Azula was filing her nails.
She had polished them blood-red, dyed a glowing orange in the reflection of the fire-filled sunset. She had relinquished her attire, her lavish dresses, her jewelry, her smooth satin; clothed only in a delicate crimson robe, tied with a gold cord, she looked slender and intoxicating in the late light, black hair free across her pale shoulders, eyes like soft rings of gold. She was relaxed, and poised, and unconcerned, sitting so quietly and easily in her chair. The room had a dark green rug that was singed in some areas, old stains of blood like puddles of poured wine. Most of the furnishings were ruined, tables splintered apart, curtains ripped, an ornate mirror smashed and thrown to the floor. Among the lingering chaos she sat alone, looking out a wall made of three massive, ceiling-high windows, all broken and shattered and lying in pieces at her feet. The orange light from the horizon reflected in glitters on the shards, illuminating her, a thousand miniature stars before her bare feet. It made her look gentle, innocent, alluring as the night fell; the only sound that betrayed her was the sharp, stinging sound of the file as it ran along the edge of her vicious nail.
She did not pause when Mai walked slowly into the room, imperceptible and empty as a ghost.
Azula was aware, and impassive. She knew what had taken place behind closed doors that night, and disregarded it. She had seen Zhanu creep through the desolate house they now abode in; their was little need for his guidance in the field now, as her army was spread far over the Union's borders under various terrified and loyal Captains. Azula was receiving delightful daily reports on the carnage at the front, and the destructive success of her rogue army. Zhanu, now, could fancy his focus to other things, quieter things, things that betrayed no fear or love, things that walked into rooms like ghosts.
It had, at first, been muffled sounds, debates. There had been one cry of protest from the heiress of Niraj, and one only.
Zhanu had taken her. Azula knew it as well as she knew the blue-curled fire in her veins, the soft curve of her sharp nails. There had been no ceremony, no subtilty; color had flushed to her cheeks, and the red hue against her white skin had poisoned him with desire.
"Zhanu finally get to you?"
It was a trick. Because Zhanu had crept through the desolate house, searching, yearning with all his eager and detestable desires, his secret fancies. Yet he had not found her, had not discovered the delights of his dark beauty. For - drawn, compelled, but for all the world devoid of longing, as mindless as water running inevitably to the sea - she had found him.
"I went to him. I wanted him," it had been meant to sound mechanical, but her voice shook. Even Azula could not distinguish it as desire, or regret, and bothered by this strange reaction, she stopped filing and lifted her nails to examine them in the dim light.
"Careful, Mai. Zhanu likes you the way you are. If you start to show any vulnerability... any weakness... well," and she raised the brazen tool to her fingers again to resume her work. "We may both lose interest in you."
Mai did not move. Her body was stiff, and her hair had only just been hastily bundled back into place. It was the first time she had ever looked vaguely unkept, less than the polished, cold perfection that she was comfortable with - and though she would not reveal it in her steps, in the way she moved, Azula knew one thing more.
Mai was sore. Sore where his hands had grabbed her, leaving those flowering, purple and blue stains on her white skin; sore were his lips had crushed against hers, regardless of force, animalistic; sore and bruised along the insides of her thighs, in her soft and secret spaces.
"...He took more than I offered," she said after a long while.
"That's better to hear," a very sharp, piercing smile curved at the edge of her lip. "Somewhat a shame, though... having you as an in-law would have been charming. Still - Zhanu is a fine runner-up."
"Your brother was never of my rank," Mai said it coldly, disdainfully, and her eyes were unreadable again.
"Neither was I. How do you explain us now?"
The heiress of Niraj chanced a side glance at the firebender, but did not move. A silent and agitated flame burned inside Mai because of the strength that dwelled within Azula; it was a power unfit for someone of her class, someone in the lower orders. How she had been blessed with such a wicked tongue and deadly flame surpassed Mai's ability to comprehend, knowing only that this woman - this woman of Agni, this fire-breather - was somehow upsetting, changing the laws of the world. Her agitation would need to be short-lived. She could remain obedient to this woman as long as it suited her, as long as it kept her safely above the laws that she had been molded from. She had no other desire than this, to remain as she was: cold, powerful, beautiful, and absolutely desired. An ice goddess.
"There was nothing I could gain from Zuko," she said it in a bored, disconnected tone. "Zhanu is harsh, but he is powerful. He is worthy."
"And what if my brother became worthy?" Azula was toying with the idea more than actually considering it. Often now Acchai entered her thought, entertained her in some strange way, but she still could not lend enough credit to her
Mai stared out the broken windows for a long time. The affections of Zuko had never gone unnoticed upon her - such a thing was impossible, as the rapt adoration of the firebender had been a constant reality from her childhood. She had never, of course, overly entertained the idea of any serious courtship with the man. The impropriety of it was plain; Zuko had been expelled from his house at thirteen, and was as desolate as any serf that used to labor at her father's estate. Her heart had felt for him, of course. Felt for him in the way she felt for the sick, or the poor, felt for him with pity - because truly, how could the poor man resist her? She had poured much into the iced perfection of her graces, into the stunning, queenlike aura of her beauty. She knew of the men who longed for her, had seen the way their eyes followed her in the street. She was their pagan goddess, so much colder and refined than the demonic fire that was Azula, but no less potent. How could Zuko resist her? At least she had given him some comfort in her attentions. At least she had shown him affection enough. She had shown him such great courtesy, such respect, in pretending to consider him.
"Your brother will never be worthy. Of that I will always be certain," she said at last. Azula's wicked smile was beautiful. Enchanting.
"You give the perfect answers, Mai of Niraj. Now awaken your lover and bring him down, will you?"
Azula stood from her chair, slipped the nail file into her pocket. She walked through the broken glass towards the door without looking down, without once cutting her bare feet.
Mai did as she was instructed. She drifted to the room where Zhanu slept, still, mustering every fiber of her being to remain calm, and cold, and collected. She found, however, that when she came to the doorway of the bedchamber, she could not enter.
"Azula requests us."
The room was dark and dim, and she could see his figure move in the sheets. She did not wait for him to rise and dress; she followed after Azula's shadow without even hearing his response, reminded vividly, suddenly, unhappily of the soreness in her body.
Azula was waiting for her down a long, beautiful flight of steps. The house was old and large, and would have been pleasantly beautiful if not for the havoc Azula's amy had wreaked upon it; it had once belonged to a noble family of Tsi-Nau, and a fairly decent one, actually, with a pleasant four-year old daughter and well-treated servants. After refusing to join in Azula's campaign, the earthbending family was slaughtered by Azula's forces, another couple casualties on their ceaseless sweep across the city. Azula herself was waiting quietly, if impatiently, before the doorway to one of the house's great parlors. The windows had been bordered up and the door was locked, and barred, and burned.
Zhanu drifted down the steps a few moments later. His eyes sought immediately for Mai, for what reaction she would have to him now, after he had inspired such terrible passions and fears in her - left her sore, bruised, torn. But she remained cool, and calm, staring lazily at the barred door with unreadable eyes. The demon in Zhanu writhed, desired to terrify her again.
"Zhanu, I'd enjoy if your father and my father became reacquainted. Could you see to it?" Azula put off the confrontation between the new lovers. Between the rapist and the willing victim.
She entered with Mai, as Zhanu's insides flared with triumph, with the knowledge that he possessed the ice-goddess, and left to seek his father. The room was dark but mostly in tact; this parlor had not seen Azula's forces, the death of a four-year-old. Most of the furniture remained whole and unbroken, having been pushed up against the walls, against the boarded windows which shut out the orange sunset. Only one piece of furnishing remained in the midst of the room; a velvet-lined, red-oak chair, flawless and polished and perfect.
The only sounds that came from the room was the haunting call of wind whistling through cracks in the walls, and the low, ragged breathing that resembled a ghosts feigned attempt at life. It was music to Azula, and hell's chorus to Mai as she shut the door behind them.
There was an unconscious man hanging upside down from the ceiling. His long, gray hair was ratty and matted and crusted against his face, against the bruised and swollen skin. He was stripped to his waist and decorated with a wide and impressive variety of wounds, of varying ages and kinds, cuts and bruises and burns and the occasional whiplash; he looked as though he had been tortured for some time, his wrists hanging down towards the floor, chaffed from iron cuffs, one shoulder joint hanging slightly out of socket. His right eyes was swollen and crusted shut, his torso a canvas of blue and purple, scarred randomly and suddenly great, white-hot knives, half-healed and was a puddle of drying blood beneath him on the stone floor, and two broken teeth. White stars in a red sea.
"Cut him down," Azula sat lightly in the velvet-lined, red-oak chair.
Mai's dagger flashed, and the man fell hard to the floor. Had the fall been greater and the floor less softened with carpet, his neck would have broken from the angle of his descent; as it was, he only fell with a rattling groan, a strained and inhuman sound. The man had been arrested and tortured for inciting rebellion amongst Azula's troops, for acquiring tactical information for the side of the Chosen King. For trying to stop her unholy crusade, her conquest.
Her destiny.
"I'm terribly sorry father couldn't be here, Uncle. He's got such a terrible cough, you know."
The man did not move. He remained lying on the floor before his neice, uttering one groan. Azula seemed to take this as a question.
"Oh - it was the coal mines he used to work in, in his younger days. You remember? No? Oh, no - you were off traveling, I think. You often were, weren't you?"
Iroh shifted on the ground, rolled onto his side so he could look at his niece. Even with one eye swollen nearly shut, he could see the picture of her sitting in the half-dark; her frame shaped by the crimson robe with the gold cord, as though she was at home after supper, readying for a bath, relaxing. As though she had no care or thought for the ruined house she stood in, the fires still burning in the streets, the war, the slaughtered four-year-old. Her black hair - the same as Ursa's beautiful, sleek black hair - trailing down across her young shoulder, and her deceptive golden eyes. Filled with innocence, with patience, with rage, with passion, with lies. It made him sick, made him mindful of the own wretched evil that dwelled in the blood of their family, the twisted destinies and dooms. It made him sick, the gorgeous, angelic curve of her red lips as she smiled at him, marred by her white, white teeth, like fangs.
"Oh Uncle, you used to talk so much back home. Such wonderful stories. I miss it, you know..."
Her tone was mocking. Cruel.
Iroh remained still and silent, cold eyes staring at his wicked neice. It was all he could do, to sit and stare and wait.
Dried blood in the spaces between his teeth. In the gap.
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Jet paced down the dock, his boots heavy and echoing against the frozen planks. The Tribesmen had found Longshot's body and carried him away, still and bloody and lifeless. He kept to the shadows and tried to ignore the pounding in his skull, in his chest, in every fiber of his being. Something gone so horribly and terribly wrong, drowned in the honey and venom of crimson lips, gold eyes, lies. Jet's body shook. He made a misstep, wavered on the ice a moment, trembled where he stopped and stood. He tried to piece back together the fragments of his mind, tried to recall some form of himself that was not consumed with Azula, with fire and passion and blood.
He saw them in his hands, fragments of his broken mind, pieces glowing red in the light of the rising sun. Glowing too red against his skin, scattered pieces. Red like the life he'd drawn from Longshot, from now-empty veins. He stared blindly at the fragments and, distraught, frustrated, shaking, forced his hands together. Tried to make them fit back the way they once had.
He only clapped, echoed coldly in the ice-coated lane.
The pieces wouldn't fit anymore.
He panicked, did it again, clapped again. The pieces still weren't fitting. Desperate, threatening to break for the first time, Jet's face fell into an expression of panicked despair and he began to wildly, repeatedly, violently clap his hands together, to try and make the pieces fit. He whimpered, tears in his eyes, tiny drops of still-wet blood springing from his hands onto the white ground. His clapping became loud, forced, filling up the lane - his own terrible, mocking applause as his brother's body was carted away.
You are my warrior.
He froze, hands poised halfway to clap again. He felt Azula filling his broken mind, felt her sowing the pieces back together with iron-hot needles, with hatred and blood. She would be furious at his failure to kill the Avatar. She would become a wraith of vengeance, cursing and screaming and scaring the side of his face with her perfect, lethal, vicious nails. Bloody, parallel cuts in his cheek with red nail polish left in the wounds.
And something in the thought made him go still again. Reclaimed the crooked pieces of his mind.
It was then he heard Kimba shout:
"Hahn! Get off of me - !"
There were sounds of struggle, of strife. Jet was so used to those sounds he often dreamed about them.
He crept through the lane toward the source of the noise, steps silent and light now instead of his previous, heavy trod. He found his way to a dawn-lit lane where the forms of two people - one female, one male, if he guessed rightly at their shapes beneath the furs - were trapped in argument. The male had his hand clasped firmly, painfully firmly, on the wrist of the girl.
"Where do you think you're going?" he spat at her. The sound was like a wolf-bat's snarl in Jet's ears.
"Away from you! Get off!"
"You little bitch. You can't run from me. We're promised –"
The man seemed unimportant, but something about the girl pulled at Jet's memory. Tortured and crazed and unable to discern the reality playing out before him, he imagined he was in Balda Haram. He imagined, suddenly, that Longshot and Smellerbee and Zuko were there, weaving their way through earthbender recruits, the ground muddy and slick from rain. He saw Kimba's deep brown hair pulled back in a ponytail, her breasts swelled beneath the furs, the brown coloring of her eyes. He was reminded of... of something deep, and painful, and beautiful... of... reminded of...
Jin.
Hahn was blindsided, his shoulder torn open to the bone, butchered by Jet's hooks. Before he could utter a cry, before he could even fully release the screaming Kimba, the sword was hooked in his shoulder, throwing him back into the iced lane. Blood followed him like a trail as he skidded away, Jet placing himself silently, confusedly, between the Prince of the Eel Clan and the waterbender.
Hahn howled in pain, in terror, a hollow and empty howl that belonged only to the throat of cowards and rats. Trembling, forgetting any desire he had for Kimba, he staggered up and fled from the monstrous figure of Jet, howling as he went. Jet watched him go, felt the desire to pursue, to hunt, to get blood for his blades -
He was stopped by her hand on his arm.
"Thank you," she breathed. The hollowness of Jet's eyes did not escape her, but she was too flustered from Hahn's assault to let it truly frighten her. Jet only stared at the girl, stared emptily and furiously.
She was not Jin.
"Who... who are you?"
Jet stared at her and did not answer. He could see her eyes trying not to stray to his red-lined blades, to the torn, bloody state of his clothing. Longshot's blood. She swallowed, he saw, tried to convince herself that this man was good, despite his state - that he had, after all, just saved her. Give him a chance. A second chance to turn you into a devil.
"...You're not from here, are you?" she said.
Jet of Hu Shin. Son of a miller. The truth, about...
Like pieces of orange-colored glass before bare feet. Like a dam breaking, exploding, water rushing... like things forgotten.
Katara was loading a small fishing boat that belonged to a friend of Kimba's father. She had asked him, kindly and sweetly, to take it out for an early-morning training session with Katara, who was behind in their class. He had consented, and rightly so; Kimba was a good girl who never got into trouble much, who's mother had died, honorably, by struggling to save the souls in the Black Lane. He warned them to stay off the south currents and stay close to the port, but Kimba had already run off in haste.
They had only what necessities they could bear, as they would need to propel the boat for most of the trip using their waterbending. It would be a dangerous journey to land beyond the Northern Waste, and even more treacherous in skirting the Empire and reaching the Desert and Acchai. But Katara's heart was beating so loudly in her ears at the thought of being reunited - reunited - with Zuko that everything else seemed dim and unimportant. A million thought rushed through her skull and each of them was more incredulous, or womanly, or ridiculous than the last: What will he do when he sees me? What should I do? Would he want me to kiss him? Will he be happy? Will he remember me?
And then, the worst question would always surface, and she'd have to focus on packing again: Will he still want me?
So, when Kimba finally arrived, Katara was eager an impatient to leave. And when she saw the tall, dark, slumped, brooding, wide-eyed, red-soaked man following at her heels, her heart sank to the bottom of her feet.
"Kimba... who's, um..." something about Jet made Katara's stomach move unpleasantly, made her hands shake a little. Unlike Kimba, Katara had seen madmen before, driven wild by the war-lands and the heat of Acchai. Yet Jet's madness was a different kind than she was accustomed, and she could not at once place why she feared him so. Aside, of course, from the bloody clothing and the hooked swords.
"This man - I think he should come with us," Kimba said, hesitantly. Katara opened her mouth, to laugh beneath the niqab, but suddenly saw the hollowness in Jet's eyes.
"Ha - What?" Katara stared wildly at the dark-haired girl, and found herself getting a nauseous, creeping feeling in her stomach. "What the hell is in your head? We can't afford fucking passengers!"
"Please, just listen, he saved me from – from that fucking Eel, Hahn," Kimba mumbled furiously at the Acchain woman. "I'd be raped and beaten right now if not for him. Look, Katara, he's not a Tribesman – he might be Acchain, and we could -"
"What if he's not?!" Katara screeched, before realizing the dark-haired man was beside them. "I'm - I'm sorry, sir, I'm sorry but you need to go back to - to wherever you came from -"
"I'll protect you. I know how to get through to Acchai. I don't need any payment. I don't eat much."
It came from some distant part of Jet, some part of him that was saturated with the cunning ingenuity of Azula. The sound of his voice was powerful, terrifying.
Katara was shocked by it and looked warily at him, but the swordsman could see the wheels turning in her head, trying to envision him as rescuing the distraught Kimba. There were still stains of blood on his shirt and forearms. Longshot's blood. Jet found himself repeating it, over and over, in his head. Longshot's blood.
Longshot's blood.
For a long while Katara locked eyes with Kimba. They communicated in silence, in those secret, subtle ways that often baffled men.
"...You saved Kimba?" Katara finally asked.
Jet nodded. He dare not speak again, for fear of the terror the sound of his voice would bring them.
Katara restrained the need to sigh. Restrained the need to refuse.
"...You saved Kimba..." she repeated to herself, and reached out to take the girl's hand, firmly, as she stepped into the boat.
Jet stepped onto the boat with them, struggling to keep composure. He wanted to clap again. To try and force the pieces back together.
Longshot's blood.
From somewhere in the back of his mind, in a forgotten corner, Jet saw a boy trapped in a closet. He was scraped, and burned across his left hand, and there was a massive helmet on his seven-year-old head. He was scribbling furiously on a torn piece of parchment.
…tink Long Shot is ded. He on the floor, Smellr Be crys...