Azula Flickering Hope

Semblance

Mentions of suicide IN THIS CHAPTER READ WITH YOUR SELF AWARENESS LOVE YOU This is a long chapter

Tylee POV

I like to think I'm an optimist, but it's really hard to feel anything but bitter betrayal and hurt after everything that's happened, at least Kiyi and Iroh are doing well I can't say the same for Ursa. The Kyoshi warriors and I decided to stay in the palace for a while not just to make sure there are no more attacks but to give some support to the royal family specifically Zuko.

His mother hasn't been doing very well she took some more antidote for the poison but she's been on bed rest for the last week. Zuko's aura is all messed up because of it. He's filled with anxiety and bottled-up emotions I don't blame him I'm still trying to wrap my head around it all. One moment we're all in this unspoken grief and then the next trying to process a betrayal none of us saw coming.

I know Azula is in pain and she's blocking us all off but I didn't think she was still this determined to take the crown. I didn't think I would freeze up as much as I did seeing her again and I didn't realize how much I missed her until I saw she was alive.

The palace had a shift in energy which is a shame after how much effort Zuko spent trying to gain the servants and palace guards' trust back. at the beginning of his rule, the servants bowed and cried out for forgiveness for the smallest mistakes such as spilling tea or their children walking into a room where he was present, even after Zuko assured them he wouldn't hurt them and that the palace was a safe place for conversation it took a long time for them to even talk to us like real people. the Palace seems back to that scared aura it once was maids run out of the room they were talking in every time one of us enters, and I'm not even royalty.  quiet gossip and rumors are spreading around the kingdom about what happened. Some people are saying that Azula killed Ursa Some people are saying her angry spirit is now cursing us.

I mean it's ridiculous hearing what people are saying about us I mean yes she's alive but only a few days before we were grieving and I guess the kingdom expects us to get back up and move on. They went straight back to calling her the wild Princess who lost her mind.

At the moment The girls and I are walking around the palace and helping out the servants as they take down the remaining flowers and ribbons.

It's depressing, to say the least seeing a funeral being shut down and cleaned up as if nothing ever happened. They take down the golden laced wreaths of yellow and white Lilys and chrysanthemums gifted from noble families. When Zuko's cousin prince LuTen died the flowers stayed up for weeks it's strange seeing them taken down so soon even if we know she's alive.

I don't know how she survived none of us do Katara said there was no way she could have survived that much blood loss without a transfusion and to our knowledge, she's the only blood bender alive. I remember seeing the blood in her hospital room the handprints she left on the floor I was shaken to my core seeing the blood-soaked sheets she must have fought so hard to survive that. Azula she never gives up on anything I couldn't imagine how scared she was being attacked in the middle of the night miles away from us.

What Kumara told me is telling me a different story entirely if she was telling the truth and Azula wrote me a note and she knew she was going to die why didn't she tell the guards how did she know she was going to be attacked. Unless she did it to herself, I- can't imagine that she's stubborn and just looking back at those sheets she wrapped around her wounds She didn't want to die right?
I don't know anymore I thought I knew who Azula was but it seems she's a different person than she even let me believe she was.

I spot a small pair of braids sitting out in the garden and I couldn't help myself from checking up on her. I walked out of the group told them I was going to check on the Princess.