I was eleven years old when my mother died and my father shunned my presence, refusing to look at me, refusing to see her in me.

The spirits knew how much I had missed Ursa that summer. The Fire Lord had finally started to take an interest in me. With both Iroh and Sen gone and the war neither too busy or too still, "Father" spoke to more than he had in years. He didn't smile at me, of course. He didn't laugh, even when my comments split his guards' sides. Azulon looked at me the same, calculating, cold, unforgiving of any failure. He would demand perfection from me while my brother the golden boy could do no wrong.

To be under the scrutiny of Azulon was more draining than an y other burden I knew. I'd rather spend five hours pretending to be indoctrinated by my tutors than five minutes alone with my father. More accurately, I'd rather spend five years with them instead of him. But with everyone who loved me gone, there was no one to lighten the burden until her return.

I couldn't imagine the burden she would need lightened, and I certainly didn't know how to do so.

Mom was not a young woman, but Dad was so much older we'd always assumed he'd be the first to pass on. Every time he coughed or sneezed, we rushed to get him tea, citrus fruits, and an apothecary. We were all so focused on him that, when mother's sea sickness didn't seem to go away on shore, we didn't worry until it was too late. Even when she realized how serious her condition was, she did everything in her power to keep me in the dark, to downplay its gravity and urge me out of the house. She couldn't bear the thought of my pain so she put off telling me and put off telling me until...

The messenger came for her while I was bending for Ursa, shooting off flames, lightning, and coming through on my long over-due promise to show her a dragon that breathed fire. Coincidentally, the dragon was also made of fire, but that delighted her all the more.

Ozai's sifu decided that, at thirteen, the prince could finally be trusted to firebend in the presence of nonbenders. It helped that the pupil had mastered every firebending form, could control a blaze of any size, and had an ever-increasing power that already rivaled his mentor's.

I'd seen many firebenders before, but none like Ozai.

There were benders fueled by emotion—by rage—that moved with raw strength and brute force, sometimes purposeful and controlled, sometimes not, but their might was fierce and overwhelming, ruthless, intense, all-consuming and untamable to all but one. Their emotions began the bending, and only their emotions ended it.

Then there were benders who seemed emotionless, fueled by nothing but their stoic drive, unnaturally imperturbable yet fully at peace, choosing lethal precision over heat or size, creating lightning with their eyes alone. Their discipline began the bending, and only their discipline ended it. Still, their self-control always cracked eventually. No one could tame every emotion, much less suppress them all. When their emotions drove the bending, heat and power amplified, but they made mistakes.

There were also benders who performed, who controlled or lost control for the illusion, the drama, the majesty, but bending and working for the beauty of flame itself. Their art began the bending, and only their art ended it.

There were benders who barely knew what they were doing, restless and confused, grateful for any flame produced, but they were so absorbed in remembering every move that they focused on muscle instead of breath. Their training began the bending, and only their training ended it. Oftentimes, these benders would gain more confidence and control eventually, but they rarely made the flames their own. They rarely understood the truth, the essence of their element. They mastered the forms but not the flames.

The greatest benders I knew were fueled by life, masters totally at peace inside and out, their fires part of their very existence, extensions of themselves. Their souls began the bending, and only their souls ended it.

Ozai, however, fit none of these descriptions. In fact, he seemed to incorporate, blend, or abandon each and every technique, depending on the move, and he did it all with an ease that... that was simply incomprehensible. The effortlessness... For all the heat and flame, he didn't break a sweat. Even forms that demanded the use of every limb were executed like a flick of the wrist. Compared to the involuntary way Ozai could bend the most advanced forms, most people struggled to blink. Fire rolled off him in waves the sun would envy. He had careless power, effortless might.

And he knew it. However it may seem at first glance, his confidence wasn't nonchalant. It was too proud, too self-aware. However skilled he was, the bending wasn't all instinct. His eyes held too much determination. They were too focused, too in control.

And they burned more brightly than ever before, which was saying quite a bit.

My memory could never fully capture the impossible light of those eyes. Whenever I saw them in reality, they amazed me. It wasn't feasible for them to glow more, yet they always found a way. I'd seen those pools of molten gold sparkle with mirth, blaze in fury, flash with mischief, and shine from bliss. But this? This inferno surpassed every other, shattering my comprehension of light, color, eyes, flame... shattering everything but the sight of those jewels, melting my heart and making it burn just as fiercely.

Ursa smiled. Ursa smiled so widely that I almost slipped up on a basic form. There were few things I wouldn't do to see that grin, to see it blaze up her amber—

"Lady Ursa."

Ursa's not a lady. Her mom's not dead.

Except she was.

"Please, come with me."

"Why?"

He never answered.

My father wouldn't leave her bedside, and he locked me out of the room. His sister didn't know what to say.

"Ursa, your mother... your mother She... your mother was..."

Our eyes always said what we could not.

No. No...

"No."

Please no.

Please be here.

Please, please, please.

Anything else she said went unheard. Everything went unheard but the echo of my footsteps as I ran from everything and everyone, as I ran to forget it all.

But however hard we may try, we can't run from our own memories. We can't escape reality without deluding ourselves.

We can't escape our tears.

After scaring a servant into telling me what had happened, I found Ursa in her family's studio, knocking over candles to set the canvases aflame, burning all the paintings her mother taught her to make.

Rivers streaming down my face, I swung wildly and brashly, numb to the heat, senseless to the smoke that threatened to suffocate me.

The only thing that made me stop was her. Her portrait. It was the last thing she ever saw me paint, and I'd been so disappointed in it. Though I loved to draw, art made me a horrific perfectionist. I was never satisfied unless my brush conveyed all that I saw or imagined. It never did, only urging me on to work more and more, exasperated by any line that fell a hair out of place.

Mother never saw the glaring flaws I did, or at least she never admitted it. She adored the painting and said she would cherish it until the day she...

I collapsed in a pool of tears, surrounded by fire that blazed with my anger, wondering if the waters of my sorrow could ever extinguish the—

The cackling vanished. The heat drew away from me, and I looked up to see my firebender sweeping in a ball of red-orange. For a second, I thought he might breathe it into his lungs, but he didn't.

"I have everything under control," she muttered hoarsely, clutching a scrap of parchment for dear life.

"Is that why everything's on fire?" I retorted before shooting the flames back out to die in the air, fed by nothing, unable to touch a thing.

Ursa didn't respond. She didn't take her eyes off the paper so I glanced at everything that had burned.

"You burned all the pictures of me," I noticed aloud.

She was the only artist I would sit for since I was a baby; she was the only one who could bribe me to stay still through a game of hide-and-explode, or through just saying please.

Ozai crossed over to me and knelt, staring at me until I finally let my gaze meet his eyes.

The gold had never been so dim, so wrought by heartache .

He felt it too. He understood my pain, my torment.

And for the second time, I said the words I never said.

"I'm sorry."

And for the first time, I embraced her. I reached out to comfort another human being, and I held her. I held Ursa as she curled into a ball and wept.

Please come back to us.

Come back to me.

She sobbed onto my shoulder, and I rested my cheek on her dark curls. I was still in shock, unable to say a word, unable to fathom, unable to admit…

She couldn't be dead. The idea of Lady… no, no it was impossible. How could life leave that woman for one second? How could she truly be gone? Irreversibly, permanently gone? She was… untouchable. She was goodness, passion, spirit—life itself. She could not die. Such a soul could not be so vulnerable, so merely physical. She was too knowing, too fearless, too kind and deep and understanding for something as meager as the physical to turn off her mind, to still her heart… No, no, it could not be! I had known many soldiers who fell, but Ursa's mother… No. No. It was. not. so.

I destroyed her paintings too, I realized in horror, catching a glimpse of a paper scrap. It was once a fiery bird, but its majesty crumbled and blackened until it was nearly beyond recognition.

Nearly, but not quite.

"Do you remember the legend she told us?" I whispered, surprising him into breaking the hug. "The phoenix?"

The prince couldn't be more puzzled, but he nodded and retold the tale.

"At the end of its life, the phoenix builds itself a nest and then ignites. Both nest and bird blaze until nothing but cinders remain. Then, a new phoenix will arise out of the ashes, reborn, invincible. The phoenix lives forever, regenerating when wounded by a foe, or letting his old age succumb to youth. Immortality is his destiny. He lives and relives. A symbol of fire, divinity, and rebirth."

"By cleansing flame," she quoted,

"All wounds shall heal,

"All pain shall pass,

"All battles won,

"All problems vanquished,

"All heartache shall be soothed.

"Out of ashes,

"Out of torment,

"Be born,

"By fire,

"Into life anew."

I had no way of knowing the effect that poem would have on the young prince, just as he had no way of knowing how wrong the words would prove to be.

Ozai hatedpoetry. Ozai hated metaphors. Yet somehow, someway, the message slipped into a hidden corner in his mind and stayed there. Those lines would claim him decades later when he lost everything else...

When he lost me.

Silence overtook us once more, but her story made me realize how I could ease her pain in a time of such brokenness—if only for a minute.

"The phoenix cry is said to be a song," I reminded her before singing Ursa's favorite song.

"Blazing flame, rarest of all, shoots across the sky, Brightest in the fall. A comet's fire forever burns, fierce, irresistible, consuming our worlds."

I joined in, my eyes shining in new tears of pleasure. Ordinarily, getting Ozai to sing was like pulling nails, but when he did...

Oh, when he did!

"Light that breaks the darkness, bursting in the night."

"Nothing can compare to stolen breath at the sight," we sang together. "A comet's streak melts all concerns..."

"Fierce, unstoppable, consuming our worlds."

"In a flash, in a blink of an eye, the future draws near—"

"But love can never truly die."

"Chase the past cause in a flash—"

"In the blink of an eye—"

"The future draws near. The blur passes away—"

"But love can never truly die."

"A comet's tail yearns, fierce, irreparable, consuming our worlds. Two hearts torn apart—"

"But we never burn out."

"Forever bound in an endless cycle—"

"Lost love returns. A comet's tale, passion rarest of all—"

And then we joined together once more.

"Light that breaks my darkness, brightest in the fall."

"Blazing flame, consuming our worlds."

"Blazing flames, brightest in the fall."

Tears finally stung my eyes as she half-whispered the last line, her voice cracking. Reality finally sunk in.

Her mother was gone.

Our mother was gone.

I know the song stunk so sorry about that, but I don't think the poem was half bad. Sorry for my cruel "update," but I'm a writer. When we release our work out into the world, we crave constant attention and feedback, even if it's just one word of response. So again, please review!