( korra is never as subtle as she thinks she is. asami has met quieter elephant mandrills, and that is... really saying something. she loves that about her. as time has worn on, all the little things that might have counted as flaws in korra to someone else just... faded away. asami looks at her and sees nothing so much as perfection.
but subtle? no.
she's up to something. but, you know what? asami is perfectly okay with that. it gives her an opportunity to be up to something, too. she sneaks out of their hotel room, hair bound up in a scarf, sunglasses perched low on her nose. completely incognito. she's so good at this.
she's going to ask korra to marry her. it just. it feels right. she doesn't want to feel the way she feels about korra about anyone else. it's never even occurred to her to look askance at another person, male or female. she wants to stay by her side, love and support her through her trials, grow old beside her and die with love in every line and wrinkle.
okay, so she doesn't exactly want to imagine herself with wrinkles. tastefully gray hair, maybe. but the love is real, and each morning she wakes up beside korra and wonders at the way her body occupies the darkness of the morning and how. bright she is. how beautiful. asami wants to have that forever, possess every inch of her, drive her past the precipice of passion and pull her back again when it's too much.
she knows that water tribes carve betrothal nechlaces. she also knows that it's not her culture. korra might be okay giving her one, but asami is fire nation through and through. if she wants to ask korra to be her wife, it needs to be done in a way that marries form and function, something that speaks to both of them.
her father, once upon a time, when her life was less fraught than it became but less settled than it is now, collected oddities. he had a knack for finding them and all the funding necessary to acquire whatever he found interesting. old relics, symbols of the past. he had genuine dragon teeth in jars, the skulls of extinct creatures, a set of ceremonial robes that once belonged to avatar roku. he kept the more valuable pieces in a vault under a shell company name, forever paranoid that someone would break in and steal it.
(his paranoia, perhaps, should have been her first clue. it wasn't. hindsight is a terrible, awful thing for a daughter to have.)
but there is one thing. one little thing.
her mother, once upon a time, was an adventurer of sorts. before she settled down, she traveled the world. she saw amazing things, met amazing people. and on one of her many, many trips, she encountered a falling star. a meteorite. it was too big to lug home (although asami remembers her joking about having tried) so she collected a bag of fragments. space rocks.
they weren't pretty or glamorous or anything with a fancy, storied history, so her father never had much interest in them. but he kept them anyway, because they'd belonged to his wife. asami has no idea if what they had was love, or if her mother was one more thing of note her father had collected, but she likes to imagine they cared for each other. after all, he kept the rocks.
asami had, honestly, forgotten about the vault entirely until a barrister approached her about it after her father died. she never mentioned it to korra, simply. let it stay as it was, its fancy objects collecting dust, paying the monthly storage container fee. but a few weeks ago, it occurred to her. the rocks would have to have ore in them, wouldn't they? she lugged them over to lin and asked if she could sense any, and lin agreed it was there. when asami told her what she wanted them for, she even helpfully pulled the ore out of them for her, depositing in her hands a singularly perfect piece of a burnished, nearly black metal, about the size of a marble.
however, as talented as lin is (and she would trust no other earthbender) she confesses she's not certain how well the metal would take to old-fashioned bending in the long-term. best to forge it.
so she goes to mako. in fact, that's where she's going now. he's had it for weeks now, and has been studying its composition. they only have enough for one shot at it, and mako. he'll do it right or not at all. she trusts him. and still, if she's being honest with herself, loves him deeply. but the quality of the love is transmuted. he's flawed in a way that she never could have erased by love alone. but he's a good friend.
the ring is. perfect. it's so dark it seems to absorb the light. shadows move inside its soft sheen. it's heavy, in her hands, which she thinks korra will appreciate, and it's. it's perfect.
asami thanks him. kisses his cheek. he lost the bitterness a long time ago, and merely smiles at her. she tells him he can give her away at the altar. he says he's having a curious sense of deja vu. they both laugh. it's enough.
and then she puts the necklace on a chain around her neck and heads back to the hotel. korra is already there, bouncing in place, entirely excited about something, and asami is laughing at her utter. ridiculousness. a vacation? sounds romantic. )
Of course. ( she kisses korra, sweetly, and then her hand where she's sought to entwine them. ) Where do you have in mind?
no subject
but subtle? no.
she's up to something. but, you know what? asami is perfectly okay with that. it gives her an opportunity to be up to something, too. she sneaks out of their hotel room, hair bound up in a scarf, sunglasses perched low on her nose. completely incognito. she's so good at this.
she's going to ask korra to marry her. it just. it feels right. she doesn't want to feel the way she feels about korra about anyone else. it's never even occurred to her to look askance at another person, male or female. she wants to stay by her side, love and support her through her trials, grow old beside her and die with love in every line and wrinkle.
okay, so she doesn't exactly want to imagine herself with wrinkles. tastefully gray hair, maybe. but the love is real, and each morning she wakes up beside korra and wonders at the way her body occupies the darkness of the morning and how. bright she is. how beautiful. asami wants to have that forever, possess every inch of her, drive her past the precipice of passion and pull her back again when it's too much.
she knows that water tribes carve betrothal nechlaces. she also knows that it's not her culture. korra might be okay giving her one, but asami is fire nation through and through. if she wants to ask korra to be her wife, it needs to be done in a way that marries form and function, something that speaks to both of them.
her father, once upon a time, when her life was less fraught than it became but less settled than it is now, collected oddities. he had a knack for finding them and all the funding necessary to acquire whatever he found interesting. old relics, symbols of the past. he had genuine dragon teeth in jars, the skulls of extinct creatures, a set of ceremonial robes that once belonged to avatar roku. he kept the more valuable pieces in a vault under a shell company name, forever paranoid that someone would break in and steal it.
(his paranoia, perhaps, should have been her first clue. it wasn't. hindsight is a terrible, awful thing for a daughter to have.)
but there is one thing. one little thing.
her mother, once upon a time, was an adventurer of sorts. before she settled down, she traveled the world. she saw amazing things, met amazing people. and on one of her many, many trips, she encountered a falling star. a meteorite. it was too big to lug home (although asami remembers her joking about having tried) so she collected a bag of fragments. space rocks.
they weren't pretty or glamorous or anything with a fancy, storied history, so her father never had much interest in them. but he kept them anyway, because they'd belonged to his wife. asami has no idea if what they had was love, or if her mother was one more thing of note her father had collected, but she likes to imagine they cared for each other. after all, he kept the rocks.
asami had, honestly, forgotten about the vault entirely until a barrister approached her about it after her father died. she never mentioned it to korra, simply. let it stay as it was, its fancy objects collecting dust, paying the monthly storage container fee. but a few weeks ago, it occurred to her. the rocks would have to have ore in them, wouldn't they? she lugged them over to lin and asked if she could sense any, and lin agreed it was there. when asami told her what she wanted them for, she even helpfully pulled the ore out of them for her, depositing in her hands a singularly perfect piece of a burnished, nearly black metal, about the size of a marble.
however, as talented as lin is (and she would trust no other earthbender) she confesses she's not certain how well the metal would take to old-fashioned bending in the long-term. best to forge it.
so she goes to mako. in fact, that's where she's going now. he's had it for weeks now, and has been studying its composition. they only have enough for one shot at it, and mako. he'll do it right or not at all. she trusts him. and still, if she's being honest with herself, loves him deeply. but the quality of the love is transmuted. he's flawed in a way that she never could have erased by love alone. but he's a good friend.
the ring is. perfect. it's so dark it seems to absorb the light. shadows move inside its soft sheen. it's heavy, in her hands, which she thinks korra will appreciate, and it's. it's perfect.
asami thanks him. kisses his cheek. he lost the bitterness a long time ago, and merely smiles at her. she tells him he can give her away at the altar. he says he's having a curious sense of deja vu. they both laugh. it's enough.
and then she puts the necklace on a chain around her neck and heads back to the hotel. korra is already there, bouncing in place, entirely excited about something, and asami is laughing at her utter. ridiculousness. a vacation? sounds romantic. )
Of course. ( she kisses korra, sweetly, and then her hand where she's sought to entwine them. ) Where do you have in mind?