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cooking-with-hailstones · 9 months

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Forever Bound to the Soul of the Hero

Fi's retelling of the Breath of the Wild Memories

(Rated T: Canon typical violence)

For @linksthoughtbrambles

Awakening

I have been asleep for a very long time.

The woods where I was laid to rest have flourished since their destruction in the last war. The spirits of the forest are chittering with nervous anticipation as I spark back to wakefulness. The Great Deku Tree rumbles his warm welcome, even though my awakening signals a portent of doom.

I feel the evil gathering in the land. Even in my sleep, I have sensed the aura of dark energy seeping into the earth, the trees, the wind, the shifting of stone on stone.

It is hard to tell how long it has been between cycles. Sometimes millennia will pass, sometimes only a hundred years. But every time the evil comes, someone will be chosen to fight back.

I can feel him out there. He sees me in dreaming, and he knows a great destiny awaits him.

It will soon be time. I shall be raised skyward once more.

Ceremony of Innocence:

“ Hero of Hyrule, chosen by the sword that seals the darkness… You have shown unflinching bravery and skill in the face of darkness and adversity. And have proven yourself worthy of the blessings of the Goddess Hylia. Whether skyward bound, adrift in time, or steeped in the glowing embers of twilight… The sacred blade is forever bound to the soul of the Hero. We pray for your protection…and we hope that-- that the two of you will grow stronger together, as one…”

I am afraid.

Much has been lost in the generations since the last champion of the Goddess bore me across his shoulders. I can see remnants of the technology, lingering vestiges that have not decayed over the millennia. But so much knowledge is gone.

There is no mystery here as to why this spirit maiden is unable to awaken her powers. The Sheikah elders from whom she must receive guidance and instruction in every generation have lost their influence over the royal family. They are only now, through their adept understanding of ancient technologies, able to regain some of their former status. But the king and these so-called priests of Hylia take no account of the Sheikah’s wisdom. Instead, they have her bathing in the sacred springs, without any of the other rites of purification. They have her speaking prayers that carry no meaning and no power. And this blessing she speaks over Link, over my new master…

This cannot be all there is. There is so much more to do. The hero’s soul has not been tempered, not been tested. While the sacred realm has long been sealed, the Sheikah of generations passed have devised many trials to strengthen our bond. But they are dormant, so it seems that this, too, is forgotten.

I have been reduced to some mere symbol, a figurehead in this war.

I am very afraid.

Listening

“From here, we’ll make our way to Goron City. Then we’ll need some adjustments on that Divine Beast so Daruk can manage it as easily as possible. He’s figured out how to get it to move! However, it’s apparent that we still have much more to learn. But to think, that Divine Beast was actually built by people… That means we should be able to understand how it works and use it to our advantage.

These Divine Beasts…so much we don’t know… But if we want to turn back the Calamity Ganon, they’re our best hope.”

My master always listens keenly to the spirit maiden Zelda, even though he lacks sufficient technical understanding to truly follow her excited monologues. She has much of Hylia’s wisdom and ingenuity. She is passionate and dedicated to her craft. In some ways, she is the most like Hylia of any of the spirit maidens I have ever encountered. I estimate that, given proper training and access to the correct tools, this spirit maiden would have a 78% likelihood of being able to forge an entity similar to myself.

The lack of technical comprehension in this era continues to trouble me greatly. The slate the spirit maiden is holding is an invaluable tool, designed by the Sheikah to interface with my technology and assist in the transmission of information, transportation, and a myriad of other utilities that they cannot even fathom. All of these have been designed by the Sheikah to aid the fight against Ganon, and it is only being used at a fraction of its capacities.

“Tell me the truth… How proficient are you right now, wielding that sword on your back? Legend says that an ancient voice resonates inside it. Can you hear it yet…hero?”

My master stops in his tracks. He cannot, I think forlornly to myself. I can see his thoughts, I am coming to know him little by little, but still, he cannot hear my voice. No matter how much I scream, my master only perceives me as an echo in his subconscious.

Being the hero is not just a matter of drawing the sword – he isn’t tested. He has not passed through the goddess’ trials and forged the bond with the master sword through the goddess’ flame. His spirit may very well shatter when he confronts the agent of Demise.

He is angry and sad and cannot tell her. He tries to listen for the sword but no one has ever taught him how, and I am too weak to reach him.

And even now, I can feel the stirring in his heart. Every reincarnation of the Goddess draws the soul of the hero to her side. Whether friends or lovers, they cannot bear to hold hatred between them. I can feel the way his heart quickens when he has to grab hold of her. I know the thoughts he does not allow himself to think.

He says nothing. She turns away in a huff, thinking this means he has nothing to say.

Devotion and Resentment

My master has awoken, suddenly aware of Zelda’s absence from Tabantha stable. This is hardly the first time she has tried to evade him, but over the last few months he has become far more adept at finding her.

There is a 75% probability that he has deducted that I am the reason he is able to trace where she has escaped, no matter how clever her trickery. He feels it not like the dowsing I used to perform, but rather as an itch behind his eyes. A compulsion that pulls him forward, towards her, demanding that he be near her. It was designed by the Goddess, that their souls should find each other. And I will always pull them together. He can no more stop following her than he can stop breathing.

After a fierce gallop across Tanagar canyon bridge and nudging his horse up to the ancient columns, he finally starts to relax. I can feel the tension leave his shoulders.

Zelda, however, seems far from pleased.

“I thought I made it clear that I am not in need of an escort,” she says with great indignation. “ It seems I’m the only one with a mind of my own. I, the person in question, am fine, regardless of the king’s orders. Return to the castle. And tell that to my father, please.”

She was in the process of examining one of the shrines left by the Sheikah monks, meant to temper the hero’s spirit and strengthen him for the trials ahead. These are objects of curiosity for Hylians, and for Zelda in particular, but they are meant to play a vital role. It is essential that the hero be able to access these shrines. Without completing a significant portion of the shrines, I predict a 98.2% chance that the hero’s spirit will break.

My master takes this in stride. It is hardly the first time he’s weathered such outbursts. He steps in line, always three paces behind her.

She whirls around. “And stop following me!”

She is so angry with him, all the time. She does not understand that Hylia’s chosen hero will follow her to the ends of the earth and beyond. He will follow her through time, through space, through any hardship, just to see her safe and the land protected.

She does not yet know that she and the land are one. And he is now starting to realize that his duty, his destiny, is to protect them all.

A Champion’s Compassion

“Ah, well…you certainly got here fast. I should have expected as much from the princess’s own appointed knight.” The Gerudo champion looks down at the sleeping Zelda. “She was out on a survey all day today. Still as the sands now…” Turning to look at my master, her eyes sparkle in the desert night. “So…? Spill it, boy. Have the two of you been getting along all right?”

Quite the opposite, I think to myself. He must have heard the thought, because he winces.

The champion laughs. “It’s OK… I know. Your silence speaks volumes.” She sighs, looking down at the sleeping princess on her lap . “She gets frustrated every time she looks up and sees you carrying that sword on your back. It makes her feel like a failure when it comes to her own destiny.”

And hardly fair, given how little progress this hero has made in his own right, I think sullenly. They are both so unprepared, so untested. Training drills and prayer are hardly enough to strengthen their spirits. The champions have been through much more rigorous trials to connect with their divine beasts. I am happy to say that Zelda’s confidence in them is well founded.

“Don’t worry, it’s not like you carry blame in any of this.” She sighs, stroking Zelda’s hair. “It’s unfortunate. She’s put in more than enough time. Ever since she was a young girl, she’s gone through rigorous daily routines to show her dedication. She once passed out in the freezing waters trying to access this sealing power. And she has nothing to show for it… That’s the motivation driving her research. I’d be doing the same thing.”

I appreciate the Gerudo champion. She is a formidable blademaster, a dedicated champion, and a wise and supportive presence in Zelda’s life. Far more than can be said for the useless aristocrat that calls himself the king, without a drop of Hylia’s blood to his name.

“She really is quite…special. You be sure to protect her with your life.” She looks at my master with a piercing maternal gaze. “It’s quite the honour.”

He knows this. I know he dreams of it every night. He knows he will fight and die for her. He meets Urbosa’s gaze, and I sense she knows it too.

The champion reclines on her cushions. She has done much to make her divine beast a more comfortable abode, befitting a Gerudo chief.

“The night brings a chill… It’s probably time we take her in. Or...” She smirks as some mischief crosses her mind, then with a snap of her fingers, the desert sky lights up with electricity.

My master stumbles at the quaking thunder and Zelda wakes up, frightened. Neither of them have ever been particularly fond of storms and lightning, even if they don’t know why.

“Urbosa! What was that?! Did you feel that?!” Zelda gasps, before catching my master’s shadow by the doorway.

“Wait, what--how did you-- what are you doing here?!”

He blushes furiously, and though the darkness might conceal the pinkish glow from some, Urbosa’s gaze is far too sharp to miss it. She leans back with a hearty laugh.

“Wha-what’s so funny?”

“Ah, you, my dear.” Urbosa wipes a tear of mirth from her eye. “One day you’ll laugh about all of this.”

I hope she is right. They deserve to laugh.

Blood on the Sand

MASTER! I am screaming as loudly as I can. MASTER! DANGER! GO!

He feels my desperation, dropping the bundle of arrows he was examining from a merchant in the Kara Kara bazaar, and takes off sprinting towards the pull that he’s grown used to, the itch behind his eyes that’s always there. But now it is more acute, so loud he must be able to hear the ringing of the dowsing call in his ears.

He rounds the corner and sees them. Those cursed agents of evil, seduced by the false promises of Demise, and they are chasing Zelda over the sands. They cackle, their wicked sickles glinting in the hot desert sun. There is a cold rage in my master’s heart, and he puts on another burst of speed, drawing me from my scabbard. I brace myself, ready for the battle, as the Yiga’s blade curves towards Zelda’s fallen body.

My master is quick, and ruthless. I feel myself slip through the Yiga’s neck with a cold efficiency as warm blood soaks the edge of my blade. The body drops to the ground as he wheels around to face the other two. I can sense their fear, and I calculate only a 26% likelihood that they will attempt to continue the fight.

Sure enough, they scatter and vanish into the desert wind. My master does not take his eyes from them until they are truly gone, only then sheathing my bloody blade and turning towards Zelda. He gives her his hand to help her upright. “Are you hurt?” he asks fearfully. I can feel his heart still pounding in his chest.

Her eyes. She has never looked at him with any fondness before, but her eyes are brimming with gratitude and care. “ No, I’m fine, I just…” she pauses, and bursts into tears.

I know Link is thinking nothing of propriety when he wraps his arms around her. I know she is thinking nothing of resentment when she buries her face in his shoulder and sobs, the fear and adrenaline rushing through her body.

Maybe this is the beginning. Maybe this is how their spirits will grow. Maybe this is how evil will lose.

Laughter

I am not supposed to feel emotion. It was not part of my design. Yet after spending millennia borne by Hylians and getting to know their innermost thoughts, I have inevitably adapted to many of their traits.

To that end, I am beginning to feel… frustrated.

“There’s one! Oh! And another! The flowers we have in Hyrule aren’t just beautiful…They’re also quite useful as ingredients for a variety of things.”

Today the spirit maiden and my master are out on a field survey. I am grateful that they are getting along better, and that her resentment seems to have given way to a nascent friendship. My frustration is not with them. It simply irks me to see the Sheikah slate being used like some ordinary pictobox.

She gasps with excitement, and Link quickly settles down beside her.

“This one here is called the silent princess. It’s a rare, endangered species. Despite our efforts, we can’t get them to grow domestically yet. The princess can only thrive out here in the wild. All that we can hope…is that the species will be strong enough to prosper, on its own.”

She smiles, sadly, and my master’s heart flutters. He understands her meaning as clearly as I do. Neither of them can thrive here. They know that their destinies are not waiting for them inside the castle walls.

The prayers, the training, the wasted time, the technology that they’ve only uncovered 18% of the capabilities of… they must feel as frustrated as I do.

The somber moment is dissipated as Zelda gasps with excitement and lunges forward.

“Is that what I think it is?! Look at this, I don’t believe it, but I actually caught one! This delicacy is known to have very, very potent effects under the proper circumstances. Tada!”

She opens her hands to reveal… a frog. My master recoils slightly.

“Research from the castle shows ingesting one of these can actually augment certain abilities. We wouldn’t be in a controlled environment out here, but with your level of physical fitness…you’d be a perfect candidate for the study! Go on! Taste it!”

Link makes a truly disgusted face.

“Oh come now, I’ve seen you eating Goron rock roast. Surely you’re not put off by a little bit of mucus for the sake of scientific inquiry?”

She may have a point there. This particular incarnation of the Hero’s spirit seems to have a stomach made of cast iron.

With a resigned sigh – he truly cannot refuse her anything – he leans down towards her hands… and the frog leaps straight into his face. He startles, falling backwards on his rear as the frog scampers away.

Zelda collapses to the ground in a fit of infectious giggles, and soon enough the pair of them are leaning on each other as their laughter echoes through the hillside.

The Question of Destiny

In truth, I do relish sword drills. It is for my benefit as well; learning how my master moves, what his grip is on the sword, the gestures he favours. My algorithms internalize and optimize every movement. As we practice together, we grow closer. Even if he cannot hear me, he knows that I am with him, helping to guide his actions and see that each strike lands true.

Zelda watches him closely from her shelter beneath the tree.

“I doubt this will let up anytime soon… Your path seems to mirror your father’s. You’ve dedicated yourself to becoming a knight, as well. Your commitment to the training necessary to fulfill your goal is really quite admirable. I see now why you would be the chosen one.”

He stiffens slightly. His father had only died a year ago, and the wound was still fresh. But Zelda seems too lost in her own thoughts to notice.

“What if… One day…You realised that you just weren’t meant to be a fighter. Yet the only thing people ever said…was that you were born into a family of the royal guard, and so no matter what you thought, you had to become a knight. If that was the only thing that you were ever told… I wonder, then…would you have chosen a different path?”

There was no other destiny for my master. He was born to be Hylia’s chosen.

Not for the first time in my long existence, I wonder at the cruelty of the Goddess’ choice of mortal champions in this cosmic war.

Link pauses a moment before returning me to the sheath across his back.

“This… isn’t about me, is it?”

Zelda blushes. “I… well…”

He takes her hand. I can feel both of their heartbeats quicken.

“I think…” he pauses, choosing his words carefully. “I think that no matter who I was, where I was born, whatever was expected of me…”

“Yes?”

“I would find my way to you.”

Prayer and Dedication

It is a unique pain that my master must experience, and thus I experience alongside him. The unique pain that comes from watching someone you love torture themselves for circumstances beyond their control.

These prayers are useless. She is not praying to a Goddess. She is meant to awaken the Goddess within her own spirit. But they still cannot hear me, and nothing I could suggest to my master would have any effect. And so, I sit, sheathed and silent as my master and I ache at the desperation in Zelda’s voice.

“I come seeking help, regarding this power that has been handed down over time. Prayer will awaken my power to seal Ganon away… Or so I’ve been told all my life.

And yet… Grandmother heard them--the voices from the spirit realm. And Mother said her own power would develop within me. But I don’t hear, or feel anything!

Father has told me time and time again… He always says, “Quit wasting your time playing at being a scholar!” Curse you…”

Holy water splashes against clenched fists.

“I’ve spent every day of my life dedicated to praying! I’ve pleaded to the spirits tied to the ancient gods. And still the holy powers have proven deaf to my devotion. Please just tell me, what is it…? What’s wrong with me?!”

Link’s composure finally cracks. I am truthfully relieved when he drops me down on the stones and splashes into the spring, wrapping a sobbing Zelda in his embrace.

“There’s nothing wrong with you. We’ll figure this out, together. I promise, Zelda, I promise…” He strokes her hair, and she weeps all the more.

I cannot weep, it is not in my design. I should not feel emotion, but despite my programming, I have begun to understand something of grief. Oh, children, what have we done to you?

They may not succeed. They may not have the strength and ability to fight off the coming Calamity. But I will fight back. The Goddess created me to protect and guide her chosen. I must do whatever I can.

Calamity and Corruption

The final spring. The last hope they had. And just as I had predicted, nothing happened.

The champions all do their best to conceal their dismay, offering words of encouragement to Zelda, but to little avail. The Zora champion starts to say something, but –

The ground shakes.

The sky darkens.

The Rito champion launches himself skyward to see what’s taking place, but before I even hear his horrified gasp, I know what has happened.

My master leaps forward to support Zelda as she stumbles. He does not need to be told either. Just as with every Hero’s spirit preceding him, he has seen this moment in his dreams since he was an infant. But he is not ready, Zelda is not ready and the Calamity must know this as well. It has chosen this precise moment of despair to strike.

The champions disperse, each of them racing back to their Divine Beasts. Without the spirit maiden’s sealing power, the only hope at holding the Calamity at bay now lies with the strength of the champions.

Link and Zelda, now alone, race down the promenade towards Kakariko village. Bolts of purple and black tar seem to be streaking across the sky overhead, the sunset rapidly disappearing behind the dark clouds.

This is unfamiliar to me. What kind of attack is the Calamity readying? I have never witnessed this before.

They keep running, over the Sahasra slope and towards Hyrule field. The castle is the nexus point. Link must be ready for when the champions reach the divine beasts for their attack. We must try to defeat the Calamity, with or without the Goddess’ power. There is only a 2.6% chance that we succeed, but 2.6% is not 0.

beep

What…?

beep beep beep beepbeepbeepbeep

A guardian! Link and Zelda both heave a sigh of relief. The guardians have been deployed from Castle Town to protect the surrounding villages. At least that will provide some measure of safety.

Wait... Something’s wrong.

POW!

Without a moment to spare, Link tackles Zelda to the ground out of the way of the guardian’s deadly line of fire. Without a second thought, he pulls me from my scabbard, leaps forward and drives me straight into the guardian’s vulnerable eye. It sparks, fizzes, and collapses, purple smoke billowing out of its joints.

“What’s going on?” Zelda screams, as torrents of purple-black tar continue to pour from the sky onto Hyrule field and Castle town. “Why did it fire at us?”

Wasting no time, Link grabs her arm and whirls around, sprinting back the way they came and dragging Zelda behind him.

“Link, no! We need to go to the castle!”

“Zelda, we – ”

A bolt of purple tar slams into me.

“The master sword!” Zelda cries.

CORRUPTION!

This is the Calamity’s plan! Oh, Hylia, no!

He has remembered his defeat from 10,000 years ago. He remembered the technology that was turned against him and his armies, and his hatred and malice are now corrupting every element of Sheikah technology, and everything they interface with.

Including me.

NO! I twist through the dark tendrils reaching through my circuitry. YOU WILL NOT TOUCH ME. I WAS CREATED BY THE GODDESS HYLIA, AND I WILL NOT YIELD TO YOU, FOUL AGENT OF DEMISE.

I push back along these tendrils of malice, burning them away with the divine light of the Goddess. I reach through the telepathic link I share with the Sheikah technology, cutting and blazing through the spreading rot. The Sheikah slate, the towers, the shrines, all the creations designed to interface with the Hero’s soul, I can still connect with them! With every scrap of energy I have left, I burn away the malice creeping through their networks.

The malice fights back, the darkness spreading… but I will not yield.

Exhaustion and Despair

The forest near the bottomless swamp is dark and twisted, the tangled roots and mud are treacherous in the shadow of the storm. It is almost dawn, they haven’t slept, they are still running. I can feel the exhaustion creeping in, their stamina depleting. I too am exhausted - still fighting against the malice, trying to keep it at bay. I cannot help them any more than this.

Zelda stumbles and cries out, falling to her knees on the path made slick by torrential rains.

“How… How did it come to this?”

My master kneels beside her, desperate to move along, but reticent to force her to keep running.

“The Divine Beasts…The Guardians… They’ve all turned against us. It was Calamity Ganon. It turned them all against us!”

She is weeping in earnest now, rivers of tears meeting the raindrops already pouring down her face.

“And everyone--Mipha, Urbosa, Revali and Daruk… They’re all trapped in those things… It’s all my fault! Our only hope for defeating Calamity Ganon is lost, all because I couldn’t harness this cursed power! Everything--everything I’ve done up until now… It was all for nothing. So I really am just a failure! All my friends, the entire kingdom, my father most of all… I tried, and I failed them all… I’ve left them all to die…

“Zelda…” he grips her tighter. “Zelda, we have to go. There may be soldiers who can protect you at Fort Hateno. We need to go.”

She nods miserably, taking his arm and standing up again. They turn to the misty shadows, and keep running.

I truly had hoped their love might be enough.

Hylia Reborn

They are tracking us. Some corruption of their programming has locked them to our signal. Perhaps it is me they are tracking, a beacon of the Goddess’ light flickering amid the swirling chaos of malice.

Wouldn’t that be ironic.

The guardians homing in on us are coming thick and fast. While I am able to target their weak points with a respectable accuracy, I was made to cut through Demise’s creations - beings of corrupted flesh. I was never made to fight these machines.

Link is exhausted. Almost two days with little sleep and hardly any food, he has taken more than his fair share of blows. There are gashes across his legs and arms that are oozing blood, and three of his ribs are broken. I predict that he will lose consciousness in less than four minutes.

But Zelda is unharmed, for now. Nothing else matters to him at this moment.

He stabs me through the eye of yet another guardian, staggering backwards and leaning on me heavily.

“Link, save yourself! Go! I’ll be fine! Don’t worry about me! Run!”

He can hardly hear her through the blood rushing in his ears, and the incessant beeping as they scan for us. I don’t know what to do! The Goddess left no instructions for this. I have never witnessed my master die.

Another guardian has spotted us through the husks of its fellows. My master is so tired, and I have no strength to give him.

And yet Link pulls me up once more, readying himself and covering Zelda with his body, as the laser flares to life.

This is it.

Hylia, forgive me. I have failed you.

“NO!”

Zelda leaps forward, throwing herself in front of Link, hands raised in desperation. What is she -?

The world explodes with golden light.

Link winces, but does not shield his eyes. Nor would I, if I had eyes to behold this sight. The light radiates from her, guardians exploding and collapsing in its wake.

She did it. Hylia has come into her own!

“Was… Was that…? The power?” she whispers in the sudden quiet that follows as the corrupted machines power down.

You did it, Zel. he thinks, and seeing her safe, he finally yields to the pain.

She whirls around as he falls. “ No, no…Link! Get up!” She lifts him into her arms, hardly noticing the blood soaking into her ruined dress. “You’re going to be just fine…”

He looks up to her, eyes full of pride, of sadness, and love, and then he lets the darkness take him.

Our telepathic link snaps. I cannot sense his thoughts anymore. He is... gone.

Hylia help me, I did everything I could, but I could not save him. May the Goddess forgive me.

The Goddess holds his body and weeps.

But, wait.

Against the pommel of the sword, I feel the slightest pressure.

thump thump

A pulse. A pulse! His heart is still beating. He might yet be saved!

With my limited remaining computing power, I desperately run through the calculations. The medical infrastructure needed to treat these wounds is sorely lacking in this era of Hyrule, but... Yes! It is there! Reaching through the Sheikah network, I can feel it, safe from the Calamity’s corruption. I remember the monk Maz Koshia designing this shrine for just this reason. The Shrine of Resurrection.

Above me, Zelda shifts. Slowly, she starts to relinquish him, not noticing the pulse that I can feel, still beating ever so faintly in his chest.

No. NO! She cannot let go!

HYLIA, HEAR ME! I am screaming through broken circuits and fragmented code. I have been damaged beyond anything I was designed to withstand, I am decayed beyond measure, but she is awake! She must listen!

ALIVE

My strength is fading, but she cannot abandon him! Not now!

ALIVE

“The sword…?”

She has heard me! YES.

“So he can… He can still be saved?”

QUICKLY, THERE IS NO TIME! THE SHRINE OF RESURRECTION ON THE GREAT PLATEAU. YOU MUST TAKE HIM THERE, NOW. IT IS THE ONLY WAY.

“I… how..?”

“Princess!” a voice echoes from across the field. The Sheikah, loyal to the last, have tracked the Goddess here. Their timing could not be better.

“Princess! Are you all right?”

She draws herself up with a strength I have never seen in her before.

“Take Link to the Shrine of Resurrection. If you don’t get him there immediately, we are going to lose him forever! Is that clear?! So make haste and go! His life is now in your hands!”

The two men nod, immediately setting to work to stabilize him for the journey. They lift him carefully, wrapping his deepest wounds in bandages, before melting into the shadows as only Sheikah can. Zelda watches them disappear into the rain, then grips me hard, clutching me to her chest.

“You speak? I can hear you? How? How is this possible?”

With the last bit of strength I can muster, I answer. YOU ARE AWAKE.

“The power?”

YES. THROUGH YOUR GRACE AND WISDOM, AND LOVE FOR MY MASTER, YOU HAVE FOUND THE TRUE POWER OF YOUR SPIRIT.

“What do I do?” she cries. “How can I seal the Calamity without Link? Without the champions?”

BREATHE, ZELDA.

I am not meant for this task. I am meant to guide the hero, not the spirit maiden, but I carry enough of the Goddess’ memories to know what must be done while she waits for the hero to return.

YOUR POWERS SHOULD NOW CONNECT YOU TO THE SPIRIT MAIDENS WHO HAVE COME BEFORE YOU. LISTEN TO THEM. THEY WILL GUIDE YOU.

She looks startled, but she does what I say. Sitting in the mud amid the husks of the defeated guardians, she takes a deep, shuddering breath. Her ancestors gather around, and I hear the whispers of Hylia’s past incarnations floating past me, just on the edge of hearing. She glows with a faint golden light in the falling rain. After a few minutes, she opens her eyes.

“Yes.” She says. “Even if he cannot yet be defeated. I can hold the Calamity at bay. I… I have done it before.”

MANY TIMES

She nods. “And what of you? I cannot bring you with me, but I cannot leave you here.”

I am barely capable of speaking anymore. The decay of the malice has been stopped by her light, but I am already close to shattering.

I AM WEARY. I MUST HEAL.

“Of course, what must I do?”

TAKE ME TO THE LOST WOODS. THE CHILDREN OF THE FOREST WILL LEAD YOU THERE.

Laid to Rest

With the spirit of the Goddess awakened within her, Zelda can now see the korok spirits guiding her, from the field of battle all the way through the Lost Woods. Now she stands at the roots of the Great Deku Tree. At last, I can rest. In Hylia’s light, my master and I shall both become whole again.

“Your master will come for you. Until then, you shall rest safely here. Although the Slumber of Restoration will most certainly deprive him of his memories, please trust me when I say that I know he will arrive before you yet again.”

She places me carefully back in the pedestal at the Great Deku Tree’s roots. I feel myself slipping into my deep sleep once again.

As my consciousness fades, I hear the Deku Tree ask “If I may be so bold…what is it that you are planning to do next, Princess?”

Zelda looks resolute. “The Master Sword… I heard it speak to me. It seems that my role is unfinished. There is still something I must do.”

“I sense there is great strength in your dedication.”

She has greater strength than ever. She is not alone anymore. The spirits of her ancestors are guiding her now, all the way back to the first Zelda who sealed Demise for a thousand years, waiting for her hero to return.

“Great Deku Tree, I ask of you, when he returns, can you please relay this message… Tell him I—"

He interrupts her. “ Now, then… Words intended for him would sound much better in the tones of your voice, don’t you think?”

She smiles up at him, nods in understanding.

As my consciousness finally slips away, I think to myself, dearest Zelda. He already knows. He loves you too.

Awakening II

He is awake, and so am I.

The spirits of the forest are chittering with excitement. Even as I rest here, I can hear the Great Deku Tree stirring with anticipation. We all felt the call of the spirit maiden locked away in Hyrule Castle, calling him once again to her side. I have felt her longing for him these hundred years.

This time, he will grow strong in spirit. This time, we shall fight together.

This time, the Calamity will fall.

Thanks so much for reading! You can also find this fic on AO3

#emily writes #my writing #fanfiction #skyward sword #Fi #loz fi #zelink #botw zelink #BOTW link #BOTW Zelda #hateno house gift exchange #hateno house #linksthoughtbrambles #gift exchange #fi lore #sheikah tech #calamity ganon

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linktheacehero · 9 months

Text

Gift for @dykevirgo for the Midna Merry Mixup!

#zelink #botw zelink #modern au #botw #breath of the wild #botw link #botw zelda #my art #gift exchange #hatenogiftexchange

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floraunderground · 7 months

Link

for valentines:)

#loftwing letters #and your heart is baked into prose #zelink #zelda #link #gift exchange #totk #botw

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keikbird · 2 years

Photo

Happy Hetsu’s Gift Exchange to @chimpukampu!!💗✨

(Thank you and also I’m sorry that I used your gift to get some practice with my new tablet)

#zelda #link #zelink #botw zelink #hetsu's gift exchange #gift exchange #chimpukampu

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aurathian · 2 years

Text

GLOW -- ao3

my valentine for @silentprincess17 for @zelinkcommunity loftwing letters! i hope u enjoy sipri love u

Beautiful in its own way, but he felt out of place among the dunes and the cloudless blue sky–like he was never meant to be there.

Link’s favorite assignment was the Lost Woods. Not the dark, foggy part of it, where he had gotten lost on more than one occasion, but the bright inner forest that teemed with life. Bright green and sunny yellows and white flowers, it was very unlike the desert home he knew, dotted with oases and cacti. Beautiful in its own way, but he felt out of place among the dunes and the cloudless blue sky–like he was never meant to be there.

“You’re on that tangent again?” his partner Zelda asked. Had he said all that aloud? “Listen, Link. Sometimes we just have to accept the cards we were dealt, even if we don’t like it. This is who we are. Besides, don’t you like all the opportunities we get to travel?”

Zelda was an optimist, he supposed, in her own sarcastic way. She saw the good in everything, the good in their countless murder missions, their hundreds of yawn-inducing, boring patrols, their thousands of scoldings by the blademasters. It will increase our discipline, fresh air is good, sometimes people are bad and they need to die; things she had said before, things he never quite believed that she even agreed with. She was an optimist in order to survive.

“Yeah, I like traveling,” he grumbled as he scaled a tree, perching himself on a branch to watch over the clearing in the center of the forest. Zelda climbed the tree next to him and sat on a branch just within arm’s reach.

In the center of the forest was the Great Deku Tree, whose all-encompassing gaze they had supposedly been trained to avoid, but Link figured that was impossible. At the foot of the tree was the very sword they were meant to watch over: the Master Sword. The darkness sealing, monster slaying, princess saving Master Sword of legend, the blade they needed to keep an eye on just in case the hero decided to waltz in and pull it from its pedestal.

“This is silly, though,” Zelda admitted. “I don’t think the hero would show up in our lifetime. It’s so rare.” She shed her red and black hood to let her hair flow freely down her back and took off her gloves. Link followed suit. There wasn’t anybody around, anyway, and he liked when he got to see her face. Maybe she liked to see his, too, but perhaps that was wishful thinking.

“What happens when we kill him?” Link asked, like she would have an answer. The truth was that even the Yiga, with their watchful eyes, never even came close to knowing. The truth was their orders were to kill anybody, any sorry traveler, who stepped foot near that sword.

“I don’t know. We win?” Zelda hopped down from the tree. What was she doing? She strolled over to the sword to take a good look while Link steeled himself on his perch, eyes hardened, wondering what was she doing? To leave one’s post, to defy direct orders was the ultimate Yiga sin. Ganon below they weren’t even supposed to be talking on missions!

“Relax,” Zelda called to him from beside the sword. “Nothing’s happening. I’m just doing some research.” Jokingly, she reached out to touch the hilt of the blade before pulling back with a giggle. Link’s heart pounded in his ears, and he could feel the blood rushing through his veins.

And then–

Why was she glowing?

“Zelda…?”

She quirked an eyebrow at him incredulously, shaking her head and putting a finger over her mouth to tell him to stop. Talking. But she paused, shook her hand away from her mouth and winced.

“Hot!” she yelped, gripping her wrist and staring, wide-eyed, as her jaw dropped. Her hand was glowing, emanating golden light. Link jumped down and rushed over to her, stumbling over his words asking if she was okay, was she hurt, what’s going on?

“I don’t know. I reached out and then it just started burning. It’s hot, it’s glowing, and I don’t know why–”

Then, the Master Sword pulsed. Link took a step closer, and it pulsed again. A step, and again, and a step, and again. Gently, he nudged Zelda to the side and shed his own black gloves, dropping them into the grass. He never would find those gloves again, shrouded by the thick greenery, lost to the forest.

He reached out, just one finger, to prick the base of the hilt tentatively. This time, it pulsed and did not stop as it radiated bright blue and a low humming began. From the sword, the air, the tree looming above them, they didn’t know.

And the sword spoke, faintly, like a whisper, to them both.

“Master…”

Link and Zelda, the Yiga patrolmen, turned their gazes slowly to each other, glowing sword and glowing hand, mouths agape. He held his hand out to hers, steeling himself for a different reason. She would either kill him here or take his hand and pull the sword with him. She would either fulfill the Yiga duty she had dedicated her life to, made constant excuses for, or she would be with the sorry partner who dragged her down at every turn, blocked her sight at every corner. She had destinies to choose.

And wordlessly, she placed her glowing hand into his. By Ganon it burned, but he gripped it harder and pulled her in close to the sword, and he felt like he belonged somewhere for once, in her grasp. Their conjoined hands found their place on the handle and the sword seemed to scream, piercing their ears, as they pulled it from its stone.

And it spoke again.

“I have waited for eternities.”

#loftwing letters #zelink #zelda #link #yiga #yiga au #gift exchange #botw #au #zelink community #zelinkcommunity

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stjimmykingofshitmountain · 2 years

Text

Cross Stitch

Oh look Kei remembered how to write.. ANYWAYS.. this is a piece as part of Hetsu’s Gift Exchange!

Ship: BOTW!Link and BOTW!Zelda

Warnings; none really? Mute!Link - he communicates via sign, Zelda might be a bit OOC with the swearing. The format is a little janky

Words: 710.. quite short and sweet

Anyways.. enough out of me! Enjoy!

‘Ok, ok.. Over, under tie the knot and - AAGH’ The knitting needles fell out of Link’s normally dexterous hands with a clatter against the wood of his porch, accompanying the sound of his inner monologue for what felt like a lifetime. In reality it had been at most a couple of hours.

Link crouched over in his seat with a tense inhale as he reached for the needles and blue wool which had fallen moments earlier and his brain whirred to life yet again…

‘Over, under.. Loop-the-loop and pull..? No! Agh! That’s shoelaces!” They threw the work into their lap with a huff.

To an outsider this would be incredibly decent progress; it was clear that the soft item he was working on was a scarf with yellow,sage and blue wool interwoven intricately to create an almost spring-blossom meadow illusion. However to an impatient perfectionist like Link - it was about as useful as a skeletal Bokoblin arm.. Which to be fair he had found to be pretty useful! OK.. so bad example but you get the picture.

The point is - if it wasn’t perfect immediately - then it was worthless. Given this is a gift for Zelda, it has to be absolutely beyond the realm of perfection and when you’re an adventurer who sacrificed fashion for survival - that was quite the quest.

Link leaned all the way back in the seat he had brought out to his porch to knit in the crisp winter air and brought his arms up to sign one simple word:

‘Shit’ He dropped his hands with a sigh.“LINK! Watch your fucking language people can see you!” Link almost fell backwards out of seat in shock- thankfully Zelda rushed to help him stay upright, the knitting fell to the floor once again. “Wah! I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” Zelda fussed, pulling him out of the seat and dusting him off. Link pulled her away at arms length and signed ‘I’m ok’ with a half-hearted grin.

“Good! Well I was at the market just now and I got you some more glass bottles,some fresh herbs and some - OH! And I ran into Mrs. Itho, you know over on the hill, and she-” As Zelda brushed past Link rambling about her day Link’s eyes fell to the once again discarded knitting and he was just contemplating kicking it off the side of the porch to be swallowed by the trench he dug to funnel rainwater when-

“Link?” He was brought out of his daze by Zelda. “Are you alright, my love?”

The tips of his ears tinted themselves a warm shade of red as always with any pet name from Zelda, as he looked away signing ‘I’m fine’ once again. Given he’d turned his head he missed Zelda briskly moving around their counter towards where he stood… beelining for his line of sight.

“No you’re not! You’re usually quite daydream-y but you always listen to me talk about my da- What’s this?” Link’s head shot up as he clocked Zelda carefully holding his unfinished…. Whatever it is in her hands delicately, her thumbs grazing the material. “Link? Are you.. Knitting?”

Link's hands frantically began to sign excuses.

‘No! It’s um..’

‘It’s not what you think!’

‘It;s something for my travels in the colder terrain.’

‘I can.. .start it again.’

Zelda just stood staring at her beloved doofus and moved forward to grasp his wrist and lower his hands to clasp together in front of him. Link watched on carefully as she tied off the last stitch with unbelievable grace, set the needles down on the chair and carefully extended the length of the scarf in her hands.

“There we go.” She mumbled softly to herself as she moved her hands to wrap the garment around her neck. “Oh Link! It’s lovely!” She brought one end to her cheek and rubbed it against her cheek. “Thank you!”

Link looked on with the most lovesick expression on his face as he slowly brought his hands up to sign ‘You’re welcome, beloved.’. Zelda smiled softly and gently held his hands again - only to pull him to her, this time, into a gentle kiss.

As she pulled back and slowly let go of his hands to make her way inside, Link decided he could learn that maybe things don’t need to be immediately perfect - as long as someone else could appreciate his efforts perhaps he could as well.

#hetsus gift exchange #zelink #legend of zelda #breath of the wild #link #zelda #botw link #botw zelda #botw

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mylove-iv · 6 months

Text

❝where the shooting star falls, meet me there.❞

ʚ aged up, botw! link x half fairy, fem! reader ɞ

synopsis: two lovers are torn apart by a calamity and death’s approaching embrace. one wakes, heart bearing a crown of thorns riddled with love and pain, whilst the other sleeps, memories of their love and life before the calamity’s fall lost to the throes of time, appearing only as fleeting dreams.

genres: angst, romance, fluff. | set pre and post calamity.

rating: mature, 18+ (mdni).

content warnings: mentions of near death (in multiple instances) and injuries, implied intercourse (barely), slight spoilers (slight canon divergence).

word count: 3.5k words.

―originally posted on @mydarling-iv, nov. 22, 2022.

ʚ masterlist ɞ

Where had it all gone wrong? You wonder to yourself as you sobbed over the limp body of your dearly beloved.

You screamed and cried, begging for him to do anything, a twitch of his finger or whatever you could get to signal that he’s alive.

But you had gotten nothing and despite using your healing magic, you heard no thud of his heart—you heard nothing and it was deafening as is.

Zelda sat a bit away from her knight and beloved best friend, heart breaking into two, your pained cries shattering whatever pieces were left of Zelda’s heart.

Anxiety and fear bubbled up in you before spilling over as a chilling numbness settled in your chest and somehow the hurt and pain you’ve felt intensified in a silent yet deadly way.

Through your tear-marbled lashes, you see the faint glow of the Master Sword and the pain sharpens in your chest causing you to gasp and stagger. “Y/n!” Zelda cries as she catches you in her arms.

“Enlighten me.” You begged brokenly as you unravel yourself from the princess’s arms and grasp onto the handle of the master sword.

You hear its murmurs and despite the chances, relief floods your body but it’s short-lived as the agony burning through your chest extinguishes any positive emotions you could barely even muster to feel.

Letting go of the Goddess Blade so haphazardly, you cup your lover’s cheeks before pressing your forehead against his. The rain pelts against you both and the rain’s dew mixes with the tears running down your cheeks.

“I’m scared, my dear,” Your voice cracks with sorrow as your thumbs brush the debris on his cheekbones. “But come find me again—where the star falls, please?” The words tumble from your lips as a broken whisper lost in the rain’s pitter-patter to everyone but you and Link.

You lock your lips with his and you pour every remaining bit of your healing magic into your lover, to heal, to soothe, and to reassure. His pale complexion brightens a tad bit but he still lies motionless.

You faintly hear Zelda speaking to a Sheikah warrior about the shrine you had finally found and setting in motion the very plan you had devised to keep your lover away from death’s cold embrace.

“I love you, my darling.” You say as you bring his left hand to cup your cheek, kissing the very ring that is to bound your souls together as it temporarily glows a hue similar to that of your eyes before you pull away, your fingertips brushing against his skin one last time.

Hand grasping the very sword your lover wielded, you and Zelda parted from the Sheikah soldier who hoisted Link on his back.

You then embrace Hyrule's princess tightly and through the rain’s chilly onslaught, you let your warmth mingle with Zelda’s as a parting gift. Tears land on each other’s shoulders as you feel each other’s bodies shake, not from the cold, but from the fear and pain consuming your souls of what is to come.

No words are exchanged besides a heartbreaking gaze between you both before you part ways, one walking to the lost woods and the other where the calamity resides.

┊ ੈ✩‧₊*°࿐ྂ。

Once you had successfully navigated through the foggy maze of the lost woods, you reach the silent Korok forest.

After the Calamity's arrival, all forests seemed to cease all of their songs and as you trekked through the Korok forest, a painful numbness settled all over your body, stopping your tears at once.

No koroks chirped with mischievous laughter nor did the wind sing with the tunes of rustling leaves. The damaged Master Sword feels heavier in your hand as you step atop the stone platform.

Your vision blurs with a new layer of fresh tears, ready to fall from your eyes as a wave of exhaustion crashes into you unexpectedly, like waves upon waves crashing onto the surf.

Collapsing into the lush, cool grass beneath the great Deku tree, a tired and pained sigh tumbles from your lips as you settle your back against the ancient tree’s bark.

You hold the sword protectively as you look at the concentrated malice engraved into the blade before you lean the butt of the sword’s handle against the bark, resting right next to your head.

A lone tear slips past your lashes and your eyes close, resigning yourself to the darkness that swallows your vision.

┊ ੈ✩‧₊*°࿐ྂ。

You awake, vision blurry as you take in the forest, seeming to have grown more lush, either due to the passage of time passing or your nature magic seeping into the flora and fauna surrounding you.

“How many years have passed?” You question quietly, fixing yourself in a comfortable position as your arms hug the goddess blade protectively.

You hear the murmurings of the forest around you and your body freezes at the answer you get.

A decade.

Anguish wracks your entire being, tears stinging your eyes yet refusing to break through the dam that was unwittingly created through the massive amounts of trauma and grief you had to experience.

The mixture of your magic pool overflowing and your sudden flare of emotions causes blooms of blue nightshade to spring to life around you.

The overwhelming pain and sadness prevents you from moving as the scent of blue nightshade slips into your nose and you’re thrown into a dreamless slumber.

┊ ੈ✩‧₊*°࿐ྂ。

You wake up throughout the decades that pass, rooted to your spot as you pitifully hope that your lover would have awoken to grab the Master Sword to finally defeat the evil poisoning Hyrule.

But to no avail, time still cruelly passes and the numbness covering your pain and grief grows. “I’m scared, Link.” You whisper into the night as you lean your cheek against the smooth, flat part of the Master Sword’s blade.

They both could be dead. The treacherous thought moves into your mind quickly, just like how shadows grow and dance under the moon’s domain, causing your heartache to intensify.

┊ ੈ✩‧₊*°࿐ྂ。

“Why am I still here?” the question tumbles from your lips as you awake from your slumber yet again, losing count of how many times you’ve awoken and fallen asleep.

Your grief and pain seem to freeze you in time whilst the world continues to spin through the day and night cycles, time passing despite how you so badly wish it could stop.

You look to the skies as sunlight leaks from the Deku tree’s leaves and branches before spilling onto your face. “Is it stupid of me to patiently wait for someone who won’t even arrive?” You lament to yourself softly.

┊ ੈ✩‧₊*°࿐ྂ。

As dusk transforms into dawn continuously, your hope dwindles as the years pass by. The idea of Link awakening grows dimmer and dimmer before you finally face the harsh truth as tears finally make their way down your cheeks.

Every instance your eyes flutter open and in the back of your mind, you continuously kill the traitorous hope of your lover being alive and as with killing your lover, you kill a part of yourself every time.

Awakening once more, you finally decide enough is enough, sick of the hollowing ache embedded so deeply within your chest.

You bring the back of your palm to your lips, gently kissing the golden band adorning your dominant hand’s ring finger before you weakly reach for a blue nightshade bud.

Crushing the bud into your palm, you force a pool of your power to liquefy into your palm to mix with the crushed blue nightshade petals. The tonic in your hand bleeds into vibrant blue before you bring the liquid to your lips.

“I’m sorry, my darling.” Your whispers are carried by the winds to lands beyond as your eyelids fall shut, hand falling limply on the ground against the Master sword’s tip and you’re blanketed with a painless sleep.

┊ ੈ✩‧₊*°࿐ྂ。

Link feels a swirl of emotions as his shattered memory is finally pieced together, he remembers Zelda, the champions—everyone yet why is there a phantom ache in his chest that hurts so much it’s hard for him to breathe?

It feels as if there’s something—someone important to him missing, seeming so close yet so far.

He shuts his eyes, hoping to get sleep before he’s to travel yet again and he’s engulfed in a sleep so comforting yet so terrifying.

“I’m scared, Link.” A soft voice whispers and Link’s heart shatters at how broken the voice sounds. “I’m sorry, my darling.”

Link feels the sudden urge to seek out the person behind the voice and comfort them with his entire being that everything would be alright but the person’s whispers are already lost to the wind.

Color fills his dream and the scenery changes. His eyes suddenly clash with beautiful e/c orbs that send his heart racing as a smile graces the woman's face and Link suddenly feels so starstruck as if he’s been placed under a love spell.

The unknown yet familiar woman cups his cheeks and Link’s heart nearly bursts at the close proximity. Her nose brushes against his and he feels swarms of butterflies wildly flap in his stomach.

Her eyes curl as she smiles yet again, “I love you, my darling.” She whispers, lips teasingly brushing against his.

Link finds himself sealing the gap between his lips and the woman’s and despite it feeling slightly foreign, her lips against his felt so painfully familiar.

It feels so heart-wrenchingly right.

But as per usual, he wakes with a start from the dream as the pain intensifies in his chest. Tears threaten to spill from his orbs as massive waves of grief wash over him, the image of the woman is immediately lost to him and he bites his lip to prevent a pained cry from escaping his lips.

He winces suddenly as light is reflected off something shiny before bouncing to his eyes. Moving his head, Link finally notices the ring adorning his left hand’s ring finger.

From his waking till now, he’s never paid much attention to the ring or even noticed it during his travels as he moved quickly, hoping to regain his strength and bearings to finally defeat Calamity Ganon once and for all.

He’s struck with a sense of nostalgia before his body moves on its own accord. Letting the muscle memory take over, his fist clenches, and the ring is brought to his lips before he delicately places a soft kiss against the cool metal.

It glows a familiar e/c hue and his thoughts take hold of Link. Eyes bearing a similar color flashes within his mind as the full image of the woman in his dreams fully make its presence known in his mind.

A soft e/c glow hugs Link and a myriad of lost memories quickly flash through his mind. His body relaxes as he inhales the comforting scent of sweet honey and floral nectar, causing everything to crash into him all at once.

Memories of you and him and the strong love you both shared for each other.

The woman in his dreams, guiding him and providing him with constant reassurance was you, the woman he had loved so much a century ago and still dearly loved now.

He remembers the moment you both met, standing on opposite sides of a fallen star fragment you both had chased as young teens, how the yellow glow of the fragment casted an ethereal glow on your stunning features that it had taken his breath away.

He remembers the night he caught you in a hidden corner of the palace gardens, flora blooming around you before you caught him looking at you so ardently. The moment you invited him to sit with you and talk about the most random of things made him feel as if he was just a regular hylian boy without the world’s weight on his shoulders.

Nights thereafter held a similar routine of basking in each other’s presence. One night, he had come to meet you with bruises from training, and for the first time in his life, his heart ached at the way your eyes filled with hurt and worry.

You then had cupped his cheek and a soft colored glow matching your eyes emanated from your palms before you told him of you being half fairy as a comforting and healing warmth filled his being, thus explaining your affinity with nature and healing magic.

Another memorable night was when he had brought you a small bouquet of gypsophila and you had tackled him in a hug, taking you both to the ground in a fit of hushed laughter and bright smiles. He sat up and found himself so close to you, your noses brushing against each other as your breaths and body warmth mingled in a tight hug.

He had eyed your lips before meeting your dazed orbs. He swallows his nervousness and musters the courage he and the heroes before him are known for. “May I?” He whispers.

Your answer was immediate, “Please.”

He then pressed his lips against yours and you quickly followed with kissing him back. It was a soft, quick kiss that sent both of your hearts beating so wildly, both of your minds reeling before you both had pulled away.

A shiver danced its way down his spine as he felt your fingers tangle with his locks on the nape of his neck, licking his lips and seeming in sync with your thoughts, he surges forward and meets your lips again in a loving kiss.

He then remembers a moment in the dead of night, when the full moon reached its apex, and you both laid next to each other, your bare skin brushed against his in the utmost alluring way as your hair spread around you almost like a halo.

You looked up at him as your cheek pressed against his bare chest and sent him a sweet yet dazzling smile that made his soul shiver in happiness—that made every part of him ache with an overwhelming amount of love for you.

He sent a small smile to you and reached over to the nightstand before grabbing your dominant hand and slipping a small golden band over your ring finger. He then placed a bigger ring in your palm, patiently waiting.

“Marry me?” He whispered, pressing his forehead against yours and cupping your face with his hands as his thumbs brushed away the tears leaking from your stunningly beautiful eyes.

His smile had widened as you abruptly sat up, holding the sheets to cover your bare body as your eyes sparkled with tears and love. A wobbly yet bright smile graced your features once more, his left hand gently being cupped by your smaller ones as you slipped his ring on.

“Yes,” You choke through your tears as you also cupped his face. “I love you.”

He smiled at your admission that seemed to always make his heart stutter. “I love you so much more.” He hummed softly as he pressed his lips against yours.

He held you tightly in his arms, and during that very same night, he realized he held a miracle.

An overwhelming wave of longing and a lovelorn sadness washes over Link as the hollowed ache in his chest sharpened into an intense pain that pricked every fiber of his being.

He had nearly died before and was on the brink of entering death’s cold embrace but yet, the pain he’s experienced before his new revelation could never compare to the brutally raw pain he now feels because there was a large possibility of you being lost in the throes of time.

It hurts. Link thinks quietly to himself as he grips the fabric situated above his heart so tightly his knuckles turn white.

How does he live? How does he breathe? When you’re not here, he’s suffocating and he realizes this is where he’d give it all up, everything he’s worked so very hard for. For you, he’d have to risk it all just to see you once more.

Hurriedly, Link gathers the small remains of his temporary camp and leaps upon his trusty steed before he prays to whatever higher power is willing to hear his prayers. And if his prayers had gone unheard, he’ll try and tear both heaven and earth apart just to get back to you.

┊ ੈ✩‧₊*°࿐ྂ。

Twisting his horse’s reins wildly, Link has the sudden urge to scream as his mind comes up with nothing regarding your location. Or where you remains rested. The haunting thought curls around his heart and squeezes harshly causing his breath to abruptly hitch.

He urges his steed to stop as a sudden wetness falls on his hands, he thinks it’s rain but when Link finally snaps out of his miserable daze, he realizes it’s his tears that are falling onto his hands.

“Where are you, my love?” Link questions hoarsely to himself and before he can curl himself to sob the grief and pain taking hold of his heart, a twinkle of gold catches his eye causing him to raise his head.

A shooting star fragment.

His mind shifts to his memory of meeting you, it was a shooting star fragment that had originally led you to each other. But yet, another memory envelops the hero, one that intensifies the longing bubbling over in his chest.

It was a warm night and he laid soundly in your embrace as you ran your fingers through his locks before you cup his face ever so sweetly. He had been sleeping, waking up to the soothing motions of your nails gently brushing against his scalp and he decided then to continue to pretend to sleep in order to enjoy your comforting touch.

He feels your thumb brush against his cheek ever so softly as you place a saccharine kiss on the tip of his nose. “Darling, do you recall of the first time we met?” You sing softly, almost as if you’re terrified of breaking the tranquil air blanketing the space around you and him.

“Because I do. I recall of our meeting a lot—you stood there, almost frozen in shock at seeing another person chasing the very same star you were. And goddesses, you looked so pretty it hurts. How the starlight cupped your face and painted it in such a celestial glow. You took my breath away the moment I glanced at you and my heart suddenly decided to beat for you.” His heart skips a beat at your confession.

“Maybe in another life, or whenever we’re lost and apart from each other, just like how we had first met, where the shooting star falls, wait there. For I will be waiting for you besides a fallen star fragment, my heart longing for you. I love you, my darling.” You finish before you kiss his forehead.

Link gasps painfully as he snaps out of the memory and before he knows it, he’s quickly urging his horse in the direction the shooting star fragment flew.

┊ ੈ✩‧₊*°࿐ྂ。

He eyes the pillar of light the fragment created and he finds himself in front of the lost woods, the pillar of light seemed to emanate from the central portion of the forest, and without thought or reason, Link throws himself into the foggy maze of the lost woods.

Despite the wild urgency and intense adrenaline flooding his body, he somehow navigates his way through the maze-like paths of the lost woods and finds himself at the entrance of the Korok forest.

Link’s azure eyes are immediately drawn to the empty raised pedestal of rock that holds no Master Sword and a sense of alarm envelops him in an unwanted hug.

His chest convulses unexpectedly as panic sets in, no matter the Master Sword, Link could still find a way to defeat the Calamity with regular weapons but, where were you?

He’s on the brink of losing himself to the raging storm within his mind but the wind rustles the trees’ leaves and branches in a gentle dance, causing a blinding light of blue and gold to flash in his eyes.

Head turning automatically and body lurching forwards in the direction of the two-toned light, the base of the Deku tree comes into view and he sees what his heart most yearned for through the hundred of years he’s slept through and the years before that.

You, sat at the base of the great Deku tree, seemingly enveloped by sleep.

Your eyes are closed as an air of tranquility blankets the space around you, a myriad of flowers blooming with life around you. Link notices vines growing along the Master Sword you embrace, gleaming proudly at its wielder as if it wasn’t drained of light nearly a century ago, as the said vines also caresses the skin of your limbs almost delicately.

Tears blur his ultramarine eyes and Link falls to his knees in front of you. He then gently removes the vines adorning your body as his eyes scan your body.

You’re still as beautiful as day the calamity had fallen and he feels the familiar warmth and happiness you always bring hug him the most spectacular ways that’d make his cheeks flush a rosy hue and his stomach flutter sweetly.

His tears finally fall as Link painfully musters a wobbly smile. He cups your face with his calloused hands, seasoned with danger and adventure, a stark contrast to your unsullied, pure skin.

Thumb rubbing against your cheekbone, Link leans his forehead against yours. “I’m sorry for making you wait so long, my love.” His voice cracks as pain and vulnerability seep into his tone. “But I’m here—I found you yet again where the shooting star fell.”

“Please, my love, come back to me.”

#𝐢𝐯'𝐬 𝐰𝐫𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠.°♡༉‧₊#legend of zelda: gallery of the wilds ༉‧₊˚✧#legend of zelda #breath of the wild #loz #botw #legend of zelda link x reader #breath of the wild link x reader #loz link x reader #botw link x reader #botw link #botw link angst #botw link fluff #botw link smut #link #link x fem reader #link x you #reader insert

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zelinkcommunity · 9 months

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LOFTWING LETTERS 2024 SIGN UP [CLOSED]

RULES | DISCORD | TWITTER

If you are interested in participating in our Valentines-themed gift exchange, please sign up using this Google form (closed)! Some key points:

Sign ups will close on January 11, and matches sent on January 14. All valentines will be posted on February 14.

By signing up, you will create a valentine for someone and receive a valentine from someone else.

This is a Zelda-themed event, so all valentines should be Zelda-related.

If you have questions, send us an ask, or view the full rules here.

#loftwing letters #loftwingletters24 #loftwing letters 2024 #zelinkcommunity #zelink community #zelink #zelda #link #botw #oot #tp #totk #the legend of zelda #gift exchange

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cooking-with-hailstones · 2 years

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Bright is the ring of words

For the @zelinkcommunity Loftwing Letters exchange, gifted to @bahbahhh

Read it here or on AO3!

Kass had given up trying to anticipate where he might next encounter Link. One minute they would meet each other in the torrential downpour of the Faron woods, the next on the tower ledge in the Gerudo highlands. He seemed to move like the bard himself did - on the whims of the wind, and wherever the road may call. They were kindred spirits, and Kass supposed he shouldn’t be surprised to find him here at Rito stable – perhaps Link was making his way to Rito village, just as he was.

Link was so unlike anything Kass had expected from the songs passed down from his teacher. He, and the other bards across Hyrule, had long recounted stories of stoic bravery, of a man tormented by duty, his shoulders slumped from the weight of the sword of destiny on his back. A man who gave everything he was and more, for his country, and for his princess.

This man was far livelier than the one in the stories. He was quicker to smile than to grimace, and his eyes sparkled with mischief and adventure. He would often arrive at the stables galloping in from some harebrained chase – or, more often these days, on that strange two-wheeled Sheikah contraption, laughing as he vaulted off its thrumming saddle. Kass imagined his teacher would have been shocked to see Link now; though he was still burdened by the weight of destiny, his spirit was brightened by the breath of the wild.

Link grabbed a pint and a bowl of stew from the stablemaster, settling himself down across from Kass by the stable’s campfire. Neither of them spoke. This was often how they spent time together; Link resting for a moment on his travels, content to enjoy whatever song Kass felt inspired to sing. Tonight, Link sat enjoying his stew, all the while regarding Kass with his usual unreadable gaze. Kass simply continued to play his concertina, humming an old tune to himself while he waited patiently to see if this was one of those rare nights when the hero felt like chatting. The song was an old favourite of his; one that every bard in Hyrule knew, that told of a bard’s true purpose. He often found himself humming it when Link was around.

His patience was rewarded shortly after Link finished his ale, and drew a slow breath in.

“Kass?”

“Hmm?”

“Why didn’t you ever tell me you knew who I was?”

Kass stilled his concertina. He had been waiting for this question ever since he had given him the photograph of the princess and the champions. The image his teacher had so painstakingly preserved, and passed on to Kass in the hopes that it might help keep the memory of the princess and her champions alive.

He folded up the concertina, setting it carefully aside. “When we first met, you couldn’t remember ever having seen a Rito before.”

“So? I still knew I was the hero. The first time we met, you offered to sing me the song of what happened a hundred years ago. You made sure I knew who I was, what my mission was, without ever letting on that you knew as well.”

Kass leaned back against the log he was seated against. “Truly, Link, I didn’t know how to tell you. I suppose I was so overwhelmed when we first met, I retreated into the familiar role of the bard; the companionable stranger ready to regale you with songs and stories.”

Link stared into the dancing orange flames of the campfire, mulling something over in his head. “You weren’t just telling me any story, though. You told me my story. You’ve been telling my story, Zelda’s story, the champions stories, for a hundred years.”

“My teacher wanted to ensure that the stories survived, no matter what happened. Even if every book was lost and the people of Hyrule were scattered, he was determined that the stories would continue on.” Kass fluffed his feathers proudly. “That is the duty of the bard. To tell the stories no books can capture. To save that which is only memory and pass it onto the next generation.”

“But you shape history too.” Link looked insistent.

“I beg your pardon?” Kass asked.

“The champion’s ballads… you made sure everyone remembered our triumphs, not just our failures.”

“No one thinks of you and the champions as failures, Link!”

“Because of you!” Link cried. “You made sure we were remembered as heroes. You told the story of how they fought to save their people until their last breaths. You told the story about…” he shook slightly, his voice cracking with the strain of emotion. “You told the story of how Zelda’s power awoke because of me. Because of… of our love.”

Kass blinked back the tears that had suddenly sprung to his eyes. Oh, how he wished his teacher were still alive to hear these words! This was all that any bard could aspire to.

Link took another shuddering breath. “Your songs… you didn’t just make sure we were remembered. You were singing my story back to me. Singing me back to myself. You held onto my story when I couldn't, and you helped me find pieces of it that I never would have on my own.”

Kass smiled at the man, this stranger from songs that he now considered a dear friend.

“It has been my honour to keep these stories for you. And I am grateful to witness you now, creating a new story of adventure and bravery and selfless courage. One which I hope to pass on to the many generations of Hyrule to come.”

“I just hope I can live up to the stories you tell.” he whispered, just on the edge of hearing. Kass felt his heart ache in sympathy.

“Oh my dear friend. You already do. You are worthy of these and so many more.”

Link ducked his head down, shadows covering his face, but Kass still caught the soft “thank you” murmured into the ground. They fell back into companionable silence. Kass picked up his concertina, playing the old tune once more, and lifting his voice to the heavens.

“Bright is the ring of words When the right man rings them, Fair the fall of songs When the singer sings them. Still they are carolled and said – On wings they are carried – After the singer is dead And the maker is buried.

Low as the singer lies In the field of heather, Songs of his fashion bring The swains together. And when the west is red With the sunset embers, The lover lingers and sings And the maid remembers.”

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bokettochild · 13 days

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Okay, so, at work, we have this little rewards system where if you complete additional trainings, as well as just helping the store's loyalty scores, you earn points. These points, when amassed, may be exchanged for items on the loyalty shop. And no, it's not just bland things like gift cards or a free store item, it's cool stuff.

I'm talking diamond earrings, designer brands and top notch equipment cool stuff!

Anyways, it took me the better part of a year, but I managed to finally save up my trainings/loyalty points, and now? I bought a brand new Nintendo Switch. i paid nothing. Paid $0.00

Free Switch basically

Anywas, it arrived, I set it up, but while I could transfer my account from my Switch Lite to the new one, I couldn't transfer my main save, since it was on a guest user (I tried so many methods, but nothing works). So? I said 'screw it, I'm starting again'.

So I started BoTW over again, and when I say that my first tower after the Plateau was Central Hyrule, the one with all the guardians? I mean it.

Also, i was just trying to get to a stable, and i kid you not, I ran into Zelda's horse on freaking ACCIDENT. First horse registered is the white mare, and on top of that, Satori appeared on the night I caught her, so.... the game likes me today I guess?

(Also I did the shrine next to Satori's mountain, the one with the swings? Didn't fall off the swings, got them first try, didn't even die until I accidentally stepped off the flooring, and it was only a lack of arrows that stopped me finishing the shrine straight off the plateau)

#botw #ketto's gaming arc

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linksthoughtbrambles · 2 years

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What Once Rang Hollow

A gift for @hyperphonic for Hestu's Gift Exchange! (Thank you so much for being patient with me)!

A huge thank-you to @bellecream for beta-reading this fic.

LoZ: Breath of the Wild - Canon Compliant - Post-Calamity - Zelink - Drama - Hurt/Comfort - ~9000 words - rated T - on ao3 if you prefer to read there.

___¤__¤__¤__¤___

Fall swept through Akkala with such grace—a calm breath carried on northeastern winds. The scent of the sea cooling with gentle patience met the chill which rolled across the chasm beyond its Wilds, stirring the mists between the jagged peaks. Their moisture nourished; they soothed the heat and the dry, the mark of Death Mountain softened upon rich grasslands kept green even as the Sun approached its yearly rest at solstice. The trees knew to rest, too, greens turned to wild marigolds, as though the land had lit itself warm in one final promise of the spring to come after their sleep.

This year, peace made itself clear in absence. What once loomed bright, deadly, eyes searching even in the dead of night, exuding the perpetual buzz of red hornets, now stood silent sentinel as it once had before the Calamity, before the lifetimes of most who had made their homes within sight of its silhouette.

Its emptiness became a beacon.

Curious eyes led feet across the Akkala span, led strong planks to be laid across the gaps in the bridge leading to the citadel’s mouth, spurred a search for a way in, and brought Hudson to its gates, Greyson in tow to shift debris far quicker than a Hylian could.

Each day saw more feet, hands, and movement, and as autumn’s cool, crisp days began to threaten frost at night, a light shone blue high in the tallest tower, strands of luminescence coalescing to a shimmer of limbs and torsos. Four shapes drifted down on gliders, landing at the edge of the tattered battlements looking over the sea. They moved, two men and two women, two blond and two white-haired, scouring the ground, one sending flashes of light into the distance as she aimed the slate at features previously hidden by malice, surfaces laid bare in the aftermath of Ganon’s defeat.

The smaller of the two men approached the gap surrounding the bright pillar, stepping on upward-sloping stones.

“Link…” the woman said, lowering the slate to watch him instead.

“Uh-huh,” he responded, leaning to peer beyond the point of absent mortar.

“You ought to be careful,” she said.

A lopsided smile appeared on his face. “I’m always careful.”

The woman raised an eyebrow, though it went unseen by Link. Their white-haired counterparts circled the perimeter, pencils and notebooks in hand, a second glowing device on the other woman’s hip as she chattered. The sound seemed swallowed by the hollow near their feet.

“You are not always careful,” the woman finally said.

“I have my glider,” Link responded, inching even closer to the edge, finally able to peer directly downward, his smile fading so completely it may as well have never existed.

“…What is it?” she asked with a small frown, her eyes on his profile, slate lowered, clutched at hip-height.

“Sorry, Zelda,” he said, quieter than usual. “It’s… some hole.”

Zelda blinked. “You don’t remember the citadel?”

Link’s head snapped up, turning to face her. “No. Not at all. Not- not the inside. I’ve been all over the outside of this mountain.”

She studied his eyes, a lengthy consideration playing on the muscles of her face. “You were within it twice with me. We stayed here on route to the Spring of Power.”

His face pinched, concentrating. Zelda waited to see that far-off distant look—the surprise of suppressed memory bursting through some dam within him—ready to move in an instant, to grasp him should be become unsteady near that deadly edge.

She did not wait a century to return to Link’s arms only to have him taken from her by senseless chance.

The look did not arrive.

One corner of Link’s mouth twitched to the side, a near-grimace, and he shook his head. “I don’t remember any of it.”

Zelda managed a tremulous smile. It didn’t quite reach her eyes. “Perhaps that’s for the best.”

He huffed a laugh. “Was someone here a jerk to me? Or-“ a bit of a fire lit in those startling eyes of his- “was someone a jerk to you? Or- oh Goddess. Was it the food?”

“The food?”

“Yeah, was the food bad?”

This time the smile became a grin of such force her eyes closed for a moment. “Link- you’re not serious.”

“I’m always serious, too. Serious…” he took one step away from the crumbling edge. “…And careful.” He picked his way toward her, true to his supposed personality traits for the moment, and slid an arm around her waist, his forehead to hers. “See?”

She rapped his chest with the Slate playfully. “What I see now contradicts what I observed mere minutes ago.”

“Nah.” He kissed her cheek—soft—pausing at her too-rapid pulse. “…What-“

“HEY LOVEBIRDS! SNAPPITY SNAP!” The machine-click of Purah’s hand-built proto-Slate caught the two of them unprepared.

Zelda rolled her eyes as Link sniggered. “Purah!”

“Ha-ha! That’s what you get. I warned you—we’re here to survey the place, not make hanky-panky.”

Link flashed his eyebrows at Zelda. “Hankity-pankity,” he said.

Zelda sighed. “Link… have I told you your plays on words have taken a turn for the worse?”

“You have.” His smile turned distinctly mischievous. “I’ve made up for it in other ways, haven’t I?” The hand at her waist shifted down a few finger-widths, his nose brushing hers.

Another click. “SNAP!”

Link sighed this time, craning his neck up to breathe his frustration to the sky. “Yeah! Yeah, we get it, thanks, Purah.”

“You’re welcome! Symin, open that sample pouch, maybe there’s some malice left clinging somewhere.”

Zelda knew there wouldn’t be. It had dissipated along with its master; yet a good scientist like Purah would check regardless.

Link moved to inspect the watchtower, unimpeded by pools of malice for the first time, but stopped at its entrance, turning once more toward her. “Zelda… you saw what I saw, right?”

“What do you mean?”

“When I was traveling. You said you… ‘watched my journey. Every step.’”

A beat passed as Zelda swiped at the Slate’s screen with apparent efficiency. “Yes. I did.”

He nodded, his fist rising to press just beneath his nose as he considered the gaping maw in the citadel’s roof once more. “So, you know that was full of malice. Right?”

She kept her face carefully still.

“Completely full. That whole shaft. There’s… nothing down there to support it. It had to be full for me to see it up here.”

“…Yes,” Zelda said. “It was full of malice.”

Link’s head kept bobbing as he turned from the innocuous sign of a horror he’d been blind to at its peak. Zelda followed him, continuing to image the wreckage, hoping that would be the worst realization to come of this.

___¤__¤__¤__¤___

The consensus between the leaders of Hyrule’s scattered peoples became that Akkala Citadel’s clean-up and reconstruction was of paramount importance. With the Calamity banished, Hyrule would appear a promising target for conquest, and the Citadel had once been a formidable deterrent to any army which would dare to land on the northeastern shores.

Link had noticed the dark circles beneath Zelda’s eyes. The monarchy’s fall hadn’t dulled her sense of duty or righteousness. She would work endlessly for her people with no thought for her own well-being if Link wasn’t there to pull her aside. He’d warp them from Rito Village to that pleasant hillside near the Maritta Exchange ruins to rest on soft grass and watch Dinraal’s flaring passage from the east, and as the weather turned too cold they retreated more often to Hateno, Link’s house always waiting in welcome. He’d build up a fire and make a hot meal while she read in a plush seat made especially for her. He had plans to rent a seaside hut in Lurelin when winter hit full stride. He’d keep her warm and safe and make sure she rested. If Hyrule was hers to bear even with no crown, no castle, he would make sure that burden didn’t bury her. She knew far more about running a kingdom than he did, but none of the old infrastructure remained in place; they kept climbing toward something but it would never be the Hyrule they’d known before. Any glory to come would be of its people’s making, not of their memories’.

To be fair… Link didn’t really know the Hyrule from before—not like Zelda did. He remembered snatches, most of it her: her sunshine hair flowing through his hands, her sweet whispers, her lips desperate on his, so much longing, and too much lost time in frustration and silence.

Even his own house remained elusive. He’d remember a long plait of brown-river-stone and Hateno-rice-stalk colored hair as a young sister giggled, chasing frogs and fireflies beneath the apple tree, and he kept seeing the image of a woman he knew to be his mother standing at the hearth, retrieving fresh-baked bread from the hollowed stone to the fire’s side. He could hear her voice, but he didn’t know her name.

He’d asked Zelda, once, if she knew. She’d held his hands tight, sorry to say she didn’t.

All of this made her approach to the citadel strange.

Really strange.

“There’s no need for you to attend, Link. I’m sure Bolson construction has the physical activities well in hand.”

“…But you’re going,” he said, a folded shirt in one hand and a jar of homemade wildberry jam in the other.

“Yes,” she said. “I must mediate and keep an eye on Bolson and his obscenely over-inflated pricing. That doesn’t mean you must go.”

“W- why wouldn’t I go?”

“Why should you?”

“That’s not an answer.”

“That’s not a question.”

“That- what?!” he thought for a moment. “You’re trying to confuse me.”

She smirked a little. “I would never.”

She regretted it (sort of) as he hooked her over his shoulder and tossed her to the bed.

They finished packing a lot later than they’d intended.

Zelda made a few more attempts to assure Link she’d be fine alone, to the point at which he asked if she needed a few days away from him.

“No! No, of course not. Why should you think so?”

“It’s okay if you do. I’d understand.” He smirked. “Too many puns?”

She hooked an arm through his. “Not at all.”

“Uh-huh. So why don’t you want me to go?”

“It’s just…” her eyelids shut. When they opened, her other hand cupped his cheek. She studied his eyes, a worried crease appearing low on her forehead.

Link shook his head. “What is it?”

She sighed. “I don’t want to see you hurt.”

“I’ll be careful,” he reminded her with a confused half-smile. “I… did survive Calamity Ganon. I have no intention to get taken out by falling rocks.”

“…I know,” she said. “… Very well, I shall say no more of it. Just… please… do be careful. And please listen to me.”

“I always listen to you.”

This time, she smacked him right in the stomach. “You insist on saying such things, and they’re never true.”

He snorted as she raised the Sheikah Slate, tapping the icon for Akkala Tower.

___¤__¤__¤__¤___

Greyson had cleared the rubble and Bolson Construction’s Hateno crew had moved in, installing structural support beams and scaffolding to maximize safety as they cleared more debris from within.

The level of destruction within the tower belied its steadfast exterior.

The canons at the clifftop battery across the parade ground had taken out the bridge, tried to slow the approach of the guardians, tried to keep them out. It seemed they’d caused the rubble at the entrances, too, forcing the guardians to either ascend the tower or punch through the walls of the citadel itself. It appeared as though they’d chosen the former—the facade remained predominantly whole. Yet the abundance of guardian parts which Purah and her team had already removed from the entrance hall demonstrated how thoroughly they had penetrated the citadel’s innards.

Link and Zelda passed beneath the arch of the citadel’s portcullis and stared, mute.

The entrance hall bore signs of its former grandeur: thick columns flanked by statues of soldiers which had once stood more than twice Link’s height, only one unbroken, a sword still in its hands, point-down, and a great shield emblazoned with the royal family’s crest, fallen, among banners so decayed as to be unrecognizable except having once been cloth: frayed nets of fabric ready to crumble to dust at the slightest touch. Greyson had just lifted a heavy, jagged stone, the remnant of some sweeping ceiling architecture, and as he did the sound of scraping metal drew their eyes to the floor beneath it.

Armor.

Crushed.

Helmets. Gauntlets. Chain-mail and cuirasses. Rust and tatter, and more cloth nets.

Everywhere in the room and down the halls to the left and right—scattered pieces, tiny glints, rust protruding from cracks and peeking through inanimate rot. Link took ten steps toward the nearest column, crouching, rising again with a thin chain dangling from his fingers.

“What is it?” Zelda asked, the whispered quiet of a funeral.

“It’s… a bracelet,” Link said. He turned it over in his hand. It bore charms: a pair of wings, as though of the Goddess. He swallowed, glancing around the chamber. “No bones,” he said.

She shook her head. No. There were none.

“You’re… here to count the dead, too, aren’t you?” Link asked.

Zelda nodded, but not quick enough. Link saw her hesitation.

His eyes widened. “You knew them,” he said.

She clasped her hands before her, eyes on a series of tiny, scattered metal rings not far from her. “Not all of them,” she said.

“But more than most... than almost anyone. There might be some Zora…” He turned to face her, crossing the distance between them, the bracelet in his fist near the bottom of his ribcage.

Zelda shook her head, certain what he wished to ask her. “I… do not know who wore that bracelet,” she said, her voice soft.

Link’s hand tightened around it. “It… doesn’t seem like something a soldier would’ve been wearing.”

Zelda shook her head. “Probably not.”

Link’s other hand raised slowly to rest on her shoulder. He thumbed her collarbone. “How many people… I mean, it must’ve been like Hyrule Castle. Cooks, launderers, maids, pages… families. Right? With all those open-air spaces, there must’ve been gardeners.”

“Yes,” Zelda said. “All sorts made their lives here. Some worked here with leaves to see home.”

“…And they all died,” Link said.

“Perhaps,” she responded softly.

“Is this why you wanted me to stay? All this… death? Zelda…” he shook his head, his hand moving to caress her cheek instead. He ducked down, forcing her to meet his eyes. They brimmed over with concern.

She had to steel herself against any change in her own expression, though it clutched at her heart.

“Zelda, I’ve… seen death. I’ve seen so much of it. I feel even more. I know I lost… almost everyone I knew. This place right here is… it’s- another unacceptable tomb. We can’t leave what’s left of these people here. We have to show them respect. I wouldn’t want to sit by and ignore their passing.”

She wrapped her hand around the back of his, unsure whether reassuring him or herself. “I know, Link. It’s why I’m here. These were my people.” And I failed them.

The words hung unspoken, fully felt by each of them. A moment later, Zelda’s arms had encircled Link’s neck with a desperate tightness, his likewise about her waist.

He knew. “It is not your fault, Zelda.”

She disagreed, but to argue the point had proven fruitless—and a large part of her felt glad to have lost. She’d have lost every argument to Link, given in on every point, if it meant she could still see his eyes, enraptured, turned to ebony on hers as he stoked the fires of their ecstasy between them.

Greyson returned and left with a massive stone statue’s torso, the sword in its grip still intact. A group of builders passed beneath the entryway, the jovial ease in their speech diminished along with their footsteps. They gave Link and Zelda a wide berth, moving down the left-hand hallway with many a cleared throat and a sniff. Symin emerged from the hall to the right, his face brightening for a moment on seeing them—then he made a hasty retreat with pursed lips. Others came and went, shifting rubble in wheelbarrows, bearing sketches and pads full of notes, carrying lumber to construct supports within the structure.

No one disturbed their silent embrace.

“I should begin,” Zelda whispered.

“Not if you need some time,” Link said.

“I don’t. Do you?”

“No, Zelda. If I remembered them, then maybe—but I don’t.”

Zelda kept her breathing as even as she could, refusing to let a catch in her rhythm betray her.

She would not wish to see Link hurt.

“Well, then,” she said, pulling away. “I shall begin with the bracelet.” She crossed toward the column where Link had picked it up, scanning the floor. She removed the Slate from her hip and activated the camera, changing the focus and angle, sweeping the lens over the area. Link watched over her shoulder, waiting for the telltale beeps and boxes to appear on the screen; they didn’t.

She saved an image of the floor anyway. Her expectant look at Link made one side of his mouth pull back, and he opened his hand, holding the bracelet in his outstretched palm. She snapped a picture, watching the screen for a long moment, then, visually tracing the shape of the chain hugging his creases.

He waited for her as he always did.

Zelda re-holstered the Slate in favor of her pencil and notebook.

“Hey… let me,” Link said.

She laughed a little. “Your handwriting is terrible.”

“It’s not that bad,” he said with a halfhearted smile. “But I can handle the Slate.”

She blinked. “Right. Yes… here. Thank you, Link.”

His smile became much crinklier. “You’re welcome, Princess.”

“Why so formal, Sir Knight?” she asked with a double-take.

“Just to remind you how special you are.”

“One needn’t be formal to be special.”

“Yeahhh. But you’re smiling, aren’t you?”

Indeed she was.

She didn’t smile again until well after nightfall.

Entrance Hall 1 bracelet – chain / charms (2 wings) – (bronze) 12 metal rings 24 35 57 bootlace anchors 71 89 106 (Link offered use of pouch – store and count when task complete). 587 18 belt buckles – 23 31 1 curved metal strip, sha belt fastening pin – 19 21 1 ring – large / ruby set in gold 17 soldiers’ helmets + 13 helmet fragments 87 chain mail fragments 3 chain mail shirts 3 cuirasses 9 soldiers’ greaves 8 soldiers’ pauldrons 11 soldiers’ gauntlets 18 swords broadswords (various 14 soldier’s broadswords, 3 knight’s broadswords, 1 royal broadsword) 13 shields (11 knight’s shields, 2 soldier’s shields) 3 soldier’s claymores - 2 knight’s claymores - 4 knight’s halberds 1 knight’s bow – 1 2 soldier’s bows 53 large metal splinters (remains of weapons / shields / other?) 1 ring – serpentine / silver / lavender quartz chips [Captain Thale’s wife – ‘Myrella’ I think]. Hundreds to thousands of small, flat metal fragments (armor/shield remains? Other?). 18 chain fragments – bracelets / necklaces? 49 rupees [values vary], 30 of which in northwest corner. (Remains of cloth – much essentially unspun – breaks to dust easily when lifted – uncountable). 8 Wedding bands – gold [2 engraved: Bruun and Deena – Jayd and Povelle] 3 Wedding bands – silver [1 with cross-hatch pattern] 5 Wedding bands – bronze [1 engraved: Arra and Linne] 2 Wedding bands – tin [1 with etched joined hearts] 1 Wedding band – platinum [small / thin – General Relaigh’s wife – Briette] 8 promise bands – each unique – metal only (silver, platinum), silver/diamond, silver/diamond-chip, gold/diamond, gold/three diamonds, rose gold/diamond-chip. (Rose gold ring - stewardess’ assistant, Jien. The head stewardess was, as I recall, unmarried - Huryai. I’d seen her wear buckled dresses. Some buckles found are quite small as they were on those garments). 2 lockets (1 tin, 1 bronze) – contents dust. (I recall a maid wearing a locket). 7 earrings (2 nickel, 1 gold, 4 bronze) 9 necklaces (1 bronze/charms, 1 bronze/opal, 1 silver/alexandrite, 1 silver/moonstone, 1 gold/fire agate, 1 tin/charms, 1 silver/charms and sodalite, 1 tin/white quartz, 1 bronze/turquoise [small]). (I do not recall these necklaces in particular).

Northwest Hall Soldiers’ helmets – 12 (helmet fragments – 7) Chain mail shirts – 4 (chain mail fragments – 23) Soldiers’ cuirasses - 2 Soldier’s greaves – 10 Soldier’s pauldrons – 7 Soldier’s gauntlets – 8 (Flat metal fragments – hundreds) Soldier’s broadswords – 7 Knights’ broadswords – 5 Royal broadswords – 3 Soldier’s claymores – 1 Knights’ claymores – 2 Knights’ halberds - 3 Knights’ bows – 1 Soldier’s bows – Knight’s shields – 4 Soldier’s shields - (Splintered metal fragments – 89) 6 ring-bracelets (gold) 9 earrings (2 gold/ruby, 2 gold/amber, 5 gold helix rings) 2 scimitars (1 standard Gerudo, 1 moonlight design) 1 Gerudo spear 2 belts – brass (17 brass fragments – likely belt pieces) 3 brass chokers 3 brass chestplates 6 bracers – brass 3 Gerudo shields (2 standard, one ‘radiant’ design) Rupees – 93 3 Wedding bands – gold [1 with etched leaflike pattern] 1 Wedding band – silver 1 chain – bronze – heavy (necklace) – medallion – House Torin’s family crest, Akkalan nobility (I believe the medallion had been gifted to the eldest son upon turning 18 years of age, approximately a year prior to the Calamity). 11 bootlace anchors (Less evidence of cloth remains than in entrance hall).

Guards’ Chamber (off Northwest Hall) Soldiers’ helmets – 31 (helmet fragments – 55) Chain mail shirts – 22 (chain mail fragments – 108) Soldier’s cuirasses – 18 Soldier’s greaves – 56 Soldier’s pauldrons – 51 Soldier’s gauntlets – 49 (Flat metal fragments – hundreds to thousands) Soldier’s broadswords – 34 Knights’ broadswords – 11 Royal broadswords – 7 Soldier’s claymores – 2 Knights’ claymores – 5 Knights’ halberds - 6 Knights’ bows – 4 Knight’s shields – 6 Soldier’s bows – Royal bow - 1 Soldier’s shields – Royal halberds - 5 (Splintered metal fragments – thousands – Saiku and Shigoh counting / possible reconstruction?) Royal Guard’s Claymore Royal Guard’s Shield Full plate armor remains (not standard issue – darker metal – large 3-point-star-shaped hole in chestplate – backplate partially melted – presence of the Royal Guard’s Claymore and Shield suggest remains of General Relaigh, also house Torin – cannot determine what crest may have decorated it). Rupees – 229 6 Wedding bands – gold [2 engraved: Aurin and Mirrah - Eylin and Olinia] 8 Wedding bands – silver [1 engraved: Louessa and Pellan – 1 with cross-hatch pattern – 1 with ribbed edges] 2 Wedding bands – tin 3 Wedding bands – bronze [1 engraved: Arra and Linne] 1 Wedding band – steel 1 Wedding band – platinum – large (again suggests General Relaigh) 1 ring – three cut amber settings, Gerudo script – defensive magic (suggests wealth on behalf of wearer – identity unknown – not near the general’s remains). 1 ring – sealed bone, ancient Hylian script – offensive magic (again suggests wealth – identity unknown). (Less evidence of cloth remains than in entrance hall).

(I recall rings – other than wedding bands – on several captains’ hands. Captain Werrush had a reputation for charging headlong into battle, and perhaps fits the mold for the bone ring, though I cannot be sure it belonged to her. The ring’s size is large for most women, but she towered over me. It could have been hers. Captain Baran wore multiple rings and came from a wealthy family heavily invested in Ordorac Quarry. I could see him bearing the amber ward).

Estimate a minimum of 150 soldiers of varying

“Hey,” Link said.

Zelda startled. “Y-yes?”

“That’s… enough for today.”

She swallowed, holding her book a bit further from her face to counteract the blur, but Link folded it gently shut around her fingers.

“It’s late. You need to eat and sleep.”

Her eyes, unoccupied by her notebook, returned to the rubble at their feet.

“No, no no no no,” he said, taking the book from her entirely, then the pencil, putting them in his Korok pouch. “No more. We’re going to the camp. We’ll eat some food, and then we’ll crash. We can stay in our tent right here if you like, but if you’d rather sleep in a bed I’ll warp us back to Hateno. We can always return at the tower-top tomorrow morning.”

She allowed him to lead her down the L-shaped hallway and out the great citadel’s arch, talk and laughter from the camp on the plateau to their right a welcome interruption to her exhausted thoughts.

She accepted a bowl of hearty beef and vegetable stew and a cup of steaming hot liquid which turned out to be a tea brewed with cinnamon and orange rind. She savored it, sipping it slowly, allowing its steam to open her sinuses with each deep inhale. Link brought over a small boule of bread. He tore it in half and they shared it, using it to scoop up every last drop of the savory liquid in their bowls. It wasn’t quite as good as it would have been had Link made it, but the fact of needing neither to cook nor attend to most of the cleanup mattered a good deal (and Monari, while not Link, had a flair for filling and flavorful cooking).

“Ahh, you two could use more. Neither of you has enough meat on your bones,” Monari said, ladling another portion into each of their bowls without asking.

Zelda blinked. “I-“

“No buts,” the older woman interrupted, though her smile remained kind. “You’re about to blow away on the next winter wind, and I’m too old to do anything about it at that point. More tea?”

(That smile of Zelda’s appeared—a small one, half-hearted, but there, and Link’s nose brushed her hair in the next moment). “…Yes. Thank you. The tea is lovely.”

“Bark and orange skin. Makes a damn fine chocolate truffle, too. I’ll make you some.”

“O- oh, you needn’t-“

“Did I say I needed to? Chocolate’ll weigh you down, not me.” Monari gave a bit of a cackle. “Ahhh, you could use it though.” She added more tea to Zelda’s cup. “You too, skinny,” she said, pouring some in the empty cup Link had already set aside.

“I’m not that skinny.”

“You can lift a rock ten times heavier than you, I’ll grant you that, but you’re- still- skinny.”

Link smiled sheepishly as the old woman wandered toward the next group to heckle them instead.

They ate and drank their second helping in thoughtful quiet, brushing each other’s knees, thighs, shoulders, and elbows. Zelda couldn’t finish her stew. She stared into the crackling fire while Link made up the difference.

“…Ought I to have made my best guess at specifying alloys of the jewelry?” Zelda asked.

Link stopped mid-chew with one cheek stuffed to roundness. He turned to study her features.

“Hardened gold is impure,” she continued. “I wouldn’t wish to misrepresent these people. A low-ranking soldier and their spouse would have been unlikely to carry high-karat gold on their ring-fingers.”

Link swallowed, an uncomfortably large-sounding gulp.

Zelda twirled her wooden teacup in her fingers. “Beyond those engravings… I ought to- to make my best effort to understand whose deaths I have accounted for. The armor will be of little assistance as knights and soldiers wore essentially identical mail.” She shook her head, one hand raking through her shortened hair. “The Sheikah won’t mind if I inspect the jewelry again. Perhaps Purah- no, she’s occupied with guardian remains. Sudaishi and Kincama have packed and labeled each already, though perhaps they’d made note of the alloys with that remarkable device Robbie constructed-“

“Zel,” Link said, voice soft as deep thicket moss.

She stopped just as softly, trailing off, but it didn’t last. “I may have misidentified some stones as well. I’m certainly no expert.”

“I bet you got it right,” Link said, pulling her against him, his arm across her shoulders, his bowl set between his feet.

“I still don’t know whose they were,” she said, the words gravid in her mouth, “for the most part.”

They spent the night in Link’s bed at home, Zelda’s back pressed to Link’s chest, his arms secure around her.

It wasn’t until the following morning, as they emerged atop Akkala tower in a threaded burst of blue light, that Link reminded Zelda of the instance she feared.

“The gap’s right below us. They did the roof already, right?”

Zelda nodded. “A Sheikah team. I shall still inspect the items for anything I can identify.”

“Anything in particular you’re looking for?” Link asked. “I can keep an eye out.”

Zelda’s breath paused.

She didn’t dare look at him.

“Not in particular,” she said.

She made a show of unfolding her glider, but his still feet had pointed toward her, his total lack of effort to prepare for the flight down signaling suspicion.

He didn’t call her on it.

They glided beside the tower to pass through the shattered roof and land on the 3rd floor walkway of the cylindrical atrium—it provided an easier approach to the war room, thanks to a blockage on the stairs leading up from the living quarters. Greyson would have that cleared soon, though not yet.

Zelda concentrated on her breathing, noting its pace when calm, vowing readiness. She’d been surprised to find General Relaigh’s remains unaccompanied by the source of her dread. Surely the citadel’s leadership had convened in the war room as the guardians approached. She had to remain steadfast—watchful.

The scraped floor bore witness to the guardians’ entry here—so did marks upon the high walls. They’d entered as Link and Zelda just had—through the roof—punched their claws into stone to skitter down the walls, to rip the barricade at the door. Something had been thrust through the guardrail, leaving a four-foot breach to the doorway’s left. The automatons’ clawmarks stood stark, having scraped the polished stone floor to white porosity; those alone would have revealed their presence a century past, but one look inside the adjoining hallway made the scene unavoidable in imagining.

Guardian upon guardian littered the hallway—stalkers, scouts, so many they would need to climb over them to reach the war room itself.

“Holy shit,” Link murmured. “Look at the ceiling.”

Long gouges ran the length of the hall, some punching deep. “More guardians,” Zelda said.

“…Yeah.”

The scene in the war room staggered them.

The chamber dwarfed even the entrance hall. Before the Calamity, it had boasted a great table nestled in a depression flanked by steps on all sides, high-backed chairs upholstered with rich velvet, massive bookshelves full of references one might need should central Hyrule fall, leaving Akkala to stand in its place, and two tall, narrow windows beside the seat at the far wall where the general would preside.

Only the windows could be seen.

All else had been overtaken by the fallen. Mechanized bodies and empty suits of armor lay so thick no amount of floor could be seen. The bookcases had fallen, disintegrated to dust, perhaps, beneath the malice which had permeated this place.

Zelda’s trachea contracted just above her stomach.

They ended up warping back up the tower to glide down and speak with Bolson and Purah instead.

It took days: days and an army’s worth of people gliding down into the atrium, installing rope ladders, lowering lumber in to begin a new layer of supports in this part of the citadel, and meeting Greyson’s efforts in the stairwell beyond the war room to allow free movement between the two; only after that could the work of shifting and accounting begin.

Zelda managed—she thought—to conceal her anxiety beneath a veneer of grim efficiency, while Link treated the entire matter with somber defiance of his typical mischief. The war room and halls which led from it stood so laden with metal remains they decided to divide the space into gridded squares, each team assigned one at a time to identify items. All non-standard remains were to be brought to Zelda’s attention, and for that reason she and Link had taken the room’s center as their assigned space.

“Master Link?” a Sheikah asked, approaching with a palm held out. “Do you recognize this?”

Zelda dropped a gauntlet-fragment in the appropriate crate and sped to put herself between them, but too late.

“Nope, but I’m not the one to ask, anyway,” Link said. “Zelda might know.”

“Indeed, I am,” Zelda said with a puff of breath which drew Link’s brows together and his head back. “There is no call to request Sir Link’s assistance in this matter. All personal affects for identification should be brought to me, not to him. Is that clear?”

The silence which followed found Zelda’s eyes widening, as theirs already had at her.

“Yes, Princess,” the Sheikah said, holding a thick, brass chain in her palm out for inspection—a sturdy bracelet.

Zelda sighed, attempting to breathe normally. “…I do recall-“ Zelda’s already wide eyes flew wider and she swallowed convulsively. “A- soldier… being admonished by his superior for wearing such a thing on duty.”

“This doesn’t seem as bad as that medallion,” Link pointed out.

“Perhaps not,” Zelda said. “Rank may have played a role there… though I suppose I could see how a chain rattling around within or around a bracer might be more detrimental than beneath a breastplate.”

“I think I’d’ve let the guy keep it,” Link said, “and let him learn his own lesson if it got caught on something or screwed up his grip.”

Zelda’s mouth twitched. “Evidently that was not this commander’s style.”

The following days saw a plethora of personal effects marched beneath Zelda’s nose: jewelry, cases, and objects which would have been used within the room, likely not belonging to any particular person. The third letter-opener brought to Zelda’s attention found her eyes rolling, though she closed her lids to disguise it.

“You need a break?” Link asked.

“I shall persevere,” she said, flashing a smile.

The room slowly emptied as did the living quarters downstairs, more and more gouged stone visible, the work dragging through to the following week, and as the final layer of debris became evident, Zelda’s average heart rate decreased.

___¤__¤__¤__¤___

Link had finally opened that jar of wildberry jam in the wake of the war room standing empty. They’d finished around noon, and everyone seemed to decide at once a celebratory lunch was the most appropriate course of action.

They’d gathered all at once on the plateau, the citadel’s great spiraling stairway looming behind them.

“Spiffy jam,” Purah said, taking a bite with her mouth wide enough to avoid making her cheeks sticky.

“Thanks,” Link said as he inhaled his second chunk of bread (buttered and jammed).

“It’s good to be done,” Shigoh said, her short white hair unkempt and sporadically glittering with the stone dust which also coated their shins—they’d stirred it often from the floor.

“We’re not done yet,” Link said. “The whole southwest wing on the first floor is still left.”

“You won’t find much there,” Symin said, wiping a stray drop of jam from his beard with some difficulty. “We carted out all the guardian remains, but there wasn’t much else in the dining hall.”

Link huffed. “What stopped the guardians then?!”

Symin cocked his head, shaking it as he chewed. “A few knights, it seems.”

“… A few?!”

“Sounds weird, Linky, but it’s true. There were only a few suits of armor in there. We left ‘em for you, Princess.”

“…Wow.”

Zelda’s last bite of bread had lodged itself halfway between her mouth and her stomach. She could breathe, but completing the swallow proved difficult. She took her canteen, drinking metered sips of water, slowly coaxing the offending material downward. She re-screwed the cap with supreme outward calm, returning it to her side, and turning to Symin with a casual smile. “I’m finished. I may as well look now. Link, you needn’t come—this shall be brief and you’ve just prepared another slice.”

“Huh?” Link said as Symin rose.

“Certainly, Princess,” said Symin, stretching a bit.

Link looked at Symin, then back at Zelda, and then at Purah who had gone oddly pale.

“What-?” Link shook his head, rising, stuffing his entire slice of bread into his mouth at once and wiping his hands on his pants. He swallowed faster than he’d any right to. “I’m good. I’ll go.”

Zelda’s heart sank. She’d little choice. He would know should she resist.

She followed Symin in the silence of her once-meditations at the springs, though no amount of prayer on her part had ever altered anything.

Link strode uncharacteristically quiet at her side, as well.

“We’re still pulling the guardians out from around the tower,” said Symin. “The dining hall’s clear, though, and I’ll tell you what a chore that was. The war room was bigger, but they were piled so thick in here we had to cut parts off to start getting them out. The parts are on the grass near the second battery.” He sniffed, raising his glasses off the bridge of his nose and resettling them. “It’s clear they bottle-necked the guardians twice, once on the way into the hall and once on the way out. I ah- don’t know how many got past them, but there wasn’t much space to get around the ones we found at the last door.”

Symin reached the door opening onto the dining hall and held his hands out as though encircling something. “Right here—one of those big stalkers sat in the middle with two more on either side and some scouts on top. The floor was loaded with them—and then another pile like it at the door to the atrium.”

Link blew air out his nose. “Smart. Use them as shields.”

“Yes… they still… well…” Symin lifted his hands before bringing them together in something that might have been regret, or reverence, or both. “You can… can see for yourself.” He all but crushed his lower lip against his teeth.

Zelda could not speak.

In the hallway, just before the dining hall itself, lay a royal claymore, beside it the mangled remains of a suit of armor.

“Holy shit,” Link breathed, crouching beside it.

Zelda could not move.

“This is… it’s melted,” Link said, lifting a piece of what had once been a cuirass. It fell easily from the seam attaching it to the back, brittle from the abuse it had seen in the battle and a century spent in the enigmatic effects of malice. He turned it over in his hand.

The imprint of stitching made itself easily visible where it would have faced its wearer – the thin criss-cross of threadlines and patches suddenly smoothed yet disfigured in form and color—pocked with bubbles and blackened patches appearing nearly as seafoam.

Symin made a sound deep in his throat, a fist over his mouth.

Link also appeared grim.

Zelda imagined it had to do with the heat of the guardians’ lasers, though she’d not seen this precise effect first-hand. She could easily understand the heat had softened, nearly liquefied the metal to join it with the fibers of a shirt beneath it-

-and then it struck that she’d never seen what occurred when liquid steel met skin.

Bile rose in her throat.

Link replaced the metal in the embrace of its backplate, face stony.

Quiet breaths passed, the slow ebb and flow of waves. Zelda opened her notebook, beginning her dutiful notations.

Dining Hall 1 Royal Claymore 1 cuirass (melted – indistinguishable) 2 pauldrons (melted) 2 gauntlets (full – 1 melted) 2 greaves (1 melted) 1 helmet (non-standard – heavy)

(This is a suit of full plate armor – all pieces appear present – many melted).

It seemed suddenly useless to list each component part. The floor appeared relatively barren but for these. Zelda supposed the knight’s shield had already been spent before he fell. Of course it had—thus the state of his armor, inundated with blazing heat.

Link stood, asking Symin if he needed air. Symin shook his head.

Zelda’s racing heart gave a hopeful leap.

Link took a step toward the large hall and stopped, peering down.

He crouched and retrieved something from a crack in the stone, turning it over in his fingers.

Zelda took two steps toward him. “Let me-“

Link flinched, gasping.

“Link- no, no- Link?!” she cried, her hand outstretched, but too late. That look had already arrived: a far-off distance—the surprise of suppressed memory bursting to the present.

___¤__¤__¤__¤___

The knight strode, his gait swift despite his heavy armor, his cape conformed to the turbulent wind, blinding Link as he caught up to grasp an armored bicep.

“Father-“

“Enough!” the knight spat, spinning to face Link, not quite meeting his eyes, teeth grinding so hard the muscles in his cheeks pulsed outward. “You are not my son.”

“How can you say that?!” Link asked, reeling, blindsided—so bewildered his blood had abandoned his face to cocoon his chilling core. “After… all this-“

“This?” The knight asked, eyeing the glaring blue of the pommel above Link’s shoulder. “This is why.”

Link’s face bunched. He floundered, images of sparring with a younger version of the man before him—smiling, with stripped oak branches—rendered in bright watercolors on his eyelids, squeezed shut. “I don’t understand.” Link counted three breaths. Dry wind whipped moisture from his eyes as he fastened them on his father once more. “Aren’t you… proud I pulled the sword?”

His father barked a laugh, an instantaneous incredulity too complete to be feigned. “Proud?” He shook his head and kept shaking it, a quiver at his mouth fascinating Link for a moment, for he’d never once seen his father weep. He’d heard it only once, as a small child. He hadn’t seen his face.

The knight removed his arm from Link’s loosened grasp with a measured deliberation marking some shuttered emotion. “I cannot be proud of a son I don’t have.”

“Wh- what?”

“I thought I did,” his father said, chin working, “but I- don’t. You’re some-“ he looked Link up and down- “ancient spirit, reborn. What did you do? Did you… crawl into my son’s unborn body? Devour him to make room for yourself?”

Link had no breath.

“SIR LYLE!” a voice called from the high watchtower. “A SIGNAL FIRE! THE MOUTH OF SHADOW PASS!”

“WORD TO THE GUARD CHAMBER!” Link’s father yelled.

“YES, SIR LYLE!” yelled a young soldier at the rooftop entry before disappearing below, metal rattling against his gauntlet.

Link’s father moved to follow him.

“Wait- wait-“ Link said.

“I attend my duty,” he responded, disappearing into the top floor of the atrium.

Link stood, dumbfounded, numb to the brutal wind battering his face and hair, the core of him gaping hollow, his blood’s heat spent.

___¤__¤__¤__¤___

Link stared at the ring in his palm, the inscription engraved on its inner surface boring through whatever barriers the Shrine of Resurrection had erected within his mind.

Lyle and Junilla ~ Til in Hylia’s arms we meet

He kept hearing these sounds. What were they?

“Link?”

Zelda’s voice.

Zelda’s hands on his shoulders. One arm across his back.

“Link- Link.”

Gasps.

He kept hearing gasps.

His vision kept jumping in time with them.

He fisted that ring tight.

“Link…”

“Master Link, do you… need help?”

Link shook his head, bringing his fist to his mouth, his eyes shut against images he could never again erase.

“I’m so sorry. I’m…” Zelda rubbed his bicep as though warming him. He could feel her intensity on his face even without his sight. “I take it… you recalled something.”

He nodded.

“…Everything?”

“No,” he said, raspy, “but… uhm…” he swallowed twice- “enough to know why you tried to leave me behind.”

She embraced him then in silence. He welcomed it, returned it with a pressure like those first moments after she sealed the Calamity, like the first time they made love—but he released her sooner.

“I have to see,” he said.

She pulled back, squinting at him as though she didn’t understand, but she freed him from her arms all the same.

Link walked the path of his father’s final moments—from the hallway he died in to the other doorway he’d barricaded. Remains of a few other knights lay within reach of it, even more within the dining room itself, but not nearly as many as the other rooms—yet they’d filled this one with the husks of their enemies.

The bottom floor of the cylindrical atrium still lay half-thick with guardian remains. A few Sheikah teams stood working to remove one, speaking matter-of-factly with each other. The entire shaft, all the way up, showed signs of the automotons’ clawed feet working their way down.

The War Room had been barricaded from the outside. Now Link knew who’d done it.

His father, committing himself and his team to the shaft, defending the passage down into the great citadel’s heart.

Had he been on the roof, too, when the guardians overtook it, skywatchers swarming overhead? That’s where he’d been in the one solid memory Link now had of him.

That, and a memory within a memory: sparring with stripped oak branches, his father smiling at him.

___¤__¤__¤__¤___

Winter arrived, plummeting on Akkala in the form of an unforgiving deluge of hailstones hammering the base of the citadel’s atrium with a roaring din—then snow blanketing it. The work of accounting for the fallen had finished, scaffolding and reinforcements running through the entire structure as restoration began. In light of Zelda’s slight frame and the cold, Link had begun to coax her toward a few weeks in Lurelin with its gentler cool season.

He wouldn’t mind leaving the citadel behind, either. He had a hard time keeping his smiles from fading fast in its shadow, and he didn’t want Zelda to keep giving him those worried looks. Even when they returned to Hateno, he’d end up standing in their little house tracing cracks in the stucco or pacing in a particular patch of grass on the little shelf of land holding the house, trying to find more stick-spars, more smiles somewhere. He needed a change of scenery, and soon; they both did.

Deliveries of fresh stone from Ordoroc Quarry had begun to arrive. Once they’d repaired the roof and assured the flues clear, they could keep the inside warm and the indoor restoration could continue through the winter.

One delivery included a person straggling behind it, dressed in battered Hylian soldiers’ gear. Link recognized him immediately.

“Hi, Nell,” Link said.

Nell stared up at the citadel in awe. “Wow.” Then he seemed to hear Link. “Wow. Hi, guy from the bridge.”

“Heh,” Link laughed. “You came back.”

“Yeah,” Nell said. “Once I found out it was safe again, I had to.”

“You wanted to pray here, didn’t you?”

Nell nodded. “For my fallen family. My grandma used to tell me about it, that I had family who died here. I did at Fort Hateno, too, but I could get there to pray easily. Here… not so much.” He craned his neck up.

Link followed his gaze to the top of the Sheikah tower. “It turns out… I had family here, too.”

“Yeah,” Nell said. “A lot of us did. My grandma made sure to tell us how lucky we were, and to thank our ancestors every day for what they did for us, so we could live. Now that I’m here, I can finally do that for my great-grandfather.” Nell walked toward the entrance, pulling the pack off his back and setting it on the ground just in front of it. He looked around. “If I put something here, it won’t be in the way, will it?”

“I don’t think so,” Link said.

Nell nodded. He opened the pack and pulled a stone from it, setting it a few feet to the right of the archway. Once he leaned back, Link could see it was an offering statue, so much like the ones the little Koroks enjoyed hiding in, but smaller—small enough that Nell could carry it and not tire too much on his journey. He took three apples from his bag and placed them in its basin.

Link half-expected a tree spirit to appear. Maybe one would later—maybe one would make another little statue to rest beside this one and wait to surprise someone.

Nell pulled something from a leather drawstring bag at his waist, knelt on the grass, and bowed his head in prayer.

Link watched him breathe steadily, his sandy blond hair whipping in a sudden lash of wind. Then he came up beside him and knelt, joining him.

A good while passed.

“Are you thanking your family, too?” Nell asked softly.

Link swallowed, his head bowing almost til his chin touched his chest. “Not exactly. I’m… asking questions.”

“I do that too, sometimes. I wonder why I’m not more like them. I’m fine traveling on my own, but to enlist in an army… to fight all those guardians…” he shook his head. “I can’t even imagine it. I turned tail when I saw those skywatchers here.”

“You were right to,” Link said.

“Maybe. I don’t think my great-grandfather would be very happy to find out he died just so I could wander into his grave and join him.”

Link huffed.

“Or my great-uncle, for that matter,” Nell said.

“Is he the one who died at Fort Hateno?”

“Yeah. My grandma was sadder about him, I think. He was her brother. I guess they were pretty close.”

The wind whipped at them again, Link’s hair flying almost straight upward. Nell grabbed at his own instinctually with an irritated grunt followed by a gasp as his hands chased something small and shining. It spun in the air a few times before he caught it.

“…Saved it.”

Link peered at Nell’s hands, curious. “Was that a ring?”

Nell nodded. “Yeah. My great-grandmother’s wedding ring. I was going to leave it here for my great-grandfather, but it’s hard to just let it go. It’s kind of why I brought the extra apples. I figured I’d make an offering, then camp… and see if I could manage it the next day. I can’t help worrying someone will pick it up, though, even though you’re really not supposed to take offerings. The spirits are supposed to keep them.”

Link tried not to give Nell the hard look he had coming. Nell really didn’t deserve it… most people couldn’t see the Koroks to know what little menaces they were. What would they even do with a wedding ring?

Instead, Link looked at Nell’s hand.

Then he froze.

“…You okay?” Nell asked.

Link just stared, reading the part of the inscription he could see over and over again.

nd Junilla ~ Til in Hylia’s

He read it again.

And again.

And again and again.

“Seriously, what is it?” Nell shifted to partially face Link.

“You- this is your great-grandmother’s ring?”

“Yeah.”

Link stared at the ring, then at Nell. He took in his sandy hair, his skin color, eye color… barely different from his own. Then he reached into his Korok pouch, removed his father’s ring, and held it out in his own palm.

Nell’s shock now mirrored Link’s own.

“Holy shit, we’re related?!” Nell yelled.

It hit Link, then, as he used one of Link’s own favored expressions, one he suddenly knew his mother had told him off for when he said it in front of his little sister.

Something about Nell’s nose, sort of bird-beak like, on the face of a scampering little girl with a long plait of straw-brown hair, as she turned to make a face at him for no particular reason.

“What was she like?” Link blurted out, hands shaking.

“Huh?”

“Your- your grandmother. What was she like?”

___¤__¤__¤__¤___

Zelda felt Link smile against the back of her neck as they pressed warm to each other in an airy bed in Lurelin—a truly phenomenal idea on Link’s part, one she hadn’t appreciated properly until her body recognized how cold it had been for so long.

She smiled, too, reaching back to thread her fingers through his soft hair. “Did you remember something?”

“Mm-hm,” he hummed half into her hair and half against her neck with a pressed kiss.

“What?”

“My mom hated the word ‘orange.’”

Zelda barked a laugh, her dozy state giving way in the face of such absurdity. “Why should she hate ‘orange’?”

“It’s my fault,” Link said. “I showed my sister you could say ‘orange’ instead of ‘aren’t’ and it would be funny.”

Zelda gave him a look he couldn’t quite see in the dark. “That is not funny.”

Link laughed with nasal absurdity. “It so is.”

Zelda pulled her other hand from beneath the pillow to whack his bicep half-heartedly.

“Pff. My mom agreed with you. She thought it was awful. My sister loved it though.” Link dissolved into a fit of silent belly-laughter. Zelda found it infectious, laughing along with him and turning in bed to face him.

“I’m glad,” she said, “that you’ve started to remember so much. I’m sorry I tried to keep some things from you.”

He caught her hand in his and kissed its back, stopping to pay attention to each divot between her knuckles. “I understand why you did, but…” He shook his head. “It’s worth it. Especially now that I know… I know I have family. They didn’t all die then. It did all… mean something, what happened to us, even if it’s been too long for us to see their faces again.” He smirked. “And hey, I’m a great-uncle AND an uncle, and a great-great-uncle, too!”

“Indeed you are,” Zelda said, her hands becoming restless at Link’s collarbone. She raised her eyes to his, moonlit sky reflected in them, so soft. “What…” she swallowed, her fingertips tapping a sweeping rhythm along his clavicle. “What would you think of perhaps… being a father, too?”

Link’s next breath drew deep. The moonlit sky in him widened as his hand found her waist, traveling along it to her hip. “Are you ready for that?”

“With you, my love? Yes. I’ve always been ready.”

Link’s next kiss delivered a smoldering heat to her body, ignited her from the inside out, burning her until the Moon had sunk once more in favor of Sun.

#gift fic #hestu's gift exchange #drama #zelink #hurt/comfort #loz #loz botw #canon compliant #post-calamity #legend of zelda #loz fanfic #botw #botw fanfic #oneshot #uses lists to tell part of the backstory

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carrotsnake · 11 months

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Botw/Totk headcanon: Sheikah NPCs beyond Kakariko

after impa being the Last of Her Kind for nearly 20 years, we were kind of spoiled with the era of wilds sheikah. still, kakariko is known for it's older population and botw makes a point to let us know paya isn't used to seeing people her age. this post is about asking 'where are they?' and filling in the gaps. being a peaceful farming village it makes sense the younger gens would want to leave as soon as they can for some adventure.

sheikah typically have hair on the grey-to-white scale (granté proves this isn't a requirement), and unlike the past games they have a greater diversity in eye colour. below is a list of hylian npcs that look too young to have greying hair that i hc are either from kakariko, or have some sheikah ancestry.

from left to right: lecia, letty, mina, her brother mils by proxy, teli, juney, and baumar. i'll go into more detail about each under the cut, comparing them from the 2 games alongside some more headcanons. some of them i haven't found in totk yet, so i'll edit when i do.

pic on the left side is them in botw, totk on the right.

Mina is a treasure hunter looking for loot with her brother by the exchange ruins outside the great plateau. the siblings also show up in the dlc. they're trying to steal a sheikah heirloom back from the yiga hideout, though they don't know it's purpose - they just wanna sell it. in totk she walks on the path between lakeside stable and lurelin. she says that even treasure hunters deserve some fun once in a while, so we can assume she's takin' it easy. Mils, meanwhile...

...joined the zonai survey team, and moans about what tough work it is. he walks through pagos woods to the zonai ruins. he joined in the hopes it would lead him to treasure, but he hasn't had his lucky break yet. most hylians travel from stable to inn and can be assumed not to have a proper home due to the lasting effects of the calamity. this is my bias but i like to think he's talking about kakariko when he mentions home. let him grow some pumpkins and wrangle cuccos. he wishes to live a quiet life.

i find it sweet him and mina are both in faron. maybe they decided to split up and cover more ground? with mina off sunbathing and sipping mimosas in lurelin, mils got the short end of the stick again.

Baumar:

'i hope you die': lazy, cliché, unrealistic. 'i hope your favourite botw npc gets mushroomed and bowlcutted': it's scary, it's possible, it's happening to me right now. such was the fate of our poor resident shield-surfer bro from botw. known for many hit quotes such as 'let's go bamboo! yahoo!', 'shield surfing is like, totally radical, dude', and my favourite:

in botw he rides his horse on the path between serenne and snowfield stable. in totk he's part of the fashion tour-group that run around hateno village. maybe he went to hebra to show his 'wicked' surfing moves to selmie and she said 'kid, if i let you out on the slopes you'll die. sorry'. his world was completely shattered beneath him like a broken shield, so he turned to cravats and puffy short shorts to cope.

his name is similar to the hills of baumer above deya village ruins. maybe he's a descendent of the few survivors. i wonder what his ancestors are thinking now, watching what he does with the gift of life.

Teli walks between fort hateno and hateno village. He sells ancient guardian parts and even mentions he trades them with Robbie. he has a high opinion of himself and tells you he's known across hyrule for his 'roguish good looks.' in totk he's one of the men in the 'Gourmets gone missing' Penn quest that gave himself food-poisoning by riverside stable. after which he scares away some cuccos and makes you wrangle them for a sidequest. just L after L for this dashing rogue.

Juney, now famous for her rupee grinding sand seal minigame, i instantly recognised as the epic divorce woman from rito village. her attitude is just as surly as ever but they gave her a soft side. i like that every minigame location could not be further from hateno. you'll find that school someday queen.

she was a newly wed mad at her husband, jogo, for choosing a cold place for their honeymoon. he begs you to give him flint to cook some baked apples for her to save their already failing marriage.

in totk they're not together, jogo inhabits a cabin in tabantha village ruins with another woman. he didn't give her enough baked apples.

Letty walks along the path between lakeside stable and lurelin. she gives you cooking tips and that's pretty much it. i'm pretty sure i've met her as a yiga disguise more often than i've seen the real her. if anyone has found her in totk, please let me know.

Lecia is a new character in totk. she's with the research team and plays a part in the foothill stable Penn quest. she kind of looks like a grown up Koko. maybe a distant relative? but maybe she's not sheikah. maybe the sight of all those pasty naked man nips traumatised her so bad she got marie-antoinette syndrome from the shock. i haven't seen her since.

thank you if you read to the end. to clarify i'm working on some fic stuff and that entails finding npcs across the overworld to give some more lore. it's a sheikah focused fic so i needed some characters other than the kakariko residents. it's also just fun fleshing out random npcs to make the world feel more lived in. again, i'm missing some details like what mina does before you save lurelin, so i'll edit this post in the future.

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novantinuum · 2 years

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Happy (belated) holidays, @linksthoughtbrambles! I was your match for this year's Hestu's Gift Exchange!

The request was "A meeting in the afterlife. (Or the spirit realm, or between lives - however you'd like to interpret it!)"

When I saw this prompt, my mind whirred with the concept of OoT Link and Zelda finally reuniting after death, finally being able to play together as children, their spirits finally released from all the trauma and loss of innocence they'd dealt with in life. I always loved the BotW style "spirit aesthetic," so I had fun mixing some of that in with this piece. I hope you enjoy, and that the year to come is kickass for you~

#loz #legend of zelda #ocarina of time #link #zelda #navi #zelda/link #loz fanart #zelink #my art stuff #WOW this took forever to do hhdsjfnhdjg i am so rusty with art but ultimately i think i'm happy #with how it turned out #glowy shit is hard tho ufhjg

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zellink · 9 months

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nearer, my god, to thee

a post-botw zelink fic. [ one-shot // 11k words // E-rated for sexual content ]

>> Read on AO3

Summary: Link finally understands that it isn’t him who has absorbed this kingdom into his bloodstream—it is the kingdom, it is her, and she is surrounding him, swallowing him whole. A tent in a forest, a summer night full of stars, and two people who have always been part of the wild.

Notes: Written as part of Zelink Hype Squad server's Hestu Gift Exchange 2023-24 for @spices28 ⭐️ Special thanks to @1up-girl and @mustardcheesedog for being such amazing betas. ✨

nearer, my god, to thee

Hyrule has always been a beautiful land.

Rolling hills that bleed into meadows. Verdant canopies of trees that shield and cover whatever creature that wanders beneath. Rivers that run wild into everywhere and nowhere, into seas that lead to places unknown. Mountains that seem to scratch the sky. Canyons that go so deep, one might think the core of the earth is visible from a bird’s eye view.

And Link, upon waking up from his long slumber, has laid his eyes on every inch of the land. Has seen it all through summer’s rage and winter’s wrath, underneath stone archways in front of mansions long gone, from behind overgrown vines that wrap around fallen citadels. He’s lost and found himself, time and time again, in the Lost Woods and the Hebra Mountains and the far-flung corners of Gerudo Desert. Has absorbed this land into his bloodstream until he becomes one with it, until he’s just another permanent fixture of the landscape—another mountain in Lanayru, perhaps. Or another river that flows through Faron.

But when all is finally said and done, and he has bled and bled in the bowels of the castle and in the field, and a golden light shines in the sky and descends gently onto the grass, he realizes, finds—

That there is just one more part of Hyrule that he hasn’t absorbed into himself at all.

And that part is living and breathing and sitting in the saddle atop her white stallion, riding alongside his brown mare. Her cheeks are flushed from the late summer’s heat. Her long blonde locks are blown back by the evening breeze, the top a little bit mussed up and the braids across her crown slightly loosened from the day’s hot journey eastward.

The urge to extend his arm outward and run his fingers through those tresses claws inside him.

He clenches at the reins a bit tighter instead.

They continue to ride.

To their right, Wetland Stable is all lit up for the night. Link has been there before, too. A few months ago, he slept in a cot underneath that very roof after he had chased down a particular landscape portrayed in an image on the Slate, hunting it all the way into the forest just across the river.

In the end, he had come out of it with a singed brow and an arm covered in burns—classic memento from the Guardians—and the haunting fragment of a memory from one hundred years ago, where the woman he ached to bring home had despaired and cried in his embrace, among the rainfall and the mud.

The woman’s voice is what slices through his thoughts.

“Gods, I’ve forgotten how muscles can ache from too much use,” Zelda says. “I think we should stop for the night and get some rest. What do you think?”

Link smiles at her. There is no mud nor rainfall on her face anymore—only a few beads of sweat that his fingers long to wipe away. “Yeah, I agree.”

“Shall we head to the stable, then?” she asks.

He turns his head to look at the stable again. It’s not especially crowded—Wetland Stable never is, unlike Riverside or Dueling Peaks—but he sees a few visitors sitting around the communal cook pot, sees some other patrons conversing with the stablemaster, and thinks that they’ve had their fair share of strangers’ eyes upon them for the past month in Hateno.

They’ll have more of that in their destination, too: Zora’s Domain is filled with people who know exactly who they are, beyond their unassuming appearance. People who know of the titles from their former lives, know of the hefty past that they carry upon their shoulders.

He wants to take her somewhere else. A place unknown to anyone else except for him. No prying eyes, no whispering mouths. Only boughs of trees overhead, the soft sloshing of water from leaping frogs, and the chirps of restless crickets.

Wants to share that piece of wilderness with her. Consume it together.

“There’s this spot in the cove of Crenel Peak,” Link says. “There’s a pond and a lot of trees and sometimes there are fireflies, too. We can pitch a tent and rest there.” He pauses. “If— if you want.”

Zelda’s lips curve into a smile—wide, dimpling her cheeks, and his heart twists and twists. “That sounds lovely, Link,” she replies. “Let’s go there, then.”

They change course, pulling at the reins to keep left on the dirt path, then turning at the intersection and heading a little further north. Past the quiet fields and open meadows and the unobstructed view to the castle—all black and gray and no wisps of crimson at all against the twilight sky—until they reach the base of Crenel Peak, where the hills part to reveal an opening to a tree-filled recess in the side of the mountain.

Link dismounts first, hitching his mare onto a trunk on the outskirts of the small forest before offering Zelda his hand—gloved palm facing up. He knows she’s more than capable of sliding off her stallion herself, but, well—he’d never pass up the opportunity to have her touch grace his skin. She takes it, and he feels her lean her weight onto his hand as she dismounts. Feels the warmth even through her glove, feels his blood rushing towards where their bare fingers meet.

When she lets him go to hitch her own steed, Link lets out a slow exhale through his mouth.

Blames his sudden breathlessness on the summer heat.

He unfastens their shared traveling pack and tent from their horses’ backs while Zelda takes the bedrolls. Lets muscle memory from a hundred years prior overtake his body because this—working together with her like clockwork, preparing themselves for a night in whatever pocket tucked away within the kingdom—is something even a long slumber can’t ever erase from him.

They walk further into the cove until they find a small clearing where the pond awaits, right at the base of the hill. He takes out the sheets of canvas and the poles, and begins pitching the tent. Assembles the poles, connects one end to another, then inserts each pole into its corresponding grommet. As he stakes the corners of the erected tent into the ground, he sees her build a fire in his periphery, steel against flint atop a bundle of wood. Orange sparks fly, and then their camp for the night is finally illuminated, ready for their rumbling stomachs and aching bodies.

And anything else that might unravel as the night progresses, a voice within him says, though he chides it, pushes it away.

Link unlaces the traveling pack and searches for some wooden plates and spoons. Fights off a smile from breaking across his face when his fingers brush over their tangled belongings—the clasp of his additional pair of pants catching the strap of her silk camisoles; her hairbrush that somehow got stuck to his robe.

Eventually, he finds those wooden plates and spoons.

He sets the utensils atop a nearby tree stump, places a cook pot on the fire, and says, “I think there’s plenty of mushrooms around. Do you want stew or skewers?”

Zelda purses her lips, mulling over his question, and something warm shoots through his nerves as if it’s the very first time he’s uttered such a question to her in this century. He supposes he should start getting used to this—asking mundane questions about nothing, about everything. Where to stay for the night, what to have for dinner.

“Skewers would be better, I think,” she replies as she settles on a fallen log in front of the fire. Gives her sweaty forehead a cursory wipe with the back of her hand. “It’s too hot for a stew, don’t you think?”

Oh, he really could get used to this.

“Yeah, skewers sound good.” He smiles at her.

So Link spends the next ten minutes foraging for Hylian mushrooms around the area, putting each that he has picked into a cloth bag Zelda had fashioned out of his worn shirt back in Hateno. In the end, he’s gathered enough mushrooms (and some Hyrule herbs, too) to feed six: one portion for her, three for him, and two for leftovers that can serve as a light lunch tomorrow for the rest of the journey to Zora’s Domain.

He returns to the cook pot, procures the jars of oil and crushed rock salt from their pack, and begins cooking their dinner. Pouring a little bit of oil, then hovers his hand above the pot, gauging the heat before pouring all the picked mushrooms into it. He stirs and stirs with a wooden spoon, trying his damndest not to look her way too much lest he makes a mistake and burns himself on the hot iron.

(But then any burn or cut is worth it when it’s for her.)

Once the mushrooms are cooked through, Link realizes that he doesn’t have the wood sticks, so he serves the food in the bowl and hands it to Zelda.

“This is just… a bowl of cooked mushrooms,” he says, bashful. “Don’t actually have the sticks to skewer them. Sorry.”

A laugh bursts from Zelda. “That’s no problem, Link,” she says, grinning. “I don’t think we would be eating the wood sticks anyway,” she adds, before reaching for the bowl from his hands. Covering his fingers with hers, pressing slightly before taking it away.

His breath becomes ragged in an instant, though he knows how to quickly regain his composure, because it has happened many, many times before. In Hateno, in their shared home and on the streets and every place in between. A lingering touch here and there, fire through his veins. The air turning heavy each time, but holding themselves back as they ride out the initial shock of being alive together in this century, as they parse through their grief and loss and shared wounds.

But now they are outside and there’s a certain lightness that percolates through him that he knows hasn’t been there in ages, and they are alone together—so alone—and he knows it will snap.

It’s just a matter of when.

So he shoots another smile at her and goes to serve a bowl for himself. Settles on the log next to her—the side of his thigh touching hers all the way to their knees. Feeling his skin sizzle even through the fabric of his breeches. Eats and eats with barely any words exchanged because their shared silence is as natural as breathing. When they break it, it’s for her to comment on his talent of making even just mushrooms seasoned with salt and herb taste good, and he replies with thanks and heat rising on his cheeks.

It doesn’t take long for them to finish their meals. It has been quite a long day, after all.

He takes the bowl from her and washes their dishes by the pond as she takes their pack inside the tent, fastens the flaps together, and changes into her sleepwear. With a rag he scrubs and scrubs the grime off the cook pot, averting his thoughts to anything else other than the sound of fabric rustling from beyond that layer of canvas, which proves futile anyway.

It’s painfully familiar, because he knows he’s been here before, regardless of the scantness of his memories. He’s felt this so often, if not always. A century ago, in other places, bearing skin with fewer scars but one that still aches to touch her all the same.

With everything cleaned, he sets them on the same nearby tree stump to dry. Takes a deep, deep breath, then takes his bedroll and pulls at the laces to unfurl it atop the grass, in front of the tent.

Link stares at it for a while, just as he has done for the past three weeks—the same bedroll set on the floor beside the bed in their home. Imagines two bodies atop it instead of just one, pictures two sets of limbs searching for one another and tangling and joining. Swallowing those images down his throat, where they sear until they settle inside his stomach, dormant and docile, before they come up into his mouth again the next night. Over and over and over, because he knows that they have all the time in the world now and all that’s left to do is wait.

And he intends to swallow them all down and wait again tonight, though something in his gut tells him that maybe, just maybe, the trees and the open sky overhead might catalyze a bolt from the blue.

There’s more rustling from inside the tent, so Link decides to distract himself by undoing his baldric and belts, taking off his gloves, carefully setting the Sword against a tree, and then sitting down and unfastening the leather vambrace from his right forearm. Then it’s the patterned strip of cloth that he peels off from his arms, unwrapping, unraveling, until he’s only in his Champion tunic with the cotton shirt underneath, his pants, and his boots.

As he sets his protective leathers aside, Zelda comes out from the tent with her cream-colored nightgown finally wrapped around her figure—loose and sleeveless, with the thin straps hanging on her shoulders and the hem falling down to her mid-calves.

The sight knocks all the air out of his lungs.

Then his eyes settle on her face and he notices the furrow between her brows.

“Why are you setting the bedroll outside?” Zelda asks.

Link gulps. “I’m here to keep guard.”

Funnily enough, even he can hear the slight question mark that follows that sentence.

Zelda actually appears surprised by his reply. “From what? Hot-footed frogs?”

“There were bears here before,” he feigns obliviousness. “When I found this place the first time around.”

“Which I’m sure you’ve dealt with since I don’t see or hear them anywhere,” she says. There’s something fond in those emeralds of hers, like she understands exactly the predicament he’s found himself in because she’s in the thick of it, too—in the knowing and not-knowing, wanting to end it in the most perfect way possible—softly, gently.

“I’d like to keep watch with you, too, then.” A shy smile forms on her lips. “If you need the additional set of eyes, that is.”

Link knows she isn’t talking about bears anymore, knows that she knows he doesn’t need the additional set of eyes, because protecting her comes as natural as the blinking of his eyes, as inherent as his fingers around the indigo hilt of the Sword.

He doesn’t need the extra guard; he just needs her.

“Of course,” Link replies.

>> Continue reading on AO3

#now off i go to lose my mind working on my longfic #my fic #zelink #botw zelink #zelink fic #zelink fanfiction #botw fic #botw

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