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Autumn had always taken a gradual hold on the Fire Nation. It was already the ninth moon of the year, yet the noon sun sweltered as if it were still the basin of summer. Many say it is a curse laid upon the islands by Agni herself, the curse of hot, wet summers and cold, dry winters, for some ancient sin none of them can recall. However, there have been signs of an oncoming winter: the colder nights and even mistier mornings, the everpresent death of the verdure, and the sight of birds flocking off to warmer climates. Thanks to the shortening of day, street lanterns will be lit quicker to avoid night’s dark, and then children will be brought inside sooner.
And with winter, war shall also slow. Every time, every year, it was almost as if a peace treaty had been enacted, albeit a brittle and temporary one, yet it would only be those of high-rank going back home to their families. The infantry, calvary-men, and medics of all sides will have to stay and tend to the damned and deceased as the nobility basks in their war-born riches. The wealthy will fat themselves with the blood they’ve sown, all the while the low-born feed off of their own flesh.
“You weren’t present at yesterday evening’s banquet.” Azulon noted, the sharp bite of his tone slipping from his lips like the spread of a fan. “The one meant to commemorate my return from the war, if you fail to recall.” He cocked his head back, looking down at the woman before him from the straight set of his nose.
Ilah replied, questioningly, “Your little gala?” She languidly leaned back in her seat, holding little regard for her husband’s dissatisfaction. “Oh, that's right. I wasn’t there because I didn’t want to be.” She avoided his glaring eyes as she spoke, instead looking off into the palace gardens where the sight was much less agitating. She ignored the steady thrum of his fingers against the table surface, instead taking notice to a particularly curious finch skittering about.
“... You are expected to be there as the Fire Lady and as my wife, Ilah.” He asserted, his voice softening as if he were reminding a child, yet the way his lip curled was far from warm. His fingers halted and unfurled into a flat palm, then it coiled, backward, into a habitual fist.
In truth, Azulon did not care if his lady was by his side at the banquet or not, but appearances are appearances. People question, they assume, and they pry; if a man’s wife was not there to welcome him home after two long, strenuous years of war, then what would it say of the marriage itself? It would display weakness, instability, something akin to a corpse for the vultures to puncture and pick. He did not love her and she did not love him, but a couple’s dance takes two.
However, Ilah did not bend the knee so easily.
“Just because I am expected does not mean that I am required, Azulon.” She nipped back, donning the same patronizing tone. “If you wish for my presence, then you best come to my chambers and gather me up yourself. I am not a dog to be called to heel.” She spoke softly, almost lovingly, but there was a sly poison hidden beneath her inflection.
He scoffed, leaning back in his seat with a look of anger-stricken disbelief. Somehow he had been saddled with the most stubborn, vexing woman in all of the four nations. Reining her in was like trying to rein in a bull, but the very same could be said for him. Pairing the two of them together was like attempting to mix oil with water.
Ilah veered in, closer and now meeting his gaze, and accusingly she said, “You court me as if I were a beast to hunt.” She propped her head up on her palm, each syllable dripping from her tongue like cruel, honeyed ichor.
After a life of nobility, she had grown accustomed to her husband's ilk: the caldera-born men who believe they are entitled to a woman’s obedience, whether she be a lady of the crown or of the colonies. Like pillagers, some often maraud and ravage, taking what they hunger without fear of retribution. Azulon was no pillager to her knowledge, but his acts in war were rarely ever reported to her. The most she would ever hear of it were his victories or whichever irrelevant port was captured this time.
“Are you not?” He responded, lips twisting into a vexed smirk. “I could have sworn…” He trailed off into a feigned expression of confusion and perplexity, looking far off into the distance with a hand pressed to his maw. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Ilah shift uncomfortably in her chair. He had to submerge the laugh he felt swimming upwards.
“You might as well be one.” Azulon said, shaking his head and then standing from his place at the table. He fixed his lady wife with a sharp, perceiving gaze of grey as she looked up at him with her own defiant eyes of ire, a pale aureate in their depths yet a molten gold in their emotion.
He caught himself reveling in their little game, no matter how much the other participant despised it. It was the pure thrill of their shared hatred, how every conversation felt like a clash of blades, each sparking ember licking their flesh as a plea for blood to lubricate the steel. Both sides fought valiantly, making each duel flower into yet another impasse, but there would have to be a victor sooner or later.
Ilah rose and stood to match him, maintaining eye contact as she moved. She looked him over – once, twice, – taking him in and estimating. He was waiting for her and the very next swing of her blade, braced and poised in all of his regality with his sword half-drawn. She knew he was prepared for anything that she could ever throw at him. And so, without any further word, she stepped from the table and walked away.
She could hear him behind her, vehement but measured, “Wait, where are you going?” Azulon questioned, his tone nearly a hiss as it slipped out from behind his teeth. She gave him no response, nor any regard, when he called for her. She would not sate his hunger for reaction or riposte; he did not deserve it, nor did he deserve anything else from her.
Azulon, as typical of his noble birth and upbringing, did not take kindly to being blatantly dismissed. He fumbled for a short moment, blinking away his bare confusion until there was only barren realization underneath. And despite the vexation and anger that boiled beneath his perfectly-cultivated expression, he did not chase after her. If she would not act the dog to be called to heel, then neither would he.
Besides, it was a beautiful day for autumn, and they refused to dawdle on each other. He had his business and she had her own, of which withheld little convergence for the other.
Ilah could feel her heart thrumming in her ears, not out of fear, but out of anger. His purpose was to test her, to humiliate her–to smooth salt in the ever-growing fissure of flesh once called a scar. When she took a glance behind her, he had already fled, trailed by a singular royal guard clad in armor. She could only catch a short glimpse of his deep umber hair and the pure ink of his attire before he completely left her sight.
She nearly scowled in her fatigued frustration. He was like a pouting child that made off whenever he didn’t get his way, so apt to taunt and provoke until he received the same treatment. She would find it entertaining, even comical, if she wasn’t forced to bide with it. He waltzes about, flashing his sharp, white teeth with coin-like malice and benevolence, threatening her from behind a veil of husbandly affection.
Azulon was a man who had not yet been taught humility. And in all fairness, no one could. He had been the old Sozin’s lone heir since birth, celebrated as a miracle for just his mere existence. He had siblings, yes, but one was a bastard and the other without flame–and both were women. Ilah wondered, for a long, steady moment, if she would still be in these circumstances if either of those two girls were given a chance.
She’s only met one of them; Princess Mizuki, Sozin’s second born, who had been sent to the colonies only a few years prior, around when Azulon himself was fifteen. She had met her on the night of her wedding. It was a quick conversation, cut short by the princess’ approaching brother, but Ilah learned a lot about her new sister-in-law in that fleeting moment.
It was no secret that Mizuki held contempt for her younger brother, and at times it was rather obvious. She had been cast out to the developing coastal colonies by the lady mother herself, all while the crown princeling was raised up to be lord. It was not a groundless hatred, Ilah believed, for she had been abandoned by her own closest kin. Even when the princess returned, brought back to the capital by the marriage, there was no commemoration, no recognition, and nothing more than a slight glance from the Fire Lord.
Princess Uzume, on the other hand, was an entire mystery. She had been born from a servingwoman and Fire Lord Sozin, yet she had been raised within the palace as if she were the fire lady’s own, much to the woman’s alleged dismay. She disappeared around ten years ago at the age of eighteen, and there has been no apparent sight of her since.
Ilah slowed to a halt then. A chill breeze had passed through the courtyard, sweeping by and sending her dark curls into a flurry. She looked down, down at herself, down at her hands and to the fingernails that had been picked raw and aching over the past fortnight. She wondered if that was to be her fate, if she was to join the Princesses Mizuki and Uzume in abandonment and obscurity. She wondered if fate was to forsake her, just as it had with those others, and if her husband was to too. She had no doubt that he would.
Just as if he were ripping fruit from a tree stem, he would rip something just as dear and just as lush from her. And when a tree can no longer bear fruit, it is traditional that the harvester sever the tree, and replant with a younger, far more vigorous substitute. The Lady Mother Ihita had escaped such a fate by outlasting her already decaying husband, yet Ilah knew that she would not be as victorious–in both life and death.
Azulon was far from the grasp of death, anyone could admit it, even Azulon’s own foes. He was young, powerful, and nigh untouchable unless one was the breath of the wind or the heat of the sun. Prayer would do no good for even the spirits aided him in his triumph and conquest, which had been asserted by the Grand Sage of Agni himself. Azulon accepts these appraisals with glee, soaking up each and every ounce of exaltation as if it were poppy nectar and he the dependent.
An end was predestined, however. Every flame was fated to extinguish. Perhaps Azulon’s pride would be his tether, that jutting root in the path which will trip him. It would be a fitting end for a man like him and she would not mind being widowed at the age of twenty. Though deep down, Ilah knew that would not be the case. There have surely been dozens of attempts on the man’s life already, both as the heir and as the current monarch, so what was one more? He would be able to suspect it by now.
Ilah could only fester like a roiling blight, fester like how Lady Ihita had, with a husband who forsook all but his own ambition. The festering would boil and burst from her sternum, seeping out of an aching heart until it drowned out the pulse. And then, finally, her time would be through.