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fulseldenWritten for the prompt 'portrait of a family’ at ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
31_days.
Series: Avatar.
Characters: Ursa, Azula.
Rating/Warnings: G.
ALL exercises were first deuised, and so in deede serued, either for games and pastime, for warre and seruice, or for suretie of health & length of life, though somtime all the three endes did concurre in one, sometimes they could not.
Richard Mulcaster, Positions (London: 1581), sig. Giir.
On the evening before her daughter’s seventh name-day, Ursa goes to pick up her flute from its stand and finds the outer bamboo has been stroked away. There is nothing left but a core of lacquer and stone dust, a crisp dark tube laced with a little soot. When she touches it, it buckles away under her fingertips, slippery as a butterfly wing.
There is a screen by the inner wall and a tall hanging at the end of the room. Ursa does not look at either of them when she scoops the crumbs of lacquer into her palm, slides open the window, and lets them flake away over the courtyard.
Her hands smell of sour ash. She lays them out before her on the cedar wood window frame, long and pale, the notches and lines of old bending scars almost invisible. Her power may be only moderate for one of her lineage, barely adequate for bearing royal heirs, but her control is exquisite. You can see how she came by it, too, in each little seam and quirk of scar tissue.
She knows she could not have burnt away that flute and left its centre whole.
They are stringing red lanterns up over the courtyard, row after row of bright silk globes, abrupt and solid in the evening light. She waits, watching the servants clamber, toss the lanterns around like hulking earthbenders throwing boulders.
Groups of servant women clatter across the courtyard holding long bundles of festival incense, platters of glossy sweets, tangles of brass bells and red string, piles of silk hangings printed, she guesses, with the characters for long life, prosperity, glory. It is important to put on a show. She can make out half her daughter’s name, folded over on the topmost banner.
One servant carries what looks like a collection of simple masks for the acrobats, a cluster of pale half-faces bouncing at her hip.
It takes almost until sunset for her daughter to come up beside her, as if she has just found herself in the music room. Ursa smiles down at her, decides not to press her about the whereabouts of her attendants. They have probably been searching the corridors and gardens for a while. She lays a hand on her daughter’s cheek, cradles her jaw.
“How many flutes did you go through, Azula?” she asks. It is not what she meant to say, before she looked into her daughter’s face.
Azula purses her lips, crosses her arms.
“Some,” she admits. “It is an exceedingly delicate technique.”
Ursa raises an eyebrow. Even her little daughter does not normally use such terms of her own accord.
“It is very impressive, my dear,” she admits. Azula looks away, out over the lanterns. “I am very proud of your hard work,” says Ursa.
She tweaks her daughter’s ear.
“But why would you do something like that to a flute, silly? They are very old and precious, you know. It takes a master months to make them just right.”
Azula looks up at Ursa. Her face reconstitutes itself, quick as the closing of a butterfly’s wings, so that Ursa is not sure what she has just seen. If she had seen anything.
Azula is full of open, guileful contrition. She clasps her hands behind her back, sweeps one foot in front of the other.
“I thought they were just ordinary, Mother. Sorry.” She gives Ursa a broad smile. “I promise that I won’t do it again. On my honour as a princess.”
Ursa lowers herself to her daughter, holds on to her shoulders, tight and wiry from her training, the metal thread of the brocade chilly and coarse. Azula is perfectly still in her grasp.
“My dear,” she says, “I know your father has found you and your brother the very best teachers. And of course he takes a special interest in your lessons, Azula. But if you want to improve your precision, I think I can help.”
She runs her hands down Azula’s arms, folds her daughter’s hands between her own. Raises a tiny tuft of fire from each index finger.
“You see,” she says, “it can be a game.”
She spreads her fingers, Azula’s hands between her palms, and has the flames hop from finger to finger, one two three four five and back again. It is something she did with both her children when they were very small.
One for a kingdom
Two for glory
Three for a phoenix
And four for a story.
And one two three four five dragon, with a little puff of fire up over their heads.
She looks across, smiles at her daughter.
Azula takes a breath. The fire goes out.
Below them, Ozai enters the courtyard, a procession of high ranking bureaucrats and military officers trailing behind him. In the failing light, their faces bob above their robes in odd shapes, pale slivers, as they turn to whisper and nod at each other. It seems almost as though they might clatter to the ground if they stopped moving, a collection of intricate parts carved in white wood and ivory.
The light is dim in the room behind Ursa and her daughter, the instruments on the walls a row of soft glints and gleams. Inner doors slide open, shut, attendants chatter. Zuko, somewhere in the near corridors, raises his voice.
“Thank you for your instruction, Mother,” says Azula. She bows her head and removes her hands. Gives Ursa a wide smile.
“Can I go and say goodnight to Zuko now?”
“Of course you can, my dear,” says Ursa.
Azula darts off, slipping out through the main doors like any small child bent on mischief, on being very especially quiet.
Ursa stands at the window. The footsteps of the procession hollow as they reach a wooden walkway, then fade out. She considers her daughter’s smile.
She reminds herself of how long it took for Azula to come to her. Both sides of their family are renowned, after all, for something like patience. She bows her head.
She knows that when she first touched the burnt lacquer, she had not been able to hold back her slight intake of breath, the widening of her eyes.
A sudden shout comes down the hall, Zuko in urgent, blustering indignation. Azula’s laughter. There is a silence, negotiation, perhaps. Zuko’s voice comes again, dictating terms. Azula wants to borrow something, that much is clear. Attendants intervene, clucking, a door shuts off the noise.
Ursa looks up, curves her lips. She had always wondered what exactly the inside of a flute looked like, but it was not so very strange after all. She raises her hands, angles them exactly. Little spits of careful fire hit every single lantern, row after row, leaving no space for darkness.
31_days.Series: Avatar.
Characters: Ursa, Azula.
Rating/Warnings: G.
ALL exercises were first deuised, and so in deede serued, either for games and pastime, for warre and seruice, or for suretie of health & length of life, though somtime all the three endes did concurre in one, sometimes they could not.
Richard Mulcaster, Positions (London: 1581), sig. Giir.
On the evening before her daughter’s seventh name-day, Ursa goes to pick up her flute from its stand and finds the outer bamboo has been stroked away. There is nothing left but a core of lacquer and stone dust, a crisp dark tube laced with a little soot. When she touches it, it buckles away under her fingertips, slippery as a butterfly wing.
There is a screen by the inner wall and a tall hanging at the end of the room. Ursa does not look at either of them when she scoops the crumbs of lacquer into her palm, slides open the window, and lets them flake away over the courtyard.
Her hands smell of sour ash. She lays them out before her on the cedar wood window frame, long and pale, the notches and lines of old bending scars almost invisible. Her power may be only moderate for one of her lineage, barely adequate for bearing royal heirs, but her control is exquisite. You can see how she came by it, too, in each little seam and quirk of scar tissue.
She knows she could not have burnt away that flute and left its centre whole.
They are stringing red lanterns up over the courtyard, row after row of bright silk globes, abrupt and solid in the evening light. She waits, watching the servants clamber, toss the lanterns around like hulking earthbenders throwing boulders.
Groups of servant women clatter across the courtyard holding long bundles of festival incense, platters of glossy sweets, tangles of brass bells and red string, piles of silk hangings printed, she guesses, with the characters for long life, prosperity, glory. It is important to put on a show. She can make out half her daughter’s name, folded over on the topmost banner.
One servant carries what looks like a collection of simple masks for the acrobats, a cluster of pale half-faces bouncing at her hip.
It takes almost until sunset for her daughter to come up beside her, as if she has just found herself in the music room. Ursa smiles down at her, decides not to press her about the whereabouts of her attendants. They have probably been searching the corridors and gardens for a while. She lays a hand on her daughter’s cheek, cradles her jaw.
“How many flutes did you go through, Azula?” she asks. It is not what she meant to say, before she looked into her daughter’s face.
Azula purses her lips, crosses her arms.
“Some,” she admits. “It is an exceedingly delicate technique.”
Ursa raises an eyebrow. Even her little daughter does not normally use such terms of her own accord.
“It is very impressive, my dear,” she admits. Azula looks away, out over the lanterns. “I am very proud of your hard work,” says Ursa.
She tweaks her daughter’s ear.
“But why would you do something like that to a flute, silly? They are very old and precious, you know. It takes a master months to make them just right.”
Azula looks up at Ursa. Her face reconstitutes itself, quick as the closing of a butterfly’s wings, so that Ursa is not sure what she has just seen. If she had seen anything.
Azula is full of open, guileful contrition. She clasps her hands behind her back, sweeps one foot in front of the other.
“I thought they were just ordinary, Mother. Sorry.” She gives Ursa a broad smile. “I promise that I won’t do it again. On my honour as a princess.”
Ursa lowers herself to her daughter, holds on to her shoulders, tight and wiry from her training, the metal thread of the brocade chilly and coarse. Azula is perfectly still in her grasp.
“My dear,” she says, “I know your father has found you and your brother the very best teachers. And of course he takes a special interest in your lessons, Azula. But if you want to improve your precision, I think I can help.”
She runs her hands down Azula’s arms, folds her daughter’s hands between her own. Raises a tiny tuft of fire from each index finger.
“You see,” she says, “it can be a game.”
She spreads her fingers, Azula’s hands between her palms, and has the flames hop from finger to finger, one two three four five and back again. It is something she did with both her children when they were very small.
One for a kingdom
Two for glory
Three for a phoenix
And four for a story.
And one two three four five dragon, with a little puff of fire up over their heads.
She looks across, smiles at her daughter.
Azula takes a breath. The fire goes out.
Below them, Ozai enters the courtyard, a procession of high ranking bureaucrats and military officers trailing behind him. In the failing light, their faces bob above their robes in odd shapes, pale slivers, as they turn to whisper and nod at each other. It seems almost as though they might clatter to the ground if they stopped moving, a collection of intricate parts carved in white wood and ivory.
The light is dim in the room behind Ursa and her daughter, the instruments on the walls a row of soft glints and gleams. Inner doors slide open, shut, attendants chatter. Zuko, somewhere in the near corridors, raises his voice.
“Thank you for your instruction, Mother,” says Azula. She bows her head and removes her hands. Gives Ursa a wide smile.
“Can I go and say goodnight to Zuko now?”
“Of course you can, my dear,” says Ursa.
Azula darts off, slipping out through the main doors like any small child bent on mischief, on being very especially quiet.
Ursa stands at the window. The footsteps of the procession hollow as they reach a wooden walkway, then fade out. She considers her daughter’s smile.
She reminds herself of how long it took for Azula to come to her. Both sides of their family are renowned, after all, for something like patience. She bows her head.
She knows that when she first touched the burnt lacquer, she had not been able to hold back her slight intake of breath, the widening of her eyes.
A sudden shout comes down the hall, Zuko in urgent, blustering indignation. Azula’s laughter. There is a silence, negotiation, perhaps. Zuko’s voice comes again, dictating terms. Azula wants to borrow something, that much is clear. Attendants intervene, clucking, a door shuts off the noise.
Ursa looks up, curves her lips. She had always wondered what exactly the inside of a flute looked like, but it was not so very strange after all. She raises her hands, angles them exactly. Little spits of careful fire hit every single lantern, row after row, leaving no space for darkness.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-18 06:35 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-18 08:17 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-19 03:53 pm (UTC)My favorite detail in this one is that Ursa "had always wondered what exactly the inside of a flute looked like, but it was not so very strange after all." So much to think about there.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-19 04:35 pm (UTC)Plus writing palace life is good times, although I find I'm running up against my distinctly superficial knowledge of Asian cultures. *Eyes empty slots on library borrowing allowance*
no subject
Date: 2010-09-22 05:57 pm (UTC)She spreads her fingers, Azula’s hands between her palms, and has the flames hop from finger to finger, one two three four five and back again. It is something she did with both her children when they were very small.
One for a kingdom
Two for glory
Three for a phoenix
And four for a story.
...this just killed me. I love, love, love, LOVE fleshing worlds out with perfect little details like this: a game you play with children. A counting game. Using fire.
Tiny Azula, and Ursa being the best mother she can to her, and... oh, it's all so poignant. Ursa senses which way her daughter is turning and she's working as hard as she can to bring her back without accidentally pushing her away. Oh, Ursa. And the tiny bit of wordless Zuko vs. Azula interplay-- something that's happened so often that Ursa knows what it is without hearing the words, without knowing specifics. So good.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-22 06:23 pm (UTC)And, yeah, Ursa. I am fascinated by her, because, oh man, to be afraid of your own daughter. And to know, or guess, that she knows you're afraid of her. And what that knowledge does to Azula. Gah.