i’ve had a few anons send asks and headcanon y/n as being a good artist and i had some thoughts so i want to expand on this a bit!!
after the war, y/n notices that zuko avoids the hall where portraits of previous firelords are. he’ll even go the long way around the palace to get to a meeting.
y/n sees this and it makes her really sad. this is his home and the last thing he needs is to feel haunted by his shitty ancestors. so she does something about it. she gets rid of all the paintings of ozai and azulon and sozin, p much all the bad guys, and works on her own painting of zuko.
she spends weeks and weeks on the portrait. she holes herself in her room so much that zuko actually thinks she’s mad at him for something. she uses messy sketches as models and she does them on the sly whenever she gets the chance–dinner, meetings, or when they’re just hanging out.
when it’s done, she has it hung in the hall and she’s never been more proud of anything in her whole life. she devises a plan with kiyi to get zuko to go in the hall by playing a game of tag.
kiyi runs into the hall and zuko chases her and he catches sight of something different.
and it’s him. well, an oil portrait of him, hanging on the wall where his father’s used to be. it’s regal looking; for the first time ever he can see himself as fire lord. he doesn’t know what to say, but he knows it was y/n because of the smile she’s wearing just watching him stare up at himself.
he’s not one for vanity, he didn’t care one way or another if he ever got a portrait but he doesn’t get a chill down his spine when he walks down that hall anymore.