2 - History

Zuko had, unfortunately, been given many opportunities to think about marriage.

Of course, as the Fire Nation's monarch, one of his duties was to ensure the continuation of his royal lineage. That, the traditional thinking went, would involve at least one marriage, and the Fire Nation was very big on tradition except when it wasn't. Zuko had grown up thinking of marriage as an inevitability, and depending on his age, either an unpleasant duty or a benign little mystery.

Once it became a little more real, around the time he returned from his banishment and saw Mai as something other than That Weird Girl Who Blushed All The Time, it became a simple matter. Mai had seemed agreeable, judging from how she often had been kissing him. They'd ever exchanged words about it, no, but he had thought they didn't need to. As long as nothing catastrophic happened, it had seemed to Zuko that things should naturally transform into a marriage.

It turned out that relationships didn't work that way, and besides, something catastrophic did happen, which he really should have expected. Those two things might have even been related.

After Mai rightly cut ties with Zuko for not respecting her or their relationship, he started giving a great deal of thought to marriage. Namely, how if he didn't resolve things with her, he would have to marry someone else. The idea was unthinkable, which turned out not to mean what it sounded like because sometimes he couldn't stop thinking about it. Every so often, his advisors would mention a family with an eligible daughter, or suggest he at least talk with one of his fangirls before pardoning them for their latest attempt at trespassing. But it was no good. Being apart from Mai was almost like being banished: forced out of his sense of comfort, desperate to fix things without quite knowing how, and terrified that he somehow wasn't good enough.

But then something amazing happened.

Mai came back to him.

The reconciliation wasn't easy or pleasant, and Zuko was still working to make it work. It involved facing a very ugly side of himself, which proved to be a lot harder than merely looking in the mirror at the massive burn scar on his face. But truth was always the only option for moving forward, as painful as it could be, when moving forward was indeed the best path. And Zuko very much wanted to move forward with Mai. And a lifetime together in marriage overall had very forward-ish feeling, he thought.

But he was also conscious, as someone who often did his best work on his fifteenth or sixteenth attempt at something, that pushing too far too fast could lead to disaster on this very important matter. He needed to be careful. He need to do things right.

So he was a little surprised when Mai just outright said, "Are we getting married?"

As thetwords echoed through Zuko's head, he found himself in a defensive Firebending stance, which was odd because he didn't remember losing himself anywhere, never mind an Agni Kai arena.

It wasn't that he didn't want to get married, but to be confronted with it so boldly- And he'd had no idea that Mai was even thinking about it! Had he completely misjudged the progress of their relationship? Had he completely misjudged her? But what he could say to such a thing?

Well, a 'yes' was the obvious answer.

It was the one he wanted to say, certainly. Probably.

But was it the right answer?

Well, he couldn't imagine it would be a wrong one.

He opened his mouth to give it a try-

He noticed that Mai was outright blanching as what seemed to be her own question-

And she rushed forward to grab his hands, saying, "What I meant to ask was if something happened that I didn't know about because fangirls mobbing Auntie's shop and they said it was because of rumors that we're getting married and I just wanted to confirm I didn't fall asleep on you proposing or anything like that and it's not that I find marriage boring or you boring or anything about us boring because it's actually the least boring thing in my entire life so please don't be offended that I need to ask but sometimes I think they're something broken about me and I know that's not good and so I just wanted to check."

By the end of that, she was panting for breath.

Zuko attempted to approach that bramble of words and extract some meaning from it without getting stabbed by the thorns. This proved to be a lot harder than touching his girlfriend when she was covered with knives, perhaps because he'd acquired very precise knowledge of where her blades rested on her body, whereas this rant didn't seem cuddly at all. So instead he seized on the part of the ramble that seemed safest.

"You think getting married would be interesting?"

Mai blinked. "I- suppose that was implied."

Zuko felt himself relax. A smile broke out on his face.

Mai's own face twisted in an answering grin. "Zuko, everything involving you is interesting. You're like a character out of the most melodramatic play ever written. If we got married, I'd expect the ceremony to be attacked by ghosts or something."

"We better invite Aang, then." He pulled her closer so that he could take her in his arms. Her form relaxed and she let herself be moved a step towards him-

-and then she stiffened. "So did we just- you know? Is it- official?"

"Um, not quite?" Zuko gave up on trying to pull her. "I think- I think we talked about it, and- and agreed it's a direction we agree on." He let the words settle into his worldview, and they seemed to be a comfortable fit. "Hm, it's like other people do? Talk about something and figure it out together? So we're both in a relationship with the same intentions. That's good."

Mai's lips quirked. "Huh. That's new. Us doing things the healthy and traditional way? Like a normal couple- or even Aang and Katara! Without a misunderstanding or a national disaster or assassins or manipulative relatives or royal obligations or anything? I like it."

Zuko tried tugging her again, and this time she allowed herself to be held. "I guess so. There are royal obligations, but I already filed the exploratory paperwork."

She chuckled, and angled her head in a familiar way that invited Zuko to lean in for a kiss-

Mai pulled back. "Wait. Paperwork? You filed paperwork?"

Zuko felt a chill brush against the back of his neck, and had to resist the urge to check if Azula was behind him making ghost noises and blowing air. "Yes? Royalty can't just call in a magistrate and get married with no preparation. There are all kinds of traditional and legal requirements, and they can change depending on who's getting married. I just asked my legal department to identify what the obligations would be for me marrying you, and to go ahead and certify any that we've already met."

Mai stared at him.

Zuko couldn't help but feel he'd done something wrong, even though - when the inspiration had originally come to him, one of those nights when he felt the need to summon a servant to confirm that Mai really had taken him back, yes, and she'd just been here, and the Fire Lord still had a little makeup on his collar, hm, hmmm - his intention had been to make sure this was done right. So he made his best attempt at a smile and said, "Is that a problem?"

Mai sighed, shook her head, and buried her face against his shoulder. "No," came her muffled reply. She then lifted her head and looked up at him with those delightfully sharp eyes of hers. "So tell me- what's a legal department?"

It was a concept that Zuko still had trouble explaining, so he decided to simply show her.

Then went down to a sub-basement of the palace where, according to legend, such activities had occurred as alchemical experimentation, games pitting traitors against viscous animals, a child-assassin training program, adventures in miniature dragon-breeding, and secret beachwear fashion shows. Some time ago, Zuko had ordered it cleaned up and repurposed. Now it housed something even more perverse- rows and rows of desk, shelves full of thick books, and lots and lots of brushes and inkpots. Amidst these implements of torture, a small army of people in very fine but practical clothes moved around, a disturbing number of them wearing spectacles.

Zuko motioned to it all. "We live in an age of laws now. My father is no longer Fire Lord, the war is over, and I've put out new restrictions on Agni Kai challenges, so we need other ways to decide things. I determined that I needed to master the ways of law and have complete knowledge of it- or at least have some people who work for me doing that. These are those people."

Mai moved her gaze over the space, and no doubt she was picking out all kinds of details, coming to conclusions that wouldn't put Zuko in the most flattering light. But he promised to share everything with her, now, and that included his darkest transgressions.

She said, "These people sit in this basement all day, reading and writing laws."

Zuko could at least offer her some relief on that note. "No, of course not."

"Good."

"Some of them like to leave before the sun goes down. And they do a lot of interpreting of laws, too."

Mai's head swiveled to face him. "What?"

"Interpreting laws." Zuko thought that making a hand gesture would help, but he wasn't sure what kind was supposed to go with the concept, so he used his fingers for some little wavy motions that Sokka had always made to accompany stories of Aang's weirder Avatar powers.

That didn't seem to help Mai at all, so he ventured, "Laws- well, it turns out that they- well, they're not always- uh, certain? Someone could have intended one thing, but- well, see, someone explained to me that language changes, and something called 'cultural assumptions,' and sometimes the people who write the laws aren't even very good at it and the thing they write isn't the thing they meant to write. So laws- well, sometimes the experts need to figure them out."

Mai's jaw was hanging. "Laws are open to interpretation? That's the most disgusting thing I've ever heard."

Zuko sighed. "It gets worse."

"No."

He nodded. "Sometimes the legal scholars don't even agree. Then they have something like an Angi Kai, except it's between litigators and no one gets set on fire, and then a magistrate needs to decide who's right. Then that decision becomes the law, unless another, higher magistrate says something different."

Mai laughed.

"I'm serious."

She stopped laughing. "And you asked these- these people to plan our wedding?"

On that point, Zuko could at least give an answer that sounded sane. "No, we get to do that part. Or at least try to. These people are just making sure everything is nice and legal." He started walking between the rows of desks, and Mai followed, looking around at all the scholarly depravity. "What do you know about the history of the Fire Ladies?"

Mai shrugged. "Only that the title is a little under 300 years old, created by Fire Lord Toshio to elevate his fourth wife above the others after their banishment. Previously, the spouse of the Fire Lord was the Royal Consort, but that title had also been applied to the Prime Concubine at times. By then, the title of Empress (sometimes 'Fire Empress' but not always) had been retired due to its association with the old warlords. The original version was actually 'Fire Wife' but people kept laughing at that and the wife got mad, so they changed it to Fire Lady. Which still sounds silly, but I guess times were different back then."

Zuko tried to pretend his girlfriend's answer had been completely normal. "You were always good in history studies."

Mai let a little smirk flit across her face. "It's okay, I know it's weird. But to a twelve-year-old girl, it's very important to know what kind of a title she's going to have if all her romantic plans work out. I thought 'Fire Lady' was stupid, so I checked on alternatives. You should have seen my mother's face when I asked what a Prime Concubine was and how I could become one."

Zuko quickly covered his mouth before he let loose with a completely undignified laugh in front of his law scholars. "The- ah, position wasn't dignified enough for her little girl?"

"No, she was delighted at my ambition."

Zuko nearly tripped over his robes. "Ah- hm. Well, there's a bit more to being Fire Lady than just the title. Certain obligations. Legal obligations."

"Like what?"

Zuko waved her along and headed to one of the desks, where a familiar scholar was hunched over a book. "This is Scholar Manisha, who's been one of the people researching everything for me. Manisha, do you have the assessment of Fire Lady duties?"

Manisha startled, knocking the book off her desk, but Mai snapped out and grabbed it. Zuko, as Fire Lord, had his own obligations when it came to his staff, and to avoid having to do anything about it, he averted his eyes and pretended he hadn't seen one of his scholars just throw an ancient, borrowed century-old book off her desk. Despite her clumsiness, and the way she'd let her hair escape from its bun to make her look like she'd just fought her way through a whirlwind, he knew her to be a very good scholar with excellent attention to detail, so if he sometimes had to pretend that she didn't always forget to bow, to name one thing, he could do that. It was much better than having her executed.

Mai laid the book on the desk and stared down at Manisha. "Manisha. Aren't I related to you? I remember that face from those big gatherings."

Zuko blinked. "You- you're related to one of my scholars?" Distantly, he heard some of the scholars drawing together across the room and raising through voices about something.

Zuko supposed that employing one of Mai's relatives wasn't that outrageous, given that it was the oldest and most respected families that tended to produce law scholars. After all, to become the oldest and most respected families in Sozin's Fire Nation, they'd probably had to break a lot of certain kinds of laws. Mai's mother came from a very old family that had once been quite respected before its money ran out, and now its descendants tended to pop up in unusual places. So far, none were assassins, unless Mai herself counted.

"Um," Manisha nearly whispered. She glanced up at Mai, and then immediately looked down at the book. "Yes. We're- uh, we're cousins. Uh, my mother- uh, your Aunt Mali- uh, I'm her- uh, daughter. Yes. Uh, nice to see you again. Yes. I- uh, one time I showed you how to tie your boots. You were really little. Yes. And you showed me how to throw a rock to knock fruit out of a tree."

Mai gave a slow nod. "Aunt Mali's daughter. Right. Didn't I hear- it must have been right when I came back from conquering Ba Sing Se- didn't I hear that you got betrothed? How are you?"

"Oh, um, yes. Um, I'm doing well. I- uh, my betrothed died during the return of Sozin's Comet." She offered a shaky smile.

"Oh." Zuko bowed his head respectfully. He hadn't heard this. The staff was usually scared to talk to him about anything but his orders and any assassins they had stumbled across in the course of their duties. "I'm sorry."

Manisha nodded. "Um, thank you. He- uh, he was a captain. On one of the airships. Um, the ones going to, um, incinerate the Earth Kingdom. That crash had no survivors. So, um, it's fine. Mother- um, she said she couldn't find another match for a twig like me when I had more sisters to marry off. Um, so I had to learn a trade. Yes. So I started reading books." She blinked once. Twice. "So, um, now I'm here."

Zuko looked to Mai and hoped she had any idea what to say to that.

She, in turn, had wiped her face of any expression. "I'm glad it worked out for you."

Manisha smiled up at her. "Thank you. Um, so- um, you wanted the Fire Lady papers?" She shifted so that she was sitting a little straighter and adjusted the spectacles balanced on the tip of her nose. She moved the book aside and snapped a stack of papers from a tray on the side of her desk. "The compiled version hasn't been reviewed by my supervisor yet, but he just stamps everything I give him, so it should be fine. The first duty is for the Fire Lady to produce a viable male Firebender heir within a year of the wedding or she will be put to death. The second-"

"No," Mai said.

Zuko motioned to her. "It-"

"No," Mai said.

Manisha looked up. "Um, it's a very old law-"

"No," Mai said.

"But-"

"No."

"We'll get it changed," Zuko quickly put in. He took a step back and raised his hands against an incoming No, but all he found was Mai glaring at him. In the quiet, he heard the echoes of what sounded like some urgent conversation across the room, and a glance showed a group of scholars talking to one of the palace servants, but he couldn't focus on that right now. "That's one of the reasons for all this. I don't want you put to death, or forced to- Well, now that we know, we can work through it."

Mai stared at him for a long moment. "Together?"

Zuko reached out took her hands in his. "Together."

She flashed a smile at him. "Working through problems together, huh? That should be new and interesting." She looked over to Manisha. "Sorry about that."

Manisha breathed a sigh of relief and smiled. "Oh, um, it's okay. So, um, should I read the others, or-"

At that point, a servant scuttled over - the same servant who had been talking to the other scholars - and bowed at the waist while presenting a scroll tied with a ribbon. He said, "Most honorable Fire Lord, you have been served."

Zuko took the scroll and tried to put a friendly smile on his face. "New here? It's okay, I have lots of servants, so I know what it's like. You don't need to tell me when you're serving me."

Manisha said, "Um, no. It's- um, being served is- um, you've been officially given something legal. Yes. Um, you better read that."

Still not quite understanding, Zuko unwrapped the ribbon on the scroll as the servant backed away in a bow. He enrolled it and scanned the message.

He read aloud, "It's from the office of the Caldera's High Magistrate. A challenge has been filed of a type that-" He skipped over any words he didn't recognize. "-that contests the legal eligibility of Lady Harbor Yu Mai to- to marry the Fire Lord and ascend to the station of Fire Lady?! What?!"

"Oh," Manisha said. "That sounds interesting. There hasn't been a legal challenge to an engagement in centuries."

Zuko could only nod. Now he saw the resemblance between Mai and her cousin- they both found dangerous things to be interesting. He looked to his girlfriend-and-maybe-future-wife and found her staring at him with evaluating eyes. "What is it?"

Mai frowned. "First an angry mob comes after me, and now this? What's the expression? Once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, three times is enemy action?"

Zuko blinked. "But this is only two things."

Mai gave a nod. "So that means I better keep an eye out for the third. And you can focus on dealing with this part with your army of weird scholars." She gave him a sharp smile. "See, we're solving problems together!"

Zuko had to admit, it was better than solving problems alone. And not having problems to solve was just a completely ridiculous notion.

TO BE CONTINUED