Of Fire

by FeiFei08

A child was born to the princess of the Fire Nation, a miracle that has the spirit world rejoicing. But will Azula accept the child that is hers or will her Ty Lee leave with the child and never return? And what is her purpose in this world?

19. Chapter 19

Of Fire

Chapter 19

A/N: FYI: Detia changes from speaking verbally to mental fluidly.

~Day 1~

The sun was high, beating down on the deck of the Royal Fire Navy vessel with a vengeance. Not that the three children sitting on the deck at one of the bolted down tables noticed. They had been sitting there for a few hours, though the ship had set sail only half an hour ago. Yuna sighed, fanning herself with a metal fan; her cards were lying on the table as they had been for the past twenty minutes – seeing as she had forfeited. From her expression she was bored out of her mind. They had been playing the lower class card game for long enough in her opinion, of course when Angi pulled out the deck of cards that was long enough for her as well. Currently, Angi's expression was cross as she looked down at her one card, then back at Detia's neutral expression and her two cards. Slowly, a tanned hand moved over to Detia's cards and pulled one out of the set.

She looked at it as a sly smirk crossed Detia's face. "Fuck!" Angi yelled, gaining the attention of some of the crew members as she slammed her cards on the table and glared at the lightning bender. "How the hell do you keep beating me! This is my game. I made it up!"

'Apparently you're not very good at it.' Detia offered, still smiling smugly as she set her card on the table and Yuna chuckled.

For a second the fire bender was lost for actual words, mumbling angrily and running her hands through her wild black hair. "I hate you." She finally said, sitting heavily back in her chair. "I hate you so much."

'Aw, you're just saying that.' Detia remarked, batting her eyes with a hand on her chest.

"You're just mad because she's kicking your ass at this stupid game." Yuna pointed it out, crossing one leg over the other.

Angi huffed, crossing her arms angrily. "How long am I going to have to suffer through your combined presence on this ship?"

'You could always go to the bowels of the ship. We're not likely to go there.' Detia suggested.

"Smart ass." Angi huffed.

Detia laughed silently. 'Three days at the most.'

"Princess." A servant-girl, probably only four or five years older than Detia, approached the lightning bender cautiously. Detia turned to her. "Your mother wishes to see you."

Detia nodded and stood, patting Angi's head as she passed. 'You calm down while I'm gone, okay.'

Angi snapped her teeth at Detia's hand, making the lightning bender chuckle. Yuna and Angi shared a look when Detia's whole form suddenly became serious, her steps more determined and deliberate. With a smirk, Angi tilted her head towards Detia in a nod. Yuna mimicked the look and nodded. While Detia couldn't read their minds she was aware of them following her. She made a show of walking down the halls, purposefully going the longest way possible. At least, that was half the reason. Part of her was afraid of what her parents were so distressed about. So when she finally made it to their door before knocking she took a deep breath. Ty Lee's voice beckoned her in.

She closed the door heavily behind her, catching sight of the golden dragon curled up sleeping in the corner – grey smoke rising from her nose. But it was her mother who concerned her. Azula was sitting on the side of her bed, back facing the wall with her head in her hands. Detia couldn't be sure but it looked like the older woman was actually crying. She had never seen her mother cry. 'Mommy?' Detia questioned as Ty Lee touched her shoulder and shook her head. But Detia squared her shoulders and rounded the bed till she was facing her mother. "Mother?" the lightning bender said. When Azula didn't respond Detia touched her shoulder. "What happened?"

"I can't bend." Azula stated, looking up at her daughter – her eyes dry.

Detia smiled, looking her mother square in the eye and said, "You can't bend fire. Have you tried lightning?"

"Lightning is an extension of Fire. If I can't bend fire I can't bend lightning." Azula reasoned as she placed her head back in her hands, so distraught that she wasn't actually thinking about what she was saying and only repeating what had been drilled into her since before she could walk.

"Is it?" Detia countered.

"Of course it…" Azula yelled as her eyes met her daughters' warm golden ones and remembered that Detia could never Fire bend but she could manipulate lightning. "…no, no it isn't."

Detia nodded. 'Are you willing to try?'

"I…" Azula stopped, she had never actually tried to bend lightning on a small scale. So she hesitated as she tried to remember how Detia did it. She guessed that it was like Fire bending but when she tried to reach into herself and pull the fire to her hand nothing happened. There was no fire there. The ex-princess sighed in defeat. "I can't"

'I didn't know that was in your vocabulary.' Detia laughed lightly. 'You're doing it wrong. You're assuming that lightning bending is similar to fire bending and it is. But then again all bending styles are similar.' The little girl set beside her mother. 'When you bend with fire you find the source here.' She touched her chest, feeling her own heart beat rhythmically. 'Fire is an element of soul. So it's only natural that you would draw from there. But lightning is an element of mind and soul. When you bend lightning you have to pull from here' she touched her head 'and here.' She touched her chest. 'That's why there were so few lightning benders, even when we were a people. It's not an easy thing to learn. But after a while it becomes second nature.'

"How do I do that?" Azula asked, only a little embarrassed because she was asking her ten-year old daughter for advice on bending.

'You know how. You've been doing it for a while.' Detia laughed lightly at Azula's confused look. 'You mean that you didn't even know that you weren't bending fire when were training together?'

"I didn't realize." Azula said lightly, unable to stop herself from smiling at her child seemingly contagious expression.

Azula opened her palm again and remembered training with her daughter, the calm and pride she felt watching her offspring mimicking her every move perfectly, then go off and do a ridiculously difficult form and making it look so easy. The energy that flowed through her body to her hand was hotter than any fire she had ever created but it was soothing and cooled her being, engulfing her very spirit. She looked at her hand, finding a small ball of electricity in it.

'See how easy that was.' Detia smile's widened as she closed her hand over her mother's smothering the ball, intertwining their fingers. The little girl's expression suddenly drew serious, 'You've been hurt in a way no one should be. But you're my mom and as such you are strong. We'll get through this.'

Azula laughed lightly, pulling her child into a hug – ignoring the heavy metal silk that still wrapped around Detia's thin form as it scratched lightly at her skin. It surprised Azula when she first saw her child wearing the heavy silk but not enough to inquire further about it after she asked where Detia got it. "Spirits, you are so much like Ty Lee."

'I try my best.' Detia admitted. 'I can teach you how to lightning bend, kinda like me.'

"Only kinda?" Azula questioned, both Ty Lee and Detia relieved to see a slight spark return to her golden eyes.

'I'm a goddess.' Detia reasoned. 'The things I do, normal lightning benders can't do.'

Azula nodded, "We'll see. Tomorrow morning we'll start my re-training."

"After noon," Detia corrected verbally. "You need your sleep."

"You need to stop worrying about me. I'm the parent here." She said, kissing her daughter's head.

Detia laughed pushing against her mother, glancing over to her mommy who had been sitting quietly next to the still sleeping Sunstone. Her smile grew wider at her mommy's joyful expression. Ty Lee watched as her daughter reached for her, easily moving to sit on the opposite side of the child. Azula smiled at her wife, leaning over her daughter to kiss the woman – knowing full well that Detia did not like to be in the middle when they did things like that – and gripped tighter to her daughter's hand when she tried to escape. 'No fair!' Detia cried out as she tried to get away.

Ty Lee giggled as she pulled away from the kiss, even though she really didn't want to. She looked down at her child's cross expression and noticed a scroll tucked neatly in her belt and slightly under the silk armor. "What's this?" Ty Lee asked, pulling the scroll from Detia's belt.

'Oh!' she almost called out verbally, so glad for the change of subject. 'That's my certificate.' Detia answered.

"Certificate for what?" Azula asked, taking the scroll from Ty Lee and easily breaking the seal. Detia didn't answer as Azula read over the scroll and gasped. She handed the scroll back to Ty Lee and only looked at her daughter. "You graduated?" She questioned after Ty Lee finished reading the scroll.

Detia nodded. "How?" Ty Lee questioned. "That's four years ahead of everyone else."

The lightning bender shrugged and replied, 'I had all the final exams given to me today. That's why I ran off. I didn't have to take most of them; the teachers just stamped the paper with a perfect score and left.'

Azula squeezed her daughter's hand, unable to find the words for how proud she was. "That's amazing." The acrobat said lightly, still unable to believe what she was seeing. She looked at Detia then back at the certificate and note the principal had written stating his congratulations.

'This way I won't have to go to school in the Earth Kingdom.' Detia said with a smile, the thought of never going to school ever again making her oh so happy. She stood, her hand still in her mother's 'I should probably see to my friends before they break the door down.' Azula chuckled, vaguely hearing voices on the other side of the door. 'You should sleep; I'm not going easy on you tomorrow.'

"I wouldn't expect anything less." Azula admitted, letting go of her daughter's hand.

Detia stopped in front of her Mommy and pulled the scroll away from her face, making her look up. She kissed the woman who gave birth to her on the forehead and said, 'You should go to sleep too. You've had a rough day.'

Ty Lee frowned but pulled Detia into a hug. "Yes, mother." She mocked lightly, making Detia chuckle. "Congratulations, my smart little girl. You should probably get to bed earlier than you usually do too. Today's been rough for everyone."

Detia nodded, pulling away from her Mommy and making her way to the door. Her parents watched passively as she stood at the door for a second then threw it open. Both of her friends fell to the floor unceremoniously, looking up at the lightning bender sheepishly. "It was her idea." The pale girl accused quickly, earning her a jab in the ribs.

"You went along with it!" The tanned child yelled.

Detia smiled at her parents before her expression turned cross. 'Out' she said simply, pointing a finger towards the door.

As if they were being punished, both Yuna and Angi stood and walked away from the door, Detia following close behind them and closing the door behind her. The lightning bender smiled when she heard both of her parents start to chuckle. The sound of silk covers moving told her that they were taking her advice and going to sleep. "You're parents are awesome." Angi said, drawing Detia's attention away from her parents.

'I know.' Detia answered. 'That's why they are my parents. So, what do you guys want to do?'

Yuna raised her pale hand and replied, "I want to braid your hair."

"What?' Angi and Detia chorused.

Detia had never had her hair braided before, which was odd considering Ty Lee braided her hair all the time. Yue had even tried to convince her to let her do it but Detia had refused, at the time having better things to do than sit around letting people mess with her hair. But now that she didn't have anything better to do 'Okay.' Detia replied, the jaw-dropping look that Angi gave her a major bonus in her decision.

"Shut up, Angi." Yuna scolded, pushing the fire bender's chin up with a loud snap and taking Detia's hand. "We did what you wanted to do for hours already."

The fire bender scowled as she rubbed her jaw with crossed arms but followed her friends back to Detia's room. "This is going to be so boring." she mumbled.

~Day 2~

The reverberation of explosions woke both Azula and Ty Lee from their sound sleep violently, both jumping out of bed thinking the worst had happened. In their robes, they ran out of the room and burst into the bridge. For all they knew they were being attacked by pirates or worse Zuko. "What's happening?" Azula demanded the instant she entered the room.

No one answered, as they stared blindly out the window at the deck below. "Angi and Detia are practicing," Yuna finally answered seemingly coming out of nowhere.

She pointed to the window when her friend's parents only looked at her. What they saw out that window put them both in a gaping stupor. A wall of fire as long as the ship was wide and ascending at least thirty feet in the air took up most of the view as it began to move forward – away from the bridge and towards the bow – charring and melting the metal deck and railing. Angi stood triumphantly in front of it, but her stance was ready to defend from the lightning bender's next attack. The spectators could barely see the massive ball of electricity ram into the wall and shatter like glass against concrete but were very aware of it as it created a cage larger than the wall and began pushing it back towards Angi. The firebender frowned briefly.

Azula and Ty Lee were as close to the window as the railing would allow them, the heat of the fire wall warming the room much like a dry sauna – not that anyone was paying that any attention. Ty Lee gasped as Detia flew through the cage of electricity and the wall of fire about twenty feet above the deck, a hole left where she came through, the red fire and white lightning swirling around her as she spun through it. She flipped mid-descent – which was much slower than she should have been – sending a large blade of electricity towards her opponent. Angi flipped out of its path, letting it slam into the deck – leaving a deep scar in the metal that pierced straight through to the hull.

The fire bender countered while Detia was still in the air with a string of fire balls, one after the other in a never ending wave. Detia twisted, kicking most of them harmlessly into the fire wall while sending more of the same towards Angi. The few that she missed passed by her without hitting. As Agni was blocking the counter attack, Detia landed silently on the deck, not even rolling, as she sprinted towards her friend performing more than a few round-house kicks to keep Angi on the defensive.

Faster than humanly possible, Detia attacked Angi hand to hand, striking pressure points that should have floored the fire bender. But the only thing the spectators could see was a blur of movement as Angi matched Detia's inhuman speed and the white and red of fire and lightning. Detia back flipped twice landing squarely on the railing with balance that would put any cat to shame, avoiding the fire that blasted her way by running along the thin circular metal. She jumped off in a twist, cutting the air in a sideways karate chop and sending two small streams of lighting at her opponent's feet.

A servant girl entered the bridge and tapped Yuna on the shoulder, whispering something in the girl's ear. Yuna nodded and left the room. But no one noticed as they watched the fight below, well what they could see of it. When the pale girl appeared again it was down on the deck. She yelled one word and the fighting stopped almost instantly. "Breakfast!"

Detia stood above Angi, who had somehow managed to find her back to the ground, fist drawn back and ready to attack. Angi's arms were crossed, prepared for the attack, blocking her face. Both stopped at the sound of food and turned to look at Yuna, whose smiled widened when their stomachs growled simultaneously. The lightning bender lowered her arm and extended it to her friend. When Angi took the offered arm Detia pulled her to her feet. They began to walk towards the water bender, but she stopped them by pointing at the wall and cage that still stood taking up most of the deck. With a flip of their hands the wall and cage vanished, leaving only the weakened charred remains of the deck.

"Your parents are awake," Yuna informed the lightning bender.

'I know,' Detia replied with a wide smile as she examined her fire bending friend. 'You look bad,' she noted, the ends of all of her clothing and even her hair were singed, not to mention the several tears in the fabric of her clothes and the small amount of blood that couldn't really be seen on the dark cloth.

Angi smirked back. "You look about the same."

Detia looked at her clothes, finding that while they weren't burnt they were covered in soot. Her white hair, which was still braided from the night before, looked almost black with the soot that covered it. Her clothing was torn as well and whatever injury she had sustained that caused her to bleed over exaggerated as the blood soaked into the white cloth. The lightning bender couldn't help but chuckle and bowed to her friend. 'That was excellent practice. I hope to have many more.'

Angi bowed back and replied simply. "Ditto. But next time I'm kicking your ass."

'In your dreams maybe,' Detia remarked, a smile still on her face. 'Do you think we should get cleaned up before we eat?'

"No." "Yes," Angi and Yuna answered.

'I'll take that as a yes,' Detia confirmed and headed back towards her room.

"Why do you always agree with her?" Angi asked, waving almost dismissively at her water bending companion.

Detia only stared at Angi, silently asking if she was serious. 'Because you're ideas are usually terrible.'

"Hey! You could have at least said that behind my back so I wouldn't have to hear it," Angi huffed, crossing her arms.

A sly smirk covered the lightning bender's dirty face. 'Now, what kind of friend would I be if I did that?'

Yuna chuckled, touching the fire bender's arm. "Come on, we'll get you cleaned up really quick, and then we can eat."

"Not too quickly I hope," Angi said in a whisper, but not low enough so that Detia couldn't hear her.

'I'm not going to wait for you,' Detia informed, continuing her trek to her room. 'I'm eating once I get there.'

~x~

Breakfast had been a fairly easy affair. After the mandatory worry her parents showed her once she entered the galley and the shared relief when they saw she wasn't injured was over, things were normal. Angi and Yuna had entered the galley fifteen minutes after Detia, both spotless. Detia half wondered what they did that took so long but usually decided that she really didn't want to know. She simply assumed that since Angi hated to get into the water that the extra time they took was Yuna forcing the Fire Bender into the bath. A short argument ensued between the lightning bender and the fire bender concerning who was the better bender, an argument no one else dared interfere in and one that Detia won because she was better with her words.

After the meal was finished, Detia and Azula agreed that they would start training, considering Azula was fully awake. They headed to the deck closer to the stern, seeing as the deck near the bow was charred and probably needed major repairs. Ty Lee sat with Yuna and Angi as the pair set up a board game that the acrobat had never seen before with pawns and knights and kings and queens. It looked like a strategy game much like Pai Sho but so different. With her attention being torn between the game the two were playing and Azula's training, she didn't quiet catch how to play. Not that that really concerned her. She wasn't very good at strategy games anyways.

As she should be, Azula was a very fast learner. She didn't feel quite as incompetent as she thought she would learning a new bending form. No one but Azula was surprised to learn that she was a prodigy after all. The ex-princess sat down in one of the empty chairs heavily when her training was done. She couldn't remember a time when she was that exhausted. "You were really good," Yuna approved, looking up briefly from her second game of chess. "This was your first time training under the mindset that you can only bend lightning, right?"

Azula nodded, though she wondered what that had to do with her bending. 'You're surprised?' Detia asked, almost offended for her mother, as she joined the little group.

"She shouldn't be," Angi offered, picking up a pawn only to put it back down. "The princess Azula wasn't supposed to be a fire bender anyways," she said casually, as if stating that the sky was blue.

"What?" Azula questioned, more than a little confused by that casual statement.

Angi glanced up. "You didn't know? It was common knowledge to us."

"Who's us?" Ty Lee inquired.

The fire bender made a vague hand motion to Detia, Yuna, and herself. "Us."

Azula caught on quickly to who 'us' was and mouthed to Ty Lee that she would tell her later. But she still didn't have her questioned answered. "What was I supposed to be then?"

"Duh, a lightning bender. You would have been the first in like a million years or something like that. But your father had to intervene, the bastard," Angi answered with a slight sneer, finally deciding on a move she could live with and moving a pawn once.

"You never found it odd that your fire was blue instead of orange or red?" Yuna asked, guiding one of her knights in an 'L' shape in front of her king.

Angi slapped her head and examined the board as Azula answered, "I never considered it, I suppose. I just assumed that it was hotter than normal," Yuna nodded, watching Angi mumble to herself. "But if I was supposed to be a lighting bender, why was I bending fire?"

Red eyes far less innocent than Sunstone's – eyes of a person who had seen one too many battlefields – glared at Azula, though it was the board that was making her angry. "All right look," Angi started, turning the board over and throwing all of the pieces onto the deck.

"Hey!" Yuna yelled.

"I was losing anyways," she said, not even a little sorry, as she gestured to the detailed drawing of a tree on the back of the board. "Alright, let's assume that you are like this tree." A long sharp nail pointed to the roots. "You were born in the summer, which to the Fire Nation is a good thing, a lucky thing. But lightning benders don't really have a season so the time of your birth is irrelevant. When you were a baby you occasionally threw lightning around, which your father assumed was fire, because he's an idiot. But your roots are in lightning. Lightning benders know their art at a ridiculously young age, far younger than any other bending style. But to one who doesn't consider lightning its own element you were merely a fire bending prodigy. So, your father started training you young. Do you remember him getting angry at you for 'messing up' a lot?" Azula nodded, clearly remembering the times she was punished for not doing a kata right.

"That's because you weren't using the fire bending style," Yuna started. "If you compare what you were doing then to what you're doing now, you'll find that they are freakishly similar."

"But that doesn't answer why she was bending fire." Ty Lee noted.

'It's a psychological thing.' Detia answered. 'As I said before, lightning is an element of both mind and soul. Ozai kept telling you that you were doing it wrong and that you were a fire bender. And as your mother grew more distant to you, his approval became more important.' Azula frowned, she really didn't like the way these three ten-year olds were telling her how she was when she was little – no matter how true it was. Detia, who was reading her mother's thoughts, ignored them and continued. 'So you needed to be the best in his eyes, and if that meant unconsciously cutting your power in half, then so be it. And you trained harder in the ways of Fire.'

"So," Ty Lee started, thinking this over in her head. "If this tree is like Azula then she…what?"

"She trimmed the tree," Angi answered. "It still grew mind you, but it grew much slower than it should have. And if you imagine this tree in color then the roots would be white but the limbs would be red up till the point when you learned that hot fire is blue and you mentally increased your power level. To the fire nation, the next logical step would be lightning bending."

"Did it change then when she started that?" Ty Lee asked.

"No," Yuna answered. "No, it did not. Instead of the entire tree changing to white, a new branch was formed, stronger than all the red limbs combined." Yuna pointed to the roots and up to a random limb.

"Why?" Azula thought out loud, all this new information rolling around in her head.

'Because, you still thought you should be a fire bender, so that part of the tree was still there,' Detia answered.

"So really that dumb kid did you a favor," Angi stated.

"Dumb kid?" Azula repeated.

As if she were bored, Angi placed her chin in the palm of her hand and rolled her eyes while waving the other hand in a vague manner. "You know, the Avatar, what's-his-name."

"Aang?" Ty Lee asked, keenly aware of Azula's involuntary cringe.

"Yeah, him."

Before anyone could ask why, Yuna stepped in. "We all know how much Soul Bending hurts. But he pretty much destroyed all the red in your tree, leaving you to start over again the right way."

'And it really shouldn't take a long time. A month or two at the most,' Detia offered.

Azula smiled slightly. "That's…reassuring actually. Though, I am highly disappointed," she admitted a slight sparkle in her golden eyes as she suppressed her smirk. "I could have been a lightning bender my entire life," she sighed dramatically. "Imagine all the things I could have done."

"All the people you could have hurt," Ty Lee finished, making her wife stop and think about that statement while the three children laughed.

"What do you mean?" Azula nearly demanded, using a tone that had been dormant since she lost her fire bending.

It was Ty Lee's turn to sigh dramatically, "You were not a nice child, Azula. The few minor burns that the servants sustained because of you would have been infinitely worse had you been a lightning bender."

"True," Azula admitted, not even going to deny the accusation. "But that was a long time ago." She flipped the board back over to the checker-patterned side, using that as a distraction as she digested all of the information she was given. "So, tell me about this game you were playing. I've never seen it before."

"It's called chess," Yuna started, moving her hand slightly to make the water pick up the scattered pieces.

~x~

The sun was high in the afternoon sky, and the three children were all on the deck. Detia found a manual on the vessel they sailed, found a nice place on the deck in the shade, and read the book for a while until the rocking of the ship along with the sound of the waves lulled her to sleep. Angi had found the skimpiest outfit, if one could call it an outfit, ever made and was currently sunbathing. She would sigh every once in a while but ultimately didn't move. Yuna, on the other hand, was leaning against the railing and looking at the ocean as the ship cut through it – wishing that she was in that water.

Azula and Ty Lee had retired to their room shortly after Azula beat Yuna at chess, which was no small feat according to Angi. That was all Ty Lee's doing. What with the subtle play on words and not so subtle bare foot that would occasionally drift up Azula's leg and the hand that seemed to have found a semi-permanent place on Azula's upper thigh. To keep her mommy's thoughts out of her head, Detia had run off at that point to find anything to keep her mind busy. Somehow, with all of that distracting her, Azula still managed to beat Yuna at chess a second time before relenting to her wife's demands and retiring for the afternoon.

The chess board had long been forgotten on the table, a few of the pieces finding their way onto the ground, but no one seemed bothered enough to pick them up. Yuna watched in wonder as the anchor of the ship descended rapidly and splashed heavily in the water. The water bender braced herself for the sudden jerk as the ship stopped. Angi didn't move much considering she was lying on the deck. Detia, on the other hand, was thrust forward into a roll, but she only rolled once before catching herself. "Why are we stopping?" Yuna asked, her hands gripping the railing lightly.

Detia hesitated, looking through the minds of the captain and crew members to find the answer. 'Apparently, the damage we did to the ship is pretty bad and needs to be repaired before the storm that everyone believes is coming tonight.'

Angi chuckled from her still laying position and said, "We did damage the hull pretty bad."

"I see," Yuna stated, looking at the clear sky but feeling the heavy water in the air. A storm was sure to come by nightfall. "So, it'd be totally okay for me to say jump over the railing and go for a swim?"

"Go for it," Angi replied dismissively.

'Isn't that….' Detia started the same instant Azula walked onto the deck and Yuna jumped over it.

All Azula saw was a blue blur jump over the railing and her daughter rush over to it. Azula followed her daughter, looking over the edge at the calm water. "What happened?"

"Yuna jumped over the edge," Angi answered dismissively, turning over on her stomach. "She'll be fine."

"She's absolutely correct, you know. I'm perfectly okay," Yuna's voice remarked from behind mother and daughter. "I'm so glad to finally get into the water and get rid of that faulty disguise."

"Disguise?' Azula and Detia chorused, turning to see what the girl was talking about.

Yuna ran a webbed hand through her now blue hair, highlighted with greens and aquas. From the back of her skull protruding upward were four long thin horns and hooked to the base of those was a thin, translucent, light aqua blue membrane that looked much like torn cloth that had been in the water a little too long. Hidden by her thick hair were long green fin-like ears, each with three spines. The thick white breast bindings and loin cloth was the only thing covering her skin, which was still paler than snow and glistening with the ocean water. The two stared at Yuna's true form. "What?" Yuna said indignantly. "You didn't think that was my true form did you? I'm a goddess."

"Well, yes," Azula answered and Yuna laughed.

"Psyche," Angi laughed as she stood, coming up and wrapping her arms around Yuna's waist, her once black hair waved wildly in red and orange streaked with yellow and a little bit of blue. Angi's pupils narrowed into slim reptilian slits, amplifying her red irises as her tanned ears elongated to sharp points. The skimpy little piece of cloth covering her neither regions allowed all of the blue scales around her wrist and ankles to be clearly seen. Detia scowled at the lack of a top but didn't say anything about how improper it was. "These are our true forms."

Azula nodded, she could accept that. They were gods after all. She turned to her daughter half expecting the girl to change in some way, even if it was in little ways like Angi. 'What?' Detia asked indignantly. 'This is my true form.'

"Just checking," the former princess admitted putting her hands up in surrender.

"Yeah." Angi chuckled, moving away from the water bender to beside Detia, patting the girl on the back and almost knocking the air out of her lungs. "Art here doesn't have any oddities like the rest of us. Curse of being the balance, I guess. "

The confused look on Azula's face prompted Yuna to say. "Well, while you get into this conversation, I'm going to use this time of stability to frolic in the water."

"Okay," Azula said, unsure why Yuna was even asking, as she turned back to her child and the fire bender. "So Art?"

Angi nodded, answering before Detia could. "It's a nick name the rest of us gave her because her real name just doesn't roll off the tongue like ours do."

"Oh?"

'Yes,' Detia replied. "There's Agni here," Detia slammed her hand on her friend's back and sending her flying to the ground, ignoring the muffled 'bitch' that came from her. "Undine is in the water. Terren, now more affectionately known as Toph, and Neos, who I haven't seen in a while."

"Probably won't either. He's busy running around teaching people to air bend. Doin' pretty good too. The population of air benders has sky rocketed since your birth," the fire bender stated as she stood and dusted herself off. "But Arjuna here just doesn't flow. So we call her Art. Don't know where the T came from but whatever."

An elegant black eyebrow lifted, "Arjuna." Despite what Angi was saying, she actually like the name. "But you chose to go by Detia?" Her little girl nodded, and she shrugged. "Okay, at least it's more original that Angi. What did you do, switch two letters?"

"Hey!" Angi yelled, her forearms suddenly alight by fire. The fire instantly cooled when the sound of Detia's verbal laughter echoed across the metal structure. She grabbed her sides as she continued to laugh. "Wow," Angi whispered towards Azula. "I don't think I've ever heard her laugh verbally like that, like ever."

"Not even in her first life?" Azula inquired.

Angi shook her head. "No, not me. Terren maybe, they were really close back in the day."

"How close?" Azula quietly demanded, her expression completely serious and almost deadly.

Angi chuckled. "Back in the day they were inseparable. Usually you wouldn't see one without the other."

"In a 'best friends' kind of manner?" the ex-princess suggested.

The fire bender shrugged. "Sure." Azula sighed in relief and Angi opted to leave out the part about Arjuna and Terren spending more than a few nights out of the week together. "But Terren was so hot back then. All sculpted and toned and manly. If I wasn't male back then, I would have tapped that the first chance I got. You know pending that Art didn't kill me." She couldn't help but fuel the flame a little, well a lot. "Yum."

Golden eyes narrowed at the fire bender, which only made the little red-head smirk. That is until a pale hand slapped the back of her head. "Don't be starting trouble," Yuna chided. "Don't listen to her. Things will go much more smoothly if you don't."

'It's true,' Detia seconded, taking her mother's hand. 'You don't have anything to worry about that. I still think kissing is disgusting.'

"Really!" Yuna and Angi chorused, devious things on their minds.

That alleviated most of Azula's fears, and she smiled at her daughter, putting her hand on white hair. "Anyways, as you three probably already know, we have opted to stop the ship for repairs."

'Where's mommy?' Detia asked.

Azula smirked. "Sated." Detia cringed at Azula's thoughts, making her mother chuckle. "You asked." The lightning goddess scowled. "By the way Agni…"

"Angi," The fire bender corrected. "Just call us by the names we gave you, Angi and Yuna. People would go crazy if they found out who we really were."

"All right." She could understand that. "I have a question for you."

The fire goddess crossed her arms and eyed the former fire bender. "Shoot."

"Why did you help me when Aang was going to take my bending away the first time?" Azula asked.

"Oh that." Angi's shoulders lifted in a shrug. "Well, I really didn't do much. All I did was clear the drugs from your system so you could think clearly. You had pretty much beaten all of your hallucinations, but the drugs they gave you were experimental and while it succeeded in making you complacent..."

"Though there was no reason for it. You were completely lucid." Yuna intoned.

"Right," Angi agreed. "It also has an odd side effect of causing hallucinations. Go figure. Besides, it wasn't fair for them to try something like soul bending while you weren't clearly aware of what was going on. So I just burned it out of your system."

"But I incinerated those soldiers," Azula pointed out. "No ordinary fire bender could do that."

"Ding ding ding!" Angi made the sound with a whirl of her finger. "And there are the key words."

Confusion was the expression Azula gave as she remembered very clearly the events of that day so long ago, the ashes of the fallen enemies spreading across the ground. She had assumed that Zuko was right and Agni had lent her power to do so. But the god was denying it. Detia rolled her eyes. "When that was happening you weren't thinking 'As a fire bender, what moves can I use to attack them?' You were thinking 'You hurt what's mine and you must die' and the fastest way to do that was to use lightning bending. I can incinerate a human instantly; Angi can as well of course, but lighting is hotter than fire."

"Oh," Azula said, her expression one of consideration until a smirk crossed her lips. "So what you're saying is that I am awesome."

"Yep," all three chimed in.

A smug smirk dominated her lips as she ignored the fact that three apparent children knew more about her than she did. "Well, all right. I'm going to make sure my wife is still sleeping," she noted, a slight hum coming from her lips as she made her way towards the door. Her thoughts hoping that Ty Lee was awake, or if she wasn't, then she would be shortly.

Detia smiled at her mother's firm steps, her back straighter than it had been for the past two days. 'Oh, mother,' Azula turned slightly to her daughter. 'There is going to be storm later, that's the perfect time to train.'

"Okay," Azula acknowledged with a wave, her mind clearly on other things.

~x~

"You have to know that I think this is the worst idea you have ever had," Ty Lee articulated, glancing out of the window from the bridge to the newly repaired deck below.

The storm outside was raging, the skies black as coal, and the waves violently smashing against the hull. The rain was heavy and falling in thick drops. But it was the lightning that struck not ten feet away and the loud boom of thunder that scared her the most. The acrobat still had nightmares of that day when her daughter almost died and still flinched whenever the flash came into view. Azula sighed; she wasn't a big fan of this idea either. "I'm sure everything will be okay," the older woman stated, though she wasn't so sure.

"I don't want you going out there," Ty Lee demanded as she grabbed Azula's hand, the panic in her voice escalating as lightning struck not two feet away from the ship. "I don't want either of you going out there."

'Mother?' Detia interrupted as she entered the bridge. 'Are you ready?' The little goddess smiled dismissively at her mother's concerned and frightened thoughts. Azula breathed in heavily and pulled her wife in for a kiss before approaching her daughter. Detia looked around her mother at her mommy. 'Do you want to come with us?'

Ty Lee forced herself to smile. "I can see you just fine from up here."

A white eyebrow lifted. 'No you can't.' Ty Lee almost looked relieved but confused. 'We're going to be practicing in the hold.'

"I thought we were going out there." Azula gestured to the window.

"Are you crazy?" Detia laughed. "Look at that weather. We're going to the hold. I had some crew members move things around so we'd have room."

"But you always practice outside," Ty Lee noted

Again Detia chuckled. "Well yeah, I do. But I can usually protect myself from it. She's still new. Besides," Detia pulled her mommy into a tight hug, "I know how much you'd hate it."

Ty Lee smiled as she hugged her daughter back, almost to tears. "You are such a good girl."

Detia nodded as she pulled away from her mommy and turned back to her mother. 'Are you ready?'

Nodding only once, Azula smirked, just as relieved as her wife to hear that they were not going outside. "I feel oddly invigorated."

Detia's smirk matched Azula's perfectly.

~Day 3~

By morning, the storm of the night before was nowhere to be seen. Azula, who had practiced with her daughter for as long as the storm lasted – which meant they didn't stop till the wee hours of the morning – didn't wake till well afternoon. Ty Lee woke before her and took the rare opportunity to watch her wife sleep. Angi rose with the sun, forcing her water bending companion to do the same. Detia woke to their bickering as Yuna complained about being up so early. She tried her best to ignore them and even feigned sleep when Angi burst into her room. Of course when the fire bender causally began jumping on her bed, Detia had no choice but to shock her with enough electrical energy to throw her against the wall.

Angi cursed vividly and set the bed on fire. At this point, Yuna dosed the bed with water to put out the fire. Yuna apologized profusely when Detia got out of bed soaking wet and looking like she was ready to kill someone. Without even flinching, Detia stripped her night clothes, put on a new pair of pajamas, and made her way to her parents' room, grumbling the entire way. She didn't even knock when she opened their door and made her way to Ty Lee, the only set of eyes who looked her way when she entered. "What happened to you?" her mommy asked her quietly, noticing her child's wet hair and cross expression.

'I don't want to talk about it,' Detia grumbled as she crawled up onto the bed and climbed under the lifted silk covers, snuggling up to her mommy before drifting quickly back to sleep.

Ty Lee only smiled as her wife turned on her side and wrapped her strong arms around Ty Lee's thin waist, chuckling softly when Azula kissed her neck and jaw even though she was still very asleep. For hours, the trio stayed like that until Azula eventually woke, Detia following shortly after, but they all just laid in the bed until a crew member informed them that they would be docking shortly in a small village town not a day's walk from Omashu. At which point, Detia went back to her room, got dressed (as her parents did the same), and grabbed her bag. The lightning bender made her way to the deck, where her friends were congregated, with her bag slung over her shoulder.

"So this is Omashu," Angi stated when Detia joined them, not even a little impressed at the small village.

"I'm afraid not," Azula stated with a chuckle, Sunstone once again wrapped around her. "Omashu is landlocked." She pointed northeast. "In the mountains in that direction."

"Oh, that makes more sense. Hey! Can I be the one in charge of the map? I'm super good at reading maps," Angi offered.

Azula looked at Yuna, noticing that the water bender was in her disguise as was Angi, who simply nodded to say that it was true. "Sure," Azula shrugged. "Where's Thunder?" she asked finally noticing that the large bird was missing.

Detia looked at her parent then answered. 'Off hunting. He'll be back to accompany us soon.'

Azula nodded, rubbing between Sunstone's eyes and making the dragon purr. "Oh, you two are back to normal." Ty Lee stated as she joined her family and their guest on the deck.

For a second Yuna was about to ask how Ty Lee knew but then remembered that the acrobat had seen them last night during Azula and Detia's training. "Yes, we're going to be around a lot of people, so we decided to be as normal as possible," Yuna offered.

"Okay," Ty Lee accepted easily as she turned to her daughter. "You know the fire Nation once took over Omashu. Mai's father was in charge of running it. He made a pretty big idiot of himself within like his first month. You remember that Azula."

Azula nodded with a slight smirk. "I recall."

'It looks like our lizards are ready,' Detia noted, the four mongoose lizards waiting at the docks – strapped down with supplies and ready to go. 'Let the journey begin.'

"I get to drive!" Angi announced and jumped to the dock without waiting for the ramp to be placed.

Yuna rolled her eyes but followed her fire bending companion once the ramp was in place. "Let's go." Ty Lee smiled, grabbing Azula and Detia's hands.

TBC

A/N: There are pictures of Yuna and Angi in her true form as adults on my Deviant art. Also, special thanks to the person who wrote 'The First Lightningbender' for letting me steal his/her idea about how Azula became a lightning bender (more or less anyways, I got the idea from that so yeah).