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Prisoner of War	By : Looneyluna Category: Avatar - The Last Airbender > Het - Male/Female Views: 8511 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Avatar: The Last Airbender, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

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Chapter Eight—

Feigning sleep, Azula listened to the hushed conversation between the general and the healer. She forced herself to relax, but she couldn’t ignore the serious tones. Her father would always use hushed, serious tones whenever he was displeased with her.

Was it possible they were plotting her death?

Her heart pounded as the realization dawned on her. Her death was only a matter of time. Her survival instinct bristled at her quiescence. She’d spent that last two months since her capture fighting to survive, and she was tired.

Would her death be a public execution, or would they dispatch her quietly?

“It was a mistake,” Maduk whispered harshly. “Your desire to curry favor with the Earth King was foolish, Qiang. It would be best if you kill her.”

Azula tightened her hold on the blankets, for there was no response from Qiang.

“You are correct,” replied Qiang, his voice so soft she had difficulty hearing him. “It was foolish of me.

“I should have realized her value sooner. I should have led the men out of the mountains and into a warmer climate. I never should have trusted such an important message to a messenger hawk and fate. No… let me finish.”

Holding her breath, she continued to listen.

“General Shen intercepted the messenger hawk,” Qiang continued. She could hear the rustle of parchment. “Even though we are trapped until the pass clears, he has ordered me to bring the princess to him. He wants her for himself.”

Azula bit her lip and tasted blood. Her stomach churned, and she shuddered. She tried to relax. Tried to keep up the façade that she was asleep.

“The bloated pig thinks I will just hand her over. He thinks I’ll obey his orders.” Qiang snorted.

“I take it you have other plans,” Maduk stated.

“Yes,” her captor replied. She could tell by the strain of his voice he had stood up. “I shall take her to the Earth King myself.”

“You’ll die.” Maduk’s inflection was matter-of fact. “You either die from exposure or die by her hand. Personally, I’d pray for death by exposure. Somehow, I have the feeling she’d torture you before she’d kill you.”

Qiang chuckled, “Thank you for your concern, Maduk. It warms me that I have someone who will burn hell money in honor of my memory.”

The healer snorted. “Why would I waste hell money on your undeserving soul? I’ll need it for my own passing.”

“Go to bed, old man,” Qiang chastised Maduk softly, their voices fading as they left the tent.

Azula sat up and prepared for Qiang’s return. After having lived under his thumb for so long, she had become to know his habits. He would be back soon.

He had been true to his word after he’d “disciplined” the two soldiers who had tried to rape her. He rarely let her out of his sight. Every night they had slept together like brother and sister. Her thought amused her, and a bitter smiled graced her lips.

Zuko.

The months as a prisoner of war had done little to dull the hatred she felt for her brother. She had underestimated him. Qiang’s words echoed in her mind. He wants her for himself. She rubbed her arms for warmth as a chill raced down her spine. “Himself” was the infamous General Shen, the Butcher of Maitsu Island.

That was the only time in Fire Nation history Earth Kingdom forces occupied Fire Nation territory. An ocean separated the two nations, but the outer islands had always been vulnerable. Closing her eyes, memories assuaged her.

She was young when she had traveled with her mother to the island. Her mother had always been a comforting figure, always the one to respond to natural disasters or worse. She was loved. The people of the Fire Nation revered Ursa. Her mother had taken her to the island for a lesson in humility.

She didn’t learn humility that day. Instead, she had received a crash course in hatred. She’d been born and bred to hate the Earth Kingdom and everything it stood for, but that day…

Azula shuddered in remembrance. She would never forget. The stench of death lingered in the air along with the bodies that were suspended upon earthen spikes. Surprisingly, it wasn’t the death that turned her stomach.

It was the survivors.

She had stood by her mother’s side as Ursa had assisted a surgeon. The surgeon was suturing something between a young girl’s legs. At the time, she hadn’t been old enough to understand.

General Shen had raped all the girls and boys of the island village.

She swallowed the bile that had risen in her throat and opened her eyes.

Staring at the entrance, she waited for Qiang to return and sifted through her options. She could beg for his mercy, kill him and take her chances with the elements, or take her chances with General Shen.

Since mercy was a concept that was alien to her, she ruled that out immediately.

Somehow, killing her captor seemed wrong. She had been told she was insane on several occasions. Perhaps she’d finally succumbed to the madness. Qiang was her guarantee out of here. Yes, he had decimated her troops, taken all of their provisions, and taken her captive, but he had treated her with… honor.

Her chances with General Shen were limited. “Better the devil you know, than the devil you don’t know,” she muttered between clenched teeth. She would rather die by her own hand than be subjected to the depraved practices of that pig.

Which led her back to begging for mercy from General Qiang. He was not easily manipulated. Moments like this—moments where she was completely alone—were rare. There was no escape. She lived because he willed it. It was a bitter taste to swallow. Vulnerability was difficult for her to accept. Damn Agni! Damn the seasons! Damn the weather!

It felt as though everything was conspiring against her. She blinked, surprised at the unfamiliar burn of unshed tears.

Qiang entered, quickly closing the flap of the tent behind him and pulling the canvass ties together. He wasn’t startled to find her awake, but he was surprised to see tears shimmering in her eyes. Her ebony hair flowed around her shoulders like a dark river. Her pale skin shone bright in the muted lighting of the tent.

The effect was instantaneous. He wanted her, and he was past the stage of hiding it. Honor was the only thing that bound him now. Ambition had stirred within his gut once he’d realized who he had captured. She was a war prize that rivaled the most glorious jewels. A member of the Fire Nation royal family. With her father dead, her value grew. The only one more valuable was her brother, Fire Lord Zuko.

He had known she was awake. He knew she was listening to the conversation between him and Maduk. He could see the fear in her eyes, the uncertainty over her fate. Part of him wanted to comfort her. The other part wanted to claim her for his own. Fuck politics! Screw his career! Forget the vows he had taken on behalf of his monarch!

“So, what should I do?” he asked, moving toward the bed they’d shared for the past few months. “Should I turn you over to General Shen, or should I take you to the Earth King? Should I take a chance that you will ‘kill’ me given the first opportunity? Or should I just kill you now?”

Azula remained silent, watching him move toward the bed. He kicked his boots off and started to undress. As was the way with them since their uneasy cohabitation, she averted her gaze and turned her back. He stripped his clothing off until all that remained was his trousers. She wore the red robe she had been captured in. It was a small rebellion, one hardly worth staging.

“Perhaps I should just let you go,” he mused out loud, skirting the edge of the bed to where she stood.

She turned to look at him then, hatred etched in the beauty of her features. “You have been cruel to me upon numerous occasions, but that remark was beneath even you.”

Qiang feigned mock indignation. “Me, cruel? When was I cruel?”

Azula clamped her lips shut, refusing to rise to the bait. He continued to stalk toward her, and true to form, she did not back down. Heat radiated from her. That is why he wore little clothing to bed in the dead of winter. She was like a furnace, throwing off heat like it was her Goddess-given right. There were no words to describe his want of her. Perhaps, if they were different people in a different time, things would be different.

But they weren’t.

He could see the hatred in her eyes. The wariness that haunted her gaze. He had been cruel, but he could have been so much crueler. He could have tossed her to his men. He could have forced himself on her. Those actions would only have fomented the hatred the pulsed in her soul.

He couldn’t help himself. It was like watching something he had no control over as he gathered silken strands of ebony hair between his fingers. She stood there, her shoulders stiff with resistance, her lips twisted with resentment.

“Have we become so mired in the world around us that we have lost our souls?” he asked softly, lifting the strands and pressing his lips against them. He dropped them and traced a line along the open V of her robe. “I suppose you were bred to hate us. Generations of hate.”

As if from a distance, she heard his words.

“Have you ever asked yourself why you hate us, Princess Azula?” Gone was the mocking tone he normally used whenever he used her title. His fingers worked the knot of her robe open. She felt the cool air of the room touch her exposed skin as he peeled the layers away.

“Or do you hate us based solely on principle?” he murmured, pushing her robe from her shoulders.

“I wonder if my sovereign will cherish you like this,” he mused, running callused pads over her rigid nipples.

“Somehow I imagine your king will have me publicly executed,” she replied, unable to stop the small catch in her voice. “Unless my brother has sired any children since my absence, I am second in line for the Fire Nation throne. It would be foolish to just keep me around.”

Her words hung in the air, seemingly suspended by hope. Qiang tempered his lust and stepped away. “What would you do if you were Fire Lady Azula, sovereign ruler of your precious Fire Nation?”

A slow grin curled the edge of her lips, and she pulled her robe back on. “I’d kill you.”

Qiang tsked. “You disappoint me, Azula, for you would have the power to do so much more. Your nation and my kingdom were at war long before you and I were born. I never cared for history, but if what I remember is correct, the war was started by your great-grandfather’s greed for more land and natural resources.”

“Only because my people were being exploited,” she countered. “My nation doesn’t have coal to mine. Winters are harsh. No one could afford the price of coal your merchants were charging.”

“Yet, the war wages on.” Qiang poured himself a drink and downed it, taking pleasure in the way it burned his throat. “The Avatar may have stopped your father and Sozin’s comet, but I doubt he has the power to stop the war.

“Generations have fought and died in this war. Hatred has been bred. Genocide against the Air Nomads. Acres of land scorched beyond repair.” He poured another drink and sipped its contents, watching her… measuring her receptiveness to what he was about to propose. Twirling the amber liquid in the glass, he offered it to her. “Do you have the courage to end the war?”

Her gaze fixated on the offering, her thoughts scattered to the wind. Peace? An end to the war? What he was proposing was preposterous. Yet, she couldn’t snuff out the spark of hope in her heart. Ambition. Greed. Vengeance. How would it feel to set those aside?

“You have the power to end the war.” His voice was velvety. His words struck fear in her heart. He stepped closer, coaxing her to drink.

“My brother—”

“Is expendable,” he stated, clasping one of her hands and lifting it toward his lips.

Her eyebrow arched, a look of awed bemusement gracing her features.

He nibbled one of her fingertips. “He continues to wage a war that isn’t winnable. Remove him and his ambitions, take his place, and rule as a benevolent monarch, revered by your people for bringing them peace.”

Azula sighed, wrapping her other hand around the cold metal cup he offered her. “You make it sound so easy.”

“Nothing is ever easy,” he retorted sharply, dropping her hand and stepping away.

This must be a dream. The words he had uttered were too good to be true. Or were they? Was there no end to the man’s ambitions? She didn’t believe it was possible, but had she met her match? There was no denying the physical attraction. She’d never felt this way before.

“Are you just going to climb down the mountain, swim across the ocean, and kill my brother for me?” She smirked and sniffed the contents of the cup before sipping it.

Qiang knocked the cup out of her hand and grabbed her wrists, pulling her against him. “This isn’t a joke,” he growled, his breath stirring her hair. How could he open her eyes? How could he make her see? When had his enemy crawled beneath his skin? When had her well-being begun to matter to him?

He should do himself a favor now. He should fuck her, then kill her. It would ease the ache and put an end to his torment, but the idea of peace had taken root in his soul, and he knew that the bitter Fire Nation royal before him was the key to that peace.

--

TBC
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- 9
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Prisoner of War