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“Where is she?”
It is a question only the young prince can dare to ask, and he only asks it once.
Everyone else – the servants, the nobles, the officers – are left to wonder. The gentle and the prudent draw no conclusions, remark only on how difficult it must be for the new Fire Lord to have suffered so much loss in so short a space of time.
---
Lady Fukumi returns from the joint funeral and coronation with furrowed brows, prickled by a vague discomfort that she cannot name. The ceremony is, by virtue of its very nature, a complicated affair. She is proud of her nation for embodying such graceful complexity – to stride the knife’s edge between grief and celebration at the simultaneous passing and crowning of their leaders – but something about this evening’s procession has bothered her deeply.
It is not until she has disrobed and immersed herself in the steaming waters of a bath that she realizes no one was present to comfort the children as their grandfather was cremated. And they are children, she reminds herself, despite their poise. The young prince and princess are barely past their tenth year.
Instinctively, her hands drop to the subtle swelling of her stomach.
---
When the appropriate period of mourning has passed, the people of the Fire Nation welcome the ascension of their new lord with aplomb. New official portraits are distributed, school children craft paper lanterns, vendors sell seasoned melon seeds and bánh drizzled with sweetcream.
In the temples, the Fire Sages pray to Agni – for the health and prosperity of their new lord, as well as his people. They consult the sacred flames, examine the embers for signs of ill-omen.
An effort is made by all to ignore any signs which may be interpreted as having to do with the absent Fire Lady.
That said, if Sage Eishun lights an extra stick of incense at the shrine for the departed, neither the attendants nor the other sages notice. At least, he is never admonished for presumptuousness.
---
On the docks, an elderly fisherman swears on his remaining seven fingers that he saw Lady Ursa take to the water the very same night that Fire Lord Azulon passed into the spirit world.
He is far from shore when he realizes his boots are uncommonly damp, and that every third nail of his boat has been loosened by a hammer not his own.
---
“Do you think he’ll take another wife?”
“If he does, he certainly won’t be coming here to find one.”
Ayame flashes a winning smile, the white of her teeth mirroring the pale skin of her breasts as she leans suggestively over the balcony railing. On the street below, a couple of soldiers wave warmly in return. Across from her, Jhu Lin scowls, fluttering a fan in front of her face peevishly.
“Tch,” she says, “let me dream. Maybe he’s gotten a taste for us common women.”
One of the soldiers has disappeared from the street and entered the brothel. Ayame can hear a girl inside call her name. She turns to leave the balcony, leaning over to give Jhu Lin a kiss on the cheek.
“Careful what you wish for, darling,” she whispers, “We don’t even know what happened to the first one.”
---
In the kitchen, the servants negotiate how to portion meals intended for four mouths down to only three. Debates are had as to whether it is wise to continue serving dishes favored by Lady Ursa, lest they risk triggering an unwanted sense of nostalgia.
After a week, the cook realizes he misses the smell of chamomile tea.
---
Her handmaids and attendants are dismissed almost immediately.
As explanation, they are simply told their services are no longer required.
---
War Minister Yuichi is a widower of many years, now. He has no sons, but several daughters, and has had to learn how to be both father and mother to each of them. It is an odd thing for a man of the military, perhaps, but now that the gray has settled in his hair, he knows he wouldn’t have it any other way. His daughters are who he fights for, and with every conquest he assures himself that they will inherit a better world.
His youngest is now almost fourteen, and already has an impressive betrothal contract. As the date of her marriage and eventual departure from home approaches, he finds himself clinging to every moment he can spare with her. Though she is more than capable of doing so herself, she allows him to run an ivory comb through her long, coal-dark hair. After several strokes, War Minister Yuichi finds that his hand is trembling, that his face is wet with tears.
His beautiful, patient daughter turns in worry.
“Father,” she says in alarm, “what’s wrong?”
He draws her close to his chest, holds her until the fit of emotion passes. He cannot tell her, cannot speak the words, for though it is only the sentimental spluttering of an aging father, it is also treason.
He is crying because it has just occurred to him that Princess Azula no longer has a mother to brush her hair, and she has never had a father who would do so.
---
Tongues move more freely in the colonies and on the smaller islands. Speculation is permissible, so long as one is clever enough to also be discrete.
The favorite theory is that Lady Ursa has escaped the palace to be with a lover of even lower rank than herself.
The more likely theory is that she is simply dead.
---
“Has General Iroh been informed?”
“Does anyone even know where he is?”
“He was close with her, wasn’t he?”
Silence settles like funerary silk upon the group of soldiers, broken only by the crackle of campfire. Lieutenant Zenji hurriedly spoons the evening’s paltry rations into his mouth, hoping the bowl and the movement of his jaw will hide the furious blush that has erupted on his face.
It’s not fair, he thinks, that an innocent observation can suddenly become innuendo. But the thought has lodged itself in his head now, and the young lieutenant has to admit, it is a rather strange coincidence that the Dragon of the West would go missing at almost the same time his brother’s wife would disappear from the capital.
---
Mutsuo smiles at his wife when she returns from another day of work in the palace gardens. There is a streak of dirt across her forehead, and something about this only endears her even more to him. As she nears him, he sees that her skin is pale beneath that line of earth.
“I was visited by Fire Lord Ozai today,” her voice is low, careful.
“Visited?” Mutsuo’s eyes flicker from his wife’s eyes to her mouth to the line of her shoulders, trying to get a sense of her tone. “What an honor!”
The royal gardener nods her head, but only slightly.
“I am to dig up all of the milk petal flowers. He wants them gone by the end of the week.”
“Do you know why?”
His wife shakes her head. Mutsuo puts on a brave smile for her, taking one of her soil-stained hands in his own.
“Oh, what does it matter? He’s the Fire Lord! And it’s his garden now – maybe he just wants a change of scenery. You could plant more fire lilies.”
Except that Mutsuo’s wife has told him the fire lilies should have bloomed weeks ago, their spindly stalks bowed with the weight of stubbornly unfurled petals.
“I don’t know why he cares.” Her voice is bitter as over-steeped tea, and Mutsuo can feel his hand suddenly go cold.
“Lady Ursa was the only one who really paid attention to the flowers, anyway.”
---
Discussing past targets is widely considered poor form among assassins and mercenaries. But collective curiosity eclipses even this, and some of the most vicious killers-for-hire in the Fire Nation begin to ask:
“Did you do it?”
Nobody ever says yes, even though they know better than anyone that people don’t just up and vanish like that. It’s simply not possible.
---
The Ember Island Players raise their cups after another successful dress-rehearsal, toasting each other, their tireless stagehand, their playwright.
“And to Lady Ursa!” One of the actresses drunkenly roars. “The best patron and supporter of the arts we could ask for!”
Her peers gape at her, and then erupt into cheers and applause. The actress gulps deeply from her cup, swaying as she steps forward to the edge of the stage. She sits heavily, staring up at the empty seats of the theatre.
For seven years, she has been with this acting troupe, and for each of those years, she has been able to pick out the Fire Lord’s wife in the crowd. This year the seat shall remain empty, if not the entire booth.
The actress swirls the wine in her cup, watching as a small vortex is formed.
In the midst of a century-long war, it had been nice to know at least one member of the royal family cared about the arts.
---
“Where is she?”
It is a natural inquiry, is what any reasonable person would expect a panicked husband to ask upon discovering his wife is not where she ought to be.
But Fire Lord Ozai never utters the words.
And that alone is answer enough for some.