#the legend of zelda: shackle and chain | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

justpoliteconversations · 9 months ago

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Midnight Impulses [Chain + Healer!Reader]

Keeping your abilities hidden is difficult when the object of your attention is so close.

It keeps growing. Will the trash heap never end?

Masterlist

TW: None.

Disclaimer: Don't own The Legend of Zelda franchise. Linked Universe is the fan creation of jojo56830.

---

You stare up at the night sky with a pinched expression, something ominously similar to a pout pulling at your lips. The blankets are pulled up to your nose, and above the soft rim your eyes glare squinty-eyed at the man laying beside you.

In the light of the pit fire, you can see the way his shoulders and back are tense with pain and fitful sleep. The shine of his hair taunts you where it highlights the delicate curve of his ear, the soft pink of a bang an elegant curve contrasting the harsh shadows of the fire light.

His bare skin. If only you could touch his skin without waking him, even just the tips of your fingers. But he's always been cagey, especially when he's in so much pain. He'd snap awake before you could even pull your hand from your covers, and then he'd be awake and suspicious all night. Just like every night before.

Your fingers grip into the inside of your bedroll, jaw clenching, resisting the temptation to rush him while he's vulnerable and force your healing magic into his aching joints and creaking, burning bones.

It wouldn't take long. If you could get your whole hand onto his face or maybe an arm, the deed could be done in less than a minute. He'd struggle, yes, but his gauntlets are off and you could keep him pinned for a few precious seconds after he manages to escape the confines of his covers.

Just one minute of struggle, and it'll be done. Sure, he'll hate you more than ever and will most certainly never trust you again. But his arthritis and damaged body (so damaged, laden with so many old, untreated wounds it makes your heart ache) will be gone.

He'll be free of them all. The pain, the weakness, the insecurities and the memories. He'll finally be able to put all those hurts behind him and just live, free of the burdens his path forced upon him. Free to look forward to a future not overshadowed by the slow, inevitable breaking of his body.

Free of a future that sees him stripped of mobility and restful night by the time he's 30. If he even lives that long, damaged as he's been by the cruel hand of destiny.

It would be worth it. Just one moment of struggle. One final twist and ache of his bones as he fights against your hands and arms and full body grip, and then he'll be released from the bondage of everlasting degeneration. The agony of a body sacrified for the greater good.

Just one-

No. The thought is irrational and unfair to the man in question. It would also reveal your hand to the Chain, and you had no intention of putting yourself in that situation.

You'd learned your lesson. Even the kindest and most honorable of men can be brought low by the promise of life. The guarantee of no more brothers lost to the slow hand of time, and the knowledge that tomorrow will find you and all you love there to greet it.

Life is so precious. Who wouldn't be tempted to keep it forever by your side.

You envied Hyrule. For his strength and his cunning. For no shackles shall ever find his wrists, no tether will ever bind his arms and legs. No force on this plain of existence will ever break his spirit.

You are nothing like him. Not a hero. Not a fairy borne. Not a beloved brother of the many powerful men who came before him.

You are just yourself. Someone who got unlucky with their blessings.

You envied him, for your healing is nothing like his. It is slow and bone deep, poorly suited to the riggers of field wounds but inevitable in its power nonetheless.

In this world of fairies and potions and the blessing of Goddesses, the hand of death will not come in the blaze of battle. No. It will creep slow and steady into the very marrow of your bones. It will start with aches so deep no fairy light can reach them, with a cough so thin no potion can grasp it.

For many, death will not be by the sword, but by the bone deep memory of what it left behind.

If you could still the hand of fate, wouldn't you? Wouldn't they, whom fate has chosen so readily? Even if it cost just a sliver of thier humanity?

You never intended to find out if these men had it in them to pay that price. No need to tempt fate. Not with men like these, who live and die by such sacrifices.

The ear twitches in his sleep and so do your fingers, the shine of his ruffled hair like a siren's call to your eyes.

You suck in a sharp breath. The temptation flaring once more within you, pushing you forward like strong wind at your back. Calling you like the promise of cool water under the desert sun. Like the shelter of home as a thundering storm shakes the land.

It twitches again. The shine of hair.

'Fuck.'

---

"He's messing with them again." Twilight grumbled, arms crossed as he levels his most unimpressed stare at the Vet's back.

Time chuckled, stretching along the log at his back and savoring the smooth roll of muscles and bones unhindered by pain or aches. He couldn't wait to bring you home to Malon and let you work your magic. His beloved wife had even planned out their sleeping arrangements to encourage your helpful nature.

"If Legend wants to drag this out, let him be. He's the only one suffering from it." He smiled then, more of a grin than anything. "And it's cute." The older man admitted impishly, leaning fully back against the log he'd been stretching over in a boneless sprawl.

Twilight wanted to say something back, but honestly couldn't deny any of it. Especially not when Legend rolled over and let his hand fall just inches from your bedroll. And your eyes widened and then narrowed, your mouth twisting into an obvious pout. How you whipped your back to him with a growl, hiding your face in the covers. Only to peek over your shoulder moments later to glare at the motionless hand with a single, leering eye.

Not when Warriors was hiding his face in Wind's sea-salt hair, trying to cover his amused grin and single cracked eye. Not with Wind's shoulders shaking with mirth, just barely hidden beneath Warrior's greater size.

Not with Hyrule smothering his laughter with both hands, back turned purposely to you so you wouldn't see. Not with Sky out like a light, breathing free and soft and unrestrained for the first time since they'd been forced onto this quest.

And not when Time looks so relaxed, spine arched freely like a man who'd not known the burden of the world pressing down on his shoulders. The effortless roll of his muscles a stark contrast to the painful twists of naught a week before.

"Fine." He eventually conceded, narrowing his eyes. "But if this keeps up for more than a week, game's over. They've not slept well in the last 3 days."

Time nodded, eye closing as he began to drift into a light, mediative doze. "Of course. We wouldn't want our shyest member to lose too much sleep over our brother's aches, now would we."

The heavily ringed finger twitched when you rolled back over to face Legend's back and began hesitantly reaching for it. You squawked at the unexpected movement and jerked back, hands flying to your mouth when you realized what you'd done.

Legend opened his eyes then, feigning sleepiness as he snapped. "What are you looking at, hah?"

You glared back. "Nothing!" Before turning your back to him once more and crossing your arms with an even deeper pout. Hunkering down in your covers.

Vet huffed, though an amused grin stole across his face the moment you looked away. "Weirdo." He snapped in a falsly waspish tone, his grin growing when you growled lowly under you breath.

Twilight looked at Time again. Frowning.

"Tomorrow. I'll talk to him." Time hummed in assurance, though he didn't bother to open his eye.

Twilight sighed again, and Time chuckled.

Near the fire, the shifting of covers, the reveal of a bare neck and another quiet gasp. The smothered giggles of Hyrule laying closest to them. The whisper of Warrior's trying to keep Wind from blowing their cover. Four returning from his watch, multi-colored eyes already rolling skyward with exasperation at the now very familiar sight.

'Yeah.' Twilight thought. 'You and me both.'

---

Return to the shadows.

#linked universe x reader #linked universe

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catreginae · 4 months ago

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This Ring is a Shield

As far as the others knew, Warriors' ring was just something he wore to make sure other people didn't flirt with him to much. What they don't know is that Warriors technically married and that the platonic nature of his marriage actually works great for both him and his wife. It should have been easy to explain the nature of his marriage but in truth, he's just tired. He's tired of the comments, tired of the advice he didn't asked for, and tired of the pity. AKA the "Warriors and his wife are both aroace but Warriors takes his sweet time telling the chain" fic. I wrote a one-shot! A long one but it's a one shot and I finished it just in time for the aro and ace prompts for the @queering-the-chain event. You can also find this fic on AO3!

When Warriors saw the collection of buildings ahead of them signifying civilization, he pulled his ring out of one of his many pouches and slipped it onto his ring finger. The ring was slightly too big when he didn’t have his gloves on but seeing as he only really wore it in uniform, he didn’t have any reason to complain about it. Getting it sized down a notch wouldn’t be difficult but the thought only ever crossed his mind when he happened to be somewhere he couldn’t get it done.

“Why do you only put the ring on when we’re around other people?” Wind asked as he sped up to keep up with Warriors.

“Because he wants people to think he’s married,” Legend answered with a shrug. “It lets people know that they don’t have a chance with him. It helps when you’re in an era that isn’t your own and you don’t want to complicate whatever this is even further. The timeline is fragile enough without becoming your own great-grandfather or something stupid like that.”

Warriors hummed, wondering if it was wise to correct Legend. The veteran was definitely correct about one thing – he didn’t want people to be interested in him. However, he was technically married. He didn’t blame the others for thinking he was single, seeing as he called Time’s wedding ring a shackle and he didn’t treat his own ring as a symbol of love and devotion. Warriors didn’t think that the others would give him a hard time if he told him that he was married and why but in his experience, trying to explain his feelings on romance and intimacy was an exercise in frustration.

“You’re on the right track,” he said after a moment of hesitation. He didn’t have to explain it all now. Warriors could just give them something to think about and leave it at that.

“Right track?” Legend huffed. “Where am I wrong?”

Warriors chuckled and ruffled Legend’s hair, dislodging his hat from where he usually kept it on his head. Legend responded with a growl as he swatted the captain’s hands away and readjusted his hat.

Thankfully, they went the rest of the day without anybody asking about the ring on his finger.

“Thanks for coming, Link,” Zelda greeted as Link dropped the salute and she motioned for him to sit in the chair across from hers. “I have a big favour to ask of you and you’re going to hate it.”

Link didn’t say anything, electing to let Zelda continue speaking.

“I’ve been negotiating with the Arlet family for more support in the court,” she started. Link nodded along. From what he knew of the court, a lot of the nobles were giving her some trouble regarding how she was getting and allocating funds for the ongoing reconstruction effort, which was further behind than Zelda wanted. Getting the support of any of the noble families for this issue, and any future concerns, would be a massive relief for her. The less people she had to argue with, the better. “They are willing to support me and fund some of the reconstruction themselves... in exchange for your hand in marriage with one of their daughters.”

He gulped. Oh, she was definitely right when she said he was going to hate it. Zelda knew he wasn’t interested in marriage but he supposed that when he pledged allegiance to Zelda and Hyrule, that was out of his hands. She said it would be a favour but Link knew there wasn’t actually a choice in the matter. After all, she didn’t actually ask him.

“Do I at least get to meet her?”

“That can be arranged. Link... look, I know you don’t want to be married but...”

“It’s politics. I know.”

“Gah! Where is it?” No matter how many times Warriors looked through all of his bags and pouches, he couldn’t find his ring. It wouldn’t be missed or hard to replace thanks to the fact that he married into nobility but he didn’t want to have to admit to his in-laws that ever lost it in the first place. His wife wouldn’t care because she wasn’t all attached to the rings whatsoever and she only wore hers when she had to leave the villa. He couldn’t afford to be an embarrassment to Athena though.

Maybe it was on the ground? He swore he had it before they set up camp, so it couldn’t have gone too far away.

“What are you looking for?” Four asked. Warriors was so engrossed in his search that he jumped slightly when he heard Four.

“My ring. I can’t find it in any of my bags.”

Without question, Four got down on his hands and knees and started patting the ground for it. As far as the rest of them knew, it was a cheap ring he used to prevent people from flirting with him too much, but it was kind of Four to help him find it regardless of what he might have thought it was.

“Oh, here it is!” Four announced as he held up the ring. “Huh, this is good quality gold and I think I see engraving... Are you sure that this is just-”

“Thanks for finding it!” Warriors said as he plucked the ring out of Four’s fingers and put it back in his satchel where it usually stayed when he wasn’t wearing it on his finger. He really ought to find a better place for it. Maybe he should use it for its intended purpose more often and just wear it on his finger, even if he didn’t care for the symbolism behind it.

“Maybe you should have a small pocket for it in your satchel. Maybe with some sort of button. It would suck if you lost it in another era.”

“That’s not a bad idea...” It wouldn’t be hard to make a pocket inside of this satchel. He just needed some more material for it. Why didn’t he think of that before?

Link sat in one of Zelda’s meeting rooms with his heart drumming in the pit of stomach. He was sitting at a small, rounded table with a pot of tea and some biscuits in the middle. He already poured himself a cup and ate one of the biscuits in an effort to calm his nerves a bit. It didn’t help. He found himself wishing he was outside fighting something big – at least he was confident in his swordsmanship.

Suddenly, there was a knock on the door and Link shifted so that his back was straight. A guard in full uniform opened the door and walked in, followed by a tall yet slim woman with chestnut coloured hair pinned into a bun. Her dress was plain, yet well-made from what Link could see, and the green and brown colour scheme matched her green eyes. When she approached the table, Link realized she would be taller than he was if he stood up. She took the seat opposite of his.

“I take it you’re Captain Link?”

“Yes. Just Link is fine.”

“You can call me Vivienne,” she said as she held her hand out. “Nice to meet you.”

Link took it. “Likewise...” he said as the guard walked out. Once the door was closed, Link let her hand go. “Before we start talking, I just wanted to say that I’m not actually... interested in couple things. I don’t really like romance and I never had the desire for intimacy and no offense, but I don’t think that will change any time soon. If I had a choice, I would probably never get married or hook up with anybody.”

He was the man who stared death in the face several times in his life so far but telling a stranger who was going to be his wife how he actually felt about being married was one of the most nerve-wracking things he had ever done. He was less nervous when the fate of Hyrule was resting on his shoulders.

“I just didn’t want you to get your hopes up...” he added slowly when she didn’t respond at first.

“Link, it’s... it’s fine. In fact... I was trying to figure out how I would say the same thing to you. I’m glad you said it first,” she said with an awkward chuckle but she also had an easy smile that actually made Link relax a little.

“So... we want the same thing. Am I hearing that right?”

“Yes. It seems as though we make a good match, though not for the typical reasons noble families arrange marriages for their children. We can make this work, I’m sure. After all, I doubt either one of us would get this opportunity to marry like minded people again.” She relaxed her shoulders as reached for one of the biscuits. That was when it finally sunk in for Link – he had nothing to fear. Zelda wouldn’t know it but her favour was actually a blessing.

“No kidding. Just to think I was so scared,” he said with a deep sigh, putting a hand on his chest. “If nothing else, I know how to put on a show.”

Spending time at the ranch was sometimes a bit of an odd affair for Warriors. It wasn’t that he hated doing hard work that often involved him getting dirty somehow, as much as the others like to make assumptions about his current life that happened to be close to the city. He didn’t mind any of the work Time gave them just to keep them busy and tire them out because collectively, they needed to burn some energy. None of them were really good at just sitting still.

He just felt awkward around Malon and Time sometimes. It wasn’t anything they did together or even separately – he loved them both. He was happy for both of them because they truly seemed to fit well together. Time deserved to be happy after everything he went through.

The problem was that he couldn’t get his brain to shut up. Sometimes, it was hard to watch Time and Malon enjoy their marriage without all the ‘life advice’ and the persistent questioning about his nonexistent dating life racing through his head and weighing him down. He could imagine all of those people pointing at Time and Malon, setting them up as the prime example of everything he was supposedly missing out on.

Aren’t you lonely without a partner? You just have to find the right person, then you’ll fall in love. You’ll settle down later in life, you’re just busy right now. Won’t you regret it if you don’t have any kids?

Those weren’t even the worst. The worst was the pity, the way they looked like they were sorry for him.

Like he was broken.

“Warriors?”

“Hm?” It took him a second to realize that somebody was trying to talk to him. It also took him a second to realize that his wrist was sore from holding his head up as he lounged against the horse fence. How long did he zone out for? His brain, his current worst enemy, helpfully reminded him that getting distracted like that in the battlefield would have gotten him or somebody else killed. Thanks, brain, he really needed that.

“Wow, you really are distracted,” Legend mumbled. “What’s going on? You look upset.”

Legend was good at teasing and poking fun but he was also good at knowing when it wasn’t welcomed. He must have zoned out for longer than he thought if Legend was frowning at him like that.

“It’s nothing.”

“Nothing? You’re all tense. I know the ranch will never be completely safe but you can relax a little bit.”

“I... yeah.” Legend was right, though not for the reason he might have thought. He shouldn’t let a bunch of people he could barely remember ruin his time at the ranch. How often do people get to travel through time and visit their now giant little brother’s home? Time and Malon did absolutely nothing but be welcoming and kind to him. It wasn’t them who tried to give him advice he never asked for. “I think I’ll just head inside.”

He heard Legend huff as pushed himself off the fence and walked inside the house.

Link woke up with the sun as he always did but it still took him a moment to remember just where he was waking up. He wasn’t used to the soft bed sheets, he wasn’t used to sleeping with more pillows than anybody actually needed to sleep, and he wasn’t used to being vaguely aware of another body in the same bed he was in. Luckily, his bed and sheets were so large that he had yet to really feel Vivienne moving around, but that didn’t stop him from being aware that she was there.

This morning though, she wasn’t there and if his head didn’t pound so much, he would have gotten up to go look for her. He always woke up before she did.

No, he should get up anyway. He had to go to the training grounds. The army had a lot of new recruits and he was one of the captains responsible for training the recruits who started to show some promise with a sword or at least seemed interested in learning how to use one. He sat up and a wave of dizziness struck him, forcing him to settle his head into his hands with his elbows digging into his thighs. His head was still pounding. His stomach felt like it was going to betray him.

Suddenly, the door opened. Link didn’t lift his head up to see who it was but only Vivienne would be around at the moment. The only other person who spent a lot of time in the villa, a women they hired named Clarissa who helped them maintain the villa, didn’t come in until much later in the morning. Usually, Link only saw her when he returned home and she was just getting ready to leave.

“Go back to sleep, Link,” Vivienne said as she guided him back down to the mattress. “I’ve already pulled a couple of strings to make sure that anybody who was expecting you knows you’re not available for the foreseeable future. You have quite the fever there.”

Oh, yeah, that would explain things.

However, it was also putting it mildly.

He was barely able to keep anything down except for some plain toast and water and even then, sometimes the toast was too much. His head never stopped aching or spinning so he had a hard time falling asleep and staying asleep. Vivienne was concerned enough to call for a doctor, who was constantly trying new medicine or new dosages. Sometimes he could keep the medicine down, sometimes he couldn’t. The doctor came daily to check for any signs for change for better or for worse. He supposed that was a perk to being married into a noble family – they had the extra rupees to pay for a doctor’s full attention.

No matter how bad it got though, Vivienne and Proxi, who dropped into their home at some point and declared that she was staying until he felt better, were always around for him. Proxi helped with encouraging words or translating his mumbled speech to Vivienne or the doctor. Vivienne was always there to help him feel more comfortable, like washing his face and back, changing the sheets, or holding his hair back when something upset his stomach too much. Sometimes, she even rubbed small circles into his back until he drifted off to sleep for as long as his body would allow.

All in all, it took nearly three weeks before Link was well enough to return to the barracks. They weren’t married for that long and once he was well, Link found himself a little embarrassed that one of her first impressions of him was him being violently ill.

Vivienne simply smiled when he said as much. “Link, we might be stuck together but I consider you to be a friend nonetheless and when one of my friends is suffering, I try my best to make it better. I’m glad you’re alright now and I’m glad I didn’t catch whatever that was.”

“You should be. It was awful.”

“I didn’t know you liked cats,” Twilight said with a grin as squatted down to scratch one of them behind the ears while Warriors was busy petting one down the length of its back. It was a creamy-white colour with long, fluffy fur that seemed pretty well taken care of if it was truly a stray. All the cats he saw had soft and shiny coats, seemed to be of a healthy weight, and he didn’t see any signs of illness. Maybe somebody did take care of them all. There were a few people in his own Castletown who took it upon themselves to make sure the strays were doing well.

He felt like he ought to be doing more, since they were in a large city and not every era had a big city to explore. Twilight’s Castletown felt much like his own, busy and bursting with life, including the very many cats he found in one of the residential side streets. However, he was busy petting cats and he didn’t think the cats weren’t going to let him go anytime soon even if he did want to leave. The cats were the perfect distraction for his very busy mind and they seemed to sense that he needed a distraction because they surrounded him in an instant. He was petting one or two at a time but the rest were doing their own thing, simply content to bless him with their presence. How could he possibly leave them to go do errands?

“Oh, I love them! I have one of my own, actually.”

Warriors always did enjoy cats but his parents never allowed one in their home, since it was attached to their store and well, his parents didn’t want fur all over the clothes they were trying to sell. He didn’t like it but his parents had a point. It wasn’t until he moved in with Vivienne that a pet was feasible – they had the room and she spent most of her time indoors, so Penelope was never alone for too long.

“Really? You have a pet? Aren’t you busy being a big shot in the army?” Twilight asked with the grin that always accompanied his playful jabs to Warriors’ career choice.

“Well, I don’t live alone. I have a roommate who takes care of her when I’m not around. That’s why we picked her out together from a neighbour’s litter. She looks kind of like this one,” Warriors said, gesturing to the cat he was petting, “but she’s all white and her name is Penelope.”

“Penelope!” Twilight was practically squealing. “Fucking adorable.”

Thankfully, Twilight didn’t ask about his roommate. He didn’t feel like explaining that his roommate was actually his wife and Penelope was regarded as their child and she was even introduced to his in-laws as such. Link inquired about putting Penelope in their will to inherit their estate should they both die suddenly and tragically young but her parents only begrudgingly called Penelope ‘the furry grandchild’, so they wouldn’t find it as funny as they did. Unless they adopted a Hylian child or brought more cats into the house, Penelope was the only ‘grandchild’ her parents were getting from them. Maybe they won’t care – Vivienne wasn’t their only child to get grandchildren from and she wasn’t inheriting the main estate anyway.

“I hope you know that if we’re ever in your neck of the woods, we’re going to see her. You’re not allowed to hide a cat from me.”

Warriors found himself laughing. “Twilight, I know better than to get between you and an animal.”

Link was grateful that his in-laws didn’t try to parade them around or throw extravagant parties on their behalf that often. Their wedding was mostly just friends and family from both sides and it took place in the Arlet estate garden, so it was out of the view of the public. Vivienne said something about how they were glad she got married at all, so maybe they were afraid to rock the boat too much. Maybe that’s why they didn’t argue when Penelope was introduced as their child.

For their first anniversary, her parents decided once again to forgo something fancy and just gifted the two a bunch of wine that they definitely drank too much of that night because he couldn’t really remember what they did besides drink a lot. He did remember waking up on the bedroom floor with Penelope sleeping on his back. Her parents didn’t leave Penelope out of the celebration either, giving her a bed that she went on to use a lot.

But Link knew that one day, his in-laws would drag him to some sort of function where they would show him off. He was the hero and a noble now.

He couldn’t say he was surprised when his father-in-law showed up at his door unannounced, thankfully when he was actually home, and told him and Vivienne that he was hosting a party and he expected the two of them to be there. Luckily, he already had clothes for the occasion that Vivienne said were nice enough – a gift from his tailoring family when he got married – and he went to fancy dinner parties before as a bodyguard, so at least he wasn’t going in blind.

“Vivienne and Link!” They spent maybe all of five seconds at her father’s before he found them near the entrance. Link wouldn’t have been surprised if he was waiting for them. His father-in-law gestured towards the rest of his estate with a grin on his face. “Link, let me show you around. This is your first time inside the main estate, yes?”

Link looked back at Vivienne. She simply shook her head. They were stuck following his father-in-law around his estate. Link couldn’t tell if it was because he was proud of his estate and actually liked showing it off to people or if it was some clever way to show off Link himself to the guests that were already there. He was certainly recognized as the hero even though his scarf was missing. At least he was used to getting looks from strangers all the time.

But it was made tolerable with Vivienne being close by, offering some sort of comment about what trouble she got into as a kid when her father introduced them to a new wing of the estate. Apparently, she was quite the fan of climbing when she was a child and he could see it in her father’s face that he wasn’t sure if he should have been amused or exasperated by the memories. When her father let them go to hang out and eat in the dining room, the two of them stuck together in a lonely corner of the room, watching and making quiet comments about the other guests. Vivienne knew most of them and had some juicy details to share.

If Link had to summarize the party, he would call it two friends suffering together. He had a decent time but it wasn’t because of anything that was offered at the party – it was spending time with a friend and engaging in gossip.

It made him think of all the people he could have been stuck with, all the people who would want more than he was comfortable with offering or just couldn’t offer at all. He couldn’t reciprocate romantic feelings as he didn’t feel them and the thought of being intimate made him deeply uncomfortable.

But being friends and sharing a space with Vivienne was easy. They were two friends who had to pretend to be more sometimes, but the important part was that they both knew that it was a game.

Warriors frequented taverns and pubs, not just to have a drink or two with those he was close to but because drunk people were a fountain of information. It was less helpful in his own era since people knew who he was and were more guarded around him, but in other eras where people had no idea who he was? They saw no reason to filter their words and they told him all sorts of things. Sometimes it was useful but sometimes he just got sucked into whatever gossip there was and he didn’t learn anything that would help them.

Today, he was at a pub with Sky and Twilight. He didn’t drink with them often, just once or twice in Time’s era when Time dragged them to Castletown. Time was his usual drinking buddy but he seemed pretty tired so he declined his invitation. It was times like those where he truly lived up to his ‘old man’ nickname.

Alcohol didn’t change Twilight that much. His accent was definitely coming out more and he was a bit louder but otherwise, Twilight was acting mostly the same. Sky was quieter after a couple of drinks, like he was contemplating matters of existence. The chosen hero wasn’t the chattiest to begin with but after a few drinks, he didn’t start conversations anymore. He needed to be roped into it.

They were only a few drinks in when a woman slid into the seat beside him with a wide grin on her face. Great, he knew exactly where this was going. Before she could say anything, Warriors held up his hand with his ring on it. “Before you say anything, just know that I’m already taken.”

“Oh, are they here right now?” she asked, her eyes scanning the crowd before her gaze settled on him again. “What they don’t know won’t hurt them.”

“I’m not a cheater,” Warriors snapped back. “I’m happy with my wife.”

“Is she happy with you? You’ve got the look of a military man. When’s the last time you’ve gone home to see her? Are you sure she’s been as loyal to you as you are to her?”

Warriors wasn’t sure what her goal was. He never had anyone who wanted to sleep with him insult him and his wife in the span of a minute. Was she mad that he rejected her?

“You don’t know anything. If you’re trying to get me into bed with you, you’re failing miserably,” he said as he stood up. Sky and Twilight caught him and he spotted Twilight fishing out his wallet as Warriors found the shortest route to the exit. He didn’t look back as he headed to the one familiar spot in town and stepped into the room he was sharing with Four and Hyrule. He must have looked a mess because the two took one look at him and stayed away from him for the rest of the night. Just as well, he didn’t feel like talking.

He knew he couldn’t avoid it though. He wasn’t surprised that Sky found him in the morning as Warriors chugged down some water, hoping that the minor ache in his head would disappear if he had more water. At least, Warriors hoped that the minor headache came from alcohol and not because that woman at the bar made him so angry that he had a hard time falling asleep and staying asleep.

Though, if he was honest with himself, it wasn’t just the encounter at the bar. His mind raced constantly, dredging up experiences and memories that he wanted to bury and never look at again. Ever since he was asked about his ring, he couldn’t stop thinking about all of the unhelpful and unwarranted advice he got when he was single or all the pity he got when people thought he was stuck in a sad, loveless marriage. Warriors just couldn’t stop thinking about it even when he wanted to or needed to focus on something else.

He hoped they weren’t travelling. He was pretty sure he wasn’t fit for it.

“Why did you storm out of the bar last night? Was it the woman?”

“Of course it was the woman!”

Sky smiled awkwardly and rubbed at the back of his neck. Shit, he shouldn’t have answered his question like that. He wasn’t mad at Sky.

“What did she say that set you off? Twilight and I didn’t really hear it.”

“She wanted me to cheat on my wife and when I rejected her, she start insinuating that my wife was cheating on me and before you ask, I actually do have a wife.”

“Oh, that’s what you meant when you said Legend was on the right track,” he mumbled as he titled his head slightly. “You are actually married, huh?”

“It’s a political marriage. Athena needed extra support from a noble and she got it when I married the noble’s daughter. Through marriage with the hero, that family is now closer than ever to the royal family and in return, Athena has more weight to throw against other nobles.”

“So you didn’t marry for love?” Sky asked with a slight pout on his lips that often came with confusion. Warriors could feel his frustration bubble under his skin but he took a deep breath. It wasn’t Sky’s fault that Warriors had this conversation before with a bunch of other people who didn’t understand that not everybody wants to date or be in a marriage or be intimate.

“I’m actually happy this way. I don’t care if it’s a ‘loveless’ marriage. We both knew what we were getting into before the documents were drawn up and before we were actually married. I made it clear to her the first time we met that I wasn’t interested in sex or romance. It turns out she feels the same way. We’re just roommates who occasionally have to pretend that we are more than just roommates. We share a home, we share a bed that’s so big we barely know there’s somebody else in it, and we share custody of a cat named Penelope. I’m not interested in anything more than that.”

Sky hummed for a moment, then smiled. “Well, if that’s what you want, then that arrangement sounds perfect for both of you. As long as you’re both happy, nobody should get a say about what the two of you do or don’t do together.”

For a moment, Warriors was taken aback. In his experience, it generally took a lot more convincing before somebody backed off and switched topics. He didn’t know why it was so hard to convince people that was actually happy.

“Why didn’t you say this before, though? Everybody would have understood.”

“Because it’s tiring... before I got married, everyone and their grandma would tell me that I just had to meet the right person, then I would want to date and get married and have kids. If I met the right person, I would be ‘normal’. Now that they know this marriage is political more than anything else... they fucking pity me. They think the fact that I didn’t marry for love is something to pity. Some people even tell me I’ll learn to fall in love with my wife. They just can’t fathom that somebody just... doesn’t care about any of that. It’s so tiring. I’m tired of trying to explain it and people looking at me like I’m broken or something. No matter how many times I tell them I’m happy, they just don’t believe me.”

Sky frowned. “Has... this been on your mind for a while? We all noticed that you seemed distracted lately.”

He only nodded. The thoughts probably would have started bothering him at some point, even if nobody asked about his ring. They seem to come and go, more often when he was in town and people tried to talk to him. However, the current cyclical nature of his thoughts was because he was asked about his ring and he had to think about how to answer.

“Do you ever plan on telling the others that you’re married?”

“If we end up nearby, yes.” He did tell Twilight he could meet Penelope and even if he didn’t, the villa would be a nice break for them and their wallets. They were always maintaining guest rooms that didn’t get used so it would be nice if the villa was full of people for once. It was far too large for a family of three and their hired help. “For now, I just need to collect my thoughts.”

Though... it helped that Sky took it so well. Maybe he wouldn’t have to explain it to them more than once. They would probably believe him if he said he was actually happy with his arrangement.

“Okay. Just let me know if you need any help.”

“I will. Thanks, Sky.”

Warriors thought there would be more time between his conversation with Sky and the conversation he knew he needed to have with the others before they set up in the villa for a few days. It was only a couple of weeks after he talked to Sky that a portal took them to a battle and it was when he was wiping the black blood off his blade that he realized that he recognized the castle in the distance. His villa was only about a half an hour from the castle.

“To the castle?” Twilight asked.

“Actually, there’s a place we should go first. Athena can wait until tomorrow.”

“Oh, so this is your era,” Legend said with a nod. “What’s this stop you plan on taking?”

“My place. It’s big enough to fit all of us comfortably.”

Wind raised an eyebrow. “How big is your place?”

“It’s...” Was this how he was going to start explaining who Vivienne was? By explaining why he can comfortably host them all? His gaze met with Sky’s, who gave him an encouraging nod. “It’s a villa. I moved in when I got married.”

There was a moment of awkward silence before Legend glared him. “Is that what you meant when you said I was on the right track? You could have just said so! It was bugging me ever since you said it.”

Warriors rolled his eyes. “I didn’t feel like explaining it back then. Even now, it’s a little difficult...” He took a deep breath. “I got married because Athena asked me to. I didn’t pick my wife but it’s pretty convenient for both of us because we are both just happy being friends. If I had to get married to somebody else, I wouldn’t be able to return any romantic feelings and being intimate would be out of the question. We have to put on a show sometimes but that’s a small price to pay to able to say I’m married and not have to do anything I’m uncomfortable with.”

He had no doubt that there were questions but the others simply nodded, except for Sky who offered two thumbs up instead. Maybe they were just saving questions for later but he wasn’t going to complain about the break. They probably cared more about having a roof over their heads than about his odd but convenient marriage.

Wind hummed for a moment before putting a hand on his chin. “So your wife won’t mind if we stay at your place then?”

“I doubt she would care. In fact, she might even be happy that we’re using the guest rooms as guest rooms for once.”

“What are they being used for now?” Time asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Decoration.”

“Wait, this means we get to meet Penelope!”

“Who?”

“His cat!” Twilight answered with a wide grin. “C’mon, butts in gear! We have a cat to meet!”

There were some grumbles but the group started moving, following Warriors as he led them to the villa. It was nearly sunset by the time they got there so he wasted no time in opening the front gate and letting everybody in. He stopped them as soon as they got into the front doors and he couldn’t immediately see her nearby. He didn’t think she would get upset about the villa being used as an inn for a few days, he wanted to give her a little bit of warning.

He found Penelope first in one of their many hallways so he scooped her up and kept looking for Vivienne until he found her in her plant room, which was the room in the villa with the most windows. She was bent over one of the pots trimming the plant inside of it. He cleared his throat to let Vivienne know he was coming in so she didn’t startle and drop the trimmers.

“Oh, you’re home.” She straightened her back and turned around to face him.

“For a bit. If there’s another lead, I’ll have to go again. I have company though!”

“Oh, those heroes you mentioned in the single letter I got?” she asked with a smirk. Warriors winced internally – they were still friends and he should really let her know more often that he was still alive and her father didn’t have to find a new husband for her. “I’m not upset, by the way. I can only imagine that time travel complicates things, to say the least.”

“Yeah. I got busy. I didn’t realize I only sent one letter,” he mumbled as he ran a hand through Penelope’s fur. “But they’re in the lobby if you want to meet them. I told them they could stay here for a few days since we have the room.”

“It would be a shame not to use it. It might be the only time we’ll fill all four guest rooms at the same time. Let’s go show them their rooms, then. My parents didn’t raise me to be a bad host.”

Warriors’ heart pounded in his chest was they walked back to the lobby. He couldn’t understand why he was so nervous. The others would be nice to Vivienne and they knew she was his wife, so there wasn’t anything to hide. Vivienne was generally pretty nice and she got along with the people he was close with before. It should go well but his nerves were still getting the best of him.

Finally, he saw the other heroes, who were all studying Vivienne.

“Wow, she’s tall!” Wind gasped. Vivienne was a bit taller than Time, as it turned out and she wasn’t even wearing shoes. Her entire family was tall – taller than he was – so he wasn’t exactly surprised that she beat them all.

“We’re just kind of short,” Time chimed in, shaking his head.

“This is Vivienne,” Warriors started, gesturing with his free arm, “and this our daughter, Penelope. Vivenne, you already know their names but they’ll introduce themselves with their nicknames sooner or later.”

“Can I hold Penelope?” Twilight asked, arms outstretched.

“Just keep her belly down, she hates being on her back,” he warned as she gently passed her over.

It was a good thing that Penelope enjoyed a lot of attention. Once she was settled in Twilight’s arms, it wasn’t just Twilight who was petting her – half the group was reaching around and crowding Twilight to get a chance to pet her. Warriors could hear her purring over the excited cooing coming from the boys.

“I hope she doesn’t expect that much attention from now on,” Vivienne mumbled before she turned to the others. “I know Penelope is amazing but I should show you to your rooms. Penelope doesn’t leave the house, she’ll be around for more petting later. She may even pick one your rooms to spend the night in later.”

“We’ll be back,” Twilight said quietly as he pet her on the head one more time and set her down on the floor. Warriors watched as everybody followed her, looking around the villa as they did so. Penelope purred and rubbed her head on his leg so he picked her up once again.

“That went well,” he mumbled as he looked down at her giant green eyes. “Especially for you.”

She meowed.

“Yeah, you are spoiled. You deserve it, though.”

Instead of following everybody to the guest rooms, he headed towards the master bedroom to change into something more comfortable. He set Penelope down on their bed – neither he nor Vivienne cared if Penelope got her fur all over it – and slowly stripped off all of his equipment and gear, dropping everything on the floor by his side of the bed to deal with later.

One loose shirt and clean pair of trousers later, he left the master bedroom to find that everybody was gathered at the kitchen table that he and Vivienne usually used for their own dinners. The only person not at the table was Wild, who was poking around in the oven to warm it up. There was a more official dining room in the villa but they only used that one when Vivienne had family over and it had one of those long dining tables that made Warriors wonder if anybody actually wanted to eat together. The table in the kitchen was a little small for the size of the group but they were all used to butting into each other’s space all the time.

Warriors decided to stay on the periphery of the conversations, joining only when their conversations were directed at him. He wanted his brothers and his wife to get along, so he wasn’t going to intrude when it seemed like they were actually bonding. Vivienne was relaxed, talking to the group in the same way she spoke to him or the few times he saw she had a couple of the neighbours over for some tea. It was also the same way she spoke to Clarissa, as the two of them became friends pretty quickly. She spoke more formally with some of her family members than she did with the other heroes.

As for the heroes, they were behaving as he expected – they were asking Vivienne for embarrassing stories about him. Oh, well. If that was the price of peace, he would let it slide. It wasn’t like she had a lot on him in particular.

Once they all had dinner and tea, the group of heroes all headed to their rooms, except for Sky. He helped himself to the last of the tea in pot and started to headed to his assigned room but he made sure that he passed Warriors.

“You did a good job today,” he said quietly, adding a small but sincere smile before leaving.

Once he was gone, Vivienne tapped him on the shoulder. “He’s right, you did a good job. I know it’s not easy to tell people we’re married,” she started before gesturing toward their own bedroom, “but we should go to get some rest too if we’re hosting this many people.”

“They can be a handful,” Warriors mumbled. “I’m sure Penelope is waiting for us anyway. Let’s go.”

#linked universe #linkeduniverse #lu fanfic #my writing #linked universe fanfic #lu warriors #lu sky #lu twilight #lu legend #the rest are there but they don't do much #acephobia #tagging just in case #catreginae: one shots #original character #warriors is in an arranged marriage #warriors is in a marriage of convenience #queered into oblivion

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wouldyoustilllovemeifiwasawyrm · 1 year ago

Text

So Am I

Once a royal knight and guard of the Princess of Hyrule, Link is tasked with tracking her down after a mysterious shadow snatches her away in the night. Legends tell themselves over and over again. But he doesn't remember hearing a version of the story where the valiant hero falls into the dark lord's hands.

Tags: Hurt/Comfort, Non-Graphic Violence, not specific to any game, decided to create my own Link and throw him in the Torment Nexus, by which i mean Ganon takes him prisoner, its fine though he gets out again, Sassy Link (Legend of Zelda), popping into a story just before the climax

To say that this wasn’t part of the plan would be the understatement of the millennia.

Pain still radiated up the side of his skull from that moblin’s strike over an hour ago—at his best guess. The complete lack of natural light prevented a decent estimation of the passage of time. Cold, damp stone surrounded him on all sides but one. Thick iron bars separated him from the snorting, drooling tusks of a monstrous prison guard. The cuts and scrapes that littered his skin had mostly stopped bleeding, though the taste of iron had not left his mouth. A heavy chain clinked as Link gave another tug on the shackles around his wrists. Though they hadn’t taken his sword, almost seeming afraid of it, the blade wouldn’t do him much good if he couldn’t pull it from the scabbard on his back.

Had he known that agreeing to serve in the king’s army would eventually end with him chained up in a dungeon, he might have thought twice about it. Though, thinking back on his service, he knew that was a lie. This was probably going to happen whether he was a knight or not, given his habit of always getting himself in more trouble than he ought. As proud as his father had been the day he bowed before the king at the completion of his training, he doubted very much that his father would be very proud to see him now. If he was even still alive…

He rested his head on the cool stone behind him, pointedly ignoring the furious hissing of the guard every time he moved. He silently dared the little beast to try something. Even shackled, Link could still take on a small bokoblin…He grimaced, his ribs aching acutely as he moved. What a mess he’d gotten himself in. First, his charge went missing, then they got a ransom note from some dickhead calling himself the King of Evil (real original), and now he’s off on a quest to get her back. Somehow.

But instead of finding the princess, he found an ambush! Lucky him. And though plenty of demon blood now stained his tunic, so too did the blood of all of his brothers-in-arms who blindly followed him straight into a trap. Their faces flashed in his memory, their final gurgling cries cut off by the blades and clubs of two dozen demons apiece. While he could have made quick work of such adversaries himself, he let himself be caught off-guard. Princess Zelda’s silhouette tempted him further into the thick fog of the woods. He was so, so sure it was really her. A foolish notion. By the time he heard the first piercing of flesh behind him, it was too late. His friends, his brothers, the men who volunteered to take on this final assault and rescue fell in the mists of those cursed woods. Perhaps one day, the gods would forgive him. He doubted he would ever forgive himself.

Why the demons decided to take him captive rather than slaughter him with the rest of the knights, he still couldn’t figure out. Seemed a little pointless to him, letting him rot in a dungeon rather than killing him in a forest. Surely even the Demon King’s forces had better things to do than guard a prison.

The snorting changed, increasing in pitch. Link opened one eye as loud stomping approached from one of the heavy wooden doors. Not the one that Link was dragged through earlier, he noted. That one must lead deeper into the fortress.

The door slammed open, causing the little bokoblin to shriek in terror. It scurried further down the hall, hiding from whatever it was that now emerged from the doorway. It almost resembled a moblin, though much, much bigger. If it hadn’t been for the sheer terror that seized Link’s heart at the sight of it, he might almost find it comical how the demon had to stoop its massive, boar-shaped head to get through the doorway.

Two tusks curled inward from either side of a boar’s snout. A long, black robe covered most of the demon’s unnaturally blue body. Yellow eyes settled on him, burning with hatred. Leathery hands wrapped around the iron bars of the door between Link and whatever this was. Since it had scared off the only creature with the means to open the door, Link sat up a little straighter. It’d have a hell of a time trying to get to him without a-

KA-THUNK!

…key.

The iron door laid discarded beside the cell, twisted and mangled like thorns ripped from the ground. The demon hunched over, squeezing himself through the new opening until it fit itself inside the cold cell, which heated as steam rolled from the boar’s flaring nostrils.

Link scrambled to his feet, reaching again for his sword, but the shackles wouldn’t budge. The demon’s cloven hooves stomped through shallow puddles as it approached, sneering. “Well, well. What have my friends brought me today?”

The demon’s hand snatched Link’s throat, lifting him up. The shackles dug into his wrists, his joints screaming as they were pulled nearly to the point of breaking.

“Oh, I know you.” The beast snarled, almost laughing in deep, rumbling snorts. Sharp claws dug into Link’s chin, his bruised face turning as the demon examined him. “You’re the king’s attack dog, aren’t you?” The demon barked a laugh as it threw him back onto the stone floor. “No wonder the royal bitch keeps whining for you.”

Though every muscle and bone howled in pain, he forced himself to stand back up and face the demon. “Tell me where she is!”

Another rumbling laugh shook the cell. “You’re in no position to be making demands, pest.” It lowered its head, the stench of death on its breath. “You’ve been a thorn in my side for months.”

Bile rose in Link’s throat, the chains clanking as he fought to retrieve his sword. “I’ll be more than a thorn, demon!” Link spat. “I’ll spill your guts where you stand!”

The corner of the demon’s lip curled into a malicious sneer. “Aren’t you confident?” The demon chuckled darkly. “Shame I need you alive for the sacrifice. I’d much prefer to rip out your beating heart and eat it in front of you now.” A single claw jabbed into Link’s chest, drawing a trickle of blood. Link bit back a cry of pain and disgust as the demon’s fat, forked tongue licked his blood off its claw. “No matter. I’ll have my fun with you eventually.”

The demon’s huge hands grabbed the chains holding Link down. Like vines, the iron chains snapped loose from the wall. “Come along, hero. Can’t have you dying of neglect down here before I can kill you properly myself.”

A fierce tug on the shackles sent Link stumbling forward, the uneven floor rushing up toward his face. Before he crashed against the stone, the demon lifted the shackles high, growling as Link dangled off the ground. “You can either walk, or I’ll carry you like this, and I don’t care if an arm pops out of its socket along the way.”

Setting Link roughly back onto his feet, the hero reluctantly followed the demon out of the cell, the short leash of the chain keeping him nearly running at the demon’s heel to keep up. The bokoblin hissed as Link rounded the corner, reaching out a claw to slash at Link as the larger demon dragged him along. A more ferocious growl shooed the bokoblin back into the shadows before the blow struck.

The corridors twisted, stairs winding upward in a spiral that confused Link’s sense of direction and distance. Up and up and up further still. His feet stumbled over a few steps, the demon yanking Link up several more whenever his pace did not satisfy. Suddenly, the spiral ended. An iron ladder rose toward a trapdoor in the floor above them, through which faint light flowed down, bathing the blue demon in an eerie green hue.

“Delivery for you, Princess!” The demon laughed. Link suddenly felt himself yanked up as the demon climbed the ladder. The closed fist holding Link’s chains slammed into the door, slinging Link like a doll in a child’s careless hand. The trapdoor swung open with a loud CRACK as it slammed into the stone floor on the other side. “Here’s your precious hero!” With one final, merciless swing, the demon tossed him up through the hole and into the room above.

Link crashed face-first onto the floor of a circular room. The trapdoor slammed back again, the echo of metal on metal ringing through this new cell, along with the howling laughter of the demon that retreated back down the stairs.

With a groan, Link pushed himself up from the floor. All his arm muscles ached from his shoulders to his wrists. He didn’t know what a dislocated shoulder felt like, but if he had to hazard a guess…

“Link!” A woman’s voice exclaimed. The hem of a tattered gown, what had once been pink, came into view, along with heavily darned stockings. Firm, lithe hands lifted him gently from the floor, helping him sit up. Familiar forest green eyes swam with worry, scanning over what he was sure was a sorry sight. “Gods, are you alright? Oh, why am I even asking? Of course you aren’t. How long have you been here? What happened? Is my father alive? When did you leave the castle?”

Shackles jingled as Link held up a hand, his head spinning from the ordeal of being beaten, dragged, tossed, and bombarded with questions. If this was part of the Demon King’s interrogation process, some sort of illusion to make him spill his secrets, he wouldn’t fall for it. Though she did look very, very real. And her hands gently cupping his face felt very, very real.

Her green eyes flickered over his shoulder, widening in surprise. “You have it! The sword! How on earth- well, never mind that. That you have it, and now I have you, is enough for the moment. Though, we will need to deal with your injuries first.” Before Link could so much as say a word of explanation, she’d picked up his hand, turned it over, and began to work something into the lock. For several seconds, neither spoke, all of Allegedly-Zelda’s focus locked onto the shackle that bound Link’s left wrist to broken chains. Her nose scrunched like Real Zelda. Her lips moved in silence like Real Zelda. Her ears twitched like Real Zelda. And, perhaps most telling of all, her small gasp of delight and the clap of her hands as the shackle’s lock clicked open, reminded him very much of Real Zelda. But he had to be sure.

As soon as his left hand was free, though scraped, bruised, and blistered from the friction of being chained up and dragged about, Link reached out to her. When he pulled her lips down to meet his, he was convinced. She tasted like Real Zelda.

For a moment, however fleeting, he was back in the palace. He was outside her door, in the darkness of the long corridor, where only the moonlight dared to intrude. She held onto the collar of his uniform like it was her lifeline in a raging sea. Her breath was warm on his ear as she giggled, pressing kisses over his face. ”My father would be furious if he knew.” Link knew it all too well. He doubted the evenings they spent in the garden—a respectable distance away as she plucked roses and he stood guard by the gate—went unnoticed by the king, the captain, or any of the guards. ”Will you still stand by my door even if I marry the prince?” She’d asked him a dozen times, and a dozen times, he swore that he would. Though it boiled his blood to see her with him, to witness that pompous man’s arrogance as he spoke only of his plans for Hyrule’s future, he consoled himself with this: the prince would be frequently away, and Link could warm the princess’s bed in his absence.

But as Zelda pulled away, her auburn hair hovering like a curtain around her face, he could once again taste the blood and ash in his mouth. He’d traversed canyons and mountains, crossed deserts and marshes, delved into labyrinths and dungeons and caves, all for her, all at the orders of her father. He cut a path through the overgrown temple, he pulled the sacred sword from its pedestal, and set his quest in motion, for her sake. To hell with the cowardly prince who fled at the first sign of danger. To hell with the king who rested easy inside palace walls. To hell with all of Hyrule, for what it mattered. He had her, at last. His quest, finally, came to an end.

“I missed you.” He breathed, his lips aching again for her touch.

Yet, rather than the voracious fire that she so often consumed him with, her eyes held only cold focus. She picked up his other hand, working the hair pin into that lock. “We need to get out of here. The Demon King has almost all the components he needs for the ritual.”

He flexed his right hand, freed from the iron. “So, that was the Demon King, huh?” Link scoffed. “He’s not that tough.” A quick look from her chilled his blood. “What ritual?”

Zelda stood, offering her hand to him. “He intends to sacrifice me to extract the Triforce of Wisdom from my soul.”

A wave of frozen terror shuddered down his spine. His knees and arms trembled as he stood, though he would prefer to attribute that to injury than anxiety. He leaned back against a small table, noticing the oddness of the room for the first time. Though this was certainly also another cell in the Demon King’s fortress, this one was not the cold, dark room he had been left to rot in. It was almost a mockery of Zelda’s bedroom. High windows, too high and narrow for them to climb through, let in some daylight into the circular tower. Instead of a plush canopy bed, she had a mat of straw covered with threadbare linen. The pelt of some animal, maybe a bear by the wiriness of it, laid across the surface like a sort of blanket. A single chair of rough wood was tucked under a small table, on which was laid a single spoon. But despite all of this, there was beauty. And a spoon.

Lantern soot ink covered the walls, looping in elegant characters. And, the longer Link stared at the lines and dots, the heavier the art weighed on him. It was music. Some melodies he recognized, though many more appeared to be entirely new compositions. She was in solitude, total solitude, for months, with nothing but her own voice to console her. Though he fought with every fiber in his body to get to her, she had languished here, without communication, without friends, without hope. Locked away in this demon-infested dungeon…how did she endure it?

“Link?” Zelda asked, her hands again steadying him, holding him up as he trembled at the weight of his failure to rescue her. Now, they were both trapped here. He’d doomed them both. He’d meant to save her, to bring her home, and instead, he sentenced them both to a cruel and violent death.

A shaky breath filled his lungs as the dread set in. “He said he was going to eat my heart.” While the threat didn’t scare him before, the true implications of it for Zelda began to dawn on him. It was one thing for someone to threaten to kill him. That happened every other day. But to think that such a fate might have befallen Zelda, might still befall her if he was unsuccessful in his rescue; it was too much to imagine. “Is that…the ritual?”

Though he was sure a lack of sunlight had turned her skin pale, even her freckles hiding away in the shadows, her complexion took on still more pallor. She nodded slowly. “He means to kill us both. If he does so, if he gets the complete Triforce, no one will be able to stop him. He will plunge Hyrule, perhaps all of the world of light, into eternal night.”

It was never his most flattering trait, but it served him decently well thus far. He laughed, almost as manic as he felt at such a revelation. “Oh, is that all? Haha!” Link felt his heart pulse inside his chest, the weakness in his joints making him wobble. “So, we’re trapped up here like prize turkeys until he prepares the feast and slaughters us? Awesome! That’s great! Haha!”

“Link, listen to me.” Zelda pressed her palms against his cheeks, forcing him to focus on her stern expression. “We aren’t going to die. We are going to get out of here. I couldn’t before, but I can now. I have you. And we are going to live. We are going to kill Ganon.” As if to add force to her words, she pressed a kiss to his dirty forehead. “The Goddesses blessed me with the Triforce of Wisdom. The Goddesses bestowed upon you the Triforce of Courage. Though I guessed it when you first joined my father’s service, that sword on your back confirms your divine calling. You must be courageous, Link. We will not survive if you give up before the fight has even begun.”

Her kiss, though brief, sent shocks through his battered body. His eyes fluttered closed, shutting out all but her gentle touch for as long as it lasted. He was tired, so tired, and scared out of his mind.

”Do it scared.” His father’s severe expression refused to budge despite Link’s pleas. He raised his sword toward the other boys at the end of the courtyard, pointing with the blade to those much bigger than him, who swung their swords and bashed the shields with more ferocity than Link had ever witnessed among the children in his home village. He was no longer the best swordsman, easily besting his peers. He was one knight’s son among dozens and dozens of knights’ sons, all competing to be selected for the king’s army. “It’s alright to be scared, Link. A true knight of Hyrule is courageous not because he feels no fear, but because he understands that his duty is greater than the fear. Do it scared.”

His eyes flew open, settling on hers. He would do it. He was scared. He would do it scared. “What do you need me to do, Princess?”

Smiling, such a bright ray of hope amongst the misery of this place, Zelda withdrew from him. She reached under the straw mattress and retrieved a small glass bottle, in which sparkled a small, flickering light. “First things first, we need to lift up that grate on the floor. And I doubt very much you’ll be able to do so in your current state.” With a pop!, she uncorked the bottle. The light flew out and circled around her, following her pointing finger and zipping over to Link. Wherever the light sparkled over his body, cuts closed. Bruises faded into the natural tones of his skin. His bones no longer ached, and his muscles knit back together. The smallest wings he’d ever seen zipped in front of his eyes before flying up and out of the tall window. “Tell the Great Fairy!” Zelda called, cupping her hands around her mouth and shouting up to the disappearing glimmer. “Tell her everything!”

Link took a deep breath. His chest no longer stabbed at him with sharp inner pain. So, that was a fairy! He thought they were all extinct. He’d never been happier to be proven wrong. He knelt by the grate, tugging on the metal. It wouldn’t budge. Even with his renewed vigor, there was no way-

Chains clinked down, the cuff of a shackle hooking around on the iron bars. Zelda pulled over the table, laying the chain across it so the loose end hung on the other side. Link stared at her a moment before it clicked. A pulley!

He rushed to her side, grabbing hold of the loose end of the chain. With her help, the iron grate that kept them penned slowly, slowly, lifted. It creaked and groaned, then gravity took hold and slammed it onto the stone floor. Open.

Link laughed, breathless from the exertion. “Triforce of Wisdom. That tracks for you. So, that leaves the Demon King with the Triforce of Power, then?”

Zelda nodded, letting go of the chain and heading toward the hole in the floor. “I believe so, yes. He is a formidable opponent.”

Shink! Free at last, the Master Sword gleamed in the thin stream of sunlight, once again in his left hand where it belonged. “So am I.”

#loz fic #hurt/comfort #zelink #zelink fic

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three-bunnies-in-a-trenchcoat · 2 years ago

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The dungeon was dark. It always was, really, but today it seemed particularly so.

Heavy footsteps descended down the passage, more than usual, and he rolled his eyes. One of those days, then; they would be using him as an example for the newest knights (that was what they said, anyway; they all knew it was just an excuse to use him as a punching bag).

He grinned as they entered, lips cracking. "All these guests? Just for me?"

The dungeon was dark. It always was, really, but today it seemed particularly so.

He grinned as they entered, lips cracking. "All these guests? Just for me?"

One of the senior knights, Rona, grabbed him by the collar (an impressive feat, considering how ragged it was). "Shut your mouth, you bastard."

"My parents were happily married, actually. I'm afraid I can't say the same for yours… How is your mother doing these days, by the way? I hope she doesn't miss me too much." It was better to just get them angry from the start– they'd play with him like a cat would a mouse if he didn't.

He punched him in the gut. Link wheezed, doubling over as much as the chains would let him.

"Have you gotten weaker?" He asked, struggling to catch his breath. "Perhaps I could give you some training ti–"

A kick to his leg, the one that they had broken and had never healed properly, and he strangled a scream.

Rona cracked his knuckles, and grabbed him by the hair, forcing Link to meet his gaze. Oh, this would be a long day indeed.

---------

They came again the next day.

"What?" Rona mocked when Link didn't look up. "Run out of quippy remarks?"

"Oh, no. I was just wondering why you cur– apologies, blessed me with your ugly mu– beautiful visage two days in a row." And really, he had been– but the bruises on his throat also made speech difficult.

"Lord Dagianis is dead. I thought I would make sure our new recruits knew what would happen if they tried to act up."

It was a blatant lie– the only people there were ones who had been knights for years.

He laughed breathily. "I see the head bastard's actions have finally caught up with him. It's a shame I couldn't have seen it."

"You'll shut up, now."

He smiled at him pleasantly, as if they weren't discussing the death of a man. "Make me."

An ugly grin spread across his face. "With pleasure."

----------

Link let out a gasp of relief, breathing heavily. The shackles dug into his wrists, exacerbating the pain of his shoulder. He was fairly sure it had only been dislocated, but through the haze of pain it was hard to tell. He cautiously tried to move it, and, oh yes, it was very much dislocated.

He took a deep breath, and slammed his shoulder back against the wall. He screamed, the sound echoing through the stone corridors. When the pain receded enough for him to think properly, he cautiously tested it again. The pain was still there, but at least there was a chance of it healing properly.

What would Orville think if he could see him now? Would he be sympathetic? Disgusted by the sight of Link covered in his own blood?

It didn't matter; four years he had been locked up, and that was more than enough for him to move on.

Our wedding would have been beautiful. He thought, somewhat deliriously (he was probably a bit concussed). He could almost hear his voice now, calling his name.

His eyes snapped open; no, that was far too real, for there he was, kneeling in front of him.

"Link!" Orville said desperately, shaking him lightly.

"Orville…" He said softly, voice rasping painfully. "You shouldn't be here."

"Where's that goddamn key?" He snapped, pulling at Link's shackles.

Someone behind him handed it over, and he jammed it into the locks, sending painful shocks through his wrists. He collapsed forward onto Orville as the last shackle opened, barely able to stand.

"Get a healer." Orville demanded, checking him over frantically.

"I'm fine." He said, and hissed as Orville's hands passed over his ribs.

He laughed wetly, covering his face with a hand. "Imprisoned for four years and you're fine. I shouldn't have expected anything different."

"That's… my ring, isn't it?" He asked, staring at his hand.

"What? Of course it is."

(He said it so simply, as if the realization that Orville had given up on him hadn’t haunted Link for years.)

"They're taking too long. You need to get to a healer." He scooped Link up into a bridal carry as if he weighed nothing (which he probably did), careful not to jostle him too much.

"I'm fine." He insisted, but rested his head against Orville's shoulder.

"I heard you screaming, Link." His voice softened. "Do you know how terrifying that was? I was so close to getting you back, and I thought that I had lost you again. Please, don't pretend you aren't injured."

"I'm always injured." For some reason, that wasn't reassuring as he thought it would be. Perhaps his concussion was worse than he thought.

“Who did this to you?”

“Ah, Rona and a few of Dagianas’s other favorites. They were… quite upset at his death.”

“I should’ve tried harder to get you out.” Orville said, avoiding his eyes.

“And end up in the cell next door over? No, I think not. I would rather you be happy without me.”

“I can’t be happy without you, don’t you understand? These last four years… they’ve been hard.” They passed into the brighter light of the castle, and he passed an eye over him, scrutinizing his appearance. “My dear, sweet Link… what have they done to you?”

“You don’t want to know.” He said quietly. “Believe me, please. You don’t.”

He gazed at him for a few moments with an unreadable expression. “Nothing I see will make me love you less.”

“That’s not what I’m worried about… some of what they did to me was horrible, and you shouldn’t have to see it.”

“I want to see it; I swore an oath, and that doesn’t just mean the pretty things.”

“We aren’t actually married.” He mumbled into his shoulder, the only protest he could give. “You haven’t sworn anything.”

“Since when have you cared for what the law says?”

He laughed softly. “You have me there, I suppose.”

“I’ll have you everywhere, if you’ll allow it.”

“In public, Orville, really? Children could hear.”

“Oh, you know that’s not what I meant.”

He wiggled his eyebrows. “Did I?”

He snorted, and glared down at him in mock annoyance. “I had forgotten how bad your jokes were.”

“You know you love them.”

“Yes.” He said, sobering. “I do.”

He swallowed thickly. “Orville, I–”

“This is it.” He said, and kicked at the door until one of the healer’s assistants opened it. “Get the healer, now.”

Her eyes widened, and she scurried away to the back room.

“We can talk later.” Orville set him on one of the beds and bent down, pressing a kiss to his forehead. “I’m going to have… words with Rona.”

“Orville, wait!” He called after him, struggling to prop himself up on his elbows.

------

Later that night, Orville returned, bruises on his knuckles and a cut on his cheek.

“What did you do?” Link asked as he took a seat at his bedside.

“Nothing he didn’t deserve.” He said, and took Link’s hands in his own, kissing the scars over his wrists.

“I can’t argue with that, I suppose.”

His gaze swept across his torso, inspecting the bandages. His eyes widened as he caught sight of something by his hip. "What is that?" He whispered, horrified.

Link glanced down. 'TRAITOR' had been carved into his side in thin letters; that was probably what he meant. He thought that might have been from the early days of his imprisonment– he had known they were doing something with a knife, but he had never been able to see what until now. “Ah, that’s– well. I’m sure you can see.”

“I should’ve done more.” He released Link’s hands, and pressed his palms to his eyes. “Four years, Link– look what they’ve done, what they’ve taken from you.”

He reached out with a wince and pulled his hands down. “We’re still here; they haven’t taken that.”

@febuwhump

#febuwhump #febuwhumpday21 #skyward sword #skyward sword manga #loz #hylia's chosen hero #loz ss

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melonba11s · 1 year ago

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Speak (Legend of Zelda: TOTK Fic)

I've branched away from BTD for the night!

Here's a fic for TOTK! Contains obvious spoilers so beware!

Contains: Ganondorf, Link, Amputation, Torture Mention, Link can talk

The chains were constantly clattering, if Ganondorf ever got too close to the dungeon’s they were background noise. A testament to Link’s constant struggle to escape, to pick his sword back up. A sword kept just outside his cell to continue to taunt the hero.

Ganondorf decided he’d finally pay the Hylian a visit, descending closer to the sound of chains rattling. As he grew closer to the cell, small grunts began to join them. He supposed Link was putting all the effort he could into escaping. Ganondorf paused just outside the cell, staring down at the floor a few feet away from the hero with a smirk.

“We couldn’t give him water today, Lord Ganondorf.” The underling from the other day had reported. “He… Bit their finger off.” Ganondorf had laughed at the report, and the sight of the severed digit on the floor brought another chuckle to his throat.

He let his gaze travel now to the blonde man, huddled in the corner, glaring daggers at him. His mouth was open in a permanent snarl. His blue eyes were filled to the brim, not with hatred like Ganondorf expected, but a sense of duty. Link had his eyes on a target that needed to be dispatched still, and he could not rest until that was done.

“Are you comfortable down here?” Ganondorf asked, his voice dripping with sarcasm. Link let out a growl, pressing himself into the wall. Ganondorf had never heard the elf speak before, he had doubted he’d get an answer now.

He walked closer, watching as Link pressed himself back into the wall, as if he were trying to disappear into it. Grabbing the chains that connected to the shackles around the man’s wrists, Ganondorf yanked him upwards off his feet. A cry of pain came from Link, as his arms were probably nearly wrenched out of socket.

“Chosen Hero, The one who Zelda promised thousands of years ago would defeat me… How does it feel knowing you never had a chance?” He wanted to shake an answer from Link. All he got was a look of defiance, thinly masking the despair he felt.

Hyrule laid to ruin, monsters running rampant, slaughtering and stealing everything they could. Those who could escape going into the sea, those who couldn’t… Left to hide until death came.

And above all of this, the Light Dragon, Zelda, still flew serenely, silently. Now and then, a large tear would well in those eyes gazing upon a land she could no longer remember living upon. It would fall to the earth that she had once walked upon, that was now desolate and unable to bear life.

She would never even know that Link had failed. She was no longer herself. She would never be herself again. And somehow that knowledge didn’t comfort the fallen hero, it just made his despair worse.

“Well? Are you going to speak?” Ganondorf shook him again, roughly. Link hissed softly, then with a small grunt, Ganondorf finally heard a raspy voice answer him.

“You don’t deserve to hear me speak.” Ganondorf raised an eyebrow, and the two men held each other's gaze. One filled with amusement, the other filled with defiance.

Ganondorf dropped him, letting him fall to the floor in a heap. Link let out a yell of pain from the sudden release of his tensed muscles.

“Very well, let’s move on then. There’s a matter of business at hand.” Ganondorf turned away, glancing back at Link.

“You haven’t been humiliated enough yet. Tomorrow, at dusk, a crowd will gather outside those castle steps. It’s there you shall finally know what true shame feels like.” There was not a flicker of fear in those blue eyes as Link just began to growl again.

Ganondorf had managed to wrench one sentence out of him though, and by tomorrow night, he’d no doubt be listening to his begs and cries like one once listened to the Stable Trotters.

#July ficfest #Melon Writes Not BTD #melons july ficfest

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laxyaklovesloz · 5 months ago

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The Legend of Zelda: Real Courage 2: Dark Mirror | Chapter Eight: Chief Gosthard

The dungeon wasn’t far from the throne room. Once inside, Lila gathered her wits and tried to formulate a plan. She took a close examination of the room, looking for anything that could help her. There was one support beam in the center with a pair of lanterns hanging off of the sides. Other support beams and lanterns were recessed into the walls so there was nowhere to hide like the hallways. For such a gloomy place, the number of lanterns made it well-lit. The room was filled with various devices that were probably made for torture. Lila thought the dark stains covering them were from blood. A tool rack hung from the wall near the entrance. Now that was something that could be useful.

The bulblin took her to the far wall and chained her up. This would have been a good opportunity, but the other bulblins had followed and blocked the only door. Once she was secured to the wall, the bulblin leader ushered the others out. They closed the door behind them, though she imagined they wouldn’t venture too far.

Lila wished she could do something, but with her hands shackled above her head, she felt powerless.

Powerless…

That word sparked something in her mind. Power. Like the Triforce of Power. The Triforce was formerly held by Ganondra, whom Lila had defeated just days before. She had a crazy thought. Could she have the Triforce of Power, now? And could it give her power? In all of the legends of the Triforce, they never mentioned what happened after the hero defeated the villain. It was always just a happy ending. Now, Lila had defeated the villain, and she wondered what came next.

Lila decided to try out her theory before someone came in. She pictured the pieces of the Triforce on her damaged left hand. She imagined two of them lit up for courage and power and squeezed her fists. Then she pulled at the chains with all her strength.

“Ow!”

The chains groaned under the strain. It was working! Though it hurt to do so, she continued pulling, feeling the rock giving way to her strength. It was slow going, but it was going nonetheless. Eventually, she broke the chains free from the wall, and they dangled from her bruised wrists.

Lila stifled a shout of excitement. She could feel the power surging through her. It felt like she could lift anything, like when she used the Gauntlets of Strength. Her heartbeat quickened with the confidence it gave her.

Now on to the next step. Lila hurried over to the tool rack by the door and started taking things down. She grabbed everything she thought could be useful and stashed them in her pockets, her boots, and even her hat. She decided to leave the chains on her wrists to use as bludgeoning weapons. The bit of rock that was clinging to each end would surely knock an enemy off of their feet.

When she felt ready, she stood nervously behind the door… and knocked.

“It’s really stuffy in here,” she called out.

The door burst open, and a bulblin came in. Lila sprang into action and attacked him on sight. She swung the rock on her chain and hit him in the head. He went down instantly. Another bulblin followed, club raised, but he went down with a punch to the nose. Lila came out from behind the door but was surprised to see no other enemies for her to fight. They must not have thought she could escape. She checked on the two she had attacked and saw that they were out cold. Satisfied, she stepped out of the door.

Looking both ways down the hallway, Lila saw nothing. She remembered the way to the throne room and crept her way there. At the entrance to the throne room, she peeked her head around the corner. The Moblin Chief was still sitting there, laughing with his subjects. Lila looked around and found all of her weapons and supplies in a pile on the other side of the room. There was nothing left but to attack. She took a deep breath and began.

Lila used the tools as throwing knives and started with the blins closest to her. They fell to the ground before anyone noticed her. She took out another group as the blins figured out what was going on. Then she had a real fight on her hands.

“Get her!” roared the chief. He jumped off of his throne, picked up Lila’s things, and ran.

“Oh no, you don’t!” Lila shouted. She fought her way through the blins, but there were just too many of them. There was no way she could catch up to the chief and get her things.

That’s when she noticed that he didn’t get everything. One lesser moblin fought with her boomerang, though he had no idea how to use it. Lila quickly stole it back from him. Another bokoblin was wearing her gauntlets, which she also took back. The combined might of the Triforce of Power and the Gauntlets of Strength allowed her to take out the rest of the blins with ease.

After every enemy was unconscious, Lila took a careful look around the room. She gathered whatever the blins had stolen, which ended up being everything except her sword and bomb bag. She even got her shield back! With her stuff back where they belonged, she followed the chief to get back her sword.

Outside of the throne room, Lila had no idea where to go. She considered picking a random direction but then thought of something else. Would the chief be susceptible to goading?

“Hey,” she called out. “I beat up your minions. You can’t hide from me! I will get my sword back!”

Lila paused to listen but was rewarded with a group of blins attacking from one side of the hallway. They weren’t any trouble at all now that she had most of her gear. She dispatched the blins quickly and continued going the way they had come from.

“Is that all you got?” Lila tried shouting again at the next juncture. More blins appeared, and more blins went down. She continued goading the chief, “It’s no use. Give me my sword and this can end.”

One more round of blins showed up, and afterward, Lila could see a darkly-lit room. She rushed into the room without considering the consequences. The door slammed shut behind her, and bars blocked the way. Lila braced herself for the possibility of a fight.

Because it was so dark, she couldn’t see her enemy right away. What she could see were pedestals and displays lining the walls, each with its own tiny candle. That was the only light source now that the door was closed. The displays held some gruesome objects, such as skeletons and severed hands. Some of the displays held weapons. At the other end of the room stood the Moblin Chief, clutching the Master Sword in one hand and a trident in the other.

“You stole that from the Gerudo!” Lila accused, recognizing the trident. “And you stole my sword. I’ll be taking both back, thank you.”

“I take, make mine!” the chief roared back as he lunged forward with the trident.

Lila used the Boots of Sturdiness to stabilize her position then grabbed the trident with both gauntletted hands. The Moblin Chief was stronger than she expected, and he pushed her against the wall. A crackle of blue lightning danced down the trident’s haft and jolted her. She cried out and had to let go, shoving forward as she did so. The moblin took a few steps back.

“What did you do to that thing?” Lila shouted.

“Make mine,” the chief repeated. “Upgraded with power. Dark. Demonic.”

Lila took heavy steps forward, keenly aware of every ache and injury that hadn’t yet healed. The electricity had awakened her nerves with a fresh wave of pain. But she couldn’t let any of that slower her down. She had to fight her way out of there.

She shifted her shield to her left arm. Then she pulled out her boomerang and threw it at the moblin. The moblin charged at her again with the trident, so he was unable to block her attack. The boomerang hit his head, which made him stumble and fall to the side.

Lila rushed forward and wrenched her sword from him. Then she slashed downward but only hit armor. The missed attack gave the moblin time to jump out of her way. She cursed but didn’t have time to regroup. The moblin chief jabbed at her with the trident, and she could feel the trident scraping against her shield as the metals screeched against each other.

Another jolt of electricity made Lila back away. The moblin followed her, pressed her. Soon her back hit the wall again. The electricity wouldn’t stop. She squeezed her eyes shut and screamed in pain.

“You suffer,” said the Moblin Chief in satisfaction. “You will die.”

In desperation, Lila thrust her sword at the moblin’s gut. The squelching sensation told her that she made a hit. The moblin roared in pain, and the electricity stopped. Lila ducked to the side, taking her sword with her. The Master Sword slashed through the Moblin Chief. Lila stumbled to her feet to see the chief lying on the ground, the fight gone out of him. Relieved, she finally took a deep breath… and coughed from the stench.

After regaining her composure, she said, “I’ll take that,” reaching for the trident.

The chief clutched it closer to himself and said, “No! Mine!”

Lila sucked on her teeth. “Give me the trident, or I’ll have to kill you for it.”

The chief hesitated, but decided to loosen his grip. Panting, Lila bent down to grab the trident. As she did, she felt electricity crackle up her arm. Quickly, she yanked the trident away from the chief, and the lightning stopped.

Lila backed away from the chief to survey her situation. First, she made sure she got every one of her items back, which she did. Then she looked around the room. The bars had disappeared from the doorway, so that was good. She noticed a familiar sparkle in the air and saw a glowing heart gem laced with gold. She had seen these hearts before at the end of particularly difficult battles. Excited, she reached for it and watched it vanish in a dance of gold and ruby flecks that reflected what little light was in the room. Instantly, she felt refreshed, though sleepy. The aches and pains were gone but at the cost of her energy. As long as she could get out of there quickly, it wouldn’t be a problem.

“I’ll return this for you,” Lila said to the moblin chief. “I’m leaving now. No need to get up.”

#fanfic #fanfiction #genderbend #legend of zelda #LoZ: Dark Mirror

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loz-and-lu-fan-blog · 5 years ago

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What you shouldn’t have know?

*based on the prompt of body snatcher and spirit form. Mostly based off some idea*

They hadn’t ment to find out.

It all started with a special dust they found one night with magic properties.

“What the hell?” Legend said as he look down at himself, correction, what legend’s spirit said. It seemed the weird dust cause the soul to leave the body and show its self.

“What the hell are you wearing?” Warrior’s asked the floating spirit before it made a drive back into the passed out Legend.

Legend got up with a startle with rage filling his eyes.

“What even is that stuff?” Legend asked slightly pissed.

“I don’t know. I think it’s what they use to separate my Zelda from her body. But it never cause any side effects and Zelda eventually returned fine” Wind explains with a smile.

“Seriously are we not going to talk about the outfit?” Warrior commented again.

“Ugh it’s what I wore when I help my uncle with his apple farm, before I started my quest” Legend replies before taking the bottle of magic dust from Wind. He got out a pinch and threw some at Warrior and Wind who dropped like rocks.

Warrior’s spirit appeared and he was younger wearing a cadet uniform while Wind was about two year younger wearing some blue island outfit.

“This is awesome” Wind says flying around the room.

“Speak for yourself” Warrior said before he flew back into his body, waking up with a startle. Wind just stuck out his tongue before flying back into his body he grabbed the bottle and threw some of the dust a Twilight.

When Twilight appeared out his body he look like he did right before his adventure, their was just one thing off.

“Dude what’s with the weird markings?” Hyrule asked.

It was true, Twilight spirit had markings that cover his skin. Twilight knew what they were, and how much they looked like midna’s. His spirit did an immediate drive and Twilight popped right back into his body.

“Weird markings. Maybe they were cause by someone? Sometime I saw Zelda with weird markings after she was possessed” Wind popped up.

“Soo is their something your not telling us twi?” Legend asked. Twilight bitterly thought of a lie.

“Basterd tried and failed” was all he had to say.

“Who else?” Wind said turning to the other Links who were smart enough to step away and cover their nose and mouth.

“What about pops?” Warrior offered.

“The old man’s asleep” Legend countered. It was true the older hero had decided to go the bed early leaving the other 8 to their own.

“But he just asleep. Come on, I know we all want to see what the old man use to look like” Warrior offered. It was true, the older hero didn’t talk much about his time saving hyrule no matter how many times the other asked.

“Fine” Twilight said as the Links began to sneak their way upstairs. He knows he should be stopping them but his curiosity was getting the better of him.

Somehow all the link manage to sneak into the room with wake up the eldest hero. Wind took a couple of steps before getting out the magical dust and blowing it where time would breath it in. He took some steps back and waited. Finally the glow began to happen to reveal....

...a child?

It was a child, not just like wind’s spirit. No the spirit was easily younger the Wind’s and thinner. He look to be no more then 8, and had bags under his eyes like he hadn’t slept for days, even with the think frame under the green tunic that wasn’t the most disturbing part.

It was the chains.

Time’s spirit had chains that shackled his wrists, the chains seemingly disappear into the darkness.

Time seemed to finally realize something was off.

“What happen?” The spirit yelled out in a very high pitch voice before turning to the Links “What did you do?”

“It’s magical dust.” Wind said trying to calm down Time’s spirit, something tells them they are in for it when he wakes up.

“It’s temporary you’ll be-“ legend words died in his throat as the chains on time began to pull.

The pulled and pulled from the darkness behind Time and his spirit kept trying to pull them back.

“How do I get back to my body?” Time’s spirit screamed out in panic, his spirit losing a lot of detailed and becoming a green color.

Time seemed to try before the chains got the best of him, pulling the green spirit into darkness.

“Time!!” The boys yelled out. They stayed frozen in the spot not knowing what to do.

Hyrule began to mutter to himself before the Links could finally here what he was say ‘not good not good, very very bad energy’, they were about to asked what he ment until they got their answer.

A horned spirit emerge from the darkness Time was pulled into, cover in armor and dark raven feathers, his white eyes stared at them with angry. However Hyrule was the only one that noticed.

The spirit wore chains just like Time’s. Two chains that attached to his wrist, and from the way they were wrapped around his hands, it looked like he had been pulling something with thoughs chains.

“GET OUT!” The spirit yelled startling all of them as one of the clawed hands reached towards the heroes. Hyrule acting fast teleporting them outside the house.

The heroes just sat in shock in the darkness.

What the hell did the do?

#linkeduniverse #linked universe #linkeduniverse au #linked universe au #hero of warriors #hero of time #hero of the wind #hero of twilight #hero of legend #loz fierce deity

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nimbus-writes · 2 years ago

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new chapter up! and with it, new characters! if your a fan of the legend of zelda and the idea of every iteration of link getting thrown in situations, why not check it this out?

#the legend of zelda: shackle and chain #tloz sac #nimbus speaks #tloz sac update

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nimbus-writes · 2 years ago

Link

been turning this idea over in my head for a while, but ive got the first two chapters posted at the time of writing this, so give it a look if u like zelda! i am at all times throwing every link into a bag and shaking it as hard as i can and this is the result. ill be posting some little info dumps in the coming weeks, so also keep an eye out here for where some of my inspiration is coming from or how im changing up canon to make everything work together nicely!

#the legend of zelda #legend of zelda #the legend of zelda: shackle and chain #tloz sac #nimbus speaks #basic idea is just #i am throwing every iteration of link together #and letting it dissolve into chaos

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nimbus-writes · 2 years ago

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after more time than i was expecting it would take, chapter 3 is finally done! a lot less of my time is taken up by work, too, so hopefully the next chapter wont be far behind!

#the legend of zelda: shackle and chain #tloz sac #nimbus speaks #tloz sac update

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nimbus-writes · 2 years ago

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Shackle and Chain Timeline

the zelda timeline as a whole is something of a mess, and its easy to get confused trying to parse out the inconsistencies and how everything fully ties together. ive seen a lot of different interpretations and how they differ from the canon timelines supplied by nintendo (none of which ive ever really agreed with, particularly the more recent idea of having the timeline split during minish cap, but thats another topic i wont get into here), but for my story i figured id give my shot at one that makes the most sense to me. there arent too many differences, but i feel any differences from the canon example at all are deserving of an explanation, so ill get into that here (along with my kinda shitty timeline graphic i threw together in like 5 minutes)

to make things simple, ive outlined every iteration of link in a square, and listed all of their games they appear in! also, the gaps in time arent really to scale, but in general are just there to help spread it all out. this doesnt feature EVERY character that i plan on having appear in the story though (such as how ravio has already made an appearance in chapter two, and i plan on him sticking around for a while because i love ravio) but lets get into the differences! like i said, this mostly follows canon, since i find a simpler option to be better, but there ARE some important changes ive made!

first off, ive included two non-canon games! im not planning on bringing in any others aside from the hyrule warriors games, but i felt these were necessary for the timeline as a whole. the first hyrule warriors is the only way to easily resolve nintendos stupid "breath of the wild is in all 3 timelines!" bullshit, since thats not how time works. at all. but if you take hyrule warriors as having merged the timelines back into one (with three parallel worlds as opposed to three timelines), then the problem is solved! and since i included one warriors game, i might as well include the other, which leads to the second timeline split as a result of terakkos actions. (and like, yeah i COULD have added in another "link dies" timeline there, but since neither that nor the post age of calamity timeline will ever get another piece of media, i dont see a reason to explore that concept)

the next change ive made is combining what canon considers two separate iterations of link (specifically the one from a link to the past and a link between worlds). i understand WHY theyre two different links, but a lot more of the two games just makes sense in my opinion if they arent different at all (specifically how a link between worlds has the same map, characters, dungeons and themes, AND the actions of link at the beginning of tri force heroes, where he tries to hide his identity. that just makes more sense to me if hes been through a LOT more quests, including one where he was labeled a criminal, than just one quest where he wasnt ever vilified)

the last change i made has to do with four swords and four swords adventures, and this change is a hill i will die on. THESE GAMES ARE A PAIR. DO NOT SEPARATE. i KNOW the timeline has them centuries apart. i KNOW this. but its wrong! at the beginning of four swords adventures, it directly references both the hero from minish cap and four swords, but only vaguely referring to minish cap while specifically calling the hero from four swords "link", which, along with implying the hero from four swords adventures already knows what happens when you draw the four sword, leads me to believe that these two games feature only one iteration of link! but then that leaves the question of where in the timeline both games fall? is it directly after minish cap? or after twilight princess? well actually, its neither! several things featured in four swords adventures shows that the two games can only exist during a brief window of time, namely the presence of zora as an enemy, and the existence of the dark world. both of these things are only found in the downfall timeline, after link is slain in ocarina of time, meaning both games have to take place there (not to confuse the dark world for the dark realm, which only exists in the adult timeline as far as weve seen. im pretty sure they have the same origin, but the dark realm was influenced less by ganon since he was sealed somewhere else in that timeline). the dark world narrows it down the most, since it gets restored back to the sacred realm after the events of a link to the past, so the game has to take place before then. this means the two games actually fit nicely into the period of time known as the imprisoning war, where ganon is properly imprisoned within the dark world (which, to those of you who played the game or read the manga, know that this is what happens in four swords adventures!). in my opinion, not doing this is the single most aggravating thing nintendo did to the timeline. everything else i can excuse, but THIS angers me to no end.

anyway, thats the timeline ill be working with! at least, assuming tears of the kingdom doesnt have MORE fucked up time travel bullshit. ill take a look at this again once the game comes out, but hopefully it wont change anymore!

#the legend of zelda: shackle and chain #tloz sac #the legend of zelda #shackle and chain drabbles #nimbus speaks

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nimbus-writes · 2 years ago

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was planning on writing some intro posts for some of the characters, but i just got my wisdom teeth removed so im gonna put that on hold. soon, though!

#nimbus speaks #the legend of zelda: shackle and chain #tloz sac

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justpoliteconversations · 9 months ago

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Comfort [Yandere!Chain + Isekai!Reader]

You're part of the family now, and everything that entails.

I have fallen deeper into the abyss. Just exploring the new, untested dynamics of this latest indulgence. It's a hot mess, so be warned before you read.

Masterlist

Sky Route

Four Route

TW: Yandere nonesense. Be warned.

Disclaimer: Don't own The Legend of Zelda franchise. Linked Universe is the fan creation of jojo56830.

---

Meeting the Chain had seemed like a dream come true at first. Of course, there had been the pain and disorientation of being ripped from everything you knew without warning, but meeting the boys and procuring thier promise for aid had calmed you significantly.

So, rather than despairing and falling into the throes of depression, you instead set your mind to learning of the world around you. And of course, you spent a lot of that time observing the boys and their behaviors (curious as to what so many fans had gotten right or wrong).

You wished you hadn't. You wished you'd kept to yourself. Ignored their very existences and just stayed focused on getting home. Wished you'd never been found by them.

You wish you'd set boundries sooner. If you had, maybe none of this would be happening. Maybe you'd be free.

"Hey. It's going to be okay." Twilight whispered softly from behind you, voice low and sorrowful as his large, warm hand pet you carefully upon the back. As though that would somehow bring you comfort after what he did.

You couldn't face him. You refused to meet any of their eyes. The bandages on your back burned against your torn skin where Hyrule had been prevented from properly healing you.

'A reminder', Wars had said, eyes cold and unforgiving, and Time had stayed quiet, only offering your cowering form a disappointed frown. Hyrule had wailed and snarled at the thought of leaving you in pain, but Legend had quieted him with soothing whispers (though he himself looked borderline rebellious too).

Wind had grit his teeth, eyes blazing hellfire, and looked ready to tell Wars off for that, but Time had placed a gentle hand on his head and given him a sad, rueful smile. To which Wind had huffed but remained silent, but not before casting (Big Brother) Wars a look that promised many unfortunate incidents in the near future.

Twilight had continued to hold you upright as your punishment was handed down. Calloused fingers caressing lightly, possessively, over the still bleeding wounds along your torn back. You swear you saw pride in his face as the verdict was decided that since he caught you, until you recovered you'd be his responsibility.

At the memory of that smug glint in his eyes, you curled further away from his soft, comforting (frightening, blood-chilling) touch, and he pulled back obligingly. A heartbroken sigh left his lips, torn so raw at the seams it almost broke your resolve to ignore him right then. Until you reminded yourself of what he (what they) were capable of despite their sweet, adoring smiles and soft attentions.

Twilight had been so damned gentle with you since that night, relieved and apologetic both. And terribly guilty. Nothing like the feral beast that had chased you down without regard for your fear or wellbeing. Took you down like thrashing, wailing, vulnerable prey when you bolted for the bright, shining portal that whispered home, comfort, safety (and freedom) that had appeared so suddenly.

Nothing like the monster that had torn into the back of your shirt (and flesh) with savage teeth, snarling and growling, ripping you away from salvation with punishing strength. Desperate, predatory eyes shining like death in the portal light, the hairs lining his powerful back standing on end and lost to the shadows that clung to his massive form.

Nothing like the man who had come after, large, burning, painfully tight hand shackled around your wrist. Cruelly dragging you on your knees from escape, shadowed eyes glowing unnatural, eerie blue in the dim light of a waning moon. No different from the creature that had drawn blood upon your defenseless skin, merely wearing a more familiar face.

And the way he had stared upon you once the light of promised safety had faded entirely. Eyes dark and bright and sharp with the threat of violence. Of sanity lost. Watching down at your whimpering, shivering, pain-racked form with quiet possession, dark promise.

The moment for escape had been so perfect, that night. You had finally managed to convince Wild to give you a moment of privacy. Convinced Time that you just wanted an hour of peace from Red's needy whines and Hyrule's obsessive tending. Managed to distract Warrior's keen eyes with a word of praise in Wind's ear and the promise of stories from your homeland. Sidestepped Sky's soft, curious eyes as you walked passed.

You had been alone. For the first time in three months. And it had been liberating.

And then the portal had appeared, and you hadn't thought of anything else after that. Not of consequences. Not of the Chain's anger or the darkness that hid behind soft, adorning gazes. And not of the way their eyes watched you always.

Not of the eyes on you even then. For you had forgotten that you are never truly alone. Not until you were reminded.

Not until that first, bone chilling howl of rage.

"We should move them closer to the fire." Came Hyrule's concerned voice, hovering just on the other side of Twilight (he must have escaped Legend's clutches. the man had been keeping Hyrule under strict supervision after The Incident). "They may be cold from blood loss."

Before Twilight could reassure his obsessively worried brother (once again) that all was well and that you were just upset, Four spoke up. Sounding just as ragged and agitated as you felt. "The Incident was three days ago. There was never issues with blood loss to begin with." He sounded done, tired. Pissed even.

You didn't doubt it. After the chaos that had ensued that night, it was decided (by Green and Vio and reluctantly Red) that merging was the most viable option to ensure a safe (quiet) and stress free environment for you to recover in.

Blue had come to blows with Twilight three times before the night had even ended after The Incident (he'd fought Legend twice. had only been prevented from triggering the sociopath that is Wars by Time's intervention). Red have been crying nonstop since you were first carried back to camp by a shame-faced Twilight. Green was running damage control to keep Wars from challenging Twilight for rights to safekeep you. And Vio had dutifully sacrificed his body to cuddles, forehead kisses and soft (distressed) cooing to placate the ticking time bomb that was Sky's protective instincts.

You almost pitied the small smith. Until you remembered how Blue had wanted to take your legs, and Vio had gotten a calculated glint in his eyes. And then you didn't feel bad for him anymore, even with the memory of Red sobbing his eyes out and Green talking Blue down before Wild got it in his head to put himself (and thus Twilight) between the Colors and you protectively.

At some point during Twilight's, Four's and Hyrule's discussion (argument) Wild had arrived with his characteristic brashness. Breezing past all of them, as usual, and putting himself squarely into your space. And Twilight let him, because Wild was one of his, and now (for the time being) so were you.

The scarred man took you in his arms (so easily, as though you weighed nothing at all), careful not to touch the tender wounds on your back, and made his way towards Sky. Hyrule made to protest, but by the low familiar hum of expectancy that sounded out, it looked like Legend had finally caught up to his wayward (stupidly determined to play mother cucco) charge.

You ignored them after that, but not before catching a glimpse of Four apologetically carding a hand through Legend's feather soft hair, cupping his vulnerable nape with tender care. Small, forge roughened fingers gripping lovingly as he whispered heartfelt apologies, eyes flashing red and speckled green and even blue at the edges. Witnessed how Legend melted under the touch, and how Hyrule had leaned into Legend's side with equal affection (and desperation for comfort. attention).

You wished you hadn't seen it. So you wouldn't have to remember the good that resided within these men, as well as the bad. About how much these men truly loved each other, and you, despite all the hurt they put you through that night.

Quiet sobbing caught your attention, and Sky was before you suddenly, though he was not the one making such heartbroken sounds. You had been lost in your head and hadn't even noticed how Wild had kissed into your hair in relief. Shedding tears of gratefulness that you hadn't screamed and thrashed at his touch (like that first night he tried to give comfort. before he sacrificed himself to Sky's doting).

Wild went to his knees before the sleeping Skyloft knight (crying silently in fitful slumber) and whispered warmly through soft sniffles. "Sky. They're right here, safe. See." He gently placed you down beside the tearfully sleeping man, and you let him. Too tired and overwhelmed by your own emotions to fight.

And too fearful. Because Sky was an enigma. Seemingly the most docile of all the boys, even Red and Hyrule, and yet Time, Wars and Vio all catered to him with due diligence (the three who knew the most, and controlled the most). Conceded to his every demand when it was made (rare as they were) and sacrificed any whom Sky called to for comfort and reassurance. Including themselves.

Claims did not matter when Sky wanted to hold you through the night. If Sky wanted to cuddle Wind, Wars would have to concede (even if it took Time and Green's combined efforts to keep him subdued). If he desired to brush Wild's hair into traditional skyloftian braids or spoon feed Hyrule sweet pumpkin soup like an infant, Twilight and Legend were made to step aside. If Sky wanted Time to sit beside him and speak of their beloveds, then it would be so. Even if it meant setting up camp early for the night. Even if it meant Blue, Legend and Wars bitched for hours afterwards (amongst themselves, of course).

In the eyes of the Chain, Sky was an outlier to the established hierarchy, and you had a feeling you knew why. You remembered the first time you felt the fear of wrongness amongst the men you called your friends (family). The moment of clarity.

You'd never forget the smell of smoke and iron reek hanging thick in the air, fanning out across the wasteland that was Hyrule's homeland. The blank and distant looks in the heroes' eyes as they emerged from the treeline. And Sky, covered in red, red, red. Like an ocean sunset dripping into calm waters. Like fresh berry juice between overzealous fingers.

He'd been crying then.

Sky rarely cries.

Sky had called for Hyrule for days after. Had kept him by his side as they walked and slept and ate. Had babied and coddled and smothered him with fierce devotion. And the chain had let him. Kept Legend and Twilight in check. Kept Blue forcibly subdued when Red riled him into a protective fury over his most vulnerable, sensitive brother's pitiful, longing tears for his Rulie.

So, when Wild had set you beside Sky, you remained quiet. Because you were afraid. And because you owed WIld.

Because when Sky called for you that night (still raw and shaking), Wild had straightened his back, looked Time in the eye and told him that you needed space. And then had given himself over to Sky's obsessive coddling, enduring the man's frantic petting and overbearing smothering.

For three days. After Vio had been merged back into Four. Wild had endured the babying for three days. Wild, the man who may have hated being tied down more than anyone else in the Chain.

You owed him, and if he thought time was up for your sulking. Well, there was nothing you could do. Especially not when Sky was in tears (dangerous, unstable).

The moment you were pressed into Sky's side, he immediately latched onto you (you were saved from pain only by Wild's arm sheltering your back), reddened eyes opening to reveal a tearful, shattered, truly unhinged gaze. "You came. You tried to leave us." He sobbed, burying his sleepy, splotchy face into your neck. His hands (so strong, enough to crush your windpipe if he wanted) gripping into the fabric of your shirt like a child seeking comfort. "I thought you hated me."

You wanted to snap that of course you hated him. That you hated them all for forcing you to stay here when home had been so close. Right there, you could feel it. You wanted to scream that you despised them for being silently complicit with your captivity, even if they weren't always the ones to physically hold you down.

You wanted to do a lot of things. Rage. Cry. Break something. Find words, accusations, demands, anything to make them understand the depths of your hurt and betrayal. To see how much they had taken from you.

And yet, frustratingly, you couldn't. The fight had been sucked right out of you at the sight of Sky's hurt, his soul-deep suffering. Because you loved these boys still, despite all the horribly broken affections they saw fit to shower upon you and each other. Genuine, but ultimately flawed and damaged (and damaging).

With Wild snuggling in from behind to sniff your hair contently (the creep), and a glimpse of Wind hovering longingly at the sidelines, unsure of his welcome. You felt your resolve breaking ever further.

In the firelight, Time leaned down to kiss Wars along the temple, ruffling his fluffy (beautiful) hair before retreating towards Twilight. He gathered the saddened, guilt ridden man in his arms and laid them both down for sleep, speaking soft reassurances into his descendant's dark hair. Warm, paternal smile on his lips.

Closest to the fire pit, Legend and Hyrule had Four trapped between them, Four resting his head peacefully on Legend's shoulder, and Hyrule sandwiching him from the back. Legend's arm draped over Four's small form to rest his hand possessively (protectively) on Hyrule's waist.

Warriors watched over this all with sharp, but quietly adoring, eyes. Scanning over you and the others around you with just as much of that overwhelmingly intense (too intense) devotion. Ensuring all was well and safe under his domain, before turning away to ensure nothing came from outside to disturb his peacefully resting family. Shield at his side and sword on his back. Loyalty corded into every line of his lithe form.

Wind had shuffled closer. Big (wondrously big) blue eyes locked on you and waiting. Wild's hand was on your hip, resting as he too waited patiently. Content to let you speak in your own time.

Sky's love stricken, adoring, grieving eyes locked with yours. Searching, waiting. A blade ready to drop across his heart and everything in it at the slightest of provocation.

And you broke. Because what else could you do.

"I don't hate you, Sky. I'm just so angry." You forced out, bitter for the truth of those words. "I just need time to forgive and heal."

Those shattered eyes lightened, the ragged edges softened, and suddenly you were looking at Sky again. Tender-hearted, fiercely protective but forever hopeful Sky. The Sky you trusted still with your life, for all you feared the zealous protectiveness that cast a very long shadow across his path.

"I understand. Twilight was so rough with you, and Warriors so harsh with your punishment." He said, and Wild huffed in agreement behind you. "It's only natural you'd want to return home. So they should have been more understanding of your feelings."

Wind, now at Wild's back, was on his knees with hands on Wild's waist as he leaned forward. "I'll put rocks in their boots every day 'til they say they're sorry! The small ones ya don't feel 'til it's too late!" He vowed, and you didn't doubt that. You'd seen Wars wincing and Twilight limping for a few days now, and now you knew why.

Your heart lightened, for all it felt shackled and confused and broken too. "Thank you guys." And you meant it.

As strange as it seemed. You really did mean every word of it. Truly and wholely.

Maybe you were a little broken too, after all. And as Wind settled behind your back, helped by Wild so he didn't agitate your injuries (he placed a gentle kiss on the bandages, so light you nearly missed it), you found you almost didn't mind.

Things were always complicated with family, after all.

---

Off I go. Back to the shadows to rest this one off.

#yandere linked universe #yandere linked universe x reader #isekai reader #what the hell is happening #a hot mess of a fic

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