#sukimai

Suki's fingers skated down the long pale line of the other girl's throat. Her hand was very steady as she dipped a soft new ink-brush into a pot of rouge on the vanity. She grinned down, maybe not as steady as her hand, but close; it was a heady thing, having another warrior bare themselves so completely, so easily. Mai's pulse pounded beneath her hands.

Makeup was simple. Suki understood makeup, had worn it for years and years as defense against male stupidity, and in servitude of the Avatar that had been her idol for as long as she could remember.

And now she wore it in offense, though she perhaps didn't know quite how it was going to work out.

Mai's lips were soft, beneath her fingers. The paint went on easy, filling up creases and cracks that neither girl even knew were there. It wasn't much, but it was enough. They would look like death from on high, a bloody rain of vengeance.

And all because Katara had caught an Earth Kingdom assassin in Zuko's room.

(No one had thought to ask what the Waterbender girl was doing in the Fire Lord's rooms. The entire palace knew what the Master Katara was doing in the Fire Lord's room. They were a fantastic source of entertainment and gossip as they stumbled around each other trying to figure out just where they stood with one another. Mai hadn't been so amused in a very long time.)

So now two of Zuko's person guard had been assigned a mission to find out exactly whom had thought it would be a good idea to put a hit on the first benevolent Fire Lord in three generations. The fact that it was Mai and Suki meant very little—they'd lived through a war together, and war crimes were a long-forgotten thing between two women who had put themselves on the line to save the world.

Besides, they had bigger issues to worry about than petty childhood rivalries.

"Gold or red?" Suki frowned.

"Gold is a colour representative of several Earth Kings," Mai said, neutral.

"Hm, I knew that. Red, then, because I guess we are technically Zuko's guard, even if he isn't there. We should probably back him up. Black trim, or white?"

"White is attached to burial traditions in the Fire Nation," Mai said, again, still calm. She flexed her fingers. Suki still sat in her lap, knees splayed.

"White is perfect, then," Suki smiled with all her teeth, bright red lips level with Mai's eyes. "We're death-dealers this trip, it makes so much sense."

"I suppose it is very neat."

"And everyone says you're no fun," Suki snickered. "I think you're lots of fun, if it's any consolation."

"They also say I have no sense of humour," Mai's voice was bone-dry in the quiet of the room.

This time, Suki laughed outright: she threw her head back and snorted, unladylike but charming for all its inelegance. "That's probably why they want you to marry Zuko so much. They think you'll make up for his bad jokes at parties!"

Mai couldn't help the way her lip curled. "Unfortunately."

"Hey, stop making that face, your makeup will get ruined," Suki said. She reached out to pat at Mai's cheeks, her fingers infinitely gentle. "You're too pretty for him, anyway."

"I would make a horrible Fire Lady. Katara will be better," Mai said.

"I don't even want to think about it," Suki sighed. "There, all fixed. Look, see, you're so pretty!"

Mai caught sight of herself in the mirror. There was no trace of the dour girl her mother had always said lived in her face—there was only an impassive lady with large dark eyes and bloody lips. She was so lovely that Mai couldn't quite stand to look at her. But she didn't look useless, so that was something.

"Mai? You okay?" Suki asked softly.

"Yes. Thank you, Suki," Mai said.

Suki beamed at her in the mirror, brighter than the sun. She brushed Mai's bangs out of her eyes, the long dark locks thick and shiny through her fingers. "We're going to screw 'em all over, aren't we?"

"I would like that, I think."

Mai watched more than felt the way that Suki pressed her lips to the crown of her head. It sent a shudder all through her, those long quick fingers curled around her shoulders.

"Let's get dressed. We have a court to greet," Suki said into Mai's ear.

Mai couldn't agree more.

—--------

They wore identical red dresses with white trim—proper Fire Nation attire, meant for the Fire Lady's guard, but with that death-defying edge that had served them both so well in the war—and stood at the front of the delegation. The Fire Lord's stand-in stood only a step in front of them, but Suki and Mai both kept their heads down, eyes lowered to the ground. Of course, this had no bearing on whether they were watching what was going on around them or not: Iroh trusted the pair of them to watch his back, and so they would.

Suki and Mai stood like a matched set of dao swords, dangerous and deadly-efficient, glinting brightly in the hungry eyes of the court. They wore needles in their hair, and each carried a fan sharpened to cut flesh.

They'd agreed that if things went south, they would trade: Suki would take the fans, Mai would take the needles, and they would kill everyone in this place and they would not be afraid.

This was what it meant to be a hero, after the war.

(No one wanted it, least of all Suki and Mai.)

Iroh finished his speech. It blurred and smeared in Mai's memory—nothing of the words remained in her brain, trickled away like water through a cupped fist. She let it go. It didn't matter to her at all, really. Suki's hand found hers through the voluminous material of their dresses. Their fingers linked for only a second, but they squeezed each other tight as they looked up and out at the court clapping politely at the Dragon of the West's peaceful words. Mai understood that the contact was perfunctory, but that didn't stop the shiver.

Suki's eyes glittered wickedly over the top of her fan. "Shall we make the rounds, Lady Mai?" she asked loftily.

"Of course, Lady Suki. It would be my pleasure," Mai replied, lips curling ever so slightly as she tapped her fan to her nose.

They leisurely walked the court. They were being watched, Mai could tell—three different men had looked to be about to cross the floor towards them, but it would have been terribly rude of them to do so if they had not been acknowledge by the Fire Lord's regent first. Suki and Mai were part of the delegation: they stood as direct representatives of the Fire Lord himself. They would not have risked the insult.

Mai might not have liked politics, but she certainly understood them.

Suki smothered a giggle behind her fan. "Look at them, they're so useless. Not even Sokka was that bad! They can't even talk to us!"

"Didn't he court you with bad poetry?" Mai asked, to turn the conversation away from a direction that might have been considered offensive. There were people listening.

"And roses between his teeth," Suki sighed, resigned. "We don't talk about it. I try not to even think about it, actually."

Mai's lips twitched. "Your life must be so hard."

"You don't even know," Suki lamented. "It's ridiculous, I can't even—"

She stopped abruptly, golden fan up to her nose. Some concessions had to be made, Mai assumed—she rarely made concessions, if only because there were very few things that she truly demanded to be a certain way, and she would not tolerate those things being any way but the way she wanted them—the golden fans in deference to Avatar Kiyoshi were as good as any. And Suki wore them so well.

Then again, Mai supposed that the other girl wore all weapons well. A memory from the Boiling Rock washed over her: Suki, barefoot in soldier's garb, running over broken glass.

"Lady Suki, may I have this dance?"

Mai looked up to find a worried young man in brown-edged-gold robes shifting his weight nervously from foot to foot. He hadn't so much as looked at her, though her arm was linked through Suki's like they were of the same body.

Suki tipped her head at him. "And who might you be?"

He coloured heartily beneath their combined gaze, cleared his throat a little as though he'd quite lost the ability to speak. "I am Lord Fen. I have, er, noticed you have not danced, tonight."

Mai was deeply unimpressed.

"Ah," Suki said. "I would love to, but you see—" she paused here to indicate Mai's frame at her side. There was a delicate sort of steel behind her eyes, a latticework of killer's instinct. Mai fought not to swoon. "—I already have a companion for the night. Have you been introduced to Lady Mai?"

He swallowed audibly, gave them the once-over. "I—I apologize, I did not realize—!"

Mai sneered at the way he stumbled over his words, and didn't deign to reply.

It only took another minute for him to shuffle away, still red in the face. Mai kept her face very neutral, and turned towards Suki. "What was that?"

Suki was biting her lip so hard she looked to be about to bite all the way through it to kill her mirth. She reached up, pressed her fingers to the side of Mai's throat. "That," she said, with eyes shining, "was the best thing I've done in ages. Earth nobles are so stuffy!"

"You sound like the Bandit," said Mai, unwilling to name the tiny blind Earthbender that spent so much of her time kicking around the Fire palace yelling at anyone who was within hearing distance. Mai respected the girl, if grudgingly, and she knew that it would be prudent to keep their social circle close to their chests, for now.

"Of course I do, I spend more time with her than I do with anyone else, except one really bendy warrior and our future Fire Lady. And, oh, you, I guess."

"I guess?" Mai raised an eyebrow.

Suki flushed (prettily). "You stop that, you terrible person. You know I like you."

Mai batted her fan to her lips. "I suppose."

"Suppose, nothing!" Suki shook her head, hair everywhere around her face. Something squirmed in Mai's stomach. "I do like you. Probably too much, but we won't talk about that right now, because I think Iroh's calling."

And indeed, the old man was waving at them merrily, eyes twinkling so brightly that even across the court Mai could make it out. He stood chortling between the Earth King (Kuei? Was that his name? Mai didn't care enough to remember) and some tall thin member of the Earth court who did not smile.

Mai, however, was not quite prepared to be separated from Suki just quite yet. Especially not after a comment like that, and with all the furious fluttering in her stomach going on, she had a vested interest in any conversation that had to do with liking someone too much.

She caught hold of Suki's hand. "Will we talk about it afterwards, Lady Suki?"

Suki coloured brilliantly. "Um, yeah, I think so."

"Then let us go and humour our Lord Regent," Mai said, very gently. She did not let go of Suki's hand.

"Let's," Suki murmured in reply.

She didn't pull away, either, and so hand-in-hand the two women crossed the floor in Ba Sing Se. Every eye turned to watch them, attached at the hip as they were—they were going to be the season's scandal, Mai could already tell. The royal couple were going to have a fit (if they ever stopped being so wrapped up in their own drama, she amended, which probably wouldn't happen ever).

Frankly, Mai couldn't bring herself to care at all.

And so they walked, and fell into perfect curtsies in perfect tandem. "Lord Iroh."

"Girls!" he chortled. "I would like you to meet King Kuei—" here he paused to indicate the rather excitable-looking king, who was grinning largely and bouncing on the balls of his feet "—and his aid, Yantsu. Have you been enjoying yourselves, tonight?"

Mai shot a look out of the corner of her eye at Suki, still faintly pink high in her cheeks. She didn't have to work to imagine the girl spread out in her bed, breathing fast and shallow with her pupils blown wide.

Mai's lips curled up into a real smile.

"Yes, my Lord," she answered for the both of them. "I think we have."

—

.

.

.

.

.