Chapter Text
It was a fine sunny day in the Capital when Ty Lee found out she would be seeing Azula again.
It had been exactly seven years and twenty-eight days since Ty Lee last had a real conversation with the erstwhile princess. To be clear, she didn't keep a calendar or anything, but the number was just there, burned into the back of her mind like a brand. Seven years since they were anything more than battle-hardened fighters who had happened to be on the same side against some dark spirit some years back.
So, when faced with the absolute certainty that she was going to have to look Princess Azula in the eye again, Ty Lee felt a sudden, violent wave of nausea hit her so hard that she almost threw up.
She didn't, thankfully. She was far too coordinated to make a beginner’s blunder like that.
What she did instead was completely drop her focus, losing her footing mid-air as she attempted a triple-twisting backflip. Blinded by the sudden, suffocating rush of memory, her hands missed the parallel wooden bar she had intended to catch.
Ty Lee plummeted, landing flat on her back with a breath-stealing thud directly in the center of a thick canvas practice mat, sending up a small cloud of chalk dust that smeared across her cheek.
"Ouch," she groaned, staring blankly up at the vaulted ceiling of the dojo.
Sitting on a low bench just a few feet away, entirely unbothered by the clumsy descent, was Mai. She was slowly stirring a cup of dark tea she had brought from the palace kitchens, her expression its usual blank, deadpan slate, despite what she had just told Ty Lee that induced the fall in the first place.
"You're going to break that mat, you know." Mai observed, her voice dropping back into its signature monotone. "You know how Zuko gets when it comes to the palace furniture. He will have to file a decree to replace it, and then I'll have to listen to him stress about the palace training budget for three hours."
Ty Lee scoffed. “You’d think the richest guy in the world wouldn’t worry about a bunch of mats.”
Mai shook her head. “Not when this was the third one you broke in a month, no.”
"Oh, please! I do enough around here to more than make up for it!" Ty Lee yelled this back good-naturedly, sitting up and wiping the white chalk from her face, though she only succeeded in smudging it further across her cheekbone. She scrambled off the mat, dusting off her pink-and-maroon training wraps, and dropped into the seat across from her friend. "Besides, Zuko loves worrying about budgets. It gives him something to do besides pacing the halls. Especially now, I can’t believe you told me, right as I was doing stretches on the bars!”
Mai set her spoon down then. She stared into her teacup for a long, agonizingly quiet moment. For anyone else, it would have looked like boredom. But Ty Lee had known Mai since they were children; she could see the slight, tense set of her shoulders and the tiny flicker of anxiety in her dark eyes.
"That’s true. But it’s just like I said. The wedding is in three months," Mai said softly.
Ty Lee's eyes lit up instantly, her internal panic momentarily sidelined by sheer excitement. This was the appropriate response when your oldest friend tells you wedding news, not falling off a training bar.
"I know! The Great Royal Wedding! Oh, Mai, it's going to be so beautiful. The whole nation is gonna be celebrating. Have you picked out the silks for your dress yet? Because I was thinking of a deep, iri… sparkling, red that catches the light when you walk down the aisle! Oh it would match your aura so w—"
"Ty Lee." Mai cut her off, her hand raising to stop the flow of words. She took a slow, heavy breath, looking everywhere in the room except at her friend. "Listen. I need you to plan it."
Ty Lee froze. "Wait. What?"
"I want you to be the head wedding coordinator," Mai stated, her voice flat but laced with a rare, underlying desperation. "The Grand Steward keeps trying to tell me that tradition dictates we slaughter three hundred ceremonial hog-tiger for the feast.”
“What?That’s disgusting!”
“And the Fire Sages are insisting on an eight-hour incense ritual that will give me a migraine. And a bunch of other things. The last wedding these old hacks planned was for Zuko’s parents and we all know how that turned out.” Mai let that sink in before adding, “My mother keeps sending me fabric swatches that look like dried blood too."
Mai finally looked up, her gaze locking onto Ty Lee's with pleading intensity. "I hate it. I hate all of it. If I have to spend the next three months arguing with ancient bureaucrats about table arrangements, I’m going to start throwing knives at people. I need someone who actually cares about things like... joy. And color. And not making me want to scream."
“Since when do you care about joy and color?”
“Since I started caring more about not pulling my hair out?”
Ty Lee stared at her, her jaw slightly open. She still couldn’t believe it. "Mai... you really want me? Me? To organize your wedding? I am not dreaming, am I?"
"Why not? I think you’d be perfect." Mai countered, leaning back slightly. "You know how to work a crowd, and people find it physically impossible to argue with you when you smile like that. If the High Sages try to complain about the floral arrangements, you can just grin at them until they give up. Besides, Zuko is entirely too stressed. He spent an hour yesterday debating with the maids on what headpiece he should wear for the Sun Festival tomorrow. I need someone to take over before he accidentally or intentionally sets the guest list on fire."
"But... what about my duties with the Warriors?" Ty Lee asked, her fingers nervously tracing the edge of her training wraps. "I have training, and the new recruits—"
"Suki already cleared your schedule," Mai said smoothly, taking a slow sip of her tea. "I asked her yesterday. She said, and I quote, 'Please take her, she keeps trying to teach the recruits how to walk on tightropes.'"
Ty Lee gasped, a dramatic hand flying to her chest. "That was a team building exercise! I can’t believe Suki has no appreciation for it!"
"Clearly," Mai said, a ghostly hint of a smirk threatening to touch her lips before vanishing. "So. Will you do it? Or do I have to elope to the Earth Kingdom, find some nice guy named Lee and live a life of quiet anonymity away from this Royal shenanigans?"
A massive, brilliant smile slowly spread across Ty Lee's face. The sheer honor of it and the excitement of handling something so filled with love and romance, practically made her aura vibrate with bright pink energy. It made her entirely forget why she was nervous about this whole thing for a moment.
For a brief moment…
"Oh, Mai! Yes! Of course I'll do it! Duh!" Ty Lee squealed, throwing her arms around Mai’s neck in a fierce, suffocating hug.
Mai stiffened, groaning lightly under the weight of the sudden affection, but she didn't push her away. She never did. "Fine. Just... please… don't make it look like a circus?"
"I promise! It will be elegant, beautiful, and totally you," Ty Lee beamed, pulling back and immediately pulling a blank scroll and a charcoal stick from her pouch. She always has a pair handy, for moments like this. "Okay, first things first: guest list, right? We need to know exactly who is coming so we can map out everything. Obviously the Avatar and his friends, the Earth Kingdom delegates, the Water Tribe chieftains and..."
Her voice trailed off as she looked down at the parchment. Her charcoal stick hovered over the paper, her bubbly energy suddenly dipping as that sharp, familiar pang hit her chest again.
Seven years and twenty-eight days.
Mai watched her closely, her sharp eyes catching the shift instantly. The casual air in the room suddenly dissolved, replaced by a heavy, quiet understanding. "You can write her name, Ty Lee. She's on the list too."
Ty Lee swallowed hard, her fingers tightening around the charcoal until it nearly snapped. "Azula is coming?"
"Zuko is her brother," Mai said quietly. "He already asked her to be there. And she said yes."
Surprise colored Ty Lee’s cheeks. "I didn't think she would ever agree to be part of something like this," Ty Lee whispered, staring at the blank line on the scroll. "Not after everything."
"Well, she insists she is still not coming back for good," Mai explained, leaning her chin on her hand. "She’s set to return only during the preparations and would leave again as soon as it’s all over. It is still a few months but it’s not forever.”
This didn’t surprise Ty Lee. Ever since her shocking return and following her reconciliation with Zuko three years ago, Azula hasn't really lived anywhere. She’s like a shadow, one who travels around the outer rims of the Fire Nation, dealing with Ozai loyalists and rebel factions and dark spirits before they can become actual threats. Ty Lee still had no idea how that all came to be but the truth of the matter was that Azula stays on the move, doing her heavy lifting in the dark.
Ty Lee looked out the high windows of the palace, staring toward the horizon. Azula. The last time Ty Lee had truly spoken to her, they were girls caught in a war that demanded they both be weapons instead of people. But the last time she had seen her was only over three years ago, during a massive, brutal clash between a dark spirit and Team Avatar.
They had been completely surrounded, heavily outmatched by an enemy that had defied the laws of their world. The Capital was on the brink of getting destroyed and Aang was on the cusp of defeat. Ty Lee had been bracing herself for the worst when a sudden, blinding flash of blue lightning split the sky, crashing down directly into the dark, monstrous spirit.
Azula had arrived out of nowhere, her cloak billowing, fighting with a terrifying, breathtaking precision to turn the tide of the entire battle.
She had saved them all that day. She had saved the Capital.
For all intents and purposes, Princess Azula had saved the world.
But the moment the dust settled, before Ty Lee could even step forward to say her name and demand where she had been all this time, Azula had turned around, pulled her hood low, and vanished again into the wilderness without a single word.
Since then, Azula had apparently reconciled with Zuko and was even civil with Aang and the others. She was pretty certain Mai and Azula had also talked, judging from an offhanded comment Mai had made some months back. Ty Lee had never asked her to elaborate. Mai didn’t offer more,
Wherever Azula went all those years ago had her helping and saving the world for the better now. Ty Lee still couldn’t believe it sometimes.
"Have you... has Zuko even seen her lately? She never came by, not after the last time and I thought they mostly just talk by messenger hawk." Ty Lee asked, her voice dropping into a small, fragile whisper. Azula hadn’t been back in the Capital since she had last saved it three years ago.
"Not here," Mai replied, looking down at her teacup. "Zuko has to travel out to meet her – Azula’s request. They met in a small, quiet port town near the Shu Jing province a few weeks ago so she could give her report about… something."
“Didn’t you come with him on that trip?”
“Yes. We had some time to talk.” Mai paused, her expression shifting from its usual apathy into something slightly more calculated. She looked at Ty Lee, her dark eyes narrowing just a fraction. "And that's actually the other reason I need you to lead this, Ty Lee. You aren't just coordinating this alone. You're going to be planning it with her."
The charcoal stick in Ty Lee's hand finally snapped completely in two.
"I'm... what?!" Ty Lee squeaked, her voice hitting a register so high it echoed off the high roof.
"Zuko insisted," Mai said, entirely unphased by Ty Lee's sudden spike in blood pressure. "He wants… Azula involved in a peaceful, familial project. For once. One that didn’t feel like… he was just using her to stabilize his rule. He thinks it will help her ground herself but it was really just an excuse to get her back to the Capital and for him to finally thank her for her part in saving all of us three years ago.”
Mai continued. “But he thinks she’d do well. She’s always been pretty good at stuff like this. I agree. You have the vision, and she has the smarts to execute it. We talked about it all night. Zuko had already sent a messenger hawk to wherever she is now. And I am here talking to you."
Ty Lee's head was spinning. Her heart felt like a trapped bird slating against her ribs. Planning a wedding. With Azula. The girl who used to control every aspect of her life, the girl she had run away from, the girl she hadn't spoken to in over seven years. They were going to be trading plans, arguing over seating charts, and will be forced to interact, at least until all of this is over.
The girl who couldn’t be bothered to acknowledge Ty Lee, even through all these years since her return…
"Mai, you can't be serious," Ty Lee breathed, her hands shaking slightly as she brushed the broken pieces of charcoal off her scroll. "Azula doesn't do weddings. She doesn't do cooperation. She's going to look at my flower arrangements and tell me they lack… whatever it is that Azula thinks it lacks!!"
"Then tell her to shut up," Mai said simply, taking a final sip of her tea and standing up from the bench. "You're the head coordinator. If she threatens to lightning-bend the catering staff, kick her ass again. I trust you."
Mai walked toward the exit of the dojo pausing just at the threshold to look back over her shoulder. "Zuko said her response should be arriving by hawk tomorrow morning. Try not to fall off any more handlebars until then, Ty Lee."
As Mai's footsteps faded down the corridor, Ty Lee sank back onto the training mat, staring at the blank scroll in front of her. The bright pink energy of her aura felt entirely depleted, replaced by a sudden, electric static.
Tomorrow. She was going to hear back from Azula tomorrow. Even if it was just through words on a page, the seven-year silence was officially broken.
For better or for worse.
To do the morning drills, Ty Lee had to be stretching in the dojo courtyard by sunrise. That meant waking up at the crack of dawn and slipping out of her quarters before the sun even rises. It was a brutal schedule that left her operating under a haze of mild, perpetual exhaustion.
But she wouldn’t have it any other way.
Just last week, she had been so deeply asleep on her feet that she accidentally dumped dried fire-lily petals into her morning porridge instead of her tea strainer, and just a few hours ago she had managed to clip her shoulder against almost every single wooden sliding doorframe in her chamber.
She was still groggy as she sat on a low wooden stool in the armory, dutifully holding an oil rag for Suki, with one hand while the other girl helped her with the Kyoshi armor.
“Is charcoal black too dreary as a wedding motif?” Ty Lee asked, restlessly shifting her weight before Suki reached out to nudge her chin back to center. Suki’s knuckles were wrapped in linen, a fraying piece held firmly between her teeth as she pulled the bindings secure.
“I don’t know. I think it fits them.” Suki murmured around the cloth, her voice slightly gravelly from barked instructions to the morning recruits. “You should be thinking more about what stories to tell during the dinner toast, I think. Does Zuko and Mai have horror exes stories we can all laugh about? I’m sure Sokka would love to hear those.”
Ty Lee simply smiled. She was not so sure about unraveling stories about Kei Lo and all the other exes, even in good fun. Ty Lee is the one with fun exes stories but it wasn’t her day to shine.
The rest of the guests didn't need to know the messy details of how a runaway noble girl had bounced from a traveling circus to the elite non-bending warrior group guarding the Fire Lord now. Suki probably would have laughed if she knew about the brief, disastrous affair Ty Lee had with an Ember Island theater performer a few years back, but details like that didn't sit right when people expected her to be a pristine Kyoshi Warrior.
She opened her mouth to change the subject, ready to distract Suki by asking about her old days running wild across the Earth Kingdom, but the door slid open.
Sora, a recently promoted imperial lieutenant guard Ty Lee had been subtly trying to get the courage to flirt with for three weeks now, stepped into the room. She was shorter than Ty Lee, her dark hair thrown into a loose topknot, her shoulder armor slightly askew in the morning shift. She had intense, yellow eyes. Ty Lee always felt a little bit crazy about eyes like that.
Ever since Sora had gone through a messy breakup a few months back, she had been a regular fixture in Ty Lee's periphery, and Ty Lee was finding it harder and harder to look away.
“Five minutes, Ty Lee,” Sora grunted. It was a rough sound, but Sora always grunted significantly softer when addressing her than she did with anyone else in the barracks.
Ty Lee caught her reflection in the polished bronze wall-mirror, locking eyes with Sora for a long second before Sora turned on her heel and slipped back into the hallway, a tiny smirk darting across her lips.
“Alright, focus,” Suki said, giving Ty Lee’s shoulder a firm pat as she finished checking the armor straps. “Tie your hair wraps tight and don't trip over the training beams today. Can’t have you go gay-panicking especially when guests start arriving from all over.”
The early morning training shift wasn't exactly popular among the warriors. Ty Lee had only inherited the shift because Suki flatly refused to handle the dawn hours, but she couldn't complain too much. Being in Zuko’s elite guard detail meant she had all the privileges of a royal, without the family drama. And she really liked being a Kyoshi Warrior.
Suki tapped her twice on the shoulder. It was a reassuring habit left over from Ty Lee’s earliest weeks in the group when she had been struggling to fit in with a bunch of Earth Kingdom warriors they had once captured.
“All set. Go break a wooden dummy,” Suki winked. “Or some girl crushing on you.”
Ty Lee rose from the stool, smoothing down the front of her dark green tunic. Pulling on her uniform boots by the door, Ty Lee muttered, “Thanks, Suki. See you later, at dinner.”
She stepped out into the stone corridor, letting the heavy door of the armory slide shut behind her. She found Sora leaning against the wall outside, her arms crossed as she watched the shadows lengthen across the courtyard floor.
“Waiting around for me?” Ty Lee teased, leaning her hip against the stone.
Sora let out a dry, breathy laugh, her head tilting. “Don't get ahead of yourself.”
If they were off-duty in a low-lit tavern down in the Caldera instead of a cold stone hallway at dawn, Ty Lee would have shifted closer, letting her eyes do the talking, but she kept her distance. Still, she didn't break eye contact. She knew Sora had come for one thing, had interrupted her and Suki for one thing. They had been dancing around it for weeks now.
“Do you ever spend your free nights at The Dragon’s Breath?” Sora asked, her voice dropping into a quieter register.
Ty Lee’s breath caught slightly. The Dragon’s Breath was a notorious, hidden little establishment down by the outskirts of the.Capital. It was a place Mai frequently dragged her to whenever she needed to escape the stifling atmosphere of the palace. She remembered well because it was in there that she had realized a few things.
The first time Ty Lee had walked in, she had been entirely fascinated by the girls with shaved heads and elaborate fire-lily tattoos; she had been so visibly enchanted that the bartender hadn't even made her pay for her drink. Mai had taken her there after Ty Lee had her breakthrough about her not liking boys after all. After that, she had been absolutely certain it was the case.
So she instantly knew what Sora was asking so early this morning; she was checking to see if they shared the same private world.
“Yeah,” Ty Lee replied softly. “Do you?”
Sora offered a small, knowing look, her gaze dropping to Ty Lee’s boots before trailing back up. Ty Lee internally cursed the rigid uniform leather; she always counted down the minutes until she could slide back into her old, faded linen flats and her white, cotton shift.
“Do you really need to ask that?” Sora murmured.
Ty Lee smirked. “I was just trying to keep things polite.”
“Somehow, I doubt you’re always that polite,” Sora returned, her voice laced with a subtle, easy confidence.
It wasn't the most intricate attempt at flirtation, but it worked. Ty Lee liked the sharp, slightly dangerous edge to it. It was the exact blend of confidence and quiet intensity that always seemed to draw her in. Mai loved to mock her for it. Ty Lee never found out why.
“Maybe you’ll find out next time I’m there, then.”
“And that’ll be? Tonight, I hope?”
“Ty Lee! Courtyard floor, right now!” a voice shouted from the end of the barracks. The spell broke instantly then, pulling her right back into her standard, disciplined routine she had employed since she had started guarding Zuko years sgo. She forced a bright, flawless smile onto her face and marched out toward the morning sun.
“Later.” She called to Sora, both as an answer and goodbye.
By the time Ty Lee returned to her chambers later that afternoon, she wanted nothing more than to crawl back under the covers.
She let the heavy wooden door click shut, leaning her full weight against it with a long exhale. It hadn't been the worst shift, though one of the wooden training bars had snapped cleanly during the final form demonstration, forcing her to improvise. The recruits looked pretty impressed and she liked the attention.
She walked into the quiet room. The bustling noise of the palace was picking up outside her window. Ty Lee might be quite beat but she had somewhere to be tonight and she was rather looking forward—
There was a message left on the vanity table.
The servants must have delivered it, as they always did whenever Ty Lee has letters from somewhere. She didn’t really think much as she picked it up and carried over her bedside to read. It could have come from any one of her friends in the circus. Or one of her sisters. Either way, to Ty Lee, it was just a letter. Something to occupy her time while she gets dressed for her date.
Until, she unrolled the scroll, caught the handwriting, and her chest went completely cold.
“Ty Lee.”
The calligraphy was sharp and precise, yet the brush strokes carried a distinct lack of the old, aggressive weight Ty Lee recalled very well.
My brother has asked me to help coordinate his wedding, and he mentioned you would be doing the same.
She replied, Ty Lee realized. Azula actually fucking replied.
I know it has been a long time, and I know I have no right to expect anything from you after all the choices I made.
If you are willing, I have reviewed the initial plans and have a few recommendations…
And she was really fucking doing it too.
I am currently near the Dusan border outpost, but I would like to go over the notes with you directly. I will be at the tea house on the main dock of the lower port this Wednesday starting noon. That’s only two hours ride from the Capital. I would have gone there immediately but I still have something to wrap up around here.
If you choose not to come, I will understand completely. I can always tell Zuko, no. I can do what he asks me to and we never have to cross paths.
No shit, she thought. Azula had done a pretty good job not crossing paths with her all this time.
But if you are there... it would be more than nice to see you.
The final sentence was written in a tighter, slightly hesitant script, the characters pressed closely together as if the writer had caught her breath before signing her name with a sharp, sweeping flourish.
Azula.
Ty Lee sat completely still, the air leaving her lungs in a slow, shaky exhale. Seven years of absolute silence, and it all came rushing back down to a single piece of parchment. Every ounce of old anger, lingering resentment, and the terrifying realization that Azula could still… affect her like this…came crashing to the surface.
It was a truth she had kept buried deep within her chest for a lifetime. Only Mai had ever heard her admit it, years ago during a foolish, drinking game in The Dragon’s Breath where they had both said far too much. Ty Lee had been desperate for answers back then and Azula had been gone, without any news for years.
And now she had returned, acting like she hadn’t disappeared off the grid for years before returning like some kind of a mythical hero saving the world.
Ty Lee smoothed her fingers over the rough parchment, her eyes lingering on the surprisingly soft sign-off. Azula’s written words seemed to echo off the walls of her room, vulnerable, cautious, yet fundamentally her. It felt like dipping her toes back into a dangerous current Ty Lee had spent seven years trying to outrun.
Ty Lee shook her head, forcing herself to snap out of the trance. She was exhausted. Her mind was playing tricks on her, turning a careful, quiet request into something incredibly heavy. She really wanted to take a nap.
She rolled the scroll shut, cutting off her view of the words 'more than nice to see you.
Ty Lee never went out with Sora that night.
How could she?
It would have been an easy distraction to spend the night flirting with Sora, let her call lines along Ty Lee’s skin, and go home with her just to feel something that didn't require so much thought.
But the last thing Ty Lee needed was to get caught up in another... complicated entanglement right now. She was completely and utterly sober, and she knew herself well enough to know that after two or three drinks, the carefully constructed walls in her mind would start to give way. She would end up staring at a blank scroll by candlelight, trying to write a response to Azula, or worse, she would actually find a way to send a message she would regret by morning.
Really, she was weak. She had lived and breathed Azula for so many years of her childhood, wrapping her entire identity around the sharp, brilliant orbit of the princess. She had spent years hunting her down after the war, only for Azula to return, like Ty Lee hadn't spent every waking moment haunted by her sudden disappearance. It had left a jagged, aching space in her chest.
One she realized hasn't quite healed, yet.
Tonight, Ty Lee made her way across the ten blocks of steep, winding cobblestones that separated her chambers from the Royal Wing, her boots striking the street with a frantic, restless energy. Stress-looping over memories was definitely an issue of hers, but it wasn't the absolute worst one she had to deal with today, so she was going to do the mature thing and just ignore it.
When she had finally reached her destination, Ty Lee stepped into the familiar, deeply shadowed quarters. The room was cool, smelling faintly of dried plum blossoms and the ink Mai used for her calligraphy. Mai was sitting at a low wooden table, a single candle cutting through the twilight, slowly stirring a cup of dark tea. The thin navy curtains were drawn against the balcony, and with the full moon filtering through the silk, it created a heavy, bruised blue hue across the entire living area.
Mai looked up, her dark eyes tracking the erratic, breathless energy rolling off Ty Lee's posture as she dropped to the empty seat before Mai.
“Yeah, sure, come on in, Ty Lee. I wasn't busy or anything,” Mai said, her voice dropping into that deadpan monotone. She didn't exactly slam her teacup down, but it hit the saucer with a deliberate, metallic clink.
“Shut up, you love me,” Ty Lee shot back, sliding unceremoniously onto the cushion opposite her. She reached out, her fingers nervously tracing the polished grooves of the dark wood, dipping her head slightly to hide the sudden, burning flush in her cheeks.
Mai watched the movement, her sharp eyes catching the subtle shift in her friend's behavior instantly. The casual, lazy atmosphere of the evening completely dissolved, replaced by a heavy, quiet understanding between two friends so intertwined by the same person.
“It’s Azula, isn't it?” Mai’s voice was flat, but it carried that specific, underlying sympathy that always managed to grate on Ty Lee’s nerves just a little bit because it meant she was so transparent.
“Okay, that was embarrassingly quick. How can you tell?” Ty Lee mumbled, finally letting her posture crumble as she put her head in her hands, letting out a soft, unrecognizable moan of sheer frustration.
“Because you always look like that, when you think of her.” Mai said smoothly, leaning forward and resting her chin in her hand.
“What is that supposed to mean?”
Mai ignored her, “And… Zuko mentioned her hawk returned to the border outpost yesterday. He said she has a message for you this time. What did she say exactly?”
“She left a message,” Ty Lee said, her voice dropping into a small, fragile whisper that felt far too close to whining for someone who hadn't touched a single drop of wine. She pulled her hands away from her face, looking at Mai with wide, stressed gray eyes. “She’s near Dusan. She said she wants to meet. On Wednesday. At that little tea house on the main dock of the lower port.”
Mai raised an eyebrow, her expression remaining a perfectly blank slate, though her eyebrows cocked in curiousity. “Oh? I honestly thought she’d say no.”
“No, I mean. Me too.” Ty Lee groaned, her fingers twisting into the fabric of her training wraps. “And I expected her to be mean about it too. But the letter... it wasn't like… her. It wasn't mean. She said she knew she had no right to expect anything from me. And then at the very end, she wrote that if I showed up... it would be more than nice to see me.”
The words felt heavy as they left her mouth, strung together in a single, rushed breath that made her chest ache. It was the first time she had felt the ghost of Azula's presence behave with something resembling hesitation, and it was terrifying. It was like tipping her toes back into the exact same waters that had nearly drowned her years ago, a slow-burn reminder of the girl who had been her absolute awakening before the world turned them into enemies.
Ty Lee swallowed hard, a sudden, sharp edge of bitterness cutting through her usual soft demeanor. She looked up at Mai, the flickering candlelight catching the tight line of her jaw.
"How did you two even do it?" Ty Lee asked, her voice cracking slightly. She didn't want to sound accusatory, but the question had been festering in her mind for months, ever since Mai had casually mentioned that Azula liked seafood boil. "How did you and Azula make up? Zuko travels out to meet her, you come with him and you talk to her, she answers him... but she didn't bother to reach out to me. Not once. Not a single letter, not a single messenger hawk, nothing until this wedding forced her hand. Why was it so easy for her to fix things with you, while I was just left in the dark for years?"
Mai went entirely still, her hand resting over her teacup. She didn't look away, but the deadpan armor she usually wore seemed to fracture, just a little, under the weight of Ty Lee's gaze.
"I don't know why she didn't reach out to you, Ty Lee," Mai said quietly, her voice flat but honest. "Azula doesn't exactly hand me a map of her thoughts. But I know why she and I are okay now. It wasn't a sudden choice, and it certainly wasn't easy. When she first started handling those… stuff for Zuko, she didn't talk to me much either. But over the last two years... well, whenever her journey brings her close to the Capital… we hang out.."
Ty Lee blinked, her fingers slipping against the edge of the table. "You hang out? Here?"
"Yes," Mai replied, looking down at the dark wood of the table. "Not at the palace and never publicly. But when she's close by, we hang out. Sometimes we just sit in the forest together while I sharpen daggers, or she'll join me for dinner in one of the restaurants here when Zuko is stuck late with the ministers. We had a screaming match the first time we were left alone, but eventually, we just cleared away all that baggage. We're civil because we had to find a way to exist in the same world again. Whether we like it or not, we'll be family soon.”
"You hang out," Ty Lee repeated, the words tasting strange and heavy on her tongue. Her chest tightened, a strange swirl of jealousy and confusion rising up. "What do you even do? You and Azula? I can’t even imagine her just... sitting in a room without killing each other..”
Mai let out a very faint huff, the closest she ever came to a laugh. "It’s not like it used to be, Ty Lee. Mostly, she just sits on the floor by the low table and smokes.”
“Smokes?” Ty Lee resented how breathless she sounded. "She smokes?"
“Yeah. Zuko hates it, She goes through an entire pouch of that terrible stuff. Cigarettes, it's called. She picked up the habit because of all the stress, I think. And more, Sometimes she doesn’t say anything at all for an hour, just watches the smoke hit the ceiling while I work on my blades."
Mai traced the rim of her cup, her dark eyes reflecting the candle flame. "When she does talk, she tells me about the places she’s seen. Small, nameless fishing villages that aren't even on the maps. She likes to talk about the way it looked, the high cliffs, the way the wind moves across the southern bays. It’s always very clinical, very technical, but it’s her way of talking these days. And sometimes..." Mai paused, her gaze softening by a mere fraction. "Sometimes she plays Pai Sho with me. She’s still infuriatingly good at it, but she doesn't slam the pieces down anymore. She plays silently. And if she stays for dinner, she always eats everything on her plate like she doesn't know when she'll see a hot meal again. It’s quiet. It’s almost boring. But it's normal."
"What does she even do out there?" Ty Lee asked, her voice dropping as she leaned forward, the sudden, fierce weight of her curiosity breaking through her frustration. "For Zuko, I mean. If she is really one of the good guys now, why hasn’t she returned?”
The rumors had reached her, of course. There were vague, fragmented whispers passed among the recruits about Princess Azula, tracking down rogue Ozai loyalists and dark spirits before they could ever threaten the capital. But nobody ever had the real details. They knew that one moment she had appeared to save the capital but everything after that had been classified information.
Ty Lee found herself trying to picture it, her mind struggling to map the princess she used to know. Because the girl who commanded pristine royal silks, absolute perfection, and a flawless court did not fit the lawless wilderness. Did she sleep under the open sky? Did she still fight with that terrifying, breathtaking precision, or had the isolation changed her into someone completely unrecognizable? The thought of Azula doing Zuko’s heaviest lifting in the dark, entirely removed from the life they had all built, made her stomach turn.
"She keeps the peace where Zuko or the Avatar can't reach," Mai said simply, her tone entirely unbothered as she watched the steam rise from her cup. "She handles the factions that still think Ozai is coming back to save them and dark spirits… It's ugly work, but she does it cleanly. If you want to know what she does, you'll have to ask her yourself on Wednesday. I don't interrogate her over dinner."
Ty Lee frowned. “What else do you even talk about?”
“Oh, random things. Here and there.” Mai paused, her dark eyes shifting back up, holding Ty Lee's gaze with a heavy seriousness. "But she never mentions you. And I never press her on it. If you want to know why, you're going to have to ask her."
Ty Lee stared at her, the air leaving her lungs in a slow, shaky exhale. Her mind was reeling, the image of Mai and Azula quietly sharing tea or dinner in the capital while she was completely isolated from them twisting a painful knot in her chest.
She looked back toward the curtained windows, her heart hammering a frantic rhythm against her ribs. She would do it for Mai, she would do it because Zuko wanted his family whole, but mostly, she would do it because she was entirely incapable of looking away from the fire.
“Yeah,” Ty Lee whispered, her fingers finally tightening around the warm cup Mai pushed toward her. “I suppose, I’m going.”
Wednesday arrived with a clarity that Ty Lee found deeply offensive.
The lower docks of Dusan were always a chaotic mess of merchants screaming about the price of fire-kelp and sailors hauling heavy crates of Earth Kingdom granite, but today the noise just felt like a personal attack.
Ty Lee stood at the edge of the harbor walkway, her gray eyes narrowed as she adjusted the collar of her outfit. She had paired it with a pair of low-cut linen pants, intentionally choosing an outfit that showed off exactly how much she had changed, how fit she was, and just how much she was thriving without Azula.
She was hot, she was cool, and she had moved with the times. She wanted Azula to see that she wasn't some fragile little circus girl anymore that feared every hair in Azula’s head.
Ty Lee walked toward the tea house on the main dock, the one with the blue and white silk curtains fluttering in the sea breeze. It was a place she usually avoided, too close to the transient energy of the ships, but as she stepped inside, the ambient noise of the port seemed to drop away.
She was there.
Azula was sitting at a small table near the corner window, a lit cigarette kept loosely between her fingers. It was right near her palm, between her third and fourth fingers, an incredibly pretentious way to hold a smoke, in Ty Lee’s humble opinion.
A small clay cup sat in front of her and she was currently scribbling notes onto a scroll. For fuck's sake, she looked beautiful. She wasn't in royal silks; she wore the simple, slightly weathered dark robes of a wanderer, her dark hair pushed back effortlessly.
Azula still hadn't seen her. Ty Lee watched from a distance as Azula took a slow, heavy drag, the embers casting a sharp glow over the striking angle of her jaw. Seeing her head-on, so close after twenty-six hundred days, Ty Lee was suddenly reminded that she wasn't a monster or a ghost from a war, she was just a woman sitting opposite her.
Ty Lee crossed the wooden floor before she could convince herself this was a stupid mistake, crumpling into the wicker chair opposite her unceremoniously. Azula jumped slightly, a tiny burst of blue sparks escaping her fingers as some ash fell onto her scroll, leaving a thick grey smudge across her neat calligraphy.
Those amber eyes locked onto Ty Lee greedily, taking her in from head to toe.
"So, how are we doing this, Azula?" Ty Lee asked, her voice sharp, a passive-aggressive shark-like smile plastered across her face. Just seeing her felt like getting ripped wide open.
To her credit, Azula didn't falter with the lack of greeting. She simply closed her scroll, took a slow sip of her coffee and leaned forward on the table. A loose strand of dark hair fell into her face, and she didn't even bother to move it.
"What do you mean?" Azula asked, her voice softer, deeper than it used to be.
"We both know that out of the two of us, I'm the one who can actually plan things that involve people enjoying themselves," Ty Lee said, her words coated in fake, saccharine sweetness.
Azula smiled. It was a tight, guarded expression that clearly signaled she disagreed, though she kept her mouth shut. Her jaw clenched slightly. "Sure. Where do you want to start? I’ll follow your lead."
She was being civil, just like Mai said she would.
It was infuriating. A part of Ty Lee almost wished she would be mad, angry and be the red-hot princess who used to throw blue fire whenever she didn't get her way. Ty Lee could handle a fight. But being around her for less than five minutes was already dragging her right back into the old orbit, and she had every right to be heartbroken and pissed.
"Where and when," Ty Lee sighed, tapping her fingers against the table. "I was thinking for the reception, we could actually use the—"
Azula’s jaw worked, her fingers tightening around the edge of the scroll she was perusing. She suddenly rose from the wicker chair, her expression shifting slightly into something closely resembling restless irritation.
"Excuse me for a moment," Azula muttered "I need to use the washroom.”
Ty Lee watched her pace toward the back corridor, her shoulders taut, her wanderer’s cloak swaying behind her with that unmistakable royal posture.
Fucking rude.
While she waited, a waitress came up to the table, sporting that classic, tired smile of someone who wanted to be anywhere else. Ty Lee can commiserate. Ty Lee swallowed the lump in her throat, looking up at her.
"Can I get you anything?" the waitress asked, but as she caught Azula's silhouette disappearing down the hallway, her face morphed into instant, wide-eyed recognition that made her breath hitch. She leaned down toward Ty Lee, lowering her voice to an alarmed, frantic whisper. "Wait... is that... is that Princess Azula? The Fire Lord's sister?"
"Yeah, yeah it is," Ty Lee said, completely distracted as her eyes drifted back to the corridor. Her heart stopped. Why couldn't she just let this go? Because she didn't want to? Because she was afraid?
"Spirits, I tell you," the waitress whispered, casting a frantic glance back toward the kitchen before looking at Ty Lee. "Everyone down here in the lower port talks about her and her journey, especially with the recent spirit attacks along the eastern ridge. The local guards couldn't handle those dark things, but ever since the Fire Lord sent her out here, people actually sleep easier at night. We're just glad she's the one standing between us and those evil spirits. Still... she's terrifying, isn’t she?"
"She can be," Ty Lee whispered, the waitress's words touching a strange, protective nerve she didn't expect. "But thank you."
"Tell me what I can get both of you, and I'll see if I can get it for free,It’s the least we can do.” the waitress offered, her eyes still darting nervously to the back hallway. "Another cup of coffee for Her Highness, I'm guessing? What can I get you?"
"Just a jasmine tea with honey, please."
"You got it," the waitress smiled, glad to have an excuse to retreat toward the counter.
When Azula returned and sat back down across from Ty Lee, her expression had smoothed back over into a guarded calm. She immediately reached for her coffee, taking a slow sip.
"So, The Golden Snake," Ty Lee said awkwardly. She had to dig deep on something had mentioned last night to restart the conversation. Azula looked pretty confused until Ty Lee added. "Mai said you play Pai Sho there?"
"Yes. I know the owner. I helped save him from… a snake spirit last year. We could rent out the upper room entirely if you want a private space for… what did Mai call it?”
"The bridal party. And no," Ty Lee shook her head, watching the way Azula's fingers twitched. Good. She was getting under her skin. If she had to be around the girl who had haunted her, she might as well have a little fun making her sweat. "Mai won't like that. She wants everything low-key."
"Fine," Azula muttered. "So we stick to doing it in her childhood home. Who’s coming?"
"Me, you and a bunch of other girl friends.," Ty Lee started, counting them off on her fingers. Azula’s eyes zeroed in on the movement of her hands, tracking the rhythm of her fingers before she threw back the rest of her drink.
The waitress returned, sliding the jasmine tea onto the table along with a warm, sugar-glazed fire-bun. Azula’s eyebrows furrowed in confusion.
"Thanks," Ty Lee smiled.
"Compliments of the house, since we have a royal celebrity at the table," The girl winked, her eyes lingering respectfully on Azula before taking the empty tray back inside.
Azula looked at the fire-bun, her eyebrows raised, her head tilted in amusement as she looked back at Ty Lee. "A celebrity? I suppose my reputation precedes me, even when I am trying to… as you say, lowkey.”
"Don't let it go to your head, Princess," Ty Lee answered, taking a large bite of the fire-bun. Oh, spirits, it was incredibly good. She was definitely going to have to get more.
She watched Azula's jaw work again. Agni, she must get the most awful tension headaches from how tight she kept her mouth.
"Nice," Azula cleared her throat, her demeanor shifting back to the scrolls. "What about the actual wedding? Guest list? We need to account for the Avatar and the Southern Water Tribe delegates and whoever else is important enough. The Earth King?"
"Right, yeah, this is good," Ty Lee washed the bun down with a sip of tea. "So, Team Avatar, the Earth King and his council, and Chief Hakoda's family.”
“Are there going to be plus-ones?”
Azula shifted in her seat, her traveling cloak moving slightly to reveal the sharp, defined lines of her collarbones. Ty Lee stared a fraction of a second too long.
"Why? Have you got a hot date?" Ty Lee said, her voice dripping with sweet, dangerous sarcasm.
Azula took a deep breath, her jaw moving, but she didn't bite back. "Just wondering if we are strictly limiting the numbers?"
Ty Lee shrugged, crossing her legs. "Why? Are you planning on bringing a plus-one, Princess?"
Azula leaned back in her wicker chair, a slow, calculated smirk playing on her lips as she adjusted her dark robes. "As a matter of fact, yes. I intend to bring Zirin and the other Fire Warriors.”
Ty Lee’s heart did a strange, violent little stutter at the name.
Zirin. The fierce, fiercely loyal firebender who had been leading Azula’s personal girl squad. Ty Lee had heard the stories too. About how Zirin rode beside the princess through every lawless village, how they lived under the same open skies, how they shared the quiet watches. A sudden, ugly coil of heat twisted tight in Ty Lee's stomach, an unwarranted flare of pure jealousy that caught her completely off guard.
"Zirin?" Ty Lee asked, her shark-like smile returning, sharper this time. "How… royal of you. I didn't realize you needed your little band of fighters just to watch your brother get married."
"They are my friends, Ty Lee," Azula said softly, her amber eyes wide, holding a quiet cadence that felt entirely too intimate. "They have been with me for years. It is only fair they see what we have been protecting."
The softness disappeared just as quickly as it came, replaced by a bitter, guarded mask. "But of course, if their presence disrupts your little list, I can always tell them to wait for me here. I’m sure they’d find some way to entertain themselves."
Ty Lee scowled, taking another aggressive bite of the fire-bun. It tasted better with Azula looking like she wanted to set the table on fire. This was borderline toxic, the exact kind of emotional disaster Mai would give her a long, silent look for.
"No, fine, add them," Ty Lee muttered, washing it down with her tea. "But if those Fire Warriors get drunk and start dueling the Kyoshi recruits, I'm holding you personally accountable."
“You always do.” Azula replied, sighing.
"Anything else, or are we good for now?" Ty Lee asked, her eyebrows raised.
Azula started gathering her scrolls, pulling her wanderer's cloak tighter over her shoulders. "I think so. We're done here for now. Ty Lee."
As Azula stood up, Ty Lee followed her lead, grabbing the rest of the fire-bun. Watching her gather her belongings, Ty Lee noticed something that made her breath hitch.
Has she gotten taller?
No. She wasn't taller. Her last actual memory of an unmasked Azula was her sitting on a wheelchair, bound in a straitjacket. She was free now. Unbound. Unbent. Unbroken.
Oh.
"Hey," Azula said, the words sounding heavy, like she was forcing them out of her throat because she knew she would regret it if she let her walk away in silence. “It was nice to see you, Ty Lee. Thank you. For agreeing to do this with me,. ”
The syllable hit her like a physical impact, catching in her chest and freezing the fake, defensive smile right on her face.
Ty Lee.
It was the first time she had heard Azula actually speak her name in seven long years. Hearing it roll off Azula's tongue, no longer snapped like an order, but spoken with a soft, quiet cadence that felt entirely too intimate…. It did something catastrophic to her defenses.
A sudden rush of warmth flooded her face, and she had to forcefully look down at the table, her fingers digging into the edge of her seat just to anchor herself. For a terrifying second, she felt exactly like she used to: utterly captivated, completely exposed, and hopelessly caught in Azula's pull.
"Okay," Ty Lee whispered.
"I will be arriving at the Capital next week to begin the official preparations with you. And to attend Mai’s bridal party or whatever. She... invited me." Azula continued, her amber eyes darting down to Ty Lee's lips for a split second before snapping back up.
It was a clumsy, desperate look that felt so out of character it made Ty Lee’s stomach drop. She cleared her throat, her voice slipping back into that clinical, authoritative vanguard cadence. "I just need to handle a restless spirit by the end of the week. Once that is done, I am entirely yours…”
What? Ty Lee hadn't realized she spoke the question out loud until she saw the slight panic in Azula's face.
“…for the wedding layout and stuff, I mean." Azula looked away, looking abashed. "So... yeah. See you around, Ty Lee.."
And Azula made true her word. One week later.
The welcome dinner for Azula had been Zuko’s bright idea. Mai’s words were that it was his carefully orchestrated, maddeningly domestic attempt to ease his sister back into the Capital before the grand wedding festivities completely consumed the palace. It was strange to have Zuko so fixated on getting into Azula’s good graces. But Azula did save their lives so it did make some sense.
The only thing weirder was Azula helping him out just as wholeheartedly.
The whole thing had started formally enough in the royal dining room, but as the night bled into the small hours, the formality of it all dissolved. Now, it had turned into a relaxed, late-night gathering in one of the palace’s secluded, low-ceilinged sitting rooms. Everyone that mattered was there and it was the strangest night Ty Lee had ever seen.
The air was thick, heavy, and entirely suffocating. It smelled of burning cedar, the cloying sweetness of aged plum wine, and the underlying, sharp sting of cigarette smoke.
Ty Lee sat tucked into the furthest corner of the long, plush couch, her formal crimson gown pooling around her ankles in heavy, dramatic waves. She held a small porcelain cup of wine between her fingers, but she hadn't taken a single sip in thirty minutes. Her entire body felt hyper-attuned to the room, her nerve endings vibrating with a restless, frantic energy that made her stomach violently twist.
She wanted to throw up. She was entirely, completely certain that if anyone spoke to her, she would vomit right onto the pristine tatami mats. Poor Zuko. He’d have to stress himself over the furniture budget again.
Because across the low wooden table, sitting cross-legged on a large silk cushion, was of fucking course, Azula.
The princess had shed her traveling cloak for the evening, opting instead for loose, dark red robes that draped elegantly over shoulder. A lit cigarrette was held loosely between her third and fourth fingers. It was that same pretentious, impossibly attractive grip that had been driving Ty Lee crazy since she first saw it.
But it wasn't Azula’s presence that was making the acid rise in Ty Lee’s throat.
It was everyone else.
"The weird stuff along Dusan was a spirit attack after all, Uncle," Azula was saying, her deeper, matured voice carrying that familiar, mocking cadence that easily cut through the quiet hum of the room. She leaned forward, using a black stone to flick a rough map spread across the table. "The dark spirit was feeding on the unrest from those old loyalist camps here. Honestly, it had the dramatic flair of a theater troupe, but if I hadn't snuffed out the rift by midnight, the corruption would have leaked directly into the lower port's waterways. And nobody wants to see what the merchants would do to the price of fire-kelp when the fish start glowing red."
Iroh nodded gravely, his round face thoughtful as he stroked his beard, a rare look of profound respect in his eyes. "Spirits touched by the human shadow are a heavy burden to quiet, niece. To handle such volatile energy without letting it consume your own fire... it takes immense spiritual discipline. You handled it cleanly, as I knew you would."
Azula let out a short, soft huff, taking a slow drag of her smoke. "The alternative was letting those spirits consume me, Uncle like it did, Avatar Kuruk. I simply gave it a choice: cooperate, or find out exactly how hot blue fire gets when I'm sleep-deprived. Well, it chose the logical option."
Zuko, sitting next to Iroh, let out a rough burst of laughter, raising his own goblet. "I'll remember that the next time the fire sages try to tell me we need a three-week ritual just to clear a road."
"Please do," Azula smirked, rolling her eyes. "Watching you debate old men about incense budgets is physically painful."
Ty Lee dug her fingernails into the porcelain of her cup. Because, how? How were they doing this? How had she missed the shift? For seven years, Ty Lee had carried the weight of the Boiling Rock like a physical bruise. She had lived in a state of arrested development, frozen in the memory of the screaming, shattered girl in the prison cell. She had spent twenty-six hundred days believing Azula was a broken, dangerous secret, banished to never return to the capital again.
Yet here they were, joking about incense budgets and fire-kelp. Zuko was laughing. Zuko, who had nearly been murdered by her a dozen times, was sharing wine with her.
The door slid open then, and Ursa walked in, carrying a fresh tray of warm, sugar-glazed fire-buns from the kitchen. Ty Lee’s breath hitched, her posture locking into a rigid, defensive line. She braced herself for the impact, waiting for the inevitable screaming match.
But as Ursa set the tray down, Azula didn't falter. She simply flicked her hair, her amber eyes glinting as she looked up at her mother.
"You should try one, Azula," Ursa said softly, offering a warm, maternal smile that contained no trace of the past's lingering shadows. "I remember how much you used to love the pastries when you were little.”
Azula took a slow sip of her wine before reaching out, her elegant, dangerous fingers picking up a fire-bun.
"Thank you, Mother. You don’t get much of this in the wild. Zirin tried to make a ration cake last month, and I'm fairly certain we could have used it as bullets for Rina’s slingshot."
Ursa let out a soft, delighted laugh, resting a hand gently on Azula's shoulder for a brief second before moving to pour more wine for Zuko. Azula didn't flinch. She didn't lean away from the touch. She just took a bite of the pastry.
Ty Lee felt a hot, dizzying wave of confusion crash over her.
She was the only one left on the backburner. She was the only one who hadn't been invited into this new, comfortable reality. Azula had built a bridge back to her mother, back to her brother, back to her uncle. How did she become this whole, functional, and effortlessly charming adult? And she had done it all without a single thought of Ty Lee.
She didn't need rescuing. She didn't need the circus girl. Ty Lee had been completely erased from the equation, left to vibrate into pieces in the corner while the rest of the world… and Azula moved on.
Then, as though the world wanted to prove a point…. Kiyi stepped quietly into the room, clutching a thick leather-bound sketchbook against her chest.
The pre-teen bypassed Zuko entirely, walking straight up to the silk cushion where Azula sat, her dark eyes wide with childish curiosity. "Zuko said you fought a giant shadow monster last night. Was it scary?"
Azula took one last, slow drag of her cigar, breathed the smoke out toward the ceiling, and then deliberately snuffed the embers out in a small ceramic tray. She looked down at her little half-sister with an amused, condescending little sniff.
"Scary?" Azula echoed, her voice dripping with easy, sharp sarcasm. "Hardly. It was loud, remarkably uncoordinated, and it smelled like swamp water. Honestly, Kiyi, if a dark spirit wants to impress me, it needs to do more than thrash around in the mud and hiss. My friends throw worse tantrums when we run out of cacao roasts."
Kiyi giggled, leaning against the table. "But Uncle Iroh said it was twice the size of a komodo-rhino!"
"Size makes for an easier target," Azula flatly replied, a sharp, knowing glint in her eyes. "It kept trying to lunge from the left because its right side was anchored to the rift. Once I figured that out, I simply boxed it in with a ring of blue fire and let it burn itself out. It's just like dealing with court ministers, really… give them a tiny corner to complain in, and eventually they run out of air. Remember that."
Kiyi nodded eagerly, soaking in the advice. "Did you use your fire daggers too?"
"Only to keep my robes from getting muddy," Azula smirked, shooing her away with a flick of her wrist. "Now go check your posture. You're slouching, and it makes you look like some untrained guard."
Kiyi let out another bright laugh, turning on her heel and running back out through the screen doors. "Don't run, you're ruining your posture!" Azula called after her, a sharp, amused glint in her eyes.
It was too much. The casual domesticity, the easy, snarky patience, the utter wholeness of the woman across the room was suffocating. Ty Lee felt a sudden, desperate wave of claustrophobia wash over her. She couldn't breathe.
Through the thin haze of lingering smoke, Azula’s amber eyes suddenly shifted, locking directly onto Ty Lee. She didn't look away. Her gaze slowly dropped down the low neckline of Ty Lee's crimson gown, lingering there with a heavy, fierce challenge before lifting back up to meet her eyes, her lips curling into a knowing, sharp little smirk.
Without a word, Ty Lee abruptly set her untouched porcelain cup on the side table She stood up, her crimson silk skirts rustling loudly in the quiet room.
"Excuse me," Ty Lee choked out, her voice tight and breathless. "I need to use the washroom."
She didn't look at Mai, and she actively forced herself not to look back at Azula as she turned on her heel and practically fled from the sitting room, desperate for the cold, quiet isolation of the corridor.
The vaulted corridor outside the sitting room was cool, but it didn’t do a single thing to drop the burning heat under Ty Lee’s skin.
She practically flew down the polished wooden hallway, her bare feet sliding against the smooth wooden floors. She didn't actually go to the washroom. Instead, she ducked into a small, deeply recessed balcony alcove, throwing open the sliding paper screen and pressing her forehead directly against the cold stone railing.
The midnight air of the upper Caldera rushed over her, smelling of distant sea salt and night-blooming jasmine, but her chest was tight, a sob catching hard in her throat.
She didn’t know why she was crying over this.
The soft, rhythmic steps of feet on the polished floor behind her made Ty Lee’s shoulders instantly lock. The ambient temperature of the alcove spiked by five degrees, carrying that heavy, unmistakable scent of bitter cigar smoke.
"If you're trying to hide, Ty Lee, you should really choose a corridor that doesn't amplify the sound of your breathing," Azula’s voice drifted out of the shadows, low, lazy, and arrogant.
Ty Lee spun around, her spine snapping straight as she backed up against the stone railing. "I'm not hiding. I was… hot."
Azula stepped into the moonlight filtering through the open balcony. Her wide, striking amber eyes looked incredibly sharp, zeroing in on Ty Lee with a fierce, undivided focus. She had her hands tucked casually into the wide sleeves of her dark red robes.
"Hot?" Azula tilted her head, her gaze deliberately dropping to the frantic rise and fall of Ty Lee's low neckline before snapping back up. "Funny. You looked perfectly comfortable until my family started playing house. What's the matter, Ty Lee? Disappointed I didn’t cause a scene?”"
"Shut up, Azula," Ty Lee snapped, her gray eyes flashing. "You think you can just waltz back into this palace and act like you didn't try to kill all of us?”
Azula took a slow, deliberate step forward then, crowding into Ty Lee’s space until their shoulders almost brushed. "If my existence offends you so much, you shouldn't have shown up when you did. Sounds like a personal problem to me."
"It's not a personal problem!" Ty Lee cried, her voice cracking as she shoved her hands against Azula's chest. She meant to push her away, but her fingers instantly curled into the fabric of Azula’s robes, trapping them both together. "You’re so arrogant, you actually think you can just slot yourself back into our lives whenever it’s convenient for you!"
Azula’s jaw tightened. With a rough, wordless snarl, she grabbed Ty Lee’s wrists, twisting them down and slamming her backward until Ty Lee’s hips hit the stone railing.
"My convenience?" Azula hissed, her face inches from Ty Lee's, her breath hot. "You have no idea what it took for me to even stand in the same room as all of you!"
"Is that right? Didn't you say that it would be really nice to see me?"
Azula looked murderous.
Good, Ty Lee thought. That's good. Fighting Azula… now that was something she knew very well.
Ty Lee dropped her center of gravity, whipping her leg in a tight, precise arc aimed at Azula’s ribs. Azula blocked the strike with a sharp forearm, but the force sent her skidding back across the balcony. Ty Lee didn't give her a second to recover; she launched herself forward, a blur of motion, throwing a palm strike toward Azula’s throat.
Azula ducked, her hand snapping out to snag Ty Lee’s waist, trying to throw her over her hip. Ty Lee countered with a fluid, acrobatic twist in mid-air, landing on her feet and immediately slamming her shoulder into Azula, pinning the princess hard against the rough stone of the pillar.
Azula’s eyes widened, a flicker of genuine shock crossing her face before it was replaced by anger. She braced her palms against Ty Lee’s ribcage, the heat of her firebending threatening to flare, but instead, she used that leverage to drive her knee upward. Ty Lee caught the movement, shifting her stance to trap Azula’s leg between her own, locking them in a frantic, sweating grapple.
They were breathing in jagged, broken gasps, chests heaving against one another, the air thick with the scent of ozone and exertion. Ty Lee stared into those blazing amber eyes, her own gray gaze darkening as the adrenaline turned into something far more dangerous.
Hunger.
"I want you to stop acting like you're above all of this," Ty Lee breathed, her nose brushing against Azula’s. The fury was still there, a hot, suffocating wall between them, but it was being eclipsed by a sharper, more dangerous hunger. “I want—“
I want you.
Ty Lee watched Azula’s eyes track her lips, the princess’s breathing hitching as the silence between them stretched, thick with unacknowledged desire. Ty Lee didn't wait for Azula to bridge the gap; she slammed her mouth onto Azula’s, her hands sliding from the stone pillar to bury themselves in the thick, dark hair at the nape of Azula’s neck.
The kiss was a violent, desperate reclamation. Azula let out a jagged, startled groan, her hands leaving Ty Lee's hips to claw at the fabric of her gown, pulling her body flush against her own with a possessive, crushing weight. They were a tangle of limbs and teeth, the fight devolving into a frantic, heated scramble as Ty Lee forced Azula back, pinning her against the wall with her knees, the sheer, raw heat of their skin making the night feel electric.
When Azula finally broke the kiss to drag her mouth down Ty Lee’s jawline, the air in the alcove felt heavy and charged.
"You're a nightmare," Azula panted against her skin, her hands shifting to slide under the silk of Ty Lee’s gown, her touch searing. “You really are my fucking mightmare,”
"Shut up," Ty Lee whispered, her fingers twisting into the dark hair at the nape of Azula’s neck as she pressed her body closer. “Just shut up and kiss me.."
(TBC)