A/N: Now I've walked through hell for you. What's an adventurer to do? Love and be loved. Read… and review!

Two Words

[Spring 114 AG]

The living room has become her primary living space now. She decided, after a certain someone showed up at her doorstep twice in the last decade, that it was high time she built a window in her main bedroom. The brunette with grey eyes also decided to solo the project, refusing help from her fellow Kyoshi Warriors or Fire Warriors. This had drawn it out longer than anticipated, but made it more personal and thus more rewarding. As a result though, there's a sizable gap in her wall as it is unfinished. She has plastic covering it, but the room is still freezing in the winter. She'll need a few more weeks to finish it, but that will have to wait.

Ty Lee paces back and forth in her living room, triple checking everything. She looks at a particularly heavy, winter jacket. 'Do I need that?' she wonders. 'It's closer to the Southern Water Tribe than it is to Ba Sing Se, so maybe?' She stares at it and debates. She picks it up, folds it, and places it in the suitcase. She goes back to mindlessly meandering about the first floor, looking at this, picking up that, contemplating something or other. Finally, she returns to the kitchen and finds the same note. She rereads it again.

My Dearest, Ty Lee,

It's been so long since I've seen you. I've most recently moved to Lanxi. It's quiet and unlike our upbringing in the city. There's a library here that reminds me of our time in the Royal Fire Academy for Girls. I'm hoping you can come visit soon. Perhaps you could make that chicken and rice recipe that I enjoy so much. Consider visiting in the new year. I'll wait for your letter.

Yours, truly,

Ty Lin

It was obvious enough. Ty Lee does have a sister named Ty Lin, but she most certainly did not recently move to the absolute middle of nowhere Earth Kingdom. Even if she had, Ty Lee doubts she'd write to her. Or address it "My dearest" or end it "yours, truly." She also found the use of 'Lin' to be precarious after their last meeting. The most obvious clue, more than the chicken and rice recipe reference, was that she mentioned the Royal Fire Academy for Girls. Ty Lin didn't attend the school, nor did any of Ty Lee's sisters. But Azula did.

It'd come in a few months after Azula disappeared into the wild. Much had happened, and yet when Ty Lee got the letter she dropped everything to make this visit possible. She was practically over the moon about it. What's more, part of the construction project in her bedroom was meant as a coverup as she created a hidden panel in her bedroom. Somewhere to safely and covertly lock away all of the letters she'd get from the 'dead woman.'

While she had been overly excited about the trip, she remained calm and serene in front of others. She had 'recovered' perhaps too soon from the blow of Azula's death, at least in the public's eye. There have been more than a few whispers about whether Ty Lee had somehow been part of her death. Most found it oddly timed that she left Republic City and not even 48 hours later the rumors spread that Azula was killed. Zuko refused to believe this, and it was entirely apocryphal. Nonetheless, the truth about how the Dragon was slain was swiftly eradicated from a mixture of hearsay and rumors.

Now, with her trip on the verge of happening, Ty Lee finds herself inexplicably stressed over it. Packing and preparing were all fine, but now that she takes the first ferry out in the morning, she is worried she'll forget something. She retraces her steps all around her lower floor. She stops and stares at her suitcase. There's a puffy, light blue, winter jacket on top. 'Do I really need that? Is it really necessary? It hasn't been that cold recently, right?' She approaches the suitcase and removes the jacket.

A sudden knock on her door startles her and jerks her out of her trance. She looks to the front door with surprise and anxiety. She puts the jacket down, and slowly ambles towards the door. It's been months but every knock on her door gives her pause. Although she doubts Zirin would knock on her front door.

She opens it and finds a woman with auburn hair and pale blue eyes. Ty Lee greets her, "Hello Suki!"

"Hello! Do you mind if I come in?"

"Of course," Ty Lee says, standing aside and holding the door open. "Bit of a mess, don't judge me for it."

"Sure, sure. Finally putting a window in your bedroom. You know-"

"It would go a lot faster with help, I'm aware." Ty Lee dismisses her.

Suki comes in and Ty Lee puts on some tea for them. They make pleasantries and passive conversation for a while. Suki puts the cup of tea down and looks around the room. Her eyes fall on the suitcase and she asks, "Where are you going again?"

Ty Lee forces a smile. "I told you before, I'm going to visit my sister."

"Ty Lin, yes?"

"That's right."

"And she moved from Caldera to some town near Ba Sing Se?"

"It's not exactly near Ba Sing Se, but that's the largest city near it."

"I see."

Ty Lee can tell she has more she wants to say, she's just not saying it. She leaves her to stew as Suki thinks about her next question. She finally posits, "You know, Zuko thinks she's still out there."

"She who?" Ty Lee jokes.

Suki doesn't entertain her. "I wonder about it myself. The RCPD never found a body. No one has taken credit for it. Some think it was that low level gangster you were worried about. Some say she did it to herself."

"What do you think?"

Suki narrows her eyes. "I think you've handled her death really well, Ty Lee. Almost like you're hiding something about it."

"So you think I did it?"

"I didn't say that, you did."

"So what are you saying, exactly, Suki?"

Both women are calm, if not hostile. It's tense but not angry. The Leader of the Kyoshi Warriors gathers herself. She stares into Ty Lee's grey eyes. Finally she huffs and looks away, "I just find it all very odd. Very peculiar. Azula vanishes from the face of the earth, everyone claims she's dead, and now, going on four months later, with the full might of the RCPD and the Fire Nation searching for her, and yet no one can find the body?"

"If she is alive, she's eluded us for almost half of our lives, Suki. And if she's alive, how do you explain Zirin's rise to power?"

Suki sighs. "Very valid points. It does stand to reason that Zirin filled the power vacuum, regardless of if she was involved in killing her or not. Plus, your whole thing with Ruki in the woods."

Suki has felt for months that Ty Lee was hiding something. About Azula, or Ruki's final moments, or about something else. She still feels that way, but all the same she can't help but admit that the brunette is correct. She asks her, "How are you handling it so well? I was certain you would unravel at some point."

Ty Lee smiles. "Well, I am going on vacation. And I think what you said to me in the hospital has stuck with me, Suki. She killed Ayon. She was a killing machine. It was all she knew."

There's a pause. Ty Lee adds, "How could anyone love someone with that much darkness?"

Azula feels like she's been here before, even if the feelings are all different. She sits upon a bench, underneath a tree, and faces the west. In the far off distance, a vast forest covers the mountainside of the North Fennu Mountains. She feels the winter air whip her in the face, and she huffs into a scarf. She'd spent the first twenty-seven years of her life in the Fire Nation, including a number of them at Ember Island. This is her first time spending some of the cold months of the year in the Earth Kingdom, and the village with a massive gorge, dropping down to the South Sea ocean, was giving her a crash course in the harshness of winter.

Azula is free and unafraid. But she's not Azula. Not anymore. She isn't the Dragon Empress either. She arrived in Lanxi and when asked for her name, she reached into her memory bank and offered the closest lie she could come to the truth.

At first she couldn't remember exactly where the name came from, but eventually she recalled. A conversation with a fierce fellow warrior in a dusty library, several years earlier. She never had gone back to learn more about the mysterious figure, but with all of this free time now she decided she would do so. The village library only had a single document, which listed all the previous avatars.

Vaman. 1215 BG - 1066 BG. M. EK

Asuna. 1066 BG - 916 BG. F. FN.

Jamphel. 916 BG - 822 BG. M. AN.

Right now, she puts her Avatar namesake on the backburner. Instead, she's focused on the visitor who is approaching over the horizon. She sees her, coming from a distance. Facing where the sun will set, she sees a brunette woman walking towards the bridge.

Early in the day, before the sun was up, Ty Lee was out the door and on her way. She trekked across Kyoshi Island and caught a ferry. Two hours later she sat for an hour in a layover at the mouth of the Nan Shan River. She boarded a more industrial travel ship and took nearly two days traveling the South Sea, all along the Earth Kingdom Coast. Finally, just over two days after leaving her home, she arrived at Luoto City. By noon she had caught a ride on a mongoose lizard. It took a bumpy and tiresome three hours on the lizard until the final stop, and still she has to walk a few more. By the time she sees the girl sitting on the bench, she guesses that she has nineteen steps until she's standing before her.

Ty Lee is almost afraid. Not of the Dragon Empress. Not of a girl who murdered her friend. Not of one of the greatest criminal masterminds in the history of the world. Not of a prodigy fire bender who had attempted to kill her before. Ty Lee is almost afraid of being with her. They have been separated by miles and years and moonlight. Now she comes to a stop in front of a bench. Her grey eyes look into Azula's, and she sees something.

She sees the twenty-seven year old woman, but she sees her for more than that. She sees the same 'princess in the palace' who was her school friend and her first love. She sees the fourteen year old warrior who fought for her father. She sees the best friend that she chased until the ends of the earth. Now she's come by invitation, and Azula smiles.

"Hello, Ty Lee."

"Hello, Azula."

"You must be tired?"

"I am." She answers. The truth is that nothing would've kept her away.

"Would you like to sit beside me?"

Ty Lee nods. She sits on the bench beneath the tree. They are silent. The wind blows. The forest trees along the mountainside in the distance flow like waves crashing onto the sands of Ember Island. It is perhaps the most peaceful and freeing moment of Ty Lee's entire life. They may have been there a moment or a minute or an hour or an eternity. She feels liberated, and that no one could ever make her afraid. She is safe in this place. At some point, Azula pulls her out of her trance.

"Shall we?"

Ty Lee lazily drags her head to look at the girl. She has expecting eyes. Ty Lee nods and they rise to cross the bridge into Lanxi.

The Lanxi Bridge spans exactly thirty feet, flatly across the gap of land into the podunk Earth Kingdom village. The gorge below it drops about 250 feet till the South Sea water. Despite being in the middle of nowhere, with limited access to resources and long forgotten by the nobles in the Earth Kingdom, the bridge is in fine shape. It's sturdy and reliable, aged and true. A pair of friends walk across it in lockstep. The brunette looks to the other and speaks.

"Ya know, I'm not sure what I was going to do if I came all this way and it was really Ty Lin out here." She jokes.

"Oh, she is here," Azula deadpans back. "Yeah, I convinced her to move here first. I couldn't just outright lie, that would be wrong."

Growing serious, Azula says, "But uh, speaking of names. Don't call me Azula around anyone here."

Tensing up, Ty Lee replies, "Are you still…"

The girl with golden eyes picks up what she's asking and says, "No. No! I. No. It's not like that."

"Oh. How is it then?"

Desperate to explain herself, she answers, "Well, in order for Azula to stay dead, I had to go by a different name."

"I see," Ty Lee says. She smiles preemptively at her joke. "Don't tell me you're having people call you 'Ty Lee' again?"

"Hahaha. No, no," Azula laughs. "No, instead, I told them my name is Asuna."

Ty Lee makes a face at her and says, "People don't generally get the chance to rename themselves. So with all of your creativity and all the choices in the world, you changed what? A couple of letters?"

"I know. Do you remember when I was on Kyoshi Island with you, and working together?"

Azula only gets raised eyebrows in response.

"Of course you do. Well, while I was there I had this conversation with Suki in the library. She told me about this supposed Avatar Asuna. She thought I was named after her."

"Ahh," Ty Lee realizes. As they step off the bridge she concludes, "I'm understanding now."

"I told her how it was after my grandfather but still, it stuck with me. I'm trying to learn more about her now. Reading everything I can, and such."

"You? Reading? About old Avatars?"

"There's a first time for everything." She quips.

"You were always a gifted writer in school," Ty Lee admits. "Very pretty prose, I remember."

"Oh? Could I write something for you? A book, perhaps, about all of our journeys?"

Sensing Azula's sarcasm, Ty Lee shoots back, "Write me a poem why don't you?"

This earns a laugh from both women. They walk through the village outskirts, headed towards the center. There are children running and playing, adults chatting idly with one another. The pair draw some eyes as they walk on. Ty Lee thinks. "Let me ask you this. You're trying to hide Azula away, but what about your blue fire? You're the only-"

"That's not a problem actually," Azula cuts her off. "This town has only seen four Firebenders in the last few generations. I told them that anyone can make blue fire, it's not special."

Approaching the village square now, Ty Lee smiles, "You always were the best liar."

"Asuna!" A voice calls to them from nearby. "Asuna, come here quick!"

Azula turns on heal and looks to find a couple of older women sitting at a pai sho table a few feet away. They are dressed in traditional, Earth Kingdom, winter garb. The table for their game is rickety and they sit on cardboard boxes rather than chairs. The one they call 'Asuna' rolls her eyes as she approaches them.

"What is it, Siyoh?"

"Oh come here," she motions for them to come closer. "Me and Tava need your help."

Azula approaches them cautiously but more quickly. She questions her, "Okay, is everything alright? Did something happen?"

"Oh yes dear, it's dreadful. Simply dreadful," the woman named Siyoh starts. She's older, lines etched across her face. The hint of a smile dawns on her face as she says, "We heard your visitor had arrived and see we want to meet the special lady in Asuna's life!"

Hearing this genuinely brings warmth to Ty Lee amongst the cold. Nonetheless, she can't help but seize the opportunity to tease her shorter friend. "'Special' huh?"

"No."

"Yes, indeed!" The small woman named Tava replies.

"Stop."

"She hasn't had any other visitors," Siyoh says. "No family."

"No friends."

"No body!"

"First time in four months that anyone comes and she's as pretty as you!"

"Hi, ah, Siyoh and Tava, I asked you specifically not to do this."

"Oh shush," Tava quiets her. "She's got air nomad eyes! Do you have any air nomad in your blood?"

A voice in the background shouts, "Asuna!"

Azula turns to the voice beckoning her. Concerned she leaves Ty Lee with the older women. Ty Lee watches her go a moment, then turns back to the elders. She smiles genuinely and answers their question from before, "You know, I'm not sure. I've never asked."

"Well, I wouldn't be surprised!"

"I wouldn't either!"

Siyoh is taller with all grey hair and amber eyes. Tava is small, but jet black hair and light green eyes. Siyoh croaks up at her, "So, tell us about yourself! Asuna is so private."

Smiling, she asks, "What would you like to know?"

"Let's start with your name!" Tava replies.

"My name is Ty Lin." She decides to lie.

"Oh it's so pretty!"

"Fitting for the girl!"

"You most certainly have Air Nomad in your family tree with that kind of name!"

Ty Lee smiles as they lavish her with compliments. Her eyes gravitate away and she looks out at Azula talking with two gruff, older men. She can tell the women about herself another time. Now she wants to know about the woman that this town knows. She turns back to them and asks, "What do you know about Asuna? I'm curious what the people of Lanxi think of her?"

"Oh she's a gift."

"A real treasure!"

"She's taken so kindly to our little home."

"The men respect her.

"And the little girls are inspired by her."

"She's been such a help to the village leadership. I wasn't convinced there were any decent Fire Benders left alive," Siyoh says. She tugs her jacket closer and adds, "What with their attempt to burn down the whole Earth Kingdom."

"Can you believe that was nearly 20 years ago?" Tava asks her.

Scoffing, Siyoh replies, "It was 15!"

"It was 14," Ty Lee replies. The memories run deep. She quickly adds, "I, uh, remember it well."

"See!" Siyoh proclaims victory

"In any case," Tava pivots. "We haven't seen a fire bender in years."

"We get Fire Nation refugees though!"

"That's true! Lonou's wife for example!"

"But the last fire bender to show up only stayed for a few days."

"It was a week!" Tava tries to correct her.

"It was not a week!" Siyoh insists.

"What do you know?" Tava dismisses her.

"Thank you," Ty Lee tries to say, but they are arguing.

She slowly walks away as the old friends fight with each other. She walks for a couple of seconds and looks around at the village. Despite the cold of winter, it is a fairly active community, at least at this exact moment. As she approaches she overhears the man speaking.

"It's gone be dangerous, Asuna."

"Eghh. I think I've faced worse."

"What will be dangerous?" Ty Lee interrupts.

"Oh, nothing." Azula dismisses it.

One man is older, perhaps in his late 30's or 40's. He has a full beard and facial hair. His eyes are a hazy green and his skin is tan. Ty Lee thinks he'd be rather handsome if his clothes weren't so dirty. The other man is younger, taller than the first man, with black hair down to his shoulders. He smiles at her and is missing a few teeth. His eyes are amber and Ty Lee wonders if he's Fire Nation. The older man speaks with a gruff voice to Azula, "Is this, erhm, your special friend?"

"'Special' again, huh?" She chides the shorter girl.

"I never called you that, they're putting words in my mouth."

"I'm Ty Lin." She says, extending a hand. Her eyes flash to Azula who crooks her eyebrows briefly without looking back at her.

"Lonou," he says, shaking hers. His hands are rugged and etched with lines.

"The women over there just mentioned you, actually." Ty Lee says with a smile. "They said your wife is also Fire Nation?"

"Aye, that's true. Her name is Alane. And this here is Roland, my apprentice."

"It's true," Roland says, extending his own hand to shake. "She told us to be on our best behavior."

"Threatened us, really." Lonou says.

"Which means we obviously now have to be degenerates." Roland jokes.

Ty Lee giggles as Azula says, "Are you all done?"

"Not quite," Lonou says. "Last thing I want to say is that I can't believe it."

"Can't believe what?" Ty Lee plays along.

"That you're real," he says and she giggles again. "And you're beautiful! Do you favor women too, like Asuna?"

"Hey Lonou," Azula says, while putting her hand on his shoulder. "Shut the fuck up."

With the tiniest amount she can muster she shocks him with electricity. He yelps and jumps a little. Roland laughs loudly at his master. The older man takes half a step back and says, "Ah! Ah! Okay, okay."

He shakes off the shock and turns to Ty Lee. "Welcome to Lanxi! As I said, I'm Lonou. I'm the leader around here and Roland here is my second in command, although Asuna here has started challenging him for that title."

"Oh c'mon!"

"Damn right I am." Azula smirks.

"It's lovely meeting you. Your aura is gorgeous." She compliments him. She's met with strange looks but she keeps going, "Now again what was so dangerous?"

"It's nothing, Ty."

"We need to do some routine maintenance to the bridge," Lonou explains. "Nothing serious. But Asuna here is offering her fire bending to speed up our timeline by a decent amount."

"So long as it doesn't interfere with mine and Roland's trip to gather resources next week, I don't care."

Roland turns his attention to the brunette. "I gotta say, Ms. Ty Lin, we are quite grateful for Asuna's fire bending during these winter months. It's been making things much more manageable in the lives of many of our folks."

"Of course," Ty Lee sympathizes. "I can only imagine."

At that exact moment, a small girl with a long, bushy, black hair runs up to the group. She brushed past Ty Lee and latched on to Azula's leg. Looking down at her in surprise, Azula quickly smiles.

"Oooh! Monan!" She reaches down and scoops the girl up off the dirt floor and lifts her up. She sits the girl on her arms, balanced against her hip. "What are you doing awfully far from home?"

"We'll chat later, Asuna." Lonou waves, making his exit.

"Bye," she replies quickly, dismissing him.

"Nice meeting you, ma'am." Roland adds to Ty Lee.

"Nice meeting you too," she smiles as they walk away.

Ty Lee turns back to Azula and the child. Ty Lee guesses that she may be between five and seven, just eyeballing it. The little girl holds as tightly as she can onto Azula, resting her head on the former Dragon Empress' bosom. She actively avoids Ty Lee's grey eyes, but bashfully peeks at her. She tries to whisper but mostly just says, "Mommy said I needed to come spy on you and your friend."

Sensing an opportunity, Ty Lee leans in closer. Sweetly she asks, "Tell me, Monan, did your Mommy call me her 'special friend?'"

"Don't answer that," Azula cuts her off. The little girl smiles. "Unless it was 'no.' then you can answer."

Burrowing her face into Azula's shoulder now she muffles, "I don't remember."

"She doesn't remember, that's, I mean," Azula stammers. "Clearly she didn't say it."

Ty Lee smiles in utter disbelief. None of what is happening feels at all real or even possible. Azula smiles back at her and whispers to the child. "I think you ought to run home and tell your mommy if she wants to spy on me she should bring some of her special dessert. The one you and I both like?"

With renewed vigor, the little girl juts her head back to stare into Azula's golden eyes. "Ooh yeah!"

"Of course, I'll need help. I couldn't possibly manage eating it all on my own. So you'll come too, yeah?"

"Yeah!"

"Yeah?" Azula questions her.

"Yeah!" Little Monan shouts with glee.

There is a bout of laughter between the three females. Azula bends down and puts Monan on the ground. As she does she tells her, "Go on now, you little gremlin. You go get where you're going."

Monan yelps as she takes off running. Ty Lee raises her eyebrows at this last quote. When Azula rises back up and notices this, she tells her, "Force of habit."

Ty Lee nods in acknowledgment.

"C'mon, Ty Lin, let's take your luggage up to my place."

"Sounds good, Asuna."

"Everyone here gardens," the golden eyed girl tells her friend.

They approach a tiny building, with a small fence out front protecting a small, 3 foot by 3 foot patch of land. The brunette asks, "Oh?"

"Yeah, so all of the homes are outfitted with little gardens like this one."

The acrobat eyes the ground by the door. It's not developed at all, the grass just blocked off by the fence. She asks, "But not you?"

As Azula unlocks her front door she tells her, "Nah. Too much work."

Ty Lee almost stops as she looks around. She humorously wonders if this is even really Azula anymore or if she really did morph somehow into the Asuna she's named herself after.

"Put your bag down wherever."

Ty Lee follows the short, black hair into a cramped cottage. She looks around and doesn't find much. There's no bathroom, a single cot barely a few inches off the ground. It's studio style, with no walls or dividers separating the kitchen from the bedroom. There are a few counters for cooking. A small window on the wall near the bed. A nightstand by the cot. Her eyes trace the space quickly and repeatedly.

"Sorry, this is the best I can manage right now."

"You're a long way from the palace and vacation homes in Ember Island."

"I know, I know," Azula sighs as she crosses her arms and leans against a kitchen wall. "Umm, she, Zirin, well, uh, she had full access to my finances. So I can't touch anything anymore."

"I thought you said the one time that you had money not even she knew about?"

"That, that was true at the time. But then I thought you were gone and, well, I just, well eventually I gave her full control."

"So all of that," Ty Lee says with a hand gesture, "and you ended up with nothing?"

"Now I earn my keep by working. Maybe in a few months or a year I can save up to buy one of the homes here."

"In Lanxi?"

"For a while, sure, why not? They're letting me stay in this little place for now while I help out."

Ty Lee blinks in surprise. Azula continues, "The benefit of being Asuna is that I don't have any debt or owe anyone anything, so everything I earn here is going right into saving for somewhere permanent."

Azula turns to the sink and gets to work on some dishes. Ty Lee looks around the space again. Everything about the space was perfectly tidy. Shoes we arranged against the wall in color order. Ty Lee imagined it would be much the same if she opened any of the closets. The bed was made with folded covers, there was a nightstand beside it with items neatly stacked together. She examines the sheets and the perfection. She slowly comes to a realization. She turns and asks Azula, in the thick of dish washing, "One bed?"

Without turning around, the short haired girl chuckles. "What? You don't want to share?"

Ty Lee pauses. She's caught off guard by the reply. She's not sure what her answer is, nor does she know what this trip is meant to be. Did she intend to share the bed? Her mind races away from her, paralyzing her tongue, preventing her from giving any response for or against the idea.

Azula chuckles some more and says, "No, I have a sleeping bag for myself. You're the guest, so you'll stay in the bed, and I'll be on the floor beside you."

"Oh, okay." Ty Lee replies. She felt relieved, but at the same time couldn't help but notice a pang of disappointment.

Neither woman knows what comes next. They don't know what this is or what it will become. As Azula sets to making dinner for them they both escape into their own headspace.

Ty Lee wonders if Azula really thinks of her as 'special?' Azula wonders if she impresses Ty Lee during this trip if it will make her want to return? Ty Lee wonders if Azula is going to become an informant for the Fire Nation? Could she convince her friend that she'd changed? Would she be a source of information about Zirin, the way that Yon Rha had been? Even if Azula spewed all of her feelings out on the table right now, would Ty Lee even reciprocate?

'Is that what she wants?' They both think.

Ty Lee has so much to share, but doesn't know where to begin. Azula knows she must admit the truth to Ty Lee, but now is not the time.

"I hope you're hungry!" Azula announces as she finishes the dishes. "I'm going to try and make us a stew for dinner."

Unsure of herself, Ty Lee answers, "That would be nice."

The meal was homely, but not altogether great. Ty Lee had to concede that Azula did well enough, given the limitations of the kitchen. The sun has set and there is little wind. Sound carries easily throughout Lanxi on this night as two women wind silently through the streets. Walking to take in the sights and sounds, to let the food settle, to see the village with fewer folks out and about.

In the silence, a woman who has never been short for words finds herself incapable of forming sentences. She's never been afraid to speak her mind, yet she is immobilized by the vibrant brunette with grey eyes. She wants to tell her. She needs to tell her. She has to know how she will respond. In the silence of the night, an uplifting rhythm catches the attention of the Kyoshi Warrior.

"Ty-"

"Do you hear that?"

"Hmm?" Azula asks, surprised. For a moment she stops hearing her own heartbeat in her ears. Instead she listens and hears instead the melody. She explains,"Oh, there's a dance hall nearby. It's mostly the elders who go-"

"Can we check that out?" She asks casually.

The way the grey eyes glisten in the moonlight, Azula would be a fool to deny them anything they wished.

"Sure," she replies with a nod. "Sure."

They walk in lockstep to the dance hall. It's ornate by the standards that Ty Lee has seen in Lanxi thus far. It's a banquet hall with a spacious dance floor. There are tiny tables all around it where older folks sit. Some lean back and just soak up the ambiance. Others tap their feet or walking sticks in sync with the music, trying to engage as much as their aging, frail bodies will allow.

When the women enter, a song has just begun. They look at each other before proceeding in. The pair stop and sit at the closest vacant table, which also happens to be the one closest to the dance floor. They sit there in silence and watch some of Lanxi's oldest residents dancing together. Some perform rehearsed dances on hobbled legs and ankles, while others are simply swaying in place with their loved ones. There are maybe two dozen people and not a single one of them pays any mind to the Dragon Empress and the Circus Freak.

After watching for a few more seconds, Azula finally sighs. Ty Lee turns to look at her when she does. The black haired girl is pensive but smiling. She is reminiscing on other times. She leans towards the girl sitting beside her and tells her, "My first job as the Dragon Empress was to steal a boat."

Bemused, Ty Lee asks her, "Steal a boat?"

"Well, steal it back." The golden eyed girl corrects herself.

"Ah! I heard about this actually," Ty Lee recalls. The golden hour and the docked boat. An expecting father. "From that man in Baochou. His name was…"

Ty Lee trails off as realization comes to her. Azula nearly giggles. "That's right. Say it."

With a certain wonder in her voice, Ty Lee recites from memory, "The last person on this Earth who was loyal to you?"

"Connecting the dots, huh?" Azula chides her. "The world's foremost intelligence officers on all things pertaining to the deposed Princess, finally putting together her origin story. And all it took was for her empire to fall."

"I met him. I know him."

"Yeah?" Azula asks without looking at her friend. Instead, her eyes are out on the dance floor. Beyond that actually, she looks to somewhere cosmic. With a whimsical tone she asks, "Imagine if I had refused?"

Laughing slightly, Ty Lee replies, "It would've saved me a lot of heartache."

Azula continues watching the people. She asks the woman beside her, "Do you ever think about the past?"

The brunette sighs. "All the time. It's all I ever think about."

The music plays on.

"It's nice to watch them," Azula comments, head motioning to the old people dancing together. "They seem happy."

After a moment's pause she adds, "Carefree."

She carries the burden of her sins. She admits, "I want to feel like that."

The music dies. Ty Lee stares out at the dancers. She turns back to the woman sitting at her side. She claps her hands together and then stands up. She begins walking out onto the dance floor.

"Come on then."

Ty Lee floats out amongst the dancers. Azula looks at her with surprise. She mumbles, "Oh, no. Ty. I can't dance."

"Neither can I," the acrobats tells her. She keeps walking out. "But, you know, 'trying new things' and such."

She walks out, looking back expectantly. Azula won't. She can't. But seeing Ty Lee wander further out still, she feels pulled. The pressure to not leave Ty Lee alone drags her from her seat. The music rises to life as she slips past other couples dancing gracefully. Azula, not knowing what she's doing, tries to mimic it from memory. Ty Lee, doing the same, raises her one hand and tries to place the other on Azula's hip.

The only problem is that Azula tries to do the same. The two women haphazardly try to position themselves correctly, swapping hands and arms, bumping each other along the way, muttering apologies to one another. Finally, Ty Lee gets her hand on Azula's back, Azula puts her hand on Ty Lee's waist, and all seems right. Then they try to move together, but Azula goes first and Ty Lee tries to follow, but ends up trying to pull the short, black haired girl in the wrong direction.

"Gah," Ty Lee grumbles. "What's happening? Whose leading?"

"I don't know." Azula whispers back.

At this point, the idea of fully dancing dies and they just stand against one another and settle into a subtle sway together. They don't traverse anywhere. They simply stay in place and hold each other. After a moment, Azula cautiously rests her head against Ty Lee's chest. A sense of calm comes over her. She feels at ease.

After a moment or so, Azula realizes that Ty Lee is staring at some of the other dancers. The village elders. Couples in their dying days. She cuts through the soft music playing and asks her, "Do you want to be like them?"

Ty Lee ponders it. She tells her, "I don't know if that's for me anymore."

"Why not?" Azula asks genuinely.

Ty Lee chuckles at her sincerity. She tells her, "We've tried to kill each other. Our relationship is built on betrayal and stabbings and burning. You think we wouldn't kill each other at some point in our old age?"

The women share a laugh.

"Sounds kind of nice if you ask me." Azula comments.

No reply comes. No joke in response. Music fills the silence. They settle against one another. Azula summons all of her courage. She doesn't allow herself the chance to back out. In a hushed tone she finally confesses.

"I've killed so many people, Ty Lee."

The world seems to stand still. It doesn't. The music plays. The people sway. Azula awaits a response. Ty Lee flickers through her life remembering so many things. Ayon. The men at The Idle Grove. The suspicions of Ozai and the crew that was lost with him. Yon Rha. The corrupt bureaucrats all across the Earth Kingdom. Koh's Disciples. All of the pain and fear that Azula had inflicted upon the world and innocent people.

Azula remembers making this confession only once before now. In response she was reminded of how she is a monster. She was shown a candle to her darkness and forced to confront it.

Ty Lee flickers through her life remembering so many things. The argument at the Sweet Blossom Hospital. The sight of her in the park after all those years. The childhood friend who protected her in school. The leader willing to sacrifice herself for all of Kyoshi Island. The teenager who found her at the circus. The woman who had risked her life to come to her in the dark of night, after her empire fell. The woman she holds right now, who is filled with darkness.

A woman who Ty Lee accepts and appreciates, in spite of her darkness.

"I know."

Azula waits for the rest. For the 'but' or the 'and' or the continuation whereby she invalidates the understanding. She waits but it never comes. Somehow those two words give her more comfort than an entire empire of fire and lightning ever gave her.

Perhaps the oddest thing of all to Ty Lee is all the smiling. Everywhere they go, as they wander all about the village late at night, the people beam at them. The people are so happy to see 'Asuna' with someone. She steers them away from the talkative ones to avoid the awkward small talk. Ty Lee wonders if Azula has ever in her life had an environment like this one. Somewhere that people adore her and support her and genuinely want to see her happy. It's almost disorienting.

"So," Azula cuts through her thoughts as they approach the outskirts of town. "What's my fuddy duddy brother up to these days?"

"Ah, well," Ty Lee takes a deep breath in. She looks out across the night sky as she explains, "He and Mai had a child. A daughter, actually."

"Oh?"

"Yeah, I wasn't sure if that news would've reached all the way out here or not."

"No, it hadn't," Azula mumbles. "Does she have a name?"

"They named her Izumi."

"Huh," Azula huffs. "A little future female Fire Lord. Just like I always dreamed."

Ty Lee speaks her mind. "All day I've been daydreaming about what you do here."

Azula cocks her eyebrow at her. They step together onto the bridge out of Lanxi.

"I just imagine you going on all these adventures here. Having fun. Going to a bar and taking a girl, or a guy home."

It's prying. Azula knows it. Ty Lee knows it. Azula shakes her head. "Never guys, and not any girls out here either."

Without saying it, in unison they come to a stop at the center of the bridge. Azula turns to the edge and leans on the railing, her fist clasped in her free hand. Ty Lee grips the railing with both hands and stares out. Deep below them water splashes against the rock. People pass them going both ways on the bridge, in and out of town.

Ty Lee sits in quiet contemplation at first. However, she begins looking around at the people passing them. They're all so ordinary. Plain. Normal.

"What happened to us?" Ty Lee asks as she watches the Earth Kingdom folks passing by. She whines, "I used to be like them."

"Like what?" Azula asks. She looks over her shoulder at some of the people. "Poorly dressed?"

Ty Lee snorts briefly. Azula smiles at her own joke. Her eyes peel back to Ty Lee and linger a moment. She tells her grey eyed friend, "You were never like them. You only thought you were."

"No, I had a life," Ty Lee insists. The sea breeze blows with the winter air, stinging their faces and turning their cheeks red. "I was innocent and pure and I had sisters and the Kyoshi Warriors. I had a routine."

After a pause to think about it, Azula asks her, "Do you still want that stuff?"

Ty Lee sighs. She stares out into space. She replies, "When I try to think of my future, I just see your face over and over again."

While this may be a romantic comment, Azula can't stop herself. Suppressing a laugh she looks sideways at her and says, "It's a very beautiful face."

Again both women laugh. Azula asks the question that haunts her at night. "Did I ruin your life?"

She stops herself. She thinks. She decides to ask anyway. Azula adds, "Do you think I'm a monster?"

"You are so many things." Ty Lee tells her.

Azula isn't satisfied with this response. She bites her lower lip and then replies, "That doesn't answer my question."

Ty Lee nods, looking towards Azula but out into space. Her mind turns it over in her head. She finally answers, "I think we all have monsters inside of us. It's just that most people manage to keep theirs hidden."

Azula barely suppressed a chortle. "I certainly haven't."

"And neither have I," Ty Lee admits.

"I think my monster encourages your monster." Azula says, eyes turning to the brunette.

A smile of acknowledgment dawns on Ty Lee's face. She looks into those golden eyes. "I think I wanted it to?"

They look into each other's eyes for a moment. Ty Lee leans back and looks around the bridge again, at the world around her. "Help me," she says, turning to Azula. "Help me make it stop."

"So no more awkward slow dances?" Azula jokes. She grows more serious and tells her, "If that's really what you want, it's not that hard."

Azula remains leaning forward over the bridge railing. She looks out at the expanse of blackness. Ty Lee scoffs. "You gonna tell me to jump?"

"No. You'll die if you jump, dum dum." Azula replies instantly. She adds, "It's easier than that."

She finally leans away from the railing. She turns her whole body and faces Ty Lee. "Stand up straight and look at me."

Azula reaches her hands out and grabs Ty Lee's shoulders. She stiffens her up and holds her in place. Ty Lee is confused but does as she's instructed. She stands to her fullest height, rising above the shorter girl with golden eyes.

"Now turn the other way."

"Huh?"

"And I'll turn this way."

Cautiously, Ty Lee does as she's told. She turns and now faces the direction of the bridge that faces the exit while Azula faces the direction leading into the village. She doesn't say anything at first. Ty Lee continues doing as she was told. She faces away from Lanxi, away from Azula. No further instructions come.

"Now what?"

With a gulp, Azula explains, "Now we walk and we never look back."

There is no movement. Ty Lee isn't sure if she should protest. She had asked for this. She had asked for help and to be free. Azula stays as long as Ty Lee does but she knows she must not. She steels herself and readies her resolve. Azula says just two final words.

"Just walk."

In unison they both take a cautious step away. With their backs no longer against each other, the second step is easier. The third is even easier. Each step is less worrisome. There is no fear of rejection because the other party is gone. Out of sight and out of mind. On the fourth step their minds rapid-fire through their lifetime of memories, experiences, and moments together. Everything that brought them to this moment. Everything that led them to walking away from each other.

The fifth step is when Azula stops. She is far enough away now. If she stops now, Ty Lee will never know. She won't hear her, she won't feel her. She could turn back and look, but she is afraid to do so.

`What if she keeps walking? What if she leaves and never comes back?'

Ty Lee stops on the fifth step. She did not come this far to only come this far. She accepts the darkness of Azula, and wants to bring it light. She wants to be the one to bring her back from the brink. She turns around.

'Please turn around. Please turn around.'

Azula has denied herself this moment for so long. She has never deserved it, and she certainly doesn't deserve it right now. But she can not let Ty Lee disappear into the night. She must follow her into the dark. She turns around.

Standing thirty feet away is the woman who has never left her life. The one who has lived in her dreams. They smile at one another. Neither one could let the other go. Neither could walk away. They can not 'just walk.'

Azula turns her body around and takes the first step back. Ty Lee sees her take the leap of faith and does the same. These women from the Fire Nation start with careful steps towards one another, but they can not just walk. They run. They run faster than they ever did when they chased each other around the world.

Azula leaps forward and Ty Lee reaches her hands up. She catches her out of the air and spins in place, holding her up for a 180 degree turn. She puts her back down on her feet. Both smile. Azula's hands slide from Ty Lee's shoulders up to her face. Ty Lee's hands slip under Azula's arms, knitting in her back, and pulling her forward.

Their lips meet at last in a passionate embrace a lifetime in the making.

A/N: It's. About. Damn. Time. Am I right?! So, normally I do my big A/N after Chapter 1, but it felt emotionally more appropriate to do it here, after Chapter 2. We're reaching a tonal shift with Chapter 2 that signals a very different kind of story in TLDOL than in EOFAL. I'm super, super excited to share this book with you all. Full disclosure, I haven't technically finished writing it yet, but I only have like 3 chapters left to write so I should be able to knock them out before they come up on the release schedule. In any case, there have been a lot of major things that have happened both to me and with this story since we closed up shop in Book 1. As far as the story goes, I made the change from 3 books to 5 books, to break things up and make it flow better and because I think it will prove to be more natural breaks for the reader than my previously jam-packed 3 books. Much of the planned content has remained the same, I haven't drastically altered the long-term plan. Basically, my plan was for Book 2 and Book 3 (of the new 5 book set) to just be super long chapters in the middle of Book 2 (of the original 3 book set). But as I was writing and planning everything for Book 2 and 3, it just became HUGE and way too much for individual chapters. So here we are now, with a 5 book planned arc of Dragon Empress: The Legend of Azula. As for my personal life, well, I got a new job and moved across the country. I've been in that new job for 5 months now and, to be completely honest, it has not gone well. It just was not what I thought I was signing up for. So work has been much harder and stressful. I've had some personal health things that have come up including a planned surgery in a few months, and all of it is combining to significantly slow down my writing rate. At my old job, I was a master of everything and so I was able to write a few paragraphs while on the clock because I had everything under control. That's not the case in this new place so things are just different. What isn't different though is my dedication to writing this story and sharing it with the world! It will just be slower than expected. I hope you all are OK with that and willing to wait on it. Alright, so, final things: I have warned y'all that there would be time skips and that will be happening throughout Book 2. I'm not in the weeds as much, instead telling the story of Azula's life with time passing in between. But y'all… y'all are finally getting what you always wanted from me: Tyzula fluff. GET READY! This chapter's OST is "Sick of Losing Soulmates" by dodie.

Love always. Tyzula forever.

Notorious