A/N: Content warning: allusions to underage sexual assault
Azula leaves.
She mentions it, off-handed, a few days before. Some port or other near the front has been attacked, sabotaged. There are infiltrators to root out, guerillas to track down, traitors to be punished. Something like that.
Azula leaves for the Earth Kingdom to hunt down the people on whose success everything depends.
Katara doesn't care. Prays to the spirits for a Fire Nation defeat. Stares daggers at Azula's back and imagines all the ways she could die in battle.
Hopes that perhaps, Aang and Sokka and all the others are out there, still fighting for her world.
Still planning to rescue her.
It's a futile hope and she knows it.
At first, it's strangely peaceful. No princess walks through the door in the evening and challenges her to react to her provocations. No gloating about battles won, villages massacred, prisoners taken. It's quite calm, really. In the morning, the guards bring her food and water. The rest of the day, Katara remains undisturbed. She spends hours staring out the windows, as much as she can see them from her cage, or dozing off. Dreaming of a world where she's free, where her brother and her friends are by her side, where the people she loves aren't being brutalised by murderous firebenders.
How did I get here? How could this happen?
Ozai must be dead, that's for sure. Nobody's mentioned him, and Fire Lord Azula suggests Ozai isn't in the picture anymore. The war is still going on, that much she knows, but Aang? Victorious, or died to save the world? Sokka? Toph? Zuko? She vaguely remembers seeing Zuko run, but whether he's made it or not, or if he's rotting in a cell like her own… Katara doesn't know, and it kills her. Not knowing what's become of her friends. Fearing every day that Azula will stride in and gloat about their deaths or capture. What will happen to her, to everyone she loves, if the war is lost.
The peace and quiet isn't so good for her after all. Too much time to think. Too much time to dread.
On the third day, no food is brought. No water.
On the fifth day, again. No water, no food.
The guards don't say anything, and Katara doesn't ask. Doesn't give them the satisfaction of asking, let alone begging, for it. Pretends nothing has happened. She's not going to squirm for their entertainment.
After a week and a half, her tunics remain unwashed. Her night pot hasn't been emptied for days.
It's as if she's been forgotten.
When the guards remember her after two weeks, it's in the worst way possible.
CLANG.
"Wake up!"
The guard bangs his sword against the bars of her cage while Katara drowsily opens her eyes. There's two of them.
"Put this on", the other snarls and throws a dress into her cage. "Lord Zhen is expecting guests and you're the entertainment, so manner up."
Entertainment?
"Bet none of them have ever seen a savage like her", the first guard comments as if Katara isn't there.
"Straight from the tribal backwoods", the other agrees. "Or would that be backsnows?"
They laugh.
"Come on, girl. Put it on."
In response, Katara pulls some water from her bowl and shreds the dress.
"What the—fine. Have it your way."
The door opens and the pair grab her by the arms and drag her out. Out of Azula's rooms, through hallways and corridors, down a staircase, her legs skipping steps as the two carry her more than she walks. She kicks, bites, tries to scratch or punch, but her arms are stuck in the guards' death grip. Eventually, as she's dragged through a large, open hallway, past the portraits of Fire Lords past and present, she gets one of the guards' hands between her teeth and bites down hard. He screams and lets go, she attacks the other man, twists herself free. A hand grabs her leg, she stumbles, falls—
"What's going on here?"
A cold, commanding, icy voice that cuts through the air like a blade. Everyone, Katara included, freezes.
Azula's voice.
The guards hurry to explain. How the evil, savage waterbender broke out of her cage and fiendishly attacked them, how they pursued her and were just about to catch her and take her back. How grateful they are Her Majesty returned earlier than expected and what an honour it is to see her and serve her by taking care of the prisoner, with her permission, they'll just finish up here.
Azula levels a piercing stare at Katara.
"Is this true?"
Katara hasn't spoken a word in months. Not to the guards, not to Azula. To nobody. Has, once Azula tired of provoking her, stared at the ground or the wall, refused to give her captor the satisfaction of interacting with her at all.
"No."
It's the first time she's uttered anything, the first time since the interrogations ended and Azula burned that handprint into her face. Azula is taken aback, and she can't stop her face from betraying it.
For this, of all things, Katara has chosen to speak.
Azula turns to the guards again. The men quiver under her stare, as they well should.
"No", she repeats Katara's words, in a calm, quiet voice that everyone in the palace knows means she's deadly serious. "What happened?"
The guards profess their innocence and repeat their story, but Azula has always been a people person. Her father taught her early on to read people, look out for their tells, the little signs betraying a lie, an unfaithful servant, a hidden motive. Right now, her sixth sense is tingling and telling her she's being lied to.
It takes her less than five minutes to pry the real story out of them, and when she does, Katara can tell Azula is livid. With a voice that says someone's head will roll for this, she summons one of her own bodyguards and has Katara returned to her cage.
Katara doesn't know what will happen to the soldiers, or Lord whatshisname, but she's got a pretty good idea what will. She lets herself be led back into Azula's rooms and locked into her prison. There is no doubt just what she's just been saved from.
Sometimes, good fortune takes the form of a monstrous princess.
When Azula returns, much later, even from her cage, Katara can't miss the obvious stains – blood, by the looks of it – on the Fire Lord's ceremonial robes.
"It's so hard to find good staff today", Azula opens without greeting.
"Loyalty and competence, is that so much to ask? In the time of my grandfather, nobody would have dared to disobey the Fire Lord. The people knew their place."
She shrugs off her robes and drops into a chair.
"The guards have been slacking. Soft. Weak. To think that they would lie to my face… ugh!" She hurls a chalice at the wall. Katara isn't sure if Azula is even aware she's here, or if she's just talking to herself.
"Disloyalty is like a sickness", Azula continues. "Like one rotten fruit in a basket. Sooner or later, the entire lot is spoiled. It spreads like a plague, and the only cure is to excise it early."
If Katara has hoped that Azula's intervention was a sign of concern for Katara, she's about to be disappointed. Azula keeps talking, venting her anger at the court in general and specific lords and generals in particular, but Katara stops listening. Control, that's all it is. That's all it ever is with Azula. She controls Katara. She owns Katara. She controls the court. What happens to Katara doesn't matter, what matters to Azula is that someone else did it behind her back.
If Katara had any delusions about Azula caring for her wellbeing, those are shattered.
Over the next days, she returns to her lethargic ways. When she's brought food, she barely touches it. She remains in bed, facing the wall, when Azula or the guards come or go.
It's always been about possessions.
Azula owns Katara. That's all it is.
When Azula leaves for the front a few weeks later, nobody forgets to feed Katara. Her water bowl is refilled more regularly than ever before. Her tunics are taken and washed, her nightpot emptied. Sometimes, the guards even ask if she needs anything else. If that's enough water. More soup? A second slice of bread?
Nobody wants to risk damaging the Fire Lord's favourite toy again.
Whatever Azula is doing, it takes time. After a two weeks, Katara starts to expect her to walk back through that door any day.
After a month, she almost misses the provocations and insults. At the full moon, the chi-blocker is brought in to paralyse her for the night, as always. It's the only variation from the unwaivering routine of food, water, and silence.
After two months, she's going nuts with boredom.
After three, she breaks out.
Thanks to the guards' newfound generosity and concern for her (sort of), she's got plenty of water. She sneaks bits of it aside for two weeks, freezes it out of sight, before she's got enough to put her plan into motion. One night, she bends it into a blade and sets to work on the bars of her cage.
Slice. Cut. Grind. Slash.
Finally, the lock is open. A storm rages outside, the rain loud enough to disguise the sound of a window breaking. Dark enough to be unseen, wet enough that no guard wants to spend more time than necessary patrolling the grounds. If ever there was a sign, this is it. Out the window. Past the fountain. Through the courtyard. Past the dojo.
A guard, sheltered from the rain inside a little pavillon. Short, a woman. This is her chance.
With this much water falling from the sky, the guard doesn't stand a chance, not even enough time to realise what's happening. Katara winces as the woman's throat is slit.
I need to do this. Whatever the cost.
She strips the soldier and puts on her uniform. It's the heaviest she's ever worn, and after months – a year by now, probably, she reckons – after months of captivity, she's not in the best shape, but the uniform fits and that's what counts. It's revolting, wearing the colours of such a monstrous people, and when Katara catches a glance of her reflection, she shudders. But this is what she needs.
Who's to look twice at a guard, dutifully patrolling the palace grounds, even in the soaking rain?
Now all she needs to do is find some sort of exit. A wall that's low enough to climb over. Find a way to the shore. Once she's in the water, she'll be free.
She makes it halfway across the grounds before she's found out.
In the end, the armour is her undoing. It's too heavy, too unfamiliar, too restrictive. She misses, stumbles, is tackled by a soldier.
Once again, the hilt of a sword hits her head and she loses consciousness.
When she wakes up, it's to Azula standing over the bed she's tied to.
"I thought you learned your lesson", the Fire Lord remarks. Condescending? Disappointed? Angry? Katara can't tell.
"When I heard of your pathetic escape, I left an important mission", Azula continues. "I hope you appreciate that I had to come all this way to deal with you."
Her hands light up with blue flames.
This is it, Katara thinks. This is how I die.
Azula's hands move towards her—and stop.
Something about Katara gives Azula pause. Like before, at the dojo. Only this time, it's not a sparring match.
Even though Azula just means to punish her, Katara expects to die. Azula sees fear. Resignation to the inevitable. Eyes devoid of life. No sign she is going to fight back. No challenge, no defiance.
Against her will, Azula's thoughts return to the Boiling Rock. The way Mai, fully ready to die, stared her down after her sudden betrayal. The fire in Ty Lee's eyes after she stabbed Azula in the back, ready to go against her princess and her nation for Mai.
Katara has none of that.
Fear, Azula decides, is not an effective motivator.
All her life she's ruled by fear. Controlled her friends by fear. It's what you do, it's what she's been taught. It's always worked. Ty Lee left the circus to rejoin her. Mai followed her around the world, knowing the future her family would face if she displeased the princess.
Until she didn't.
Perhaps it's time for a new approach.
That day, Katara gets away with just a small burn. That night, when the pain keeps her awake, she can hear Azula pacing up and down in her bedroom, long after all the lamps have been extinguished, muttering to herself.