Mortality
Zelink Week 2021 prompt #7/7 @zelinkweek2021
Word Count: 3,684
Incarnation: Breath of the Wild 2 (pre)
Additional Prompts Followed: Forsaken Fates, Lost Eternities
Inspired by this art by @morniae
A big thank you to @braidy-maidy and @linktheacehero for beta-ing!!
He wasn’t expecting a fairytale reunion as his horse trotted slowly, arriving at the Forgotten Temple with next to no fanfare. All sorts of geniuses from every race of Hyrule had gathered to study this place, to pull it from its lost state and unearth its secrets, to discover the reason behind its eternity and maybe even why its fate was to be forsaken and forgotten to all of history.
Link left his horse with the many others that were being cared for on the left side of the canyon and began to navigate the ruckus on foot. It seemed crowds of scientists and historians alike were out here securing their tents, making food, and languishing in a well-deserved rest. Link felt as if he stuck out like a sore thumb with his small brain, but no one paid him any mind, not even her.
In fact, she was nowhere to be found.
Perhaps he was expecting some fairytale reunion as he peered his head around every Sheikah, Goron, Rito, Zora, and Hylian in sight. He didn’t care that there was no fanfare, in fact, that may have made it even harder to spot her if it were a big deal that the hero of Hyrule had arrived. Thank Hylia these ruins were more interesting, that no crowd had congealed into a true tidal wave of obstacles. He missed her dearly, after all, no matter how short a time two weeks was in comparison to a hundred years.
He made his way all the way to the shrine in the back when he finally saw her. Zelda smiled when she spotted him and bounded over, clutching the Sheikah Slate.
“Thank the goddesses you’re here,” she said, pecking his cheek. “They haven’t made anything good for dinner in days.”
She walked right past him. Link’s mouth popped open as she practically flew to another inscription of the ruins being studied. Purah, following close behind Zelda, approached Link as he looked over.
“Two weeks she hasn’t seen me and I get a colder welcome than ten thousand year old ruins.”
Purah clicked her tongue and began to cross past Link.
“Sounds like you better get cooking.”
And so he didn’t see his blur of a girlfriend until dinner, when he was serving a ladle-full of meat stew to everyone who passed by with a bowl, salty chunks of meat and sweet carrots swimming in a broth that radiated a scrumptious scent for at least a mile.
The last person he served came up wearing a forehead beaded with sweat and sticky blonde hair from a hard-days work. As she approached, she lightly hit the empty wooden bowl against her hand, and pursed her lips taut with eyes almost apologetic. Her steps shuffled in the sand.
“Look who it is,” Link said before she could muster an apology. He looked more amused than upset, anyway. Zelda sat on her heels in front of the cooking pot and handed him her bowl.
“Sorry,” she said, “it was just a busy day. We think we’re close to finding--”
Link and Zelda’s eyes met. They both knew what she was going to say. The entrance to the caves. The hidden reason why this expedition was such an extensive operation. Only Purah and Impa knew the true reason, after all. Everyone else was just here for research. Bless their hearts.
They knew they needed to find it, but not finding it meant more of an excuse to not go down there.
Yet.
To not let go of the illusion of peace.
Yet.
To not face their mortality once again.
Not yet.
Link looked down to pour soup in her bowl. With everyone else fed--and Zelda more than likely went to the back of the line on purpose so that she would be the last one to eat--Link poured himself a bowl as well. They soon sat down in front of Zelda’s tent.
“When are Impa and Paya arriving?” Link asked.
“Tonight,” Zelda replied, but she swallowed hard, regretting taking another spoonful with a “mm”.
“Oh my gosh I almost forgot!” she said enthusiastically. “You should have seen it, Link. The reunion between Purah and Robbie? They just marched up to each other, both short, old, and wrinkled, said each other’s names and walked off. It’s hard to believe they used to be lovers.”
Link choked on his stew.
“What?”
“Did I not...mention that?”
Link was still coughing, eyes tearing up.
“No?” He croaked, before coughing a couple more times. “You’d think I would remember something like that.”
“Believe me I wish I didn’t,” she said, before changing the subject. “Oh yeah, how did the meeting go?”
“Horrible,” Link said between spoonfuls.
“What do you mean?” Zelda inquired, slightly disappointed. She had hoped diplomacy would work.
“If I had known that Kohga had an eight year-old hiding somewhere in that hideout, I never would have attacked him,” Link started. “Apparently we needed him to keep his son in check. The kid is so hell-bent on revenge that he didn’t even read the treaty. He’s determined to hunt us down until the end of our days. Even his guards think he’s taking it a bit far. I could see it in their faces when Sooga was going on and on about his forces being strong and ready to fight. Those poor men and women are tired.”
“I thought the Yiga wore masks?”
Link shook his head.
“Not anymore,” he replied. “Sooga wants them to be proud of themselves, whatever that means. Goddesses, that whole meeting was like getting a child to eat their vegetables. I’m pretty sure Riju was about to slap him at the end, the little runt recycling the dogmas of the Yiga that are ten thousand years old now. Even when I ask him why he said such things about Hylians, he doesn’t give a straight answer. He knows less about history than I do and I had amnesia. He’s just been conditioned, raised to hate.”
“That’s unfortunate, but not hopeless,” Zelda said. “I’m sure Riju and the rest of the Gerudo will be able to work it out if the entirety of the clan no longer backs him. Is there any danger until then?”
Link shook his head and swallowed his current spoonful.
“Not yet,” he said once he could. “The only reason they haven’t attacked here is because he wants to find the entrance of the caves as much as we do. He didn’t say it outright, but he’s waiting for us to do it for him.”
“That’s not frightening at all,” she said sarcastically. “We’ll have to increase security when we do eventually go down there, make sure he doesn’t follow us.”
“I wouldn’t worry too much about it, Zelda,” Link said. “He’s only eight years old, and he’s pretty short and lean.”
Zelda smiled as she sipped her soup.
“I remember a little eight year old like that who could best adult knights,” she said with a smirk. “People say he saved Hyrule.”
“Really?”
“Never grew an inch after eight years old though.”
Link scoffed.
“I can and will pour the rest of this stew over your head,” he said as he held it up. Zelda laughed, but put her arms out in defense.
“Don’t you dare!” She exclaimed. She stood up and began to back away “I’m a princess!”
“Not anymore,” Link said, forgetting about the soup and tackling her. They wrestled playfully, rolling down the rocky slope and laughing joyfully until they stopped suddenly in a gulch, Zelda hovering over Link and sharing with him panting breaths.
“I win,” she said.
“By chance,” Link argued. He brought a hand up and lightly coaxed her head to lower. It, however, did not take much effort, as Zelda more than willingly met his lips to his, exploring his mouth and enjoying the sensation. She felt her cheeks warm. Kissing was all they had ever done, so being flush to him was frankly exhilarating, but she didn’t mind it in the slightest.
They both heard the reigns of horses, the clatter of a covered wagon, the jingle of Kakariko-style bells, but it blended too much into the rest of the ruckus for them to think anything of it.
“Paya, you brought us to the wrong place,” Impa said. “I wanted to go to the research expedition, not a mating ritual exhibition.”
Zelda pushed herself off Link and attempted to fix her hair, composing herself as best she could. Link stood up, but he let his messy hair be.
“H-hey Impa,” Zelda said, walking towards her oldest friend. Despite her feeble frame and short stature, Impa hopped off the wagon like a child. “How was the trip?”
“Long,” Impa said, bruskly.
“She’s a bit cranky,” Paya explained as she stepped off and started to untie the two brown horses from the wagon. “Where do these go?”
“Over there,” Link said, pointing over to the mini-stable on the left of the canyon. “And your tent is the one next to ours. If you’re hungry, there’s probably some stew left.”
“Please,” Impa said, allowing the young man to lead the way to the appropriate cooking pot. She even let him help her walk when the terrain wasn’t the smoothest.
They had left Zelda alone, but it gave her the opportunity to help Paya with unloading the wagon, and to catch up with one of her newer friends before they all turned in for the night.
Zelda was surprised to find Paya as reserved as she was when they first met, but after a bit of grilling she admitted to Zelda that Impa had told her of their true purpose here, that sealing Calamity Ganon may not have been an ending they could trust. Her red eyes were sad and apologetic for learning the secret but Zelda wouldn’t have it, insisting to Paya that it was okay, that it won’t be a secret for long, and that Hyrule was going to be okay.
That last one was a lie Zelda thought about well into the night.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“Zelda.”
He opened his eyes to the dark tent, the edge where tan cloth met a small patch of dry grass.
Link couldn’t believe a whisper was what woke him up. Still half awake and already turned away from the center flap of the tent, he kept his eyes closed, hoping he could doze off again.
“Zelda, wake up.”
Someone gently shook Zelda’s foot, and Link guessed the voice belonged to Paya.
Link felt Zelda’s arms slide away from holding him and he tried to slow his breaths. They both would feel so guilty for waking him.
“What is it?” Zelda asked, the rustling that followed suggesting that she got out of the tent. “Should I wake up Link?”
Paya must have shaken her head, or said something to suggest that it wouldn’t be necessary, because that was the last Link heard of the conversation.
He inwardly wrestled with the decision to get up anyway since he was, in fact, awake, but his comfort insisted otherwise and he drifted off before he made up his mind.
“Link.”
The sunlight was bright, even through the dulled filter of the canvas tent.
He felt Zelda’s hand on his shoulder, and he rolled over at the gentle prompt. Link found her green eyes.
“We found it,” she said. “An entrance to the caves.”
Link closed one eye and scrunched up his face. Zelda knew he did that when he was both tired and confused but with his messy bedhead she saw it as adorable.
Link moved his arm to the other, pinching his own skin somewhere around the wrist and, once he felt pain, his entire body sighed exasperated. He faced the top of the tent and closed his eyes far too tight to go back to sleep.
He opened the blue gems one at a time and took a deep breath.
“I assume we are leaving as soon as possible?”
Zelda nodded.
Link didn’t say another word when he got up and started getting ready, almost ignoring Zelda and how she sat on her heels in her own silent and undetectable bout of sadness. He even left her there in the tent but Zelda let him have his space, let him breathe his last breaths in this wild, fresh air, let him hear the birds and see the sun before she dragged him down to hell, back down to war, back down to fear and panic and worry and trauma and everything he had worked so hard to heal from.
It wasn’t until they were several steps into the caves that his stoicism really started to wear at her. One statement and all of him was left in the tent. He just…walked, looking forward, not saying a word. Zelda hated it as much as she did a hundred years ago. She tried to remember that he wasn’t really mad at her back then, so he couldn’t be mad at her now…
Right?
She looked over at his profile again.
Right?
“Link?”
The hooves of the large, blue ox behind them clapped along.
“I, uh…” she began when he gave no response. “I’m sorry about all this.”
“It’s not your fault,” Link said quickly and briskly.
Zelda’s lips parted. Her pacing slowed to a halt. If she hadn’t stopped pulling the ox along, it would have rammed into her.
Link looked over his shoulder when he realized he was the only one moving, turning around completely to see Zelda with a slightly furrowed brow.
“Why don’t I believe you?” Zelda asked.
He decided to look elsewhere as he hugged his arms close, the stone ground, the cavernous chasm above them, the rocky wall, anywhere but Zelda.
“I’m not mad at you, I...” he said quietly, “I’m just feeling a little off, okay?” He said quietly. “I had trouble breathing when I left the tent this morning.”
Zelda’s expression softened. She closed the distance between them and attempted to comfort him with a hand on his shoulder.
“You could have told me that,” Zelda said. “I’m nervous too. We have a right to be. It’s nothing to be ashamed of.”
Yet Link still refused to look up.
“I almost collapsed, I felt so weak,” Link said. “The dread, the fear of facing it all again, the thought of losing you…it gathered, I felt it here.”
He placed a hand on his chest and he started to pant. His fingers began to clutch at the brown leather, the blue cloth and he stumbled to his knees.
“Link!” Zelda exclaimed as she grabbed him under his forearms, kneeling down with him. His breaths were shaky and fast, and he stared down at the ground.
“Link,” she repeated. “Link.”
The next sound from Link was the combination of a spurt of fresh paint and a croaking frog, warm vomit spilling from his mouth in smelly chunks of beef and carrots. It was instinct that Zelda stood up with a yelp and backed away with arms floating up, the gathering of vomit ending up mere inches from her toes. If she had stayed where she was, her pants would have been covered in Link’s partly-digested dinner.
“Oh gosh, Link,” she said once she got over the shock, rushing to his side and drawing circles on his back. He didn’t react though, only staring at the mess on the floor with his weight on his hands.
Zelda’s eyes stung with tears as she ran her fingers through his hair, some drops even lopping onto Link’s mess. She held him as best she could while still giving him the distance he needed, but that could never stop her from the occasional kiss on the side of his head and whispering sweet assurances of love into his right ear.
After a couple fruitless lurches of his back and neck, Link hurled a second time. As ironic as it was for her to hope for anything from the goddess anymore, Zelda prayed it was the last one.
“Zelda,” he said between heavy breaths. It was apparent his lungs were exhausted. He coughed a couple times.
Link looked into Zelda’s eyes, finally, although they veered towards horror, the green marbles conveying desperation for how to relieve this poor young man.
“I know,” she said, trying to smile. She wiped away Link’s tears. “I know.”
Wary of the mess near them, she brought him into a proper embrace, rocking him back and forth and holding him in such a way that she was sure he knew he was held. She wasn’t sure how secure he could feel on the cusp of embarking into danger, but she would try her best.
“I’m scared, too,” she said. “Down here is an untouched wild that was left alone for a reason we know not of. Nothing is scarier than the unknown, especially for us who have been hurt again and again by the unknown. Hope has betrayed us too much for us to readily depend on it, but we have to try.”
Link looked up, tilting his head to see her.
“How?”
Zelda lips parted. She stammered speechlessly. He seemed so hurt by her hopefulness.
“Together,” she said, attempting to fake her confidence. There was still a small question mark at the end of her statement that she didn’t mean to expose.
Link stood up and faced away from her. He crossed his arms.
“Do you know how long a version of Ganon has been terrorizing Hyrule?” Link asked. “How long he has been reincarnating?”
Zelda, who was now sitting on her heels, shook her head.
“No,” she said honestly.
“Do you know what makes us any different from the people who tried to stop him in the past?”
“No,” Zelda repeated, again, honestly.
Link nodded.
“I don’t either,” he said. “And that scares me.”
Zelda stood up.
“Link, we—”
“I can’t lose you!” Link exclaimed, turning around quickly. “I ignored it, okay?! All this time when you talked about there being caves, there being another journey, I ignored it! I put it off! I casted it aside! I focused on us.” His voice broke. “I thought that was all there would ever be…”
He placed his hands on his hips and collected himself.
“This morning it all collapsed,” he said. “Right before my eyes. Everything I could have ever hoped for.”
Zelda scoffed.
“Do you think I was happy to have found these caves?” Zelda asked rhetorically. “To have been woken up in the middle of night and told that this place I saw in my nightmares was indeed real, that I was to investigate a threat that hasn’t been faced in ten thousand years of Hyrule birthing warriors more capable than you? I had to keep a straight face, but Link, I wanted to scream so loud that even Lurelin could hear me!”
Zelda released her residual anger at the world in heavy pants of her breaths. Once she sighed herself calm, she snagged a small rag from the heaps of resources strapped to the patient and by now likely deaf ox.
Zelda stepped forward and washed Link’s stunned face clean of vomit.
“Then I thought of our future,” Zelda continued. “I was angry because coming down here means jeopardizing that. I scorned myself for how selfish that was. I told myself that this wasn’t about me and you, that this is about a peaceful Hyrule. That helped but...do you want to know what really helped?”
“What?” Link asked.
“The people of Hyrule want to live in peace, and so do we. They want to raise families without worrying about another Calamity.” Zelda smiled. “I think we do too, when the time comes.” She perished the thought. That was a long while down the road. “But this isn’t just about a peaceful Hyrule, it’s about our peaceful Hyrule. I’m no longer a princess, distanced from others by a pedestal, and you are no longer a knight, distanced from others by a sword. We actually feel like a part of Hyrule this time. Of course we loved the Champions, my father, but we aren’t acting as Hyrule’s weapons anymore. We don’t feel like cards to be discarded or pawns to be knocked off in a game of chess. All of this is voluntary. We can’t blame a kingdom or a calamity this time. The possibility of losing each other is already giving us stomach-churning guilt because no one told us to go down here. We came down here because we want to preserve peace for all of us, preserve peace beyond even our lifetimes.”
Zelda placed a hand on Link’s cheek.
“And we will,” she said. “We have to believe we will. If we don’t think we’ll get out of here, then there is no chance we will. This is our first on-our-own decision and it’s a damn risky one. We can always turn back if--”
“No,” Link interrupted.
Link’s hand went to hers and his thumb stroked her soft fingers.
“No,” he repeated, however shakily. “We are going through with this. I just need to process it, that’s all. I didn’t think we would actually be doing this. I think we both held on to the fantasy of peace. I definitely held on to it too much.”
He finally let her touch soothe him.
“I’m here,” Zelda assured him softly. “I’m right here.”
She took his hand and placed it on her heart, the rhythm of which pulsated through his own veins.
“I’m not supposed to be alive right now,” Zelda said. “I should have died an eighty year old queen about thirty years ago but here we both are, young and spry. These caves are filled with dangers we don’t know, but with my heart in your hands and your heart in mine I know we can dare to do the impossible again.”
Link met his forehead to hers and closed his eyes. He tried to breathe the way she was, to feel her calm and to adapt it into his own body.
“Okay,” he said. “I’m ready.”
