Well, that's another chapter done. I know I've taken my time in writing some of these chapters but never this long. I don't even want to think about how long it's been, I'm really sorry about that. It's just that my stupid social life gave me a lot of free time to make me think I could easily handle a project like this and then swamps me with a bunch of other stuff when I've started.
Chapter 5: No Turning Back
Waking up felt strange. The silk sheets, the numerous pillows cradling her head and the incredibly soft mattress that was so large that even when the acrobat stretched both her arms and legs as far as she could, they did not leave the borders of the bed.
She sat up and rubbed her eyes with the back of her hand. How much sleep had she gotten? Four hours? Three? She wasn't sure. Even with the luxurious bed she'd been provided with she'd stayed up for hours, just laying under the sheets, trying to think of a good way to go about the next order of business.
After arriving at the palace they had been taken to their assigned guest rooms right away and told that Zuko and Mai would see them at breakfast first thing in the morning. This was when Ty Lee had decided to tell them that she wanted to make a visit to a certain mental patient.
Getting up and stretching, she started going through the process of getting dressed and tying her hair back. Just as she was putting the final touches on her braid the door knocked and she could hear Daisuke's high-pitched voice. "Lady Ty Lee! The Fire Lord and Lady would have you join them in the Royal dining room for breakfast as soon as you can!"
"Okay, I'll be there in a moment," she called back. She'd only been there a single night and it was already starting to bother her how formal everybody spoke. She just hoped that Mai and Zuko wouldn't be that way too. They were friends, after all. She carefully applied her make-up and walked up to the door. Taking a deep breath, she put on a big, goofy grin and opened the door. She was greeted by Daisuke's crooked little grin and a small bow. He looked as if he was slightly impatient and spent little time on formalities. Thank Agni!
As she was led down the large halls of the palace she was hit by a new wave of nostalgia. There was so much that reminded her of the past. The high, crimson walls, the dark marble floor. It was a bit overwhelming. There were some noticeable changes, however. The large portraits of former Fire Lords had been taken down and replaced with other works of art, mostly paintings of beautiful landscapes, and the entire hall just seemed...brighter. It didn't look like the manner of lighting had been changed, but there was just something about the atmosphere that had changed. Servants chatted and gossiped as they walked past the acrobat, but when she'd been younger an eerie silence had always dominated the palace interior. Zuko's been making some changes.
She was quickly joined by Suki who smiled warmly and offered her a good morning. The day was going well...so far.
The way from the guest quarters to the royal dining room led through a rather large courtyard. There were several trees on which there grew beautiful white-pinkish blossoms, a pond where a family of turtle-ducks swam and quacked happily and a sizable clear area meant for members of the Royal family to train firebending.
It looked no different from the last time she had been here about two years ago.
The pink clad acrobat skipped happily across the palace grounds, smiling and greeting almost every servant my name, ignoring the questioning stares they gave her. Today she was the happiest girl in the world and nothing was going to bring her down, or that was at least what she thought.
The night before she'd snuck into the royal palace and spent the night with Azula and it had been the happiest night of her life. She'd never felt closer with the princess as she did then, and Azula had looked like she was really happy with this turn their relationship had taken as well. Unfortunately the princess had been called to a meeting with her father and Ty Lee had to sneak out way earlier than she'd wanted to, but Azula had told her to be back by noon, and here she was.
She decided to go to one of the larger courtyards since Azula usually practiced her firebending around this time of day, and sure enough, as she drew closer she could see flashes of blue coming from the practicing area. She found that she could not keep a steady pace as she approached the light's source, she had been looking forward to meeting her friend-turned-lover for too long. In reality it had only been a few hours since she left Azula's room, but when you do nothing but think about the thing you're excited about, time passes slowly.
As she stepped closer to the training area, she started waving and saying hello to Azula before she felt it. Something was wrong.
She stopped and looked over the scene before her. The gray stone square in the center of the area and even some grass and plants around it had been scorched by fire. There were three Imperial Firebenders standing on different sides of the zone and even though she couldn't see their faces, Ty Lee could hear their heavy breathing echo inside their helmets Lastly her eyes fell upon the person standing in the middle of all this, Azula. Her bending stance was the same as it always was, if just slightly more tense than usual, her breath almost matched that of the soldiers around her and an occasional drop of sweat ran down her face which was itself set in a grimace of rage.
"Again!" the princess shouted. They soldiers hesitated for a moment before attacking, launching streams of fire from their fists at the young princess who effortlessly swept her leg though the air, creating an arc of blue flames that quickly overpowered that of her attackers. As soon as she brought her foot down she raised the other one and delivered a kick that sent a burst of fire at one of the Imperial Firebenders, knocking him hard onto his back. She quickly turned and sent another blast to each of the other soldiers with the same effect. She looked very frustrated at their seeming inability to get up. "Come on! Get up you weaklings. Again!"
"Uhm, A-Azula?" the acrobat took a few careful steps towards the princess as she spoke. Azula's head snapped in her direction and her facial features seemed to soften a little when laying eyes on her friend, but they still showed an incredible amount of anger.
All this frightened the little acrobat a bit. Azula had looked so happy that morning, well, at least content, and even when she got angry or sad she'd bottle it up. Something really bad must have happened.
"What do you want!?" the princess practically hissed at her. Ty Lee had to steady herself a bit before responding. "W-well, you told me to come back here at noon so..." there was a brief pause. "Are you alright?"
For a moment it looked like Azula was just going to explode and throw the acrobat out, but she ended up just sighing. She'd calmed down, if only just a little. "It's Zuzu." She spit out his name like a curse word.
Ty Lee was dumbfounded. What could Zuko possibly had done to make the princess feel this mad. He couldn't have said anything to her, or broken anything. "What do you mean? What did he do?"
"That idiot ran off to join the damn Avatar," Azula snarled.
"What?" He'd actually joined the Avatar? Ty Lee had noticed the prince had been acting kind of weird for the fast few weeks but the thought of him joining forces with their enemy had never even crossed her mind. But why was Azula so upset? The acrobat knew the princess didn't have much love for her brother, she'd even looked a little amused when he'd been banished a few years back, but now she was furious.
"A-and?" she asked. She was almost certain there was more to her friends anger than this.
"And that bastard made a point of it to tell my father that I lied about killing the Avatar in Ba Sing Se!" Azula sit out every syllable with as much venom in her voice as possible. "And as you might imagine he wasn't very happy about that," she muttered as she turned around and started walking out of the training area and motioned for Ty Lee to follow.
It was then something caught the acrobat's eye. Just under the collar of the red shirt Azula wore under her armor her skin looked a little red-ish. Ty Lee reached over and carefully pulled the collar down to reveal that a large portion of the skin on the princess' lower neck was red, almost like a burn wound. It was shaped like a hand. She only got to look at it for a split second though as she princess quickly winced, turned to face her and roughly pushed her back.
"Don't touch me!" she looked even angrier than before but her eyes were wide in what looked like slight panic. She knew what Ty Lee saw.
"Azula," the gray eyes girl was more than a little hurt, but she also felt immensely sorry for her friend. "I just want to help, you know."
Then something strange happened. Azula smiled. It wasn't warm or welcoming however, but cold and threatening. "I am the princess of the greatest nation in the world and heir to the throne. What could a stupid little acrobat possibly help me with?" The smile only lasted for a moment as the princess' grimace returned as she spoke.
Ty Lee was actually getting a bit scared now. The look on Azula's face was...well, she didn't really know how to describe it. She was obviously furious, but her lips twitched occasionally and her eyes were wide open in an unstable sort of way. What puzzled her even more was what her friend was saying to her. They'd been closer than ever only a few hours ago and now this.
"Get out," the princess ordered much more calmly than one would expect as she turned around and resumed her walk towards the inside of the palace.
"Azula?"
"I said. Get. Out." And with that the princess strode off into the palace, leaving Ty Lee in the courtyard with her hopes of this becoming a great day completely shattered.
Ty Lee remembered that day as well as almost every other moment she'd shared with the princess. That particular conversation had taken place a few days before they left for the Boiling Rock, and by then they'd made up after Ty Lee promised to stay away from things that were "none of her business" and Azula had actually apologized. Of course that hadn't lasted long.
Suddenly she realized that they were standing in front of the door leading to the royal dining room. These short while where she phased out had stopped surprising her and she'd given up trying to fight them. The only solution was to face its cause.
"Hey," Ty Lee looked to her side as Suki nudged her. "Are you alright?" her leader asked carefully.
"Yeah, I'm fine," she smiled, but it wasn't one of her fake, exaggerated smiles. She'd realized that wasn't going to do any good with Suki. The Kyoshi Warrior nodded and smiled back at her. They both turned their attention to the large doors as the guards on either side of it pushed it open.
Meeting Mai and Zuko went the same way it had the last few times they'd met. There were a lot of 'Great to see you agains', 'you look greats' and smiling, even from Mai. After that they sat down and began chatting about virtually everything that had happened for the last few months while eating from the most beautiful and delicious buffet of breakfast dishes Ty Lee had seen since she was a little girl. Suki asked what it was that the Fire Lord and Lady had wanted to tell them but they said they'd like to wait until everyone arrived. "Everyone?" Suki asked.
"Yeah," Zuko stated happily. "Aang, Katara, Sokka, Toph and uncle are all on their way. This was good news. At least it eliminated the possibility that the news was something serious. Wow, when did I start being so pessimistic?
Ty Lee herself didn't talk as much as the others though. Every time she was about to start leading the conversation towards the subject of going to see Azula she was cut off or she chickened out at the last second. Her friends kept on talking and laughing at something she didn't quite hear. She was to lost in her own thoughts about how to go about doing this. Come on you chicken, do it. Okay, I'm not really a chicken I'm just...yeah, I am.
"IWANTTOGOSEEAZULA!" The room was suddenly filled with a strange silence. Ty Lee lifted her head and looked around only to find that everyone's eyes were fixed on her. Had she said that out loud?
Mai was the first to break the silence. "You want to...what?" she asked in a voice that was somewhere between her usual monotone and that of complete shock.
"I...I want to..." she swallowed nervously and looked down at the bountiful plate in front of her avoiding making eye-contact. "I want to visit Azula in the hospital."
"Are you sure, Ty Lee?" She didn't have to look up to hear Zuko ask her. She nodded quickly, not wanting to say anything at the risk of her voice breaking. She hadn't known it was going to be this hard.
The young Fire Lord sighed. "Alright Ty. I'll send a messenger hawk to arrange for a visit."
The acrobat was quite surprised her friends hadn't protested more, or just flat out forbidden her from going, but she was too relieved to comment and risk ruining it. "T-thanks," was all she was able to say.
The rest of the meal was spent in relative silence with only an occasional remark about the food, Ty Lee however found that she had lost her appetite and just poked at it with her chopsticks.
After they'd finished eating Zuko hurried off to some meeting, leaving Ty Lee, Suki and a very annoyed looking Mai to spend the rest of the day together. Ty Lee was suddenly regretting having asked to see Azula so early in the morning.
They spent most of the day chatting and playing pai sho and her and Suki even took some time to spar in the courtyard. Ty Lee and Mai didn't really have a real conversation all day until finally, when it was approaching dusk.
"Hey, can I talk to you for a moment?" Mai motioned for Ty Lee to join her the pai sho table.
"Sure," the acrobat jumped over and sat down opposing Mai. Suki had gone out in the courtyard to look for a lost earring she figured had fallen off during the spar. They were completely alone. The silence stretched far longer than Ty Lee would've liked it to as Mai was wordlessly placing the tiles on the pai sho board. "Soooo, what did you want to talk about?" the acrobat asked cheerfully, she had been doing a pretty good job maintaining a happy face since breakfast and she wasn't about to fail now.
Mai finished placing the tiles before looking up at her friend and asking very calmly in her monotone voice, "Ty, are you serious about going to see Azula?"
"Of course I'm serious silly. What makes you think I wouldn't be?" It had never been more difficult for her to feign cheerfulness, and that was saying something.
"Well I just figured, you know, after last time," she left the sentence unfinished.
Ty Lee's happy façade dropped in a split second. She couldn't believe Mai would throw that in her face like that. "Mai, I am completely serious," she spoke slowly and calmly, suppressing the urge to shout at the Fire Lady. "You told me to stay away from her, and I did, but it's been two years and I just can't take it anymore."
Mai nodded, her expression staying the same throughout the entire conversation. "Alright then. But since you'll probably be going there pretty soon, most likely tomorrow or the day after, I'd like for it to be arranged so that you'll speak with Akari, the head nurse at the asylum. She's been in charge of taking care of Azula for the last two years and I want her to tell you what you should be expecting when you meet her again. Does that sound acceptable?"
Mai was speaking in exactly the way Ty Lee had hoped she wouldn't, it didn't even sound like she was speaking to a friend, but even though the way she said it was infuriating, Ty Lee had to admit what Mai said made a lot of sense. "Yes, your highness, it does," she almost hissed through her clenched teeth. "Now, if you'll excuse me I think I'll go help Suki find her earring," she said as she quickly strode out of the room. Even though she was pretty mad, she could take solace in one thing Mai had said...
There's not turning back now. I'm coming Azula.
Thank you guys for bearing though yet another one of my boring chapters where nothing really happens. But in case you were wondering (and it somehow slipped your mind) the flashback in this chapter is a direct follow-up to the one from chapter 2.
Ok, so I don't really have much more to say other than I hope you like it and that I'll finally get to write more about Azula from now on :D
As always I would really appreciate it if you guys would review the story and tell me what you think.
Peace out!
