A. N. : Fun thing about language, the way titles work tend to reflect the importance of hierarchy in the society that language comes from. In French, you would for example talk about a doctor as "Docteur X", while in German it would be "Herr Doktor X" (literally "sir doctor X"). For a society as heavily militarized and hierarchized as the Fire Nation, I thought titles would work a bit like [title of nobility] [profession/army rank] [last name] [first name]. This chapter comes with a warning for suicidal ideation, so if you're sensitive to that kind of stuff, I'd ask you sit this one out. As always I'll provide a summary before next chapter.
Mai stares at the closed door.
Azula is back, the servant said, and Mai and Ty Lee are needed at her side. After he left, the two of them prepared – Ty Lee, still sleepily carrying her blanket around her shoulders after dressing, grabbed a few baozi from the kitchen while Mai finished arranging her hair. Neither said a word.
Something was wrong, they both knew it, but mentioning it would make it more real.
It was simply too early for Azula to be calling them. She should've been in an audience with the Fire Lord, making her report on whatever it was she did in Tenuht, or getting her beauty rest. And if she – the thought makes Mai's insides twist – if she had failed, there was no way she would call for anyone to see her.
And so Mai stares at the closed door to Azula's room, wondering what could be standing behind it.
Next to her, Ty Lee shifts awkwardly from one foot to the other. She bites her lips, grabs Mai's hand briefly, and nods. Mai exhales. She knocks for the fifth time since she arrived, and opens the door without waiting for the answer she knows won't come.
The floor is covered in glass. That's the first thing she notices, mirror shards mixed with black glass, reflecting the morning light in an almost surreal way. Each footstep she takes creaks in a way that makes her worry she might damage the sole of her shoes and end up with a cut under her foot. Looking down to avoid walking on the largest shards, Mai sees long, black threads littered around as well.
Azula would never allow her room to be in such disarray. Somehow, that's the thought that sticks out the most, at least until Mai sees it –
At first, the silhouette doesn't register as a person, but simply as a large doll prostrated on the floor against Azula's desk, clothes shaped like royal armor, its hair cut haphazardly.
It reminds Mai of something she hasn't thought of in a long time, of the dolls Azula never played with, that she let Mai handle as much as she wanted. At home, Mai wasn't allowed to change the haircuts of her dolls because it wasn't proper to damage the work of the craftsperson. But Azula didn't care about that, and let Mai do as she pleased, even if the result wasn't always all that good. They were all going to end up in the chest anyway.
One time, shortly before Fire Lord Azulon's death, Princess Ursa had seen one of Mai's less-fortunate creations and, thinking Azula was the one who'd handled the scissors, gave her daughter a strong talking-to – about respect, and how Prince Iroh had been the one to make that gift, and how she couldn't do this to everything that came from him, especially during such difficult times.
The argument had grown, Ty Lee and Mai sitting frozen in the room as Azula claimed that those were her dolls and she could do anything she wanted with them, before finally setting the object of the crime on fire.
Princess Ursa had quickly put out the flames and sent Azula away to think about her actions, and that had been it.
Mai wasn't sure if she had to come forward, tell that she was the one to cut the doll's hair, but she was sent back home before she could make her choice.
Then, Fire Lord Azulon died and Princess Ursa disappeared and when Mai apologized to Azula, she just said that the dolls were hers to do anything with, including letting Mai cut their hair, and that was none of her mother's business, and anyway no one cared about that stuff anymore.
Don't talk of Princess Ursa, Mai understood.
Azula never received any dolls anymore after that, and Mai started playing with blades in other ways, and things moved on.
It's Ty Lee's pained gasp that brings Mai back to the present, to the shaking form of – Azula ?, Ty Lee murmurs before hurrying closer to it, no, her, putting an unsure hand on Azula's shoulder, her face turned toward Mai as if to ask what to do.
Is it noon yet ?
Mai starts at the voice. It sounds like Azula's but it is – too tired, too rough, too off, unrefined and wrong, much like her hair and the state of her room.
There's a laugh like nails scraping on a slate, and the voice that sounds like Azula's asks if they've come to kill her.
Ty Lee gasps in horror and immediately attempts to reassure Azula, denies the accusation and starts babbling meaningless words as she hovers around Azula like a mother pig-hen.
Mai just stands. Stares.
There's a paper bearing the insignias of the Fire Lord on the floor, and it doesn't take a genius to figure out how everything fits together. Azula is dead, at least socially. There is no recovering from this fall, and all that's left for Mai to do is to await her own sentence. Nothing she wants matters.
To Azula, death would be a mercy, she thinks. They have that in common right now.
It hits Mai that she has a choice. Suffering will be inevitable, but she has power, power over Azula's fate, and therefore her own.
Azula asked if it was noon, meaning probably – her life ends at noon. At that time, she will be nothing, nothing but a doll that will end up in the chest no matter what, and so whatever happens to her won't have any consequences.
But before that time, she is still a Princess of the Fire Nation.
Before that time, her death matters.
Mai lets a knife slide down her arm. The weight in her palm almost feels like she is holding her own heart. She steels her hand.
It would be mercy. For the both of them.
It would be her choice.
Ty Lee's voice fades into nothingness as Mai takes a step forward. Ty Lee – Ty Lee will be fine. Her family will protect her from repercussions, and she will be free to go back to her circus. Mai wonders how long she will cry. If she will watch the execution.
The thought makes her uneasy.
Mai is thankful for everything Ty Lee has done, for her constant support, for the appointment with Lady Doctor Lee Mei Lin – and Mai felt so much lighter then, freed of her worries about the future, so sure she was of her fall alongside Azula. So sure she was of Ty Lee's presence when the time would come.
Is it truly mercy, then, to die alone ? Even if by her own decision ?
Is it mercy to deprive herself of Ty Lee's warmth, and to break Ty Lee's heart at the same time ?
Is it mercy to set a doll on fire only to seek the punishment that act brings ?
The heart in Mai's hand is too warm, and she can't help but stumble as Ty Lee looks upon her once more, eyes widening at the sight of steel, pausing her endless words of comfort to Azula in a silent question –
Mai stumbles under Ty Lee's gaze, and stops under Azula's. Her face is as tired and rough and unrefined as her voice was, her smile off like her laugh was, and –
She looks wrong. Pleading. Mai's heart twists in her hand.
It would be mercy.