#I hope Zelda will stay by his side and hold his hand while he recovers! I love that they continue their adventures together!!

[fuckit-hero-of-trains]

Sit by the fire until... Chapter 2

ao3 link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25870150/chapters/81650737

Here’s the thing they don’t tell you when you get magically transformed into a bunny rabbit against your will by the corrupted darkness of the Sacred Realm: somethings, unfortunately, tend to stick.  

Now, Legend isn’t saying that he’s hiding a cotton tail under his tunic or that his soul secretly aches to frolic in meadows or spend his time sleeping in holes or whatever else it is that rabbits do when they're not busy being very confused and scared twelve year old Hylians.

No.

But that doesn't mean he was left unscathed by having his entire anatomy re-written in less than an instant.

Because of course he wouldn’t. Goddess forbid he ever catch a break for once in his life.

He was still pretty young when it happened, so Legend can’t remember if his teeth had been quite so bucked before the incident. Regardless if they were or not, they sure as Hylia are prominent now. Then there's also the fact that he never really grew into his ears, the damn things always just a shade longer than they should be for a regular Hylian.

Before he joined this wild cucco chase masquerading as an adventure, Legend would sometimes catch himself looking at Ravio wondering, Is that how I would have looked? Besides the hair and eyes, the merchant was supposed to be his mirror image after all. Zelda and Hilda were, so it stood to reason that he and Ravio should be the same.

In which case, the bucktooth thing was going to be a problem regardless.

The ears, on the other hand, are a completely different story. From the quick glances Legend has managed to steal of Ravio’s side profile, the merchant has relatively short ears himself, which just make the Veteran’s own look comically long when the two stand side by side.

And ugh, and that wasn't even touching on his… less physical changes.

 Namely, his cravings.

Noshing on some leafy greens while home alone doing some chores? A-Okay.

Getting caught by Warriors and Twilight absentmindedly chewing on the hay he was supposed to be feeding the horses? Ehhh, not so much.  

Goddesses, his ego still hasn’t recovered from the amount of jokes the Pretty Boy had made at his expense. And that’s not even mentioning the veritable mountain of carrots he found in his bedroll, no doubt courtesy of that flea bitten farmhand.

Regardless of the less than natural way he got these… attributes, Legend couldn’t say they were all bad. ‘Cuz sure, his ears were a bit longer than average, but he could also hear better than most of his companions, able to catch the sound of crunching leaves above even their loud bickering. Like wise, his eyes were sharper than others in the low light of dawn and dusk, allowing him to see things others would miss.

Frankly, both skills had helped keep him alive during his quests. He was thankful for them in a weird huh, guess that works kinda way, but thankful all the same.

But sometimes Legend wanted to wring the goddesses necks because really? Being turned into a rabbit couldn’t have fixed this particular problem?

This particular problem being his absolutely horrible pollen allergies.

“ A-A-A!”

Each rapid, involuntary inhale feels like a simultaneous punch to the gut and a gasp for breath, the air yanked into his body and then stoppered up. It leaves the veteran in a state of limbo as a paralyzing calm falls over him; lungs full of air, shoulders hiked up, muscles tensed.

For a second, everything feels lodged in place, frozen, like the Champion had used his stasis rune on him.

And–

Legend clamps his mouth shut and tucks his face into his elbow just as tension snaps and–

“- acheew! ”

Nothing but a soft, cut off sneeze slips past his lips, yet, the force of holding it back  still sends Legend bowing over. He stays there, hunched over for a breath as his body recovers, before he straightens back up, sniffing irritably as he tries to ignore the itch prickling at his eyes and the congested pressure throbbing behind his sinuses.

A chortling huff sounds next to him and when Legend glances down he can see Wolfie– or should he say, Twilight– peering up at him, mouth open and tongue lolling in a doggy grin, but icy blue eyes too pointed, too teasing, to be anything but human.

Legend's nose twitches tellingly as it begins to tickle again and the wolf gives another stuttering huff. A laugh. Legend can practically hear Twilight’s twangy, Awww. You sneeze like a bunny.

The bastard.

“Yeah, yeah, laugh it up, dog boy,” Legend grumbles, wiping harshly at his face in an attempt to stave off another sneezing fit. “Don't you have trees to piss on or something?”

That earns him peeled back lips and a growl, but Legend just sends the other a responding sneer as strides past the grumpy wolf and out into the rolling field of tulips that stands in front of them.

Another huff, this one more annoyed than amused, sounds behind the veteran before the wolf streaks past him, loping through the flowers with his nose down and tail high.

Legend rolls his eyes.

Twilight loves to show his teeth, but the farmhand is quite literally all bark and no bite.

And besides, they both have better things to do than needle one another. If Legend is going to be miserable, he may as well take steps to make that misery as short as possible.

Afterall, they aren't out here swanning through a meadow of flowers for pleasure.

The last Dark Portal they had all walked through had, once again, separated them. Legend and Twilight were lucky enough to find one another quickly, though, now that Legend thinks about it, it probably had less to do with luck and more to do with Twilight’s nose.

After regrouping, they had tried to search for the others more that day, but a storm had them holed up in a cave overnight to wait out the deluge. They had gotten up early to start their search again today, but so far they had no such luck in finding any of the others in the forest.

Which just left the inexplicable meadow of tulips surrounding the wood.

Legend had been hoping that the rain would keep some of the pollen at bay, but nooo that would be too merciful, wouldn’t it?

If anything, the rain just made this whole experience more aggravating. Now, along with stinging eyes, a running nose, and a throbbing head, Legend also had the delightful honor of feeling the tulip stalks and leaves and petals sliding wetly across his skin, the annoying slap of his tunic smacking his thighs as it got more sodden by the second, and the disgusting squish of water between his toes with every step he took through this Wind Fish damned field.

And sure, maybe it was worth it to reunite with the other heroes, but really, would it kill the goddesses to make his life just a little bit easier.

A bark pulls Legend from his miserable musings. Twilight's dark tail stands out among the ocean of pastel pinks and yellows and oranges, wagging frantically twenty meters away. It disappears after a second, replaced by a muzzle and expectant eyes.

Twilight barks at him again.

He must have found something.

Finally, Legend thinks as he begins to make his way over toward the other, hopefully a reason to get out of this floral hell hole.

“What is it, boy?” Legend asks, voice going high and mocking as he takes delicate care stepping on as many flowers as possible, “Little Time-y fall down the well again?”

Instead of a growl for his effort, Legend gets a flurry of black flecks falling upward, like pieces of reverse snow, in his peripheral vision.

“You know,” Twilight says as he straightens to his full height, eyes half-lidded. Unamused, “You’re really not as funny as you seem to think you are.”

And before Legend can interrupt that– No, actually, you just have a dog shit sense of humor. Literally– Twilight continues, “I can smell the smithy all over this thing.” He nods down at a small tree stump breaking through the tide of flowers. “The scent is a bit old, probably from sometime before last evening, but still traceable. I should be able to find him from here.”

Legend eyes the stump for a moment, peering into the cracked hole in the top of the wood. Inside, he can see the round, red caps of several toadstools sprouting.

He can also sense magic. Close to that of the fairies– natural and glittering and smelling of moss– but not quite the same.

The Smithy’s doing?

Or a natural occurrence?

Regardless…

“Welp,” Legend says, straightening up, “Let's go find him. Couldn’t have gotten far on those little legs of his.”

“Again,” Twilight huffs, the black fractals already consuming him once more as he transforms, “You’re not as funny as you think...”

His voice distorts and fades into nothing as the magic swallows him whole, leaving Legend once again having a conversation with a very unimpressed looking wolf.

“I like you better when you can’t talk,” Legend tells Twilight as the other sets off, snuffling at the ground.

The other pauses to give Legend a look that would be more at home on a disapproving mother’s face, before continuing his tracking.

He also whaps Legend in the leg with his tail.

Hard.

The prick.

They continue on their trek together like that for a while, Twilight occasionally pausing to shove his nose into the dirt some more as he decides which direction to follow as Legend trails behind, keeping his eyes peeled for a quadripartite tunic and a head of straight, gold hair.

It isn't long before the farmhand turned canine breaks off into a light trot and then a jog, and then a full on sprint.

And stops just as suddenly.

Legend is out of breath by the time he slides to a stop behind the farmhand, but from a cursory glance around, there doesn’t seem to be a short, mouthy smithy anywhere in the vicinity.

“What happened?” Legend asks, still searching, turning circles as he cranes his neck, “Did you lose the trail?”

Twilight gives a light whine, grabbing Legend’s attention.

Then he does two full spins and sits primly, looking up at Legend.

“The hell is that supposed to mean?” Legend crinkles his nose at the canine. “Use your words.”

Wolfie rolls his eyes in a way that Legend didn’t think was possible for dogs and then stands.

The canine stares at him intently, as though making sure Legend’s eyes are locked with his own. And then he flicks his eyes over the yellow tulip he is sitting next to meaningfully. Then back to Legend. Back and forth back and forth, his eyes go for a full minute before he stops and stares at Legend once more.

Legend feels as his face wrinkles in confusion.

It's just a regular tulip, just like the thousands currently around them. Pretty enough, he supposes. The bulb seems to be a little wilted, like it's been weighed down by rain water perhaps, but other than that, nothing to sneeze at.

Or everything to sneeze at, if you’re Legend.

Legend gives the flower one more skeptical glance before turning to look at Twilight once more, brow raised.

“Pretty,” he assures the other. “Not sure how it helps us find Four.”

Twilight heaves another too human sigh.

And then he reaches up,  takes the sleeve of Legend’s tunic between his teeth, and yanks.

“Hey!” Legend yelps as he’s dragged down into the dirt, “Watch the teeth! The embroidery on this thing took forever to do and even longer to enchant!”

Twilight pays him no mind, pulling him down and forward, closer to his chosen tulip.

Legend tries his best to keep his face away from the damn thing.

“I swear on The Three, if your slobber stains–”

Legend’s words crumple up and die in his throat.

There’s something in the tulip.

At first glance, Legend would identify it as the Smithy's earring. The small feathered one that he takes special care of. The one that Four refuses to tell Legend the origin of, besides his cryptic, “From a friend.”

Legend would say that it was just the earring, but… but it isn’t.

Rather than being completely red with a white tip, Legend can see that this little feather is only mostly red. Right before the tip, a darker red plumage takes over, followed by purple and blue and green.

Also, rather than being attached to the small, golden chain and stud Four uses to fasten the jewelry to his earlobe, it’s attached to a body.

A very, very small body.

By now, Twilight has let go of his sleeve, but Legend both doesn’t notice and doesnt care, all of his attention fixed on the little creature before his eyes.

From what he can tell, the little creature is asleep, curled up in the bulb of the flower, his feather tail tucked up near his nose for warmth. Looking past the plumage, Legend can see that the little guy has a very rat-like face, complete with a small, twitching pink nose, long whiskers and–because the creature is shivering– long, chattering rodent incisors. Oval shaped ears stick out from the creature's head, a mix between mouse-like and Hylian.

And framing those ears is shoulder length, soaking wet blonde hair.

Blonde hair held out of the little guy's face by a green headband.

And…

And he’s wearing the smithy’s tunic?

“... Four?” Legend whispers in amazement.

And just saying the other’s name out loud is like a spell because suddenly Legend can see all signs. The little guy has Four’s bag over his shoulder and the Four Sword at his hip. That same magic that was by the stump– the not-fairy, fairy magic– completely surrounds him, dusting him in the same way he is currently dusted in yellow pollen.

“Is that you, Smithy?” Legend asks a little louder.

But rather than startle awake, the small creature– Four, Legend reminds himself– simply hunkers down more fully into the flower, curling up more fully as his shivers increase.

“He must have transformed in order to speak with the Minish around here.”

Twilight’s voice, even though it is a whisper, gives Legend a start. He hadn’t realized the other had transformed, nor had he seen the farmhand crouch down by his side.

The other isn’t looking at him as he speaks, cool blue eyes instead locked on the fitfully sleeping smithy, face concerned.

“He once told me that the Minish are insatiable gossips. He must have transformed to try and find us.”

The concern on the farhand’s face darkens the longer he stares.

“He must have been caught out in the storm,” Twilight says grimly.

Legend tries to imagine what that would be like. To be the size of a mouse and out in a storm. Tries to imagine what it would feel like for gale force winds to pull at drag at him, crushing him into the dirt one moment and yanking off his feet the next. Tries to imagine dodging back and forth between tulips, avoiding the head sized, stone cold rain drops pelting down from the sky

It's not a pretty pictograph, he’ll admit.

And ugh, Legend really isn't a fan of what it's making him consider.

He spares another glance at Four.

And fuck, the little guy shivers and shivers and shivers until the fower he is sleeping in is shaking with it.

And then, he sneezes, the sound coming out tiny and squeaky and weak.

Son of a bitch.

With a sigh that is as weary and reluctant and annoyed as he can possibly force it to be even though the vetran is feeling none of those things, Legend takes hold of the flower near its stem. As gently as possible, he digs his nails into the soft green there, cutting the flower from the ground while keeping it intact.

He hands it to Twilight, who takes it from him with gentle, if slightly confused hands.

With one hand, Legend flips open his shoulder bag. With the other, he rips his hat from his head with a motion probably a tad more violent than is really called for. He arranges the hat inside the bag, making sure to cover his items with the soft fabric while also shaping a soft bed.

Without looking up from his work, Legend extends a hand out to Twilight.

Makes a grabbing motion when what he wants isn't immediately in his hand.

After a second, Twilight slowly places the stem of the flower back in Legend’s hand and the Veteran gently lowers it in the small nest he had created, making sure the bulb sits in a place both shielded from the sun and extra comfortable thanks to the extra fabric padding beneath it.

In one smooth motion, Legend takes a hold of the strap of his bag, pulls it carefully off of his shoulder, and places it on the other side of Twilight’s neck.

And then, he reaches down and touches the dark stone hanging from the necklace around the farmhand’s throat, letting the darkness flock around and consume him.  

When Legend blinks open his eyes, Twilight is looking down at him smugly.

He is looking down farther than usual.

Also looking smugger than usual.

“Shut up,” he grumbles, shaking out his fur before hopping on all fours to get closer to the bag.

“I didn’t say anything,” Twilight replies, not bothing to wipe the smug look off his stupid face even as he lowers the bag to the ground for easier access.

“Yeah you did,” Legend hisses quietly as he clambers carefully into the satchel, settling down the nest of leather and items and hat.

He pulls the flower closer to his side where it is warm.

Inside, he can feel as Four’s shivers begin to lessen.

"Cute," Twilight laughs from above them.

"Fuck you," Legend whisper spits, though he makes no move to push Four's flower away. If anything, he pulls it closer when he hears the smaller hero start to make small, chittering snores, surprised the smithy could sleep through such a racket.

Twilight, thankfully, doesn't comment, instead pulling the top of the bag loosely closed to give them some shade. Then, Legend feels as he gently lifts the satchel back up, slings it slowly over his shoulder as to not disturb the contents inside, and begins walking, hopefully back in the direction of the forest.

Legend can still hear the farmhand laughing to himself from within the bag, but without the others' eyes on him, he finds he doesn't care.

The pollen still itches at his eyes and nose and Legend can still feel the pound of his sinuses even now.  But something about the shade and warmth and soft rocking of the bag makes it hard for him to mind.

Four gives a harty twitch, kicking a petal directly into Legend’s face.

And even that doesn't dissuade the veteran from his task.

Instead, Legend sighs and pulls Four even closer, relaxing despite the discomfort.

He’s got dirt on both Twilight and now Four, the two heroes with sticks most firmly inserted into their asses. He can get out of whatever chores and lectures they try to pin him with.

Yep, he thinks , distantly. That's why he did this.

For the blackmail.

And no other reason.

[awkwardspontaneity]

A Special Favour

Part 9 of Memories of You

BOTW!Link x GN!Sheikah!Reader

Prev | Next

AN: I got hit with writers block so this took me soo long to finish but i’ve finally got it. This is tha last chapter before the finale so enjoy the happy vibes while they last :’) 

Summary:  The ceremony for a group of heroes unites the diverse group as the Champions of Hyrule and, later they unite in the best cure for the crushing weight of destiny. Laughter.

------

“Lead our Champions, Princess. And together, protect our kingdom from the threat of Calamity Ganon.”

Y/n stood with their fellow Champions in a small pavilion outside the castle. The ceremony had been the longest hours the Sheikah had ever spent standing around, and they had once spent 6 hours meditating over the sacred temple deep beneath the shrine of resurrection. It was to unify their spirit with the great elders that now resided in a secret shrine of the hero. Apparently it would only open when the time was right. Guess the impending doom of the rising calamity wasn’t enough to wake the monk from their sleep to oversee the trials.

Moving on from their painful memories of meditations, the Sheikah now stood watching Daruk stretch out his arms. He was moaning about how exhausting fancy events were- something Y/n could definitely agree with. They were more of an outdoors person. Nonetheless, the Sheikah Champion stood with their pinky linked through Links as they played with the new scarf they had received.

“Y’know, as boring as these uppity ceremonies are,” This drew the attention of the other Champions and the Princess to their white-haired friend. Revali scoffed at the dismissal of the ceremony, naturally being a fan of the boost such high praise gave his ego. “I do have to say I’m a fan of these tokens you made for us Princess.”

The mentioned princess bowed her head with a soft smile. “It was nothing, truly. I am merely showing my gratitude towards you as the Champions that will protect Hyrule from the calamity.”

Y/n grinned back, dragging Link over with them to the bashful princess. That poor girl needed to get used to praise and up her confidence. Good thing she had her loyal friends beside here- yes, even Revali. “Now now Princess, don’t forget that you’re one of those Champions that will protect Hyrule. Why I’d even say you and Mr. Hero over here have the biggest roles of us all. And before you get down on yourself for not unlocking that power of yours don’t forget that, with or without the sealing power, you are just as much a hero as us. We have the utmost faith that when the time is right, you’ll blast good ol’ bacon-breath away and free us all!”

“Y/n is right.” Urbosa stepped between the Hylian and Sheikah, lacing a warm hand on their heads. Y/n grinned as they received head pats from the tall woman, sticking their tongue out as the princess giggled at the sight. “You are just as valuable to us as we are to you. Don’t you ever forget that we have faith in your abilities whether that power shows itself or not.”

Zelda looked between her friends with a soft smile. Perhaps she could do even a fraction of what was expected of her as long as she had her Champions standing beside her. She allowed her eyes to fall upon the Sheikah who was now teasing Link with the same praise. Zelda giggled as she watched red paint the boys cheeks from Y/n holding his hand to their chest as they sung his praises. He was just as bad at taking the compliments as her. Especially when it was from Y/n. The Sheikah had a way of making people feel like they could do anything with their infectious energy and confidence.

Mipha was the one to change the topic, having been given the Sheikah slate from Revali. “Is it true that this device can create true-to-life images?”

“Yes!” Zelda made her way over to the Zora Princess to explain the use of the rune she spoke of. While they had not unlocked all the functions of the device yet, they had focused their efforts on mastering the ones available to them. As such, they were quite good at capturing these images for their compendium.

Mipha stared at the tablet in awed thought. “Princess… may I ask a special favour of you?”

------

And that was how the group of Champions stood on the grass in front of an excited Purah and Robbie who was waving his arms around as a form of direction. As per Mipha’s request, they were about to take a photo together to commemorate the day they were officially named the Champions of Hyrule.

“Daruk can you crouch down? You’re as big as death mountain.” With a hearty laugh, the Goron Champion leaned closer to the group. Y/n meanwhile, was too busy teasing their bird-friend after they had caught him changing his stance upon seeing it matched Urbosa. Revali was swatting away their hands as they poked at him, ignoring Purah directing the rest of the group to fit into the picture. “Y/n, you’re gonna need to leave him alone or we’ll never get this done!”

The mentioned Sheikah gave one last poke at the Rito, snorting at his huff when arms wrapped around their waist. Link had grabbed his partner, bringing them to his side instead of Revali’s then closing their hand in his grasp. Y/n looked at him with wide eyes as they felt heat crawl up their neck. They offered a sheepish grin at the boy, something he matched with his own flushed grin. The two seemed so lost in their moment that they missed the click of the camera. Purah cackled as she stared at the zoomed in picture she had taken of the pair locked in a love-sick stare.

“Stay just like that!” Y/n grabbed her friend and boyfriend by the hands grinning widely at the Sheikah Slate. They felt a squeeze from LInk, catching his soft gaze again. THey were drawn out of it by Purah calling for them again. “Now, Smiiile!”

Just as the shutter clicked the group was knocked forward by the giant Goron behind them. Revali let out a squawk as he was thrown into the Gerudo beside him. Urbosa smiled down at Mipha who was matching Revali in her shock. Y/n laughed as they were knocked into Link who was staring at them in surprise, an arm out to steady them.

As the group stumbled to regain their balance (and dignity for Revali) Purah and Robbie cackled at the image on the slate. Revali was the first to recover, spinning to face Daruk in indignation. His glare however, had the opposite result he had hoped for seeing as the Goron let out a booming guffaw. Y/n was the next to react, letting out a snort as they watched Revali’s feathers literally get ruffled by Urbosa and Daruk. Watching the chaos unfold amongst the diverse group, they became unified- not only in their roles- but in their bonds.

And together they laughed.

[quillandink333]

Courage

BotW Link X Zelda ~ Vampire!Link AU

Rating: M

Word Count: 3.2k

WARNINGS: blood and gore, near-death experiences, nudity

Summary: In defiance of his creator, Link risks his life over and over as he fights to protect Zelda’s, but then watches his world crumble as she does the same for him.

Masterlist

“Highness!”

An electric arrow flew at her from above. I deflected it in the nick of time, skidding against the rainforest’s damp soil.

The scaly eyes of the monster who’d fired lased into me, just like those of all the rest as they emerged and made themselves known. I hissed, outwitted. We were surrounded, having just walked into the clearing before the Spring of Courage, but we hadn’t been expecting company. And now, there was nowhere to take cover.

One of the unholy creatures leapt out at us from behind. We would’ve been done for if I hadn’t heard its approach in time. I drew my blade and dealt with it swiftly, but this battle was far from won.

The lizalfi were cunning, more so than they appeared. They’d blended in with their surroundings, only revealing themselves when we’d walked straight into the heart of their trap. They were nine, ten...twelve in number, half of them foot soldiers and the rest archers.

“Link...?”

“It’s alright,” I asserted, though I had to admit the validity of my statement was questionable at best. “Just stay close.”

My sword and shield clattered as they hit the ground. “Wait,” she stammered, “what are you—?”

I crouched down and closed my eyes. The image of my enemy’s blackening corpse strewn across the ground beneath me devoured my thoughts and claimed my focus.

Soon enough, my arms turned thin and leathery, my legs melted away, and the corners of my vision were blurred and bloody.

With my new wings, I soared high above the stone pillar.

The monster at its vertex jerked its head up.

I dove down. My body changed shape, and I landed feet-first on top of my victim, causing it to plummet to its doom.

I leapt to the ground, retrieving the sword and finishing it off with one final blow.

“Link—ahh!”

I turned. Time froze when I saw the princess backed up against a tree with two lizalfi closing in on her.

One grabbed her wrist between its claws. My throat clenched in anger.

Thinking quickly, I picked up the bow of the fallen archer and shot an electric arrow right into the nape of her attacker’s neck. It spasmed a few times, letting go of her before collapsing to the ground at her feet, dead.

The other turned its head. In response, I shot a second arrow through its eye socket and into its skull.

But when I reached for another arrow, my hand was seized, and I was pinned to the ground.

The princess screamed out my name as I wrestled with the enemy, but it had me immobilized. I could hear the pitter-patter of the others’ footsteps fast approaching, and saw countless shock arrows wizzing overhead. No matter how hard I struggled, I couldn’t get the damned thing off me.

So I closed my eyes again.

The creature that had been holding me down squawked in confusion. I fluttered out of its grasp with ease. If I still had my face, I would’ve been smirking in triumph.

The archers were still firing away at me, but their aim was off by a mile as always. It was even harder to hit me now that I presented a much smaller and faster target.

Assessing the battle field, I counted three on foot and five ranged remaining. I spotted one try to pick up the sword, jumping back when its hand began to sizzle. I took this chance to shift back and reclaim my weapon.

It didn’t take me long from there to eliminate the three left on the ground. All the while, I was careful to keep Her Highness in my line of sight.

Until one of the archers shifted its aim from me to her.

I raced to her side at once. The arrow flew, and I blocked it with no more than half a second to spare.

Then one of them rushed at us, catching me off-guard.

I swung my sword out, and it leapt back.

I could’ve sworn I’d taken care of all the ones on foot. Could one of the archers have abandoned its post?

“Are you alright?”

The question caught me even more off-guard. “Yes, Princess,” I stuttered, trying to focus on fighting off my opponents. “Get to the spring.”

She nodded and made a break for the stone serpent’s mouth.

Then I heard a low grunt. Her footsteps halted.

Rising to its feet in front of her was none other than a towering, third-class moblin.

Another bolt just barely missed my ankle. It purged me of my paralysis, and I dodged it. I looked back just in time to see the brute raising its club above her.

“Zelda!”

She screamed and darted out of the way. I thanked Ganon for making these boorish behemoths as slow as they were.

“Keep running!” I ordered, blocking another lightning-fast attack. “Don’t look back!”

She was terrified. I heard it in the way she gasped for air as she fled. I should’ve known better than to give way to overconfidence. Now my grip was shaky, my movements frenzied, and I was starting to panic.

I advanced, but the spineless freak just kept leaping back miles out of reach. The three left with bows were still firing away at me. I shouted out in futile aggravation. I’d lost my shield some time ago while transforming, leaving my left side wide open. I could no longer see the princess, though I still heard her frantic footsteps, as well as her pursuer’s.

I had to get back up on my feet somehow, or else her blood truly would be on my hands this time.

I sprinted over to where a bow and quiver full of shock arrows were lying deserted. My opponent, after a moment of standing there in confusion, chased after me.

I turned and thrusted the tip of my blade through its open palm.

It screeched dramatically. This gave me an opening. I grasped it and slashed the creature’s throat open once and for all.

The loud rustling of palm leaves caught the attention of one of the archers.

Standing to the left of the spring’s entrance was the princess, frozen in fear. The black moblin was sluggishly approaching her from behind.

The lizalfos took aim. She gasped and turned around, but then came face-to-face with the pig-snouted giant.

Then she took even me by surprise and ducked between its legs.

The moblin stumbled. Then before it’d had the chance to recover, the archer let loose its arrow, which hit the beast right in its thigh. Lightning surged throughout its lanky form before it collapsed on its front.

I held my breath.

But it got back up again like nothing had happened. Of course that wouldn’t have been enough to kill it, as I had hoped. Soon, it turned back around and continued its dreaded hunt.

I’d missed my chance. “Damn it...” Now it was impossible for me to hit it with the projectiles at my feet, and I had the attention of all three archers back on me.

I picked up the bow and arrows and ran. There had to be some position that was ideal for shooting down the last of these fiends.

I maneuvered across the battlefield until all three of them were in view. They were farther away than I would’ve liked, but this would have to do. Besides, this way I was far enough that they wouldn’t be able to hit me with their inferior aim whilst I pierced their throats one after another.

Finally, the last one fell from its post and into the water below, vanquished.

“Ough!”

I spotted Her Highness, sprawled out on the staircase at the spring’s entrance. She must have tripped on her way down.

Time stopped, yet again, as the monster emerged from the shadows, poised to strike.

The defenceless princess didn’t so much as scream, merely watching her fate unfold in complete, mortal terror.

The beast swung its mace.

I nearly tripped myself as I leapt in front of her, parrying the death blow, but just barely.

The enemy staggered back. I charged forward.

My aim was true.

The blade cleaved clean through its torso, exiting out through its backside. Its thick, black ichor sprayed all over my arm when I took it out. The beast fell to the ancient pavement slowly and heavily, shaking the earth as it landed.

My chest was heaving violently. By the time I looked down, the gore staining the sword had already burned away. Arms shaking in exhaustion, I returned it to its sheath, wiping the sweat from my brow.

“Link...”

I swivelled when the princess’ frail voice called me. She hadn’t moved from her position on the steps, twisting at the waist to look up and face me. She seemed just as drained as I felt, if not more so. Other than that, though, she hadn’t sustained any serious injuries from what I could see. All she had were a few small scrapes and bruises here and there.

Then it hit me. The front of her white dress was sopping wet, and I’d been staring at her for well over a minute. I immediately averted my gaze, feeling a wave of embarrassment crawl beneath my skin.

“What?” she worried. “What’s the matter?”

Without looking, I cleared my throat suggestively. When that evidently hadn’t gotten the message across, I muttered, “You’re drenched.”

“Ah...” She looked down, noticing the exposed state she was in. “I just...fell into the spring a couple of times,” she blushed. “You don’t have to look away, though. I-I trust you.”

There was that phrase again. That utterly ridiculous phrase that she’d been using with me for the past month or so.

Taking a deep breath, I reached out my hand to help her to her feet.

The few drops of sacred spring water left on her palm hissed softly as they made contact with my skin. I winced. The pain was small, but excruciating.

“Oh my Goddess,” she gasped, loosening her grasp on my hand and poring over it. A few small cracks had formed in my palm, from which a few wisps of smoke had risen. “I’m so sorry,” she deliberated. “Are you alright? Do you need—”

“I’m fine, Your Highness,” I interrupted, gripping her fingers gently in demonstration. She looked up at me, uncertainty lingering in her expression, then back at my hand.

My own gaze landed on her wrist. Through the intricate metalwork of her wristband, an array of three puncture wounds, each secreting thin threads of dark red, could be seen. The memory of the monster’s filthy talons penetrating her precious, delicate skin flashed through my mind’s eye.

I cursed quietly. Once again, my infernal hate had taken hold of me and obstructed my ability to fulfill my sworn duty to her. I’d tried to fight it, but it was inescapable. I bit my lip, swallowing back a sigh. The worst part of it all was how I now found myself struggling to tear my eyes away from the blood seeping out of her wounds, further proving that I was no different from the monsters from which I was trying my hardest to protect her.

“Are you sure you’re alright?” she asked again, tone tender and brimming with warmth. I nodded; it was all I could bring myself to do.

It was not my place to listen in on her prayer. However it was difficult not to when she was such a short distance away. Tuning her out was quite the challenge, as soft-spoken as she tended to be during these rituals of hers. Besides, I couldn’t help but be intrigued.

The things she spoke to the Goddess about were shocking to me. I hadn’t the slightest clue about how formal or intimate one was expected to be when speaking with Her, but the princess seemed to have no qualms with confiding in Her just about anything. Once, during one of these pilgrimages, she’d even confessed to Her that I was in fact a day keese. It was likely that She’d already known this about me, but even so, if I’d ever been so obscenely foolhardy as to confess my betrayal of Lord Ganon to His own face, I would’ve been stricken down on the spot.

After a while, it became apparent to me that the princess had gone quiet. This was more than a little unsettling. I kept my back turned respectfully, but kept my ears trained just the same.

Splosh

My heart sank. I turned around, just in time to see her hand fall below the surface of the water.

I didn’t think twice before diving in after her.

The water penetrated my clothes the instant I stepped in. It went up to my knees. I couldn’t withhold my wail of blinding agony. My legs were like sandcastles, and the spring, a riptide.

It took every sliver of strength left in my body to reach the princess. By the time I had her safe in my arms, I could no longer feel my feet. There was no way I could get her back to dry land by carrying her. The one choice I had left was to hurl her unmoving form as far as I could and hope for the best. So, with a silent apology, that’s just what I did.

I was forced to crawl my way back to dry land; I no longer had the physical capacity to remain standing. To my immense relief, she was there on the concrete, safe and breathing.

Until now, I hadn’t had the chance to truly feel the searing pain consuming what remained of my body. My flesh was cracked and crumbling, and the water had soaked through each little crevice deep into my brittle constitution. If I wasn’t careful, my body would’ve lost any resemblance to a Hylian it had left.

When it had become strenuous to continue drawing breath, I realized I wasn’t long for this world. And yet, as I gazed upon the princess’ unmoving form whilst my surroundings faded to black, I smiled. At long last, I could bid farewell to this dastardly life of mine.

I awoke with a slight weight on my chest and a warm, bitter-sweet taste in my mouth. A series of coughs wracked my already broken body as the familiar liquid ran slowly down my throat. I opened my eyes.

“Link...?”

The face that greeted me was veiled in heavenly, golden light. I squinted. For a moment, I was certain I was looking straight into the eyes of an angel. Then my vision adjusted. Of course, I realized, no angel would ever shine half as brightly as she.

Her hand, planted firmly at the back of my head, encouraged it forward, until my lips sealed shakily around the weeping slit in her neck once again. As I drank obediently, I began wondering if she’d made the incision herself. Something about it felt sickeningly wrong. Even so, I was too numb, too fatigued, and too delirious to do anything about it.

I regained consciousness gradually, becoming more and more aware of our situation as she slid down my throat one swallow at a time. Her blood was like finely aged wine, pleasantly burning my insides as it went down. All the while, I could feel my body recovering its structure. The cracks and chips littering my skin dissolved one by one, and before long, my legs had pieced themselves back together. Now I could feel the cool mists of Faron, as well as the warmth of her bare flesh, clinging to my own.

It was around that time that I finally came to my senses. My tongue traced over the smooth edges of the lesion, making her tense up against me. I jerked back.

For the first time since waking, I was able to get a good look at her neck. The cut was fairly small, but the way it gaped and pulsed—staring back at me and perceiving each and every one of my innermost thoughts like the all-seeing eyes of our Father—forced me to look away. I could hear His petrifying voice even then.

I let my fearful gaze meander, coming across her and my clothes, which were still damp with spring water from the looks of it. Then my eyes landed on my sword, lying unsheathed on the pavement a few feet away. A corner of its blade was stained with crimson.

I shed a silent tear. “Why...?”

“‘Why?’” she rowed, teeth clenched, clearly in pain. “You wouldn’t have made it if I hadn’t done this! And yet...you’re still asking me why?”

I opened my mouth, but found myself speechless. No matter how much I wanted to just look her in the eyes and tell her everything that weighed on my mind, I couldn’t. What good would it do to resent her for this? It was already too late.

“How could you throw your life away like that?” she stabbed. “You knew your body couldn’t take it, surely.”

I risked another glance at her neck, watching as it gushed out rivers of blood with no sign of stopping. “I could ask the same of you.”

“Because I love you, Link!”

My eyes widened. I looked up at her, desperately clinging to the possibility that this was some kind of joke. “What...?”

“I love you.”

So I had heard her correctly. “No...” I muttered, gently shaking my head. “N-no, take it back.” My fingers clamped around her arm. “Please...”

“But it’s true,” she cried, voice breaking. “I think about you every moment I live and breathe, and I can’t bare the thought of losing you.” Her tone made it clear that this was no joke. “I would rather die.”

I’d thought I had felt the most pain I ever would’ve felt when I’d thrown myself into the spring moments ago. But the crushing anguish brought on by those words was so unfathomable that I never could’ve imagined it until now.

“Link...” She cupped my cheeks in her delicate palms. The way she looked at me, eyes glistening behind a watery film and voice barely above a whisper, was just another twist of the knife. “Why won’t you say anything?”

I choked, giving way to an unstoppable wave of tears and hysterical sobbing. “Because,” I whimpered pathetically, “I don’t deserve...‘love.’” I was crying into my hands as she lay across my bare front, shaking almost imperceptibly. “H-how could—how could someone such as I ever love you back...?”

As she began weeping freely into my shoulder, I felt another even greater surge of tears swell up and out of me. All I ever did was hurt her. It was made worse when I thought about how, even if I hadn’t been born the demon that I was, I still wouldn’t have had the chance to be with her. In the end, Lord Ganon would kill us all either way. Why had I even been created in the first place? What was the point in letting me learn what happiness was before forcefully tearing it out of my grasp?

I clutched onto her with all my might for no reason other than that she was there. She held me tighter.

[syilcawrites]

threaded

s. Let’s gaze into the mirror of parallels. a/n. Fun chapter to write! Hm, I don't think the 'past' section has a specific timeline? It's kinda scattered like how you can find the memories in whatever order. So you can take it how it is or you can draw your own map or something :-) Thanks for reading! xoxo ao3 | all chaps on tumblr

2. chocolate & liquor

"The wine should pair nicely with the chocolate-covered wildberries. Did I mention that the Princess—yes, I know, the Princess Zelda—planted this wildberry bush right here?" The young Hylian chef taps on the thorny bush next to them.

Several oohs and aahs resonate around him from the other customers.

Link takes a gulp of red wine, his face contorting into a series of controlled distaste. He was hoping this time would be different, but that sharp aftertaste never goes away regardless of the kind of alcoholic beverage he’s tried. Granted this time, it should taste better with chocolate, at least. And it’s a free taste test.

"Are you sure she actually planted this?" Link asks when the chef passes by him. The chocolate begins to melt off of the wildberry in his awfully warm hand.

The chef scoffs and rolls their eyes. "Do you doubt me? My great grandfather said so!" He takes back the plate of chocolate-covered wildberries from Link to move on to the next customers. Link shifts his gaze from his palm to observe the wildberry bush the chef had mentioned earlier. It sways in the light, chill breeze—plucked clean, without a single berry left. Do wildberry bushes even last over a hundred years? Let alone through an almost-end-of-the-world event.

Link sullenly eats the chocolate-covered wildberry. Sour and sweet in itself with the rich taste of chocolate to balance it out. He takes another sip of the red wine, and the sweet aftertaste of the chocolate stays prominent. Nothing tastes as sweet as chocolate-covered wildberries planted by the Goddess-blood Princess herself, huh?

There were always rumors flitting around about the Princess. It is a bit hard to believe that she planted this very wildberry bush. But maybe she did? Maybe, with her own two hands, she cared for and delicately planted it, and it survived throughout the calamitous century.

Yes, a century ago….

A century ago he could've been there with dirt-stained hands and the memory of her smile seared into his mind as they planted it together, but he wouldn't know.

All he knows is that right now, he has a handful of pink-fleshed berries left out from the wild.

"You're drunk, aren't you?" Zelda deadpanned as she crouched down in front of him with an eyebrow quirked up. It was evident she tried to remain stern, but a laugh was bubbling up her throat. "You know that you're terrible at handling alcohol, right?"

"Revali," Link managed to slur out with a thick coat of wine stuck on his tongue. He stared at Zelda dead in the eye. "You're gonna lose," he declares adamantly as he waves a lopsided finger in front of her face.

"Revali retired two hours ago. This always happens between the two of you, whenever alcohol is involved." Zelda stood up and placed her hands on her hips.

Technically, he didn’t mean to drink so much. But Revali kept egging him on and on because it was one of the few things that he could beat Link in within a landslide. And so Link drank.

And drank.

Until Zelda snatched the cup from him and dragged him outside while he profusely declared that he was fine, sober even.

“Why'd you drink so much? You know you can hardly hold your liquor." She grabbed his arm and pulled it over her shoulders as she hauled him back up—she sucked in a sharp breath as she almost lost balance from supporting his weight.

"I can keep going…" Link hiccupped, wobbling on his feet as Zelda struggled to keep the both of them upright.

"Oh Hylia, you're heavy!" Zelda squeaked as she set him down against a tree, heaving. Her forehead glistened with sweat as she straightened out her back. Link leaned his head back against the tree and stared up at her—moonlight gleamed down upon her as if she were some angel that was here to save him. "You and your doe-eyes… stay here, okay? Nod if you understand me.”

She waited until he did so, albeit it being loose and wobbly.

“Good. I'll go get one of the guards to bring you in—"

Link immediately slouched forward and grabbed her wrist. "Don't go," he muttered, almost whining as he tugged her toward him. He tightened his grip around her wrist as he tried to stabilize his vision by blinking rapidly—which did, in fact, not help at all.

"Okay, okay! Just stop moving, or else you're going to vomit." Zelda’s brown boots came into view as she stepped closer to him. She knelt across from him and gently pushed him back so he was leaning against the tree. Afterward, she placed her hands on both sides of his face and raised it just a bit so it wasn’t hanging forward. With a chuckle, she offered him a lopsided smile. "If you keep moving like that you're going to regret it."

He squinted at her so he could stop seeing three blurred versions of her pretty face. "You've got somethin’ right here," Link said, poking repeatedly at the curve of her jaw near her chin. "Did you always have that dot?"

Was it a birthmark? He would’ve noticed it earlier if it was. Maybe it was a grease stain then? He did accompany her to Purah’s lab earlier in the day, where she helped tinker around with some Sheikah tech.

"Hm?" Zelda wiped at the spot with the back of her hand, but all it did was smudge the dark brown dot.

"Lemme help," Link insisted, leaning toward her face, his full attention on the smudge lining the shape of her jaw. He took his thumb and tried to wipe it away, but the persistent smudge stayed there.

"Link, I don't think—"

He leaned closer and slightly parted his lips, licking it instead. It was sweet and bitter—dark chocolate. Her favorite. He drew back just a bit to see if it was gone. "It was just chocolate," Link muttered, as he graced her jaw with one last quick stroke of his thumb just to make sure it was gone, before slumping back against the tree trunk. He winced from the sharp headache that began probing his temples and squeezed his eyes shut.

“Good thing it wasn’t grease, it probably wouldn’t taste that good,” he muttered as he rubbed his eyes with the back of his fingers. He was still recovering from consuming a whole plate of rock-hard food with Daruk from a week ago, and he was pretty sure tasting a grease stain wouldn’t help him.

When she didn't say anything, Link hurriedly opened them again, only easing when he saw that she was still sitting in front of him. For a split second, he felt as if he was actually alone the entire time.

Zelda had a hand placed firmly against the side of her cheek, with her face as red as the wine he had drunk at the party. "You…" she sputtered, her wide-eyed expression soon shifting into a series of disbelief and embarrassment. "You're never allowed to drink again!" She shot up from her position and threw her cloak at him while muttering a series of incomprehensible words he couldn’t catch.

The lingering aftertaste from the drop of dark chocolate tasted sweeter than it did bitter.

[ashleyswrittenwords]

Whumptober No.7

I’ve Got You (Support | Carrying | Enemy to Caretaker)

Series Summary: After Calamity Ganon awakens, Zelda is left alone and heartbroken. Now something horrible has happened to Link and no more is she merely tasked with fighting the Calamity - but also what is left of her knight.

Against her better judgement, Zelda unfurled from the ball she had cocooned herself into. Impa was long gone – back to the village that wasn’t too far from where she stayed stargazing. Chills snuck down her spine and her joints ached from the long period of stasis on the ground.

She rolled up into a seat, hands quickly rubbing at the crick forming in her neck.

There were a tumultuous number of factors that made this a bad idea. Even while knowing that, she didn’t feel the urge to return to the village where she knew she’d be safe and warm. There was a freedom in being alone, a hint of the independence she had always yearned for.

Now, her fingertips reached for the sky.

I believe he was looking for you.

Her movements stuttered and her arms folded behind her head.

The implications of that were obvious and to pretend they were anything else was childish, but that didn’t mean she wouldn’t dwell on it any less. Nor would it spell that she would forget the way Link saw her for the brief span of time. It was almost him.

Almost.

Behind her was a cluster of buildings and within that light from several pitched tents. Zelda wasn’t sure how long she had been away. The songs she could scarcely hear coming from the village had ceased and she assumed that the only ones awake were the rotating night watch. Her nose scrunched at the brief comparison to her former guard. These people were far from that. Though some had formal training, the majority were simply men and women who had lost enough to follow her in protecting what was left of Hyrule.

It was confounding because it was her fault after all. Normally Impa would scold her into “corralling her thoughts”, but Impa wasn’t here to read her mind. Zelda could be as unschooled as she pleased.

A short walk is what she needed, or that’s what she told herself. She’d be a fool to waste a night like this. Other than the slight wading in the snow, it wasn’t hard to convince herself to do just that. The land laid out in front of her, the darkness not as fierce when the stars were there to light the way. The snow, however, hid small crags that made her trip.

She made an embarrassingly uncouth noise, found her bearings, and glanced back at the town she was temporarily leaving. At that point the distance would mask any uncouthness she could muster and it suited her just fine. Zelda wobbled up the hill to gain a better vantage point.

Castle Town had been once formidable. It had fortified walls to keep its wealth within and its enemies outside. For centuries, it had endured and even grown. On a clear night, one could spy the lights of Castle Town from the peak of Mount Lanayru – she would know because she had done it. A chill not born from cold met her as she stared at the black abyss of where the city was meant to be. Nothing but the dull hue of Calamity Ganon illuminated the castle.

As the princess, she should feel anguish and she had for a time. Guilt, sorrow, and grief rolled into one wedged deep. But no one human can keep living with that weight, according to Impa of course. Zelda found that she had only gotten used to it; dulled it, adapted to live with it. None of that was communicated to her Sheikah friend. Some things were better left unsaid.

Below her was the snaking Regencia River, winding from Hyrule Castle’s moats and to the south. Zelda had seen is freeze over before, but she recalled remark from Purah about the downward temperature trends.

Ice skating. That was something she missed. She wasn’t particularly good at it, as much as her father bragged. To anyone that discussed his daughter with him, Zelda was a renaissance woman to the fault of where the kingdom needed her most. Who was to call him out when her days were spent studying in monasteries and venturing across the country for holy springs?

Zelda glanced back at the village while biting at the inside of her cheek. Scaling down the hill left her completely out of view, but her feet had their own mind.

Her mother, however, was a little too honest. It was her smile that Zelda remembered the most, toothy and unadulterated. Always so perfectly her and bursting with optimism. Before the doctors had barred Zelda from seeing her mother alive again, she promised her that she would be able to surface her power. In a sense, she wasn’t wrong but it couldn’t have been what she had expected.

Zelda’s boots toed the edge of the iced over river. Solidness against rubber felt safe enough and once she had smoothed back any loose hairs from her braid, the woman had a surge of confidence. It bubbled in her chest and twitched the corners of her lips upward.

The boot’s heel picked up in hesitance before stepping on the ice altogether.

This was silly.

She took another step and the liberty to slide it across the surface, her stance wobbling in uncertainty. Another step when she regained it. Pale hands outstretched on either side of her. They traded heights frantically as nervous laughter trembled on her lips.

Surely, she had gone mad.

With time she created a gentle shuffling of feet and her subconscious dared her to venture further. Whatever she was doing was a pitiful bastardization of ice skating, but she’d be lying to think that having the correct footwear would make any difference.

A noise made her whip her head back to the shore. The swiftness caused her to misplace her weight and her back foot slipped forward. Her backside hit the ice harshly, pain shot up her sides.

“Dammit-”

The curse froze on her lips when a sharpness pierced through the air. It lasted long, as if snaking through the air. Suddenly Zelda felt it and her hands scraped up the ice only for her to fall again. The bank was so far with her, nearly halfway across the river’s width. Another low, cutting sound caught her ears and then the ice turned to large sectioned puzzle pieces.

Zelda held her breath, scrambling upward to see the world turn and capsize.

Her environment muffled. Shock stalled her muscles as icy cold invaded her senses.

Cold, cold, cold.

She kicked her feet wildly only to realize that she couldn’t tell which direction was up. It wasn’t until the weight of her boot suctioned her further into the dark abyss did she begin pulling herself to the surface. The first attempt was lame, and already Zelda’s muscles burned fiercely.

Anxiety gripped her. She kicked again, then again until there was nothing more she could give. Cold solid ice scraped her fingertips and despite the force she applied to her pounding, it wouldn’t give. In the murky water, Zelda watched how more air left her.

Screaming. She was screaming.

It was foolish. All of this was, she decided suddenly when her hands left the ice. Born a princess, soon motherless, a life of falling dominos left her an orphan altogether.

What was the point?

Meant to be Hylia’s servant, maybe. And she had been for a time. Now here she was, drowning in a river caused not by Ganon. Her lungs met the unforgivable water. It would soon be all black due to her closing her eyes or falling deeper into the river.

Life was unforgiving too. All it did was take. Zelda was all too willing to give: her time, energy, opportunity. Had it not been good enough for Hylia?

She just wanted to be happy – even if it took taking a few dedicated moments back.

The water jostled her.

Had she taken too much?

Solidness gripped her arm.

Her mother seemed happy. Is that why she died?

Then, her waist.

Zelda’s lungs hurt. She wanted it to stop.

“Death is only good when it’s swift.”

It was as if he meant to add that he knew from experience. He watched her with stolen eyes. His coat, too, was most likely stolen. The winter weather an excuse enough to mask what Calamity Ganon had done to him. She had heard stories of him tricking clueless people into giving him shelter.

Zelda hated him. This was not Link. How dare he pretend to be the same man!

But the string of her bow relaxed anyway because nothing good ever came from hope.

There was pressure on her chest. So much pressure that came and went.

The woman was taken away by Impa. The town was built into the hillside, so she found herself on a rooftop. Zelda was stuck in a fight with him. His grin was wild, drunk until she read his steps wrong and her arm was caught in the crossfire of his blade. It was a shallow cut only because he jerked back at the sound of fabric tearing. Blood pooled in the wound, but she rebounded quickly.

The jacket she wore was roughly being torn.

Then, muttering anger. “…never walk on river ice…”

Her short sword balanced in her hand as she met him once more. Link appeared laxed, meeting her blows with an unreadable expression – staring uncomfortably at her arm. The roof was sloped, and with him taking the upper ground she expected this to be difficult. Zelda hadn’t expected to be tripped by his foot and sent tumbling into a snowbank. He was gone by the time she recovered.

Unexpected warmth enveloped her. She clung to it, shivering violently. It was a moving heat that adjusted her until she was comfortably cradled. There was a crackling fire singing in her ears and something that was distinctly not fire. A haven she desperately clung to.

Zelda couldn’t feel much. Her hands were the ice that trapped her. She pressed her fingers closer to that warmth – she wasn’t burned, just pulled tighter. Exhaustion took hold of her mild consciousness. There was a smell that was familiar, but sleep overtook her before she could figure it out.

  “Princess?”

The sudden light made Zelda squint. She buried herself deeper into the quilts.

“Princess, please. Are you alright?”

Light nudges stirred her to lucidity. She blinked, adjusting to the brightness and then to who was in front of her. Esme stared with wide eyes, adverting them with a flush. Zelda shivered and, to her horror, looked down to see pale nakedness. The princess yelped, pulling the blankets around her tightly.

She was at the entrance of a barn; the doors were ajar. Beyond Esme was her soaked clothes laid out nearly on hay bales.

Esme seemed to take assessment, already with a steaming cup in hand. “You have your people worried sick, love.”

“I-I um,” she swallowed, sitting up. It was difficult to form words. She looked down at her forearm to see intricate bandages around her wound from last night. “Did you see anyone else here?”

Esme gave her an odd look, glancing around the small barn.

Evidently not.

[c-c-cherry]

Talk to Me

AKA: Link doesn’t like storms. Also Zelda and Link really need to talk more. 

BOTW Zelink Hurt/comfort, POST-GAME, a LOT of angst (but it’s a happy ending!) 

WORD COUNT: 4196

◇◆◇◆◇◆◇◆◇◆◇◆◇◆◇

“Alright. According to the map, it should take about 3 more days to reach Zora’s Domain. We’re making good time here, aren’t we, Link?”

Link felt his heart warm his body as Zelda smiled warmly. Genuinely. There were so many times a hundred years ago that she had to “smile” during so many occasions, so many meetings, so many failed attempts. She had to put on a brave face and smile through it all. Now it was different.

Link nodded in agreement and walked alongside the princess as they picked the last of the apples they had come across. Link stooped down and fed one of his to his horse and shoved the rest in his bag, securing it onto the horse’s saddle.

“It’s funny. I never knew how much food could grow in the wild. I suppose I always thought that it came solely from farms, now.” Zelda said thoughtfully, examining the red fruit, “I assumed that most life had been wiped out from the Calamity, but somehow things still managed to grow. It’s fascinating.”

“It’s just that…” The princess paused, rolling the apple around in the palm of her hand, seeming lost in thought.

“Oh, never mind,” she said absentmindedly, turning to Link, “We should get going. The faster we travel the faster we’ll get there.”

Link let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding in. It had been at least a month or so since the couple had defeated Ganon, but both still had yet to talk to each other about it. You would assume that two people would bond over the shared experience, but Link felt like treading on that territory just pushed them away.

It seemed like both of them were reluctant to speak about their experiences; he still had no idea how Zelda stayed, holding back Ganon for his 100 year slumber and she had yet to know about his epic quest while she was keeping Ganon at bay.

He sighed and remained content. He walked away from the apple tree, mounting his horse as the princess did the same and, side by side, rode closer and closer to their destination.

*

The sun had finally begun to set, and the two of them were closer than before after a long day of traveling. Zelda breathed in a breath of fresh air and admired the mountains as their horses slowly trudged on. She liked that she had more time to appreciate nature now. It felt nice.

Link rode on silently next to her, seeming as content as she was. The champion leaned his head back, his eyes partly closed, and embraced the wonderful weather. Zelda giggled. She barely saw this side of Link before the Calamity, but she was glad that she could now.

Sure, he was still a silent champion, but not as silent as before. He spoke when he felt he needed to now. He felt that the burden he carried upon his back was no longer so heavy that his words were locked away. And he wasn’t sworn to her anymore, either. He could go off and live his life as he wanted, yet he preferred to stay by her side. She found it comforting.

Link seemed to have heard her soft giggling, as his eyes flew open and his head turned to hers, an eyebrow raised.

“Nothing’s wrong, Link. I just like seeing you so happy.”

She watched as the hero’s face flushed red, his mystical blue eyes barely meeting hers.

“You act like you’ve been caught doing something forbidden!” Zelda laughed heartily, “We have the freedom to feel happy now. No one can tell us that we cannot do so!”

Link looked long and hard at her before chuckling as well, their giggles turning into small fits of laughter which echoed through the trees and the mountainside like a song.

Their laughter was cut short when Link’s face perked up, his eyes suddenly taking on a serious tone. Zelda sobered up and frowned.

“What’s wrong?”

Link’s eyes glanced up at the clouds, which were now forming a dark wall above their heads. A soft rumbling could be heard in the distance. Link bit his lip in concern.

“I think it’s going to rain soon, Zel.”

By late evening, it was Zelda who had felt the first drop on her nose. Blinking in surprise, she watched another one fall onto her hand. And another. And another. Soon the landscape was being sprinkled with soft rain, the quiet sound being heard throughout as the sun finally set.

“We should find somewhere dry,” Link looked tense, his eyes fixated on the sky.

Zelda much enjoyed the rain, but she didn’t want to spend the night in the cold with wet clothes and gear. Link was right.

After staring at their map, they noticed in annoyance that there was no small town anywhere remotely near them. Link closed in on the map to locate any stables, and to their disappointment, there was nothing.

The sun had set. It was getting dark. They were starting to get cold, too.

“I think we have no choice but to trudge on. There could be unmarked shelter up ahead,” Zelda sighed, grabbing the reins on her horse. Link remained tense, but nodded in agreement.

After what felt like hours, but was probably more like 45 minutes, Zelda squinted and noticed a peculiar structure in the distance. Upon further inspection, she noticed:

“A cabin! Link, I think that’s a cabin over there!”

The two of them picked up speed as the rain finally pattered down harder on them, the sprinkle becoming a full-on rain. Dismounting their horses into a small stable-like thing attached to a cabin, they pulled out their wallets and walked into the small cabin, hoping to offer money for a bit of shelter for the night. Zelda shivered, wet clothes clinging to her, but as Link knocked on the door, he found no answer.

Slowly pulling the door open, they found that the cabin was dark and almost completely empty. Clearly someone had not been here for years.

“It seems abandoned.” Zelda thought out loud, “ But...should we really go into someone else’s house?”

The patter of rain on their backs morphing into a violent stream of water gave them no other second thoughts as they pushed through the door with their things pulled off their horse’s saddles.

*

The rain’s hard drops could be heard from the roof and the outside, which made them feel at ease that they were no longer in the sudden downpour and sheltered by this wooden lodging.

Link sighed in frustration as he found that most of his wooden weapons were completely soaked, but felt relief as he found a single torch in the bottom of his pack that remained mostly dry. Lighting it, he  lit the only light in the centre of the room that had long ago been burnt out, giving them a dim lighting in their cabin.

Zelda shivered, and Link found himself starting to freeze up in his wet clothes as well. The two stripped hastily and grabbed their other set of dry clothes, hanging up the wet ones up to dry.

“Can we close the window?” Zelda asked, making her way over to one of the walls. Wind whipped harshly outside, shaking the cabin and coming in through the open window. But upon closer inspection, Zelda found that the window had long been broken.

“Well, at least the window isn’t above the bed…” she thought to herself, “But it seems to be quite close to the light. Let’s hope the wind isn’t strong enough to blow it out.

Link nodded. He took the torch and lit a small fire in the fireplace, bringing out their apples from earlier. The room had barely anything in it; a fireplace, a now lit lantern hanging in the centre of the room, a wooden chair that seemed to be rotting, and a sturdy, rather large bed. A mattress made of hay and fabric still lay on the bed, but any blankets or pillows were already gone.

“What are you making?” Zelda asked, pulling out their bedrolls and pillows from her pack and setting them up cozily on the bed. She was reluctant to bring such items as they would stay in stables and inns, but Link insisted on bringing them ‘just in case’.

“Looks like simmered fruit tonight,” Link answered quietly, blowing out the torch and readying the apples, “We can go hunting tomorrow morning so we can have something meaty. But this is all I can do for now.”

“I think it’s perfect.” Zelda answered, coming up behind him and wrapping her arms around him. Link turned and returned the gesture, smiling warmly, but Zelda noticed something off about him. His shoulders were too tense. His gaze looked to be somewhere else.

“Is something wrong?” she asked him, kneeling down beside him as he put the apples in the cooking pot. Link bit his lip at the question, but shook his head.

“Are you sure, Link? Because you can talk to me. After all we’ve…” Zelda stopped herself, slowly trailing off. Now probably was not the time to bring up old memories about their trials and hardships.

Will there ever be a right time?

Noticing her distress, Link patted her head affectionately and smiled, “Everything’s fine, Zel.”

Nodding skeptically, Zelda soon forgot the ordeal as Link finished making their meals and the two sat in comfortable silence, sitting on the side of the bed and eating. Their legs dangled off the side of the bed, and the two of them slipped off their shoes and set their plates down by the fire, which Link had now put out.

The dim light of the lit lantern hanging from the ceiling was their only light, and the two of them laughed as they recalled a memory from Gerudo Town when Link first accompanied Zelda to the women’s only haven, still sitting on the side of the bed.

“You were the only voe there!” Zelda giggled. Link’s ears grew hot at the thought of it. His eyes shined brightly as he too chuckled at the story.

“Urbosa had to escort us, remember? I thought that one guard was going to kill me!” Link replied, covering his mouth as his small fit of laughter turned into a bigger one. Zelda had her hand laid beside her on the bed and Link placed his hand over hers, both not noticing the gesture as they continued to laugh about old stories.

Link had recovered most of his memories by now. He felt whole again for the first time in awhile. He was glad that he could finally laugh about old times with Zelda again. When he first woke up in the shrine of resurrection, he thought he would never regained any memory of who he once was.

Link’s eyes lit up as he thought of an especially funny time.

“Hey! Remember when--”

*BOOM*

The cabin shook from the ground up as an exceptionally large thunderclap shook the skies. The wind picked up speed and the rain pattered harder on the roof. Even Zelda herself felt shocked into silence as she watched the lantern hanging from the ceiling swing back and forth slowly from the impact.

She finally regained focus and waited for Link to continue his story, but found that he wasn’t speaking. The hero beside her tensed up significantly, the hand on top of Zelda’s tightening its grip as his eyes flew shut, a painful expression on his face.

“Link?” Zelda inched closer to him in concern, “Are you alright?”

Link’s eyes flew open again, his gaze elsewhere. She watched as his face flickered through a thousand emotions before he regained a neutral expression again.

“Link?”

“I’m fine.”

Link slowly lifted his hand off of Zelda’s and crossed his arms tightly against his chest, shrinking into

Himself. His expression looked shameful, his lips pursed slightly and his eyes widened. He looked pretty shaken up.

“Link, you’re awfully tense. Please, tell me what’s wrong.” Zelda begged, placing a soft hand on his shoulder. She knew it was hard for him to open up, but maybe a nudge would help him voice his feelings.

Link seemed to melt into her touch at first, but soon shrugged it off and dropped his head down, letting his hair fall in front of his face.

“Link--”

*BOOM*

Link’s breath hitched in a small gasp, his knees now pulled up to his chest. Zelda frowned in confusion as she brought herself closer to him.

“What’s wrong?” After no response, she placed one tender hand on his shoulder and another one on his head, “Look at me, Link.”

She slowly lifted the champion’s head up and let out a soft gasp. His blue eyes shimmered with unshed tears, and his expression looked fearful.

She didn’t say anything for the longest time and Link felt awareness suddenly hit him as the tips of his ears burned red. He quickly blinked any tears away and regained his neutral expression. His voice cracked as he spoke.

“We should get to bed.”

Zelda nodded in worry.

*

They silently got under the covers and took off their socks, setting them in their shoes. The bed was pressed up against two walls, the top and side of the bed were protected by wooden walls, and the foot of the bed had just enough room on the ground to put their shoes and packs.

Link gave Zelda the most sheltered side of the bed, his primal instinct was to keep her safe, but the princess didn’t miss the worried expression on his face that came with it. Zelda frowned as Link pulled the covers over his head, hair covering his eyes. He refused to look at her. It was bone-chilling.

The bed was large enough so that the two of them had breathing room and just enough room so that the two barely touched each other. It was still much smaller than Link’s bed in Hateno and the beds in Hyrule castle, but Zelda didn’t seem to mind.

Ultimately, they decided to keep the lantern lit as it was their only source of light in this winding, dark, stormy woods. Zelda felt her eyes start to grow heavy with exhaustion, and she turned her head to the hero sleeping next to her, who had his back to her. The patter of rain on the roof gave her a steady rhythm to fall asleep to.

“Goodnight, Link.” she whispered. Link didn’t answer.

*

*BOOM*

A monumental clap of thunder sent Zelda’s eyes flying open. Blinking, she remembered, We’re in a cabin. It’s just a storm.

Zelda was actually very fond of rain and storms on late nights. She wondered if Link rather enjoyed them as well. She rolled over to see if the crash had woken him up as well, but outstretching her arms, she frowned.

Where’s Link?

Sitting up, she squinted her eyes in the dim light, and looked around.

He can’t be outside in this weather…

Blinking in surprise, she saw the silhouette of the hero at the foot of the bed, hands grasping the sheets next to him aggressively. She couldn’t tell over the sound of the rain, but she thought she could hear his breathing from over here.

“Link?” she asked groggily, “What are you doing?”

The hero jumped, startled, but stayed in the same spot, his back to the princess. She could see his hands shaking slightly in the dim light above them.

She begged him softly to come back to bed, but the hero remained in the same spot in silence. Zelda sighed and sat up straighter. There had to be something going on with him.

Before she could speak again, Link’s voice, soft and low said something. Zelda craned her neck and raised her eyebrows.

“What was that?”

“We’re…” he paused, “We’re in a forest...do you think we’ll get...struck?”

Zelda, confused replied, “What, by the lightning? No, Link. We’re in a cabin. Don’t be silly.”

She watched as the hero’s head turned to the window, standing up suddenly and walking cautiously over, muttering to himself.

“But wood is a natural conductor...we’re surrounded by trees which means we’re even more likely to get struck...what if there’s something metal on top of the cabin?...what if the cabin catches on fire?...And if each lightning strike carries up to one billion volt of electricity...and the possibility of a tree being struck and exploded is likely...what if--”

*BOOM*

Link’s quiet ramblings were interrupted as a loud clap of thunder shook the cabin again. It seemed that the storm was almost directly above them, and the wind picked up as did the rain. A flash of light could be seen outside the broken window and the horses outside whinnied loudly.

Link jumped back from the window and Zelda could hear his breath grow heavier. The lantern swung in the centre of the room and Link had both hands over his ears, kneeling on the floor.

“Link!”

Zelda leapt from the bed and ran over to Link, wrapping her arms around his back and pulling him up slowly.

“Is it the storm? Is that what’s bothering you?” she asked frantically. Link’s tense body was shaking like a leaf and his hair was sleek with sweat The hero seemed to get ahold of himself, pushing the princess away softly, standing up and backing away from her.

“Link, come back to bed and we can talk there.” Zelda offered, gesturing towards the cozy, warm bed. Link turned his back on the princess, hugging himself tightly. Zelda could see his shoulders still shook, and he stuttered out a few words.

“I’m...I’m fine...I’m fine, Zel..”

His voice was shaky, unstable, and Zelda knew better than to just let him stand there in such a state.

“Link, why won’t you just come here?” she asked him tenderly. The wind blew through the windows and Zelda felt herself shiver. Link seemed almost agitated that she was still convincing him to come to her.

“Zelda, I said I’m fine. It’s stupid, anyw--”

*BOOM*

The lantern swinging suddenly blew out, leaving them in complete darkness, A broken-sounding cry came from Link as he stumbled in blind panic through the darkness and into Zelda’s arms. She wrapped one arm around his back, the other tenderly on the back of his head. His head fell into her chest and she thought she could hear a soft whimper escape him.

“Okay, back to bed.” she said gently, leading both of them to the bed in the darkness. Another thunderclap had the whole cabin shaking from its foundation and Zelda felt Link’s shoulders tense up.

“So it is the storm, then?” she asked quietly, guiding him to the walled side of the bed this time. Link tried to get ahold of his breathing as he was set back into bed, but failed miserably as another clap of thunder and a crash of lightning could be heard from outside.

“You didn’t have to keep it from me. We could have talked about it, you know.” Zelda pried, getting under the covers herself and inching closer to Link.

“We don’t just...talk about things, do we Zelda?”

Link’s sudden composure surprised the princess. He seemed almost angry at what she had said, judging by his harsh tone and the way his face was pressed into the pillow.

“What?”

“Of..of course you wouldn’t know that I hate storms. Because we never talk. We can never talk about what happened during the Calamity, or the hundred years that just happened, or--or anything!”

Zelda began to understand where he was coming from. But he had never been so upset before, it shook her to the core.

“Link…”

“You wouldn’t know how long I spent in that Divine Beast, hours and hours of trying not to get killed--trying not to fall off of it in order to save Urbosa! And that goddamn fight--gods it was so fast, that--that thing and lightning it would shoot was--”

Link halted his rant, his eyes lighting up with that very same fear that he felt when he first felt the electric shock go through his veins, the first time he felt his heart stop, the first time he felt his body vibrate with the pure electricity that was coursing through his veins.

And suddenly he wasn’t in a cabin in the woods anymore--he was there.

He was right there in Vah Naboris again, fending for himself again, the hunger pangs in his stomach refusing to cease as the food in his inventory had long depleted. He was right there, reliving his inner cries for help that no one would ever answer.

And he was reliving the fight; every minute of it.

He could feel the scars on his back start to bleed again, the voltage running under his skin, the complete and utter helplessness, and a shrill cry that he didn’t know was coming out of his own throat until he felt himself clutching his chest, gasping for air, and the shell-shocked emptiness that he felt when Thunder-blight finally died.

He stood in shock as Urbosa blessed upon him the power to control the one thing that he feared besides Ganon himself, and warped him back to the desert.

He was reliving the grueling moments in which he would sit in his house in Hateno just days after and do...nothing. Nothing but sit there and wonder if there was anything left worth fighting for. If he really was just in this whole thing alone, and if he should be feeling this empty about “saving his home”.

He walked out of his house, and fought and killed a Lionel. No--two. Just to feel something, any kind of feeling at all.

And then he was sobbing. He was back in the cabin in the woods and he was wrapped up in Zelda’s arms and sobbing his heart out. And his breath was so shallow that he could feel his lungs in his throat and the tight hug that Zelda was pulling him into as he felt endless tears streaming down his face and onto Zelda’s shirt and the blankets.

And he tried to put a hand over his mouth as his crying got louder and louder and his entire body shook even more violently, but Zelda tenderly lifted the hand off his face and squeezed it tightly, saying nothing.

And the crashing of the thunder made him cry even harder in pure fear as he clung onto the princess, begging for the world to stop spinning.

And then it did.

The lightning and thunder slowly got farther and farther, but the rain remained, sprinkling overtop the roof and dulling his cries. Link breathed shakily and felt himself shake just a little bit less, cry just a little bit softer. His eyes felt puffy and his face still wet with salty tears, but he felt alive again. He was here in present time again.

He didn’t dare lift his face up in fear of what the princess thought of him now. Some hero, getting worked up over a little bit of rain. It was humiliating.

The two of them said nothing for a long while, and Link remained with his head buried in her chest, breathing slowly as his small hiccups subsided. Finally grasping the courage to look up, he lifted his gaze to find the princess in near tears. Her face looked tender, as if remembering something that deeply hurt. Link opened his mouth to explain himself.

“Zelda, I--”

“I told you that I’d been watching you all this time.” she said unsteadily, her eyes glazed over with unshed tears, “I told you that after the final battle. But that was a lie.”

Link grew confused. What is she talking about?

“I said that I’d been watching you and your perilous quests, but I never truly saw you. For those hundred years, I couldn’t see anything. It was strange, really. It was like I didn’t have a body. I couldn’t see you, but I could sense you.” she continued, “I could sense how brave you were, and when you grew closer and closer to Hyrule Castle, and whenever you took control over another Divine Beast. But I never felt anything that you felt. I never knew of your endless hunger, your constant fight with life and death, and Link, if I had known, I would have done everything I could to help you.”

Link could tell she was on the verge of crying now too, so he locked eyes with her and gave her a teary smile.

“It’s okay.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay.”

Zelda sighed and embraced him closer. And they spoke freely about things, freely without anyone to judge. They spoke about the things that they were capable of, the things that gave them great pain and none at all. They spoke until the rain stopped hitting the roof and their eyes became heavy with exhaustion. They both drifted off into an easy sleep, and Link chuckled as Zelda’s eyelashes tickled his forehead.

“We really need to talk more.”

[frizz22]

A story where Sabrina and Ambrose find out about Zelda stealing Leticia, we only got to see Hilda’s reaction I would love to see theirs

COMBO Prompt: One above and also–Sabrina actually calls Zelda mom, and it’s not just at her deathbed. Read on ao3

Notes: Okay, I cheated a little with these, since I had this scene in my You Always Say No fic and it fit so perfectly for both. I changed it up a little, though. Hope you still enjoy!

Also, in this fic it’s customary for a witch to receive a gift from her mother on her dark baptism. Though the aunties didn’t tell Sabrina about this tradition, Zelda still went to lengths to get a family heirloom restored to give to Sabrina; only to have to hold onto it because of debacles. 

Zelda was cooing over Leticia, unable to help herself from fawning over the babe, when a door slammed down below, and she felt the rush of new magic pulsing in the air even floors above.

Turning in surprise, Zelda blinked. “She, she signed?” She murmured incredulously, though the signs were unmistakable.

Despite her confusion, Zelda quickly cast an alarm spell over Leticia—so she’d be alerted if the babe woke—and bent over her trunk to snag a small box out before stashing in her robe pocket.  

She eased the door open and shut it quietly behind her so as to no disturb Leticia and then made for Sabrina’s room. When Hilda didn’t emerge from her room as well, Zelda assumed her sister was already asleep—good, Hilda needed to recover from holding off the Thirteen and Red Angel; she’d expended enormous amounts of energy. There was no need to wake her sister, she’d find out in the morning. 

Besides, Zelda wanted to have this moment alone with her niece. 

Knocking tentatively, Zelda waited. Though she knew Sabrina was in her room, the magic palpable enough it would’ve given away the girl’s location anywhere in the house, she didn’t want to force anything.

After a moment, a quiet, “come in,” filtered through the door. Pushing it open slowly, Zelda took in Sabrina’s new appearance more fully than she’d been able to during her astral projection. Her niece was sitting cross-legged on the bed, already in her pajamas and cuddling her stuffed rabbit.

“Want to talk about it?” Zelda questioned softly, coming to sit next to Sabrina.

Sniffing, Sabrina’s chin trembled. “I signed the Book of the Beast.” She informed her unnecessarily, leaning into Zelda’s side. “Ms. Wardwell said it was the only way to stop the Thirteen and the Red Angel. I had to burn them with Hellfire, like in my vision from the Malum Malus. But I wasn’t strong enough, so I signed. I, I didn’t see any other way to save everyone.”

Zelda froze midway between wrapping her arm around Sabrina comfortingly. Badly wanting to leave right then and strangle Wardwell for coaxing Sabrina out of the safety of Hilda’s protection and into the woods.

Exhaling slowly to rid herself of the red that flooded her vision at the mention of Wardwell, Zelda hugged Sabrina against her. “Oh darling, we were already doing everything possible to protect the town. The coven was safe at the academy and the mortals at Baxter High. We only had to last an hour. It worked.”  

A few tears slipped down Sabrina’s face. “Not everyone was at the school, Auntie Zee. Roz, Susie… Harvey. They were all outside and in danger.”

It was a monumental feat, controlling herself. First Wardwell, and now the Kinkle boy? Zelda squeezed her eyes shut and pressed her lips together to not curse anything. Why, why was it that whenever something happened Harvey was somehow the inspiration or motivator?

Zelda knew, on some level, it wasn’t his fault her niece was so heedless in her pursuit of her wants, of what she’d deemed was right. But things certainly would have been much easier this past month and a half if Harvey Kinkle had never been part of Sabrina’s life.

“It’s not your job to protect everyone, sweetheart. That is a much too heavy burden to carry, let alone for a teenager. No matter your abilities.” She reached up and tucked some of Sabrina’s hair back. “I am sorry you felt you had to give up so much.” Sabrina just curled further into Zelda’s side. “What were you thinking? Leaving the protection of the school? Of your Aunt Hilda?” She admonished, though they’d all made it out in one piece, it very well could have ended differently.

Pulling back, Sabrina wiped some of her tears away. “I was thinking of what you would have done in my shoes.”

She stared at her niece, dumbfounded. “What?”

“I was just doing what I’ve seen you do all my life. Protect people. It’s not always crazy like summoning Hellfire,” Sabrina smiled sheepishly, “but it’s always been there. The harrowing, the feast, Batibat, the resurrection…” she trailed off, lip quivering at the reminder. “I also understand why you’ve been so keen on following the church’s lead. I felt the Dark Lord’s presence tonight; His true presence, not just a possession. It was chilling, terrifying. He’s really dangerous, Auntie.” Sabrina informed her, pale faced.

Though panic shot through her at the idea of the Dark Lord hovering over Sabrina as she signed, Zelda also felt relief that Sabrina understood where she was coming from. “I know He’s dangerous, Sabrina. Which is why your constant rebellion against Him has given me ulcers.” She half-teased, cupping Sabrina’s cheek for a moment. “I’m glad you finally understand. Though there is something I understand now as well. I was,” she took a deep breath. “I was letting my past experiences cloud how I raised you.

“I was stifling you, trying to force you down a certain path in order to keep you safe. My fears come from a genuine place, as you’ve realized. But my fears stem from more than just knowing the Dark Lord is dangerous, darling. He took something irreplaceable from me and in the process forced me to do something I was strongly against. A part of me broke, Sabrina.” She whispered, explicitly confessing for the first time how damaged she’d been after Edward’s murder; how she’d never really recovered from it fully. And she hated it, hated how the word ‘broke’ stuck in her throat, hated the implications of it, hated that she wasn’t strong enough to glue herself back together sufficiently enough that she was now confessing to her niece. But it needed to be done, she couldn’t continue as she had, holding it in until she’d purged it with whipping. It wasn’t an option anymore; which meant this… talking.

Sabrina dropped her rabbit and lurched forward, wrapping her arms around Zelda fully. The gesture stunned Zelda, and after a moment she brought up a hand to stroke Sabrina’s hair; grateful her girl was staying quiet, as if she sensed that if she spoke Zelda would stop.  

Taking a shaky breath, Zelda continued. “I am relieved you’ve come to understand where I’ve been coming from… but you were right to work to change certain things as well. I’m sorry, sweetheart.”

With a vigorous shake of her head, Sabrina pulled back from their embrace but gripped Zelda’s forearm tightly. “No, Auntie Zelda, I’m sorry. A lot of pain could have been avoided if I’d just signed on my birthday.” She dropped her eyes, “you were right, everything has a price.” Sniffing, she lifted her gaze and there was a bit of that old spark in it again. “I’m not sorry for most of it, stopping the harrowing, the Feast of Feasts, helping Susie’s uncle….”  

Zelda restrained herself from pointing out that while her girl had the best of intentions, none of what she’d done had any lasting effect. Yes, the harrowing would stop for a little bit, Prudence and her sisters scared off. But that happened every now and then, but it would pick up again when a new group of witches wanted to hurt others the way they’d been hurt. And Sabrina had saved Prudence from a gruesome fate, certainly, but the Feast wasn’t ended by any means and would continue again the next year. As for Jesse Putnam… well, he was dead now even with their intervention.

But Sabrina’s heart was in the right place, she’d done those things to try and protect people, so Zelda wouldn’t admonish her beyond what she’d already done in the past. She just pressed her lips together and covered Sabrina’s hands with one of hers, squeezing slightly.

Sabrina curled into her side once more, a silence settling between them as they processed the conversation. Carefully, Zelda pulled the necklace out of her robe pocket with the hand not holding Sabrina against her. She was about to hand it over when her niece broke the silence.

“Are we going to talk about where you went? Why you disappeared?” And though there was no accusation in her tone, Zelda couldn’t help but feel they were both thinking if she’d been present tonight Sabrina might not have needed to sign—at the very least she’d never have allowed Sabrina to go off with Wardwell. Not that it mattered now, they couldn’t change the past.

Sliding the necklace back into her pocket, Zelda nodded slowly. Before she could explain, however, a thin wailing cry echoed down the hall, though it soon died down; Leticia likely just falling back to sleep.

Confused, Sabrina stiffened against her. “Was that a baby?!”

“Yes, I—”

“Why didn’t you say you had a baby here?” Sabrina demanded incredulously, pulling away from Zelda to stare at her.

A smile touched Zelda’s lips and she cupped Sabrina’s cheek for a moment. “I wanted to check on you first.”

Her niece softened at that and then remembered herself. “Well, now I want to talk about the baby.” She gestured towards the door, eyebrows raised expectantly as she adjusted her position, facing Zelda completely and tucking one leg underneath her.

Shaking her head affectionately, Zelda shifted on the bed to mirror Sabrina. “Her name is Leticia. She is the first born of Father Blackwood’s twins. That’s what I was going to tell you, why I disappeared earlier.” She clasped her hands in her lap to hide how she was twisting her fingers; anxiety was rolling through her, though why she was so nervous to tell Sabrina about Leticia she wasn’t sure. “I was summoned to the academy; Lady Blackwood had gone into premature labor and I was needed for the delivery. I tried to come back, Sabrina. I did, but—”

Sabrina waved a dismissive hand, “I know, Auntie, I know you wouldn’t have abandoned us. What about the baby?”

Huffing in amusement, Zelda went on to explain. “Lady Blackwood died. Her body under too much stress from her overuse of magic, from her pregnancy induced hysteria, the whole Thirteen and Red Angel situation… it was hardly an ideal time to give birth. She bled too much; I didn’t have my tools… I couldn’t help her. But both babes lived.”

Sagging in relief that the children were alright, Sabrina looked at her sharply then. “But why?” She gestured down to the door again.

“Leticia was born first, a surprise when all signs pointed to twin boys. I decided it was too dangerous for Faustus to claim her as his first born and there was no way to trick the coven into thinking her brother had been born first. You see, there are spells and—” Zelda went to explain but Sabrina headed her off.

“Spells and potions, yeah. I read about them for one of my classes.” Sabrina interrupted her impatiently, “why is Leticia here?”

Picking at the palm of her hand, Zelda swallowed. “I, I took Leticia for her own protection; to hide her and also raise her. The ways of our church can be cruelly archaic, sometimes Sabrina, and Faustus is bound to follow them as a High Priest. I was saving him the hardship of disposing of his child and Leticia by bringing her here.”

Sabrina licked her lips, “so, Leticia, she’ll, she’ll be your daughter?” She asked, voice a little high pitched.

She blinked, surprised this was the point Sabrina was focusing on and not on the fact that she’d taken the girl in the first place. “Well, I, yes. I suppose she will be. In every sense of the word at least.” And Zelda tried to mask how thrilled she was by the notion; especially when she saw how her niece’s face fell a bit.

“Oh, okay…” Sabrina murmured, nodding jerkily and clearing her throat.

Frowning in confusion, Zelda peered at her niece. Unsure why Sabrina seemed more upset by this than having to sign the book. But it wasn’t as if she could give Leticia to someone else, not that she could bear to part with the little girl in any case, so Sabrina would need to come to terms with another child being in the house.

Perhaps, perhaps she thought she was being replaced? Another adopted girl of a High Priest? Zelda had to admit, the parallels were somewhat disconcerting. But Leticia could never replace her girl.

Slowly, Zelda took the necklace back out of her pocket. “I have something for you.” She murmured, gripping the box tightly in her hands where they’d come to rest in her lap once more. “I, I intended to give it to you on your original Dark Baptism, but with everything…” Zelda raised a brow and chuckled slightly, and Sabrina gave her a wry smile in return, though there was still something akin to doubt in her eyes. “Well, anyway,” she handed the box over and waited for Sabrina to open it. “It belonged to my mother.” Zelda explained, as Sabrina admired the necklace, “and her mother before her and so on. It’s been passed down through Spellman women on their Dark Baptism for centuries. And I, I want you to have it.”

Sabrina carefully took the necklace from the box, tears in her eyes. “Your mom gave it to you?” She repeated tremulously.

Humming in the affirmative, Zelda placed a hand on Sabrina’s knee. “Yes, I wore it every day for a very long time. It means quite a lot to me, and I hope you come to value it as well.”

“Are you, are you sure you don’t want to save it for Leticia?” Sabrina whispered, running the chain through her hands and not meeting Zelda’s eye.

Taken aback, Zelda looked at Sabrina baffled. “Why would I save it for Leticia?” She inquired, the thought that Sabrina was trying to graciously reject her gift forcing itself into the forefront of her mind; her heart dropped at the idea.

Sniffing, Sabrina rolled her shoulders, eyes still downcast. “Because she’s your daughter.” Came a thick reply, “she’ll get to call you mom.” Several tears dripped off Sabrina’s nose. “And this is an heirloom that gets passed down from mother to daughter.”

The dark, sinking feeling that was threatening to pull Zelda under dissipated at Sabrina’s words. She wasn’t rejecting the gift, wasn’t rejecting Zelda. She truly thought she was being replaced and didn’t believe the necklace should go to her.

“Oh, my girl.” Zelda murmured, pulling Sabrina back into a tight embrace, her niece’s head tucked under her chin as Sabrina’s arms wound around her and fisted the material of her robe. “I never wanted to, to tell you this before.” She swallowed hard but forced herself to continue. “Because I didn’t want you to be uncomfortable or feel pressured or think I was trying to replace Diana. But I’ve loved you as a daughter. Always. You have always been, and always will be, my daughter.” She was crying now too, tears rolling down her cheeks.

Sabrina buried her face against Zelda’s shoulder. “No matter how many babies you take?” She asked tremulously, the question slightly muffled.

Zelda couldn’t help but laugh a little and hugged Sabrina tighter. “No matter how many babies I adopt.” She clarified, rocking the two of them on the bed gently. “Though I don’t plan on taking in anymore.” Zelda pulled back and framed her niece’s face, wiping the tears away with her thumbs.

A wide smile broke out on Sabrina’s face and she lurched forward and wrapped her arms around Zelda’s neck. “I never thought you were trying to replace Diana. I’m sorry for what I said the other night. You’re my mom in every way that counts…. I love you.” Sabrina murmured, sniffing once more.

Heart soaring at the words, Zelda clung to her girl tightly, and it took a moment for her to respond past the lump of emotions stuck in her throat. “I love you too, sweetheart.”

When Sabrina pulled back a minute later, she was chewing on her lip, suddenly shy. “Will, will you help me put it on?” She asked, already turning around and taking off the necklace Harvey had given her. Beaming, Zelda nodded and took the necklace and looped it around her girl’s neck before fastening it.

When she turned back around and let her hand drop from the pendant, Sabrina look at Zelda. “How does it look?”

“Lovely,” Zelda whispered, fussing with the chain, smoothing out a twist and gently touching a lock of Sabrina’s new platinum hair.

Not missing her aunt’s action, Sabrina’s hand came up to touch her hair as well. “Auntie Zee, does everyone’s hair change when they sign?” She asked, lightly tugging on the strand.

Reaching up and tucking a few stray locks behind Sabrina’s ear, Zelda shook her head. “No. It only happens in rare cases, when someone signs under extreme duress—which might be what happened to you tonight. Or when the witch or warlock signing is especially powerful. My hair did the same.” She reassured, smiling at the memory.

“Really?” Sabrina straightened and looked at her excitedly, “what did your hair look like before?” Her brow furrowed, as though she were trying to imagine her aunt with anything other than her fierce red locks.

Shifting on the bed to get more comfortable, Zelda huffed a little in amusement. “It was dark brown, like your father’s. We were so close in age and looked so alike people mistook us for twins at times. Thomas, Ambrose’s father, he had blonde hair like Hilda. Well, clearly Ambrose took after his mother, lucky for him; Thomas wasn’t much of a looker.”

“Auntie!” Sabrina playfully scolded, but she was smiling again. “But you had brown hair?” She asked, touching Zelda’s hair briefly before letting her hand fall.

Zelda nodded, “yes, and when I signed, it lightened and took on a reddish color. I was delighted, naturally, not only because of what the color change indicated about my powers, but also because I felt red hair fit my personality so much better.” She winked and Sabrina shook her head in amusement.

Sobering for a moment, Sabrina tugged at the ends of her own her. “So, it lasts forever then? The color change.”

Pressing her lips together, Zelda sighed. “Mine did, though I am not sure about others in general. It is not a common phenomenon and little research has been done on the topic. If you dislike this color, there are potions and spells we can use.” She offered, seeing Sabrina was self-conscious about the new look. “But that is something we can explore later. We should both be in bed.” Zelda arched a brow and stood. “Night darling, damned dreams.” She kissed the top of Sabrina’s head and made for the door.

“Night, Auntie Zee, thank you for everything. Love you.” Sabrina smiled at her and crawled under the covers.

Trying to contain herself, Zelda smiled back. “Love you too,” she breathed, switching off the light and closing the door behind her. Once out in the hall, Zelda had to lean against the wall, attempting to stem the fresh flow of tears making their way down her cheeks; though these were from joy.

Sabrina loved her.

Her reaction to the statement was over the top, on some level she knew this. Of course, Sabrina loved her, they were family. But to hear her girl say it, after so many years of conflict, after the gap between seemed to have been stretching endlessly for so long… it was something else. And then, then Sabrina had said Zelda was like a mother to her in every way that mattered.

Emotions clogged Zelda’s throat at the recent memory, and she covered her mouth to hide the wide, teary smile on her face. Her girl, her girl…. Sniffing, Zelda collected herself and made for her bedroom. 

~~~

She woke the next morning to a crying babe. Rubbing the grogginess from her eyes, Zelda changed Leticia’s diaper before casting a quick spell to dress for the day and fix her hair. It was a late start for her, though she suspected it would be one for most of Greendale given how late they’d all stayed up because of the impending crises of the fake storm, the Thirteen and the Red Angel.

Just as she was about to go downstairs to feed Leticia, a knock sounded on her door. Surprised anyone else was up, Zelda opened the door and found her nephew standing there, looking a little anxious.

“I meant to come find you last night, after witching hour. But I was tethered to the academy, I—” Ambrose fell silent, having noticed the small bundle in her arms. “That’s a baby.” He remarked, eyes darting back and forth between her face and Leticia in confusion.

“Come,” she smiled, leading the way down the hall and past the closed doors of Sabrina and Hilda’s rooms—they were still asleep; understandably, given the magic they’d used the night before. Once in the kitchen, Zelda prepped a bottle for Leticia and explained to Ambrose what happened after she’d been summoned away from Baxter High the night before.

When the bottle was ready, Ambrose stood and took it from her and then he took Leticia as well, carefully balancing the babe as he started to feed her. “Eat, auntie,” he instructed when she blinked at him. “I already had breakfast.” He grinned and turned his attention back to Leticia; cooing at her and saying ridiculous things as he sat down in his usual spot.  

Zelda did her best to hold back her tears at the interaction and busied herself with making tea and toast to hide her sudden surge of emotions. Once her food was ready, Zelda settled across the table from Ambrose, sipping on tea and munching on slightly burnt toast while chatting amicably. When both she and Leticia finished eating, Ambrose burped the babe, stood, rounded the table and handed Leticia back. He smiled tenderly at them as Zelda adjusted her arms to better accommodate Leticia who was snuggling into her chest.

Touching her arm, Ambrose waited until Zelda lifted her eyes to him to speak. “If you need anything, anything, let me know.” He insisted, eyes imploring her to not take this on alone.

She nodded. “Of course, darling,” Zelda murmured, reaching up and cupping his cheek briefly before patting it; emotions welling up again. Heaven, one would think she was the who’d given birth with how hormonal she was acting…. Though it was nice to have so many positive emotions swirling through her for once.

“You deserve this,” Ambrose stated quietly, catching her hand as she pulled away and squeezing it. “To have a child of your own,” he elaborated at her confused expression. “And she deserves a mom like you.” With that, Ambrose kissed the top of Zelda’s head and retreated from the room before she could react other than more tears brimming in her eyes.

Perhaps, she thought as she blinked back the tears, perhaps her feeling that things were looking up for the Spellman family wasn’t wrong, just mistimed. A little early. Because surely her heart couldn’t get any fuller.

[ladyspellwood]

Spellwood Week Day 5: AU

“Faustus Blackwood!” Zelda shrieked, struggling to free herself from his arms “Yes, dearest?” His low silky voice almost made her want to stop struggling. Almost. “Put me down!” He held onto her even tighter and she desperately tried not to laugh as he carried her across the lawn. “I don't think so. If you didn’t insist on wearing heels all of the time, I wouldn’t have to do this.” “Satan help me. If you don’t put me down, I will—” “You’ll what?” He loosened his hold on her as though he were going to let her fall and her arms immediately wrapped around his neck to keep herself cradled in his arms. Successfully bringing herself closer to him. “There. Now isn’t this better?” He murmured against her hair once he held her tightly once more. “I hate you.” Even though he knew she couldn’t see him, he smiled down at his blindfolded wife. “A fact I am well aware of, darling.” When he reached the tree line, he set her down gently and steadied her against his chest. He undid the knot holding the blindfold in place, careful not to mess up her hair. Once it came loose, she tore it off her face, ready to whirl around and reprimand him further until she caught sight of their surroundings. Warm lights floated in the trees and illuminated the woods behind the manor while bright red flowers climbed the tree trunks and filled the night air with their sweet perfume. In the center of the small clearing sat a table set for two. “Fau—”  she started to ask. “Happy anniversary, Lady Blackwood.” She turned to look back at him rendered speechless. Suddenly she jumped up to kiss him. He staggered back slightly but caught her and managed to keep them from falling to the ground. When the kiss ended, she cupped his face in her hands and looked down at him with a touched smile. “I thought…” “You thought I forgot?” She nodded sheepishly and began to regret picking a fight with him the instant they returned home from the Academy. He set her back on her feet and she focused on adjusting the collar of his shirt, not wanting to meet his eyes. He lifted her chin with a finger and forced her to look at him. “How could I forget the best day of my life?” Her green eyes softened. After all these years he still managed to make her weak in the knees. No longer trusting her legs to hold her, she slipped her arms around his waist. “I love you.” His hands moved to her hips and held her tight, “I love you too.” He kissed her slowly just to keep her to himself a little longer. With one last quick peck to her lips, he let her go, but her arms stayed around him. “Are you hungry?” She nodded and dropped her arms but held his hand as he led her to the table. “Good.” He held out her chair and as she settled into it dishes heaped with her favorite foods appeared. “Are the children joining us?” She asked as she regarded all of the food. “No. Tonight it only the two of us.” “Then why is there enough food to feed a small army?” “I needed to make sure there would be enough. After all, you are eating for two again.” He couldn’t keep the broad smile off his face, still elated by the news. She laughed lightly. “The baby is barely larger than my little finger, it's still too early for that.” Her stomach grumbled audibly. “I stand corrected. It would appear your son is hungry.” “Oh? Are we having another boy?” He joked, knowing it was too soon for her to be able to tell. She rolled her eyes and watched him put the choice bits of each dish on her plate. “As if you would want a girl.” His hands stilled and he raised a brow. “Why wouldn’t I? She will be as wicked smart and beautiful as you.” He set down the serving spoon and covered her hand with his. “I am actually hoping for a girl,” he admitted, “not that it matters either way.” He took her hand and drew her out of her seat and over to his where she settled comfortably in his lap. One of his hands held her in place while the other came to rest on her still flat stomach. “All I want is both of you safe in my arms a year from now.” His eyes softened with clear adoration while he held her protectively. She swallowed thickly, overwhelmed with his obvious love for her. If he kept this up she would turn into a puddle in his lap or start crying. Maybe both. She cleared her throat and caressed his cheek, “We will be.” She kissed him softly and tried to show him how much his words meant to her. When she pulled back, he saw her eyes remained shiny with tears. “Was it something I said?” He asked, amused by the soft side of his wife few ever got to see. She punched his shoulder causing him to wince. “Yes, you idiot. Quit ruining it.” A few of the tears spilled over as she smiled at him. "Satan, why am I crying?" She muttered under her breath.

“We can always blame it on hormones.” He winked at her and she rolled her eyes but couldn't be mad at him “You know when I said yes to marrying you, I never thought any of this—” She gestured around them— “would be our life." He smiled in agreement and pulled her in close where she willingly melded against him.

"It gets better too. I let the staff off early so we have the house to ourselves.” Still trying to recover from her bout of sentimentality, it took her a second to register what he’d said. “An entire night all to ourselves? When was the last time that happened?” “It has been a while,” he admitted. “But you are the one who refuses to take a break and let me whisk you away from Greendale for a week or two.” He wiped the water streaks off her cheeks, glad to see her smiling again. “Maybe because the last time you and I went away on vacation I came back pregnant with Judas.” “Judas was hardly an accident, dear.” Based on the look she gave him, she remembered that night in France as well as he did. “Besides I have already rectified that problem. You’re pregnant and we haven’t even left.” He flashed a caddish smile at her. “You are incorrigible.” “You’re the one that married me.” She leaned against him and put her head on his shoulder. “Yes, I did.” She could feel his laughter as it rumbled through his chest. He looked down at her and she closed her eyes.

“Any regrets?” Her eyes opened and gazed lovingly up at him. “No.” Her answer brought a warm smile back to his lips. Though their dinner sat at the table getting cold neither of them were willing to break apart to do anything about it. They remained there until her stomach interrupted them again. “Your child is hungry,” she remarked, not opening her eyes. “I believe it is our child, dear.”

She sighed as she moved to get up, but he held her in place and instead summoned her plate over. He took his hand away from the small of her back to pick up a fork despite her whine of protest. Though she quickly forgave him when he held up a forkful of food. She smiled gratefully and took the bite off his fork before settling back against him as she chewed. He took some food for himself before he offered her a choice piece of meat. She glanced at him warily as a smirk broke out on his face. When she moved to take it, he pulled it away playfully.

"Faustus," she warned.

“Say you will let me take you on another honeymoon and its yours.” She tried to glare at him but couldn’t manage to keep a smile off her face. “You realize most people only get one of those.” “That isn’t an answer.” The juicy piece of steak moved dangerously close to his lips as he pretended he was going to eat it himself. She quickly put a hand to his chest to stop him. “Yes, yes we can go away!” He grinned and held his fork back out. “You don’t play fair,” she said around the morsel. Which tasted better than it had any right to. “Not my style.” He gave her a charming smile.

"It's a good thing I am in love with you," she muttered.

[katedoesfics]

Shadows of Hyrule | Chapter 66

Link continued to stare at Dorian, and this only angered the Sheikah further. He stepped forward and grabbed Link by his shirt. His nostrils flared as he shouted at him.

“What did you do?”

“Uh,” Link started. “You know. Went out for tea and fruitcake.”

Dorian thrust him forcefully. His lips pulled back in a sneer.

“We closed a fucking portal,” Link shouted at him.

“Impa gave you no orders to close a portal,” Dorian barked back.

“I didn’t know I needed to take orders from Impa,” Link sneered. “We had an idea where one of the portals could be, so we checked it out.” He crossed his arms. “Maybe if Impa was a little more forthcoming -”

“Idiot,” Dorian snapped. “You had no business being at the Forgotten Temple.”

Link narrowed his eyes on the Sheikah. “No business? It’s my damn job to close those portals so we have a damn fighting chance in this war.”

“Your job,” Dorian hissed, “is to do as Impa says, when she says.”

Link held his gaze on Dorian. Something didn’t sit right with him, but he knew he would get no answers from the Sheikah.

“You’re friends almost died for that stunt you pulled,” Dorian continued. “You’ll be lucky if they pull through.”

He suddenly remembered Daruk and Revali and Mipha. His forehead creased with worry, then narrowed on Dorian once more. “Where are they?”

“They’re being taken care of,” Dorian said, his voice softer. “They will stay here until Impa approves them to leave.” He turned to the door. “This is a highly secure, classified military support hospital. Do not step foot outside without permission from Impa.” And with that, he left Link alone in the room.

*****

It took awhile for Link to navigate the hospital in search of his friends. Most of the doctors and Sheikah ignored him completely, too busy trying to save lives. And from what Link could gather, there was a lot of lives in the hospital needing saving. Hyrulean soldiers milled about the hallways, some gathered together in casual conversation while others seemed to be stretching their legs after their own recovery. Though, Link couldn’t imagine what they were recovering from. He was sure he would be aware of any and all battles that would be going on. Clearly, secrets were being kept from him, but he couldn’t worry about that until he knew his friends were alright.

He finally found Zelda, Urbosa, and Paya in one of the waiting rooms. They stood quickly when they saw Link, their faces torn with confusion and worry.

“What’s going on?” Zelda asked. “What did Dorian want?”

Link shook his head and shoved his hands in his pockets. “Nothing,” he lied, then shrugged. “To tell me I’m an idiot.”

This didn’t seem to satisfy Zelda as she held her gaze on him, but she didn’t press further.

“Where is everyone?” Link asked. His brows knit together as he looked around, hoping for some sign.

“I don’t know,” Zelda admitted. “I think Revali and Mipha are fine,” she continued, then hesitated. “Daruk was hit pretty bad. He was trying to protect Mipha.”

Link cursed under his breath. His knees felt weak, and he felt suddenly exhausted. He let himself fall into one of the seats and dragged his palms down his face. Zelda sat next to him.

“I’m sure everything will be fine,” she said in an attempt to sound reassuring, but her own voice shook. She turned away from him and slouched in the seat slightly, feeling defeated.

Time ticked by endlessly as the four of them sat and waited. Soon, the waiting became too much for Link, and he paced back and forth, his mind racing. His fists were balled at his side, causing his fingers to cramp. He flexed them at his side for a moment before they curled into his palms once more, his nails digging into the skin. The room was much too quiet as everyone waited in solemn silence until Zelda finally muttered.

“Your pacing isn’t going to make things go any quicker.”

In a moment of weakness, a wave of frustration washed over him, and he punched his fist through the wall. He immediately regretted it as he felt his knuckles shatter from the impact and he had to bite his lip to keep himself from shouting angrily. Instead, however, the anger continued to course through his blood, and he resorted to kicking his shoe into the wall. After another hole was put into the wall, he tossed his sword across the room and it clattered loudly against the floor.

He stood for a moment, his breathing heavy, staring at the sword, until he finally calmed down enough to let himself lean against the wall. He slid against the wall until he met the floor where he stared at the floorboards in silence, still holding his broken hand.

“Link.”

He turned his gaze to Zelda and in that moment, he felt the water well in his eyes. He closed them in an attempt to keep the tears at bay, turning suddenly when a door opened and Impa emerged. She turned to look at the two holes in the wall, then turned her gaze onto Link as he got to his feet.

“I’m sure you plan on fixing that,” Impa said.

Link bit his tongue, fuming once more.

“Is Daruk going to be alright?” Urbosa asked softly.

Impa sighed. “Yes, but we’ll need to move him to ICU to be watched for the next few days. My power can only do so much in these instances. I suggest you all get home and get some rest yourselves. It’s only a matter of time before Ganondorf shows himself. You must take time to prepare yourselves.”

“I leave when we all leave,” Zelda said, and Urbosa nodded.

Impa shrugged. “Suit yourselves.” And with that, she left them alone in the waiting room.

Paya moved toward Link hesitantly, her hand outstretched for a moment before taking his wrist. Link said nothing as she worked at healing his broken knuckles. When she was finished, she offered him a smile as he pulled his hand away.

“Thanks,” he muttered. He wiped the still fresh blood on his jeans without a second thought, and without another word, he left the waiting room. He couldn’t stand to be there any longer, but he didn’t know where else to go, so he wandered the hospital aimlessly until he stumbled upon the room where Mipha slept. He poked his head inside, then slipped in quietly and took the seat against the wall, facing the bed.

He slouched in the chair and let his arms dangle loose over the sides as he watched Mipha. The heart monitor beeped in steady rhythm, and her chest rose and fell with each soft breath. Satisfied that she was alive and well, Link let himself drift off to sleep.

[mavda]

Melted

Ch.1 | Ch.2 | Ch.3 | Ch.4 | Ch.5 | Ch.6 | Ch.7 | Ch.8 | Ch.9 | Ch.10 | Ch.11 | Ch. 12 | Ch.13 | Ch.14 | Ch.15 | Ch.16 | Ch.17 | Ch.18 | Ch.19 | Ch.20 | Ch.21 | Ch.22 | Ch.23 | Ch.24 | Ch.25 | Ch.26 | Ch.27 | Ch.28 | Ch.29 | Ch.30 | Ch.31 | Ch.32 | Ch.33 | Ch.34 | Ch.35 | Ch.36 | Ch.37 | Ch.38 | Ch.39 | Ch.40 | Ch.41 |  Ch.42 | Ch.43 | Ch.44 | Ch.45 | Ch.46 | Ch.47 | Ch.48 | Ch.49 | Ch.50 | Ch.51 | Ch.52 | Ch.53 |  Ch.54 | Ch.55 | Ch.56 | Ch.57 |

Ch.58: The link that can’t be broken II

William tried to see into the plaza before Ashei even turned the corner.

Silence greeted them. And before William could understand what happened, he saw a couple of unmoving soldiers who covered their mouths in shock. He got off the horse but Ashei remained on top of the animal, maybe she sensed something before him. William's feet moved to where Link was, he was hugging Zelda. It looked innocent enough, it looked beautiful enough. Link and Zelda remained still in the center of the plaza, with traces of golden magic surrounding them. At the back of his mind something started to wake, but William supressed it. Zelda's feet weren't holding her weight. Link was whispering to Zelda's ear in a broken voice.

And William stopped walking. His voice came out weak, still holding onto the slimmer of hope he couldn't let go, "Link?"

It was as if Link woke up from a trance. The sword lay at his feet, but he didn't even bother with it. His face was smeared in dirt and tears and William didn't dare utter his name again. Link moved Zelda's body with care, he brought her legs to his right side and supported her head on his left shoulder. She didn't move a muscle, but she was breathing.

When Link started walking towards the Castle, William remained by his side. No one said anything. Ashei got off of her horse and walked behind them, Epona in tow.

Link never faltered, but the silence unnerved him.

Link was not getting enough sleep.

"The doctor said she was all right, yeah?" Link was sitting in the corridor outside of Zelda's room, surrounded by Shad and Robert. William looked at the group from a couple of steps away. "Her body is fine, it's just a matter of time before she wakes up."

Link was not listening to her. As soon as the door opened to let the doctor out, Link stood.

"May I see her again?" he asked to no one in particular, but it was Kafei who stood next to the door who signaled for him to go in.

Dotour whispered with the doctor down the corridor and a maid whimpered nearby.

William shadowed Link and Robert kept his head low as he entered behind the group.

Leela was rearranging the bed clothing on Zelda, her eyes where bloodshot and she only dipped her head once as a greeting.

Link stood beside Zelda's bed, looked at her once, he sat on her bed and grabbed the hand the doctor had probably used to check her pulse. Link's intimacy with the Princess of Hyrule made everyone want to look away. And when Link brought Zelda's hand to his mouth, everyone averted their eyes but William.

Link let Zelda's hand down with care and then stood, he walked to the window in the room and looked to the sky. His body seemed to tense and grow as he breathed in.

"She's gonna be fine," Link said as he turned. William would have let him go if Link's body language wouldn't have screamed mission.

Link looked at Leela in the eyes, "She'll be fine, but I need you to take care of her for a while."

The moment Link left the room Leela was left alone with Her Highness. "Of course you will be all right, isn't it so, Your Highness? We will take care of you until you wake up."

William was sure Link didn't even notice the little entourage that followed him. Kafei jogged to catch them, while the other Council members looked tired or disapproving.

"What's going on?" asked Kafei.

"I don't know."

They passed Dotour and the doctor, "Tell Link to stay put, the doctor said-"

"The doctor said she should be awake." William thought about how ridiculous they all must look following Link around, "There's nothing wrong with her body, and she has never reacted like this to stress or illness."

Kafei stopped and William stopped a few steps farther.

"So what are you doing?"

William pointed the Link and the group that followed him, "Making sure he doesn't do something stupid."

"He can manage, you should stay here, when people hear about this..."

William turned his head and saw the group dissapearing in the corner of the corridor. What good was he going to be following Link? If he was asking that, what good was Shad for that matter? Ashei and Robert he could understand. But himself?

"I have to check something," William blurted. Kafei shook his head.

"I'm staying here."

"Good. I was going to tell you that."

As William tried to catch up to the others he tried to make an excuse to use when confronted again. Why did you follow him that time? I was making sure he had a good head on his shoulders.

Why was William so eager to follow him now? He could feel an adventure.

Shad met him halfway down the next corridor. "Ashei tasked us with getting provisions to travel, we'll meet at the barn in 10 minutes."

William started to make a list to complete in his head, "Where are they now?"

"Getting something from Robert's room."

"Robert's?"

Shad nodded back.

"Link's something?"

Shad raised his shoulders, "I don't know more, Link is pretty private about his stuff."

When they were waiting in the barn, William raised his voice again, "Do you know where we're going?"

Shad snickered once, "Not a clue."

When Link entered the barn his eyes were clearer, his body was less tense and he looked at Shad and William with interest. He then looked back at Ashei and Robert.

"Are you all coming?" his voice was less strained too.

Ashei spoke before anyone, "Yes," and it was final.

Link got on Epona and smirked, "Fine, but I'm more than enough."

Shad had to defuse Ashei's temper with small talk. Robert looked a little paler than usual and Link had a new bag on his belt.

It clicked late, but Willliam was glad he could understand at least. "It's magic, isn't it?"

Link looked surprised for a second, "Yes, it is."

"What are we doing then?"

Link cocked his head, "You are doing nothing, I'm... doing something."

"Magic related?"

Link cocked his head the other side, "Yeah," he sounded unsure.

"Is it safe?"

"Pretty much."

"What's the much about?"

"It may take me a while to come back, that's about it."

William frowned, Link seemed almost elated, "Why are you so happy?"

Link had the gall to smile, "Oh, well, it's just-" he grabbed the bag around his belt and felt its presence, "Now I know I can fix this."

William looked back and Ashei was listening intently, "Care to explain?" Had no one ever asked Link for answers?

Link remained silent a couple of seconds, "Well, at first I just thought it was magic exhaustion, I've never seen Zelda use so much magic in so little time, and from what she told me she had never done so either," William felt a pang of jealousness his curiosity drowned, "so I figured, given enough time she would recover. But she did not, in two days, no change whatsoever, so I got worried, and well, when you fight with magic you have to be wary, so I thought, maybe there's some magic at work here?"

William was confused, "Then how do you know for sure?"

Link huffed, "Well, uhm, I smelt it on her."

Robert looked as baffled as William felt.

"Excuse me?"

Link spurred Epona towards the center of the meadow outside Hyrule, "You'll know soon enough."

[cutegirlmayra]

Zelink Month 3 (August 12th - 18th) Theme: The Passion of Friendship

Prompt:

Giggles and childish laughter could be heard from under the castle, as two mischievous but adventurous youngsters sneak under the dirty and dark floors of the mossy ground towards the secret chamber of legends.

“You’re going to love it, Link! But we must be silent.” A young Zelda, turning around to place a finger on her mouth in the universal sign of ‘shh’, was speaking much louder than the boy ever uttered in his life.

He looked up, used to crawling into small and dirty places, but banged his head against the top of the floor, rattling some things above as a few maids in the night scrambled. Clearly, they were worried about mice…

“Just a little ways further… Father only let me in there once… but I swear, Link, he looks just like you!” she tapped the palm of her hand against the floorboards, before finally finding a rickety one. “Ah! Link! Help me move it, will you?” she looked behind her, seeing her young friend obediently move to her side.

They held the board with both hands bent above them. Link gave her a silent look, as if waiting instruction.

“Alright. Now I know we’re both children—” she couldn’t help but giggle in-between her sentences. For a princess, she was daring and exciting, and she loved to live her small, sheltered life in the moment of discovery. It gave her a rush, and Link couldn’t help but be fascinated every time he saw her smile light up from her adventurous spirit taking wing.

“But I think we can push this!”

Link gulped.

The sides of his mouth pursed together and bent in as if he was keeping a secret.

“Don’t fret, Link. We can do this!” She had no memory of the future he had known, but he knew. And he knew what he could accomplish with strength and…

Her faith.

“Ready?”

..In him.

“1…2…Ah!” she was surprised how quickly he lifted the block, all by himself, and the board slid as the open room became available to crawl up into.

“Oh.” She stared up into the shadows, then looked to see Link standing and smiling down to her.

“…Well, you can be assured I’m well pleased.” She leaned up, dusting off her dress and then trying to attempt to help him lower the board.

Without hesitation, Link placed the wooden blank, which truly looked like a cinder block and probably weighted as much too, down to the side and jumped out with a ‘hyup!’ before reaching down to help her through.

She blinked, “Do… Do all kokiri’s have this strength?”

She took his hand…. Some magical feeling of security leaped through her, and she had to pause a moment to recognize it.

“Strange… it’s like… I’ve felt this before. This moment… in a dream I think.” She looked a little baffled, before shaking her head and getting ready to lift her foot. “Nevermind, I’m coming out.”

Link’s face had changed. A slimmer of hope passed his face but he said nothing, per usual.

He helped her out, but held her hand… hoping…

He squeezed it so lightly, it was almost unnoticeable.

Almost.

Nervously, Zelda giggled and to her hand.

He let it go and looked away, embarrassed as she turned away and blushed, hiding her touched hand behind her back like a silly lovestruck girl.

“Oh look! The mural!” she pointed towards the legend, the one her father had only shown her once, before locking the door.

“Isn’t it… just… what words could you give it..?”

They walked around the room, quite large with little furniture, simply lots and lots of bookshelves.

“It’s a beautiful piece… I wish we turn the light the candles and get a better look.” She was amazed when light appeared, and turned around. “Oh, Link!” she stared at the flickering light, wondering where it came from. “It’s as bright as Din’s fire! But… how’d you manage a candle?”

He was holding a stick that lit up the room. He once again ducked his face a moment, before holding his achievement up in pride.

It was though he was confidently saying—Happy to be of service.

“Ah, a deku stick?” she examined it as he pulled out some milk too. “My! You really are the ‘prepared for adventure’ type, aren’t you?” she laughed, and decided to let him keep the milk.

He looked down at the milk, wondering if he had done something wrong as she wondered around to gaze at the now lit up scenes of legends, trying to find a face as he put the milk away and stumbled over to her.

With a sincere wish to be of use to her, he held the deku stick with the burning flame like a solider, making sure to keep up with her and look dutiful.

She barely noticed this considerate nature though, although she knew it was very much ingrained in him, but stared at the face she was longing to see again.

“There! The handsome one! In green!”

Link, noticing the descriptor, looked to her and then up. He was in awe at the mural’s depiction.

She sat down, moving to tuck her legs under her long nightgown dress and hugged her knees close to her.

“I’ve dreamed of a hero like this… They call him… The Hero Of Time.”

Link’s eyes widened, shifting around before looking back at Zelda’s expression again.

In a sense of lulled ease, she dropped her doting head to her legs and tilted it every so slightly. She sighed, “Look how his face is completely towards his princess… It’s said they never parted, always together… in all the legends… they seem to be close friends.”

Link was looking back at the man… and felt a sense of belonging. As though fate would have it so, he silently made a prayer to the Goddesses that his destiny would go much like it should.

He wanted more than anything… to be next to Zelda.

He looked back to her, a goofy and content smile at his silent wish before being spooked back a bit.

She was staring directly at him… the flames flickered her blue eyes into a beautiful, trance like enchantment that stole his breath.

“O…wah…” He couldn’t help but vocalize his absolute entrapment within their blue, radiant oasis…

She giggled.

“You stare at me as if you’ve never seen me before.”

He looked away, embarrassed again.

He fidgeted, lifting a leg to scratch behind the calf of his other leg, keeping some wobblily, but decent balance as he held the stick in place.

It had been a while… for him anyway, since seeing Zelda like this…

The world was serene again… and he couldn’t help but be moved by how peaceful it all was.

How… beautiful it was.

“Isn’t she lovely?”

He turned his attention back to her as she now stood more upright on the ground, smiling with an odd sense of being bound to the princess in the mural. “…It’s alright, you can think she’s prettier than me.” She laughed again, “After all, she is a woman.” Zelda patted the spot next to her. “Want to stare at it a little longer? I hate looking at the black and red monster… but I do like the princess and hero’s faces…”

He obliged, carefully sitting down before holding out the burning stick like a fishing pole.

She stared at Link as he admired the mural again, stretching out in a circle across the room and up to its roof.

She examined his face, and then nodded, “I had once thought my dream… would happen.” She looked away.

Almost instantly, he knew what she meant, and his face turned a little more serious…

He slowly… moved it down, away from the mural.

“I worried what calamity would befall hyrule… but I had hoped to meet the hero. There was a boy, like you, in my dream-“ she stopped herself. “Anyway, father thought it silly, and the evil man never came so…” she looked away, “…I was so sure of it, though.”

He quickly turned his head, mouth open… before closing it.

Oh, Zelda… you were right.

He wanted to say.

You are always right…

His eyes turned softer, thinking back on her as a woman.

…And … you are beautiful.

Her sorrowful expression at sending him back to his world still stayed and lingered on his mind… even in his dreams, she was a vision of heavenly divinity.

“…Link...?” she scooted closer.

His whole being spiked into a sudden, electrified jolt at the contact of her shoulder touching his.

His face was now brighter then the glow of the flame above their tiny heads…

She yawned, and leaned her head against his shoulder.

He almost dropped the deku stick and quickly recovered.

“Could we… stay here… just a bit longer?”

He had stopped the terrible calamity she spoke of. He had lived the legend…

But his hero days weren’t exactly over.

He took a gamble… and slowly moved his head to look down at her.

She seemed to softly be breathing…

He leaned his head down, and lightly kissed her forehead, breathing out the words he wished he could voice as a grown man.

“…You are beautiful…Zelda.”

“Emm…” she squirmed slightly, the hot breath making her slightly uncomfortable. But with a quick adjustment, she was back to silent breaths of slumber…

He pulled out his ocarina, the one made specifically for him, and although not as magical as his last Ocarina he held…

He played her lullaby.

If she was awake, she may have been surprised he knew it.

But while she slept… she dreamed of a man in green by her windowsill, sitting with one leg up and leaning against the frame. Her, a much older woman lying in bed, hearing his beautiful lullaby to her while she drifted into a peaceful rest…

It was so serene… the dream so perfect…

From that moment on, she had renewed faith in another dream. A better dream.

[youremarvelous]

double trouble

a birthday present for the lovely @cafecliche

happy birthday 🐝!!!!!

I hope you enjoy my offering of hotel bed shenans

“Yurik, we have a problem.”

Yuuri exits the bathroom to find his husband shouldering the far hotel bed, mouth pulled tight, red-cheeked and grunting as he angles all his weight into the pliant mattress. “The bed’s stuck,” he announces after a full minute of fruitless, straining effort.

Yuuri blinks once, twice. “Yeah,” he agrees when his brain has recovered enough from the sight of Viktor’s flexing pecs—visible beneath the dip of his deep v-neck—to recollect the functions of spoken language. Yuuri sits at the foot of the nearest twin bed and pats the spot next to him. “They tend to do that in America.”    

Viktor accepts his invitation and slumps into the vacant space, leaning his head on Yuuri’s shoulder. “But, why?”

“To preserve chastity?” Yuuri jokes, dabbing at Viktor’s dewy forehead with the cuff of his jacket. “They probably assume two guys reserving a room with a pair of singles aren’t in a relationship.”

“So they’re in the business of cuddle-blocking friends?” Viktor demands. “And what kind of straight person requires a chaise lounge and David Hockney prints?” He throws out his arm, exasperated. “Hockney, Yurik.”

Yuuri shrugs and Viktor flops back on the bed, groaning. “Americans are repressed.”

Yuuri pats Viktor’s knee. “Don’t worry, I’ll still check under your bed for sulfates before we go to sleep.”

“For the millionth time—” Viktor wraps his arms around Yuuri’s waist and drags him down next to him—“that’s not how they work.”

“I’ll protect you from the scary sulfates,” Yuuri persists, tousling his fingers through Viktor’s hair.

Viktor wrestles Yuuri under him, ruffling up his hair in retribution. “My only fear—” he says, trapping Yuuri’s head between his forearms—“is the poor night of sleep I’m going to have without you playing ‘The Tale of Zelda’ at my elbow till 3am.”

Yuuri nudges at Viktor’s stomach with his knee. “You know it’s ‘Legend,’” he says, straightening his glasses when he’s released. “How do you think I’ll feel, having to sleep without you snoring in my ear?”

“I don’t snore.”

“So that recording was—”

“Bears, I told you.”

“Ah right, the famous Russian apartment bears.” Yuuri offers his hand to Viktor and pulls him up from the bed. “It’ll be tough,” he concedes, squeezing Viktor’s hand before releasing it, “but it’s only a few days. We’ll live.”

“You jinxed us,” Viktor calls from the bathroom the next morning, dabbing concealer into his undereye circles.

Yuuri turns his head into his pillow, mumbles something that sounds like, “technically, we’re not dead,” even though he feels like he is.  

“Mmhmm,” Viktor hums. He plods back into the room and plants himself on the side of Yuuri’s bed, creeps his cold, roving fingers under the back of Yuuri’s shirt to trace the bumpy landscape of his spine. “Tell that to my complexion,” he says, leaning down to kiss him.

His breath smells like unwashed mouth and coffee and his stubble is rough against Yuuri’s cheek. It’s the most comfortable Yuuri’s felt since turning in three hours after Viktor the night before. His eyelids start to droop so he pushes himself up, fighting against every traitorous fiber of his being coaxing him to stay there—to trade being a functional adult for being a well-rested one.

“Vitya,” Yuuri grumbles the second night of their stay, “your elbow is in my ribs.”

“Your ribs are in my elbow,” Viktor rebuts. He sits up and runs a hand through his hair, sighing. He and Yuuri have spent the better part of an hour trying to negotiate the breadth of their shoulders in the space of one narrow twin. So far all they have to show for their efforts is a colorful collection of bruises from falling off the bed and increasingly thinning patience.

“What if we hold hands?” Yuuri suggests after he is nearly kneed in the crotch for the third time.

Viktor moves to the spare single and they stretch their arms over the bedside table, clasping their hands in the center. Yuuri smiles at Viktor from his pillow, and Viktor rubs his thumb across Yuuri’s knuckles. The arrangement works—uncomfortable but bearably so—until they actually start to drift off. Yuuri is sinking into a recurring dream involving a troupe of costumed, dancing bears when their joined hands slip and knock the hotel-provided phone to the floor, upsetting the silence of the room with a clamorous crash and proceeding shrill dial tone.

After that, they decide to separate for the safety of themselves and their surroundings—the consequence of which is another sleepless night, punctuated by intermittent sighs and at least one short-lived, exhaustion-born breakdown.

Yuuri zombie walks into the bathroom the next morning while Viktor fights a losing battle with his darkening eye bags. He wordlessly wraps his arms around Viktor’s waist, presses his face into his spine.

“Yurik,” Viktor pets the crown of his head when the telltale steady whistle of Yuuri’s sleep-breathing permeates the air. Yuuri raises his head—slow-blinking and disoriented—and Viktor pointedly ignores the wet spot of drool sticking his shirt to his back. “I’m booking us a different room.”

Yuuri shakes his head, rubbing a fist into his eye. “It’s a waste of money.”

“You can’t put a price on sleep hygiene,” Viktor argues because really, they’re not in their early twenties anymore. All the coffee in the world notwithstanding, they can’t rebound from an all-nighter like they used to.

“One more night,” Yuuri bargains for the sake of his frugal upbringing more than anything.

Viktor agrees because compromise is a cornerstone of healthy relationships, but he regrets it when he has to make a fourth call to the concierge, requesting yet another delivery of pillows with the excuse that he can’t sleep unless completely sequestered like an infant in the womb. He’d worry about his reputation, but it’s nowhere near the most far-fetched demand the media has purported he’s made.

“This isn’t going to work.” Viktor adds the newest bundle of pillows on the cushion mountain crammed between their two beds.

“It’ll work,” Yuuri assures him, spreading a blanket over the top to create the illusion of a perfectly flush bridge between them.

It doesn’t work.

Their bodies manage to sink into the chasm of pillows for a good six inches before the buoyancy of the cheap cotton catches up to them—springboarding Yuuri headlong into the bedside table and dropping Viktor to the floor in a newly formed crevice on the side.   

Viktor scrambles to his knees, pushing pillows out of the way with one hand and rubbing at his sore back with the other. “You okay, angel?” He asks when he unearths Yuuri, hissing at the beet red welt swelling at his husband’s temple.

“Mm,” Yuuri groans his discontent, kicking a pillow near his foot. “Tired.” He leans into Viktor’s chest and Viktor wraps his arms around him, propping himself against the side of the bed. He rubs his hand up and down Yuuri’s back, intending to lull him into a drowsy enough state to be lured into bed and a restful night of sleep, Viktor cradling his head and snoring into his ear or no.

He recalls the old adage about the road to hell’s paving company when he wakes the next morning—sore and uncharacteristically drowsy—piled in a disheveled tangle of limbs on the floor.

“Yurik,” Viktor whispers, voice thin with exhaustion. He shakes Yuuri’s shoulder, brushing his thumb over the creased corner of Yuuri’s eye when he starts to stir. “Yurik, we fell asleep on the floor.”

Yuuri grumbles and takes Viktor’s hand in both of his, pressing it against his face.

“Can I book us a new room?”

Yuuri exhales. Viktor can feel the warmth of it against his palm. “You can use my card.”

[chainsawbettyloo]

Title: Size Differences are Lovely But They Have Their Downfalls 

Pairing: SidLink | Rating: Everyone | A/N: written from a random word prompt generator

Tags: Fluff, just that’s about it, non-established relationship, kind of some pining 

Summary: Sidon is big. Link is small. How does hugging even work?

Cross posted on my AO3!, Prompt requests are still open, btw!

-

Hopping up onto the shore, nimbly maneuvering so he didn’t get a drop of water on his boots, Link landed gracefully with a soft ‘oomph’. Stretched out in front of him was the massive grassy plains of...somewhere. Massive trees, housing immense colonies of vibrant green leaves that shifted and danced in the light wind blowing through dotted across the landscape. In the far distance, he could see faint moving shapes that were probably, most likely, horses...maybe. He would be cautious approaching them, regardless.

There was some splashing behind him. Turning, he took a couple steps back to give Sidon room to get out of the river. Water streamed down his scaly skin, glinting with tiny sparkles as the bright, high noon sunshine bounced off the droplets. Golden eyes surveyed the beautiful scene laid out in front of them, the usual twinkle of excitement and enthusiasm more visible than usual. Reaching forward, Link tugged on his still damp arm, and smiled up at him when he looked down.

‘Thank you for carrying me out here.’ He signed.

“Of course, my friend!” Sidon exclaimed exuberantly, his broad voice echoing over the once quiet, still landscape. Behind him, he was pretty sure the herd of possible horses were taking off now, startled by the loud Zora voice, “Happy to do anything to help. However, if I may voice a concern?”

‘Sure. What’s wrong?’ He asked, cocking his head curiously.

“Oh, nothing is wrong.” Sidon reassured, waving his hands slightly, “I simply wanted to make sure this was where you meant to part ways. Are you certain you do not want me to take you further up river? There’s a lovely little village there.”

Smiling, touched that Sidon would be concerned from him, Link shook his head, and signed, ‘No, this is alright. Thank you. Don’t worry, though. When it starts getting dark, I will head over to the village.’

“Good.” A relieved smile spread across the Zora Prince’s face, revealing the sharp white teeth lying behind his lips, “If you need any help with anything, please don’t hesitate to stop by the Domain. I will do whatever I can to aide you.”

‘Thank you, Sidon. I appreciate that. It makes me feel stronger, knowing I’ve got you on my side.’

“You do indeed.” Sidon said fondly, warmth appearing in his golden eyes. Letting out a soft sigh, he placed his hands on his hips, cocked his head, and commented, “However, I would prefer it if you would visit outside of emergencies popping up. I expect you to be stopping by whenever you’re able.”

Chuckling, Link nodded, ‘I’ll do my best.’

“You had better, or I might just track you down and drag you back to the Domain for a good meal, and a good rest.” Sidon teased, though Link got the feeling that there was a considerable amount of seriousness behind that statement. There was no doubt in his mind that the Zora Prince would actually do it if he stayed away for too long. Not that he intended to do just that. In the Domain, he had found a peaceful, welcoming place to rest and recover. Plus, Sidon was there, so.

‘It won’t come to that.’ He reassured with a smile, ‘I will stop by as often as I can, I promise.’

“Alright,” Sidon offered a small smile, then sighed again, “I won’t keep you any longer. I need to return to the Domain, as well.”

‘Good-bye, Sidon.’ There was a disconcerting pang inside his chest. The familiar loneliness that he hadn’t noticed had done quiet during his time in the Domain was starting to creep in again, quietly whimpering that they didn’t want to leave Sidon’s side just yet, that they wanted to stay with him, to stay engulfed in this warmth, this fondness, this comfort. He shoved it forcibly away. He wasn’t a child, and Sidon wasn’t his mother or caretaker.

“Good-bye, Link.” It was a little bit of a relief to notice that Sidon, obviously, didn’t want to part ways just yet either. Fidgeting where he stood, it looked as though he was trying to think of something else to say, something that could keep him there.

For a few awkward, silent moments, they kind of just stood around, shifting uncomfortably, neither wanting to take the first step away. Finally, he couldn’t take it anymore. Knowing that if he remained for a moment longer, the loneliness whimpering like a lost child at the back of his mind would win, and he’d give in, go back to the Domain, stay one more night while telling himself all the while that it would be just one more night, he would leave the next morning, and ignore the fact that would lead to the whole thing playing over again. Better to just put his foot down, and walk away now.

Offering one more smile, he turned, started to walk away but stopped when Sidon caught hold off his arm. Jumping in surprise, he turned back around to find the Zora Prince doing...something. Knitting his eyebrows in confusion, he quietly watched as Sidon leaned forward, reaching out, then moved back, shifted to a slightly different position, repeat, then seemed to change his mind. Releasing Link’s arm, he held his own out, stooped, thought better of it, and continued to fidget around, looking confused and uncertain. Not catching on at all, wondering if this was some kind of good-bye friendship dance Zora performed, he signed, ‘What are you doing?’

“I want to embrace you but,” Sidon chuckled, an adorable hint of flush appearing in his white cheeks, “I don’t mean this as an offensive, but you’re so small. How do I?”

A hug from Sidon would be very nice but he wasn’t too sure either how to work that out. No offensive had been taken, he was tiny compared to Sidon. Course, he was tiny compared to a lot of people and things. He didn’t even come up to the Zora Prince’s midsection. If Sidon were to try to hug him standing upright, he get nothing but an armful of air. Bending over might work, it’d be awkward, but it would work. Still, there had to be a better way. Tilting his head, he thought about it for a second then the solution popped up inside his mind.

‘Can you kneel down?’ He asked, gesturing towards the ground.

“Of course.” Lowering himself to his knees, Sidon brought himself somewhat closer. To further reduce the distance between them, he sat back onto his legs, which put the two of them nearly at eye level. Chuckling, he slowly shook his head in embarassed amusement, “That was easy.”

Instead of responding, Link stepped forward, pushed himself up onto the balls of his feet, wrapped his arms around Sidon’s shoulders, and squeezed tightly. Muscular arms snaked around his midsection, pulling him close to a sturdy, warm, still slightly damp chest. Sidon’s scent was stronger than he was so close. Something tangy, like the wind that blew in from the sea, mixed with an undertone of salt. Underneath it all was a crispness that he couldn’t quite identify. Against his skin, Sidon’s was surprisingly smooth. He had assumed Zora were scaly, but it seemed as though that wasn’t the case.

Melting into his embrace, Link let out a content, happy sigh. How long had it been since he was hugged like this? Perhaps that wasn’t the right question to be asking. Really, it had to be, when was the last time he had been hugged? He couldn’t even remember. Was that why Sidon’s embrace felt so good? Why he could feel himself drifting towards the conclusion that he didn’t want to ever leave the loop of his arms?

He didn’t think so. He was pretty sure that he felt that way because it was Sidon. Something about him just made him feel so good, so safe.

“Promise me that you’ll be careful.” Sidon murmured, his breath tickling Link’s ear.

Since he couldn’t respond as his hands were preoccupied, Link chose to just nod firmly, rubbing his cheek against the fin that hung by the side of Sidon’s face, hoping that he could convey to the Zora Prince that he would. After all, Zelda was waiting for him, and now, there was someone who would be sad if he got hurt so it only made sense that he did his best to remain intact and uninjured. Letting out another sigh, Sidon squeezed him once more then slowly began to move back. At first, he couldn’t bring himself to letgo, not wanting to be separated from that warmth, but eventually convinced his arms to let go.

Stepping back, he smiled up at Sidon as he stood, ‘Will I get another one of those when I come back to the Domain?’

“More than one, if you want.” The Zora Prince smiled in return.

‘Okay, I’ll hold you too that.’ He teased, then offered a slight wave, ‘Good-bye, Sidon.’

“Good-bye, my friend. I will see you soon.”

‘See you soon.’ He agreed with a firm nod.

Before the loneliness could come tumbling back in, he turned and started to walk away, hyper focusing on the herd of maybe horses in front of him. A loud splash came from behind him a few moments later, signaling that Sidon was leaving. It was right then that he came very close to turning, racing back to the river, and throwing himself back in in a desperate hope of catching the Zora Prince before he sped away. He, somehow, managed to fight it back. Stuff to do, he had important stuff to do, needed to keep moving forward. If he did, he could reward himself later on for being strong. The reward, of course, being going back to the Domain to spend more time with Sidon.

And get more hugs. A lot more hugs. He wanted so many more hugs.

[syilcawrites]

flickering

Series: The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild Type: One-shot Main pairing: Zelink (Zelda and Link) Rated: T Tags/Genre: post calamity, pre botw2, what’s the tag for his adventuring in between?? just botw?, then that’s it LOL, angst Summary: Link scouts out Hyrule Castle to see how he should prepare to fight Ganon, and stumbles upon Zelda's bedroom and her diary after he believes he sees her there. Snippet: “It was a silent vow that always lingered around in his thoughts—from when he spoke to the remainder of the Hylians to listening to the sweet melodies of a past long gone, sung by Kass.” A/N: I am terrible at summaries and was never good at them LOL. Anyway, this is just a little something for linktober Day 19: phantom/ghost! This is also loosely based off of my other fic archived memories chapter 6 :~) (which will be out tomorrow on Oct 20 haha). Hope you enjoy!! I like to spend a week editing whatever I write 'cause I tend to change it a lot but didn't have the luxury of doing it for this piece since I wrote it last night afouhgkjds.  You can also read it on ao3!

The first time Link stepped into Castletown, he was barraged with an incessant amount of echoing whispers.

Chaotic, haunting, loud and quiet, begging, pleading, bargaining. It felt like they were whispering about him, but he couldn’t decipher one word drifting into his ears.

He was by no means ready to take on Calamity Ganon—he had simply wanted to scope out the area, to see what he should expect—and he was hit with a wave of nostalgia that he didn’t understand.

Then came the nausea, and the painful throb against his head whenever he gazed upon the castle. It was different up close—the pain was worse, the stench that rifted off the malice was almost unbearable, and his eyes watered by being within ten feet of it.

But he marched onward—past the rubble and decay of a once grandiose town—or at least that’s what he assumed. It was hard to decipher what it used to look like amongst the ruins.

Link strolled up to one of the glowing eyeballs, staring into it for just a moment, before he stabbed it. It sputtered, shrinking, shriveling, before it withered away. He tightened his grip on the handle of his sword as he scanned the rest of the area.

More, his mind chanted. He wanted to see more of them crumble up into dust.

An unbearable anger always overcame him when he encountered anything inflicted by the malice—he wanted to tear at it with his own hands, rip and shred it into pieces until there was not even a speck left.

The overwhelming sense of hatred and revenge that dwelled deep within him feared him—because he couldn’t pinpoint why. He understood why, knew why, from an outside perspective. It took all of his dear friends and family one hundred years ago, but how the anger simmered within him like it ran through his veins felt unfamiliar to him.

His body remembered but his mind didn’t.

Link traversed the ruins of Castletown speedily, taking out the glowing eyeballs one by one and watching with satisfaction as they faded away—it felt like he was reclaiming the town back from the Calamity—whatever was left of it, at least. It was all he could do now.

“Okay,” he huffed out, peering at the large iron doors that stood between him and the castle. “One quick look inside, then you come right back out.” He whispered, gulping. He more frequently than not spoke to himself whenever he was alone—it grounded him, reminded him to stay focused.

“Free Zelda and all will be well,” he said quietly, his eyes trained on the various Guardians loitering the front. He would chant this before he fell asleep and it was the first thought that passed his mind when he woke up. It was a silent vow that always lingered around in his thoughts—from when he spoke to the remainder of the Hylians to listening to the sweet melodies of a past long gone, sung by Kass.

Link pulled out his shield and sprinted forward—holding his breath as he struck his sword at a stationary Guardian before it could respond to his presence.

Again—that bloodthirsty anger laughed in joy as he watched it implode, and he pushed down the desire to tear apart the ones that had long stopped working, and forged ahead.

The heavy metal doors of the entrance slammed open as Link used magnesis, echoing. His nose scrunched up as the putrid stench of the malice slammed against him at full force—causing him to double over. Link his behind a crumbling wall to hide from the wandering eyes of the Guardians as he gathered his bearings.

“Do not encounter Calamity Ganon, not yet.” He whispered, warning. He wasn’t going to go in until he was absolutely prepared—he had already failed once. Link gritted his teeth as his grasped at the small, vague memories that he’s so far recovered. They were so fragmented and confusing, full of questions and questions and questions that lingering on them for too long caused his head to split open while his mind desperately tried to remember. But he never did, and in the end it only left him feeling like a hollow and fractured version of himself.

All he knew was that he had to stay alive���stay alive long enough to seal Calamity Ganon and to free Zelda.

Zelda.

His blood ran cold at he thought of her.

“Will she fade away, too?” Link whispered to the castle, glancing up at it.

It did not respond.

He forced his way through the entrance, using the wreckage to avoid needless confrontation. He needed to be quick, no matter how much he wanted to slaughter the rest of the Guardians and the malice. Once Link was inside, he found the orange glow enveloped around the castle unsettling, as if the air around here had stayed stagnant for the past century. It felt it was holding its breath, waiting. Or maybe it was slumbering.

Zelda. She was here, waiting.

Then, he thought of Mipha—and the way his heart dropped when he saw that cursed blueish glow around her, just like with the late King. She smiled at him with so much familiarity, but he could only stare blankly at her, mostly just confused. Her eyes gazed upon him with such love and comfort, but he could not return the same affection, even if he wanted to. He found it easier to—to detach himself a little bit. Untangle himself from the Champions when he encountered their spirits. He had one left—Urbosa—but he had to mentally steel himself to confront her, like he had to for Revali and Daruk. When he confronted the both of them after Mipha, he forced himself to reflect upon those past memories—his own past memories—as a mere spectator, and it helped.

Link shook his head, drawing himself back from the depths of his plagued mind. He circled around the ransacked interior—taking note of the blocked passages, the crumbles in the walls that acted as a makeshift pathway to another part of the castle, and attacked slumbering monsters who blocked his path with an all too personal rage.

And then he saw a tower outside from one of the windows, set a little apart from the main building. He would have to paraglide to it and climb up if he wanted to get in.

His eyes trailed up the tower, to the caved in wall and blinked—eyes widening when he saw something shift—blonde hair, green eyes, flickering.

He rubbed his eyes, shaking his head and peered again, but it was still there—she’s there—looking at him.

Link, without a second thought, jumped through broken glass window, his paraglider wide open as he headed toward the isolated tower, heart racing.

He latched onto the broken tower and glanced up—he saw her peering down at him, smiling. She was familiar and warm, and... and so close. So, so close.

Link desperately climbed up—almost slipping toward the end—but reached up just far enough to latch onto the edge of the opening, and threw himself over. He fell onto the ground of the room with a heavy thud, and found himself face to face with an alarmed moblin.

Link quickly rolled off to the side, narrowly missing getting slammed head first with its stolen weapon, and was up in a heartbeat, his own weapon drawn. He mindlessly went through the quick, precise motion of eliminating it—simply allowing his body to move on its own, because if he dwelled too much on it, he became rigid.

He hated being out of sync within his own body.

Link exhaled with the final blow, and watched the moblin scatter into thin air, leaving him alone in the room.

With no one in sight, to his dismay. He wasn’t sure how long he searched every nook and cranny for those familiar green eyes and golden hair, but there was not even a hint of her ever being there in the first place.

With a heavy heart, Link walked toward the rotten desk, observing the scattered, torn books that lay in its wake. There was a flimsy notebook—leather ripped and torn, pages missing, but some of the writing was still legible.

Link flipped to the first page, reading the barely legible text at the front.

Zelda’s Diary.

He flipped through the carefully, as to not tear the pages, and found various scribbles and sketches—then a pressed cherry blossom flower in one of the pages, now brittle and brown. When he brushed a gentle finger over it, it crumbled immediately. His eyes scanned the next pages—various face portraits of Hylians. His lips tilted up a little when he passed by some sketches of food, of pastries and breads, or at least that’s what he assumed they were. It was hard to tell since many of them had faded away into the obscurity of time.

Then he found a familiar face, a face that he knew all too well.

It was messily sketched, but it was him—smiling, laughing, sometimes stoic, and it peered back at him like a stranger. It was him, but not really him. Link wished he could talk to the person he used to be, to ask him all of the questions that had piled up, but it was a futile desire.

He sighed as he peeled his eyes away from the sketches and flipped through the pages once more.

“Bit by bit, I’ve gotten Link to open up to me…”

He paused, lifting the journal up closer than ever to his face. His eyes drank in the words—words about him, who he was, how she saw him. He stopped at the end of the paragraph and closed the journal, staring down at it with confliction.

He took out the Sheikah Slate and slipped it into his inventory, and along with it, a little hope.

“I’ll keep this journal safe for you,” he whispered into the quiet room, his eyes roving around the falling, rotting objects that Zelda once owned, “so when you return, you’ll still have something.”

He waited for a couple moments, listening to the still air around him, as particles of malice floated peacefully by. He found it foolish that he even considered the possibility of her responding back and slapped his cheeks.

“Get ahold of yourself,” he muttered tiredly. He knew coming here would prove difficult—in terms of physicality, at least. He thought with time, settling into this new world would prove easier, but the distant reminders of the past associated with the wreckage of a world he once knew seemed to nail in how... alone he was.

Even without all of his memories, his heart ached with a heavy loneliness amidst a vast and broken land, because when it mattered most, he couldn’t save a single one of them. And then he left her, he left Zelda, to suffer by herself for one hundred years.

But he could do something now, even if it couldn’t bring back the lives lost. Even if she was going to simply drift away into the sky with the others, he could at least free her from the century of pain and torment she had endured waiting for him.

[wandering-chronicler-blog]

The Wolf of Farore - Chapter 35

An Ongoing Zelda/Witcher Fusion Fic - Updates Wednesdays/Thursdays

War has come to The Kingdom of Hyrule.  The people cry for a savior as monsters and spirits stalk the once green fields of the provinces.  Famine grips the populace as the Gerudo Tribes and their blin allies strike along the borders.  Hope for peace begins to drown in the blood spilled in No Man’s Land.  But Hyrule doesn’t need another hero.  It needs a professional.

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CHAPTER 35:  AN ANCIENT EVIL

A couple hours had passed since the attack.  Link sat in the office of Chieftain Komali along with Medli and Linebeck.  Aveil, a couple guards, two of the pirates and the hylian girl with her hair braded in a pair of pigtails sat on the other side of the room.  They all stayed in their groups along the walls and cahirs that were there, keeping quiet as they waited.  Behind the chieftain’s desk was a pair of rito guards with their arms folded.  The chieftain himself was out the door in the back of the room on a balcony, speaking with a far older rito.  The chieftain wore a burgundy tunic with white slacks under it while the elder had a long red robe that dragged on the ground. It also bore stylized markings of runes along its hem.

 Link glanced over to the others there.  The guards who had fought at the docks were exhausted.  One used his spear to prop himself up while a zora sat on a crate that had been dragged in bent over.  He heard snips of their conversation, worry in the voices that this was just the start of something worse.  He couldn’t hear what the pirates were saying, but the girl caught his eye for a moment as she removed bolts from one of her crossbow’s hoppers.  Looking up, Aveil was leaned against the wall.  Her left leg was propped up against it and she was watching the pirates.  

 To Link’s immediate right though was Medli, head in her hands.  She rubbed her eyes a little, but made no effort to sit up.  Next to her was Linebeck, who had seemingly fallen asleep against the wall in his chair.  Link gently put a hand on Medli’s shoulder and gave a sympathetic pat.  She looked up slightly, deep red eyes still watered with tears.

 “He did it to protect everyone,” Link said.  “Getting hurt like that was a real possibility.”

 “I know,” she said with a sniff.  “And I know he’ll recover, Valoo isn’t an ordinary dragon.  But I still saw my patron mangled by a monster.  And they attacked us in broad daylight.”

 “They attacked us like that in the seas too,” Aveil said, not looking away from the pirates. “Middle of the day.  Sun out.”

 “We only had a few of them though to deal with.  And… And that massive-eyed beast was with them!  I’ve never seen anything like it!”

 “We crippled the creature,” Link said.  He pulled his canteen from his back and offered it to Medli.  “If we hadn’t have done that, they both could’ve died.”

 The rito handmaiden looked at the canteen for a second before taking it, unscrewing the lid. “Still…  I wish we could’ve done more.”  She took a drink then.  “We’re going to need some extra help too if we’re going to the Tower of The Gods. Unless we leave quickly and are able to avoid another attack like this.”

 “I’m still waiting on my armor to be repaired,” Link said.  “And we’ll need to get some more silver and other tools to deal with the geozards.”

 “I’m sure Komali would be willing to supply you.”

 “Hoping so.  But there was a lot of damage down there.  They’re going to need supplies.”

 “Gonna have to repair the piers too,” Aveil added.  She watched as the girl came over to them.  She herself looked a little beat up from the fight with a bandage over her arm and dirt on her face.

 Link glanced up at her, seeing she held two crossbow bolts.  They were his silver ones.  “Here,” she said.  “I didn’t need all of them when help came.”  She glanced at Aveil for a moment.

 “Keep them,” he said. “Just in case.”

 “Silver’s expensive though.”

 “I can handle myself. And they might be coming back.”

 “She can handle herself pretty well too,” Aveil said.  “Took down nine of those things while we were holding the path up there with the other two guards here.”  She motioned to the zora and rito guards who were also in the room.  “If you could pull those sort of shots with a recurve, you’d be a heartseeker in The Tribes, Aryll.”

Link’s jaw fell open as he looked the young woman over.  “I…” He smiled a little.  “Do you have a telescope?  With a pair of seagulls drawn into the top?”  Medli had said she was there, but the last time he’d seen her was before he’d gone through The Change.  Looking closer now though he saw the girl who’d hidden behind him so long ago.

 “Yeah, but…”  She glanced down and then back at him.  “What does-  Wait.”  She tilted her head.  “Link?”

 He looked up at her. “You get my letters?”

 She dropped bolts.  She laughed, a massive smile across her face as the bolts clattered on the floor.  The sister he hadn’t seen in over a decade threw her arms around him.  “Nayru’s Love!  It’s you!  What are you doing here?!”

 He hugged back with a grin on his face.  “Helping a friend.”  Link took a deep breath.  “I’m glad you’re okay.  When the war started it stopped any correspondence.”

 “Did you get mine?” She pulled away, letting go, but still smiling.

 “I didn’t.  I was deployed to the Castor Wilds. Until…”  He cleared his throat.  “I’ll tell you later.  It’s a long story.”

 “Against the blins?”

 He nodded and looked back at Medli.  “Aryll, this is Medli.”

 “Hi.”  Aryll offered a hand.

 The rito sniffed once and composed herself before shaking Aryll’s hand.  “Good to finally meet you,” she said with a sad smile.

 “Oh, he mentioned you in the letters!  You helped him on a job for Hyrule out here.”

 “More than one, but yes. Your brother has always been a friend to us.  I’m glad to see wanting to help people runs in the family too.”

 “Yeah.  I heard something was going on with the couriers so I found a way to get up here to try and get letters to people.  At least in the islands.”  Aryll looked back to her brother.  “So, what’re you helping them with?”

 “Getting to the bottom of where the couriers are,” he said.

 “The Crown wants you to do that?”

 “I’m…”  He let out a sigh and shook his head.  Link was about to tell her that he was no longer with The Crown when two more pirates entered.  One looked fairly ordinary with a striped shirt and bandana on his head. The other though, made him go silent. “I’ll tell you later.  Meet me when we’re done.”

  “Are we ready to actually talk about what happened out there?” the second new arrival asked. Link watched her very closely as Aryll walked to the woman’s side.  “And what in Demise’s name those things were?”  She wore a blue vest over her shirt and pants that looked they had once been white if not for the black blood staining them.  She’d wrapped a bandana around her arm, blood staining it from a wound, and put her hair up in a messy bun.

 “I heard one of the handmaidens call them geozards,” the zora said.  He rubbed his nose and cleared his throat.

 “Never heard of ‘em before.”

 “Not surprised,” Medli said. “They’re supposed to myths.”

 She turned to look at Medli, stopping briefly to look at Link.  Their eyes met and he focused.  He couldn’t let her know.  He did see the captain’s jaw fall open slightly though before another voice interrupted them.

 “Every myth has a grain of truth, dear Medli,” someone said.  It was the older rito.  He walked into the room followed by the chieftain.  “They are primal zoras.  Beings that live far deeper than their more amiable cousins.”  He motioned slowly to the guard in the room.  “They have had no need to change for they are content roaming the Abyssal Plains.  The ones who attacked us however…  Are unnatural.  Altered by magic to the point they are tainted.”

 “We figured that,” one of the pirates said.  “So we got some witch out there making these things.”

 “It’s too powerful,” Link said.  “The skill needed to make something like that is intense.  I don’t know of any mages who would be capable of it.”  That was a lie and the pirate captain raised an eyebrow slightly when he’d said it.

 “I’ve met a couple who could,” Aveil said.  “I can count on one hand how many witches might be able to alter a creature to make it that dangerous and full of magic.  Two of them are with The Tribes, one is dead and the third was last seen decades ago in the Castor Wilds.”

 “You can never trust a gerudo though,” the pirate grumbled.  He shook his head as he leaned back in his chair.  “They’re just thieves, murderers and whores.”

 Link saw the viper’s glare lock with the pirate.  He caught Aveil’s hand twitch slightly and turn.  If she had wanted to, she could’ve grabbed her hookshot and pulled them onto her sword.  He was sure it’d all be in one fluid action as well.

 “Hey, you wanna try pissing off one of the people who helped keep the island from being overrun?” the captain snapped at her companion.  

  “Captain Tetra,” Chieftain Komali said as he pulled the chair out from his desk.  “If your crew cannot be civil, I’m going to have to ask you all to wait in the commons room.”  She elbowed the man who’d made the remark.  He looked to the elder rito, who thanked him and took a seat. “Besides, one of your crew fought right beside her without an issue to keep the geozards from reaching the caverns. Aveil has given us no reason so far to question her words.”

 The elder cleared his throat.  “If we may continue?”

 “Please do,” Tetra said after glaring at her subordinate.  Link fought the urge to smirk slightly, knowing the look the pirate was getting too well.  She turned a little then to face the elder, looking relaxed, but he caught the tenseness and alert gaze.  

 Medli nudged Linebeck then to wake him up.  He snorted and shook his head violently as he sat up.  “That’s my treasure!” he said.  “I found it!”  He blinked a couple times, seemingly realizing where he was and cleared his throat.

 “As I was saying…” the elder said.   “The culprit is the grain of truth in the old myths.  From the evidence we’ve gathered we can reason it is Bellum.”

 “Bellum?!” Medli nearly shouted.  “With respect High Priest Zepps, Bellum’s been dead for thousands of years!”

 “What is a Bellum?” the zora asked.

 “An ancient demon,” Medli said.

 “More than that,” Zepps said.  “He was an old god; a being that predated the creation of the world by The Golden Goddesses. He had a place in the depths of the ocean and a place in the natural order of things.  Because of the laws of nature though, he came into conflict with others.  Namely the Ocean King and Sky Spirit.”

 “I’d assume then that Bellum was defeated,” Tetra said.

 “At great cost,” Komali said.  “The old stories passed down by The High Priest of Valoo to his attendants are the closest record we have.  They say that Bellum had a following on a great continent.   And his servants crafted suits of armor that would harvest the living for sacrifice.  The conflict grew.  Lives were lost.  The Ocean King and Sky Spirit had to do something as Bellum’s influence spread through the continent.”

 “If I recall the stories right, it was not just his influence that spread,” Medli said.

 “You’d be right, child,” the elder said.

 “What happened?” Link asked. He leaned forward a little and picked up the bolts his sister had dropped on the floor earlier, but did not leave his chair.

 “Well…” Medli began, “if I recall right, Nayru wept for the loss of life and her tears flooded the continent.  Washed away all the blood so that there could be a fresh start.”

 “That’s one of the Hyrulean retellings actually,” the elder replied.  “What happened was his phantoms nearly cleansed the entire continent of life, absorbing it.  In the end, the only thing the Ocean King and Sky Spirit could do was undermine Bellum. The Sky Spirit taunted and distracted him, while the Ocean King dove under the continent.  Bellum had wrapped his many tentacles into the continent so better to feed off of the life there.  And thus, with just a little trickery, the entire continent was brought down upon the god.  All that remains of it are the scattered mountain tops and some of the islands. Outset, Mercay, Gust…  Most of the larger islands in the trade circle are the edges of the continent’s mountain range.”

 Link saw his sister gasp and look shocked at the tale.  “An entire continent?” she asked.

 “Yes.”

 “How?  And if Bellum is under it all?”  She shook her head and looked at the floor.

 “What she means to say is how could this thing survive an entire continent being dropped on top of it?” Tetra asked.  She bowed her head slightly at the question.  Link caught it and remembered another time she’d done that.  “Even if it did, it’d be buried under goddess-only-knows how many tons of rock.”

 “A dead god can still dream, captain,” Aveil said.  “Some of The Tribes believe that Demise’s tomb is in the heart of the Haunted Wasteland. It is his hate that makes the sands shift and why there are so many monsters in the region if you believe local legend.”

 “Anyone actually been out to see it?”

 “One or two witches have made it there.”

 “Mmm…”  Tetra looked back to the elder.  “So why use the geozards then?”

 “Simple, I’d assume,” Komali said.  “He’s not at full strength.  But strong enough to influence the things in the depths.  He can’t make his servants yet so has to utilize the local resources as it were.”

 “Meaning twisting the geozards,” Link answered.  “Be simple for something like Bellum then.”

 “Indeed,” the elder said.

 “I had a feeling this was all connected,” Aveil muttered.  “So… Bellum is in The Abyssal Plains in the center of the islands.”

 “Looking that way,” Link said.  “If not for the attack on the island, I’d say we’d need proof, but it looks like he’s trying to remove potential threats to his return.  Logically, we can reason Valoo is a descendant of the Sky Spirit.”

 “That’d be right,” the elder said.

 “This is way out of my pay grade,” Aveil said.

 “No one’s asked you to go after an old god,” Tetra said.

 “Yet,” Linebeck added with a yawn.

 “Actually, that is what myself and High Priest Zepps are asking,” Komali said.  He walked in front of the desk, hands behind his back.  “Before you arrived from the docks and cleanup below, we spoke at length with Ambassarod Tolec.  We’ve agreed this is not something we can wait on.  Bellum represents a threat to the entire South Seas. Regardless of what else is going on, he needs to be dealt with.”  He looked at the collected group.  “He is on his way back to the Craetor Depths and Labrynna to campaign for assistance. Before he left, we quickly drew up some contracts.  I am willing to hire each of you to find a way to find the zora who was captured by the pirates in the region.  Get information from him and then, if possible, find a way to stop Bellum’s raids from continuing.”

 “You’re what?” Tetra asked. She had a look of disbelief on her face. “You’re asking us to go after a goddess-damned demon god at the bottom of the ocean.”  Tetra looked to the rest of the group there.  “A group of pirates, a couple sellswords and a disgraced Labrynnan privateer after a dead god?”  In spite of her tone, he caught the look in her eyes.  There was a sparkle and a plan already forming in.  He wondered if what Komali said had given her the idea or not.

 “How much are we talking?” Linebeck asked.  Link could already see some of the greed in his eyes.  He shook his head at the smuggler. “What?  I’ve said it before.  There’s nothing that says we can’t do some good and get paid well doing it!”

 Aveil began to laugh a little.  “He’s got a point,” she said.  “And if Bellum regains its power, we wouldn’t be around long enough to enjoy it anyways.” She looked back at the chieftain. “I’ll take a look.  I make no promises until I’ve seen those contracts.”

 “Medli brought me in hoping I could help,” Link said.  “And you guys have always helped me.  So you can count on me.”

 “If the price is right, me too,” Linebeck said.

 “You really thinking about your wallet after hearing all this?” Medli asked him.

 Linebeck pulled his flask out of his coat and opened it.  “You two are going to need a boat to travel still.  And I have a contract too with Aveil.”  He pointed at her.  “Though we both agreed on ‘escape clauses’ in case we needed to make ourselves scarce…” He took a drink then.

 “We did,” she answered. “Which is more than I can say for the one with Remor.”

  The chieftain looked to the other side of the room.  “What about you, captain?” he asked.  “Can we count on your crew?”

 Link watched her as she looked at the floor for a minute.  He then saw her shake her head and look back up.  For a moment, he caught a sorrow in her eyes.  It was replaced with a mostly emotionless look. The same one he’d seen a couple times since the war had started, but he wasn’t going to let on.  “We’re just pirates,” Tetra said.  “It’s out of our paygrade and we’ve no interest in going after dreaming gods at the bottom of the sea.”

 “So you’re not going to?” Ayrll asked.

 “Look, Aryll, you might’ve come here to do some work for the rito and we’d give you passage as you played mailwoman on the islands we passed, but this is not what we do.”  She looked back at Komali.  “Even if we wanted to help, our main mast got destroyed in the fight!  We can’t go anywhere at any reasonable speed until it’s fixed.  We also lost six people to those things.”

 “I’d like a little payback, captain,” the larger of the pirates said.  “Those bastards whipped us.  Nobody gets away with that shit.”

 She looked back at him. “I’d like to as well, but this sounds like a really fast way to die.”  Tetra looked back at the chieftain.  Link saw her expression slightly change and how she shifted her weight. She’d figured something but wasn’t about to say it in front of an audience.  For a moment, she glanced over at him.  Link tried his best to keep a neutral expression.  “You really want our help, you’re gonna have to give us some incentive.”

 Aryll spoke up before anyone else could.  “The fact that if Bellum gets out and threatens everything isn’t incentive enough?!”

 “Like our gerudo friend said.  This is out of our pay grade.”

 “You said you needed incentive,” Zepps said.  “So how about you sit down and we discuss it?”  He shook his head a little and rubbed his left side a little as he shifted his weight.  The old rito looked the pirate captain in the eye.

 There was a moment of silence as the group was quiet.  “Well… No harm in discussing it at least,” she said.  “I need to talk to you about getting some letters into Hyrule anyways.”  Link smiled slightly at her words.  He knew exactly what she was doing now.  He held his tongue though as a small, sad smile came across his lips.  

 “When will we need to have a yes or no on those contracts?” Aveil asked.

 “By tonight,” Komali said. “Time’s of the essence.  We don’t know what some of his plans are or where he is.”

 “What makes you think the zora’s still alive too?”

 “We don’t know.”  He looked down.  “We need to find out.  From what Tolec said though, he’s a tough one.  Out of Termina’s Great Bay.”

 “Well, we’re already heading into the area and the Tower of the Gods as part of our plan,” Medli said. “So we’ll be able to check there. If not, there’s Mercay.  They’d probably be able to point us in the right direction.”

 “You know how dangerous it is there,” Zepps said.  “But be careful.”

 “Of course.”

 Komali looked to the rest of the group.  “If there is nothing else, we must discuss things with Captain Tetra and see if we can come to an agreement.”

[xx-ingie-xx]

Forgotten Excerpt

My writer’s block finally lifted! Hooray! Since last Saturday I’ve been spending almost all my free time working on the next chapter, and it would be posted by now if it wasn’t so looong. I was hoping I could finish editing it today, but I might need more time. It’s a lot of content. So here’s an excerpt in the meantime. :D

Edit: Just realized I should have posted something Mother’s Day related today... oops. >_< SOMEDAY I WILL BE ON TOP OF THESE THINGS. T_T

(To give some context, Link, Zelda, and Shayne (though he’s not in this scene) went to visit the forest, and Link is leading her through the Lost Woods.)

----

“How do you know your way around here so well?” Zelda spoke, free to ask such questions in Shayne’s absence.

“I’m immune to the enchantment,” Link answered simply. “Like the Kokiri, I am blessed with the Deku Tree’s protection.”

“And that’s how you know your way around?”

Link gave a quiet laugh. “No. I know these Woods because I explored them as a boy. I discovered many interesting places, and I visited them often.”

Zelda fell quiet, wondering if he had sought refuge away from the village, where he never truly fit in. She had done something similar, back when she explored the castle as a girl.

To think that was nearly twenty years ago, she thought to herself. It feels like yesterday.

“I can understand the lure of exploration,” she told Link. “When I was a child I wanted to discover every inch of the castle.”

“I remember,” he replied, turning to her with a smile. “You showed me many unknown places in the castle. And I returned the favor here.”

Zelda returned his smile, but inside she felt another tug of sadness, a desire to remember the boy with whom she had shared such adventures… the boy she had grown to love.

“We’re here.”

Her thoughts faded as Link led her to the edge of what looked like a deep ravine. Below them lay a massive pool of perfectly clear water, disturbed only by a tall, narrow waterfall. It’s glassy surface seemed to dance in the sunlight which shone through a gap in the trees. The surrounding bank was mostly rock and pebbles, but beyond it lay a bed of lush green grass. Flowers of countless shapes and sizes colored the area, growing in bright patches among the grass, adorning vines, and sprouting from small blossoming trees.

“It’s beautiful,” Zelda breathed, letting Link take her hand as he led her down to the water’s edge.

“We used to come here all the time,” he said as they sat on a moss ridden log. “The water is quite warm, perfect for swimming. And it’s beautiful by night as well—especially a moonlit night. Certain flowers and mushrooms glow in the dark—you can see them everywhere. And when the fireflies gather… it’s quite a sight to behold. If you’re lucky, you might even see a fairy or two pass by.”

A blush warmed Zelda’s face as she realized how very romantic the place was. Just what sort of memories had they shared there? Was that why he had brought her there?

Stop jumping to conclusions, her practical side scolded her. He just wanted to show you a beautiful place.

Zelda tried not to dwell on such thoughts, focusing instead on the soothing rush of the waterfall and the birds singing in the treetops.

“I was quite wrong about this place,” she told Link. “It’s so lovely, even despite its dangerous enchantment, and it feels very peaceful here… It makes the troubles of the world seem small and far away.”

Link nodded, his eyes fixed on the lake. “Yes... it does.” He turned to her then, studying her profile. “So, how do you like my old house?”

Zelda gave a small laugh. “Very charming. But so humble, compared to your life now. Did you ever dream that you would one day become King of Hyrule?”

Link gave a halfhearted laugh of his own. “Certainly not. Though I did often dream about… visiting the castle.”

“You pursued your dream and realized it—to say the least,” Zelda said cheerfully. “Your story is as encouraging as it is extraordinary.”

Link looked away then, noticeably saddened by her words, and immediately she regretted them.

“I’m sorry,” she said gently. “I don’t know enough to say such a thing…”

He waved a dismissive hand. “Don’t worry about it. What else did you two talk about?”

Zelda thought a minute. “She told me how you came into her care, how she raised you… and how you left the forest when you were only ten years old. It’s quite remarkable, but… you were so young to be on your own. Did no one else look after you?”

“I had friends outside of the forest,” Link replied. “People I could go to if I needed them. And I could always come back here. In truth, though, I spent a lot of time with you over the next two years. My education here was rather lacking, to say the least, and you became a sort of tutor to me. We were both quite young, but you’ve always been very intelligent. You taught me a lot—history, language, grammar. We had daily lessons, and I enjoyed them immensely, as did you.

“Eventually, though, I grew restless,” Link admitted, “and I went off to explore the kingdoms beyond Hyrule’s border. My travels taught me a great deal about the world, and I did enjoy them, but… I missed Hyrule. And I missed you,” he added softly.

Zelda dropped her gaze to her hands, feeling her heart flutter with nerves. She tried to remember that Link spoke of the past, and that he wasn’t pressing any feelings upon her, but it flustered her nonetheless.

“I didn’t travel for two years straight,” Link told her. “I came back to Hyrule each spring—to visit you on your birthday. When I was fourteen, I discovered that your betrothed had finally taken an interest in you, and you were quite taken with him. Suddenly I felt… unwanted there. You were always kind to me, but you were engaged. Our friendship had become… inappropriate.”

Zelda recalled their conversation in her chamber the previous night, remembering that her infatuation with her fiance had lasted three years. Had Link pined for her all that time, burdened with unrequited love?

“I was lost again… for a while,” Link’s quiet voice brought her back to the present. “But I didn’t want to leave Hyrule, so I took up work at Lon Lon Ranch. Talon and his daughter were kind and welcoming people, but the work didn’t suit me. There was plenty to do, but… I wanted to be part of something… larger. I needed a new kind of challenge, and I wanted to stay close to the castle—and to you,” he added softly. “So I pursued the only path that made sense to me.”

“To enlist in the army,” Zelda said quietly.

Link nodded. “I was too young, though. I had the skills to be a good soldier, but mentally… I wasn’t ready for the horrors of war.”

A rush of compassion swept through Zelda, and she nearly reached out to touch his shoulder, but then Link turned to give her a sheepish smile.

“Enough about me. I’ve been meaning to ask you—did Saria say anything about… your amnesia?”

Zelda looked away, remembering the anguish in Saria’s face as she begged her to recover her past, to become the Zelda Link knew and loved.

Link watched her closely, noticing her discomfort.

“She made a plea for my sake,” he said. “Didn’t she.”

His voice lacked any inquisitive tone, as he apparently knew the answer. Zelda bowed her head, unsure what to say.

“She… She asked that I try to regain my memories; that’s all.”

Link sighed quietly, but Zelda could not recognize the cause. Embarrassment? Sympathy? Longing?

“That must have been uncomfortable for you,” he said quietly. “I’m sorry. Please don’t hold it against her… She’s only looking out for me.”

“I know,” Zelda said quickly. “Any good mother would do the same, I’m sure—or even a friend... And it was a perfectly reasonable request—”

“Zelda.”

I turned when Link took my hand in both of his, reluctantly meeting his gaze.

“If you do try to regain your memories,” he said, his blue eyes gazing into mine, “then it must be of your own choosing. Don’t do it for my sake, or Saria’s, or anyone else’s. No one can force you to act against your will.”

His words swept through her with strong reassurance, but the feeling soon passed, and the weight in Zelda’s chest remained.

“But surely you want me to remember,” she whispered, looking at him sadly. “More than anything…”

Link studied her a moment, then lowered his gaze and withdrew his hands.

“I can’t say what feelings I have… or will have for the woman you are now,” he admitted slowly, “but I do respect you, and I will respect whatever decision you make—even if it hurts me. As I’ve said before, I ask only that you be a mother to Shayne, and he doesn’t need your memories.”

“I would hate to have you resent me...”

“If I do,” he said softly, meeting her troubled gaze, “then it would be my failing, not yours.”

Zelda gazed back at him, stunned by his selfless words—and his apparent sincerity. She wanted to return his consideration, to assure him that she did not oppose the idea of regaining her memories, but somehow the words stuck in her throat.

“Maybe it was a mistake to bring you here so soon,” Link murmured. “I didn’t mean to overwhelm you.”

“No, I asked to come here. Thank you for sharing this with me... and for being so understanding.”

"Friends do that much for each other,” he replied. “I hope you’ll at least consider me that.”

Zelda smiled. “I certainly don’t consider you an enemy.”

Link gave a short laugh. “Well, that’s a relief. Not the response I hoped for, but I’ll take it.”

Despite his playful tone, Zelda couldn’t help but wonder if she hurt him when she kept her distance in that way. Before she could figure him out, however, Link rose to his feet and offered his hand.

“Come on,” he said. “Let’s head back.”