When I finally left the dark interior of the meeting room, I was nearly blinded by the bright afternoon sun. Despite the large amount of fire used to light the meeting room this never failed to happen.

Going by memory rather than sight I made my way to a bench in a nearby garden and sat down as I waited for my vision to return to normal. I was half certain the previous Fire Lords designed the meeting hall with a lack of windows just so that when long annoying meetings dragged on they could laugh at the politicians as they blindly bumbled their way around once they were dismissed.

Soon enough I was able to look at my surroundings without squinting just in time for the newly appointed Head Trade Magistrate to walk by. I didn’t know much about Magistrate Weizhe. He was fairly new to the court and hadn’t made any moves to stand out among officials. And while he no doubt had the skills to do his new job, I was fairly certain the only reason he got it was due to him not being firmly attached to any existing power circle.

I would have to investigate the man later to see exactly what I dig up about him. If nothing was too out of place I could try winning him over as an ally. If not…

Well I’m sure someone else would be available for the job.

“Already planning for this one to lose his job, Sister?”

I looked over to see Azula, Mai, and Ty Lee walking over to me.

“Hello girls.” I greeted. “What are you doing over here?”

“Father thought it would be best to avoid another situation like with Zuko and had us watch from a hidden guard station to learn how to behave in a Court meeting.” said Azula.

I sighed. Father was truly unsubtle about his favoritism.

“It was so boring.” Mai complained, “Just a bunch of old men arguing about how important they are.”

“I enjoyed your part, Princess Azura!” Ty Lee chirped, clapping her hands together. “You were so dramatic! Building up till the end and then just sweeping everything away with a passionate speech! It was just like something out of a play!”

The commentary made me smile. It always was entertaining to see the two extremes between Azula’s friends. Mai would find just about anything boring or pointless, while Ty Lee was an inexhaustible fount of cheer.

“I’m glad you enjoyed it then. Most meetings aren’t nearly that entertaining. So what did you think otherwise? Learn anything?”

“Not really.” Azula said. “Father told us he predicted you making a move to deny the former Head Magistrate’s proposal. Everything else was just aimless blathering.”

I let out a soft snort at the idea of Father ‘predicting’ anything. I hadn’t exactly hidden my preparations against the proposal. In fact I wasn’t supposed to speak against it at all! I had approached several other officials to speak out in my place. But with Uncle leaving and my support base splintering because of it, my initial plan was useless and I had to improvise.

“Well if anything, you learned how to present information in a way that makes you sound wiser than you actually are.” I scoffed, enjoying the confused faces on the three preteens.

Still cryptic statements had their time and place, and I was tired after being in a mostly pointless meeting for a good portion of the morning.

“I have been organising against the new tax proposal for several weeks.” I explained to them. “If Father was unaware of my stance until now he would be nothing more than a figurehead ruler, there was no prediction about it. Even so, did he mention what his response was likely to be? I figured since I was against a new tax he would be at least slightly in favor of it.”

I focused on Azula because, even as close as Mai and Ty Lee were to her, she was the only one who could really speak about the relations between the Royal Family and not have it potentially used against her.

Both of them straightening up and looking elsewhere meant they knew it too. Smart girls.

“Father mentioned that you were mostly over reacting.” Azula stated. “But he didn’t say his thoughts on the matter.”

I wasn’t surprised. For all Father’s ruthlessness, he rarely committed fully to anything himself without a guaranteed outcome. Shame that he didn’t let any bigger opinions slip, but it wasn’t an issue.

I got what I wanted and actually a bit more than I planned.

I never imagined my plan to stop former Head Magistrate Zun’s proposal would lead to him being removed from his position and almost being banished from the Fire Nation at the same time. I suppose Father really didn’t like the possibility of a major stronghold falling in the name of greedy nobility. Now I had a bit more time to consolidate my own power base since ex-Magistrate Zun’s own allies would be looking for new alliances and the other officials should be more interested in snatching the unattached officials rather than try poaching the ones still in an alliance.

A shrill cry attracted my attention.

I looked up just in time to see a messenger hawk pass overhead. Not an unusual occurrence. With the amount of officials that gathered it sometimes was easier to direct messages here rather than a home or normal workplace. No, the thing that drew my attention was the black ribbon attached to the bird’s harness.

“A black level message, a priority message to be directly reported to Father and his council immediately. I wonder what happened?” Azula wondered. Unknowingly mirroring my own thoughts.

“Maybe the rest of the old guys screwed up and lost us the war?” Mai commented, causing Ty Lee to gasp.

“That can’t happen, right?”

“I wouldn’t put it past them.”

“Oh please, if there was any major problem in the colonies we would have heard of it way before now. The worst that could have happened is some raid somewhere.” Azula pitched in.

The girls continued to speculate, but I ignored the conversation for the most part. Black level messages were rare, yes but they didn’t often require much action from the capital. They mostly tended to be urgent requests for new orders after something unexpected popped up that affected a larger plan one of the generals made. Such as when a group of earthbenders managed to sneak behind an offensive and block a mountain pass before they were resupplied.

The lack of a supply route meant that even though the army managed to take the town, they needed to pull back when they were cut off from the rest of the frontline.

I wonder which general had a plan ruined by a competent enemy?

Anyways, not my problem.

I turned back to the other three and started moving the conversation towards less dangerous topics than the failures of the military while they were surrounded by high ranking military officers.

Simple topics like how had the academy taken a princess running off in the middle of the day with no warning. How their training had progressed in the week since I had seen them. And if they were planning on visiting the circus that was passing through the capital at all.

In order, the headmistress still didn’t care if you were a princess and had all three of them writing an apology to their teacher for worrying her when two students disappeared and another lying about where they went. Azula was given an additional punishment and had to write an essay on how it was irresponsible for a princess to vanish without a word. Good to see the old hawkbat was still as strict as ever.

Training was going smoothly for all of them. They were all very advanced in their chosen form, and Azula was apparently going to start getting introduced to the basics of lightning bending pretty soon. Not that she knew that, but since I was being trained in that as well I recognised the beginning forms.

And they hadn’t actually known about the circus. Of course now that I told them about it they were all excited to see the shows and started making plans on what they wanted to see first. Naturally Mai was interested in the knife throwers and Ty Lee wanted to see what professional acrobats were like, but Azula surprised me by saying she wanted to see the exotic animals that tended to accompany the show. I had figured she would have wanted to see the fire performers. She had always liked similar shows in the past.

When I commented she gave the incredibly vague answer that she didn’t want to get exposed to any bad habits.

More likely Father said something about performers being third rate firebenders in general at some point and Azula latched onto the idea.

Despite Azula using me as something of a measuring stick for how a princess should behave, she craved Father’s approval more than anything. Either parent really, but Lady Ursa tended to keep a certain distance from Azula. She was never neglectful. If anything she went out of her way to make sure none of her children wanted for anything. Even me, which was surprising considering how children from previous wives tended to be… set aside… when a new wife married in.

But while she was polite with me, and practically doted on Zuko all the time, she seemed to treat Azula like she was about to explode if handled the wrong way. Being carefully disapproving while never really offering a better outlet for Azula’s behavior.

And she needed an outlet.

Zuko and I were easy for Lady Ursa to mother. Zuko was a gentle soul and wanted nothing more than to make his mother proud. And I had already lived through one childhood. I wasn’t exactly going to beg for attention and play children’s games. So we fit in easily with the day-to-day life of a noblewoman. A tea ceremony here, a flower arrangement gathering there. Normal leisure activities.

Azula liked to fight.

To be fair, I did as well. Firebending was somewhat addicting when you spent one life unable to. But I never liked sparring those my own age because it felt too much like picking on, well, children. Nevermind that there were several who were just as good as me at the time. Azula though, she took to fighting like a salamander to a campfire. She just seemed to belong in a fight. Much like our Father really. And because of this Lady Ursa was constantly trying to correct her behavior. ‘No Azula, girls don’t act like that.’ or ‘You need to spend more time on your calligraphy Azula. It’s more important than firebending.’ Simple things that weren’t actually wrong really, but always discouraging Azula from being active. It obviously chafed, but I was at least able to reduce the stress by offering alternatives. Usually by including her in my own practice or playing more physical games like tag. The disapproving looks remained, but the comments stopped.

“Princess Azura?”

I turned to see a messenger bowing to me.

“Yes?”

“The Fire Lord has summoned you to the council meeting chamber.”

I blinked.

Well, this was unexpected.