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The ornate door slid closed behind Jee. He groped for the bolt with one hand, but it was a little hard to concentrate because there were suddenly fire-hot hands digging into his sides and teeth closing on the skin of his neck.
“Sir,” he managed, but he forgot what he was going to say as Zuko bodily pushed him against the door and bit down. Ow. That was going to leave an angry mark, but nobody would care to notice what was on some royal guardsman’s neck. Besides, Zuko’s hands were on his belt now, traveling along it towards the buckle, and that was so nice.
"Lieutenant, shut up," Zuko mumbled. He hooked his fingers under the belt and pulled Jee forward again, into him. He lifted his face as he did it.
Jee had no choice but to kiss him then, none at all. He swallowed the lick of fire that came up from Zuko’s throat. Yes.
He had to come up for air after a minute or so, though. Zuko sucked in a hard breath of his own when their mouths parted.
“Lieutenant,” he breathed again. He sounded almost drunk.
Jee smiled. His official title was Captain now. Zuko never called him that, though, and the fact that no one else still said "Lieutenant" almost made it sound like an endearment when coming from the Fire Lord's lips. Jee knew better, but it was a nice fantasy, clean and warm, something to make him smile when no one could see.
The hands were still on his belt, pulling. Jee blinked his eyes open for a moment, to make sure he knew exactly where Zuko’s face was so he wouldn’t accidentally bite him on the nose when he dove back in. It gave him a much clearer close-up of Zuko’s face than he’d had in a while.
Jee stopped moving as he opened his eyes properly.
Zuko never really looked well-rested these days, but now he looked downright bad. Jee was almost entirely sure that the splodge of purple under the Fire Lord's good eye hadn't been half this lurid and intense earlier today. And the eyelid was very red and puffy, as if he'd been rubbing it.
Wait. Rubbing it...
"Sir, do you wear make-up?"
"What?" Zuko looked at him as if he'd gone mad, then blinked. "Uh. Mai's been painting my eye a little. She says I look like someone punched me otherwise."
Jee indicated the bags under his own eyes. "I think you rubbed the paint off, sir. You do look like you've been in a fight."
A groan. Zuko raised a hand as if to touch the eye, but jerked it down again.
"It itches, I don't know how she stands wearing that stuff on her whole face every day!" He groaned again. “Ashes, I ruined it again. She’ll be mad, she told me fifty times to keep my hands off it and I ruined it..."
"Sir, the Lady Mai left for Omashu at noon today," Jee reminded him. “She’s not here to be mad at you."
"Oh. Right, she did." Zuko looked forlorn for a moment, as if he'd forgotten that he'd have to do without his girl for at least two weeks.
He still had one hand on Jee’s belt.
Jee sighed. "Sir, perhaps you should go take a nap?" Sleeping wasn't what he'd had in mind, but he didn't exactly feel like listening if Zuko was in the mood to whine about missing his girlfriend.
Zuko growled.
"No, I shouldn't go take a nap! I don't have time for naps, I need to be at a meeting in fifteen minutes." He pushed a hard, insistent kiss on the side of Jee's mouth and jerked him forward again. "Fuck me. Hurry."
Oh, all right. Jee liked uncomplicated orders and clear expectations. "Yes, sir."
He cast a quick look around the space they’d wandered into. It looked like a little-used waiting room, empty save for a few chairs and two tables with some ugly statues and vases on them. The table closest to them had a very promising sturdy look about it. The wood was dark and lacquered. It would set off Zuko’s nice white skin, and the blush it would be carrying when Jee started fucking into him.
Excellent. Jee took a step back and let his smile curl into a grin. He grabbed Zuko’s belt in the same way as the Fire Lord had been holding his, and pulled.
It had looked perfectly doable in his head. He’d done it dozens of times before. Grab the chair behind him and pull it out of the way while tugging Zuko forward, step out of the way to let the Fire Lord’s momentum carry him into the table, and push him over it face down - easy.
He got as far as moving the chair and pulling at the belt biting into his fingers. Zuko stumbled forward, just like planned, and Jee ducked to the side, just like planned. He ducked just low enough for the pointy ends of the Fire Lord’s shoulder pieces to rip across his face.
The pain came as such a shock that he didn’t even think to scream.
“Um," Zuko said as he stood in front of Jee, being useless while Jee tried to feel for the flaps of skin that must surely be hanging off his skull right now. "Um. You have a little cut on your cheek. Are you all right?”
It hurt like fuck.
“Sir,” Jee hissed, praying to every spirit he knew for patience. “May I suggest, for the tenth time, that you take those miserable giant clothes off when we do this?"
Zuko's hand shot up to touch the upper shoulder piece, as if he was afraid Jee would try to take it away from him.
"I told you, I can't! They take half an hour to put on properly. What if there's an emergency?"
"Like what? Sir."
Zuko shot him an annoyed look, as if Jee was the only unreasonable person in the room here. "Anything! What am I going to say if... if a volcano starts erupting and I have to go deal with it in my underclothes?"
"Sir. That never happens," Jee said, trying for a professional but reassuring tone, as if he had this year's volcano eruptions schedule all memorized and wouldn't dream of undressing the Fire Lord when it wasn't convenient. Any other time, he might have mocked Zuko a little for getting all overwrought and dramatic, but the poor fellow did look extraordinarily tired. And if Jee made him mad, there might not be so much as a kiss for days.
Zuko squeezed his eyes shut and pinched the bridge of his nose.
"It will happen as soon as I take all my clothes off just for a fuck. The spirits hate me."
"But you don't sleep in your regalia, sir. What if a volcano erupts at night?"
Zuko clearly didn't see the joke. "You know what I mean! I can't afford to let anyone think I'm slacking off in the middle of the day! They'll start saying I'm lazy and incompetent and only interested in my own fun or something, and then they'll start going on about how hard-working my father was, and... Agh!"
He threw his hands in the air. One of them caught in the cape.
"AAAAAGH!"
Jee watched him flail, frowning. There was an unfortunate grain of truth in all this paranoia. A lot of people in the capital were still unhappy about a dishonored traitor being dropped onto the throne of the Fire Nation by the Avatar. A teenaged dishonored traitor, at that. Jee was sure he didn't hear even a quarter of all the relentless criticism that Zuko got for everything that he didn't do absolutely perfectly -or everything he did, period.
Zuko had matured since the time they were on a ship together, and he'd gotten a lot better at just choking things down rather than taking everything as a hideous personal insult and exploding. But the way he pinched his eyes shut and his lips together when he was trying to ignore barbs was far too tired and bitter an expression to be on the face of anyone younger than fifty. Jee wasn't sure he preferred this to the good old shouting fits.
He reached out and put a heated hand on the back of Zuko's bare neck. The stiff collar didn't let him reach down to soothe the tense muscles below, though. Even the Fire Lord's clothing seemed designed to weigh a man down.
"Sir. The clothes are impractical. You get stuck on everything, and the shoulder pieces are as heavy as a war hammer. You're murdering your back by walking around in this all day long."
Zuko slumped.
"I didn't invent this outfit. Why is everything around here always my fault?"
Oh, stupid brat. "Aren't you taking this a little personally, sir? It's just your job to be at fault. You get to sit on a throne and tell everyone what to do, and in return you take all the blame."
"I don't remember it working like that for my father."
"Sir, won't you at least consider not wearing the cape? It doesn't serve any purpose. You're just trying to make yourself look bigger."
Zuko grimaced. "I need to look as big as I can. Not like I'm some eighteen-year-old."
"You are an eighteen-year-old, sir." Good thing, too. If Zuko didn't have a teenager's stamina and recovery time, his girlfriend might not have agreed to share him at all.
"Well, I can't afford to be an eighteen-year-old."
The mulish look on his face gave Jee an uncomfortable flashback to back when they were still sailing around the world. I can't afford to be eighteen if I want to capture the Avatar.
"Sir, the cape makes the shoulder pieces even heavier. And it's too hot. Nobody wears capes outside of ceremonial occasions."
"They do in the Earth Kingdom."
"They need capes there, sir. Because it gets as cold as a penguin’s ass in winter and nobody's a firebender over there."
"And because they can't afford to look like they were born last week, either," Zuko grumbled.
They were clearly getting nowhere. Perhaps it was time for the direct approach. Ever so often, being told an unexpected, brutal truth confused Zuko just long enough that he ended up agreeing to something before he recovered his wits.
Jee leaned forward until he was almost nose to nose with Zuko. "Sir. The clothes are in the way. I can barely even reach your face over all those shoulder plates, and I have to tangle with a silk cape and your overcoat and your tunic and your trousers and your loincloth before I can reach your behind. Do you have any idea how hard it is to fuck someone if you have to keep all that out of the way?"
Zuko looked beautifully stunned. It took him a few seconds to find his voice.
"Doesn't bother me," he said.
"That's because you don't have do any of the work, sir. You just lie there and enjoy yourself while I have to concentrate on not soiling or tearing an armful of priceless fabrics and on performing to the Fire Lord's satisfaction."
Zuko looked insulted. Almost hurt, even.
"I'm sorry you're finding it such a chore, Lieutenant, but I'm not here to make your life easier," he snapped. There was a nasty, hissy undertone in his voice that Jee knew he should probably back away from. "You're always complaining about something. I could go about conducting affairs of state completely naked and you still wouldn't be happy."
Jee was so bad at backing away when he should. He was no longer even trying to get better at it - it was part of him. "I'm captain of your guard, sir. I'm supposed to find things to be unhappy about. It's what you pay me for."
“Whatever,” Zuko groused. "Mai never whines about my cape."
"Perhaps that's because it's not in her way, sir. The Lady Mai only needs access to your front when she wants some."
Jee knew he’d made a mistake halfway through the sentence, but his mouth finished it even as his brain was screaming at him to stop.
He was allowed to give Zuko a rather astonishing amount of lip, usually. He more than half suspected that General Iroh had given his nephew a lecture on the importance of cultivating people who were not afraid to talk back at the Fire Lord. But there were certain lines that were not to be crossed, and judging by the freakishly angry look on Zuko's face, a line had just been crossed by a mile or two.
"...Sir. I suppose. Not that I'd presume to know what you do with the Lady Mai, sir," Jee said. He was close to babbling, but Zuko looked close to killing him, so maybe he was allowed to panic a little. "My apologies, sir. I meant no insult to the Lady Mai. None at all. I misspoke, I swear."
"Don't let it happen again," Zuko said.
"No, sir."
The lopsided glare kept boring into Jee’s forehead for another few very loudly silent seconds. Then Zuko sighed and stalked over to window. He stayed to the side of it while looking out, though, and didn’t get close enough to it to be visible to anyone in the gardens. Good. At least Jee’s lessons about not putting one’s royal self in the middle of giant open windows like a turtleduck begging for the hunter’s arrow were sinking in.
And it was a little bit funny to see Zuko lurking half behind the curtain. He really had gotten much, much better at being impressive, but it was hard to stay afraid of him when he went to stand in a corner and sulk.
Jee stared at the Fire Lord's back and tried to wait without fidgeting, like the proper guard he should probably start behaving as right now. He used to enjoy making Zuko angry. Not all that much anymore, though. Now that he'd been living in the palace for nearly half a year and had truly learned to comprehend how many random and intentional forces conspired to make Zuko's life hard, he felt rather guilty about adding to them himself.
He'd really misbehaved this time. You didn't go about making insinuations about a lady's bedroom habits, particularly not the future Fire Lady's. And Zuko's girlfriend didn't seem to be the type to get herself all rumpled up by having sex in closets in between meetings. Jee had certainly never caught them at it; he didn't even really know what they liked to do together, if anything. Perhaps they sat around and did competitive complaining about how lousy their day had been and how they hated everything. They seemed to like that. When they had children, the brats would probably emerge from the womb scowling and grousing about how long that had taken and how the color of the bedsheets was just appalling.
The other denizens of the palace clearly couldn’t wait until Zuko convinced her to marry him, though. Everyone from the ministers down to the chamber maids was of the opinion that the Lady Mai was the most efficient person in the whole building. One of the younger and more forthright clerks had even told Jee that keeping the Lady’s royal betrothed from distracting her while she was at work was essential to ensure the smooth day-to-day running of the nation. So Jee was really making a contribution to the country's peace and prosperity by providing sexual services to their young and comely sovereign. He wasn't just acting like a treasonous lecher. That was a nice thought.
Zuko was still shooting him dark looks while tugging on his sleeves and the hem of his overcoat. The clothes looked respectably ridiculous again, but his crown hung a little lopsided, and a few locks of hair were poking out of the topknot.
Perhaps a peace offer? "Your hair looks a mess, sir. Would you like me to put it right?"
"Fine." Zuko yanked the crown out of his hair and knelt down with his back to Jee.
Jee took a moment to appreciate the sight in front of him. I live in the palace and wear silk clothes and eat like a king, and the Fire Lord gets on his knees before me when I tell him to. No, he hadn't done all that badly for himself at all.
"Mai didn't even say goodbye when she left this morning," Zuko told the crown he was turning in his hands.
Aha. "Didn't she, sir?"
"I could barely get a word out of her all week. She was furious that I was sending her to Omashu," Zuko grumbled. He sounded genuinely miserable, as always when he'd had a falling-out with his lady.
Jee sank his fingers into the thick dark hair and gently massaged the scalp underneath. Zuko hummed a little, almost inaudibly, and Jee smiled.
He finger-combed the hair for a few more moments before pulling it up and folding the stiff gilded tie around it. "Well. I understand that she's unhappy, sir. Being sent to Omashu is a punishment."
"You've never even been to Omashu, how would you know?"
"Everyone hates Omashu, sir. It's tradition." He gave the finished topknot a final tug and held out his hand. "Crown?"
Zuko's hand shot up and back, and Jee nearly got his eye poked out by their greatest national symbol of authority. He carefully plucked the sharp crown from Zuko's fingers and fitted it snugly under the hair tie.
"I don't get it," the Fire Lord whined. "She acts like I make her do things she hates just for a lark! It's not my fault that Bumi only ever wants to negotiate with her. That old crackpot just wants to torture her for that old occupation business. He doesn’t have any problems talking to me or Ambassador Kon or anything, he just likes being unreasonable!"
"He's a head of state, sir. I think being unreasonable is a requirement."
"Yeah, he..." Zuko started. Then he seemed to catch himself. "I am not unreasonable."
"Right, sir," Jee agreed.
The frown that that earned him was so perfectly Lieutenant, why is my ship running slow and I ordered you to get that engine fixed last month, Lieutenant that Jee couldn't help but smile. Ah, the bad old days. He'd have laughed himself silly if anyone had told him three years ago that one day, he'd agree to live in Zuko's home and be a willing target for all the whinging and moaning that the Fire Lord couldn't afford to indulge in while in front of other people.
On the other hand, he also wouldn't have believed that he'd get to entertain the Fire Lord whenever his lady love was busy, in a different country, or too sick of the whinging to tolerate him. But even if Zuko hadn't improved all that much, personality-wise, he still was a lot more bearable now that he actually trusted Jee to do his job well. Being responsible for the personal safety of the Fire Lord was no small thing, and Jee really did appreciate the vote of confidence.
And the perks that came with this new employ. Living in a palace, wearing silk clothes, and eating like a king was nice. If Zuko hadn't offered him a job, Jee might have been out on the street, like all those other poor buggers who'd been discharged from the military into a country already filled with unemployed men.
He'd been expecting exactly that, but an emissary from the palace had accosted him on the docks when the shipload of former prisoners of the Northern Water Tribe arrived. (The greatest invasion fleet in history, and the surviving Fire Nation soldiers had all fit on one ship.) There had been a pouch with more gold than Jee had ever held in his life, and a personal letter from the Fire Lord, thanking him for his loyal service and telling him that he was free to go anywhere he liked with his reward, but that he was very warmly invited to stay and work in the royal household if he wanted. Jee hadn't understood what on earth Zuko might need him for. He didn't have any extraordinary skills, and he hardly thought Zuko might be inviting him back for more of the - admittedly very pleasant and memorable - fornicating that they’d engaged in on their old ship. The Fire Lord had a girlfriend, and if he needed anything on the side, he probably had his pick of men and women far younger and less rude than Jee.
No, Jee really hadn't understood. Not until he followed the emissary to the palace and arrived just in time to witness a massive uproar about an assassination attempt on the Fire Lord's girlfriend, which had come within an inch of succeeding because there were so few loyal guards left that they all had to cluster around the Fire Lord, leaving anyone else unprotected. Jee had spent hours waiting in the corridor outside the palace infirmary before Zuko stormed out in a cloud of fury and barely-suppressed panic. Jee had taken one look at the brat's ashen face and offered his services without even being asked. Zuko had nodded, accepted the offer with an oddly stiff and formal politeness, appointed Jee captain of the guard on the spot, and even offered to show him to his new room a few doors down from the royal bedchambers.
As soon as they were there, Zuko had closed the door, slumped to the ground, and spent a few minutes crying into his voluminous sleeves while Jee stood about and wondered if he was still allowed to touch the brat. Fire Lord.
Things were better these days; Jee had two full contingents of capable guards to command, and the whole palace staff had gotten better at dealing with assassins. They clearly had a long way to go, though. Jee moved to stand in front of Zuko, took a critical look at the placement of the crown, and adjusted it a little to the right.
"Perfect, sir."
Zuko got to his feet, movements slow and tired. "Thanks."
He leaned in and Jee met him halfway, putting his hands on Zuko's sides instead of trying to grab anywhere near the treacherous shoulder pieces. It was a lot more awkward even than hugging while both in full armor used to be. All his fingers could feel was the stiff leather of the Fire Lord's protective body harness under layers of heavy silk.
But the mouth that closed over his was all naked softness, warm and insistent and deliciously slow. Jee hummed into it, opening up just a little so that he could catch the sparks on Zuko's tongue.
Zuko pushed forward, and Jee leaned back a little so that some of the Fire Lord's weight rested on him. The ache that caused in his spine was barely more than uncomfortable. Not worth stopping over. Maybe Zuko was still a selfish little bastard who only wanted the kissing and fucking for consolation, just like back on the ship. But Jee hadn't let that dampen his enjoyment back then, and he wasn't going to now.
The lovely heat pulled away abruptly, and Jee's eyes flew open. Zuko was staring at him as if he'd just remembered that there were five volcanoes erupting and he had to go deal with them all right now.
"What time was the governor of Shu Jing arriving again!?"
Jee blinked.
"The meeting you were going to, sir? You said it was in fifteen minutes. When we came in."
"Damn it, I'm going to be late..." Zuko stopped and sighed. Jee could see his shoulders sag, even under the stupid costume. "I'm already late."
"Probably, sir."
"He'll get all offended and refuse to hand over a bigger share of his provincial taxes. I need that money for the new merchant fleet," Zuko mumbled.
"Surely Master Piandao will talk to his governor for you, sir."
Zuko shook his head. "The governer hates him. Because he's ticked off that Master Piandao is the most famous person in the province and not him, or something. Or because Master Piandao cheated on his taxes. I don't even remember." He rubbed at his scar, then at his good eye. "Everybody hates each other and they all hate me. And they don't pay their taxes."
Jee put a warm hand on the side of Zuko's head, curled his fingers, and began pushing gentle pulses of heat out of his fingertips. It took a long time before he could feel Zuko's heartbeat slow down a little.
"Wishing you were still chasing the Avatar, sir?"
Zuko huffed. "Yeah. Kind of."
Then his head shot up again, just when Jee was almost entirely sure they were back in calm waters now.
"Ashes! I forgot it's Toph's birthday, I didn't send her anything!" Zuko's eyes darted around the room, then back to Jee. "And did you remember lock the door when we came in?"
Jee sighed and wished he could brew the very special tea that General Iroh used to brew to make his nephew calm the hell down.
"The Lady Bei Fong is your friend, sir. I hardly think she'll stop paying her taxes because her birthday present arrived late."
Zuko looked vaguely horrified.
"Toph doesn't pay me taxes! We're not occupying the Earth Kingdom anymore, we can't make them pay taxes!"
Oh. Right. That was hard to remember sometimes. They'd owned most of the Earth Kingdom for Jee's whole life.
Zuko seemed about escalate his little panic attack, so Jee soldiered on. "Sir, you're worrying about trifles again. It doesn't matter. At worst, she'll be a little offended and you'll have to send her two presents."
Zuko deflated.
"Oh, shut up, Lieutenant. Is the door locked or not?"
"Yes, sir, of course I locked the door. Nobody knows you're slacking off. I swear."
It was a little amazing that no one in this whole palace actually seemed to have cottoned on that the Fire Lord had developed a habit of spending his tea breaks bent over the nearest available piece of furniture. The only one who had noticed anything at all was the young Lady Bei Fong herself. Jee had no idea how she’d found them out. He’d met her only once, at the peace banquet in Ba Sing Se, but she'd spent half of the evening leering at him from across the table. The memory was still fresh enough to make Jee check behind the curtains and under desks every time Zuko dragged him into a room.
"Sir, may I make a suggestion?"
Zuko was standing still in the middle of the room, hands clasped, a frown of intense concentration on his face. "Do it quickly, I need to think of a present," he muttered.
"Sir, I really do believe you need a nap. Or a break. A real break. You can't work if you're all wound up and exhausted."
Zuko slammed his hand down, and a plume of bright yellow fire trailed after it.
"Stop distracting me! I need to go meet the governor and find Toph a present and... and things. Important things," he snarled, whirling in the direction of the door.
The sudden movement made his cape snap up and knock a vase off the smaller table.
"AAAAAAGH!"
He wasn't quite stomping his feet, but he obviously wanted to. Jee didn't bite back his snicker quite fast enough. Zuko whirled on him.
"And I'm sending you to the coal mines!"
"Really, sir?" It was a threat he'd heard at least once a week since he'd arrived in the palace. He was starting to get curious about what the coal mines might be like.
"Yes, really," Zuko snapped. "I'm getting a new captain of the guard who doesn't waste my time with insolence."
"As you wish, sir," Jee said, bowing. "I'll make sure to tell him exactly how you like to be spanked, sir."
"What!?", Zuko shrieked. He'd gone nearly as red as his tunic.
"If he's my replacement, I need to inform him of all he needs to know to do his job, sir. It's a matter of professional pride."
Zuko blinked. His good eye was very wide all of a sudden.
“…You wouldn't really tell anyone about that. Would you?"
"I thought I was being replaced, sir,” Jee let his inner twelve-year-old answer.
The look of confusion that came over Zuko’s face was almost heartbreakingly intense.
"I'm not replacing you! Why…” Damn him, he looked like Jee had kicked his favorite turtleduck for no reason. “Don’t tell anyone about the spanking, why would you do that?"
Damn him.
"Of course I wouldn't, sir. I apologize. It was a bad jape." Jee only had to dip his head a little to press a soft, apologetic kiss on Zuko's mouth. They were nearly of a height now.
Zuko sighed. It was a very sad sound.
"And it's not your job to touch me," he muttered against the corner of Jee's mouth. "If you don't want to, don't."
Jee closed his eyes. Oh, brat.
"Sir, that's a silly thing to say." He didn't put his arm around Zuko's shoulders; the last time he'd tried that, he'd gotten his hand stuck between the wings and bent one of the delicate metal tips out of shape. Sometimes he wished he got to be there more often when Zuko was out of his regalia, but that happened only during training or at night. Training was rather public, and evenings and nights belonged to the Lady Mai. Jee knew when not to butt in.
And he had no idea how to mention things like fucking you whenever you have ten minutes and need to relax is very enjoyable, but I would also like to hold you and kiss you, and it would be nice if I could do it in my own bed for once. The spirits only knew how Zuko would deal with a hint that Jee was getting a little sentimental about all this. Probably by asking his girlfriend what she thought it meant.
Zuko didn't exactly lean into him, but it was quite a few moments before the the warmth of his breath drew back. A wooden creaking sounded a little to the right almost immediately afterwards.
"Lieutenant?"
"Yes, sir?" Jee blinked his eyes open. Zuko had sat down in the chair Jee had drawn away when they'd barged into the room.
"Do you think I'm a good Fire Lord?"
Uh oh.
"You're not perfect, sir. But you've come a very long way."
Zuko’s tired eyes disappeared behind his hands. "You think I'm rubbish at it, don't you.”
Well, a little bit. But it wasn’t like Jee would be any better at it.
"Sir, you're learning. Nobody's great at anything at your age."
A sigh.
"Everyone else seems to be doing so much better. Aang and Katara and Suki and Sokka, they're all doing well, and I…” He dropped his hands and lifted them again, palms up, indicating either his own bedraggled state or the broken vase on the floor or the whole palace city. It was a very eloquent way of saying I suck at everything I do.
Which was a gross exaggeration. Jee remembered what he’d been like himself at eighteen. He’d barely been able to manage his daily ration of moonshine and ship biscuits, let alone a country. Zuko was doing well in comparison.
"Do any of your friends have to make people pay taxes, sir?"
Zuko blinked.
"I don't think so..."
Jee patted him on the knee. "There you have it, sir. Your job is clearly the most difficult of all."
It got him a smile. A very small one, but wringing any kind of smile from Zuko was an achievement these days.
The frown was back in seconds, though. Zuko spent a few long moments just staring in front of him. It was the sort of expression that heralded that the next thing out of his mouth would be something Jee would not like to hear.
"Warden Ming was here two nights ago."
Jee blinked at the sudden change in topic.
"She was, sir? I didn't see her." Usually, the capital prison's young warden took a moment to at least greet Jee when she came to report. He rather liked her; she was clever, and good at her job. Maybe bit too inexperienced for it in Jee's personal opinion. But in Jee's personal opinion, Zuko was about three decades too inexperienced to be put in charge of a flea circus, never mind a nation.
"She came through the underground passages," Zuko said. He was talking to a little sculpture of a dragon that sat on the table close to Jee's hand. "Someone waited for her at her house and offered her six hundred golden sen if she'd look the other way while they broke my father out of prison."
Jee sucked in a breath. Spirits, it just never ended.
"I take it Warden Ming was not harmed, sir?"
Zuko shook his head. "No, but she'll be coming to live in the palace. We can't guarantee her safety if she's sleeping down in the city."
"You did tell your spymaster about this, sir?"
"Mai said she was going to handle it. Um, I'm not supposed to be telling you about it at all, but...” He looked up, but not quite into Jee’s eyes. "Lieutenant?"
"Sir?"
"I'll triple whatever amount of gold they offer you. If they ever ask you to..."
…Coal and ashes.
"Sir, nobody’s going to ask me anything."
“Mai says they might,” Zuko said, and that made Jee think twice, because the girl was damned sharp.
The fire in his belly began to curl in on itself as it dawned on him exactly how likely the scenario was.
Zuko was so well-guarded and so jumpy that barely any assassin ever managed to even come near him. But Jee was at his side at least half of the day, and a little closer than that several times a week. If anyone in Zuko’s court had gone bad... if anyone who wanted Zuko dead knew exactly how much the Fire Lord let his guard down around Jee, they might come to him with six hundred golden sen. Or seven hundred, or eight or nine hundred. Maybe even a thousand golden sen to pin the Fire Lord against a wall, caress him and murmur sweet nonsense into his ear until he tilted back his head and exposed his neck, and then slide in a knife instead of a kiss.
Jee had to take a few deep breaths, and then another when Zuko finally looked straight at him.
"You need to tell me if I ever treat you badly. Like back on the ship. I don't mean to, sometimes I just get…” Zuko swallowed. He looked all of fifteen. "If you're unhappy, tell me what I need to do to fix it. Promise you’ll tell me."
"I want for nothing, sir."
"But if there's something..."
"I'd tell you, sir," Jee said. He really wasn't supposed to cut the Fire Lord off in mid-sentence, but this wasn't a conversation he wanted to have. Best make it take a more productive direction. "If someone ever approaches me with such a dishonorable offer, sir, what do you want me to do? Subdue them and bring them to you?"
Zuko sighed again. "If you think you can, maybe. But don't take any stupid risks. Tell me or Mai right away."
"Not spymaster Wen, sir?"
"Mai doesn't like him. She thinks he’s way too close with my father’s biggest old supporters," Zuko sighed. "I don't know if she's right. I don't know. I have no idea who all these people really are, I was away from court for years."
Jee wanted to hug him. The thrice-cursed clothes were still in the way, so he settled for pressing a hand down on Zuko’s shoulder.
"Sir, I would never betray you." He couldn't think of a single more convincing thing to say. He'd sworn the solemn oath of a royal guard, recited the soldier's pledge a hundred times while in the army, and probably made dozens of other promises of loyalty to the Fire Nation and its ruler in specific. But none of those quite expressed the blank horror that the idea of harming Zuko made him feel.
"Thank you," Zuko whispered. He’d closed his eyes, but his hand came up to clutch at Jee’s fingers.
Jee rubbed at Zuko’s knuckles with his thumb. The Fire Lord’s hands no longer felt as fire-weathered as Jee’s own - there were servants bringing him creams for his skin after every training session.
A whole palace full of everything any man could ever want, and still they ended up having these sorts of conversations seemingly every other week. Jee worried sometimes. All the time.
But he had a job to do now, an important one, and he forced himself to focus on that rather than his desire to spirit Zuko away to a ship in the royal harbor and take him for a sailing trip around the archipelago and not return him for a month.
"Sir, the seneschal will be announcing dinner shortly."
"Yeah, I know."
He squeezed Zuko’s shoulder one last time and let go. “Sir, I mean to say that you have time to go talk to the governor of Shu Jing, or to have a fuck. But not both. And you'll have time for neither if you just sit here."
"I hate having to make two hundred decisions every day,” Zuko groused.
Oh, good. They were back in comfortable and familiar whining territory now. Jee could deal with that.
"Sir, this is a very minor decision. Either you go talk to the man now and get it over with, or you send a servant to tell him you have a headache and you'll see him tomorrow, and I bend you over this table and you don't need to have a single thought for the next ten minutes." He tapped the tabletop under his hand for emphasis. It felt rather welcoming, as hard flat surfaces went; the wood was smooth, and faintly warm, like all objects that Zuko sat or stood near for any length of time.
Zuko spared the tapping finger only a brief glance. He didn't look excited at the prospect of getting to know the table better. He just looked worn out.
"Sokka says decisiveness is the hallmark of a can-do leader."
"Does he now? Sir." Most of Zuko's friends were interesting, terrifying, or both, but the Water Tribe fellow was still failing to make any sort of favorable impression on Jee. Zuko loved him like the brother he'd never had, though, so Jee tried not to be too openly disdainful.
"He makes it sound so easy. I wish I were a can-do Fire Lord," Zuko sighed. He stared at the table, as if waiting for the universe to reassure him that he could be any kind of Fire Lord that he wanted to be.
Oh, for sun's sake. "Just pick an option, sir. There's only two of them."
Zuko blinked up at him. Slowly but surely, his eyebrow curled down into its standard determined frown.
"I don't want to talk to that idiot governor. And I don't feel like having only ten minutes here before I need to go sit in the dinner hall and eat quail soup and listen to koto. I hate koto. I have no idea why I'm supposed to like fine arts!"
Jee could sympathize with that, at least. "I'd play the pipa, sir, except that it would probably be treason to sing "Girls from Ba Sing Se" in the royal dinner hall."
Zuko chuckled, but this time it sounded genuine.
"I think the antique paintings would catch fire all by themselves if you sing sailor songs in there." He groaned. "Ashes, I never thought I'd actually miss music night. At least none of you ever had a koto."
He stared at Jee for another moment or two. A strange, almost fond smile slowly replaced the frown.
"Would you like to see a dragon, Lieutenant?"
It took Jee a moment to wrap his head around the non sequitur. "Anyone would give their firstborn to see a dragon, sir. But aren't they extinct?"
Zuko's eyes lit up, as if he was pleased to have discovered something Jee wanted. He rose from his chair. "Yeah. Kind of extinct. But there's a ton of them down in the Dragonbone Catacombs! Well, dead ones. Rows and rows of skulls," he said, drawing vague shapes in the air with licks of fire.
Jee watched him pace around the room, bemused. Zuko rarely got animated about something he liked, other than sword practice. Let alone this suddenly.
"And nobody ever comes down there," Zuko went on. "I should... go check if they're okay, or something. It's my duty to make sure those catacombs are in good upkeep. Important national heritage."
That sounded reasonable. And rather fascinating, to be honest. "But I thought only the Fire Sages and the Fire Lord were allowed into the Dragonbone Catacombs, sir?"
The grin Zuko seemed to have been holding in burst forth. It took years off his face.
"We can sneak in. They'll never know."
Well, this was something completely different. General Iroh had mentioned Zuko's ersthwhile love of going around like a sneak thief at night, once or twice, but Jee had never quite believed it.
"I'd love to, sir."
"Great." Zuko was still smiling. It was a little unnerving. "Go get your stupid pipa and wait for me under the window of my bedroom, we'll need to slip through the back garden." He shrugged, jostling the shoulder pieces, and made a face. "And I need to change into something more comfortable first."
Thank the spirits of the moon and the sun and all the stars, he was taking his fool's suit off. Jee resisted the urge to fist-punch the air and just smiled back instead.
"Those catacombs sound awfully cold, sir. Shall I bring a blanket?"
Zuko blinked, and for one horrible second, it looked like he hadn't invited Jee to a hidden location where no one would think to look for them with the sole purpose of having sex all night.
Then the grin flashed back, though.
"Yeah, you do that." He looked Jee up and down. "You're pretty old, you'll probably need a lie-down. Lots of wall-climbing and sneaking before we're there."
"Right, sir," Jee said. Just for that, he was bringing rope as well. And a gag.
Zuko turned towards the door, and Jee automatically began to move forward to fall in step behind the Fire Lord. He nearly got his throat sliced by the tip of one of the damn shoulder pieces when Zuko suddenly whirled around.
"Oh, I could send Toph a dragon bone! She loves getting new things to bend!"
"Bone isn't rock, sir."
Zuko scowled and shook his head, like he always did when dismissing inconvenient bits of reality. "Toph can find rock in anything. She'll probably discover a way to firebend by this time next year."
He started to turn again, but stopped almost at once.
"Oh. There's not just bone down there, there's piles and piles of lava glass. Do you know what that means?"
"No, sir." Jee wondered if he should write to General Iroh and ask to be taught how to make the very special tea. It was apparently some kind of White Lotus trade secret, but he was starting to think that the lack of very special tea in the royal palace was turning into something of a national emergency.
"Bumi loves lava glass!", Zuko exclaimed triumphantly. "Uncle gave him a piece of it during the peace banquet, and he ate it, and then he tried to convince us to export it. If I promise him a steady supply, he'll agree to the treaty. And maybe he'll talk to me from now on instead of annoying Mai. And then Mai won't be angry with me anymore." He paused for a second. "I solved everything. I am a can-do Fire Lord." He looked half satisfied and half expectant.
It was such a ridiculous bubble that Jee couldn't resist the urge to pop it. "Except that the governor of Shu Jing still hasn't agreed to give you a bigger share of his taxes, sir."
Zuko glowered.
"I'll beat him with Toph's dragon bone until he gives me money." It was impossible to tell if he was serious. "Go, Lieutenant, and tell my seneschal that I'm indisposed and retiring for the evening. And pick up something to eat from the kitchens."
He opened the door a little and tried to stick his head out, perhaps to check the corridor for people. The shoulder pieces got in the way, though, and he had to twist his upper body into a curve that would probably make Jee's spine break if he tried it.
"Sir, how do you think you're going to sneak all the way to your quarters? You're not exactly inconspicuous, and we're on the other side of the palace."
Zuko glared at him over his shoulder. Then he seemed to remember something and straightened up.
“I’m the Fire Lord, if I want to go to my room and not have anyone bother me on the way there I can just ignore them when they talk to me.”
It seemed like he was expecting confirmation for that too. Jee nodded.
“That’s right, sir."
Zuko smiled. “See you in a bit, Lieutenant."
He still looked like a teenager playing dress-up with his father’s clothes, Jee decided, but he wasn’t going to say a word about it again. For today.