DREAMLAND
The nightmares are bad every night. Ty Lee pretends to have grown accustomed to the world her wife lives in, both day and night, but she has not. Oh, spirits, she has not. Ty Lee has mainly had good dreams in her life, or at the very least boring ones, but Azula has horrific nightmares every time she manages to sleep. She wakes drenched in sweat and paces around the palace like a ghost for hours until she at last returns to bed where Ty Lee pretends to be asleep.
But Ty Lee cannot sleep when Azula is like this. She cannot sleep until she again hears her wife's breathing steady and slow beside her in bed.
One late winter night, Azula wakes glistening with cold sweat and with a scream trapped in her throat. She throws the blankets off of herself with no regard for whether or not it will wake Ty Lee and starts to leave the room.
But Ty Lee takes a deep breath and grabs Azula by the wrist. It startles the princess so much that she lights her hand ablaze, painting the room shades of cerulean, and almost burns Ty Lee's face before she snaps to reality and catches herself.
"Don't do that, moron!" Azula hoarsely hisses. "You'll get yourself killed."
"Azula," whispers Ty Lee, heart pounding so much that blood pulses in her ears, "I worry about you when you leave. Can you stay tonight?"
Well, Azula does not fancy pacing for hours. But she wants to and… she supposes she can just wait until Ty Lee falls asleep, then sneak out to do as she pleases. It would avoid a whole… thing.
"Fine," Azula snaps, lying back down beside Ty Lee. She curls and uncurls her toes and toys with her hair and wishes she remembered how to sit still.
"Can I hold your hand?" Ty Lee breathes, brushing her fingertips across the blankets towards Azula.
Azula says nothing, just lets Ty Lee intertwine their fingers together.
They lie there like that in silence until they both slowly fall back to sleep.
Azula still has nightmares. Ty Lee still worries.
But a new nightly tradition is born.
