C A T H A R S I S
a world can't rebuild itself after all.
{maiko}
a/n: i'm sort of high on writing these things at the moment. i'll probably bottom out eventually, but 'tis nice to enjoy things while they last.
drabble title: divine
word count: 736
pairing: MaiZuko
prompt: "james believed he was given the monarchy by God's will. people hated him. the dominion failed. he was chased out of the england."
disclaimer: not now. probably never.
divine
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They were decent leaders, Zuko and Mai. They didn't strike fear into the hearts of their subjects—rather, preached all the right things. They called for rectification, unity, the empowerment of citizens. They were pioneers—given the divine right to rule and to have everything, and they outright rejected it, instead giving power away by the bucket full to commoners and lords alike.
"Anorexic leadership," sneered the nobles, with their noses sharply upturned and wrinkled as though they'd smelled something awful.
But who cared? Mai didn't, and Zuko didn't because Mai taught him apathy.
As was the Fire Nation tradition—and infamy—many risks were taken by dissenters on the royalty's lives. The pair had seen many assassins in their day, and Mai was unimpressed with each and every one of them, convinced that the last was more pathetic than the first. This became a cycle. Zuko would take a stance, real fear coursing through him like he'd jumped into a vat of ice and death, and everything became sudden real. At the same time, Mai stood there, with an expression of complete and utter boredom.
And so it came to pass that the casual, for-hire assassins thought Zuko and Mai invincible. Maybe Agni Himself had given them the power, and that it was His will that they should never be stripped of it. Maybe it was meant to be.
And it's not like they could go against Him or His choices.
One assassin found the couple in their bedroom, sneaking in through an unlocked window. It was a happy coincidence really—a guard had dozed off, stationed outside their grand chamber door. The man, coated with umbrage, was able to find his way around without trouble, sneaking on bare feet and hiding around corners.
When Zuko and Mai brought themselves away and decided to call it a night, Zuko closed the ornate door behind them obliviously. Sleep-deprived, his eyelids drooped, dark and bleary. He collapsed onto the bed.
Mai, however, froze. Something wasn't right.
Her acute senses were unimpaired. With a clatter, mere seconds later, a poison dart came whizzing past her ear. She pulled a secret knife from her hair and spun around, crouched in the deadliest stance she could muster. Zuko jumped from the bedspread with a puff of smoke, jolted, quaking in his boots.
Mai cut the man down and pinned him to the wall. He was helpless against her quick reflexes and lethal aim. She folded her arms across her chest and forced an unhappy stare across her face.
Zuko, on the verge of panic, exclaimed, "What the hell?"
Mai thought that pretty much summed up this encounter. She made a mental note to reprimand the palace guard staff. Whoever was the idiot that let this killer in was…well, an idiot.
Then again, he made her night far more exciting.
The assassin dared gape at both of them directly in the eyes, a thin cut across his cheek dripping scarlet blood across the stone floor.
Mai demanded the room not be carpeted when she acquired the throne and all its entitlements. She liked the frozen texture on her thin soled shoes—and the effect was unexpected, not too dissimilar from black ice. Now she rolled her eyes.
"I hope you know you're fated to die," she murmured, looking at the man with pungent apathy in her soul, painted across her features.
He didn't twitch.
Mai shrugged. Zuko burned on.
Zuko wanted to kill the man, but Mai said, "Don't bother. He'll suffer a worse fate when they torture answers from him."
Resigned, Zuko nodded. Punishments should fit their crimes. A flash of fear sloshed through the assassins eyes.
Mai said, "It's been a strange night."
The assassin was hauled away, kicking and screaming. His defiance fallen through. He thought himself sane and the Fire Lady bat-shit insane. She didn't disagree.
Zuko's eyes were blurry. The dark circles were so extreme that they made his nose look broken and swollen.
Mai wrenched her knifes from the wall, noting the material covering the floor. It would have to be fixed first thing in the quickly-approaching morning.
Zuko fell with the moon, collapsing once more onto the elaborate sheets of their bed.
Mai lay awake for the carcass of the night, contemplating but never vocalizing. For a while, light streamed in through the still-open window, and she had no inkling of where it hailed.
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