Chapter 2

Azula stayed in bed until noon, her sleep disturbed three times by nightmares. In the first, Father was whipping Aang, she defended him, and got whipped herself for it. In the second, Father directed his lightning at her, and she met it with her own, only to find herself stabbed in the back. She lay facedown, feeling the life ebbing from her and wondering who had stabbed her, Mai or Aang. In the third, the waterbender checked her injuries just as old Yoroh had, gloating nastily the whole time. "From now on, every day you live is a debt you owe me. It might not be long, though. There's something wrong with you that I couldn't fix. You're rotten inside."

When she finally sat up in bed, the first thing she saw was her wedding clothes, hung up and ready for the big day. For a moment, the sight of the elaborately embroidered kimono made her thrill with anticipation, before she remembered. Today was supposed to be the day she put on the most gorgeous garment she had ever seen, and gave herself to Aang. But he had betrayed her and run away with the peasant.

Instead, Azula spent the day preparing for her father's funeral, and her ghosts accompanied her. The sages went through the ceremony with her, telling her where to stand, what to say, how to start the pyre. The whole time, her father filled her ears with complaints that the ceremony would not be as elaborate as his own father's. Ignoring his whines took all her concentration.

Next, she had to spend several hours with lawyers, signing the dozens of papers that they said were necessary for the transfer of power. They insisted that she make up her will, designating a distant cousin as her heir, though she doubted a piece of paper would prevent civil war if she died without a child of her own. Mother fretted about the implication that her girl could die anytime, which made Azula want to snap at her. What do you care, Mother? I'm a monster, remember? I certainly don't care. She could not muster her usual flourish, and each signature became more of a scribble than the last.

And then the archivists and historians made her recount the story of the previous evening's confrontation again, for the official record. She repeated it near perfectly; as a skilled liar, she resisted the impulse to elaborate on her previous testimony. That didn't prevent Mai from scoffing at her, and promising that she would eventually be found out.

Between meetings, she asked the guards for a report, and they told her that the Avatar's bison had disappeared in the night, as she'd known it would. She told the general to command all the troops throughout the world to be on the lookout for the Avatar and his flying beast, and to communicate all sightings directly to her as quickly as possible.

That was when she heard another new voice for the first time.

"You won't find me that way," Aang promised her.

She looked behind her to see him, but he wasn't there. Of course, when she finally heard a voice that she actually wanted to hear, it disappeared.

And then it was dinnertime. Azula sat alone at the long table eating sea soup, roast duck, and saltnose mushrooms—foods she recalled had been planned for the feast that would have been tonight.

The headwaiter interrupted her meal, "My lord, we need to discuss the menu for tomorrow's funeral—"

It almost made her burst out with bitter laughter, as a line from an old play came into her head. Mother had forced her to sit through many boring theatrical productions, but this one stood out in her memory because it was particularly violent. A prince was upset because his mother had remarried too quickly after his father's untimely death, and made a caustic joke about it: "Thrift, thrift! The funeral baked meats did coldly furnish forth the marriage tables."

This was exactly the opposite case: wedding food repurposed for a funeral. Zuzu the theater nerd would have appreciated the thought, as would Mai, who enjoyed dark humor. It was strange that at moments like these, Mai deserted her, appearing only when Azula had made a mistake of some kind. As it was, the lonely new Fire Lord kept the idea to herself, only the merest smile ghosting over her lips, as she wiped them with her napkin. She'd lost her appetite.

"Just serve this. You had plenty ready for the wedding. Don't waste it." She looked around at the empty chairs and realized there was no reason for her to eat alone. "Where is Ty Lee?"

The nervous butler called guards, who searched the palace and reported back that her friend seemed to have disappeared. Clothes and luggage were missing from her room, as if the girl had planned and packed. "Another traitor," she muttered, and stormed off toward her room.

There she saw the wedding kimono again. She had the thought that she could wear it for her coronation, styling herself the bride of the nation, like the first female Fire Lord, Izumi, the Virgin Queen. But that would mean never marrying. It would mean giving up on Aang, and she refused to do that. Besides, when Izumi died childless, the country had been plunged into chaos, and Azula had no intention of leaving that kind of legacy.

Instead, she went next door into Father's room, and searched his closet for the most elaborate raiment she could find. Though it was late, she had her maids fit the cape and ceremonial armor to her smaller body. The armorer was called in to measure the plate for a new fitting. Azula told him to cut down the middle to emphasize her trim waist, and alter the chestpiece to accommodate her breasts. A tailor promised to trim the cape and add a skirt. These changes would emphasize her femininity without diminishing the raw power the armor communicated.

"Wow, Azula!" Ty Lee clapped in delight at the sight of her friend in the mirror. "Only you could make ceremonial armor look so sexy!"

Tears came to her eyes. Raw hurt at her friend's abandonment mixed with gratitude for her presence, and confusion at the contradiction. Somehow Ty Lee had known that what she needed more than anything in this moment was flattery. "Thank you," she murmured, meeting the acrobat's eyes in the mirror.

"You're welcome, my lord," bowed the tailor and his assistant.

Right now, Azula thought she looked like a little girl playing in daddy's clothes, but she knew the craftsmen's good work, and trusted that the final effect would be striking. No one would dare call her a jilted bride in this. She would be crowned with all the splendor of the greatest nation the world had ever known.

The entirety of the following day was devoted to rituals commemorating the late Fire Lord's life. At sunrise, the nation remembered Ozai's birth, at noon his marriage and coronation, at dinner his accomplishments on the throne. Understandably, Azula's emotions were in turmoil the entire day, torn between guilt for her father's murder, relief that he was gone, sadness recalling the times in her childhood when she had basked under his praise, and elated determination, looking forward to her coronation and life as Fire Lord.

When his deeds were enumerated, Ozai was given credit for several military victories that Azula had won herself, she noticed. She constantly had to restrain herself from snapping at her father's petulant voice, as he grumbled about how the celebration was not extravagant enough, and how more people should be weeping at his loss. Not once did he tell her that he would miss being her father, or that he was proud to pass the throne to her.

Azula shed a few decorous tears because everyone expected her to, and she was determined to be the perfect Fire Lord, even starting before her reign officially began. The Fire Sages commented approvingly on her restraint. Her acting certainly deserved high praise. She hadn't been thinking of her father at all, but of a play she'd attended with her mother as a child, in which a faithful old ostrich horse had died. If she had cried for her father, it would have been over the fact that though she had always been secure in her status as her father's favorite child and chosen heir, she had never been more than an instrument to him, a weapon against his enemies and a conduit for his legacy. But if she allowed herself to think about that at all, she would have been reduced to blubbering hysterics, and she had a ceremony to perform.

As the sun set, the crowds gathered below the palace steps to see the new Fire Lord start the funeral pyre for the departed leader. Setting fire to her father's body, Azula imagined herself incinerating everything bad about her father. What would be left, if I burned away the selfishness and avarice and cruelty, she wondered. Her fire turned white-hot, a purifying, quick-burning flame that engulfed the body instantly, as though the sooner she could reduce Ozai's body to ashes, the sooner she could rid herself of the power he still held over her. She stared at her father as he was consumed, until nothing remained but a sickly sweet scent.

"I'm not going anywhere," he promised her, his sinister voice stealing the bit of peace she had felt watching his earthly remains disappear. "For you, my reign will never truly end."

Lieutenant Raiden watched the coronation with interest from his guard post in the rear of the square. Though he had served in the palace guard for a year, he had been assigned only to pace the walls and man the watchtower, not to protect the royal family. He had never seen Azula, daughter of Ozai, in person before, and wondered if she lived up to her reputation: indomitable, imperious, beautiful, and perhaps a bit mad. When she stepped into view in her kingly raiment, she was a breathtaking sight. Bright epaulets broadened her shoulders, making her waist look impossibly small. The fine velvet of her cape trailed behind her grandly. Her upper chest was covered by something red and sparkly, either a jeweled breastplate or a large ruby necklace. Raiden glimpsed a pale thigh through a slit in the long skirt, disappearing into a high, armored boot. The contrast of that bare skin's vulnerability with the austentatious armor intrigued him.

The light of the rising sun gleamed off the crown as the head Fire Sage stuck it into the regent's topknot. As the new Fire Lord lit the brazier with a flame that would be kept burning throughout her reign, the colors of the fire traveled through the entire spectrum, a virtuosic display that the crowd appreciated with "oooh"s and "aaaah"s. A non-bender, Raiden couldn't help but be affected by that little trick; he knew most firebenders could not make their flames hot enough to burn blue or white. The spectacle was so impressive, he could almost believe the crowd would have bowed before her spontaneously, even if he and his men weren't there to compel them to follow custom.

Prodigious? Clearly. Arrogant? Probably. Beautiful? The word is grossly inadequate. But that outfit is unnecessary, he decided. Her commanding presence would have sufficed to win the respect of the nation. Why does she think she needs to put on a show?

Raiden loved his country with a passion, and could not help feeling stirred by the coronation's imagery. He'd enlisted in the national guard searching for adventure and hoping to contribute to the Fire Nation. But during his tour of duty, he had seen things that made him realize that his country's war was an unjust atrocity, a betrayal of its ancient ideals. He had sought and earned a place in the elite palace guard partly so that he would not have to participate directly in the war's cruelties.

Now, his personal definition of patriotism was almost exactly opposite of the way Sozin, Azulon, and Ozai had used the word. It was because of his profound loyalty to his nation's deep history that he felt so disgusted by the way the last three Fire Lords had led it. His former naivete had hardened into a determination to fix the problems he'd been unaware of when he'd signed up to serve. He wanted nothing more than to make the Fire Nation better, to return it to a long-ago golden age before imperialist ventures corrupted it with greed and false chauvinism.

When he mentioned these thoughts to his old sword master, the nobleman had recommended some books and invited him to a meeting of like-minded old men. They had set his mind ablaze with dreams of a more peaceful world, but he couldn't yet see how he could help achieve it, especially from his current position.

In Raiden's heart, jaded patriotism warred with idealistic dismay as he watched the flags waving, and listened to the anthems praising the new Fire Lord. The texts he had been reading recently made him question such displays in a way that few of the people around him ever would. Surely a truly powerful ruler would not need to inspire such awe and fear in their subjects. When leaders show themselves to be wise and generous, they win followers naturally, without shows of force and wealth. Authority comes not from birth or might, but from the support of the people.

Such ideas were dangerous, so Raiden did not voice them, but they excited him as well. The monarchy had been a tradition in the Fire Nation for so long, no one ever questioned it. And up until about a century ago, the Fire Lords were generally benevolent, competent rulers.

What kind of Fire Lord would Azula be? Raiden wondered. If this ceremony were any indication, one just like the last three.

Author's Note: Let me know what you think in a review! Next chapter on Friday. Follow to get notifications.