"Fire Prince Ozai is leading a search for the Avatar next month," Azulon announced as casually as he sentenced earthbenders to death.
I didn't have to fight a reaction, to suppress any expressions.
I was too stunned to think, much less show how much it blindsided me.
My brother, however, reacted for me, also attending the war meeting that had been interrupted by a sudden decision of my fate.
"Father, Fire Prince Ozai has two young children and—" he began to protest on behalf of both them and my wife.
"It's only a yearlong mission," the oh-so-loving grandfather sighed. "If the old man can't be found in that time, we needn't waste further time and resources on someone who can't be found. I'm sure Ursa can handle being alone with Zuko and Azula for that long," he muttered, and I straightened out of both indignation and a strong desire to set his facial hair on fire. "Besides, they'll be at school."
"Princess Azula is four," Iroh reminded him. "And Zuko—"
Whether or not my brother could continue to restrain his disbelief and irritation, nothing he said or did could alter what the Fire Lord had already declared.
"I'm sure Princess Ursa respects that honor just as she respects the sacrifices made by all of our soldiers and their relatives," I said before bowing and thanking him with, "I am honored to serve and defend my nation in whatever capacity the Fire Lord wills. If you would excuse me, Father, I'll begin the preparations needed to ensure we will achieve every conquest possible."
"You're excused," he granted as indifferently as before, shifting to another tactics discussion as I marched out.
Iroh came after me before the weight of everything hit me.
"Ozai, wait! It's not too late. Unbendable wills always break eventually, and our father—"
"The Fire Lord's word is law. Once spoken, it is never undone—not even by the Fire Lord himself."
"You are not the man you used to be, my brother. You are stronger and wiser and freer than you ever used to be. And now you have come at the crossroads of the destiny. It is time for you to choose. It is time for you to choose good."
"Are you implying I chose this? That I want this?"
"You've been waiting for this you're entire life. Everyone knows that, but it's not just that Azulon gives it when you least want it. It's—"
"I have no choice, Iroh. Everyone knows that."
"Everything you do is a choice. You always have one, and you'll have to make it again—"
"Save the lecture for later," I ordered and nearly flew back to the villa.
I was sketching in our bedroom, trying not to worry about whether or not Lu Ten was annoying the increasingly irritable Azula, when the door creaked open.
My darling stoic didn't seem so stoic, which wasn't unexpected after a meeting with his father. The unexpected part came in the absence of seething, of silent fuming and cantankerous brooding.
He just seemed shocked, and after more than twenty years knowing Ozai, I knew that expression should be dreaded above all others.
"What is it? What's the matter?" I asked, rising and crossing to him immediately.
The surprise fell away, and his eyes softened back to molten gold before he kissed me with one of those infuriately deep and knee-collapsing kisses, trying to clear our minds of all thought.
It worked.
For a few seconds.
"Ozai, tell me."
"Azulon's sending me to search for the Avatar. I'll have my own Fire Navy cruiser, free range to travel anywhere, and—" he panicked a little as I began to shut down. "I won't leave for another month, and I—"
"How long?" I tried to ask without losing all composure, striving to be stoic like him even as my voice threatened to crack.
"Just a year. It's the last effort to search for the airbender, and I can come back in a year if—"
We both knew that if was a when.
"—I can't find him."
Next month? I serve that callous fiend tea almost every evening, and he says nothing until… Was there something I said, I wondered. Something that made him think Ozai needed… I hardly ever speak. I just listen to him ramble about his childhood and his history and… A year! He'll miss… He'll miss so much.
"A year," Ursa tried to repeat with tranquility, but that crumbled soon enough. "Of course, a year is nothing compared to the time so many other wives and mothers have lost in this war. I have no right to... especially when it will be incomprehensibly harder for you—"
He drew me in close, holding me as I clung to him, his arms around my waist, his lips on my hair.
"Just a year," he whispered in my ear as I tried not to scream. "There won't be a week that goes by where you won't receive a letter from me, even if I have to take along every messenger bird in the Fire Nation," he swore desperately, taking my face in his hands to assure me with that gaze of his.
"I won't be able to write back, will I?" I realized in disbelief. "You won't stay in one place long enough, and—"
"You'll reply to every letter," he insisted, taking my hand and guiding me to sit down. "So I'll have plenty to read when I get back. So I won't have missed a moment."
The fire that formed her eyes ignited, and she gripped me firmly.
"And you'll write everything that happens. Everything that you do and everything that happens to you. Don't leave anything out. Don't spare my feelings or worry about how I'll react. I don't care you can't write. I don't care if it's too hard. You can and you must write it. If you can take it, the least I can do is hear it. I know you more than I know myself, Fire Prince Ozai, and I won't let this change that. I will love you whatever happens and whatever you have to do. I'll never be able to understand fully because I can never experience what you'll… but I have to know, Ozai. I have to try."
"I love you."
"Shut up," I dismissed him with a shove. "You wouldn't say that if you'd had a normal meeting with Azulon."
"What would I say if it'd been normal?"
"You'd just be 'cranky daddy,' as Azula says, and threaten to burn someone."
I grunted roughly in reply, eliciting a sincere laugh from her, and then plopped onto the bead and whined about needing to set with the sun.
"Mom! Uncle Iroh gave me another stupid doll, and Lu Ten's whiny because I burned—Daddy!" Azula switched out of an adorably lethal glower into wild enthusiasm with scary swiftness.
"Hello, princess," Ozai replied and lifted her up into an embrace. He set her back down before she could start rambling about her day and requested, "Go get your brother. Your mother and I need to talk about something."
Azula's smile dropped immediately, somehow already having the instincts to sense the worst, and obeyed.
Ursa breathed deeply, trying to steady herself and prevent any tears, so I sat down next to her.
"I don't think I can tell them without… I can't answer their questions. I can't pretend that I'm okay with this horrible, morally-defunct war or that they should be proud of everything you'll be… How can I even pretend you'll be safe—"
"All the nations combined couldn't prevent me from returning whole to you. You are the sun. And the moon. And the stars. And every source of light in this universe. I love you, Ursa. I love you more than life. I love you more than fire. I love you more than fire flakes."
I kissed her, and she smiled, yanking on my goatee in that teasing, gentle way I adored. Usually, she pulled on it so my mouth met hers.
But not that day.
"Yeah, that doesn't help at all," she sighed as our children raced back in, Azula determined to beat Zuko so she could be the first to know the bad news.
The next month flew by, but somehow I didn't collapse. Zuko and Azula seemed as ready as they could ever be, and Ozai found a flawless balance between cherishing and being present with us as much as possible and preparing his ship, his men, and himself.
He would never say it, but I knew my prince's ambitious spirit had always longed for this. At nearly thirty, Ozai viewed this as the last opportunity to prove himself, his worth. I knew how much it pained him to think about all his countrymen risking their lives while he lived in luxury and safety, and I knew how much this chance for glory meant to him. I never felt that desire myself, but I knew he did. Ozai was a bender to his core, a master, a genius, and a prince of the Fire Nation. If he was prevented from showing that to his people, he'd have bitterness and regret that I could never relieve him of.
So I supported him fully and did everything I could to make this transition, this separation, easier.
So I didn't voice some of the things I should have. Out of love for him, my heart silenced what my head knew.
A few days before his departure date, I found him in one of the training rooms by following the smoke billows.
Every dummy in the room was on fire again.
"I have everything under control," he insisted between pants.
"Is that why everything's on fire?" I asked, walking forward only after he put them all out and wiping down my drenched prince with a towel. "Which of the thousand excuses for this would you like me to invalidate first?"
He smiled, sighing and sitting when he saw my eyes.
She had that Ursa look.
"Ursa. Beloved. It's just… My principles have always been shaped by you."
"Guided, perhaps," I confessed, sitting next to him and taking his hand, "but your core values have always been there."
"They remain only because you protected them, nourished and raised them as your own. Now I fear they will starve."
"Don't be absurd. You must simply learn to feed them yourself," she said with total confidence in my ability to do this."
Her blind faith touched my heart, but I knew she overestimated me yet again. I knew I couldn't fight a war neither of us believed in and come out a better man. I knew I couldn't uphold her values because I would do anything to come home to her, commit any crime to regain my life, my perfect love.
Anything.
And everything.
On Ozai's last day, I forced myself to wake up a few seconds after him.
"Good morning, wife," he said while changing out of his robe and into some pants for bending the sunrise forms.
"Good morning, husband," I said, knowing it would be the last time I could say it for some time, with the weakest of smiles.
He crossed the room as I sat up and kissed my forehead, massaging his thumb against my temple.
My hand held his there in a hopeless attempt to keep him forever.
His chest—still so flawless and so toned, radiating heat but smooth as stone—rose and fell with a sigh, and his eyes gazed into mine, searching without question and drinking me in without desperation or even bittersweetness.
His golden eyes just looked into mine, impossibly bright but burning with peace, molten as ever, seeing me, knowing me more than any other eyes ever could…
Always saying what words could not.
Her perfect face, carved by angels and growing more beautiful by the day, looked up at me without guile, without masks. Her eyes hid nothing, vulnerable and powerful and genuine in ways no others could be. Those amber crystals brought a glow into my very soul, shining light into every corner of my heart, piercing every wall without injuring me once, seeing me wholly but also giving me so much to see. She was art and beauty beyond memorization.
She was my princess, my bride—
My Ursa.
He kissed my hand but maintained that neither-smoldering-nor-cool stare, and I struggled not to weep. He knew what I felt, and he felt it too, but we both knew he rose with the sun.
Azula and Zuko took turns pounding on the door, thoroughly accustomed to waking up early because they so loved to see their father bend, and I finally climbed out of bed.
"I'm right behind you, my prince," I said, opening the door for our prince and princess.
They nearly fell onto the floor but caught each other, straightening and blushing from head to toe.
"I'm leaving not long after," Ozai reminded them while glancing over their clothes. "Be sure to keep your clothes clean."
They nodded obediently, and Zuko asked for a piggyback ride.
His absurdly innocent question accompanied by Ursa's young, large eyes meant I couldn't help but grin and agree. Azula whined immediately, but I promised she'd have a turn next.
I watched them leave before I even thought about what I'd wear, sending Ozai an air kiss when he glanced back at me and praying his flawless skin would come back in the same condition it had always been in, untouched by scars, unmarked by a single blemish.
It was one of my only hopes that came true.
Iroh came up to me as I pretended to need to pack up some last minute things. Ursa and our children had already left for the marina.
"You will come to a better place," my brother promised as I refused to turn around and meet his gaze. "You can't always see the light at the end of the tunnel, but if you just keep moving..."
"It's easy enough to say that now. It's easy to think their absences, her absence, won't kill me, that memories can be sustained and still shine through the abyss of war—"
Iroh grabbed me by both shoulders, spinning me around and speaking in desperation.
"Do no surrender to despair, brother. You will only slip further and further until you surrender to your lowest instincts," he said, and I broke free, spurning his touch in exasperation. He called after me in anger, "In the darkest times, hope is something you give yourself. THAT is the meaning of strength!"
"Love you too, brother," I replied and left before he could soften and return the sentiment.
A few hours—or was it milliseconds—later, we had found our way to the docks. The ship was in. My men stood in line. Lu Ten and Iroh, who would stay in the capital for the full length of my absence, stood next to Azulon.
I didn't hear the speech Azulon gave. I didn't see the ship or the men. I just looked at my prince, at his golden eyes and impossible cheekbones, and clutched my children's hands as though their lives depended on it.
Before I remembered how to breathe, they were marching on board, and it was our last chance to say… to say whatever people say.
Zuko swallowed back tears, trying to prove the strong prince he could be, and began to say goodbye.
Ursa knelt immediately, tears overflowing in her amber eyes also, and gripped him tightly.
"No, Zuko," she scolded emphatically. "We do not say that word. Never say that word…" she trailed off and rose, her hand flying to cover her face.
I cast off the mask of Fire Prince to kiss her one last time, to show her how much I meant it.
"There's so much I want to say—"
"You will. When you come back to me, we'll have a lifetime to say it. You'll come back to me because it needs to be said."
I hugged my children, and Azula cried as she hadn't since infancy.
Azulon cleared his throat, and Ozai snapped the mask back into place.
It slipped a little when she began to hum our song.
He marched onto the ship, and it departed after an ostentatious salute and fire display.
My prince stood tall at the helm, and I ran to the edge of the deck, followed closely by Zuko and Azula, so I could stare after that face and those golden eyes for as long as possible.
I never dreamed that my Ozai, my prince, the boy and the man I loved, would never come back to me.
I never dreamed that the man who did would be someone I feared.