route, and attached a short and frantically scribbled plea to its leg. As she watched the bird fly off, all she could do was hope that the message would reach its recipient in time. Lastly, it was on to the dorm as usual. Anshi's brow furrowed when she saw her.
"Didn't the Fire Lord tell you? All of the children are to sleep in the dormitory tonight," she said.
"He gave me special permission to have my sons with me in the bunker," Shiza said, trying to project confidence while telling a complete lie. This whole idea hinged on the assumption that communication between the various parties was still not good, and she was proven correct.
"Really? No one's telling me anything today," Anshi complained. "Okay, then. Have fun."
Everyone was eating informally tonight, so no one found anything amiss when Shiza asked for dinner to be sent up for her room. Since it was in the middle of summer, the sky was still light when they finished eating. She took the kids down to the wooded area in the garden, carrying with her a fish knife that she had swiped from her tray. While Zoren and Teza played some sort of game that seemed to be a combination of hide-and-seek and tag, Shiza brought the knife out and made a few tentative slashes at the air.
"You're doing it wrong."
Shiza felt like she jumped about a foot in the air. She whirled around to see the Lady Mai emerging from behind a tree. As far as she knew, while Mai's father was known to be a staunch supporter of the Fire Lord, Mai herself didn't seem to have much of an opinion either way. Would she keep Shiza's secret?
"Lady Mai! I'm sorry, I didn't know you were there!" she exclaimed rather unnecessarily. Lowering her voice, she added, "What was I doing wrong?"
"Keep in mind that my specialty is with throwing knives, not stabbing ones," Mai forewarned her. "But first of all, you can't let people sneak up on you like that. Secondly, if you stand completely still like that when wielding the knife, facing your opponent head on, you'll be a big fat target. If, hypothetically speaking, you were in a situation where you needed to stab someone, you'd need to keep moving. Like so." She had a shuriken out seemingly in the time it took Shiza to blink, and she turned towards the side and leapt in the air. Shiza didn't even notice that Mai had thrown the shuriken until it landed with a thunk in a nearby tree.
"Like this?" She tried to imitate what she'd seen Mai doing.
The younger girl paused, choosing her words carefully, before saying, "Well…that was marginally better."
They ended up working together for nearly two hours, Mai patiently walking her through all the steps. Finally, as it got too dark to see, Mai determined her to be "on the road to adequate." That would have to suffice.
"Thank you so much for your time," Shiza told her as she wiped the sweat off her forehead.
"Well, it was a more enjoyable way of spending the evening than just walking around wondering what's eating at Zuko this time," Mai intoned. An awkwardly long pause followed, then she added in almost a whisper, "He liked you, you know. As in like liked you. Maybe he still does."
If Shiza had had a list of things she had thought that Mai was going to say next in order of likelihood, that remark would have been somewhere in the hundreds. She was at a loss as to how the taller girl wanted her to reply. All she could think of was a lame, "He can't like me. He likes you."
Mai threw up her hands. "I don't control his brain. He's allowed to have crushes."
"Well, maybe once. But he hates me now. He won't even look at me!" This was embarrassing. She was about to break down in front of a girl who she'd barely spoken to for over three years. This was not for lack of trying on Shiza's part; she'd made multiple attempts to reach out, but the younger girl had seemed lost in her own bubble of grief. After a while, Shiza had simply given up.
A horrible thought crossed her mind. "You don't believe those rumors about Teza, do you?" Her younger child came running over as he heard his name, Zoren following closely behind him.
"Of course not," Mai snapped. "I never pay any attention to their empty gossip. Just know this…Zuko does not hate you. Suffice to say I have my ways of knowing."
There was an air of finality in her words, so Shiza knew that further questions would be futile.
"Uh…so…thanks again for helping me with self-defense," she managed to say, making sure to add in a quick, "Hypothetically."
She felt a little better about her chances now. Of course, a dainty little fish knife would not be at all a good choice for an assault weapon against an actual human. She'd need a better one, and she knew where to find it.
The next morning, she was up before dawn. She checked quickly to make sure both of her sons were still fast asleep, then made her way to Azula's rooms.
If her plan succeeded, this would be the last day she'd go through with this routine for the rest of her life. Why did that make her feel so conflicted?
PRESENT
"Halt!" the leader of the army ordered. Shiza wasn't certain if this was directed at the rest of the Water Tribesmen or at her, but she stopped just to be safe. She made no effort to hide the sneer of contempt that took over her face. She still believed in the Fire Nation, despite having lost all faith in its ruler, and held no esteem whatsoever for foreign invaders.
"Don't come any closer!" she told them, painfully aware that she sounded exactly zero percent threatening.
"We aren't going to hurt you," the leader said slowly. 'We just want to know what you're doing here. Civilians aren't supposed to be outside."
Shiza sized the man up. He was tall and slender. That absurd wolf helmet he was wearing somewhat obscured her view of his face, although he appeared to be roughly Ozai's age. She stared him down, not moving an inch.
Then, a voice from the rear of the formation.
"Bato. What's going on?" The formation parted to allow two people through. Apparently, the man who had been speaking with Shiza was actually the second-in-command. The real commander of the troops was a surprisingly handsome man around that same age. It appeared that he had gotten injured at some point during the fighting, since he was walking slowly, supported by a young woman who looked to be about as old as Azula. His daughter, perhaps? Or his mistress? Or both? Who even knew anymore?
He didn't look like the sort of man who'd do that to his daughter, though. This was no leader who would live a life of comfort in a palace while countless men died for him. His eyes, so bright blue against his dark and weather-beaten skin, showed nothing but kindness and concern as he beheld Shiza and her sons. And those muscular arms, bared by his uniform…the thought crossed her mind that she wouldn't mind being this man's mistress.
All right, stop that, she scolded herself. Now you're just being silly.
"I'm not sure," Bato was saying. "We found this lady climbing down the mountain with her children, but she's not telling me anything."
The leader moved closer to her, and Shiza took a step backward out of instinct.
"Ma'am? My name is Hakoda, and this is my daughter Katara," the man said. He continued to look at the three of them, taking in the still-sobbing Zoren, Shiza's own tearstained face and hair escaping from its bun, and Teza hiding his face in her skirts. "Are you all right?"
"Don't you dare hurt my children!" Shiza shrieked at him. She realized that she had nearly let herself be lulled into a sense of complacency by their front of sympathy. They were the enemy!
"No one said anything about hurting your children," Hakoda told her. His daughter looked at Shiza, then at Zoren, a glimmer of comprehension present in her eyes which was absent from her father's.
"We just want to help you!" the girl added. To her disgust, Shiza felt herself starting to be swayed. All of her life, she had been told that the Southern Water Tribe was a backwards group of woman-hating barbarians who resented the Fire Nation for bringing innovation and prosperity to the rest of the world. However, she realized that she had also been told all of her life that the Fire Lord was a wise and benevolent ruler for whom it would be an honor to die…and that had proven to be a huge lie. Maybe if she told them the truth, that she was escaping the Fire Lord, they could help get her out of here, at least on the principle of "the enemy of my enemy is my friend?"
No. She couldn't take that risk; couldn't put the lives of her children on the line if these people proved untrustworthy.
"I don't need your help!" she informed them. She drew her now-bloodstained knife and brandished it at them. Hakoda, to his credit, did not flinch.
"Let her pass," he instructed his men.
Katara's face fell. "But…"
"Katara, there's no time. We have to keep moving," Hakoda said sternly. Then, to his men, "Resume march." And off they went, only Katara looking back.
Shiza resumed her run for freedom as well, but the eclipse occurred in its entirety a couple of minutes later. When Zoren bent over and threw up, she decided that even as desperate as their situation was, pushing him any farther during the eclipse would be inexcusable cruelty.
She managed to find an abandoned battlement in which they could take shelter, and spent the remainder of the eclipse huddled with her children.
"I messed up!" Zoren was wailing. Thankfully, they didn't appear to be within anybody's earshot.
"Oh, sweetheart, you didn't mess up," she murmured in an attempt to calm him.
"Y…yes I did!" Zoren insisted. "You said I was 'posed to be big!" He dissolved into fresh tears. Right now, Shiza felt like the absolute worst person to have ever existed in the entire history of his planet. Well, maybe Ozai was actually the worst, but she was a close second.
"I'm the one who messed up. Not you," she said. The trio stayed there until the sun began breaking free of the moon's hold and Zoren's tears died down a bit.
'We're going to have go quite a long way now," Shiza warned her children. "And run some more. But then we'll be on our boat, which will take us far, far away from all this."
The final leg of their journey took them across more rough terrain at the foot of the mountain, which eventually turned into first a dirt path, and then a paved road. The royal family's private harbor was located a couple of miles away from the main one, and was nestled in towering cliffs to obscure it from prying eyes. Unless one was an experienced rock climber, the only way to access the harbor from land was by this road, with the entrance blocked off by a padlocked gate. This lock was opened via combination, which Shiza had memorized as she peeped through the curtains of her palanquin on one of her outings. Nearby, there was an equally locked-up building where some surplus war machines were kept.
They were almost there! She could see the boats bobbing in the blue inlet. Her heart was pounding away, and her lungs felt like they were being shredded with every gasp of air she took. But their destination lay a couple hundred yards away, and she kept pushing on. She could taste the salt air now; they were so close…
And then, the overworked muscles in her legs gave out, and she tripped over her own skirts. She twisted to the side in an attempt to shield Teza from the fall, and in the process felt a pop in her ankle, followed by searing pain.
Somehow, she managed to not cry out. Crumpled on the ground, she kicked off her boot to inspect the ankle, and saw that it was already swelling. She didn't know enough about medicine to tell whether it was broken or merely sprained; either way, it was bad. Even the slightest movement sent a fresh stab of agony into her calf, and she didn't even try to get the boot back on. Over and over again, she tried to get to her feet long enough to hobble to the gate, but was never able to move forward more than a step or two before she collapsed all over again. She had to resort to crawling the rest of the way, Zoren and Teza walking slowly to keep pace with her.
They did reach the gate at long last, but she encountered a new obstacle: the padlock was only just within Shiza's reach when she was standing on tiptoe, and required two hands to enter the combination. To unlock it, she'd have to stretch her arms up as far as they could go, while bearing all her weight on the toes of one foot. Perhaps the Princess Azula would have had the strength, agility, and balance to pull it off, but Shiza had not had that kind of athletic training. Her efforts simply caused her to topple over to one side, her body instinctively putting weight on her bad foot and making the pain even worse.
She sank down onto the ground, trembling from exhaustion and adrenaline, and fruitlessly pounded her fists against the gate. She'd been so close. They'd almost been free. And she'd failed at the last second. She'd been too proud to accept the help of the Water Tribesmen, and now she would pay for that with her life. A word that she'd never dreamed she would ever utter tore out of her throat:
"FUCK!"
As of now, the area was still deserted, but she knew it would be a matter of time until the guards found them. And when they did…if she was lucky, they'd kill her on the spot. If she wasn't, if Ozai had ordered that she be brought back alive, she didn't even dare to think of what horrors he may have in store for her.
She turned to her children. Just because she was going to die didn't mean they had to.
"Zoren, listen to me. Take Teza and hide! And stay hidden no matter what you see!"
Neither of her sons moved.
"You two do as you're told right now!" she cried.
"No, Mommy," Zoren answered, his voice soft yet steady.
"We stay," Teza added.
Shiza was still trying to think up a way to persuade them to abandon her when she heard the sound she'd been dreading: footsteps. She sat up straight, squared her jaw, and positioned herself so that she was between her children and this assailant. Her fingers closed around the handle of her knife. Now that her death was imminent, she felt an eerie calm pervade her. She was determined to meet her fate with resolve and dignity, and would protect her sons to her last breath.
The footsteps belonged to a single hooded figure, unarmed and presumably male. He spotted them and started running over. All of Shiza's muscles were tensed and waiting to strike. Maybe she still had a chance after all. If she could keep her knife hidden and stab this person in the gut as he grabbed her to take her back to the palace…
However, the clash for which she had braced herself never happened. To Shiza's confusion, the unknown person stopped a few paces away from her. Rather than raising the alarm that he'd found the fugitives (as a guard would surely do), he put a finger to his lips, looked in every direction, and took down his hood.
It was Prince Zuko. Zoren's eyes lit up, and he rose in greeting, but Zuko shushed him as well. Shiza, on the other hand, could only stare at him dumbly. The knife slipped out of her fingers and landed on the pavement with a little clank. She had been so prepared for a struggle to the death that she had no idea what to think now. What was he doing all the way out here? It appeared that he hadn't been sent to track them down; had he fled the palace as well?
She was snapped out of her daze as Zuko cleared his throat. He got a pained expression on his face as he looked downwards; following his gaze, Shiza noticed that her sleeve had slipped down her arm, revealing her burn scars. Out of habit, her other hand moved to cover them, even though she knew that there would be little point to doing this.
"Please, Prince Zuko," she whispered as she finally found her voice. "Get your brothers to safety! Don't bother with me."
He looked dismayed at her words, and violently shook his head. Then he headed off to take care of the gate. Not bothering with the combination, he simply cut through the padlock bar with a fire dagger, opened the gate, and ran back to them. He winced as he saw Shiza's swollen and now bruised ankle.
"Can you walk?" he mouthed. She shook her head.
"I told you not to…" she began, but he scooped her up into his arms anyway, knife and all. Her body shuddered as she recalled the time that Ozai had held her in much the same way. Zuko looked concerned, probably thinking that he'd hurt her, but she gestured that she was okay.
This is different, she told herself. She made herself relax, her body instinctively curling closer to his to seek out the soothing warmth of a firebender. Zuko carried her through the gates and onto the dock, Zoren and Teza following close behind. He hesitated here, until Shiza realized that he didn't know which boat was hers. She quickly pointed him in the right direction.
He stepped down into the Izayoi with her, placing her in a chair. One by one, he picked the boys up around the waist and brought them in too. He got the mainsail and jib ready to hoist. Shiza was stunned at how expertly and quickly he did this, until she recalled that he was at sea for three years and had undoubtedly spent some time in sailboats. Even if he'd never done this himself, he would have seen it done up close. He even lit the auxiliary engine for good measure.
His eyes finally met hers, filled with the unspoken. He continued to hang around, looking unsure as to what to do next. She whispered one word.
"Go."
He nodded, untied the boat, and climbed back out of it as it pulled away from the dock, giving them one final look over his shoulder. Once Shiza steered them far enough away, she used the last of her strength to pull on the ropes that released the sails. The wind was coming from the south, which was exactly what she needed. As the air filled the large pieces of canvas, she collapsed onto the deck, holding her sons close. She'd refrained from crying while Zuko was carrying her because she didn't want to get tears and snot all over his tunic, but now her tears flowed freely into their hair. The boat picked up speed and whisked them out of the harbor, and still she clung onto them, never wanting to let go.
"I love you," she sobbed. "I love you both so much."
They'd done it. No matter what difficulties might await them, at least they were free. Shiza felt as if an enormous burden, one which she had been resigned to carrying forever, had been abruptly lifted off her shoulders.
She saw a flash of color out of the corner of her eye, and turned her head to see a solitary war balloon rise into the air. Somehow, she knew that Prince Zuko was in it. Now he was free as well. She and her sons watched the balloon get smaller and smaller in the sky, as the winds carried them through the Strait of Azulon and towards hope.
THE END