Second Verse, Same as the First

[weirdlet]

More on that AU Ozai-mpreg prompt- as usual, I can't leave well enough alone^^  Cut for mpreg and sexiness (not necessarily mutually exclusive).  I think I like the second one better, but I wanted to get both of them down.

First up- Ursa's point of view from the wedding on- (am stalled in the process of editing this one- it has a couple things I like in it, but feels like it either needs to be in smaller pieces or end more solidly.)

The wedding had been over in a rush, the capstone of a few weeks’ hurried negotiations and preparations.  Ursa had known that her relationship with the younger prince (only a lieutenant when she met him, cocky and daring her to bust him down) would have consequences- it was only the wise thing to expect from such a reckless whirlwind of an affair.  The sudden state of being a candidate for royal matrimony had not been what she had been thinking of. 

Stocks, exile, hush-money perhaps, but to suddenly have him back?  That had definitely not been on the short list of things that she thought the Firelord was likely to order (although of course it was not her place to speculate on her Lord’s thought processes). 

Something fishy had been going on, of course.  She had served mostly on overland campaigns, but she knew the smell of a dead elephant-koi when it flopped up onto the beach in front of her. 

Her first real clue had been when she’d lifted her veil and drunk the ceremonial wine that was really only dark fruit juice. 

Something must have escaped her, then.  She’d seen his eyes when he’d looked in hers, over the wide bowl of the chalice- contrition was something unknown to the royal sons, but she flattered herself that Ozai hadn’t liked the thought of her in pain.   

She’d let him have until they were on the private ship to Ember Island before tearing the story out of him, word by word, burning out the poison of gossip with hot, leeching anger.  Her prince had explained through gritted teeth, then retreated to his bunk, trying to save face when what he wanted was to curl up and die, preferably before he lost any more meals. 

He’d let her in mostly because the rocking of the boat made him too ill to stop her.  She’d held back the hair of other soldiers after their first time taking a life - it seemed that making life would be a similar battle for her husband.  It went counter to something in him, the thing that made him a wonderful horror on the front lines, and left him adrift when she rubbed his back or kissed him gently, without teeth. 

Sometimes she wondered if that was all him, or if he got it from his father as well. 

The core of the argument had burnt itself out by the time they had reached the royal estate- the salt-lover versus the hearth-lover lost, and whatever the circumstances that had brought them together again- they were together.  Now their immediate and extended newlyweds’ retreat would allow them to get acquainted, as noble couples often must, and to (prepare for) practice at making heirs. 

The place had been repaired since their last visit, scorchmarked panels replaced and stained to match the rest, a small shed that had been destroyed entirely pulled down and covered over.  No horses or palanquins- Ember Island’s famed theaters, shops and restaurants, even the more public beaches might as well have been on the moon, except for during the lowest ebb of the tourist season.  Whatever adventure might have been found or advances made in careers or training, they were firmly on hold.  A few servants, a contingent of royal guards, arrangements in place for a wetnurse when the need arose- that was all. 

Still, they made the best of it.


With the master chamber aired and made ready, Prince Ozai took his bride to bed as husbands had for a thousand years, striving and pleasing, a wild dog-stallion tamed to the hand of she who could look him in the eyes without flinching.  A few lazy days were spent like this, a real honeymoon as befit royal lovers- boredom could only set in so quickly with lovers' foods, complete privacy and no paperwork (one thing she would not miss).  But slowly, other things filled their days as well- a careful dance of firebending versus twin-dao katas, a few secretive jaunts in cloaks and without royal regalia to the take in the delights of the nobles' getaway.

 

Six months after their wedding, Ursa’s arms rested around her husband’s shoulders, the pair of them settled back against the cushions in front of the royal beach house.  She could smell his hair- sunwarmed and salty and straggling a little at the edges, but still pulled back neatly from the face he turned towards the sunset.   

She splayed her hands over his chest, cupping the new fullness that wasn’t quite a breast but was warm and soft and pleasing in its contrast, shifting when he leaned his head back to look at her.  Ozai exhaled sharply as she kissed him between the eyes, taking one of his nipples between her fingers at the same time.  He wasn’t taken with the changes to his body, but as the one who’d be credited with them, she was, intrigued by the unbidden blend of warrior-hard and mother-soft- and the noise he made in the back of his throat when she lavished attention on the dark, sensitive points was very pleased, if grudging. 

Lower now, moving her hands over the full curve of her husband’s belly.  The taut skin was golden in the setting sunlight, and she brushed away some lingering sand - the cream that kept him from stretchmarks worked wonders, but it did have its disadvantages on a beach.  Ozai leaned back into her, stretching like a cat under her touch, and she smirked to herself as her breasts pressed against his muscled back, heat tingling between them.   

She skimmed lower, cradling the underside of his abdomen and stroking the tender flesh there.  One side shifted, strained- then settled beneath her questing fingertips.  Ozai grunted. 

“You’re waking him up.”   

“Am I now…?” Ursa smiled, leaning to rest her chin on his shoulder.  “Should we play quietly, then, while the baby’s sleeping?” she teased. 

He glared at her, the one that melted butter but didn’t quite pin men to the wall like an iron rod.  

“I’d prefer we didn’t need to ‘play quietly’ at all-” 

Her fingers slipped lower, cutting off that line of thought. 

His voice lowered into a growl.   

“-but surely we can find something to do with ourselves.”

.............

And finally, the arrival-

When Zuko is born, the beach-house nearly burns down.  The sudden flares in the lanterns, the hearths settle into a rhythm soon enough, but the intensity is- astronomical.  A raging firestorm, leashed to the pattern of a dragon’s breathing. 

The dragon is in pain. 

Ozai hasn’t enough breath to curse, knows his squandered rage will leave him cold and ashen if he spends it as he wishes- and as he always has, he bends it to his will, making it fuel him beyond where a prisoner breaks, a dog snaps, a warrior falls over in his tracks and dies- 

And it works. 

His muscles strain, his sweat runs, and his breath is the only thing he hears.  It’s the only thing he can hear, because if he listens to anything else, he’ll lose.  Lose it all.  Ursa’s touch is numb to him (she should have been his, she was, but they had taken all the triumph from it-), the midwives’ words nonsense humming beyond a flickering curtain (the last time he saw his father, a formal order to spend his year-in-pleasant-exile, not even a word about him, his state-), his body turned against itself and he refuses to give in- 

He loses the rhythm and almost falls back, shaking- they’re fussing, why is it they’re panicking-? 

-why is it blue? 

Ursa leaves his side and takes up the infant in slender hands, presses her breath into it- some bit of viscera is unlooped from its neck and the sickly-white turns to demon-red in short order, shaking and squalling and pressed to his center, hoping to draw heat and life from his belly where it is laid. 

“You have a son,” Ursa says to him, and he looks up to her, nearly spent but still willful. 

“Your son,” he says, and sighs.  Azulon’s orders are implicit, if not clear.  This is the child of a wedded prince and his lovely bride, not a willful and wastrel second son who picked up something shameful on his travels. 

The child coughs, and he looks again, once more, for the first time.  It makes a pathetic sound and shivers, and he tries to regain his breath, to share the warmth he has spent so recklessly.  Ursa reaches forth and touches his son, picks him up, allows the servants to take him and clean him as she looks on, terrified, the picture of a new parent. 

He has lost her already. 

Neither of them is wholely mine.   

There is cleanup to be done and more work, to expel the extraneous mess of this whole long fiasco.  He leans back and lets it happen, watching through the growing fog of exhaustion. 

The next hiccupping breath startles him, and he looks to his son with a glare that can melt walls, terrify soldiers, entrance those who flirt with danger- please, Agni, that can inspire strength… 

Live, damn you- be worthy of what I have given up! 

I will accept nothing less.