Fierce Divergence of the Heart

Disclaimer: I do not own Avatar or any of the characters there within.

Azula smiled in the face of her brother's folly. He was so easy to scare, which always made it so fun. It was a simple game and it never ceased to please. She loved having that power over him. But this time, it was even better because what she had told him was an absolute truth—and Zuko's horrified expression was so much more satisfying when she meant every word.

"Stop it! You're lying!" he had shouted, twisting the silken bed sheets in both his hands. "Dad would never do that to me."

Azula was all too prepared to fuel his fear for the pure entertainment of it, when a stern voice from the doorway interrupted her.

"You're father would never do what to you?"

Both children looked up at the personage at the doorway. The girl's expression fell while Zuko's turned to one of shuddering relief.

"What is going on here?"

Princess Ursa, mother to the two children before her, entered the room with a penetrating gaze. Her long shadow from the doorway cast over her daughter, swallowing the child in darkness. Striding forward, she made her way over to her son's bedside where her daughter sat, watching the small girl and the aloofly chaste expression that had just flitted across her face. Ursa knew this face well. Azula had undoubtedly been spinning tales to frighten her brother with again. Still, the act was improving as her daughter firmly met her mother's gaze with a blameless repose.

"I don't know." Azula said with as much innocence as she could muster, but the guiltless expression did not quite reach her eyes and Ursa caught the fabrication. The woman gave her daughter a stern glare.

"It's time for a talk."

Ursa came forward and took Azula's forearm firmly, to show she meant business. The young princess betrayed a flicker of fear for being found out and taken by force to some unforeseen punishment. Ursa was awkwardly thankful she still had this small amount of power over the ever blooming confidence of her youngest child.

As the senior princess led her daughter down the hall with an ironclad hold, she noticed her hand growing very hot and the girl growing steadily more resistant. Almost as obstinate as the child she tugged forward, the woman refused to let the girl go until they were safely tucked away for a stern talking to. The blistering heat continued to swell and the older princess' hand only clamped tighter to her daughter; she could feel the growing annoyance of the little princess. This disrespect flared the already flayed patience the woman had for the girl and her shrewd eyes searched wildly for an alcove.

At last, Ursa pulled Azula into a side hallway, turning her full attention to her daughter. When she released the girl's arm, her own hand was burning hot; as though she had handled a scalding teapot fresh off the stove. The woman did not betray her frustrations at this as she folded her arms within her sleeves; standing tall to reprimand her child.

Azula's gaze was smoldering, surely burning clean holes in the wall behind Ursa with her eyes. The girl refused to meet her mother's gaze.

"What have you been telling your brother?" Ursa said curtly, her voice echoing down the dark hallway ominously.

"Nothing." Azula shrugged indifferently, tossing off the pressing issue in such an uncaring, dispassionate way, it unsettled the older princess. Azula's behavior was alarmingly like the negative aspects of her husband's personality. Ozai had been grooming his daughter a little too well, while his son remained ignored. The gaping fissure that separated her children wounded the woman deeply, but years of being reared as a lady stopped the expression from reaching her face.

"Young lady, you have been taught long ago not to lie," Ursa reprimanded angrily.

"I wasn't lying!" Azula snapped, her burning golden eyes shot up directly and bore into her mother's; her teeth bared like a cornered animal. She was a delinquent who had been wrongly accused.

"Do not take that tone of voice with me." Ursa snapped back so forcefully that it silenced Azula—but the child's own displeasure seemed to fuel into a rage.

"It's not my fault he's a whiny baby who can't handle the truth."

Ursa was shocked by this response. She bit back her own fury at the child's lofty reply; what truth was she speaking of? Azula continued, unable to stop in her soul-filled address.

"The truth has him shaking in his sheets. I was only trying to help him, but he never believes me. It would be his greatest honor if Dad gets rid of him."

Ursa's arms slipped from the fold over her stomach, disbelieving what she was hearing from her child. How Azula could say such cold, callous things about her brother was beyond her. Again, the woman was reminded of the parallel's the girl shared with her father. Ozai had returned from the assembly with the Fire Lord with a grim finality, and when Ursa had questioned her husband of it, he had made one sharp gesture for immediate silence. She inquired no further. Had Azula been graced with the knowledge Ursa had been denied? How?

"What are you saying, Azula?" Ursa asked lowly, dangerously. The young girl suddenly grinned horribly up at her mother, those golden eyes flashing with glee.

"Dad is going to kill Zuko." An elated triumph trembled in the girl's voice; she was a spoiled child that had just received a rare, exotic gift. Ursa felt her heart freezing in her breast. This creature before her could not be her flesh and blood. "Then I will be your only child, and you will have to love me like you loved him." A fierce passion had entered the girl's eyes, and suddenly the child was growing. Up and up she rose, taller and taller until she was towering over her mother. Ursa had sunk to her knees before her daughter.

She had done this.

She had done this to her child.

Azula was the being she was today, because of her negligence as a mother; she had no one to blame but herself. Where she had given her heart and soul to protect and nuture her poor son, who had been shunned by his father, she had also shut her daughter our from her affections. Where she had fostered one, she had cast aside another; and the woman's heart tore in two. Azula had not deserved this wrong.

The girl was staring down at her mother with a hateful stare that warred with a gaze that begged acceptance and tenderness. Why could her mother not love her? Zuko was worthless when set beside her. Did her hard earned accomplishments mean nothing? The envy for love she so desired from her mother was transforming into a tangible possession that she demanded to have, like a revered figurine to grace her armoire. The love she desired was becoming something that could be measured, traded, galvanized into power.

Power. What could such a young child want with power? Ursa thought hopelessly. What had happened to her little girl?

The older princess reached imploringly for her daughter, wanting nothing more than to pull her into a tender embrace; her arms raised up in worship. When she spoke, her voice was tremulous.

"My darling, I've always loved you—"

"Liar!" Azula shrieked down to the woman, shying away from her mother's touch as though the show of affection disgusted her. "You never loved me best!"

It was then Ursa saw the jagged blue and white lights snap and crackle about her daughter's hands and wrists, and a sharp inhalation hitched in the woman's chest. Dear Agni, her daughter had the gift. Even the greatest masters of the Fire Nation rarely possessed the ability to produce lightening. Yet here was her young daughter, her little girl, sending the prickling, hair-raising power to snarl and flash about her hands. An eternity seemed to pass as Ursa looked up at her daughter, a young girl becoming a woman before her very eyes as she shrank before it. Azula would be great—she would be terrible. The sun was setting on Ursa, while it rose on her daughter, and she was helpless to stop it.

Azula stared down coldly at her mother, now devoid of all emotion as the extent of her power seemed to sweep her up in its supremacy. A vengeful, tyrannical Queen that knew no mercy stood regally over Ursa.

"You'll never love me," the princess ground out lowly, her golden eyes flashing with the same intensity of the sun, "but I don't care. I don't need you anymore, mother. Zuko will die and father will become Fire Lord. Then the throne will be mine." Her voice rose to a frenzied pitch. "You can't stop it. Zuko's going to die. Zuko's going to die!"

Suddenly something clung to Azula, pinning her arms to her sides, constraining the sweet energy that had been flowing through her veins to match her wild fervor. Shock swept her as she eyes focused onto the small, golden crown that crested her mother's head; but the force of the uncontrolled infant lightening being stopped so abruptly in its creation, hurt her. A thousand stabbing knives were piercing the girl all over her body in repercussion. In pain and rage, Azula misread her mother's hopeless embrace for fearful restraint and the power returned when she called for it.

"Don't touch me!" she screamed and the shock of the lightening blasted them apart. Ursa collapsed to the floor, a piteous sound that resounded over and over in the emptiness of the deserted passageway. Stunned from the blast, she lay unmoving, her dark hair flowing gracefully around her head like an arc around the sun. Blood trickled down her lip from where she had inadvertently bitten down on it in her fall. But the pain of her fall compared nothing to the words that echoed down the corridor. She barely registered her daughter's footsteps retreating hurriedly—the flash of red in her blurring eyes—fleeing down the hall and the girl's voice echoing back to her in its horrible resonance:

I hate you. You. You.

I don't care if you die.

Die.

Die.

And all went black.

Author's Note: Wow, that turned out a lot darker than what I had started with, but that's what I get for writing without a clear cut ending in mind. Simple, short, I haven't written a 2000 word story in months! And I meant to finish this story months ago! Wow, way back in March or something. The new episode The Awakening just spurred me to finish this snippet of story that we missed in the Zuko Alone episode. Lordy, how awesome was Azula? We hardly saw her, but she was so deliciously evil for everything! She's definitely soared to my favorites, almost right on par with Mai...

Ursa and Azula's relationship fascinated me because it's not normal; I found I just had to write this. (Though I think it's been done, I had to try my hand at it!) That, and I love writing these filler scenes. You can actually see Azula worried when Ursa pulls her away across the front of the screen. I HAD to write it!

Still, not everything went as planned, but I'm still pretty happy with what a little revision did to the story. I wanted to pull the story title across the story and a brief exchange between mother and daughter that explains for Azula's behavior later. I think I acheived those goals, though I only wish the banter could have been stronger. Ah, tell me what you all think.

Ursa's alive somewhere, I tell you! She'll be back this season and Azula won't be too happy about it! Place yer bets!

Anywho, do drop me some reviews as I love to hear from you!

Blackfire 18