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Starsnatch cliff has always had the harshest, most difficult wind of Mondstadt. As the gliding champion of Mondstadt she knows how to listen, how to feel, how to fly with it. Many say that if she hadn’t received a pyro vision, Amber would have been a prime candidate for anemo instead, but they don’t understand the truth. Amber knows the wind because it is her life, her hope, her passion.
One eye closes. A tensed string snaps loose. Soft and even, an arrow arcs into the sky. She watches the fletchings shake. The wind will guide it high above. She knows this, because she can hear.
Burning bright in her eyes, a silver tip makes its way to the sky.
Her target is the sun, and for the first time of many, Amber wonders what it means to succeed.
When Childe comes to Mondstadt, it is no coincidence. He is there to hide, to keep his head low after the fallout in Liyue Harbor, and because he knows he cannot face the Tsaritsa. Not now, not until things with Signoria settle. And so he makes for the land of wind, the land of freedom with a bow in his hand.
The urge for blood is strong, but Childe knows he cannot try to kill anything. The backlash against his family would be unfavorable, at the minimum, if he was not backed in his actions. And so he deigns it best to buddy his time, become a tourist for a little while.
He is, of course, stopped on his way into the city. Knights give him wary glances, and he responds simply that he has been asked to check on and train with his fellow diplomats. It is, of course, a lie, but Childe knows he has enough authority to turn it into a truth.
And so he makes his way into the city, resisting the urge to pluck his bowstring along the way.
There is a girl, one who he finds his resting upon many times throughout the day. While Mondstadt is leisurely, annoyingly so, she is not. He finds her bounding across the skies with a wild grace, as if she has become the wind itself, as if there is no such fear of death, of falling.
He finds it reminds him of the way he conducts battle.
Amber takes notice of the foul presence that follows her throughout the city. Ginger hair and a bright smile act is if they’re innocent. She knows they’re not, though, because they remind her of the cavalry captain. They are exposed by eyes that know too much and are too cunning to ever be innocent. Unlike with Kaeya, though, there is a kind of danger she also doesn’t like. There is potential for malice.
She eats a sticky honey roast and eyes the threat.
He simply eyes her bow.
An arrow hits a target.
An arrow misses a target.
An arrow hits a target once again.
Outside the city, Childe tries to hit a bale of hay with his bow.
It does not go well.
He is still lacking in something, the question is if it is skill or not.
Amber draws back, feet planted in the ground. One eye closed, she feels familiar elastic pressed to her nose. Pyro flares. Burning rubber flows with the wind.
A single shot heads for the sun.
A single shot streaks like dawn.
She must fire a thousand, no—a million more to perhaps even truly find what she is looking for.
She sees him one day in Springvale. He shoots and shoots and shoots. His arrows are all over the place. His shoulders are hunched and he seems hurried. With a glance, she can see every mistake in his form.
“You’re too impatient,” is all she says, unsure of whether to help a harbinger.
As an archer, she cannot help herself, though.
“The arrow is the target,” she says, cryptically, without explaining herself.
Because he is a harbinger, he can figure that much out for himself.
There is a nod of thanks, but she does not return it.
Amber, instead, wonders what it truly means to pierce the sun.
Childe tries again and again to listen to the words of the archer. Shots miss and miss.
He is angry, frustrated—out for blood.
He takes his bow and finds a hilichurl camp. They all go down, with enough time and enough patience. But the bow does not listen to him. It is difficult to hit his enemies.
The arrow is the target —
The arrow is the target, he tells himself, and yet somehow he cannot bring himself to understand or believe it.
He watches from afar as the girl is sent out on a mission with the cavalry captain of Mondstadt. He does not miss the way the captain goads her on purpose, the way he manipulates her. She fights with more purpose as a result.
Each strike is precise, fluid. Her arrow is able to pierce every enemy in a place that is weak. For a moment it seems as though death is not a means to an end, but rather an end to her means. To the girl each monster is only a goal, and the precision of the arrow is a target.
In a small moment of wisdom he understands.
It must have taken thousands of hours to just be able to hit with precision.
Amber feels the winds move about her. They are blessed by Barbatos, they are alive. She is alive with them.
Inhale.
She fires.
Exhale.
An arrow flies for the sun.
Childe finds that he does not know how to make the arrow the target. In the midst of training recruits, in making Springvale his temporary home, he tries and tries again. Arrows scatter. He cannot keep himself straight. He does not see improvement.
The itch to fight takes over.
Any progress he has made diminishes as soon as a hilichurl camp clears.
Cecilias rustle. Birds cry and dive. Waves crick and crash against rocks. Amber stares at the bright goal ahead of her.
She inhales—fires. Exhales—flames glitter in the air.
Footsteps approach. She whirls around, bow lowered. She raises her bow. It is the harbinger, the ginger she doesn’t trust. Something within her tightens. The wind swirls. It loosens.
“How do I make the arrow the target?” he asks.
She thinks about ignoring the question, refusing his request, and telling him that there is no place for him. But she stops. Mond is the city of freedom. At that moment a bird dives off the cliff, floating into turbulent winds. Courage. She realizes it must take great courage to ask advice of one’s enemy.
“Stop fighting,” she says. “A bow is an instrument, not a weapon. It is made to fire a stick into the same place over and over again. It is purely coincidence that it was made to kill.”
And with that she turns around—inhales, exhales, and lets her arrow burn.
Once again she wonders what exactly it means to hit the sun.
Childe has a hard time accepting her words.
He fires at hilichurls.
Nothing improves.
He wonders if it was a mistake to pick up the bow.
Bitter and cold wind blows down from Dragonspine. For a moment, Childe thinks of home. He is still waiting, watching for a letter from the Tsaritsa. Some indication he can do something. But really, what he wants is an indication he can see his siblings again. He misses his family, and misses his home.
He gives up on the bow for a little while, favoring a sword.
Hilichurls, mitachurls, lawachurls all fall.
A letter comes to his hotel room.
It is thanks, from a frozen sword and a burning bow.
Amber sees him while gliding through the city. He talks to Sara, instructing her on how to cook—something.
It smells like the coast, and just for a moment, it reminds her of her grandfather.
The morning is early. Amber is tired, but she cannot stop.
She takes a deep breath in.
An arrow vanishes into the sunrise.
Childe spots her at Good Hunter. He is looking for advice, for specialties to ship home to his family. Aside from the cavalry captain, though, he has the favor of almost no one else. And so he chooses her, his instructor of the bow.
Her head bobs up and down. She is tired.
He sits down.
She almost hisses. “What are you doing here?”
Something within him is curious about the exhaustion. For a moment he thinks about it. Perhaps he can ask Kaeya for souvenir suggestions, instead.
“Why such an early morning at the cape?” He asks.
It is no secret to him, that she has gone off to shoot.
“It’s been the only time during the day that I can go, recently,” she says.
He thinks about how he found her the first time, firing arrows off into the horizon. Curiosity claws its way up.
“To fire more arrows off a cliff?” He asks.
It is a mistake. He can tell so within an instant. Her hand trembles.
A pair of glittering eyes stare into his soul. “No I—”
She stands.
“I’m sorry,” she says. “I have duties to get to today.”
She runs off and he is left with the meal she ordered.
He tries—oh how he tries not to be curious. But something within him fights. And so he goes off to the cliff with the bow he regrets ever touching.
He fires—
And fires—
And fires .
The arrows rain. Over and over he fires off the cliff.
The wind tilts them, makes them fly in different directions. He watches the subtle fluctuations, the way the fletchings make them twist. He watches with awe as they fly, and in the true spirit of the wind, admires their freedom.
Footsteps come up from behind him.
Pyro flashes to his left.
Neither say a word as bowstrings snap in unison.
Amber breathes in. Beside her the harbinger does the same.
Two arrows fire.
One streaks across the sky. The other is done in by wind.
An age old question sits in her mind.
She wonders which one sits in his.
They continue this way, for a while, and it makes her wonder about many things. She remembers her own time learning the bow, as a young child in the wilds with her grandfather.
She thinks about the tales he would tell, the lessons he would whisper.
They are, strangely enough, the same ones she teaches the harbinger now.
Childe is surprised when she hands him an instrument, of all things. She smiles as she gives it to him.
“Captain Kaeya said you asked,” she beams. “For your brothers and sisters, nothing is more Mondstadt than a lyre.”
He thanks her and sends a letter home.
To see how much he’s improved he takes on a hilichurl camp. The arrows hit, not one of them missing an enemy. He has improved. However, they still are not precise, not deadly. They are on their way, but he is not a master archer.
He thinks back to that patrol.
He’s far from what he’s seen before.
“How long is this going to take?” He asks her one day.
There is a sick and uncomfortable impatience within him.
She does not stop firing with his question, though. Instead she focuses, continues what she is there to do. It is as if the bow is an extension of her.
She exhales. “Until you cannot remember how many times the string has snapped, and can finally hear it in your dreams.”
For a moment, he wishes the bow was like the sword. He keeps firing.
There is a day where he goes from sunrise to sunset.
His fingers hurt.
He lies down in soft, windswept grasses.
The warmth of dawn, and a blanket greet him as he awakens. She is before him, standing on the peak of the cliff, fearless as she fires.
“My grandfather once told me a story of a man who shot down nine suns,” she says. “He said that if anyone ever wished to become a master archer, they must pierce the sun with their own arrow.”
“And so you come and shoot every day?” Childe asks.
The wind sweeps hair back and forth. Birds fly high above and dive, crying as they do.
Amber nods. “Someday, I’ll figure out what he meant. For now, I can only do as all archers are meant to—repeat until the answer becomes clear.”
Childe stands. Perhaps repetition is an answer for him, too.
A meal is eaten at Good Hunter.
Letters are sent home.
A bow is fired from dawn till dusk.
Until you cannot remember , he remembers. Until you hear the snap of the string in your sleep.
He fires from dawn till dusk.
His fingers bleed. He bandages them.
Arrows travel on the wind.
A meal is eaten at Good Hunter.
Arrows fly for the sun.
Another meal is eaten at Good Hunter.
Until you cannot remember.
He fires from dawn till dusk.
She joins him.
Sticky honey roast, at Good Hunter.
His fingers bleed. He bandages them.
Until you hear the snap of the string in your sleep.
Arrows fly for the sun.
She joins him.
Arrows travel on the wind.
He eats at Good Hunter.
Until you hear the snap of the string—
She joins him.
He fires from dawn till dusk.
His fingers bleed. He bandages them.
—in your sleep.
A meal is not eaten at Good Hunter.
He lies down in soft, windswept grasses.
There is no difference between his dreams and the dawn that rises before him.
Amber watches one day as he cries while reading a letter. She pretends not to notice. He pretends not to cry. They go about their days, but she can’t help but resonate with the feeling of words that wish to be said and people that wish to be met.
She fires for the sun.
Inhale, exhale.
Perhaps the answer will come, if she lets the question go.
One day, she sees him back in Springvale collecting calla lilies that rustle in the breeze. She helps him in a silent, unintended self-invitation.
Hands search muddy shores. Feet move to the coast, with the skills of an Outrider, she catches everything they need. He plucks a few mint leaves, on the way back to Mond. He takes something else with him, something she raises an eyebrow at.
They then go to Good Hunter, where Sara lends them her kitchen. He cooks something monstrous, something that looks inedible and yet the smell that washes over her once again is over the coast, of home.
It reminds her of her grandfather.
To her surprise, despite the monstrous appearance, the soup is edible — quite good, in fact. She relishes in the surprise that something that appears so bad on the outside can, in fact, be good. And as she does this she finds, for a moment, that perhaps being around the harbinger is not so bad either.
She goes on missions.
She fires at the sun.
He joins her.
His bowmanship improves.
This makes her happy, in a way she never thought she would be.
She learns to expect his presence. Sometimes he watches, other times he practices. Both are valid. Both are useful, in their own ways. For a little while she wonders what the outriders will be like when she finally revives them.
Will she have a dozen silent students?
There is so much hope, awe in that single thought that it escapes her notice that in her mind he has ceased to be an enemy in full. Instead, his existence is gray, not quite black or white. He is her student, even if he is a harbinger.
When she finally realizes, though, she accepts it as a fact of life—impossible, but true. It reminds her of another fact. Something else impossible that happened in the truest of ways. Something else she has accepted.
This fact, though, does not tear her apart.
Not like the other one.
Not like the day she had to accept that her grandfather had left.
She decides to let it be, and fire more arrows at the impossible goal of the sun.
He finds that, like when he was stationed in Liyue, there are things he loves about Mondstadt. The laid back atmosphere he hated at first has grown in him. He enjoys breezy mornings and calm nights where everyone knows and says hello to each other, even him.
He enjoys nights hopping from bar to bar, talking to the cavalry captain and the misfits of the city. Often they get eyed down by Diluc Ragnvindr, who is infamous in Snezhnaya that Childe can identify him on sight. There is something about seeing his enemy in his natural habitat that is amusing to him. It makes the tales and the thrill of drinking all the more fun, which is something that he suspects he might have in common with many of those he chooses to keep company with.
He enjoys the food from Good Hunter and the cheesy greetings, speaking of freedom and the wind. There is a fondness to it that he knows his siblings would love, if they were with him.
It is a shame, he thinks, that someday he will have to leave. It was the same way, he remembers, with Liyue and it is a fact he knows he will have to face soon. Mondstadt is a home in the most terrifying of ways, in that it is temporary, a place for him to live in and love, to settle, until his orders rip him away once again. And for Childe that is alright, though bittersweet.
He is a soldier, after all.
He knows that the call will come soon.
She enjoys him being there. He is not perfect with the bow, nor will they both ever be, but he is getting closer. The instrument looks less awkward on him now. She is more comfortable with him at her side.
They fall into a strange equilibrium, one she never thought could exist.
Amber makes him steak. It is terrible, and they both know it, but he eats it with a smile anyways.
The message comes, like he knew it would.
It is a call to move on, to pick up arms and leave once again. He wishes it is orders to go home, even though that remains impossible. He is her majesty, the Tsaritsa’s blade, after all, and as a soldier, he must answer her call.
He cooks calla lily seafood soup for the cavalry captain.
“Don’t break her heart,” is what he gets in return.
The sun rises and the sun sets.
Two bows fire in unison, for only the length of a day.
On the day he talks to her, it is early. The dawn ribbons out across the coast, streaming in fire and gold. Birds dive and cry. Beautiful cecilias wave this way and that, surviving what to them is a normal breeze. Truly, it is a day in Mondstadt, the land of wind and freedom,
“It is time,” is all he says.
That is all he can say. In his line of work, goodbye is too much like death. She says nothing, and continues to fire. He almost prefers it that way. But then, he remembers the cavalry captain.
“Though our time was brief, I thank you for piercing my sun,” he says, and after a pause lets out one last word, “ master .”
She turns around.
“Why—?” She begins.
He smiles. “You are already a master archer. The goal was never the sun in the sky. It has always been to pass down legacy, knowledge, which you have already done.”
She smiles, and it is the fire of hope itself.
He walks. It is time to return to being a soldier.
“May your winds always be gentle,” she responds, to his back, “Sir Childe.”
And with that, he is gone.
The winds blow harsh on the cliff, but she hears them and is not afraid.
A tear rolls down her cheek.
Someday, she will pierce many suns, she vows.
For today, though, she fires at the one in the sky.
A flaming arrow becomes the dawn.