(WOW this got way longer than I thought it would)
“It was not like the Hero of Courage to be so…afraid.“ Zelda leaned in, her nose almost brushing the bars of Ganondorf’s cage. She was tantalizingly close, but this cell had been designed to hold him. Him, specifically; the magic woven into the cell meant he could no more reach through the bars than he could lift himself up by his own bootstraps. “What did you do to his spirit, while he was in your…care? How did you break the unbreakable?“
Ganondorf chuckled. “Do you really believe that courage is the absence of fear?”
A tilt of her head, a narrowing of her eyes. “What is it, then? Tell me, ancient one. You have faced us in countless cycles past. What is his courage, if not that?”
He shook his head, then leaned back against the wall of his cell. “I thought that too, at first. I thought, yes, this is the one foe that fate had chosen to bar my way! He must be a paragon of courage, of fearlessness, for what am I if not the paragon of power? But, then…we fought. We fought, and I looked into his eyes, and I saw terror. I saw desperation. And as I lay bleeding in the dust, I saw that the absence of fear–my absence of fear–was naught but foolishness, and that true courage came from accepting fear, from allowing it into your heart as a friend, and from there it would help you stand tall when others turned and fled. I thought myself unstoppable, until I faced a boy who’d defeated me in his heart before we ever met face-to-face.” Ganondorf smirked. “And from then on, I knew fear.”
The Queen straightened, her face cast in shadow; Ganondorf couldn’t tell if she was pondering his words, or had discarded them as the rambling justifications of…well, of Ganondorf, the Ancient Evil. After a moment’s silence, she spoke again, but this time she sounded troubled.
“Why did he not cry out? If he was so afraid of me, why did he not object? He merely tried to pull away, to run. He did not call for help. He did not ask for mercy.” Another pause. “Did it simply not occur to him?”
Ganondorf’s smile disappeared. “…He can’t.”
He sighed. “He can’t talk. I’ve been trying to teach him for his entire life. It’s as if the words just get…caught in his throat. I’d never thought anything of it before; in all those cycles, I counted fewer words from him than duels we fought. He understands everyone around him perfectly, but…” Ganondorf gestured helplessly. ”All he can get out are mangled grunts and half-noises. It hurts him to even try.“
“That’s ludicrous,” Zelda scoffed. “None of the tales mention that. You’re playing games with me, and I’ll not suffer it gladly.” She turned to leave, and called over her shoulder, “We’ll speak again once your hunger makes you willing to tell me the truth, Gerudo.”
Before she could leave the dungeon, Ganondorf barked a laugh. “You’re trapped.”
Zelda stopped, seemed to wrestle with herself for a moment, and then turned to meet the challenge. “I’m not the one in a cage, ancient one.”
Ganondorf rose from where he sat, drawing himself up to his full height and moving to the bars to meet her as she returned. “You’re trapped, Zelda.”
To her credit, Zelda didn’t flinch from his gaze. He loomed, dwarfing her with his presence on the far side of the bars, and his eyes burned like coals. “I heard you the first time. Explain yourself.”
Ganondorf smiled, this time without humor or mirth. “Fate has plans for us, O Wise One,” and the way he spat the words made his mockery clear. “It always does and it always has. It conspires against us, does everything in its power to force us to dance to its tune. Every Zelda I’ve ever known might as well have been locked in a tower, for how much freedom she had to live her life. Ten years old, twenty for the lucky ones, and then you face a murderous madman obsessed with conquest, only able to trust in a young man you’ve never met but whose face is burned into your soul. Every Zelda I’ve ever known has been forced to use her mind for Fate’s design, unable to allow my madness to consume her world. You aren’t allowed to be anything else.” His eyes softened. “And neither are we. I, locked into conquest; I, locked into failure. Fate ensured that I was born with nothing, that the envy and hunger might consume me and draw you both out. And he…” Ganondorf looked away. “Perhaps it was a cruel jest on the part of the gods. He cannot speak, so he must act.” His eyes locked on to hers again. “I was tired of all this. I changed fate, I went off the course that had been set for us, and now I am free.”
Zelda held his gaze through the bars for a moment, then glanced around his cell. “You’re right, Ganondorf. You are mad.”
As she swept out of the dungeon, his laughter echoed behind her, following her up the stairs until the echoes had faded together into a mocking whisper. She would spend the rest of the night trying to distract herself from the nagging feeling that she was the one behind the bars of that cell, and that Ganondorf was on the outside, looking in.
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