The Princess and the Peasant - (An Azula Epic)

A New Age, a New Hunt

About thirty minutes later...

The team now followed Silah at a cautious pace up a sloping pathway onto the caldera with a cluster of noble mansions just over a ledge below them.

As the three women warily observed the woman saunter at an almost purposefully slow pace.

Almost as if...she was doing it just to get on their every last nerve!

Only for Silah to suddenly pause in her walk with her lifeless doll immediately halting in unison with her.

Zoi, Azula and Ty Lee stared questioningly at the woman with their young friend padding to a stop beside them.

And that was when their ears picked up the sound of voices in a mansion below while they watched Silah turn to glance down at the estate with oddly fixated dark green eyes.

"But, Father...do we really have to say the pledge before dinner?" A boy's voice asked almost as if in annoyance.

The team listened as they gazed at Silah with taken aback expressions in their eyes as they watched her stare down in bizarre interest at the estate below.

"And is it really necessary to have the Fire Lord's portrait on the wall?" A young girl's voice questioned soon afterward.

"Of course, it's necessary! You should consider yourself lucky that the nobles aren't home right now to hear you talking like that. Do you have any idea how fortunate we are as commoners to have a place in Hari Bulkan as servants in this household? Now, I don't want to ever hear you say anything like that again!" The voice of a man called out in a voice of paternal discipline.

Azula stood with her frigid amber golden eyes gazing down coldly at the estate below.

Only to gaze out of the corner of her eye at the puppeteer's pale face as the woman still listened closely.

'Why is this woman so interested in the dinner conversation of a family of servants?' Azula thought with her rigid amber golden eyes staring at her enemy in consideration.

As the two noblewomen still gazed back at the woman with bewildered looks in their eyes.

And the handmaid stood before her noble friends with her amber eyes gazing down at the estate in confusion.

"Yes, Father." The two children agreed in a voice of unified obedience as their voices carried out the window.

"Now, say the pledge." The father commanded in a voice of boundless nationalism that flowed throughout the window.

The hunter still glanced down with a chilling gaze in her dark green eyes as her lips creased into a scowl.

"My life I give to my country. With my hands I fight for Fire Lord Ozai, and our forefathers before him. With my mind I seek ways to better my country. And with my feet may our March of Civilization continue." The family chanted in near perfect sync as their voices traveled into the air throughout the window.

Team Azula listened with their eyes gazing at the puppeteer in bafflement only to take notice that her gaze now expression of unfathomable contempt.

And then Silah let out a disgusted sneer as she turned to resume her walk up the pathway while the four continued to follow after her in confusion.

"How pathetic. What a bunch of insignificant worms. They are nothing more than indoctrinated drones...with little more personality than my puppets...utterly without any semblance of individual thoughts of their own." Silah ranted under her breath in a disdainful voice as she walked with the princess now glaring in fury at her back.