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Azula prowled around the circular cell, hands flexing and breath coming in short, furious gasps. Nila was kneeling, hands bound to the floor in front of her. The non-bender was trying to catch Azula’s gaze, but she was determinedly avoiding her eyes.
“Azula?” Nila asked hesitantly.
“You will address me by my title, Traitor.” Azula spat the words out like a weapon. “I want nothing to do with you, but Father has decreed that you are my problem to deal with.” Her sneer had almost as much venom as her voice.
“Azula! I—” Nila was cut off by a snarl from the princess. “Princess Azula, please, you have to believe that I never betrayed you.”
“How can I?!”
“I lov—,” Nila broke off and started again. “I’m loyal to you, ‘Zula. I always will be.”
“LIAR!” Azula screeched. Twin plumes of flame left her hands as she threw them back. The blue flames illuminated her puffy eyes and pale skin. “You left! I was finally accepting that maybe I wasn’t the monster everyone thought I was. That I could be… different.” Azula turned away. “Then, you chose my brother over me. You left.”
“This isn’t about Zuko, ‘Zula.”
“Yes, it is. You chose him. He has always had someone: First Mother, then our uncle, now the avatar and his lackies. He even had Mai and Ty Lee for that stupid prison break! I had no one!” The fury in her voice peaked in a flame filled yell. Tears had begun to spill down her cheeks. “I had no one… until I had you.” Her voice grew fainter; her arms came up and curled around her stomach. “My own mother thought I was a monster. She hated me. I came to terms with the idea that I couldn’t —shouldn’t— be loved. That love was useless that it made you weak. I guess I was right.”
“‘Zula.” Nila’s voice was commanding, despite her placement at her princess’s feet. “I need you to listen to me. Those words, those thoughts, they aren’t yours. Your father—”
“My father made me strong!” Azula shrieked, her hair tumbling wildly about her face. “He is always right! Love does make you weak. I will not disappoint him. I can be strong. I know I can. Because I was strong, when you left. I learned. I know that you are not weak, so you can’t love anyone. So, you never really loved me.”
“I do love you ‘Zula.”
“You are not weak; you don’t love me.”
“I am weak.” Nila’s furious tone stopped Azula in her tracks. “I willingly choose to be weak. I love you, Azula. The real you. I love the girl who would hide flowers in my room. I miss the girl who let me kiss the scars on her fingers. I love the girl who would watch sunsets because she loved the silence that came with them.” Nila was crying now too, the tears tracing lines in the dust on her face. “Please, ‘Zula, let me be weak. Let me love you. The real you.”
“You shouldn’t love a monster.” Azula’s voice was faint, barely a whisper. “It’s not worth it.”
“It is to me. I love you, and Ozai can tear that from my dying breath, because that it never going to change. You are not a monster, you are mine.”
With I final sob, Azula threw herself forward, crashing into Nila in a side hug. Nila’s hands tugged at the chains, but she swallowed the yelp of pain. This was worth it.
After Azula’s sobs faded into shuttering breaths, she pulled away from Nila and looked her in the eye.
“Why, Nila? Why did you leave me? After you left I—“ she broke off with a sniff. “Why?”
“I never wanted to. If it was up to me I would have stayed by your side until my end, you have to believe that. But Ozai wanted me gone, he has for a while. Your uncle was the only thing stopping him from getting rid of me, so when he left with Zuko…” Nila trailed off, and the two sat in silence for a while.
“Why didn’t you tell me? I could have asked Father to… to do something.”
“He would have taken it as a sign that I mattered to you, ‘Zula. He would use me against you, you know he would. He came and told me my second day in the palace; As soon as I became a ‘weakness’ for either of his children, he would end me.” Nila and Azula’s eyes were locked on each other, both sets were filled with tears. “I was scared, Lulu.”
Azula nearly choked at the nickname.
“I thought I would never hear that name again.”
“Would you like me to say it again.?”
“Yes…Please…” Azula pressed her head against Nila’s shoulder, the whispered words brushing against Nila’s skin.
“You are mine, Lulu. I love you. I will never leave you again. Lulu, I’m here, and I’m yours.” Nila was rambling, desperate to say everything she had been holding back for years. “No one will touch you while I’m here. No one can hurt you.”
Azula stood suddenly, making Nila look up at her in surprise. She scrambled at her pockets, producing a key, and unlocking Nila’s cuffs.
“No one can hurt you while I’m here. No one will touch you, because…” Azula paused in her declaration, the continued, her voice firm. “Because you are mine. You love me. You are weak, for me. And I…” she trailed off.
“You don’t have to say it yet, if you don’t want to, Lulu.” Nila’s voice was gentle, offering comfort and reassurance.
“No. I chose to be weak. I love you, Nila. I don’t deserve to, but I do.”
“You deserve the world, Darling.”
“No. I am a monster.”
“Azula, you are—“
“I know that I am a monster,” Azula interrupted. “I know it because if someone hurt you, I would burn this world to the ground. I know it because I hated my brother and uncle for taking you from me. I know it because I am going to kill my father for threatening you until you left me.”
“Please don’t. If you are going to do anything, do it for you. Do it for the scars that he left on your arms. Do it for the whispers he left in your mind. Don’t do it for me.”
“You’re a part of me, Nila. Anything I do for me, I do for you. I love you.”
“I love you too, and I’ll say it a thousand times until you feel you deserve it. I love you. I love you. I lov—“
Azula cut her off with a kiss.