100 ASC
I still rise with the sun.
It's not on purpose. My prison cell is well beyond the reach of sunlight, or even its warmth, but it still wakes me.
My bending may be gone, but there's fire in my blood.
Once I do rise, the flawless, lethal execution of the sunrise forms comes naturally, instinctually. It's a habit I cannot break. I'm less than a husk, having lost anything that resembled humanity years ago and having all the power I'd gained from that stolen away.
There's no identity that remains.
"Good morning, brother," he says, bringing me tea and ash banana bread even though I never accept either, even though I never speak back.
Iroh was the first to visit me here. Every day that he's in the city, he comes, not to give any more philosophical lectures or words of wisdom. No, it's much worse than that. He just chatters and prattles and rambles on about the most mundane details, updating me on everything I couldn't care less about.
He tries to be kind, funny, the big brother he's never really been. One whose love comes with no conditions, who doesn't try to parent me, constantly casual and at ease.
It's his last strategy to make me feel something for him, for anyone, again, and it fails as well as the others.
Today, he's praising Zuko for some new change he's made, for being the man I never was.
Sometimes, he'll vaguely refer to Azula, whether she's better or worse, how many bad day she's had, how stubborn the scars beneath her skin prove to be. There are never any tangible details, but it's enough.
My children's weaknesses torment me in his every word.
"I know Zuko's been visiting," he confesses to my record silence.
I don't acknowledge this with any blink or nod or release of breath, but he continues as if I have.
"You actually spoke to him… until he asked you about Ursa."
It's the first time I've heard her name in over five years.
Incineration is my only instinct, but my body can no longer fulfill it.
Instead, I feign interest in the insect scaling the wall adjacent.
"But for the last six months, he hasn't said a word. However much he's yelled at you, shouted, pleaded, threatened, wept, confessed… You never respond. He doesn't know why he keeps coming back. Why he can't go a month without at least trying, asking you one more time. He's so sure you'll never tell him."
I turn so he can't see the sliver of a smirk tugging at my lips, and he leans forward.
"He doesn't know what I know."
The smirk falls.
"He's going to give up eventually. He's going to stop asking. He's grown too much to keep giving you this power, this control on his life. But we both know you're going to tell. We both know he can't find her otherwise, and you won't allow that. Everyday you're in here is a day you're less sure that she's safe. As soon as you're sure he's leaving for the last time, as soon as it seems he's surrendered all hope, you'll tell because you need her more than you need this mind game. She's not a tile up your sleeve, a piece of leverage. You need her to come home."
He knows. He knows that I loved her once. Back when I was capable of love.
I smile, and I speak.
"Lu Sen."
Iroh's face changes, as if struck, as if he was reliving the night he last heard that name.
"Lu Sen, Lu Sen, Lu Sen," I sing-song her name and then her lullaby. "Leaves from the vine…"
His eyes slam shut on tears of rage and grief, but he doesn't stand up. He doesn't breathe fire in my face.
"You're not my brother, Ozai. You haven't been in a long time. But if I can't apologize to him, you'll have to do."
I keep humming as he forces himself to meet my gaze.
"I'm sorry. I am so sorry for how I failed you. Zuko is proof of that, and perhaps I could've done the same for you, if it hadn't taken so much to wake me up, to change me from the dutiful general… At least our nation has the Fire Lord she's always deserved."
I belt the ballad now, and he leaves, perhaps for the last time.
But he's not wrong.
When I see that look in Zuko's eyes, that total resignation to despondency, I tell him.
The voice is so different, mature yet impossibly familiar.
"Mom?"
Zuko is in my arms before he can finish asking the question.
His handsome face is the spitting image of his father's at his age, but his eyes are unmistakably his own. Like his voice, they're wrought with hope and fear alike, relief and disbelief, hesitation and impatience. He's afraid to trust them, suspicious that he could've actually found me, that this could be real.
I should be hesitant to trust my eyes as well, but I've longed for a mirage this perfect for too long. I don't care anymore.
"Zuko, my love."
He hugs me after some hesitation, incredulous, and his image blurs in my vision. My tears are too joyful for him to reciprocate or comprehend.
I pull back to see him better, unable to feel bittersweet just yet, praying I can share the weight crushing him.
He's so grown up.
His eyes widen as he remembers something, but I noticed his scar instantly. I saw every piece of him at once, in no order, with no horror, nothing but delight—at least outwardly.
I rest my hand on his cheek to show him this fear is unnecessary, to assure him I won't recoil or weep, that he hasn't pained me.
"My beautiful boy."
He sobs into my shoulder, happy and relieved and utterly heartbroken. For him, this embrace has been an eternity, so many lost years, so many times I could not comfort him, so many sobs I was not there to witness. It's more than just happiness at being with me again; it's closure for all the pain I couldn't shield him from, the loads I never got to lessen.
Holding him stamps out the roaring blaze that scar did ignite in me, the primal and permanent fury at whatever… thing had caused it, though in all likelihood it had been an accident.
"You're so grown up! So handsome…" I glance around us and realize I'm surrounded by foreign faces, quite literally, in this small cave.
There are four children. A girl and boy from the water tribe. A girl from the earth kingdom and a boy with arrow tattoos—
"An airbender?" I gasp aloud.
His people were slaughtered a century ago, but he can't be older than thirteen.
His smile is huge, oddly comforting.
"And your grandfather! Pleased to meet you."
Zuko has to steady me so I don't fall down.
"The—the Avatar?"
The shock on my face must be fairly severe because the other children, excluding the earth kingdom girl, rush to help me sit.
Zuko sends him a glare for this.
"Nice going, twinkle-toes!" the earth kingdom girl, who seems to be blind, scolds the boy and strikes him. "As if she's not overwhelmed enough!"
Irrationally, this makes me smile a bit, as does the realization that these are the first people I've ever met who weren't members of the Fire Nation.
Zuko smiles at me, and I take his hand in mine. I want to spend every second I can soaking in the sight of him, but I can't help turning back to the boy with the tattoos.
"Are you truly the Avatar?"
"Yeah, but everyone calls me Aang. This is Toph," he explains, gesturing to the blind girl who nods.
"Greatest earthbender in the world. Nice to meet you, er, princess?" she asks, uncertain whether or not to use this title.
"This is Katara."
"Hello!" the pretty girl says with a kind smile and a wave.
"She's a waterbending master, and this is her brother Sokka."
"I'm the boomerang guy," he says with an odd amount of pride, trying to lean his elbow against the wall but slipping.
"The war…?" I begin to ask.
"It's over," Zuko says firmly, to assure me of the reality. "Thanks to the Avatar."
"But…" I don't know how to say this. I can't bring myself to say the name aloud again. "Your father," I try instead.
"He's alive!" Aang cries out, wishing to make that very clear for some reason. "I mean, he's in prison now, Zuko's Fire Lord, and—"
"You're the Fire Lord?" I ask my son, beaming with pride and smiles. "My Zuko, Fire Lord Zuko," I say, laughing a little as I cup my hands on his face again.
He grins and blushes until I adjust to this.
"But who put him in prison? How?"
Everyone begins to talk at once, all about, well, my reincarnated grandfather.
He shrugs sheepishly, and Zuko nods when I raise my eyebrows at him.
"You mean to tell me that this little boy defeated my husband?"
This skinny child, with the wide, innocent, albeit strangely wise eyes, won against the greatest firebender in the world?
"I had help."
Unable to process this, I laugh irrationally.
"…Mother?" Zuko asks, concerned at first, but then he starts to laugh to when I meet his gaze.
The others stare at us, smiling awkwardly, not in on the joke that isn't really a joke.
Once my sides stop splitting, I look around again and ask the question that'd been tugging at my heart for most of this exchange.
"Where's Azula?"
The children's smiles drop, and Zuko falters.
"She's… at home."
The look on his face prevents this from comforting me in any way.
"Let's give them some time alone," Katara suggests thoughtfully, taking the somewhat startled boys by their arms and urging them out, back in to the forest. "They have a lot to catch up on."
They leave, somewhat reluctantly, and I take my baby's hands in mine, sitting down and waiting for him to begin, to say whatever he needed whenever he needed, ready to listen.
Time does not exist in that cave. Hours or seconds could be passing. I don't know. All I know is him, my son, the Fire Lord, the teenager. He doesn't tell me everything, but he tells me a lot, and everything, including the way he says it, shows me the man he has become and is becoming. My gratitude for Iroh threatens to explode my heart, but I restrain it for Zuko.
My brave Zuko. Courageous and compassionate in a way only those who have known fear and cruelty can be. Thoughtful, selfless, empathetic, and moral in a way only those who have been thoughtless, selfish, unfeeling, and immoral can be. There's wisdom etched in his face, kindness and honor, peace and humility that was hard won and fought for. There are so many questions I want to ask, but we'll have time now. We'll have so much time.
I hold him and kiss him. We laugh and weep some more. He has questions for me, a million, but there are some I won't answer without Azula there as well.
But when he tells me about her, time becomes all too real.
It's my fault. I failed her. My poor little girl.
My princess.
How could I have left her alone with him? I should've known. I should've found another way. He couldn't give her what she needed. He could only bring out the worst in her, and she…
She needed me.
Again, he doesn't tell me everything, but the little he does is proof of a bravery I cannot begin to fathom. My heart breaks to hear of her violence, her willingness and attempts to harm, and worse, her own brother, but his strength in fighting back, in subduing her, still trying to protect and take care of her… I'm so proud of who he's become. I can't believe how mature he is, how much he's had to overcome, how I could've helped with any of this. He's a good man, a truly good man, through choices of his own. I had nothing to do with it. I couldn't have dreamed he'd be this way, and I certainly couldn't have shaped him or trained him to be it.
We leave with his friends, who are eager to share stories of the past few years, to brag on my humble son, to tell and retell everything, even though I can tell they're leaving some things out.
I cannot hope to listen to all of it, so I reflect on heading home. After five years, I'm going home. I've been expecting it in a way, seeing as it's been months since I received any supplies, since the servant Ozai sent each week came to check on me. I knew it meant something had changed. The island I've been living on is considered the most dangerous in the nation, which means Ozai thought it was the safest.
For all the fearful rumors and the refusal of even the most foolish to travel there, the island is safe. There are no haunting spirits in its dense forest. There are no large predators. The volcano isn't active.
But it's unknown to my people, perhaps that why they fear it so. I'm sure there are other reasons, other horror stories and legends, but I've forgotten them. I've explored every inch of it, discovered its beauties and secrets, so leaving it is somewhat surreal. It's not bittersweet. I couldn't be more at peace, happier, to be leaving this exile, but the isolation wasn't quite a hellhole. The separation was, but it's over now. I'm going home to my daughter, holding the hand of my son.
The children keep talking and laughing for hours, and my body is too alive to feel my exhaustion. They have so many stories to tell, and I love to listen, even if my heart is breaking for another.