#If he can be a safe space for Zelda to lash out

[sheikfangirl]

A bitter sweet memory ❤️

Pre-Calamity flashback panel from my Zelink comic. Work in progress.

[totkdaily]

Day 1: Below and Above

We walk down stone steps into the darkness, lit only by the torch in Zelda's hand. I feel awake for the first time in years. It's only here, heading into the unknown, that I realise some part of me has been asleep since we defeated Calamity Ganon. That thrumming in my veins, the low buzz in my ears as our footsteps resound against stone, wisps of Gloom around us. The Princess walks with purpose. I circle her tightly, trying to guard her from every side. She would have protested, once. Now she knows what manner of thing her Swordsman protects her from.

We find murals of ancient conflict. Zelda drinks in these hints at ancient knowledge, but something about them sets my skin alight. I can barely hear her, so focused on any hint of danger. The Demon King. The Imprisoning War. History. Stories. She’s delighted by how much knowledge she’s uncovering about the distant past. Somehow it doesn’t feel so distant to me, but I can’t explain it to her. I just wait, and follow.

The tunnel opens up into another chamber, wide and deep and dark, and something in me recognises this room. I reach for the Princess, but it’s already too late. The thing at the centre is moving.

A husk of a man, all tendons and muscles and no skin at all. But those eyes that shoot to us, to her. He shudders up from his splayed position. Was the green hand holding him in place, or sustaining him? There’s no time to work it out. The Princess picks up the stone, and I wish just once she would stop being a scholar long enough to keep her safe.

He speaks, and it means nothing but malice. He knows us. He knows her. He lashes out and I swing the Master Sword, relieved at last to unleash that thrum of unease into action. The sword shatters in the face of him. It can’t. It shouldn’t. It has. A fragment catches what would be his cheek, and his blood boils outwards. He’s reaching up, past the stone above. The castle. So much fought for, so much rebuilt, and it’s all vulnerable to this unseen threat below. As his power crawls up through the stone I feel the burning pain in my sword arm.

The ground shudders and cracks. I reach for her. It’s all I’ve ever known to do. Her hand stretches for mine as she falls away from me into darkness.

And then, light. 

Another hand grasps mine. It's the last thing I know.

I wake somewhere else. Another enclosed space, but soft golden light instead of that sinister red. The Princess is gone. My hair is longer than it was – please, it can’t have happened again. I failed to protect her once before, and slept for 100 years before I could free her from the darkness of the Calamity. My arm… it’s strange to me. Dark green and longer nails and wrapped in strange jewellery. 

That voice… could it be the voice of the creature? But no… he says he gave me his arm. Replaced it, just like that. I listen to him mechanically - Rauru. He knows Zelda. 

This place feels old but untended, the vines thick and ancient. I carry the remnants of the Sword, useless now. Corruption scars its surface as it ruined my arm. 

The consoles, the blue teleportation site, the machinery - it reminds me of Sheikah tech, but it’s different. When am I? The designs are strange, the green light unfamiliar. 

I know I’m being reckless, jumping without a paraglider. But the instinct doesn’t lead me to harm - and I find trousers, which is a relief. 

I'm above the clouds. Floating islands... Zelda said the Zonai came from the sky. I can see the Gerudo Highlands, Death Mountain - erupting. This is Hyrule. But it’s changed, I’m sure of it. How long was I asleep? These ruins are old. Have I slept another hundred years? I can't have left my Princess for so long again.

Time to jump.

This place is quiet and strange. Some of the constructs attack, some speak to me with kindness and melancholy.

One of the peaceful ones, a Steward says the Princess left the Purah Pad for me. She was here? How long ago? Is this where the light took her? The construct says she's waiting for me. I can't keep her waiting. I swore never to do that again. 

The sky darkens as I explore this island. These constructs have just... been left. They're so old. Everything they were built for is gone. I know how that feels, though they don't seem to. What does that mean for me - have I slept so long that I’ve missed the rise and fall of a civilisation? 

The Stewards’ patience touches me. Rauru's sadness at the last vestige of his people touches me. Wherever I am, it's so old. Is this what comes after Hyrule? Or… what came before? And where is Zelda?

[nolongerapileofashprobably]

Hiya, me again! I’m loving your deep dives into character and plot for BotW/TotK, so I was wondering if you might like to give me your take on something I’m ruminating on for a WIP. I’d totally welcome others pitching in too! The question is this: what do you think that an emotional “breaking point” would look like for Link during TotK? He canonically masks his emotions to an extent and seems to have a history of trauma responses that include shutting down and dissociating, but what happens when it all gets to be too much? When a friend who’s trying to be helpful or sympathetic unwittingly presses too hard into an emotional sore spot and Link - already barely holding it together with everything that’s going on - just snaps? With everything bottled up so tight, what happens if the bottle explodes at the worst possible time: while he’s in the presence of others? Does he lash out? Break down? Flee? Some combination of all those, or something else entirely? I have my ideas but I’d love to get more takes!

Oooooohhhhh hi hi hi

I LOVE character analysis study time to determine how they would behave in a fic. I think Totk Link definitely shows far more emotion than we the players get to see and I think the best part of the game in general to determine that is the chase in Hyrule Castle.

As we know, Link canonically does go mute when he’s feeling a lot of emotion. But, he shows more emotion than is let on. Buliara tells us that Link is legitimately frazzled, utterly focused on ‘Zelda’, and in a space where he may “miss a wrung” in his haste to get up to the observation deck. And as he chases Zelda down and gets to the Sanctum, his expressions change for “oh my god Zelda is right here, I can see her” to “something is off. This isn’t Zelda” as she speaks. I can’t explain it properly, but this is that final nail in the coffin that YES. Zelda is the light dragon. She is going to be forever.

That is absolutely DEVASTATING. Because we know at this point in the game, Link is AWARE that it’s not the real Zelda that’s been seen across Hyrule. But he’s still so desperate.

And after the battle with the sages coming to aid him, everyone else is speaking and Link is just kinda there until Riju addresses him. And she goes “you should come to Lookout Landing too, Link”

While from a gaming perspective, that’s the way the game points the players back to Lookout Landing and of course Link isn’t going there with everyone else, because once the cutscene ends, Link will be by himself for the player to control.

However, in this case, we could argue that this was incredibly emotionally taxing for Link and he is at a breaking point.

So I think for him, it’s a sign that he will go mute and in a sense ‘run away’. He will seek a place to be alone and not surrounded by others who expect things of him. His breakdown point is led with a trauma response of becoming selectively mute and then seeking a safe place to break down with no one around him.

It’s so unsettling because for most characters, you get that explosive reaction, the one that erupts all of their emotions to whoever pushed them a tad too far… but Link’s trauma and his own training as a soldier creates an even worse response.

He doesn’t lash out in front of people. He doesn’t even let them know what he is thinking.

For a Link who is now far more expressive than he was previously, to shut down again and be mute, completely dissociating around some of his closest companions… that’s a LOT. And it’s a lot different from a writing perspective, but I think an internal breakdown, completely oblivious to the people around him, and a steady blow up once everyone is gone or he fled the area to be alone could be very emotionally impactful!

[jq37]

The Report Card – Fantasy High: The Seven Ep 5

Through a Glass, Darkly

Welcome back to the Temple of the Earth Defiant where the girls and their magical horses (and one pony!) have found refuge from the strange, twisted, fae creatures that have been chasing them. The statue of Asha Hammerheart that Ost animated last episode is still alive and wrecking house on the remaining harpies and beasts that are foolish enough to keep fighting and the rest soon get the hint and flee. 

Ost does some healing (boosted by the ambient Hallow effect of the temple which gives everyone a short rest) and then, seeing the damage to the temple caused by erosion, starts using Mending to fix things up. Her friends help out too with Sam and Yelle being most effective--Sam by repairing water damage and Yelle by creating tree cover and other druid-y tricks. But of course, we can’t overlook Katja’s crucial addition of carving “A Horse is a Home” into one of the walls of this sacred temple. 

Anyway, the girls are nesting super hard, the horses are having their scrapbooking reviewing club (an insane thing that was established last episode) and then Sam asks a question. Did y’all mention something about a photo of me going viral? Everyone’s like yeah, but don’t worry, you looked super hot. That’s not the part Sam was worried about. What she’s worried about and what all the girls except Zelda don’t really seem to know is that Sam doesn’t really have a social media presence. So like, 180k and climbing views (as decided by a dice roll) isn’t really what she wants. She scrolls through the comments really quick and sees that they’re not awful but one person is like, “Hey that girl looks a lot like that character from that old show”. Which Sam doesn’t love. She says that she’s fine but also that, even without an Insight check, she’s obviously not. 

Sam kind of looks to Zelda to bail her out and Zelda is like, “Hey, I’m gonna delete this video.” The other girls follow suit, even though they don’t quite know what’s happening. When they have to split up to investigate, Sam has Zelda kind of bail her out again and they split up to go check a nest outside--Zelda waving off Danielle when she wants to go with. Ant and Yelle decide to check out a cache of some treasure they saw earlier and Ost and Katja stay with the horses to keep fixing the temple up. Penny initially goes with Ant and Yelle but rushes back to be with Ost and Kat when Ost discovers a hidden lock while she’s fixing a wall.

So, the girls are split up, let’s run all these scenes.

Antiope and Yelle

Ant and Yelle go see the pile of treasure (near the statue of dwarven paladin Yvonna) which they learn is like a “take a penny leave a penny” situation for weapons and items. They were left by adventures who were similarly chased here and you can take what you need as long as you leave something to help others. Like, “Oh no I only have an ice sword and I need flaming arrows.” It doesn’t have to be equivalent exchange, you just need to leave something useful.

In this space, Yelle feels a weird melancholy and like they’re within the watch of something vast and powerful. She tries to check for TK’s presence but rolls low. Antiope leaves her Kalvaxus killing shortsword and takes some really nice, white feather fledged arrows with mirror tips and an ax Kat wants as a present for her dad. Danielle takes a bandolier of potions (3 healing and 2 mystery I believe) and leaves a bunch of mushrooms. Some of them are psychedelic and Ant takes one because this is probably a good time to be high, right?

It’s not messing with her competence obviously though because she rolls a 25 on Primeval Awareness and gets a weird sense, like something is closing in on this place. And like something very powerful is bleeding, which combined with the chaos of the mountains might explain the weird harpies and the cat/dogs. But she’s high so she explains this is a very spacey, stoner way. Probably a good thing she’s with Yelle.

Sam and Zelda

Sam can fly and Zelda can basically walk vertically with her goat legs so they check out the nest. Well, ostensibly that’s what they’re doing. Really they’re just having a heart to heart. Sam thanks Zelda for saving her ass and apologizes profusely for being so short with her. Zelda gives her a huge mid-air hug and says it’s not a big deal because she knows Sam is just lashing out because she’s hurting but Sam says it’s not a good enough excuse and she’s truly sorry. It’s been her coping mechanism for so long but she doesn’t want to be that way. She tells Zelda that the Everpetals are divorcing and that she’s living alone and Zelda says that any one of the girls would be happy to have her stay with them. Sam further explains that this is a big part of the reason she’s been so broken up about the possibility of their group splitting up and Zelda immediately takes out her crystal and texts her “I’m in” in the thread, breaking Sam again. 

Since they’re in heart to heart mode, Sam tells her that she talked to her bio-mom and an agent and she’s not sure what to do. Zelda says that she’s gonna be spectacular no matter what she does and she doesn’t have to do any of them but it’s cool doors are opening for her but also Antiope and Penny are gonna be PISSED that she’s out here making side plans after she gave them so much shit for theirs. Lol, well it’s a nice moment in the meantime and we cut to…

Penny, Ost, and Katja 

While Penny is lockpicking (and also trying to teach one of the horses to lockpick because sure) Katja and Ost go talk to the statue of Asha Hammerheart. It seems to be animated with at least some level of her true consciousness from beyond the grave and that she can kind of woge into her statue when she wants, which is cool. She’s been there for like 250 years so that’s a lot of history to see. 

Ost is maybe the most polite we’ve ever seen her talking to Asha (at least to begin with lol) and they ask her about TK. Asha says she saw TK show up 12 years ago but she never left, at least not through the front door. And then about 2 years ago (right around when they were in the crystals) that’s when the harpy queen showed up. At first they were normal and then they started mutating. Also, recently, Korra (one of the other statues/heroes) saw a woman in the mountains--not TK. 

Ost then takes a page from the book of one St. Kristen Applebees and asks, “Hey. What’s the deal with our god? He never talks to us, does he just suck?” Asha--who has never talked to him even though she’s a martyred hero and literally in dwarf heaven makes some excuses for the guy but Katja scoffs at them. “If people wanna take care of you, they do.” Ost then straight up asks if Logran Soulforger is even real which sets Asha off but Ost isn’t mad AT her, she’s mad FOR her. You go and do all this cool shit to the point where you have this cool ass statue, you fully DIE for him and he doesn’t even say hi? With a 21 Persuasion check, Asha admits that yeah, she would have liked some recognition. She decides she’s gonna go do some talking to some people and leaves after getting Ost’s number but before they can ask more about the woman Korra saw (who they think is Charity). 

OK, that’s all the small group stuff! Everyone comes back as Penny finishes up with the lock and they go down into this room that’s full of polished, precious stones. This is probably where people who were upkeeping the temple stayed. While everyone else is going down, Sam feels some powerful magical pull--much like her episode 1 Lightning Lure--calling her from the top of the stairs so she goes back up. We’ll get back to her in a bit. 

Penny rolls a high check to clock what’s going on down here. First off, she finds flintlock bullets and airship uniform scraps which makes it seem like there was a battle here involving some airship guys from the Baronies. Which is not just the place of origin of Riz’s imaginary Romance Partner. It’s a cluster of nations known for high rates of monarchical turnover and renaissance style intrigue. I’m picturing just a nation of [REDACTED]s from Crown of Candy. 

With all of this stuff, Penny finds an emblem of a billionaire airship mogul named Lord Talcidimir Tallbreeze who is a friend of her dad’s. Yelle is immediately like FUCK billionaires which isn’t plot relevant but it’s nice to know she’s always on brand. 

Oh also, Penny just casually finds the Legendarium so that’s neat. 

To be safe, Ost casts Protection from Energy on Ant (who is the one who knows how to use it) and brings out her Spirit Guardian (who is a combo of her mom, nona, and Asha, with her dad’s rings). Ant checks it out and sees that there are currently no A, B, or C quests in all of Spyre. While Penny cross references the bylaws to see if there’s a way to get around this, Yelle does some druid BS that I still do not understand to use the crystals in the cave to jailbreak this super powerful magical Artifact so they can just have copies on their crystals. While that’s happening, let’s check on Sam. 

Sam goes back up the staircase where she sees Ending who doesn’t look menacing at all, just extremely sad. She’s looking out the mouth of the cave and, when she turns, Sam can see she’s crying blood. 

“What’s wrong?” asks Sam, the acid-tongued but good-hearted. “Can I help you?”

With a 25 Persuasion check to get her to talk, Ending apologizes for scaring her and her friends before. She didn’t mean to. She sometimes forgets that her very nature can be frightening and dangerous to others. She says that when she escaped, she tried to rejoin her sisters but found their mirrors shattered and them gone. Sam thought they escaped but that doesn’t make sense to Ending. If they had, why wouldn’t they have freed her as well?

Sam asks who her sisters were and we finally get true names for Ending and her sisters:

Chrona, Terra, Pyrria, Nira, Zefira, Anima, and herself, Talura (which is what I’ll be calling her now that we know). Talura is the baby, the youngest. Sam realizes she’s talking about the Eidolons and Talura seems surprised and a bit pleased that Sam recognizes them. 

Sam asks if she can hug her and Talura hugs her tightly in a very cold embrace that doesn’t hurt. Downstairs, she hears her friends (Penny specifically) freaking about about the lack of quests but she doesn’t break the hug. 

“My own sisters are struggling right now but I’m gonna stay with you because you don’t know where yours are. But maybe we can find them.”

Talura clocks that the way that Sam is being is her true nature, not the bitchiness she often uses as a shield. Then she starts to talk about her history. That she and her sisters were sealed away when the gods were done with them (Sam can relate to being used and set aside) and the only way out was death. Talura has been crying and looking for her sisters to no avail. Her tears of blood leaking seems to be what caused the monsters to mutate which is in line with what Yelle and Ant were sensing. 

Talura doesn’t think anything could have destroyed her sisters so she’s very confused. Sam offers Talura her Mirror of the Past because it almost knocked out Sam to get god-tier information but Talura presumably won’t have that problem. Talura offers her a boon in exchange for this great kindness but Sam says she doesn’t need any quid pro quo. “This is just because you’re hurting.”

Talura is supremely touched and still wants to do something for her new...friend? Sam accepts the title and says that what she needs is some help on her GED quest. Once she explains what she means, Talura again recognizes Aguefort and is like, Oh, you need a quest? I can totally help with that! As we learned earlier, these guys are kinda genie connected so it’s not super surprising when Talura very happily goes full your wish is my command.

Downstairs, a Class A quest suddenly appears in Spyre on the screen. 

Back upstairs, Talura says that it’s been too long since she got to grant a wish and seems really happy about it. Sam gives her the mirror so she can check what happened to her sisters but when she does, she totally flips out and gets super angry--not at Sam, just at whatever she’s looking at. She can hardly believe it. Sam tries to figure out what’s wrong but she just gets super big and then disappears into a puff of smoke, leaving Sam's mirror on the ground, covered in frost. 

Downstairs, the Class A quest expands across the entire globe and then the Legendarium cracks. Ost’s spirit guardian disappears because of alarm bells ringing in the afterlife. And the girls learn that a Class A quest is a quest that affects the whole MULTIVERSE. Yikes!

So anyway, they girls go upstairs to check on Sam (on a bear that Penny makes because sure) and they see that something clearly just happened with Sam. Yelle asks if she’s good and Sam is like yeahhhh I don’t think ANYONE is good right now. Sam seems like she’s about to cry and Antiope instantly forgets all the petty bullshit going on between them and rushes to make sure she’s not hurt. 

Sam gives the girls a rundown of what happened and Yelle concretely puts together what I said earlier about Talura’s tears messing with nature. 

Sam wants to check her mirror to see what Talura saw and Brennan says she can do it the safe way with risk of failure of the surefire way with risk of personal harm. She, of course, picks door 2 and rolls a 13 on her con save which means she rises into the air like Storm from X-Men, eyes wide, and then instantly passes out and goes into shock. Antiope is there to catch her as she does. 

Also, she looks SUPER hot while falling on a 31. Honestly, it’s a shame she doesn’t allow herself a social media presence. 

Anyway, we’ll get to what she sees in a bit. Yelle and Ant make sure she’s OK (she is, but the has to be knocked out for this or she won’t be able to handle it). 

Penny tells them what she knows about each Eidolon from her earlier research which is what element each goes with:

Chrona: Time (Related to astral and elemental planes) 

Terra: Earth

Pyrria: Fire

Nira: Water

Zefira: Air

Anima: Life

Talura: Death 

They also talk about TK never leaving via the front door and all this airship stuff being around. Maybe she left out the top of the mountain on an airship? Katja has the hookup with this Tal guy (she’s met him when she was younger) so they decide they need to check it out once Sam is good. 

The girls fix the Legendarium and Ost, when she goes to pray for her spells for the night, doesn’t pray to her usual god. She prays to Asha. And not only does she get her spells, she also gets a new one--Commune. 

And now let’s get to what Sam is seeing in her Vision Coma. 

She was told by Talura that the only way out of the mirrors given to them by the gods was death. And what Talura saw that drove her to do whatever multiverse threatening thing that she did was every one of her sisters walking out of their mirrors and choosing death. I will specifically highlight that the oldest sister leaves almost immediately with a small, “Oh,” of realization and Anima, the closest sister to her seems terrified before coming to a joyful realization and leaving.

And that’s the end of the episode! Join us next week when apparently there is talk of a masquerade ball?????? Brennan, you shouldn’t have!   

Superlatives 

Sam: Most Likely to Accidently Snag a Brand Deal

Did you guys ever read the Greek myth of Cupid and Psyche? Where Psyche was born so hot that it was basically a curse and she was miserable because she was so hot that Aphrodite hated her? That’s Sam. She is incapable of almost dying in a non-aesthetic way. It’s like a Pantene commercial every time. This is my favorite running gag.

Random Thoughts

Man, I have so many feelings about Sam. She’s such a BITCH in so many ways but it’s so obvious that she has a good heart. Every time she has an opportunity to be nice with no gain--helping Lola find her dog, magically turning the pages for the horses during book club, fully refusing a boon from Talura--she does. And I’m glad she gave Zelda such a sincere apology and didn’t let the extenuating circumstances absolve her because she said some pretty uncalled for things. But at her core she’s so kind and I want only good things for her. 

Also those of you who know me from my FH recaps know I’m a messy bitch for sister stuff so Talura and Sam both referring to the other maidens as her sister had me dead. You can tell when something in this show is f’ing me up when I just start directly quoting instead of paraphrasing. 

Katja being richer than Helio but having no idea what any of the brands Ost is mentioning are is peak comedy.  

As is Ant’s response to the take and penny leave a penny translation from Ost, “No, Penny didn’t come with us.”

Ost: I get service in the afterlife.

You could really tell which of the players watched Sophomore Year because the Baronies came up and all of them went into fight or flight immediately. 

Very Elsa vibes from Sam during the top of the scene with Talura. (Sam is, of course, a better sister but we simply do not have time to get into my feelings on Frozen 2 right now).

I was wondering why this season was called just “The Seven” when it dropped initially. Like, was it snappier? Did they not want to use the word “maiden”? But they still call themselves the Seven Maidens in the show so it’s probably not that. Now I’m wondering if it’s just to parallel the 7 of them w/ the 7 Eidolons. 

So it seems clear based on the reactions of the first and sixth sisters that they didn’t just “go gently into that good night” as Ant would say and ditch Talura. It seems like they figured something out. Also Brennan isn’t really a “and then they all died, the end” kind of DM, you know? Credit to my friend @camwritery for getting here before I did but the gods said the only way out was death and she is death so you know? Those def seem like puzzle pieces that go together. 

The only crit rolled this episode is a 1 by Penny which she gets to reroll as a halfling. 

[little-lemon-lattes]

The Scheme

🌛Zelda Spellman x fem! reader

—Word count: 1.9k

— Triggers: Mention of murder and burning in a non-violent context

— Summary: We have part 2 to The Set Up! You and Zelda spend a blissful day together since kissing the night before, and make the most of being together before the mortuary fills with life- and typical Spellman scheming- again!

You were on Cloud-fucking-9.

The previous evening, you and Zelda had kissed. It had been truly extraordinary, even better than the few times you had allowed your mind to indulge in that kind of imagery concerning her. You had never felt that good with anyone before; well, minding that you had neither felt for anyone like that of which you had been trying to cover for the astonishing woman.

She currently lay in the grass next to you, cheek resting tentatively on your belly, as you both just watched each other in comfortable silence. Gosh, kissing Zelda had felt SO good that it had been hard to stop at just one. Like now. Her stunningly bright and beautiful green eyes were boring into yours, but you really couldn’t tell if she was trying to send you a signal or was just unwittingly that gorgeous on the daily. Probably the latter. You also had to remind yourself that, EVEN though you two already lived under the same roof, you would take things one step at a time together. The last 24 hours with Zelda had been like a dream, and the Spellman mortuary had a new air to it now that you knew where you stood.

That morning, you had woken just before dawn (which was much earlier than you preferred), likely still on a high from the feel of Zelda’s lips. Rather than lay there attempting to force yourself back to sleep, you rose from your pillow. Perhaps it was your always-lingering insecurity pulling some strings, but it suddenly seemed desperately important to you- then and there at 4:56am- that you find a way of proving to Zelda that she hadn’t made the wrong choice opening up to you the night before. Just one more bonus of Hilda’s disappearance that weekend being that the kitchen was inevitably free, within a few minutes you had decided to make a spot of breakfast to share. You would never admit it out loud, but you were also buzzing to showcase your culinary ability; of which had been somewhat hindered by the unspoken acknowledgement that Hilda was the kitchen witch of the house.

With that, you were out of bed and clothed in a black turtleneck and mom jeans, as you put the finishing touches on a French braid: all by 5:15. THe next two hours flew by as you whipped up black coffee, almond cake, black sausage, eggs, salmon, bagels, mushroom, and tomato. You were just laying out bloody-fleshed plums and yoghurt when you heard gentle footsteps on the landing above you. Smiling softly, you stopped to admire as the woman padded down the stairs, wrapped in a silky black robe and wiping bits of sleep from her eyes. She stopped dead as she spotted the food on the table, hand still raised to her eye.

“Surprise...?” you peeped.

Zelda’s hand flopped to her side as she tilted her head adorably, treating you to a giddy smile. And you were hopeless to try not to smile right back. That there was enough to have made the last two hours worth it. “

“What’s all this, y/n?”

“I, uh... breakfast?”

Zelda couldn’t help smiling a little more at the cute way you had made it seem like a question. “I see that,” she laughed, “but why?”

You forced an expression of mock pain onto your face.

“I am hurt, Spellman, hurt! Does there have to be a reason?”

All she did was raise her eyebrows in disbelief. You supposed it was probably best to build any chance you had together on honesty.

“Okay, FINE. I just... wanted to show you that last night wasn’t a mistake, in case you were having any doubts.”

Zelda trotted, cat-like, down from her post against the railing, and came to rest just half a metre in front of you.

“Why, there was absolutely nothing of the sort. I hardly slept a wink all night; your lips have something of a memorable feel to them, if I am honest.”

And this time, it was her that closed the space between you, snaking her arms around your waist to pull you closer. One long peck later, the bubblegum-pink shade of your cheeks matched hers in perfect unison, as if in competition.

Breakfast was sweet and long, spent thigh to thigh next to each other, chatting about all the things you had been too afraid to ask each other until that point.

The rest of the day was passed laying next to one another in the winter sunshine, beneath an age-old willow tree. After what felt like just minutes since you had arrived (but had really been hours), you pointed to the sky with the hand that wasn’t clasping Zelda’s.

“Look, the sun!”

You received a lazy “hmmm” in response. Twisting to face her on your left, you couldn’t fight your sigh of content. The High Priestess was laying with her eyes closed in utter bliss, the final rays of Sunday’s sunshine dancing across those glorious lashes.

“It’s setting, Zelda. Everyone will be back soon.” you murmured to her. It was as if you had thrown a bucket of ice over her. Cloud 9 disappeared with the snapping open of her eyes. The soft expression that had occupied her visage all day visibly hardened into her more familiar, stoic one. She leapt to her feet, snatching up the open novel beside her and swinging out her hand to you with force. Time and Space closed in around you the moment you took it, and, the next thing you knew, the two of you were outside the mortuary once more.

You turned to her sharply.

“What was that about?” you demanded. Standing silent for a moment, Zelda’s ears visibly pricked. After a few more moments, she seemed appeased, and swivelled to you. Her shoulders were tense, and you took note of her fingernails digging into her palm.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered, “I didn’t mean to be so abrupt. I just... I am enthused about where you and I are headed, y/n, and I’m terrified that others may not share my enthusiasm. I want to enjoy things as they are at present for a while longer, before having to think about who needs to be involved in our business.”

It was understandable, you supposed, and admittedly: there was a certain appeal to keeping things 007-style, like that fantastic mortal film. You relaxed a bit, and instantly felt awful for raising your voice at her.

You reached for the woman’s shoulder.

“You’re right, Zelds. I understand.”

She looked unconvinced.

“Are you sure? You have every right to want to murder me right now, if you so wished. Although, only if you were to bury me in the Cain pit...” she added as an afterthought.

You had to giggle at that one.

“You’re safe for now, Zelda,” you teased, “now, come on! I need to find a good hiding spot for scaring the BANSHEES out of them when they get back!”

Hilda, Sabrina, and Ambrose literally stomped their feet in sheer disappointment when they arrived back at the house and hadn’t caught the pair of you locked in some form of intimate embrace.

“Aw man! What will I tell my friends?! I had Roz totally excited about y/n finally getting some action... Like, she seriously admitted that she had this big crush on her when she first met her; whiiiiich definitely earned a few looks from Harvey, to say the least. The take-away from it all is that we now know exactly how fragile that guy’s ego is, YIKES, is all I can say.”

All the while, Ambrose was muttering a consistent string of “fuck”s under his breath, and Hilda was deciding whether to scald Sabrina’s ass to Hades and back.

“Sabrina!” her aunt admonished in disbelief, “how could you be so careless?! If any of this gets back to your aunt Zelda, we should consider ourselves excommunicated from her presence for good!”  

All of them fought a cringe. Sabrina looked a bit sheepish.

Hilda turned to Ambrose.

“And what about you, mister? What’s with the constant profanities?”

Ambrose took a step back from his aunt, nobody was sure whether consciously or not. “Erm...hm. Yes. Well. I-” his sputtering was resembling a car trying to start up. Ambrose’s eyes suddenly seemed unable to reach past the witches’ knees.

  “-um. Damn. Hecate, yes, I have... just lost a particularly large sum of money to one Dorian Gray.”

Hilda’s eyes were ready to pop out of her head.   “I was so unequivocally certain that our plan would work! Now where I am supposed to come up with $1000?!”

He was a little manic. The only one of the three who seemed somewhat happy about Ambrose’s situation was Sabrina, sticking a finger at him. “HA! Now that makes what I did so much better!”

Her plum-coloured lips parted with glee, and without warning, her and her travel bag had disappeared. Ambrose made a furious mental note to pour formaldehyde in her evening tea for leaving him here alone. When he had finally built up the courage to look his otherwise cheery aunt in the eyes again, a flash of fear struck him at the murderous look in hers. A low growl exited her throat.

“Well,” she snapped, “I suppose there will be no more silly little attempts on our part to play Cupid.”

As quickly as it had started, her anger dissipated, and was replaced by a certain sadness. Her mouth raised just a fraction, into a tired little smile.

“ ’just thought that Zelds could do with something nice for once. We failed. It didn’t work.”

With that, she picked up her carpet bag and shuffled off up the stairs. Ambrose watched her go, now a lone silhouette in the entrance of their home.

Or so he thought. You waited until Ambrose had moodily trudged down to the embalming room before emerging from your spot in the broom closet. Sniffling a little from all the dust- those things hadn’t been flown for years, SO old fashioned- you felt a mix of emotion at what you had just heard. You hadn’t intended on becoming an audience to some type of scheme, and especially not one of which involved you.

At first, there was embarrassment. You hadn’t realised that your feelings were apparently so obvious! Paired with the fact that Zelda’s must have been too in order to warrant such a matchmaking scheme; along with that you had truly thought that you had done a superb job at keeping it all under wraps, you were left feeling a bit stupid. But then came the funny side of it all, imagining Hilda, Ambrose, and Sabrina sneaking about like the Pink Panther and holding secret meetings about your love life. And finally came the warmth, the realisation of exactly how much the Spellmans had grown to care for you- so much that they trusted you to love Zelda as much as they did.

The whole situation was entirely too much of an opportunity to just leave alone. Grinning with total delight and schemes cooking of your own, you rematerialised in Zelda’s study at the Academy. The loud CRACK that accompanied that particular piece of magic made the woman flinch. Her brow crinkled at the sight of you in front of her great oaken desk. She was a little taken aback, and (it delighted you even more) flustered to see you there.

“Y/n?”

“Zelda. I NEED to tell you what I just heard!”

A game was now afoot.

And your opponents weren’t finished yet either.

[valhallanrose]

What Baking Can Do

@arcana-echoes​

Mixed together the ‘Holidays’ and ‘Cuisine’ prompts for a bit of pre-holiday fluff between my sibling duo, Zelda and Tamryn. I hope you enjoy!

2.4k words

For as long as she could remember, Zelda had always found a certain comfort in food. Especially making it - somehow, it was the first thing she completed on her own after she lost her memories, entirely without Asra’s help, and it felt...so natural, like she’d connected with a part of herself that she didn’t know was there. 

She supposed that’s why it felt so fitting that much of her reconnection with Tamryn revolved around food. 

One of the first things he’d given her, when they both started to get comfortable with one another, was their family’s box of recipe cards. They were yellowing, edges worn and some of them stained, but she nearly cried at the aching familiarity of the swooping handwriting on each and every one of them even if she still couldn’t remember Evalina’s face. 

So every week, at the end of the week, Tamryn came to her home, and they picked another card - making dinner or dessert as he quietly told her anything he could think of from the life they’d shared together as children. 

That was how they ended up at her kitchen counter that night, jostling and ribbing each other as they did their dishes, laughing together as if they’d never been apart for a moment in time. 

Tamryn cracked his knuckles as he put the last plate away, listening as Zelda rummaged around in the cabinets for the newly treasured box

“You didn’t lose it, did you, Zelly?”

“No, I didn’t lose it, I just put it somewhere safe.” 

“Behind what sounds like an armada of pots and pans doesn’t feel ‘safe’.” 

“Yeah, well, who’s going to look back there without making a ton of noise? Natural security system.”

Tamryn quirked a brow in her direction, his lips pulling up into a grin. “You have an actual safe, don’t you?”

Zelda paused for a moment before she blew a raspberry at him, pulling out the box in question. “Don’t make me get the spoon.”

Tamryn laughed at that, raising his arms to pull his hair up into a little bun when Zelda passed him a tie. “You sound just like mom. She used to wave this old wooden one at us both when we stole bits of food while she was making dinner. ‘You act like you’ve never been fed’, she’d say, but then she’d slip us a spoonful of batter or a bite of cookie dough while dad wasn’t looking while he was baking.”

“Did dad say anything about it?” Zelda flipped through the recipe cards as Tamryn scoffed, shaking his head with a grin before he reached for her hair. 

“No, he’d slip us another and tell us not to tell mom. Which we never did, but I’m pretty sure they knew and just let us have it. Tie?”

She passed him one off her wrist, and he started to braid her hair back, the tie in question caught between his teeth. Zelda hummed idly as she read off a few recipes for him, most of them rejected by one of them for not being what they were in the mood for. It was only when Zelda paused at one to try and read the name on the card that Tamryn spoke up, setting his chin on her head and giving her braid a tug. 

“I can hear the gears in your head turning. Which one is that?”

“Suf...sufganiyot? Is that right?”

“Yeah, you got it. Mom and dad used to make those at Hanukkah...I haven’t had them in ages. I’d be willing to give those a shot.”

After taking a few minutes to read over the card, Zelda eventually nodded, shutting the box and pushing it to the back of the counter. “Okay...yeah, I think I’ve got all the ingredients here. I’m not sure if I have enough jam but we could maybe do half with it and half with chocolate?”

Tamryn groaned, laughing as he stepped back and ruffled Zelda’s hair. “Yes, fine, you and your chocolate sufganiyot. I still believe jam is better.”

“You’re entitled to your wrong opinion, but chocolate will always be better than jam in any context. Now shush and get my mixing bowl since you can reach it without climbing on the counter.”

*     *     *     *     *

The process of making the dough was easy enough - though the yeast took an extra try or two to get right, much to Zelda’s chagrin - though she got Tamryn back for his teasing by making him do the kneading when it came down to it. It gave her the space to think, seated on the counter next to him and her legs swinging idly in the air in front of her. 

“You said mom and dad made these for Hanukkah?”

Tamryn nodded, gaze loosely fallen on the light beaming in through the window as he kneaded. “Every year. I haven’t told you about Hanukkah, have I?”

“I know a little from the books I’ve found - the one day’s oil supply lasting eight days, lighting the candles in the hanukkiah...a lot of latke recipes. Why are there so many ways to eat potato pancakes?”

“Mom always explained it as a symbol of the oil - that’s why the sufganiyot and latkes are cooked in it as well.” Tamryn chuckled, elbowing her playfully as he worked. “You and I used to bicker about what was better to put on latkes. Mom always gave you applesauce because you hated sour cream. You had to have been six years old the first time you tried sour cream on them, and you scrunched your nose up so much that dad told you it was going to get stuck like that.”

Zelda snorted, leaning back to rest her head against the cabinets. “I still don’t like sour cream.”

“A couple years ago, mom showed me how she and dad used to eat them - smoked salmon, sour cream, and a bit of dill. It’s actually quite good, if you want to try it one day.”

“I’d literally rather die than eat sour cream.”

The blonde barked out a laugh, shaking his head and blowing a few pieces of hair out of his face as they tickled his lashes. “Yeah, I don’t think that would have changed much from when you were a kid.”

He was quiet for a moment, expression pensive, before Zelda reached out and gently tugged his sleeve. 

“Tam? Are you alright?”

Tamryn blinked a few times before he paused mid knead, reaching out to pat her hand lightly where it rested on her arm. “I’m fine. Sorry, just...it’s weird, thinking about the holidays now. I haven’t really celebrated any of them since mom died. It didn’t feel right being alone, like…”

“...like everything that made it special was missing?” Zelda finished, and Tamryn nodded slowly, sighing as Zelda leaned in to rest her head on his shoulder. “Tell me about what it was like for us, Tam. When we were all together.”

She waited for a few long moments, patient as she stepped in when Tamryn was finished kneading, rolling the dough out as he gathered his thoughts and rummaged through her cabinets for a wide enough glass. 

“We traveled a lot, so we didn’t always go to service during Hanukkah.” He began, the two of them cutting circles in the dough with the tops of a set of wine glasses he’d found somewhere. “But I remember mom would always make way more food than we could eat throughout the entire eight days and ended up giving leftovers away after Hanukkah ended. Usually to her colleagues, when she went to work, but eventually we both just became latke fiends as we got older and leftovers just became breakfast for as long as we had them. Sufganiyot were never around for more than three days, so dad always made another batch during Hanukkah and another at the end because he’d end up promising some to his friends and realizing he didn’t have any left. Which, by the way, he agreed with you that chocolate was better than jam in them.”

Zelda grinned as she placed a piece of chocolate inside one of the rounds, sandwiching it together with another as Tamryn prepped the oil. “It’s because we have good taste.” 

“Mm, no, not in the slightest.” Tamryn laughed as Zelda elbowed his side, joining her in filling some of the sufganiyot with the raspberry jam in question. “We used to sit on the kitchen floor and play with the dreidel while dad was making the second batch. You were so competitive, but you ended up eating some of the chocolate gelt as soon as you got it, and by the time one of us won the pot we’d only have half of what we even started with in the first place. Not that I minded, we’d end up sharing anyway because I didn’t like them nearly as much as you did when I won. And I remember…”

Tamryn paused for a moment, swearing softly as he squeezed some of the jelly out of the dough he’d been pinching together and all over his hands. Zelda slapped a hand over her mouth as she tried to stifle her laugh, helping him clean up before he tried to refill the pastry itself. 

“Where was I? Oh, right. Mom and dad used to let me light the candles each night, but there was one year you wanted to help - I was eleven, so you couldn’t have been more than five years old - but you were too afraid of the candles to light it on your own. So I used to pick you up and show you how to light them, every night, and we just never stopped. Eventually you got too big for me to hold you like that, but we always insisted we lit them together, even if it made it harder. I think we only stopped because we nearly set the curtains on fire one year and mom told us we had to alternate nights.”

Zelda laughed, shaking her head slightly as she dropped the first of the sufganiyot into the sizzling oil. “From what you’ve told me, singed curtains seem...unfortunately in character.”

“Oh, we were hellions.” Tamryn snickered, folding his arms across his chest. “Dad used to tell us that a bull in a china shop would be impressed by the amount of damage we caused in the house. It got to a point where we had to play outside because we’d knocked too many vases or knick knacks of his over from tumbling into every surface that wasn’t nailed to the wall or floor.”

The blond hissed quietly as he juggled a hot sufganiyah, rolling it in sugar, and grinning as he poked at it with the tip of his nail. 

“Hey, these feel like dad’s! Hopefully they taste as good, too, he always was tweaking recipes. Never seemed to write them down either.”

“Oh, that drives Asra up a wall.” Zelda chuckled. “Aisha and I cook together sometimes, but we both adjust as we go, and whenever he tries to help he can’t rely on the cards we have.”

“Like father, like daughter.” Tamryn snorted, and the pair fell into a steady rhythm, Zelda assuring the sufganiyot cooked properly and Tamryn finishing them off with their sugar dusting. By the time they finished the batch, the sun had long since set, leaving them cleaning up and chatting idly in the comfortable warmth of the lights strung up around the kitchen. It was only while they were drying everything that Tamryn reached out, gently grasping Zelda’s arm to get her attention. When she turned her attention toward him, Tamryn released her, instead offering his open palms to her as he spoke. 

“Zel, I want to celebrate again this year. With you, like we used to. I know you haven’t in a long time, and it won’t be exactly the same, but...I miss it. And I know I’ll have to teach you the specifics, I don’t mind.” Tamryn felt Zelda set her hand in his and gave hers a squeeze, a light smile on his face. “But only if you want to. I know it’s been a lot to learn, and Hanukkah is fairly tame, so...I thought it’d be a good place to start since it’s coming up.”

Zelda beamed at that, throwing her arms around her brother’s shoulders and giving him a squeeze. 

“More than anything, Tam.” She murmured, planting a cheerful kiss on his cheek. “I’d love to celebrate again. Maybe we can invite some of my friends, too? It won’t be the same as having mom and dad, I know, but…”

“Found family is still family, Zelda.” Tamryn reached out and plucked up a sufganiyah, taking a bite out of it over her head and talking through the mouthful of dough. “Oh, shit, these really are like dad’s. We should make these again for Hanukkah.”

With a sound of indignation, Zelda shoved against his stomach, groaning as he squeezed her closer. “If you get jelly in my hair, you won’t make it to Hanukkah, now let me go so I can taste how much better the chocolate one is than the jam.”

“It’s not going to be.” Tamryn sang playfully, and Zelda rolled her eyes, 

“We’ll have Asra taste them when he gets back. He can be the tie breaker.”

“Given that he eats skink, and you two are dating, I’m not sure that’s a fair judgment call.”

“Why do you think I’m suggesting it?”

Tamryn laughed again, wrapping an arm around Zelda and giving her a playful squeeze as she too took a bite of her sufganiyah - 

Only to groan in dismay and cause an outburst of laughter as she realized she’d gotten one full of jam, not the chocolate she’d expected - but she couldn’t seem to mind as she looked up at the brilliant, bright smile on her brother’s face, and couldn’t help but feel like she’d found that something that’d been missing all this time. 

[avinrydarchive]

Silent Princess

Author: AvinRyd Fandom: The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild Rating: G Pairing: Link/Zelda Word Count: ~1700

He’s studying, studying me. “What’s wrong?”

“Twenty-three.” He says eventually, that quizzical frown only deepening. An enigmatical answer.

“I’m sorry?”

He sighs. Blue floods my vision as he truly meets my gaze once again. “The number of words you’ve said, to anyone, in the past two weeks since we left Kakariko. Twenty-three."

--

Because the Silent Princess is a rare flower, indeed.

Read on AO3: link

I’ve always thought evenings in the wilds of Hyrule are more beautiful than words could ever express, and tonight is no different. To attempt to describe… Oh, where to begin? Though the sun has not yet fallen, the grotto in which we’ve made camp is cooling quickly. What’s left of the day’s light catches on Akkala’s rough cliffs and bluffs all around, highlighting them in pinks and golds. The wind is chill on my skin, but the fire before me is warmth and light; to my right is another such light. Firelight picks out strands of gold in Link’s tawny hair as he’s bent over something in his lap. I can see a glint of steel. Peeling apples for dinner, it seems. His focus is admirable; I myself can’t seem to keep my mind on any one thing for more than a few minutes.

The pastels of sunset have drained from the sky, leaving dregs of grey in their wake. Slowly, slowly, the dark of night rolls in with it’s sprinkling of stars. The campfire pops and spits to send it’s sparks up to join those silver gleams. I’m drifting. With every star that appears, an instance of a century passes my mind. Connected to every breath of life, every blade of grass, I remember. The veil of Hylia’s mantle lifts and I hear a child brought, screaming, into the world. I feel moss creep over ruined towns. I smell the earth of fresh-tilled fields and fresh-dug graves. I see-

“Zelda?”

I see champion-blue eyes, far closer than expected. Reality snaps back around me, juttering and spinning, and I have to anchor my sight on Link’s face, my perception of the warmth of him suddenly inches away. I don’t move, can’t move with the world still slotting back into place.

“Hmm?” I manage in reply. His mouth twists and his brows draw together in an expression I know well. He’s studying, studying me. “What’s wrong?”

“Twenty-three.” He says eventually, that quizzical frown only deepening. An enigmatical answer.

“I’m sorry?”

He sighs. Blue floods my vision as he truly meets my gaze once again. “The number of words you’ve said, to anyone, in the past two weeks since we left Kakariko. Twenty-three. That’s including your formalities with the Zora royal family. Are you-” His voice seems to balk, rebellious, but he presses on, “Forgive me, princess, but I’m concerned. I’ve never known you to be so...quiet.”

Replies build up in my throat: ‘Where do you get off picking at my silence, what with your own reticence with words?’(Even if he’s been more talkative than I’ve ever heard since the Calamity’s defeat.) ‘You haven’t known me for a century.’ ‘You’ve been counting?’ ‘This isn’t a matter of my safety, why should you be concerned?’ They stack and press, unable to escape, building pressure in my throat and they won’t leave.

“I- That is-” I stammer. I’m choking on words, on thoughts, and it hurts. Cool air rushes into my lungs and I try to focus on it, on anything but the powerless feelings within and the dark encroaching on my vision from without.

Breath, still such a novel sensation after a century of immaterial existence. Its noise, its gentle force, the tidal push and pull, they press back the dark and the fear. Head cleared, if only a little, I gather my thoughts. Link is right, of course. Since my ill-considered question of his memories, I haven’t spoken more than a few words to my knight. That’s not to say we don’t communicate; catching of eyes, brushes of touch, a nod or facial expression in response to whatever he’s said, all have kept us together these few weeks of travel and survey. I know my silence is out of character, truly I do. It’s just- The words won’t come. Even now, I reach for them and they slip away. Perhaps if I try to work through this aloud? If not reassurance, it will give him context for my silence.

“Link,” I start, hearing my voice for what it now is: rusty and strained from disuse. “I did not mean to alarm you. The fact of the matter is I haven’t had a spoken conversation with anyone for nearly a century. My years of containing the Calamity- Hylia and I existed together in a realm of thought and possibility. My body in stasis, my mind strung together with Her’s, there was little need to speak with words.

“Early on, I couldn’t bear it, having my unfiltered thoughts visible to anyone, even a Goddess. I spoke, I screamed, I raged, and the Calamity...he drank it in. And once I’d run myself ragged, my words were turned back upon me and I couldn’t- I had to stop. For years, decades, I cloaked myself in Hylia’s protection where he could not reach me with my own vitriol. I spoke only as a distraction after that. The Calamity would set his sights on a gathering of life, on your resting place, on the Champions yet resting in their patience, and I would gather his attention back with a witty jab or affected cry of despair. Towards the end, I confess, it wasn’t so affected…

“His wrath was- Link, I can’t even describe it. Even though he’s gone, I can feel it. He’s right there, behind me around me above me, and if I keep talking he’ll be-” My breath is coming in shallow; I feel my eyes widening as black creeps into my view of clenched hands upon my knees. “He’ll- I can’t, I can’t- ”

That horrible pressure is building once again, air barely whistling past the huge lump in my throat, but I have to continue. He needs to understand, needs to know. The world is spinning around me, chaos and noise again, just like the castle but there’s no golden mantle to wrap myself in this time. My lips stammer but can no longer form the words. Ice floods the pit of my stomach, spreads, and I shiver violently. It’s so cold and I’m still a failure and-

The softest of touches stills my runaway mouth. A firm grasp encircles my wrist in warmth. Drowning out the static is a low rumble of sound in my ears, comforting and husky and unmistakably Link. His touch, voice, the scent of him so near mixed with the campfire smoke; even my fear-addled mind can’t drown them out. I latch onto the reprieve desperately, even as I attempt once more to speak in thanks.

“Hush, shhhh,” Link shushes me, his finger on my lips pressing just the slightest bit, “I’m sorry. You’re alright, you can stop.”

He continues in that vein and it all blends together in a protective cocoon about me. Safe, safe, safe. My breathing slows, deepens; the tightness around my windpipe eases; the darkness I see is just the black behind my eyelids and my mind begins to settle. The finger against my lips moves, tracing a sparkling path of sensation up the line of my jaw and his hand sinks into my hair, cupped at the base of my skull. He leans in until our noses brush, foreheads pressed together, and I open my eyes.

He is very close, so close his eyelashes almost brush my cheeks when he blinks. I have long envied those lashes, contributing to that understated beauty he has that I couldn't match if I tried. In my secret romantic imaginings before the Calamity, this was the point where Link would tilt his head just slightly and catch my lips in a kiss. Not now, though. Now he is just close, sharing space as easily as the breaths we share. Our gazes catch and hold for a long moment. When he finally speaks it’s in that same soft, low tone, but with the suggestion of steel behind it.

“Zelda,” he says, “thank you for telling me, but I never, ever want you to feel like you have to speak when the words won’t come. Not to me. I get it, I understand. Maybe not about the Calamity, but the fear of having your words stolen away to hurt you later? Every word of mine is a double-edged sword and I trust very few to have my back so armed.”

The grip about my wrist slackens as his hand moves to clasp my own, small and soft compared to his swordsman’s grip. He brings our twined hands up to press my knuckles to his lips in a gesture that has my breath catching hard for an entirely different reason than before, and as I try to contain my gasp he murmurs into my skin,

“However you need to talk, I’ll find a way to listen,” and he breaks away just enough to bring his mouth from our hands to my brow, his kiss a firm pressure as he holds me close and I try not to cry. I fail in that endeavor, but it feels less miserable than most failures as hot tears spill across my face.

We stay that way for what could be another hundred years. Just as the last age, time passes in a blur of feeling; though this time it is wonder, not terror. The Akkalan night grows colder around us and I shiver, unintentionally breaking the spell. Link barely moves when he reaches for the hood lying beside me, but it’s far enough that my hand tightens spasmodically around his. He grins at that and in the firelight it’s hard to tell, but I think I see his cheeks pink, just a little. In a deft movement, he drapes the hood about my shoulders with one hand, hearth-spun Hylian cloth chasing away the chill.  

I bring up my free hand to scrub the last of the tears from my face, but he catches it mid-way. I feel a curious noise leave me, but he says nothing, just takes both of my hands and begins to move them, place them in a manner that’s somewhat familiar. It’s- yes, it’s the hand-signs I often saw him use when conversing with Urbosa and Mipha back in our old lives. His eyes come up to meet mine, green to blue.

“Sometimes this is easier.” He says, simply.

And, as I find through the next hour before we curl up to sleep, (in the same bedroll tonight,) it is.

[princelesbian]

Sidlink Fic: Connecting Chapter 5

Ao3

Chapter 1 // Chapter 2 // Chapter 3 // Chapter 4 // Chapter 5

    “And… There.” Zelda stepped back from Vah Rudania’s control panel, wiping her hands on the front of her blouse. “We simply need to record what switch does what, and then we can work on smoothing it’s movement.” She pulled a notepad out of her back pocket, jotting something down with a charcoal stub as she spoke.

    “Thanks, Princess. It’s still a little embarrassing that I’m the last to figure out how to work this thing, but I really appreciate your help.” Daruk smiled, sheepish. He stood behind the Princess, peering over her shoulder and down at the blinking controls. She flipped the book shut and turned, tucking the materials safely away.

   “Oh, it is no trouble at all. I rather enjoy being able to study the Divine Beasts closely and learning how to control them myself.” Zelda unhooked the Sheikah Slate from her hip, prodding at the terminal information screen.

    “So Princess, how’s the little guy?” Daruk leaned back against the wall, and scratched at the white scruff of his beard. Zelda’s fingers paused.

   “Finally away from me, for the moment.” She huffed, not looking up. She had sent her knight inside Rudania to fetch some trivial items that she had demanded. He would take his time in order to give her space, he was at least that considerate. “He is so infuriating, I swear.”

   “Oh, well he’s not so bad if you got to know him.” The Goron Champion raised a brow curiously at the princess, watching her jab at the screen with too much force. She snapped up, brows furrowed and frowning.

   “How can you stand him? He is just so… Ugh!”

    “I was under the impression he was quite the charmer!” Daruk gave a sudden hearty laugh, pushing up from the wall and grinning.

   “Oh yes, I am quite aware. All the maids in the castle can talk about is how ‘handsome’ and ‘brave’ he is. I for one, do not see it.” She glowered, rehooking the Sheikah Slate to her belt and folding her arms across her chest defiantly.

    “You’ll see in time, Princess. Our Link is a real catch.” Daruk winked, wiggling his eyebrows. Zelda stared at him, unamusement etched on her features.

    “And what is that supposed to mean? He rarely even speaks, there is nothing charming about that!” She snapped, fuming.

   “It makes him seem mysterious, women like that kind of thing. You think you’d know that, Princess.” Daruk shrugged.

    “Men are not my objective.” The Princess nearly spat in irritation.

   “Anyways, he’s also just an all around nice guy. Everyone loves him, even our own Mipha! Too bad the poor kid is too dense to see it, she’s a real catch too.” The Goron laughed. “Get it? Catch?”

   Zelda rolled her eyes, but smiled a bit at the comment still. “I will agree with you on one thing however, Hylia help him that boy is oblivious to everything. I would be surprised if he knew what even he was thinking or feeling half of the time.” She turned her attention back to Vah Rudania’s controls. “Lady Mipha must know him the best out of all of us. I wonder, I could ask her about him sometime…” The Princess trailed, pursing her lips. Daruk shook his head hopelessly, smiling to himself.

    Zelda only bristled again when she heard Link climbing up and out of Rudania. She let out a long and irritated groan.

    ~*~*~

    “Would someone mind explaining exactly what is going on?” Zelda’s hands were placed on her hips, and she tapped her foot impatiently. Link’s gaze was cast to the floor, his hands folded neatly in his lap despite the disarray of his mussed hair and hastily thrown on tunic. He sat unmoving and unspeaking on the bed of his given room, the Princess having been brought to the quarters by her immediate demand after greeting the King. Sidon stood aside, close to Link yet with a posture of marble with the presence of the Hylian Princess. Sidon gazed upon the room warily, the tension the Princess caused nearly suffocating. He cleared his throat, and Zelda snapped her attention the Prince.

    “Princess Zelda, if you would-” Sidon began, and trailed weakly as Link shook his head, holding a hand up and signalling him to stop. The Princess’ frown deepened, and she turned back towards Link.

    “I asked you to do something very simple, Link. You were instructed to deliver a letter, something that should have taken a week at most. I had been so worried that something terrible had happened! You could have been hurt or lost! I did not know what to think when the Zora guardsmen came instead of you, but I feared the worst!” Zelda jabbed out an accusing finger, and began to pace as she spoke. Link pursed his lips, desperately ignoring the guilt that pooled in the pit of his stomach at the Princess’ rant.

    “I’m sorry, I didn’t think of it that way.” He looked up at her, begging. Zelda shot him a fiery look.

    “You did not think at all, and that is what got us into this mess in the first place! I do not want your apologies, I want to know why you had not just waited for me to find the proper documentation as we had planned!” She fumed, seemingly talking to herself as she paced back and forth in the enclosed space. Sidon from aside looked between the pair helplessly. Link’s expression was distraught and pleading, and Zelda’s was drawn crossly. He bit his lower lip, and shuffled a bit looking down. He felt awful, truly, but he knew it wasn't his place to interject further. The Zora prince hadn't expected the Princess to lash out as such, perhaps he had hoped that she would simply be happy for the arrangement. Perhaps he’d been too caught up in the engagement to realize that maybe she would find the necessary documents and they wouldn’t even need an arranged marriage. And perhaps he was reluctant to call off the marriage, as a quiet defensiveness blossomed in his chest at the Princess’ rampant speech.

    Zelda paused in her pacing, and deflated. “I apologize, your Highness, I had not wished for you to see me like this. May I have a moment alone with Link? I would like to speak with him privately.” She bowed her head, hands folded across her skirt. She seemed almost embarrassed with her own lashing, unfit for royalty. Sidon blinked at the sudden change in demeanor, having missed the tail end of her ramblings in his own musing. Which may have been for the better, as Link seemed more crestfallen than ever. The Prince breathed sharply at the sight, Link of all people like a dog with his tail between his legs. He swallowed thickly.

    “Of course, Princess Zelda. I will have breakfast arranged post-haste, then.” He said with a curt nod. Folding his hands behind his back he threw a final mournful glance to link, who gave a tiny hopeful smile. Sidon turned to the door, frowning. What did that mean? He shook his head and left, the tension following him as he went.

    From inside, Zelda watched the ornate door click shut. She turned back to Link, a hand resting on the embroidered skirt of her hip.

    “Link, look at me.” She spoke softly, her posture more relaxed. The Hylian Champion looked up warily, a nervous smile on his lips. He remained silent, and blinked up at the Princess.

    “What is this, truly? You have already defeated Calamity Ganon, you do not need to be the hero again. Impa and I discovered the relations paperwork that had been stored deep within the castle. It is not in ideal conditions after the shelves were buried in soot for one hundred years, but the signatures are legible. Once I present it to the council this marriage of convenience will not be necessary and you can return to Kakariko with me and begin rebuilding Castle Town to a habitable state. You are not required to save the kingdom this time, Link. Wouldn't it be nice to just settle down and stop being the hero for once? I do not even expect you to wield another sword as long as you live if that is how you wish it.” Zelda spoke, resting a gentle hand over Link’s shoulder. He bit his lower lip and looked away. It should have been the solution he wanted, he should want to allow Prince Sidon to marry for love, to gift the elegant choker to a more worthy suitor. He didn't, though. The mere thought of someone else wearing the sapphire made his fingers itch to fasten the silver piece around his neck and a defensive fire to rise in his belly.

    “Are you sure?” Link asked quickly, in a quiet voice. Zelda quirked her brow.

    “Am I sure of what?” She drew her hand away, eying the Hero suspiciously. Link pressed his lips together firmly, frowning under the scrutinization.

    “The documents, are you sure they're all properly dated and… signed?” He gave weakly with a shrug, his eyes downcast.

    “What? Did you not listen to a word I said? Of course I made sure the papers were applicable and credible. I double checked, triple checked even.” Zelda furrowed her brows, overlooking the embarrassed red tinge to the tips of the Hylian Champion’s ears. He scratched the back of his head, nervousness and desperation creeping up.

    “I don’t doubt that, but this is all really sudden…” He trailed. Zelda’s eyes widened with apall, and she snapped her mouth shut. Link tried to sink further into the bed to save himself from the Princess’ wrath he had incurred. He wished that he had prepared more for her arrival. Although he shouldn't have anticipated a different reaction, he hadn’t expected her to actually find the solution she needed to desist the need for marriage, by sheer willpower too no doubt. He fidgeted under her steadfast gaze, and found himself longing for the comforting presence of the Zora prince. He noticed himself quickly becoming dependant on the Prince’s security, at his side nearly constant for weeks. The Princess sucked in an intake of breath sharply between her teeth, and Link braced himself.

    “Sudden? You wish to speak of sudden? I am not sure if you recall, but I did mention the guards on my doorstep with no warning did I not? I was terrified for you! Do not speak to me of sudden!” She glared fiercely.

    “I said I was sorry, he didn’t want me to leave to escort you myself. Not with the marriage and courting.” Link held his palms out in weak defense. He truly did feel bad for scaring the Princess, still.

    “Oh, of course he did. And for a marriage that is entirely unnecessary and could have been prevented if you had waited rather than insisting on jumping into things without thinking. A marriage that can and will still be prevented if I have anything to say about it.” She nearly growled. “It will be okay, I will fix this.”

    “Isn’t it a little too early for politics?” Link asked, and flicked his gaze to the side away for a moment when the Princess shot him a look. “I mean, I just woke up and I’m sure you’re tired from your journey as well. Why don’t we talk about this later? I’m absolutely starving.” He added quickly with a short and nervous laugh. Zelda frowned for a moment and sighed.

    “Do not think I am done with this conversation, Link.” She jabbed her finger in his direction. He shrugged, and the Princess rolled her eyes. “I will meet you down there once you are dressed, just please do not take too long.” She shook her head, not waiting for an answer before slipping out of the room with a soft click of the door.

    Link sat still for a moment, and released a shuddering sigh. He would need to find a way to keep Zelda from calling off the wedding, and find out why he wanted it still in the first place.

    He grabbed immediately for the Silverscale necklace from the bedside table as he stood, running his fingers over the smooth and intricate details before clasping it around his neck with clumsy fingers, much too accustomed to Sidon’s assistance.

    ~*~*~

    The Princess looked down at her meal with distaste, wrinkling her nose a bit at the foul smelling mixture of ocean water and reek that could only describe seafood. It was a simple and light breakfast as the Zoras were accustomed to, of sticky rice balls wrapped in nori and covered in thin slices of raw voltfin. She held her breath. With a slight cough sounding from the opposite end of the table to attain her attention, she redirected her bitterness towards the fish to the pair across from her.

    The three of them sat silently in the dining hall, looking between each other as if debating who would speak first. Sidon folded his hands together

    “I must apologize, Princess Zelda. I was unsure of when to expect your arrival, and as such there was very little time to prepare a proper meal. I do hope it is to your liking, however.” He spoke with an icy politeness, bowing forward slightly. Zelda looked at him, his back straight and his chin high in a seemingly vain manner, and back to her dish.

    “It is fish. Again.” She said dully. Sidon blinked, curious. Link cleared his throat.

    “I am sorry Princess Zelda. I was not under the impression that you did not like fish?” Sidon said, shooting a look towards Link who gave a small helpless smile. The Hylian Champion shrugged and began picking at his own rice and fish, avoiding involving himself with either of the royals at the table as to not choose sides.

    “I am not looking forward to living solely off of seafood for however long I say.” Zelda pursed her lips, poking the meal with her fork. She took a small bite of the rice.

    “And just how long are you planning to stay, your Highness?” Sidon asked carefully. Zelda’s fork paused in the center of the riceball, and she frowned.

    “If things go as planned then only a few days.” She said. Link’s eyes were downcast as Sidon looked over at him quickly and with worry. The Hylian champion moved the rice and voltfin around his dish, not really eating it. Sidon pursed his lips, and turned his attention back to the Princess.

    “Are you planning to leave before the wedding?” He asked with a nervous smile, his voice breaking from the formal tone and losing hold of his voice. Zelda scrunched her nose.

    “If I have any say, this mess will be sorted as soon as possible and there will be no wedding to speak of.” She said matter-of-factly, crossing her arms over her chest. Sidon frowned, gazing back to Link who had buried himself in his meal. Sidon did the same, quietly.

    The minutes in silence ticked on, a stifling stillness hanging heavily over the dining hall. As the quiet became unbearable, Sidon looked around the table Link had since given up on prodding at his meal, and Zelda barely touched hers in the first place. She sat still with her arms folded.

    The Zora prince pushed away from the table, standing abruptly.

    “Ah, well thank you both for joining me to breakfast, it has been an honor Princess Zelda.” He clasped his hands together, bowing. “But if you will excuse me, I have duties to attend to this morning.” He said quickly, attempting to remain formal as confusion of the whole ordeal swept through his mind. He looked back at Link briefly, whose eyes reflected his own worry. Briskly, he turned and left down out the stone doors and down the hallway before either of the Hylians could say a word.

    Zelda rolled her eyes, sighing. She sat up straighter in her chair.

    “Dear Hylia, he is so pompous.” She shook her head. Link furrowed his brows.

    “You know, if you only got to...” He began, but trailed off as the Princess’ eyes widened, and she reached across the table to tug Link’s collar down roughly.

    “What is that?” She demanded, her voice sharp. The Hylian Champion blinked in confusion, before reaching his hand up to touch what she was referring to. The Zora's Sapphire. He swallowed thickly, cheeks reddening.

    “Well… uh. Sidon gave it to me as an engagement gift.” Link stumbled over his words, looking down nervously.

    “Are you even aware of what exactly that sapphire represents!? I swear, if that Zora thinks he can just manipulate you like this… I promise you Link, I will fix this.” Zelda nodded to herself determinedly, before standing straight and pushing from her chair harshly.

    Link sat in his place at the table still, confused.

    “Manipulate me…?”

    Zelda gave a brief smile before turning and disappearing in a flurry, slamming the door behind her.

    She slipped through the blue-lit halls, furrowing her brows in frustration as she realized she didn’t know her way around the palace as well as she would have liked. With a huff, she turned, and caught sight of a green-skinned Zora guard standing post.

    “Excuse me, do you happen to know where Prince Sidon has gone off to? I’m afraid there are matters I must discuss with him still.” She smiled politely, and the guard nodded wordlessly.

    “Of course, your Highness. He came this way down that corridor.” The guardsmen paused. “He must have gone to his study. I’m sure you will find him though, he only just passed.”

    “Thank you very much.” Zelda smiled and bowed slightly, straightening and following the hall to the Zora’s directions. After guiding herself along, she caught sight of the towering Prince, walking almost stiffly. Zelda wrinkled her nose. She stepped over lightly, and grabbed hold of his arm before he could go further.

    The Prince paused and turned with a relaxed smile, expecting to see Link. He blinked, and the look vanished as he realized who was before him.

    “A-ah, Princess Zelda. Was there something more you needed?” He asked carefully, retracting his arm from the Princess’ grip. She looked up, attempting an imposing look. She wore it well.

    “I wish to informally notify you before I announce to the King and council of my disapproval of the marriage.” She started immediately. Sidon blinked at her suddenness, and nodded. “You must know, Link has a tendency to need to be heroic that distracts his rationality. Personally, I believe that he has done enough for Hyrule to last a lifetime, and this world as a whole as well. Do not condemn him to a life of servitude as your humble consort simply because he agreed to it. This is an unnecessary engagement, as I said before. I discovered legal documentation that outline indefinite ties of our kingdoms, and once I bring this to court, I will be returning to Kakariko with Link.”

    Sidon watched the Princess as she spoke with a clenched jaw, his heart sinking as she went on. Did Link truly feel that the arrangement was merely of convenience still? That it was his duty to wed the Zora prince? Sidon frowned in thought, wondering if the Champion was unhappy with him. With a deep breath he recalled the Hylian’s almost bashful reactions. Were those misread? The Zora prince felt utterly foolish, having given the symbol of his kingdom, of marriage, of love to the Hylian Champion, with absolute faith that they would become close enough for the symbol to be true. Then, he recalled their times swimming, the picnic, the dinners they had alone in comfort in the past few weeks. The Princess’ words felt heavy on his heart. Link had become something he’d begun to look forward to, a smile when he thought of him, but there was always the lingering doubt that he would be able to make the Hero happy. He wondered if it truly would be for the best if the engagement were dissolved, for Link’s sake. He deserved the happiness that Sidon could not provide.

    The Prince let out a long and shuddering sigh, careful as to not let his turmoil show. How his stomach was in knots. “I agree, your Highness. Link should not be forced to marry me if it is not necessary.”

    “I am glad you see it as such. He is an important person to me, and I would rather him not continue to save me from my own duties.” Zelda said with a curt nod. “Now, if you will excuse me, I must prepare to present to the council. Thank you Prince Sidon, for your time.”

    The Princess turned on her heel and strode back in the direction she came. Sidon watched after her as she left, the frown on his features deepening. He couldn’t bring himself to dispute her claim, he’d been so clouded in the idea of being engaged to his most trusted friend that he had not very much considered his own thoughts on the matter. The Princess had called Link important to her, and it was much the same for the Zora prince. He nodded in determination, steeling himself for the outcome of Zelda’s meeting with the council, ignoring the ache in his chest. Who was he to steal Link’s future from him?

    ~*~*~

    Link walked beside Zelda in untested silence. He was still unsure as to what would upset her again, although he knew he had to say something before they found Muzu to request the council meeting so that Zelda could present to the court.

    He threw a glance to the Princess, her features drawn in contentment. She was still angry with him and would change her demeanor quickly should he say the wrong words undoubtedly, though he could tell by her expression that she was confident in her ability to fix things. Link looked forward, pursing his lips. The problem was, the idea of ‘fixing’ the situation weighed down on him and he felt sick at the thought, though he himself was unsure as to why.

    “Can’t we hold off the council meeting?” He blurted in panic, unsure. Zelda shot him a sharp look.

    “And why would we do that? The sooner we speak to the council, the sooner we can go back to Kakariko.” She huffed, directing her attention forward once more.

    “We could go on a walk.” Link pressed, wringing his hands.

    “We can take a walk in Kakariko.”

    “But Kakariko is nothing like Zora’s domain. You don’t come here very often and I might as well have grown up here. We should take the trail to Ralis Pond, the Hinox is gone. The view from there is breathtaking, you can see just about everything. Besides, it’s a beautiful day.” The Champion continued, plastering on a wide smile as he walked.

    “Link, it’s raining.” Zelda deadpanned, then snorted.

    “It’s only a sprinkle.” Link waved his hand for effect. The Princess paused and turned, facing Link. Her eyes softened as she was met with his pleading expression.

    “Okay. We’ll go on a walk.” She shook her head. The Hylian Champion lit up, a genuine smile stretching across his features, almost giddy.

    “Great! I’ll go get Sidon!”

    “I did not agree to-! Oh, just hurry back.” Zelda called after him as he skipped away and sped down the hall to the door he knew to be the Zora prince’s study. With a strong hope that the Prince would be there, Link shoved the door open in excitement, forgetting to knock as he on most occasions did.

    Prince Sidon looked up from his desk, startled at the sudden noise of the door, coral tip pen clutched tightly with widened eyes. As he saw the Champion, his look did not stray from that of shock.

    “Sidon?” Link shuffled his feet, estranged with the change in demeanor of the Prince. The Zora only tensed further, his features reverting to that of stoic and princely.

    “Link? What is it? I expected you to be with Princess Zelda readying for the council meeting.” He mused, seeming almost offended with the Hylian’s presence. He turned his attention back to his papers, finishing the wax seal of a scroll with a press of the stamp. Link frowned, but continued.

    “We’re going on a walk first.”

    “And what is it you will be needing from me?” Sidon looked up at him, unable to stay his curiosity. Link swallowed, nervous now in the presence of the Prince.

    “I want you to come with us.”

    Sidon blinked once, and then looked away, clearing his throat. “As you can see, I have many important… duties to be done here. As Prince of Zora’s Domain, my obligations are first and foremost.” He regained his regal tone. Link stepped forward, peering over at the new set of documents laid out in front of the Zora. They were completely blank. Link furrowed his brows, giving the Zora prince an incredulous look. Sidon’s facade deflated, and he sighed.

    “Alright. I shall accompany you and Princess Zelda then, if only as an escort.” He shook his head. Link smiled a bit, still baffled by his behavior.

    The pair walked down through the halls in strained silence. Link kept his lips pressed firmly, trying to figure out best what was the matter with the Prince.

    “Are you okay?” He tried, peering up at the towering figure.

    “I am fine, thank you.” The Prince gave, simply. Link nodded, and looked ahead. He felt grateful once he caught sight of Zelda, relieved that she may make for some conversation, perhaps help figure out why Sidon was acting so strange. Zelda huffed and crossed her arms, motioning for Link to lead the way.

    They started on the trail to Ralis pond, the two royals trailing behind Link. They remained quiet, as the Champion wracked his brain for a solution to postpone the meeting further. The rain had picked up slightly, and he briefly wondered if he should worry about the sword on his back rusting.

    The silence had prolonged, and Link frowned. “How was the trip?” He threw over his shoulder, asking Zelda. He felt nervous and unsure being the one trying to start a conversation.

    “It was remarkably uneventful.” Zelda said simply from behind, her tone stiff from being stuck next to the Zora prince.

    “Tottika and Dunma, how did they do?” Link asked, attempting to hook Sidon into the conversation with his own guardsmen.

    “They were fine. As I said, there were no mishaps.” Zelda said bluntly, much more interested in the surroundings. Link hummed, looking back to Sidon who kept his gaze ahead. The Hylian Champion frowned. He was used to silence, he liked it even. Though he much preferred to be silent and let others do the talking as they were bound to, he liked to listen. Here, the silence was suffocating, or maybe that was the humidity of the rain. Regardless, his two dearest friends acting as such made Link worry.

    “Do you think we could go swimming again soon, Sidon?” Link asked desperately, craning his neck to look up at the Zora prince. Zelda huffed, mumbling under her breath. Sidon didn’t meet the Hylian’s gaze.

    “You will be departing as soon as possible.” The Prince gave, a cold and vague answer. Link frowned, his chest tightening.

    “Maybe we could go swimming before?” He tried, still dreading the idea of leaving the Domain.

    “I do not think so. I will be much too busy.” Sidon shook his head. Link pursed his lips, recalling the blank papers on the Zora prince’s desk. He remained silent as they walked on.

    The rain was sudden, as was the darkened sky. It began as soft, barely noticeable kisses on their skin to bullets in mere minutes. Cold winds rolled over the surrounding hills, whipping the trees in all directions as a storm came in. Link looked to the inky sky, the telltale sounds of thunder in the distance. Zelda shivered, hugging herself tightly, her brows drawn as she pulled at the material of her blouse clinging to her form. Sidon stood alert, looking around with widened frantic eyes at the sound of thunder.

    “We need to get back to the Domain, now!” He shouted over the rain, scanning the hills and mountains for that first strike. Link shook his head, his hair sopping wet.

    “Not enough time, we need shelter. The Domain is too far!” He scanned the immediate area for anywhere safe from the storm quickly.

    “Are there caves nearby? Rock formations?” Zelda huddled closer to be heard, trying to wring out the sleeves of her blouse.

    “There are a few shelves of rock on the cliff by the pond. We’re a few minutes away, if we run and crouch beneath them we should be safe.” Link nodded to himself, trying to keep a level head as his instincts from long days of adventuring kicked in. He pulled Sidon and Zelda both along, beginning to sprint over the slick grass.

    The storm picked up, and lightning struck in the surrounding area, hitting a tree close by. The Champion’s heart sped up as he felt the electricity in the air, his hairs standing on end. Sidon shouted incoherently through the beating of the rain as Link shoved him and the Princess a distance away. The sword, his sword was sparking. He grabbed at the hilt of the blade frantically but to no avail. It was caught in the sheath. His eyes widened, and his shaking fingers slipped over to the buckle that kept the weapon secure. As the buzzing reached his ears, he panicked, the wet buckle slipping from his fingers at every grasp and making it impossible to pull free. From peripheral vision where he had pushed the other two, he saw Sidon picking the Princess up from where she had fallen in the mud and then both of them making their way toward him.

    “Link!” Zelda yelled over the rain, her voice cracked and fearful. She threw out an arm to stop the Zora prince, her other hand occupied in gathering her skirt from the mud. “Prince Sidon, please stay back! As a Zora, even a spark could harm you immensely!”

    Sidon charged forward past the Princess, barreling towards Link and grabbing his shoulders. Briefly, he flashed a reassuring smile, and ripped the weapon free. Tossing the blade to the side, he tugged Link close and wrapped his arms around the Hylian tightly, shielding. Link yelped in surprise, though the Prince didn’t budge. Not a moment later, the lightning struck the sword, and Sidon dove for the ground to keep Link safe from the residual sparks.

    Pulling away, Link got to his feet, still frantic. Sidon blinked up at him, a bit dazed.

    “Link! Prince Sidon!” Zelda yelled over the rain as she approached quickly, keeping her pace to avoid slipping but staring wide-eyed at the Prince’s form still on the ground. She huddled close to Link.

    “Sidon, are you alright?” Link asked, touching the Prince’s forearm lightly. The Zora shook away the daze and nodded, standing.

    “I am fine, but the danger has not passed. Run, quickly now to the cliff shelving!” He pushed the two two, urging them forward. The Zora kept pace with the Hylians, watching their backs closely as they made their way to the cliff side. There was a slight buzzing in the air again, and Zelda’s eyes widened.

    “Link, the necklace!” Zelda shouted, stepping back.

    “But-” Link touched the metal in a protective manner, his shoulders drooping. From behind, Sidon reached down and broke the clasp at the back without a second thought, tossing that as well. Quickly, he pushed Link under the shelf of the rock, and Zelda crouched low as well. Link looked up at Sidon with wide eyes.

    “But that-”

    “Is far less important than your life.” The Prince said softly, helping the Hylian to the ground with a gentle hand. Zelda gazed up at him curiously.

    “You could have died!” Link said, sitting still. His voice was full of worry, and his brows were drawn. Sidon smiled.

    “I have faced worse beasts than a storm, and so have you. I am fine, I am only glad for your safety. I will ensure that you get a fire once we return to the Domain, I apologize for any discomfort.” He settled next to the Hylian. Link huffed.

    “What about you, anyways. How come your jewlery didn’t spark?” Link prodded at his arm playfully, smiling.

    “Oh, it is a different metal than the Silverscale. Although a bit weaker, it is not conductive so that we Zora may be protected without fear of electricity. I simply crafted yours from Silverscale because well, I fear I may have gotten caught up with the look rather than the practicality of it.” Sidon looked away, embarrassed. Link hummed, and settled into his side.

    The three of them sat close to the ground to protect further from the storm. The Hylians’ clothes were soaked through, their boots sopping wet, and their plastered hair a matted mess. Link was content though, with the two people he cared for the most. Zelda simply stared at the pair wide-eyed, watching their interaction. As if she had come to some sort of realization, she chuckled, which soon rose into long and drawn laughter. Link looked at her, confused, before laughing along with her at the situation. The Prince glanced over at the pair and cocked his head. He smiled solemnly. As much as he wanted to laugh too, to pretend it was all a joke, he couldn’t help but feel like this was just another reason Link would be happier elsewhere.

    ~*~*~

    The rain had lessened and the Hylians and Zora prince returned to the Domain quickly, before it picked up again. The storms were projected to last through the night. The guards ushered the Prince and guests inside the palace, apologizing profusely to the Hylians who were not built for prolonged heavy rain and storm. Once they arrived, a guard led Zelda to her room with a clean dress and bath, and Sidon offered walk with Link to his, still worried from the events of the afternoon.

    They paused before the door, an uncertainty weighing in the air.

    “Are you alright, Link?” Sidon asked softly. Link nodded, and gave a reassuring smile.

    “I’m fine, thank to you.” He shuffled on his feet, unsure of the Prince’s shifting demeanor. He was glad for that familiarity, though.

    “I am glad.” Sidon sighed, relieved, and placed a hand on the Hylian’s shoulder, only to jerk it away with a hiss in pain from a sharp burning that shot from his fingertips all the way up his arm.

    “Sidon?” Link asked, grabbing at the Zora’s hand gently, turning the larger palm over in his hand. The white scales were off in color, opaque, and peeled away to reveal the painfully scarred and inflamed flesh beneath. Link gasped sharply, frowning.

    “This is my fault. I can fix this.” He resolved. “I know a recipe-”

    “Your elixirs do not work on Zora, remember? I will just have to get it bandaged in the infirmary.” Sidon mused. Link shook his head, features drawn into a frown.

    “No, no, I can fix this. I have an idea, just wait in my room and I’ll be back in a moment.” The Hylian determined, vanishing down the hall from where they came, unchanged from his dripping clothes still.

    “Ah-” Sidon began, but Link was already gone. The Zora sighed, shaking his head with a light smile. He was ever the hero, even after being alienated for most of the day he still cared for the Prince. Sidon’s heart fluttered at the notion, but he frowned. Their engagement would be dissolved soon and he was to ensure Link had the happiest future of free choice, but it didn’t stop the Prince from feeling selfish for wanting to keep him.

    Sidon stepped into Link’s room, smiling at the little decorations and telltale signs of the Hero’s presence. The dried flower crown, a satchel of apples on the table for Ayla, little ingredients for elixirs he’d picked up as a curious habit, dirtied clothes strewn about the floor. The room even smelled of Link, although he’d spent the good part of a month in Zora’s Domain, he still smelled of pine and smoke.

    The Prince sat on the edge of the waterbed, curious as to what Link was doing exactly. His palm brushed against the covers, and he jerked back, wincing in pain. Sidon hadn’t thought of the possible repercussions of saving Link at that moment, in fact he hadn’t even realized he was burned until just now. He may be the crown prince of his people, but if Link were in trouble he would do it all again in a heartbeat.

    The door clicked, and Sidon looked up. Link’s arms were full, and so he shut the door with his foot as he carried the ingredients over to his table and dumped them all in a heap. With it came a thick book, which the Hylian thumbed open, scanning the pages and nodding. Sidon stared, at a loss.

    “May I ask what all of that is for?” He asked, attempting to regain his regal tone. Link frowned.

    “The library had this book that I saw the other day, and I found this recipe for a healing salve that works on Zoras.” He kept his eyes on the book, nodding once more. He straightened, and began picking some ingredients he had stashed around the room along with what he’d brought. “Just this… and this, two of these…”

    “Really, Link, this will not be necessary, I-”

    “No, I’ve got this. You just need a hearty elixir with an extra thing or two.” Link cut the Prince off, explaining the salve vaguely. From his pack he fished a small pot out and tossed various incredulous ingredients in from the collection on the table, glancing over at the book occasionally as he stirred and ground ingredients with the mortar and pestle he’d brought along. Sidon watched the Hylian work in silence, admiring his dedication, his cheeks warming a bit at the thought that the effort was all for him. Link looked over his shoulder at the Prince.

    “I hope it doesn't hurt too bad.” He said quietly.

    “It is fine.” Sidon looked down at his palm. It was a dull throbbing pain, though when he touched it, it sent a sharp and jolting stab of pain through his arm. Link shook his head, frowning at the answer.

    “It’s my fault that you got hurt in the first place, so it’s only right that I would be the one to fix it.” Link looked forward again, stirring the pot, slower.

    “You cannot control the weather.” Sidon said with a softened voice. Link shrugged, and lifted the pot up in his arms. He set it on the floor in front of the Prince, and dug around the bedside drawers for gauze and bandages.

    “I knew that the weather wasn’t very good, and I still convinced Zelda to come on a walk because I’m being selfish.” Link said absently, sitting close to Sidon.

    “Selfish?” The Prince asked, looking at the Hylian curiously. Link ignored him.

    “This might hurt.” He grabbed at Sidon’s arm gently, and scooped out a jelly-like substance that was pinkish in color, with various chunks of poorly ground ingredients showing through. The Prince was dubious of the strange ointment actually being effective, but he would never disallow Link from trying. The Hylian smoothed a thick layer of the salve directly onto Sidon’s burned scales. The Zora inhaled a sharp hissing breath, his arm tensing at the white-hot agonizing sensation. It was fleeting, however, and the burning felt cooler and soothed after the initial pain.

    “How does it feel?” Link asked, peering up at the Prince hopefully. Sidon looked down, astonished.

    “Much better, truly. How did you do that? Thank you Link!” He waved his hand around, staring at it in amazement. Link sighed in relief, laughing a little at the Prince.

    “Alright, alright, let me finish.” He caught Sidon’s wrist, smearing the salve a bit. He wrapped the bandage loosely around the wound as to keep the pressure minimal, and clipped it in place gently. He kept hold of Sidon’s hand in his own. The Prince looked down at Link thoughtfully, almost dazed, and spoke suddenly.

    “Why was it so imperative for us to take a walk today? And why did you say you were selfish?”

    The Hylian blinked and looked away, blushing. “I still haven’t gotten out of my wet clothes, and I’d rather not catch a cold. I’m actually rather tired after today if you wouldn’t mind.” Link feigned a yawn, and motioned to the door with a nod of his head. He’d much rather spend more time with Sidon, but he truly was exhausted, even if he was only avoiding the question. Sidon blinked in surprise at the response.

    “If you wish, then. Thank you, again.” He nodded, standing. He walked to the door.

    “Sidon.” Link called softly, catching the Prince’s attention. His hand stilled at the doorknob, and he looked back.

    “Yes?”

    “I’m glad you’re okay.”

    ~*~*~

    Night had fallen and the storm picked back up, the rain beating steadily on the palace walls. After the long day, Prince Sidon retired to his room, his eyes exhausted although his mind was not quite ready to sleep. He floated lazily in the pool that was centered in his chambers, serving as his bed. The water was soothing and comfortable, especially after such a long day, though it didn’t help him sleep any. Most nights recently, he’d found himself wandering into Link’s room when he couldn’t sleep, curling up to the little Hylian’s side after after hearing a story of his sister, or just talking. Although Link was quiet, Sidon loved to just hear him speak, and he did more so when it was just the two of them together. Even though the waterbed was uncomfortable for the Zora, as he’d much rather be in the water, he found that being in Link’s presence more than made up for it.

    Tonight though, he couldn’t find comfort in Link’s room. There was no need for it, the marriage was to be called off by the next morning, surely, as the meeting as delayed due to the night’s storm. The Prince sighed, wondering if Link was also having trouble sleeping, but waved the thought off. That Hylian could sleep for eternity.

    The minutes stretched on, and all the Prince could dwell on was the events of the day and the weeks past. He was unable to keep his mind at peace to enjoy some well needed rest. The Prince sighed.

    Suddenly and quietly, there was a light click as his door opened, and the shadow of a small form darted in through the dim bluish lighting. Sidon’s eyes widened, and he stood quickly, the water splashing and pooled around his waist. He squinted in the darkness, his heart skipping at the thought of Link.

    The bright glow of a luminous stone lamp was switched, and Princess Zelda shifted almost nervously, her hands on her hips for appearance.

    “Princess!?” He whispered in shock, giving her a baffled look. Zelda coughed.

    “I apologize, this is very unbecoming of me, but I feared I would never sleep unless I knew why you would risk your life like you did for Link.” She said, her voice low. Sidon blinked, as if the answer was obvious.

    “He is the most important person to me.” He said simply. Zelda cocked her head to the side, giving him a curious look.

    “Yet you are the sole heir to the Zora throne, you have an entire people to rule. It was no time to be a hero.” She told him, her voice soft. She lowered her hands from her hips, and placed them gently folded at her front.

    “In that moment I was neither prince nor hero. I simply wanted him to be safe.” Sidon nodded, determined. Zelda smiled.

    “I thought as much. Thank you, then. For saving him.” She gave quietly. “He tends to be airheaded and clumsy sometimes, but he has a good heart.”

    Sidon nodded, exhaling a sigh. “He is also an astounding glutton.”

    Zelda chuckled, and paused with a light sigh. She looked to Sidon, who was leaning on the edge on the pool with a soft and almost dreamy smile.

    “Prince Sidon,” Zelda started. “I feel as if we’ve gotten off on the wrong foot, and I am to blame for this. I pictured you as a pompous and stuck up prince, but I see now that you truly care for him.”

    “Perhaps we could start over. I would much rather be friends if that is alright with you.” Sidon smiled. Zelda nodded.

    “So this marriage… You truly have feelings for him, don’t you?” She asked quietly, stepping a little closer. Sidon blinked, opening his mouth to answer, but snapped it shut quickly. He thought back to the past few weeks and how he’d felt around the Hylian. How even then, he could feel the warmth blooming in his chest as the thought of him, and his cheeks tinging an embarrassing shade of blue. His eyes widened as it dawned on him.

    “Yes. I do.” He said thickly, almost giddy with the knowledge. Zelda smiled, and nodded.

    “I do not believe that I am mistaken, but I truly think that Link may feel similarly.” She nodded, tapping her chin. Sidon looked at her, surprised. “Though he can be quite oblivious, so he likely doesn’t even know it himself.”

    “You really think he has feelings for me?” Sidon said, hopeful. The excitement was evident in his voice, and Zelda grinned.

    “I am almost positive. In fact, I will help you get him to admit it. I will agree to ratify this wedding for his sake, he’s much happier here anyways. Just take good care of him.” She crossed her arms.

    “Really? It is a deal, Princess.” The Prince held out his unbandaged hand, and Zelda clasped it in her own. She smiled, now glad that she knew what was happening between her knight and the Zora prince. She wanted Link to be happy, and she’d make sure of it that he was.

Chapter 6