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“ Everything the light touches is our kingdom.” - The Lion King (1994).
“What is honor compared to a woman's love? What is duty against the feel of a newborn son in your arms ... or the memory of a brother's smile? Wind and words. Wind and words. We are only human, and the gods have fashioned us for love. That is our great glory, and our great tragedy.” - A Game of Thrones, by George R. R. Martin.
He hated himself for having to leave the palace so close to the moment of labor. He knew, he felt, that the moment would come while he was away. But Mai told him to go soon, solve the problem quickly and return home.
Trusting this, he went, leaving his beautiful pregnant wife in the hands of his healer friend.
"Relax, man. Katara will take good care of her," said his best friend, the Avatar.
Of course he knew that. He trusted Katara with his eyes closed, but it wasn't that simple.
Mai and Zuko had already lost two babies over the years and this had left Mai devastated and Zuko deeply worried.
He needed an heir, but not at this cost.
The closer they got to the day of childbirth, the more apprehensive he became.
Katara and Aang had come the day before. Aang and he would set off on a quick trip when dawn broke, but it was about time a healer kept an eye on the Fire Lady until the baby was born, and Zuko didn't trust anyone other than his friend for this mission.
“Would it matter if I asked you, if things get complicated, to please save the mother?” he asked when he realized that his wife had finally fallen asleep.
Katara gave him a sad smile. “No. I'll listen to the instructions she gives me.”
Zuko snorted. Of course his wife would choose to save the baby. He didn't think it was a good idea to put pressure on the waterbender by saying that if Mai died, so would he. He simply didn't see the point in living in a world where his wife didn't exist, because it would be too horrible a world to bear, even with a child to raise.
Not that everyone didn't know.
Sokka and Suki had come to visit them often recently, worried about Mai's health, but the Fire Lord also knew that they were probing him in case he did something stupid if his wife died in childbirth.
In any case, Zuko felt like a nervous wreck when he climbed onto his dragon to make the journey with the Avatar.
He kissed his wife's temple as she lay prostrate in bed, too weak to say goodbye in the palace courtyard, and promised that he would be back soon, before the baby dreamed of being born.
Of course, his child would insist on being born while he was away.
A hawk found them at dusk with the message that the Fire Lady had gone into labor.
The mission had not been completed, but Zuko, without saying a word or giving any satisfaction to those who owed it, climbed back into the saddle of his dragon and headed back home.
The Avatar, who didn't need much to know what was going on, made a formal bow and explained, “Forgive him, his wife is about to give birth,” and ran to accompany his friend.
All the way back, the Fire Lord berated himself repeatedly for having been so stupid. He should have stayed in Hari Bulkan with Mai. He should have seen the bag burst, picked her up and taken her to the room where everything was ready to receive her at that moment. If, by chance, he got there and the baby had already been born, or if something had happened to either of them, Zuko would never forgive himself and death on a rope noose would have been too little for him.
When he arrived at the palace, the servants and staff found him and immediately directed him to where the Fire Lady was. But the most frightening thing was turning into the corridor and hearing shrill screams resounding and shaking the walls of the place he called home. Such a frightening sound didn't fit in with the good memories he and his wife had built up between those walls.
He shot off in the direction of the screams, oblivious to what the people behind him were saying.
“Milord, it's not appropriate to come in like this, the women are already sorting it out...” the palace steward tried to interrupt him, but Zuko just grabbed him by the collar of his tunic and let out a draconic growl and pushed him out of the way.
When he entered the room, Zuko didn't see any servants, only Azula and Ty Lee, sitting on the edge of the bed, wringing their trembling hands.
He asked them why they weren't with Mai.
“Katara said that the fewer people, the better, and that she would call us if she needed anything,” Ty Lee replied.
He couldn't help but notice the violence behind it all. Even his sister, who was always unshakeable, uncontrollable like an erupting volcano, and his sister-in-law, both fearless and brave, seemed disturbed and tiny in the face of their friend's screams in the other room, almost as if they themselves were giving birth.
He made his way over to where his wife was, trying to dissolve from his mind the portrait of his sister with her wide, unblinking eyes in shock, and of Ty Lee's lips in living flesh, which she was sure had been nibbled to such an extent by anxiety.
The other room was a bath room, large and airy, very private and luxurious, but also comfortable. Mai had spent weeks redecorating the place to make it look as welcoming as possible when the time came.
In one of the huge pools, he caught a glimpse of a ghost. Or rather, his wife, except that she already looked like a ghost, with her skin as pale and emaciated as wax, her lips white, and sweat dripping down her body, sticking to the strands of black hair on her forehead and neck.
Katara was with her, both immersed in the pool, with the Fire Lady leaning against the wall, and the healer positioned in front of her, with the water up to her chest.
Immediately, Zuko removed the outer layers of his suit and his shoes, leaving only a simple shirt and pants, and entered the pool to join his wife, between one moan and another.
As soon as she saw him, Mai whimpered.
“No, no, please go away.”
“Zuko, please...” Katara whispered.
“No,” he said firmly, moving closer to Mai.
“I don't want you to see me like this,” Mai murmured, her voice so weak that Zuko could hear his heart breaking.
“I'm here, darling.” Ignoring his wife's pleas, he took her place on the wall of the pool, whose warm water relaxed his tense muscles, and took Mai in his arms, resting her back on his chest, caressing her swollen belly.
He exchanged a glance with the Water Tribe woman, but couldn't identify anything on her face, whose facial expression remained indecipherable.
"Okay, Mai, now let's go back to doing it the way we were doing it before, okay? Just push." Katara repeated the instructions and Mai did as she said, seeming to use all the strength she had left to push the baby out, screaming as if she were being tortured.
Zuko knew that he was far from feeling the physical pain that his wife felt, but he could swear that he felt that pain a thousand times worse in his soul. Seeing the person he loved most in the world suffer so much made him want to take all that pain for himself, because it would hurt him less than witnessing her torment.
After a while, Katara kept instructing Mai to push and Zuko, feeling totally helpless, was unable to do anything but simply stand there and mutter things like “ stay strong, my love”, “I'm here with you”, “it's going to be okay” and “we're in this together”, which, for him, was very little, practically nothing.
At one point, he noticed that Katara was getting sweaty and panting, which was alarming, because not only was she a waterbender with first-rate physical fitness, she was also an extremely skilled healer.
“Bring wet towels!” she shouted, probably to Azula and Ty Lee, who were standing outside.
Shortly afterwards, the two of them and Aang entered with some damp towels.
“Leave that to me,” said Zuko, anxious to focus on anything other than his wife's body shaking like a tree branch in a gale.
“You can go now,” ordered Katara.
The three of them left, but not without some reluctance.
“All right, Zuko, keep wiping her forehead and neck.”
“Katara, what's going on?” he asked. He was starting to get impatient and felt that Mai would have been too, if she hadn't almost collapsed in his arms.
"I think the baby is crossed. I'll have to use waterbending to turn it. Hold her."
Zuko saw Katara's submerged hands glowing as they “turned” his child in its mother's womb, and he could only pray to Agni that it would be over soon.
A few minutes later, Katara again asked Mai to push “harder this time”. He didn't know where else his wife could draw strength from, but he held her as she forced the baby out again, with a grunt so animalistic it could have come from a dragon.
He felt her suddenly grow lighter, her head tumbling backwards as Katara lifted a mound of pink flesh from the water.
“Aang!” she called.
The Avatar came running, already prepared to enter the water and take the little human being in his arms and, with a waterbending thrust, expel himself out.
"Now hold still. I need to get the placenta out," said Katara.
Mai was panting in Zuko's arms, but unable to move.
When the healer gave permission, the Fire Lord took his wife in his arms and climbed out of the pool. Mai was wearing nothing but a simple translucent nightdress that was stained with blood around her belly.
He noticed that Aang was wiping his baby down with some more damp towels. Although he had heard the baby whimpering when it came out of its mother's belly, the little one was now struggling with giggles next to the Avatar.
Meanwhile, Zuko and Katara led the Fire Lady to a shower, where they removed the nightdress from her head and washed off the rest of the blood that stained her white skin.
With worry occupying his mind, he barely noticed when Azula and Ty Lee also entered the room. The former helped the Avatar take care of the baby and the latter brought a bag containing a soft towel, which she used to dry her best friend's body. Then she took out another nightdress, this time more elaborate and comfortable, in a soft shade of pink. She slipped it over Mai's head with the help of the healer and her husband.
Mai didn't protest against all those hands touching her. She mumbled something, but it was barely audible.
Once again, Zuko scooped Mai up in his arms and carried her to bed, on Katara's orders, who was ready to receive her. Ty Lee pulled back the sheets while he settled her on a pile of pillows.
At that moment, drawing strength from who knows where, Mai grasped her husband's wrist with unwavering firmness.
"Where... is my baby? Where is... he?" she whispered, gasping.
“Katara's taking a look at him,” Ty Lee replied, pushing her friend's shoulders against the pillows.
“I want to see him.” Her eyes swept the room and Zuko suddenly wondered if his wife was that weak.
Although the color hadn't returned to her face, he could tell that if they didn't bring her baby here soon, then they would have a serious threat to fear.
But before that idea could form in his mind, the waterbender emerged with a bundle in her arms.
“Here it is, this little girl has barely been born and she's already calling for her mommy,” she said, placing the bundle in Mai's arms.
When Mai held the little bundle, she felt almost as if all her strength had been restored.
Everything she had worked for over the years had borne fruit, and there it was. The perfect fruit. A beautiful little thing with silky black fuzz on the top of her head, a tiny nose, chubby little round fingers and a huge mouth that yawned.
That was it. She had done it. She had finally gotten what she wanted so much. A family. A man who had loved her since she was a child, and a daughter who was half him.
She had a family. A perfect family.
She only realized she was crying when a tear trickled down her daughter's forehead and forced her to constrain her happiness by sniffling and wiping the tears away with her hand.
“Hey, baby,” she greeted in a voice that was still a little shaky. "Hey, Izumi. Welcome."
They had chosen that name months before. An old word for “ fountain”, the place where their love had begun.
She looked at her daughter's father, who was staring into the face of the life they had done together. His expression couldn't be read. But Mai knew that he loved her. Zuko loved Izumi as much as he loved Mai.
“Isn't she beautiful?” Mai asked, with a smile that went from ear to ear.
“She's just like you,” he replied, without smiling or taking his eyes off the girl.
Mai giggled.
Katara returned. She had taken a moment to clean and dry herself and had changed her clothes. She smiled at the sight of the family moment.
Even though the royal family of the Fire Nation had been responsible for great tragedies in the world, including for her own family, she could see hope in these people. A chance for the balance between nations to finally be restored.
What's more, Zuko was a friend and deserved this fresh start and the chance to build his own family.
“Mai, you made it!” she exclaimed. "Your baby is big, strong and more than healthy. But now you need to rest, okay?" She took the baby gently from her mother's arms, slightly afraid that Mai would stab her, but she let Katara walk away and was alone with her husband.
Sitting down next to her, he said, “Try to rest, okay? I'll be right back.”
He slid his palm up to hold her face, making her lean into his touch. She nodded, and he placed a kiss on her forehead before getting up.
Before leaving, Zuko watched his daughter sleep in the ornate oak cradle he had made for her himself ever since he had learned of her existence.
She was just like her mother. She would give nothing but pride to that nation.
When he returned a day and a half later, Zuko stopped at the bedroom door and glanced in as his wife breastfed their daughter. The color had already returned to her face, looking almost healthier than before, and her hair curled around both of them like protective shadows. Motherhood had done his wife a lot of good, he thought.
She hummed softly, a love song that he had sometimes heard his mother sing to Azula, and she had pretended to hate. A song about someone who had lost their loved one and was waiting for them under a weeping willow.
When the song ended, he could hear his wife murmuring to Izumi, "I have no honeyed words to speak. It is fierce out there. But you are fiercer. The Fire Nation belongs to you. We shall move mountains, my girl. It is you. It is me. It is us."
Leaning against the doorframe, he watched the two until his wife noticed him.
“Are you back?”
“Yes.”
“Did you get it?”
He placed a leather bag at her feet and took out a dragon's egg, golden like dawn, warm to the touch.
The couple smiled.
"I'll put it in the cradle. Izumi will sleep with it until it hatches."
“They'll be best friends.”
“So I hope.”
“How did the original firebending masters let you bring that egg?”
Zuko smiled. “They have faith in Izumi.”
And the egg hatched, in a definitive testament to her honor and strength, the heir princess of the Fire Nation and symbol of her parents' love ruled that nation to its true moment of glory and prosperity, always respecting other nations and becoming a symbol of diplomacy.
The Fire Lord Izumi.