AUTHOR'S NOTES: While it isn't to say that he's going to fall out of the story or anything by any means, Tarrlok's redemption arc has, for the most part, concluded, and so his focus is going to shift more towards Kwan and away from the Water Tribe politics, since he's all too familiar with how dangerous he can be when faced with hostile opposition. That said, Korra's parents will receive more attention, particularly Senna, whose behaviour in this chapter hints at deeper parts of backstory that will be revealed in their own due time.
Happy Reading!

BOOK THREE: WATER

CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED THREE: THE CHIEF OF THE NORTH, PART 1

The rest of the voyage was fairly eventless, although all of Korra's friends, including Tenzin's family, and even Tarrlok and Kwan, heard about Korra's outburst, much to her embarrassment. Fortunately for her, Kwan was there to listen, and Tenzin offered the same kind of wise advice he had offered her during her struggle against the Equalists. He also advised Asami in one of the many conversations they had behind Korra's back, which turned out to be better for her. Asami and Korra were still temporarily avoiding each other because of their problems, not wanting to exacerbate the issues the other one had, but staying on friendly terms as to not jeopardize their relationship or give anyone that impression.

Whatever the case, they arrived at the Southern Water Tribe without incident, where the docks were crowded with people clearly waiting for someone that Korra noticed was not them. Despite that, she saw familiar faces among the crowds: Bumi and Tenzin's sister Kya, as well as Katara herself. Her own parents were also there, both with their arms crossed and different expressions. Tonraq's was a mirthful grin bordering on smug, while Senna's was much more a wry smirk as if there was something about this incident that she had been predicting.

Tenzin's children had barely stepped off the boat when they beelined for Kya and Katara. Tenzin, Pema, and Bumi (particularly the latter) watched in amusement as greetings and hellos were shared, although Tenzin looked about as excited to see Kya as he had been with Bumi—which was to say minimal at best.

Tonraq opened his arms to greet Korra as she and her friends walked off the boat, but Senna's gaze seemed to be fixated on something over Korra's left shoulder. She was briefly distracted as she was pulled into a bear hug by her father, and Asami kept the conversation engaged.

"I'm sure you remember Mako, Bolin, and Asami, right dad?" Korra smiled.

"Of course," Tonraq's grin widened, as his eyes met Asami's. "Treating my little girl right, I take it, Ms. Sato? Someone has to do it because she sure won't do it herself."

"Daaaaaaad!" Korra shot him an upset pout.

"Actually," Asami laughed, both at Tonraq's remark and at Korra's pout, "she's been doing a better job at taking care of me than I have for her lately."

"That sounds like my girl," Tonraq looked proudly at Korra as he spoke.

"And I'm sure you remember Mako and Bolin, yeah?" Korra gestured towards the brothers.

"Sir," Mako offered his hand respectfully.

"Here's the two fine young men I've heard were my daughter's partners-in-crime," he joked, before Korra interrupted him with a jab to the arm.

"Knock it off dad!" she pouted, but Tonraq simply laughed. He suddenly grew quiet and looked behind the brothers as well. It was only here that Korra realized Senna was no longer with them, but was directly confronting both Tarrlok and Kwan, who had stepped off the boat at some point.

"I've heard a great many things about you, ex-Councilman Tarrlok," Senna pointed a finger at Tarrlok's nose, "as well as many things that you did to my little girl."

"Those allegations are likely true," Tarrlok put his hands together, "But much like with Kwan, I'm sure you probably guessed that Korra forgave me. I do not know why, nor do I think I was deserving of such forgiveness, but I certainly don't wish to spit in her face by not putting her blessing to at least some good use."

"I'm not here to accuse you this time," Senna crossed her arms, "Honestly, it warms my heart to see that my daughter was able to help two people start a new life together. I was just going to wish you both a congratulations."

"I take it the catch is that you'll rip out our innards and make breakfast out of them if we deviate at all from our new life paths?" Kwan quipped.

"That's about the gist of it," Senna riposted with a comically straight face. "They don't call me the Hero of Desert Storm for nothing."

"I've heard a great many things about the Hero of Desert Storm, actually," Tarrlok commented, "At the forefront, that she was the most terrifying waterbender to ever crawl out of the tribes. I also heard that she took out over two dozen insurgents singlehandedly."

"I'm not saying I did…" Senna reached into her coat, "but I'm also not saying I didn't." She brandished a broken hunting knife that made Kwan's jaw drop. It matched the description of the broken hunting knife from her story of slaying a couple dozen insurgents.

"Suffice to say," Tarrlok kept his composure, "you need not worry about us causing anyone any harm, much less Avatar Korra. My wife is very adamant about keeping her safe."

"As am I," Senna hummed, "but I digress. It looks like we have company."

There was indeed a growing throng of people around the little group, and it seemed to be getting larger by the minute as people flocked to see whatever was here."

"That's an awful lot of people to show up just for the Avatar," Kwan raised an eyebrow.

"No," Senna corrected her, "they're here for them…"

She gestured towards an enormous ornate Water Tribe vessel that she and Tonraq clearly recognized. The former of these two sighed.

"The great chief of the Northern Water Tribe comes to grace us with his presence," he rolled his eyes, "hooray."

"Just relax, Tonraq." Senna put a hand on his shoulder, "they'll be gone soon enough—and even if they aren't, I've got your back."

It was a rather extravagant moment, watching the Chief of the North disembark. Korra recognized Unalaq from her sojourn with the Red Lotus, and briefly wondered about his relationship with them. The story she had heard shortly after the Nakkoa incident had been a claim of ignorance; that he had not realized his companions were Red Lotus terrorists until too late, which explained why he had ratted them out. She would have to dig deeper into this while Unalaq was here.

At Unalaq's side were his nearly identical twin children, with hunched postures, long, pin-straight hair and sullen expressions. The only noticeable difference at first glance was that one of them had purple eyeshadow—the trick Korra used to tell them apart.

"Whoa, whoa, who are the lovely ladies?" Bolin interrupted Korra's train of thought.

"Oh, that's Eska and Desna, the chief's children," Korra chuckled, turning to Bolin, "Desna's a guy, by the way."

"Oh I knew that," Bolin attempted a smooth recovery, but then paused. "...and which one is Desna?" His eyes darted between the two twins, trying to spot a difference.

"He's the one on your left," Korra gestured with a whisper, "look at their eyes. Eska's got purple eyeliner, Desna doesn't."

"Right," Bolin grinned, rubbing his hands together a moment, although it was disrupted by an authoritative stare from Chief Unalaq himself, which seemed to give off a subtle aura of disapproval as he looked over Korra, her family, and her friends. His expression was soft towards Korra, but looked much less approving of Asami, even less approving of Mako and Bolin, and rather disdainful towards both Korra's parents, as well as Tarrlok.

For a brief moment, Unalaq and Kwan made eye contact, where Korra saw Kwan make one of the most scathing expressions she had ever seen the little lavabender make. Unalaq's expression was one that almost dared her to speak out, but she and Tarrlok both kept quiet.

"Good to see you again, Avatar Korra," he smiled as he approached Korra's family, "you've grown a great deal since we last met, and it seems that you were able to overcome the impacts of Nakkoa's betrayal rather well."

"Thank you," Korra gave a respectful bow, "good to see you too."

"Brother," Unalaq turned to Tonraq, his expression turning to an icy glare that Tonraq returned in kind, hiding any and all emotions and feelings he may have had.

"Brother," he responded bluntly.

"And of course, the infamous Hero of Desert Storm…" Unalaq's gaze moved to Senna, who stared at him as if she knew a secret about him that she couldn't prove.

"Chief," she nodded cordially and curtly.

Mako, Bolin, and Asami all exchanged concerned looks, although none of them said anything at the moment. Even Tarrlok, as well as Tenzin's family, wasn't sure how to react.

It was only after they returned to the Southern Water Tribe Palace that Mako broke the ice.

"I smelled bad blood," he turned to Korra, "no offense or anything."

"My dad suspects that Unalaq knew about the Red Lotus conspiracy against me long before it happened." Korra explained, "I'm inclined to believe it myself, but even if that does turn out to be true, we have no way to prove it."

"What about your mother?" Asami asked, "She looked ready to shiv Chief Unalaq right there on the docks or something."

"She's even more convinced than my dad," Korra pointed out, "and given what little I know of her actions in Desert Storm, shivving him seems exactly like the kind of thing my mom would do."

"I hope it doesn't come to that," Mako's lawful streak began to show again, "that would just throw everything into more chaos."

"No, I'm pretty sure she wouldn't actually do that," Korra assured him, "she might be tempted for sure, but she's more civil than that unless her whole life has been a lie to me."

"I mean," Kwan interjected, having lingered around with Korra and her friends for a while, "she did pull a broken hunting knife out of her coat that matched the description of the one from that story I recounted last time we were down here. So I doubt she's lying too much about her past."

"Well, I really hope my mom doesn't shiv my uncle or anything," Korra shook her head, "it doesn't really seem like her considering that she fought insurgents, rather than join them."

"I'm just saying that you and I know very different versions of Senna is all," Kwan shrugged, "it's not a bad thing, and definitely don't start thinking I'm pointing fingers because I'm not. I'm just saying I don't trust Chief Unalaq, and it seems your parents don't either."

"He was there though, wasn't he?" Bolin piped up, "with you and Kwan when you… well, when all that crazy stuff happened before we properly met and all."

"He was, but I don't think he counted on Nakkoa." Korra stroked her chin, "I mean, none of us did, except maybe me. My problem was I was too naively optimistic and thought that her rather straightforward threats were shallow."

Korra frowned for a moment, remembering how Nakkoa had, on many different occasions, said she had wanted to kill her. She thought back about Nakkoa's paranoia; her general fear of the Avatar, and wondered just how much more had been going on behind the scenes than she knew. She thought about the spirit world, and wondered if Kwan had been right when she theorized that Nakkoa's spirit might actually linger there.

"Well, she's gone now, Korra," Kwan was actually the one to try and reassure her, "and I dunno about you all, but I came here for a vacation, and also to see a healer because I'm pretty convinced I'm pregnant. Don't mind me, I'm just gonna go find tall, dark, and handsome, and we're going to get out of your hair for a bit until the festival starts."

"Pfft, have fun," Korra laughed, as she, Mako, and Bolin waved Kwan off.

"That reminds me," Asami turned to Korra, "it turns out the mogul I'm meeting here is Mr. Varrick himself. It seems his companies are headquartered here in the Southern Water Tribe rather than Republic City, so this is his turf on a business level."

"It makes me wonder if he's trying to partner with you to try and establish a more prominent foothold in Republic City," Mako warned, "I imagine this goes without saying, Asami—but be careful. We'd hate to see Future Industries go down just as much as Korra would."

"Yeah, Korra's told me that one a dozen times or more," Asami smiled. "Thank you though."

"By the way," Bolin was never exactly one to keep things secret, "how are you two doing? We kind of picked up the vibes from the ship here, but you two seem to have patched things up?"

"We never really broke up, in truth," Asami admitted, "and as far as I know, we don't plan to."

"That's the last thing I'd want to do," Korra added before allowing Asami to continue.

"Basically, I'm just letting Korra focus on building her spiritual connection while she's letting me focus on hammering out a deal to save my company. We've still got each other's backs, but I guess we just needed to give each other a little space so that we didn't stress ourselves out worrying about each other."

"Or stress each other out with our worrying about each other," Korra quipped. "I… there's not really a clearer way to explain it, so… take my word for it?"

"Hey, I'm not a relationship counselor," Mako shook his head dismissively, "You guys do what you need to do; just don't let anything get between you."

"We won't," Asami smiled. "And I'm sure we'll all cross paths now and again at the Glacier Festival. Do you really think Korra's not going to try and win me prizes I don't need from games she just wants to show off at?" She threw a teasing expression at her lover. Korra simply crossed her arms and angrily pouted.

"I apologize for absolutely nothing." she stuck her nose up defiantly. Even Bolin and Mako cracked a chuckle at this.

True to Korra's promise, the Glacier Spirits Festival was everything the young Avatar had hyped it up to be, as well as more. Food, drinks, games, and prizes abounded, and for the first couple of days, everything seemed fine and peaceful, with even Unalaq and his children staying clear of Korra, her family, and her friends.

Despite being from the north, Tarrlok seemed a lot less tense than Korra had ever seen him, and it warmed her heart to see vestiges of the kindhearted boy that he had been before Yakone had corrupted him and Noatak, emerge even now as he was an older man. Kwan seemed to bring out Tarrlok's better side, although at one point Korra did notice him confiscating a bottle of whiskey from Kwan. She wondered about it briefly, but then turned towards a high striker booth, where the game operator chanted at passersby to test their strength.

"Ooh, I got this, babe," Korra stole a kiss before turning towards the mallet. "Here, hold my jacket for a moment." she removed her coat, which Asami did in fact hold, and took a moment to flex her arms and crack her knuckles. She had arm sleeves that went from her fingers to just under her shoulders, possibly due to the colder weather, but they hugged her arms well enough that very little muscle definition was lost to viewers.

She hefted the mallet, and whether by luck, strength, skill, or some combination of all three, she struck the center of the target, which launched the projectile all the way to the top where it struck the bell, signalling Korra's victory.

"We have a winner!" the operator announced, and Korra tossed the small pouch of coins to Asami in exchange for her coat back.

"Some spending money," she teased, knowing that while money was tight they were far from going broke. "As soon as you get back from that business meeting with Mr. Varrick, I'll win you a few more prizes, okay?"

"Implying you haven't won me enough already," Asami teased, "I think someone just wants to show off to get the girl."

"I'm smitten, love." Korra put on a straight up idiotic grin, complete with (naturally) blushing cheeks as she reminded herself just how in love she was. "You want it, I'll win it."

"Just don't come kicking down Mr. Varrick's door or something, alright?" Asami waved as the two prepared to part ways, "trust me when I say I've got this."

"Of course," Korra assured her with a much sweeter smile, "I always trust you."

With a soft kiss goodbye, Asami went one way and Korra went another, before the latter stopped dead in her tracks. Almost as if he had been waiting to swoop in the moment Asami had left her side, Unalaq had appeared, spotted Korra, and was now approaching her.