Umeron watched the girl furiously light another bush on fire. It flared up in a roaring flash of blue. The human seemed to have no true motivation for doing so, other than misplaced anger. No other reason that he could detect.

He'd have to put a stop to this somehow, lest he see his whole forest go up in flames. And that wasn't an option, it was his duty to make sure that the place remained safe and intact.

Yet he didn't want to hurt the girl either. But a confrontation of any sort, at this rate, would end in a violent quarrel of some sort.

Umeron rubbed his chin mumbling to himself as he stared down at the girl. The same girl who, only moments earlier, had also antagonized a herd of fox antelopes, a rabbaroo, and a duo of wolves. The had been stirring up all kinds of havoc across the forest.

Perhaps I should just aim for the confrontation and…elimination. He thought, combing carefully through the words. It would be a well-earned punishment. Even so, he hadn't the heart to hurt the human girl. She was, in his eyes, still a child after all.

A lost and hurt child.

Umeron frowned to himself.

He thought again of the wolves she had terrorized.

And he knew how the situation would be handled.

.oOo.

Azula's lips curled into an angry scowl. She couldn't seem to make a shelter of any kind from these flimsy twigs and branches, the grass rough and scratchy, there were rocks scattered all over the place for her to step on. So she may as well just torch the place.

That would teach it to defy her.

She gave one of the rocks a swift kick so that it landed in the fire she had awakened. She kicked at another and sent it crashing into an oversized rabbaroo. She wasn't particularly aiming for the dumb thing, but it didn't bother her any that it got hit.

She watched the poor animal hop off as quickly as it could manage.

As quickly as the rabbaroo left, a wolf came to replace it. "Just lovely," she hissed, "one more creature this ungodly place sent to assassinate me." She would snuff out the problem before it had a chance to off her.

Fire blazing in her palm, Azula approached the wolf.

Slowly.

Dangerously.

And with vicious intentions.

She lit its tail aflame. The wolf whimpered and yowled.

She was safe. It couldn't snap and tear at her now.

Just as Azula turned her back on the wolf, she heard the sound of her flames dying out. She looked back just on time to see the wolf retreat otherwise unharmed back into the denser parts of the forest. And in its place stood a man…

A spirit, she realized.

Tall and with dark skin half covered in bark sprouting with leaves, small vines, and other blooms. From his eyes ran symmetrical and geometric green markings that ran up to his forehead where they grew obscured by a sweep of dark brown hair. From his head grew a pair of antlers, elaborate with symbols of a written language foreign to her.

His bright green eyes seemed to blaze into her with a calm ferocity as he began an undecipherable chanting.

Narrowing her eyes at the new threat, Azula reignited the fire in her hands.

The fire died in her hands as quickly as she had conjured it up. For a most distracting and intolerable pain flared up first in her abdomen and flaring out from there, until not even an inch of her body wasn't crying out in agony.

Azula clenched her jaw, falling to her knees as the pain grew more unbearable. She was shaking ,she realized, but could do little to refrain.

She could do just as little to restrain the tears that reflexively wet the corners of her eyes.

Digging her nails into the ground, Azula looked up at the spirit. She hoped her gaze was as infuriated as she intended.

"What are you—" she tried, her voice straining.

She looked back down, clawing at the ground against the pain so intensely that her nails began to crack.

She gave a sharp cry of alarm as her muscles seemed to pulse and strain. Each and every one of them twisting as if she had been working them in the very wrong way. She wondered if they truly were tearing.

She squeezed her eyes shut, her tears flowing more freely down her cheeks.

In all of her battles and bending matches, she'd never felt such pain before.

Azula wondered if the spirit was still there, taking in her torment. A shuffle to her right indicated that he was.

She yelped in pain again, as her spine arched in a way that it was never meant to.

Her fingers grew tense and rigid, though she couldn't tell if it was her own doing or not. It didn't matter, she had bigger problems.

Problems that revealed themselves in droplets of blood falling upon the back of her hands, when she had absently placed once again back into the grass. Unable to detect where the blood was dripping from, her stomach knotted at the sight.

Azula felt sick.

Sick and afraid.

Something warm and sticky ran from her nose, over her lips, and down her chin. That's where the blood is coming from…

Her thoughts came to an abrupt cut off, as a white hot pain overtook her jaw. The feeling moved inward, lacing her gums with a sensation most unpleasant. Her mouth filled with a coppery metallic taste. She winced and impulsively bit down.

She hadn't even bit down that hard, yet the snap drew blood from her cheeks.

Azula flexed her aching hands.

Or perhaps the flexed on their own.

She was losing control of herself again.

But this time in a more physical sense.

Whatever this is, Azula thought to herself, he's making it more painful than it needs to be. Her head dipped forward, she didn't do anything so truly horrid to deserve this. She felt so dizzy and disoriented. Her vision blurred, darkening around the edges.

And for once she let it happen.

She let herself fall away.