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Rain.
Soaking her hair, filling her boots, dripping from her eyelashes. Aloy cursed softly as she landed her next step in yet another puddle, this one splashing mud and bits of gravel up the back of her legs. She slicked her sopping hair back off of her forehead and stalked past the guards at the entrance to The Grove.
Under normal circumstances, she liked the rain just fine. It would last maybe an hour, and she would be damp by the time the storm had run its course, but she never minded. It was refreshing.
But this?
This was something else entirely. She’d never seen so much rain in her life, nor had she ever felt it come down hard as stones. Her eyes scanned the grove, unable to find who she was looking for. In fact, she thought, she didn’t see much of anyone . The Tenakth too must be taking shelter from the freak rainstorm.
Aloy’s feet carried her past Kotallo’s room, where she knew he was unlikely to be, and turned instead towards Hekarro’s throne room. She touched her palm to the wet stone of a building as she rounded the corner, and finally her eyes landed on a familiar figure. He was nearly completely bare of white paint, the remaining pigment streaming down and around the ink he wore on his back.
“Kotallo!” She yelled above the pelting rain, stopping dead in her tracks as he suddenly stiffened and heaved a visible sigh.
“ What is it now? ” He groaned, frustration — and exhaustion, just below the surface — flashing in his eyes for half a second as he turned to face her, before recognition replaced the spark.
“Blood of The Ten, Aloy,” he sighed, “I’m sorry. Truly.”
He brought his hand to his eyes and swiped it down his face, letting it linger over his mouth as he avoided her gaze. He looked like hell. She willed her legs to move again, stopping when he was less than an arm’s reach away.
“Kotallo.” She moved a hand to cradle his jaw, swiping away the raindrops and pigment there with her thumb. “Talk to me. What’s going on?”
His eyes slunk up to meet hers, and it hit her a second time how tired he looked. Even his shoulders themselves seemed too heavy for him to bear, dragging him down ever so slightly. He looked like she felt most days, like the weight of the world could crush her to pieces, and the thought made her chest ache. It had begun to rain sideways, but she hardly noticed the sting as it pelted the side of her face.
“I apologize. It’s. . . Been a tough week.”
“Come on.” Aloy grabbed his hand and practically dragged him through The Grove, not paying any mind to the puddles she sloshed through. She had one destination in mind.
She pushed open the door to his room, and left Kotallo to settle on a bench just inside by the already-lit fire. He groaned softly as he lowered himself down, resting his elbow on a knee to hang his head. Aloy grabbed a wet cloth, warmed by the fire, and crouched at his feet. Slinging the cloth over her shoulder, she pulled his soaked boots off and set them by the hearth to dry. He didn’t protest the attention, which she took to be another sign of his obvious exhaustion.
“Are you okay?” She asked softly. And then, “Are you hurt?”
He only shook his head, eyes focused on where she wiped away the streaks of white paint running down his legs. “I’m fine.” He tried a smile.
Aloy cursed under her breath. He was not fine.
She moved her attention to his chest, discarding his armor on the floor. The cloth left his skin completely bare, and her fingertips traced absently over the ink etched into his body as she continued to his arms. A soft sound graced his lips when her hands met his shoulders, and she could feel the tension lying just beneath his skin.
“You’re so tense,” she said, draping the wet cloth back over her shoulder and placing her hands back on his shoulders. She rolled her thumbs into the hard muscle by his neck and he groaned, slumping forward just slightly as she worked him under her hands.
Petra had done the same for her, once, when Aloy was about at her wits end and more than just fraying at the edges. Serene relief had bloomed wherever Petra had focused her deft fingers, and by the end Aloy was left practically floating from her handiwork. She tried to follow the same path on Kotallo’s body that Petra had taken on her own, pressing the heel of her hand along the outside of his shoulder blade.
“Aloy,” he grunted, followed by a soft moan as her thumbs worked out a particularly large knot.
“Yeah?”
“I must apologize again. For— mm —for. . .”
“Kotallo.”
“Yes?”
Aloy smiled softly, leaning over his shoulder to brush her lips over the shell of his ear. “Relax. I have you.”
A visible shudder ran down his spine and she pressed a kiss to his neck in answer. He reached up to catch her wrist in his hand, dragging it down to press her knuckles to his lips. “Aloy. You’re freezing.”
Was she?
She hadn’t noticed until now just how drenched she was, rain water still dripping from the ends of her hair and running down her back. She was practically swimming in her boots, and her chilled clothes stuck to her skin. However cold and wet she was, though, nothing was about to tear her from her task. The fire in front of her was plenty warm enough.
“I’m not—“ She yelped as he pivoted and hooked his arm around her waist, tugging her down onto his lap—“freezing.”
Her arms settled loosely around his neck as he reached around to drape his dry cloak over her shoulders. It was pleasantly warm from the fire and it smelled like him , and she found herself melting into it. His fingertips danced up the curve of her spine, sure to be leaving behind swirling embers from the sparks that they burned into her skin. She nestled closer into him, humming contentedly as she allowed his warmth to sink in.
Aloy gasped softly as Kotallo’s lips pressed just below her jaw. He grazed his teeth over her pulse, in the same spot that he knew made her knees weak.
“This isn’t about me, Kotallo,” Aloy finally managed to say.
It pained her to pull away from his mouth to search his expression, but she caught a flicker of whatever it was that flashed in his usually steady gaze. “You don’t have to talk about it, but at least let me do this for you.”
Kotallo carded a hand through her tangled, still dripping hair. “Is is nothing you need to worry yourself over.”
She leaned into his touch, greedy for anything he would offer.
“You’ve been under stress, Kotallo. More than is usual for a Tenakth Marshal.” She looped the stray hairs at the nape of his neck around her fingers.
She hesitated. “This time of year must be hard for you, I’d imagine.”
A full year after the horrors of The Embassy.
Kotallo grunted. “I’ve made my peace with it, Aloy. You know this.”
She chewed on her lip, the heat of the fire suddenly was too much to bear. Even now, after all this time, she was still anxious that she would cross a line and hurt instead of help. The line was drawn thin, and it was a conversation that they had yet to have. She cleared her throat, exposing her nerves.
“No, I know. It’s just. . . Dekka is worried about you, and so am I. It’s not my place to tell you how to feel, and that’s not what I ever intend to do — I just hope that you’d take the time to give your thoughts and feelings the consideration that they deserve. That you’d do yourself that one small kindness.”
His eyes found hers in the soft orange light of the fire. “It is nothing compared to the burden that you carry. I. . . Apologize if Dekka pulled you away from your mission just to see me sulk. If I had known she would call for you. . .”
Aloy took his face into her hands and mustered up a scowl. “Don’t misunderstand my words, Kotallo. I’m glad she called. I want to be here with you. Or have you forgotten the pledge we took together?”
“I have not.” He looked offended that she had even suggested such a thing, his eyebrows knitting together indignantly.
Aloy brushed a thumb over the scar on his lips. “Then remind me of what it said.”
“Let your weight to carry be mine, and let mine be yours. But Aloy—“
“Just as true now as when we bound our hands before the tribe.” She gave him a pointed look. “Let me share the weight.”
Kotallo surged forward, pressing his mouth to hers in a deep, languid kiss. He pulled away, far too soon. “You are a wonder, Aloy. Every sunrise I thank The Ten for putting me on your path.”
Aloy hummed. “Does that mean I can go back to tending to you? I was enjoying myself, you know. Watching the tension release from your body by my hands.”
Finally, a smile — a genuine smile — graced his lips as the arm he had around her waist drew her in closer.
“You can have your way with me later. For now, I wish to pick my poison, and I choose to sit here and simply drink you in.”