Chapter Text
There was a time where Azula had hated water. The opposite to fire, water wielded a power that its contrary element could never. Fire was devastating, could turn everything into ashes and burn whatever it was at its path but water held a secrecy to it. Water could sneak into your body with only the feeling of a slightest touch and could kill you without any sound. It wouldn’t leave a clue behind; it would be a clean, surprising death.
Azula preferred to be burn to death, with her skin peeling off her bones, than to die a silent death with water.
To die by water was to die without honor. Not that Azula had ever preocoupied with honor until she lost it.
And wasn’t it so poetic? That she got defeated by the hands of a waterbender, trapped in ice, chained, spitting blue fire. And for the first time, her fire couldn’t help her. The prickles of frozen water pinching on her neck, caught in a spot her lighting couldn’t touch, and then later caught in her own mind.
She despised the water at the asylum. It reminded her of mistakes, her failures. Sometimes when she looked at the clear water for too long, she could see Mother laughing, a soft smile that didn’t match the cruel tone of the question she kept repeating on her daughter’s head. “Wasn’t this what you always wanted?” she would say and Azula would strike at the water, angry that she couldn’t make it hurt like the way it had hurt her. The nurses had to force her to take a shower when her hair became a rail. Then they cut it off. It was easier and it wasn’t like Azula cared, she had already lost her honor the day she let herself be trapped by water.
The first time she got let out into the sun, was the first time Katara visited her. At first she thought her mind was playing tricks on her, another one of her hallucinations. She had been having them less frequently but who knows? Perhaps it was her mind’s way of reminding her of her shame. So she got more comfortable in her seat, closed her eyes and counted until eight and when her eyes would open, the waterbender would be gone.
One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight,
Azula opened her eyes but Katara wasn’t gone. Instead she was standing in front of her. It took all of her training to not jump back startled.
“Mind if I sit here?” Katara gestured to the chair in front of Azula. She didn’t respond but it wasn’t like Katara was waiting for an answer anyways.
She laid her hands on her table. Lean hands with long, delicate fingers. The hands of someone that could control you at their will.
“I’m not here to fight.” She followed Azula’s gaze.
“I have no use to you.” Her voice felt like scraping against stone. It sounded strange to her. It was so long since she had an actual conversation. Zuko, Mai and Ty Lee came to visit, sometimes all three of them, sometimes only one, but she didn’t do a lot of talking even then. But none of the Avatar original friends had come to visit her and why would they? Honestly Azula would have expected to see Aang first than Katara.
Katara stared down at her and Azula escaped her eyes, she wouldn’t take the pity of Katara, least of all. “Did Zuzu send you?” She asked with a less rough voice this time.
Katara laughed. Oh, the nerve of this girl. “I don’t think he knows I’m here,”
Azula frowned, the question evident in her eyes. Still, she didn’t ask. “I have nothing to offer to you.” She said and was so displeased with herself. The first time she got the sun to touch her skin again was ruined by the waterbender that helped in her downfall coming to mock her.
Katara sighed. “I’m not sure if you know I’m a healer.” She went to touch her necklace. “Maybe even the best. And I always want to learn. I’ve heard about you hallucinations, and I think waterbending healing doesn’t only apply to physical wound but to mental illnesses too.”
She was met with Azula’s blank stare.
She sighed again. “I can help you Azula. And I want to help you.”
A laugh emanated from the firebender, rich from her heart. Oh, wasn’t this all too nice? The same waterbender that wanted nothing more than her downfall wanted to help her.
“You want to use me as your experimental rat.” She waved a hand. “Honestly Katara, I’m flattered. I didn’t think you would pity the girl that tried to kill your boyfriend.”
Katara looked at her hands. “We were children Azula.” Her voice was gentle. “Children caught in a war.”
“So unlucky of me to be caught on it since the day I was born, then.” She laughed bitterly and flexed her hands. Katara could say everything she wanted, Azula knew better. She had been a machine meant for conquering and death and now that she could no longer be useful like that, what could she be good for?
Katara leaned closer. “How long has it been since you were here? Can you tell me?” She tried to not give nothing away but her mind was a mess. Time was a difficult concept when you couldn’t see the sunlight and she fight to wrap her head around days, weeks and months. She couldn’t tell if she had been here three months or three years.
“Two years Azula. You have been here two years. Don’t you want to get better?” Her voice sounding helpful was what drove her to the edge.
“Oh don’t act like if you are being a great saint. You are desperate to test your skills on, see if they work.”
Katara didn’t back away. “Of course I am. If this works it’s going to be a great advance in the history of healing, imagine all the people I could help.”
Her next words came out in hesitation, like if she was having a hard time saying them. “But I also want to help you.” If her voice carried pity it was well conceived.
“Why?”
“Because we were children.” Katara stood up. “Think about it, please.”
They were still children, Azula wanted to say but Katara had already left by then.
“Don´t you want to get better?” Katara’s voice resounded mockingly on her mind. That’s what all the healers and nurses said. “Don’t you want to get better Azula?” They said with their looks of disapproval, looking down on her. Of course she wanted to get better. But why should she try? What was waiting for her outside. At best she would get looks of pity. And at worst? She didn’t want to imagine.
“Katara came to visit.” She said so abruptly a few months (weeks?) after she got allowed into the sun for the first time that even Ty Lee stopped talking.
Zuko furrowed his eyebrows. “Why?”
So he hadn’t sent her then. Zuzu was never good at lying and there was sincere confusion on his face.
“She said she wanted to expand her waterbender horizons.” She tapped her nails against the metal of the table. Her nails were so short now. “She thinks she can fix me.”
“Princess Azula I think that’s great! Katara is the best healer alive!” Ty Lee said at the same time Mai, always cautious, murmured, “Are you sure she isn’t trying to get revenge for her ex-boyfriend?”
She drowned their voices, focusing on her brother. “What do you think?”
“I don’t doubt of Katara’s abilities and you shouldn’t neither. She cured the Avatar after you hit him with lighting.” He gently reached for her hands and Azula shallowed displeasure before letting him. “But you shouldn’t do anything you don’t feel ready to do. We will wait for you the time you need.”
Ty Lee nodded enthusiastically. Mai even gave a court nod. Ty Lee was on her Kyoshi Warrior gear and Azula was reminded of simpler times in Ba Sing Se. it had been fun hadn’t it?
“I’ll think about it,” she said. She pulled her hands away and cleared her throat, thinking on a piece of information Ty Lee had spilled on one of her visits a few days ago. “Zuzu, so now that we are talking about the waterbender, what is this I hear of you having a crush on Katara’s brother?”
Ty Lee cooed and Mai smirked. Zuko face matched the color of his scar.
Azula smirked too. This was going to be a good visit.
.---------------
With the sun touching her skin, Azula could feel her fire bending coming slowly back to her. She had given up on it a long time ago, deciding that she wasn’t deserving of her firebending anymore.
But now she was doing better now, wasn’t she? She took the time out to practice her bending, first it was only fighting stances and katas and then she could feel the sputtering flames coming out of her knuckles, out of her mouth.
The first time she managed to do a fire fist again, she had never felt prouder of herself. But that was also the first time the hallucinations came back stronger since the day of her failed coronation and Azula found that the more she progressed in her bending, her mental state got worse.
It didn’t make sense, was her brain tricking her? Or were the spirits punishing her? Fire was the element more connected to your emotions so if you were having a turmoil you couldn’t bend. But Azula was bending wasn’t she? It was even more pitifull than her brothers bending but at least it was something. And in a world where Azula was stripped to nothing, having something meant a lot.
She tried again but with the same results. She was stunted in her bending, it was like if she wanted to gain her power back she had to give up her mental wellbeing and she couldn’t do that again. But every time she got further in her training, when her fire was starting to look blue again the hallucinations became worser, her mother cruel words now screaming into her brain, making a hole in her head.
It was a gaping wound that got bigger everyday by little cuts everywhere and Azula wasn’t sure how much of it she could take.
So the next time she saw the waterbender again, she didn’t hesitate.
“We’ll do it only once. Only to see if it works. And we will do it under my conditions okay?”
Katara nodded, earnest. Azula hated her more for it. “We won’t do anything you aren’t comfortable with, Azula.”
The princess knew vaguely that it had happened a year since Katara first came visit her. Ty Lee and Mai helped her with the dates now. She supposed she was busy flying around the world with the avatar and making kissy eyes.
“Fine.” She clenched her fists. “Let’s do this.”