Zuko does not go to Ozai about his desire for a mistress, because he is not an idiot.

It is not as if Azula had any problem asking for one, or had any problem forcing Ty Lee's hand in the matter. But Ozai clearly has wanted Azula to change her mind and demand her brother's death since the first moment.

That moment in which Zuko's heart stopped and he thought he was going to die. One second, he was on her, tasting her, the sensation that could probably be described as love coursing within him. He was never sure what to make of his liaisons with Azula, save for the fact that he truly enjoyed them. But right now he is unsure what the monster in his stomach is.

To be tasteless, he could identify the monster in his pants, but the beast in his stomach when he thinks about Azula and her mistress is something he does not know how to explain away.

Like most things over the past year, to be honest. This has not been the easiest stretch of time, and there is no one to place that blame on but himself, of course.

That does not change the fact that he cannot stop thinking about her, and how she will not tell him a word about how she wants to defy father. She has never explained why she wanted to stretch out a hand to him in the first place, has never told him why she thought of their sex as defiance against him.

Father loves Azula; Azula loves father. They have a perfect little relationship and a happy little family that Zuko never got to be a part of.

Zuko hated them both for that, and he still might, even now that he is being forced to realize that Azula has also suffered due to circumstance and fate.

Ozai aside, Azula and the monster in Zuko's stomach aside, the prince is now examining his options. Of course, Mai is out of the question, because she was... disgusted by his affair with Azula for some reason. He could not understand why, because Mai does not care about things, and it was on Azula just as much as it was on Zuko.

Zuko never hurt Azula, and Zuko could not understand why anyone expected him to know better than her, or to take more blame on his shoulders than her.

"... or something more exotic," finishes the quite well-dressed and well-groomed yet somehow disgusting man as Zuko sits down in the office.

It has too much bamboo in it, and the paintings have transcended classy and moved into too sexual, in the prince's opinion. He remembers when he was younger, and his uncle had to first explain many uncomfortable sexual things when Zuko first walked down to the engineering decks of their ship and saw the ink paintings on the wall.

The naked women were so graphic, and Zuko was... well, not quite aroused, not aroused the way he wound up being when he was with Mai or Azula. And those women were painted to be beautiful, but none of them were really as beautiful as someone flushed and digging her nails into his skin.

Uncle had to explain things, and Zuko has always been quite turned off from pornographic images since then. They are now only equated to the scent of oil, men he could not look in the eyes, and his uncle seeming so calm as he talked about it to an agape thirteen year old.

"I don't know what to think yet," Zuko says, trying to sound more adult.

He is an adult. He is a married man, a married man who is now co-heir apparent; he will now rule the country beside his sister.

"You must have already had so many options," says the man that Zuko is trying to remember the name of. It was such a common one, Chan or Li, but he pronounced it in a weirdly fancy way that Zuko was unsure if he misheard it.

In another world, Prince Zuko would have used his royal status to bed many women. But in a world in which misfortune left its mark upon him so many times, he has not had the chance. He does, of course, display the appearance that he has. Men look down on someone who would be inexperienced.

Azula likes him, anyway.

That monster in his stomach growls again. Azula likes Ty Lee better.

"I do think I want someone exotic. Someone really... hot." That was not specific, and Zuko fears he has outed himself as inexperienced.

"I have some interesting Earth Kingdom girls. And some Water Tribe ones..." The man furrows his brow. Zuko thinks for a moment. Maybe he was Chang and not Chan. Chun? "Why don't you try them out? Any girl would be eager to."

Zuko shrugs. "That sounds fine."

Zuko probably should not have started off his conversation with Mai with those words.

"I didn't mean it that way. And it's not auditions. I just want to say that I was thinking about you the whole time. I've always loved you," Zuko says and he feels like a total fool.

She stands there, looking at him impassively. Mai truly does not care if Zuko loves her or not; she just cares that her family is in upset, and that Mai is going to have a lot of trouble living this down. Maybe her reputation does not matter, but her freedom does, and she did not have a lot of it in the first place.

"What you just described to me is holding auditions for a mistress. Azula has Ty Lee because she..." Mai squints. "No. Azula doesn't love her. But Azula doesn't want to let her go. You just want to upshow her."

"I don't want to let you go either." Zuko's hands twitch to touch her, but he decides he wants to keep his hands, and so he stops himself.

"There aren't second chances for this kind of thing." Mai might wish there were, or she might not.

Princess Azula paces in her quarters, thinking about what she has just learned of her brother. It enraged her, and she could not explain the feeling in her gut. It was one she had never felt before, and it was one she wanted to crush or electrocute.

Ty Lee is with her, feeling nervous, flushed and feverish. The acrobat really does want to talk to Azula. They are friends before this new, strange dynamic that they will need to take time to explore. But Ty Lee thinks Azula wants to fuck right now, to... make herself feel better.

But it won't stop her from feeling hurt about Zuko going behind her back and... supposedly auditioning girls. It really won't, and Ty Lee wants to help Azula with that, not sleep with her.

"This is a little rushed," Ty Lee whispers very faintly even though she knows how entirely futile this is.

"Yes, well, my brother rushed things a little bit too, don't you think? Mai told you as well I'm sure," Azula snaps, clutching her hairbrush with an admirable force.

"About the..." Ty Lee hesitates before whispering, "auditions?"

"Yes," Azula replies sharply. "Get on the bed." There is no response. "Please get on the bed."

Ty Lee does so in the electrically charged silence. "Azula, I think maybe you should talk to him. I think he's just jealous about this, and it doesn't seem like Zuko to..." She trails off when she sees Azula's eyes and knows that she said the exact wrong thing.

Azula moves forward as if she were striking and enemy and presses her rosy lips against Ty Lee's. Her smooth, pale hands slide under Ty Lee's shirt much less delicately than they used to, unbuttoning it from the inside and tearing it off like the seal on a letter and not wrapping paper on a present.

She always had superhuman agility, but right now she is angry. Right now she is jealous and confused about her brother, which Ty Lee understands, and which Ty Lee really wants to help Azula with. Of course Azula has mixed feelings about Zuko, but this is not how to figure them out.

Azula kisses her fiercely and Ty Lee kisses her back to the response of a burning sensation. Her nipples harden under the caress of Azula as the princess slides her mistress onto her back. Fumbling slightly and wondering if she should stop this and try to talk Azula down instead, Ty Lee slides off Azula's clothes. There is certainly a longing within her, but it is uneasy at best.

Azula guides Ty Lee's hands along her flawless body and Ty Lee tries to cling to the sensation of the toned but perfect curves.

But she hesitates when Azula moves much more forcefully, more like an invasion than a dance they used to share before Zuko.

"You know you want me, Ty Lee," Azula snarls and that voice does not belong to the woman Ty Lee loves.

"I want you, princess!" Ty Lee shouts, more to fight her inhibitions than encourage the encounter.

Forcing herself to focus on the moment instead of her dizzy daydreams, Azula trying to forget her motives.

It works.

It doesn't work at all.

It seems like it works.

"You want to play a game, ZuZu?" Azula asks and he slowly shakes his head. "Oh, but you're already playing."

"I don't want to. I thought that mistresses were the norm." He sound crisp and clear, and Azula is mildly impressed by his confident tone. But he is not intimidating in the slightest.

"I would just let you apologize and crawl back to me. But I think this might be fun. We haven't played together in so very long. Do remember that I tend to make up the rules."

Azula's gaze lingers on Zuko for a moment longer, and then she walks past him. Her menacing, cold smirk fades as soon as she is out of his sight.

He gazes after her, and she knows that he is looking. She knows that he wants her. She also knows that he wants to play a game with her.

And unfortunately, even if he is supposedly holding these auditions tomorrow.

Azula always wins.