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Aloy is admiring her new set of Tenakth amour — fetching Ferikka's armour off of a mountaintop hadn't exactly been a critical task, but it had been something that she could do with her new Sunwing, and doing something was better than sitting around and contemplating all the ways that they couldn't get Hephaestus back under control just yet — when her Focus receives an incoming communication.
"Yeah?" she says, turning away and reaching up to tap her Focus. Talking to the others like this isn't exactly discrete but there isn't anyone nearby to overhear her. And she's not sure the Tenakth would question her anyway; their attitude after she appeared on the back of a Sunwing reminds her distinctly and uncomfortably of the Nora naming her Annointed.
"Aloy, it's Kotallo," she hears. "Have you returned to the Base?"
Kotallo isn't the type to question her for no reason so even though it's a question that she might bristle at normally, Aloy finds herself answering easily.
"Still at the Bulwark," she says. "Ran a few errands for some people."
She'd been considering staying overnight, even. The sky was whiter than normal, with an extra bite in the air that everyone seemed to agree heralded an oncoming storm. She hadn't particularly wanted to be caught out in one. Restoring Aether had stabilised the biosphere but storms — even bad ones — were a natural consequence of weather patterns and couldn't be eliminated entirely.
"That is excellent news," Kotallo says, sounding a touch relieved. "I am at Cliffwatch… but there has been some trouble."
"Need me there?" Aloy asks, already moving toward the exit of the settlement. There's a pulse of dread low in her gut — what trouble? More than Kotallo can deal with? — but also the keen determination of a new goal and task.
"It would be appreciated," Kotallo affirms. "I will meet you here."
Aloy nods at the defenders on the Bulwark, even as she gives no explanation and strides past them.
The brief moment of weightlessness as she leaps from the platform is familiar to her after all this time with her shieldwing, but it never fails to make her heart pound in the same way as a good fight. This time her shieldwing remains inert in her hand, but she whistles long and loud and her Sunwing responds to her call and catches her in midair, its claws digging briefly into her shoulders before it flips her up onto its back.
"Fly on the wings of the ten, champion!" One of the Sky Clan Tenakth calls, even as the others holler after her. In approval or protest, she can't quite tell.
She lifts a hand in their direction, but banks her Sunwing in a tight curve to head south. The air is achingly cold this high and she's glad she decided to change into the Sky Climber armour after all — it might not be as covering as any of her Nora furs, but it's still lined in fur and more suited to the climate than Desert Clan armour she was wearing on the way there.
The distance vanishes beneath her wings, eaten up faster than Aloy can really comprehend. On foot the trip would take days, if not weeks. Riding machines has always given her the advantage of speed, but this is something else entirely.
Only the bold Sky Clan colours make Cliffwatch visible against the side of the mountain, and Aloy flings herself off of the back of her Sunwing, hanging in the air long enough to get clear of the machine before she brings out her shieldwing and glides to a gentler landing on the wooden platforms.
Kotallo is near the edge of the platform, watching over the valley below. It strikes her how very similar this is to the first time they'd met — or maybe second or third time they'd seen each other, but the first time they'd truly talked.
But this time, when he sees her, his face goes softer instead of harder.
"Well, here I am, as requested," Aloy says, hands briefly raised, like he might not have noticed her.
His eyes dip down over her new armour and linger for a fraction of a moment on the Sky Clan colours, before snapping back to her own. He can't truly be surprised by the new armour, Aloy thinks, because seems to collect new sets every time she goes out but it's more of a reaction than she usually gets.
"So I see, Commander," he says.
"So, what's the trouble?" Aloy asks. "Doesn't look like a fight."
There are no rebels moving in the valley below, no large machines that Kotallo couldn't have dealt with himself. She hadn't really thought it would be, but a fight is an easy problem to solve. Aloy is very good at solving problems like that, and with Kotallo at her side it would probably even be fun.
"It is not," Kotallo says. He gestures out towards the mountain. "One of the youths here issued a challenge to her suitors. A simple enough one — to retrieve some greenshine from a cavern slightly north of here. The climb is… respectably difficult, but not impossible."
"Uh, okay," Aloy says, even though that all means little enough to her. Kotallo isn't acting like it's anything out of the ordinary, so it can't be the reason he's asked her here. "So, what's the problem?"
"They haven't returned," he answers. "When it became clear that they would not — Ikkotah led a squad out in search of them and found nothing along the path. And with the storm blowing in…"
If the storm hit, the rescue squad would get lost too. But Aloy and Kotallo have their Focuses to guide their way.
"And a Sunwing can cover a lot more ground than a squad on foot," Aloy says. She props her hands on her hips and stares out to the mountains above them. Even with a Sunwing, it won't be a simple search; there are too many hills and crevices, places to hide — or fall and be injured.
Kotallo nods. "Indeed. Your assistance would be… greatly appreciated."
"Of course," Aloy says, reaching out and letting her fingers gently rest against his forearm. It's nothing but the very briefest touch but it draws his attention to her like lightning to metal and she feels just as electric for it. "You don't even have to ask. But… a second pair of eyes probably wouldn't go amiss, if you're up for it."
It isn't that Aloy has been avoiding taking anyone flying with her — but neither has anyone asked. She had thought Kotallo would, with how excited he had been over the concept, but he hadn't. It was the same with the Chargers — the others would do it, when Aloy decided it was necessary or when she took off ahead and they had no choice to do so in order to keep up, but they never did when they went off on their own and they never asked for an override so that they could acquire mounts on their own.
She tries not to let it sting. There's probably a reason for it, something she doesn't have the perspective to see, rather than just them… not trusting the technology.
"Of course," Kotallo says and his voice sounds almost strangled. "Lead the way."
He takes a moment to affix his prosthetic arm — in case they do find trouble, Aloy surmises — and then she leads the way out of Cliffwatch so that she can call down her Sunwing without alarming the locals too badly. Or having them shoot at it.
With the Tenakth that seems more likely and she doesn't want to waste time having to repair her mount.
"So… why were you in Cliffwatch?" Aloy asks as she braces a foot against the machine's leg and uses it to vault herself up onto its back.
Kotallo follows her lead after only a moment's pause, with only a fraction less grace. He presses tightly against her to avoid the machine's sparkers, a wall of warmth at her back that's not unwelcome in the mountain air.
"Marshall duties," he says, brief and unforthcoming.
Aloy clicks her tongue, both to display her annoyance — which he knows she gets annoyed when he avoids giving any answers of substance to her questions — and to signal her mount.
The Sunwing ducks low for a moment, crouching to build force, and then launches itself into the sky with an explosive burst of energy. The almost fabric-like wings come out and beat, once twice — seeming to fight the very air — and then some equilibria is reached and gravity stops fighting them so hard.
They're flying.
Kotallo clutches at her waist, cold metal hand on one side, warm skin on the other. Neither hand grips so hard that she feels the need to tell him to move them. It's only practical, anyway.
"By the ten, Aloy," he breathes. It doesn't sound like reproach for not warning him. It sounds… awed.
"Everything you imagined?" she asks, an amused smile spreading across her face.
"More than," he says, apparently sincere.
Aloy guides them higher, so they're looking down over the whole of the Sheerside Mountains range — too high to be practical for searching, really, but she wants to make the most of this moment, wants him to really see the world in all its glory from up here.
"Okay," she says, after a long pause. "Where are we headed?"
Kotallo indicates a ridge to the north of Cliffwatch — it isn't particularly far, travelling like this, though who knows how long it would take by foot.
They swoop down, building speed like they're running a race, until they level out and the ground is just flashes of white snow and dark stone beneath them. No signs of any young Tenakth.
"So… they were looking for greenshine?" she asks. It isn't like she can judge — not with how many caverns she's gone diving in looking for the stuff.
"It was a khurim," Kotallo says after a pause, like he's realising he will have to explain further before Aloy understands. "When Tenakth decide to marry, one party will issue a challenge — a difficult hunt or retrieving a rare resource, commonly — and the other must complete it as proof of their worthiness. Sometimes it is done by partners who have been long established together or sometimes a challenge is issued by a warrior with many suitors as a way of… narrowing the field."
Aloy absorbs this new piece of information, as curious as ever about the culture of other clans. It's funny — she knows more about how most clans punish prisoners than about how they marry or live their lives. "So they'd just … take whoever won?"
The concept feels a little… unsettling, somehow. Like being a prize, even if the person set the stakes themself.
"There are ways of… biasing the competition," Kotallo admits. "If you set a challenge to fight a Fanghorn, you might give your favourite Frost Arrows to give them an edge. And there's no obligation to accept, especially if there is more than one challenger who completes the task." He hesitates. "But it is wise not to reject them too overtly after they have proven themselves."
It sounds complicated, as do most traditions Aloy hears about. But at least it's nicer than the Banuk exiling people for the snow and ice to judge, or the Tenakth forcing their injured to fight to prove their worth.
"And how does the search party feature in?" Aloy asks, pulling the Sunwing up over the edge of a rise. The snow is starting to fall now, wind whipping it around them in little gales. There are dark forms of other machines huddled on the slope; Sunwings, not an issue as long as they don't take flight and attack.
"Not ideally," Kotallo says. "It is supposed to prove their own abilities."
"And are they going to refuse our help?" Aloy asks. The number of times that has happened… sometimes she sees where they're coming from, like with Penttoh, and sometimes, like Mailen, she really doesn't.
"It is… a possibility," Kotallo acknowledges.
Still, it's better than thinking that they won't find them.
"Down there," Kotallo says, suddenly. His weight tips to the side, just slightly, as he leans to look, and Aloy follows him, guiding the Sunwing to circle around.
"The snow is disturbed," she says, reaching one hand up to switch her Focus on. It's hard to scan from the air and she doesn't dare take too much attention away from her mount. "Something happened there."
She sets the Sunwing to land nearby. Kotallo leaps off, landing nimbly in the snow and Aloy shivers as cold wind replaces him at her back and steals his warmth away from her.
"No bodies," he says, circling the clearing, one hand on his Focus as he uses it to scan.
Aloy watches him work for a moment — it's… nice to see someone else using it like she does — before sliding down off the Sunwing to join him. The snow hits the tops of her calves and it's still falling. If they don't hurry, walking through it is going to be… difficult. Not to mention, it might bury any leads.
"Two tracks came up from here," Aloy says, gesturing down the slope. "Probably circled around to avoid the machines we saw. Then found… whatever was here and…"
Fought, then fled. But fought what? Fled where?
"North of here is Frostclaw territory," Kotallo says, quietly. "There is a path through the mountains, above the Bonewhite Tear, but it has been abandoned for a long time because of them."
Aloy frowns. "That's not good," she says. If the Tenakth had circled to avoid Sunwings they're not the kind who will be able to deal with a Frostclaw. She drags her bow off of her shoulder and prepares her arrows. "We better hurry."
At the very least, a Frostclaw is easier to track than a person. They follow the churned snow and the slashes cut into the rock face where it had dug its claws in, until they find it prowling a clearing with steep sides. There's red in the snow, but at first glance she sees no bodies.
Aloy glances at Kotallo and nods. First they need to take out the Frostclaw, regardless of anything else.
She drops to one knee and braces herself for an explosive shot, drawing to the fullest and aiming for the chillwater sac on its stomach. It hits cleanly and explodes — there's a half-second delay before the chillwater sac follows, sending up gusts of chillwater and freezing the machine plating brittle. It roars and charges at her, ploughing through the snow like there's nothing there at all.
Aloy dives out of the way, rolling back to her feet and pulling another arrow out to keep shooting. She's vaguely aware of Kotallo shooting from the other side — he must hit one of the sparkers on its back because it suddenly erupts in a crackle of electricity and the machine drops to the ground, twitching.
Aloy drops her bow and spins her spear into her hand, leaping through the snow to shove the blade deep into the Frostclaw's heart until it shudders and stops trying to get back up.
"Nice work," she says, heaving in great gusts of air that burn her throat with how cold they are. Her fingers are stiff as she retreats to pick up her bow and sling it back into place. Snow dusts her armour and has started to melt into even colder water.
"I should be the one saying that," Kotallo says, watching her in a way that makes heat rush to her cheeks. "You make it seem as though a Frostclaw is no challenge at all." It makes it sound as though it's something exceptional, and not just a matter of practice and training and upgrading all her weapons at every chance she gets.
"We should keep looking," Aloy says, instead of responding further to that. She trudges through the snow, and scans the splash of red — blood as expected. It scatters off towards the sheer rock cliffside though Aloy doesn't see how anyone could have climbed it while a Frostclaw was after them.
When she gets closer though, there's a break in the rock — a cave. The edges are lined with icicles and built up snow, but there are definitely signs that someone has forced their way in. The floor seems to drop away sharply inside, leaving only uneven rocky ledges like a set of stairs.
"Hey!" Aloy shouts into the darkness. "Anyone in there?"
"Yes! We're here!" A voice echoes back, breathless. A face pops up where the light of the outside barely reaches, like someone hanging off of a ledge. "Be careful, there's a—"
"Frostclaw, we know," Aloy says. She waves at Kotallo to let him know that they've found their missing Tenakth and he heads towards her. "It's gone. You can come out now."
"Shirokeh is injured," the Tenakth says, shaking her head. "Bad. I can't get him back up."
Badly injured enough that he can't climb is definitely badly injured enough to be unable to get back to Cliffwatch. Aloy swallows and glances around the cave but it's definitely not equipped to hunker down and wait out a storm. She glances at Kotallo, but he looks equally grim, having made the same calculation.
"One problem at a time," Aloy says decisively. "Let's get him out of the cave."
She ducks inside, carefully, making her way down to where the injured Tenakth is, and is glad she didn't rush when she finds that the bottom of the cave is full of water. At another time, she might have been interested in exploring further, but now the cold water is nothing but a deathtrap.
Shirokeh has a broken arm and a deep gash across his torso. Dangerous, and in need of treatment soon, but not immediately life threatening. "I'm fine," he says, face pale beneath his paint. "Just take Nirotak back. I'll follow along later."
Nirotak scoffs. "I already said I don't believe you," she says. "So just shut up. We can get him out, right?" She turns hopeful eyes on Aloy, like Aloy might have some kind of solution.
Shirokeh is taller and bulkier than both of them, and if Nirotak hadn't been strong enough to lift him out then Aloy won't be either. Kotallo might but… Aloy surveys the cave entrance instead.
"We can," she says. "Kotallo! Pull him out when he gets up to you!" She fumbles at her bracer and unclips her pullcaster and grappling hook. "Here, give me your arm. The good one."
Setting it on Shirokeh is easy enough, and she crouches behind to help aim. It takes two goes before it hooks onto the stone outcropping she's aiming for, and then the winding wheel of the pullcaster yanks him out of her grip. Shirokeh gives a grunt of pain, but grimly hangs on, and then Kotallo is reaching out to pull him to safety.
Nirotak lets out a heavy breath. "Now that's useful," she says.
Aloy chuckles. "Only got one of them," she says, moving towards the exit. "We're just going to have to climb."
The two of them scramble out and the air outside the cave is so heavy with snow that they can no longer even see where the Frostclaw fell.
There's no way they're going to be able to walk back down the mountain. And there's no way that the Sunwing will be able to carry four of them. If she takes one back and then returns—
"Take the injured one back to Cliffwatch," Kotallo says, eyes meeting hers. "Nirotak and I will find somewhere to take cover."
Aloy bites her lip and then swings her spear off her back, driving the blade point first into the snow at her feet. The blue override canister casts a dim and ghostly light amidst the falling snow.
"Fly back yourself," she says, because it's such an obvious solution. And maybe it comes out a little challenging, because it should be an obvious solution and she doesn't understand why it isn't.
Shirokeh gasps but Aloy spins away. She leaves her spear stuck in the snow and whistles, using her Focus to broadcast it so that her Sunwing can hear her, more signal than sound in truth.
It appears out of the white like a wraith and lands before her. She helps Shirokeh up and slides in front of him. "Hold on tight," she warns before they take off.
The ride isn't smooth. The wind is really starting to howl now and without her Focus there would be no way to navigate through the white. But they make their way to Cliffwatch, battered about by the wind. The place seems shut down — doors barred and all the residents retreated away into the safety of halls built into the stone. But when the Sunwing gets close, someone sounds a horn and Ikkotah comes sprinting out to help.
"He's injured," Aloy says, trying to pry her frozen hands from the blue reins. Compared to her, the machine feels warm now, which is probably a bad sign.
"The herbalist is inside," Ikottah reassures her, hauling Shirokeh down. The young Tenath seems worse off than Aloy is and that's fair — he was out in the cold for much longer. "The others?"
"I have to go back for them," Aloy says, looking apprehensively out into the storm. There isn't going to be time. This is worse than she'd expected it to be, and come on much faster.
"Marshal Kotallo will do it," Shirokeh says, barely managing to keep his feet under him. "I bet he's already on his way!"
"He's on his way?" Ikottah asks. "In this?" He doesn't sound exactly skeptical, but the expression on his face as he looks out at the snow isn't promising.
"She challenged him to fly on the wings of the ten," Shirokeh says, sounding impressed. "To tame a Sunwing."
Aloy winces, already regretting how short she had been about it. She could have sent Kotallo ahead on this one and stayed to override a second herself— but instead she'd just allowed herself to get annoyed and ill-tempered.
If he doesn't make it—
Ikottah raises an eyebrow. "A challenge indeed," he says. "Perhaps we will have a wedding feast after all."
It takes a moment for his meaning to register. "That's not—" Aloy stammers, but they're already moving away, back to shelter, and it's too cold to hang around outside.
She presses a hand to her Focus. "Kotallo. Do I need to come back for you?"
There's a long pause, and she dreads not getting an answer. That would mean… nothing good. She gathers the reigns back up in her numb hands, ready to take off again even if she's not sure she would make it anywhere—
Then there he is. "We are on our way," Kotallo's voice crackles over the Focus. "This is… more difficult than you made it look."
Aloy lets out a relieved laugh and slides down from her mount. "We're waiting for you," she says. She staggers after Ikottah, into what must be some kind of community hall — there's a fire going and the warmth is like a slap across her exposed skin. Someone drapes a warm fur over her shoulders and someone else shoves a drink into her hands. She wraps her frozen hands around it and tries to get some feeling back.
But she doesn't move deeper into the hall, lingering near the door even when gusts creep through the cracks around it. Eventually — after long minutes that draw her patience thin — the horn sounds again and Aloy pushes her way back outside.
A dark form bursts through the falling snow, landing with a heavy thump in the middle of the settlement. Aloy dashes towards it but Kotallo and Nirotak are both sliding down and running towards her before she makes it very far.
"You made it!" she shouts over the storm, spinning back to lead the way inside. Ikottah and a handful of Tenakth have followed her and she sees the Commander clap Kotallo heavily on his good shoulder as thanks for bringing the missing youths back.
They retreat inside and there's a brief commotion as Nirotak runs into another Tenakth, a young woman who had clearly been waiting for her, who grips her by the shoulders.
"Didn't get your greenshine," Nirotak rasps. "Sorry, Atteko."
"Hah. According to Shirokeh you both fought a Frostclaw and flew on the wings of the ten. I think you should be the ones setting a challenge for me," Atteko says back, not hiding her relief. "Come, sit by the fire."
That leaves Aloy with Kotallo, both of them more at ease away from the others. They find a nook near the hanging canvas that leads to bunkrooms deeper in the hall, distant enough to at least pretend at privacy.
Kotallo unhooks his prosthetic arm with a wince. The metal must be freezing cold; it looks like it's started to ice over.
"Your spear," he says, pulling it from his back where it was hooked alongside his sword. He holds it out to her, steady.
Aloy takes it, relieved to have the familiar weight back. "Thanks. Seems like you got on okay with it. You know… you could always get one yourself." She taps her fingers against the override canister.
"I don't pretend to understand how it functions," Kotallo says, as though Aloy hadn't ripped a strange canister out of a Corruptor and tied it to her spear with very little idea of anything let alone how it worked. "Or that my skills are adequate to create one."
Aloy blows out a breath. "Could just ask me," she says. Is that it? The big hurdle? They haven't asked so she hasn't offered; she hasn't offered so they haven't asked. It makes her feel even more foolish for having been annoyed about everything. "I didn't want to…make anyone take one, if they didn't want it. I know that even the Focuses are a lot to deal with already."
"I would be honoured," Kotallo says, voice quiet. It isn't quite the answer that Aloy was expecting — it makes her feel like she has missed something.
She shifts uncomfortably. "It's just an override."
"Just a skill you have mastery of, that no one else could hope to match," Kotallo says, raising an eyebrow, sounding almost teasing. "I cannot think why anyone would be honoured by your offer to share."
Aloy huffs. "We'd have had a lot less trouble with Regalla's rebels if no one could do it," she points out, but it's light too. Teasing. It makes it sound as though it's a normal skill, something people would want to learn, like Rost teaching her to hunt or fight. "Though, you know… they seemed to think, that when I told you to fly back… that I was challenging you to a... What did you call it?"
"Khurim," Kotallo says. He shakes his head. "I am aware you did not intend it as such."
Meaning, yes, it had sounded like one. Aloy bites her lip. It isn't something she would have done intentionally — she wouldn't have known how to do it intentionally. The easiest option would be to agree with him, that yes, she hadn't meant it. She had just wanted him to get to safety.
Instead, she says, "what if it had been one?"
Aloy has done riskier things — many riskier things — but somehow the pounding of her heart and the clamminess of her palms don't agree.
Kotallo looks surprised, eyes going wide and staring at her in almost certain disbelief. Rightly so — how many times has Aloy insisted that she should do everything alone, that she doesn't need anyone, that people are just a distraction? Even now, after slowly learning that she was wrong about it… having formed a team and learning to trust them to do their part…
Has she ever said she wants him here? At her side, always, forever, no matter where she goes or what new mission she has to do next? She isn't even sure she can say it now but she hopes that he hears it, regardless.
"Then," he says, and his voice is low and deep enough to send shivers down her spine. "It would have been an excellent one. Aloy… you demanded that any partner of yours be your equal in everything, even the sky — there is no challenge more fitting. And it was not a task that could have been completed without your favour."
"And," she says, taking a half step forward until there is nearly no space between them at all. It's an answer, but not to the question she was really asking. "Would you still have done it?"
"Even the snow storm could not have stopped me," he says. He has never backed away from saying the things he means. It is what I choose, he had said, when he had decided to join her. She hears the same certainty now.
Aloy swallows, pulse pounding in her ears. She feels reckless, a little wild, like the first time she had leapt from a height and trusted in her shieldwing, or the first time she'd taken a bandit camp on alone. "Got told it wouldn't be wise to reject someone like that," she manages to say.
"There are ways," Kotallo says and his eyes are still steady on her face as he gives her another way out. "You could simply issue another challenge — something even more impossible."
Aloy smiles at him, tentatively. "No, I think— I'm happy with how this one ended." She reaches out and puts her hand on his forearm, a gesture she has made before, a reassuring connection.
Something warm melts through his expression and he moves his arm so that her hand slips down into his. It's strange, but nice.
Something she could get used to doing. Something she could get used to wanting.
"What happens now?" Aloy asks.
"Usually a feast in celebration," Kotallo says, lips quirking into a small smile. "Though… I suspect you would rather skip that."
"You got me," Aloy admits, though it's not like it's a surprise. Varl and Erend had told the story of her leaving Meridian during the victory party often enough. And she knows that Kotallo understands too, that he would also prefer not to be the centre of all their attention.
Kotallo runs his thumb over the back of her hand, a soft sweeping motion, ever so gentle. "Then we could simply retire for the night," he suggests. "The storm will likely be over by the morning."
In the morning, the urgency of her task will be back — someone will need her help, there will be something wrong that she'll need to fix — but for now she just smiles. "Sounds good."