The Warrior's Gambit (Zutara)

XXV

This is late, yes, I know....

I ended up getting my Wisdom teeth out. I, because I am a scardy cat, waited until the last possible moment (basically nearly to when I'm not on my parent's insurance) to have all four pulled, and it's really not been fun. Today is the first day in nearly eight days I've been aware/awake/feeling okay enough to be on the computer. Word to the wise, if your doc tells you to have your wisdom teeth pulled, do it young! My 17-year-old sister had hers pulled with me, and she was literally back to normal by day 3.

In terms of the story, this is part one of THREE of the ball! Yes, we get three glorious, juicy chapters all before the fights ;) I hope you enjoy :D

This chapter is also written a bit...differently than others. I had a lot of little events I needed to happen and found myself having trouble writing the transitions between everything without sounding repetitive. So, being The Author, I just decided to write each moment as just that- a moment in time! You'll see what I mean in a second. I enjoy this because it gives a sense of time passed, and I hope you guys like this little deviation in story-telling style for these three chapters!

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5:30 PM

As Zuko stood in front of the mirror, he couldn't help but feel like he was thirteen again. He remembered that day vividly, as though someone had dumped it into the forefront of his mind just now, and let it settle.

Zuko looked at himself in the mirror in the crown prince regalia. It hung off his body, not quite fitting right. He seemed gangly and uncoordinated, like a child playing dress-up with his father's robes for a festival. It did not seem like these clothes were made for him. Right now, at the tender age of thirteen, his body was somewhere on the edge between that of a man and of a child. He toed the line, though he knew that his childhood was gone. Eradicated. Strangled and choked away, and he was left, still trying to gasp for air.

In a few years, his shoulders would fill out the space, his legs would grow, he'd shoot up a few inches...but for right now, he felt like an intruder in such robes. He felt like he did not deserve to be allowed in on the war meeting that day. He wished he were still just the cousin to the heir, but all that had changed. The shift had been sharply noticed, like shards of broken glass cutting against his skin.

His face burned. His jaw locked as his eyes – fuck, no, eye – traveled up the length of the mirror, trying not to make a face of displeasure at his clothing that fit so strangely, but he could not help but feel ill when he saw the gauze over his left eye.

The skin beneath was tender, almost painfully so, so that even as Zuko touched the wound, it felt like his world burst with pain. Perhaps it was the pain of knowledge, that weighed so heavily upon him, something he would never be able to unlearn. He did not think he would ever grow used to this sight. It would be a reminder; constant and twisted.

The healer said she could not fix this. His mother had cried when Zuko had been told he'd wear this mark forever.

Azula was sitting behind him. She was still wearing her girl's clothes. She would not have a wardrobe fit for a lady for a few years still, but she too seemed to have shed her childhood innocence (if she had any, to begin with), and to see such a look in her eyes fit jarringly with her ruffles and pink. She had just about thrown a fit that she was not allowed in the meeting, and it had been all Zuko could think of to let her sit in on this fitting. It satisfied her for now, or at least, she was quiet.

She was watching him. Glaring daggers, more like.

Ever since the event a few weeks ago, Zuko could not figure out what Azula thought about it. He knew better than to ask her. It had been years since they laughed as siblings, and now their relationship was icy. It had been icy before the...well, just before, but it was worse now. It had been days since she'd talked to him. Even Mai had written him with some sort of apology and asked how he was doing, whereas Azula has not offered up any comment on it.