Disclaimer: Blue, Azure, Jay, and Eros are original characters. I claim ownership to no particular video game or sexy elf. Written in my mid-teens, during a time in which I was deeply enthralled with George R. R. Martin's Song of Ice and Fire series.

Author's Note: Don't kill me.

Fanfiction Note: Sort of alternative universe with elements of Ocarina of Time and A Link to the Past - with a dash of crazy.

For everyone who said Link and Zelda were related. How wrong/right you were… L/Z *nervous cough*

Enjoy!


Blue


"Cluck! Cluck!" a cucco greeted dawn. It ruffled up its feathers, fattening deliciously in the coffee-brown eyes of the just-awoken soldier. An old feather sank to the blanket the cucco had claimed as its nest during the night, the soldier's sleeping sheets given to him by his late mother. The hunger for cucco stew left the soldier's lips when he saw the white and green splatter on the worn wool sheets. He gave the bird a fine smack with the back of his leather-clad hand.

"Damned birds!" Eros cursed. The soldier shook the feathers and ticks off the sheets, but the splatter remained. He ran his hands in his greasy blond hair, untangling the weaker knots, tearing out the knobs of stronger ones. Pointing to the cucco, now pecking with an air of dignity at the spring earth of Hyrule's fields, heavy with grass seeds and thick dirt worms, he cursed it again, "I'll kill you, your mother, and the girl who raised you both!"

"Eros, come and look at this!" Eros came up to the side of an identical blond man with a half-shaven beard and knife and soap in his hands. His twin brother, Jay, was an early riser, infatuated with the salmon pink of the dawn Eros hated, for it meant the start of a hot day beneath metal and leather, whether it be summer, spring, autumn, or winter's pitying cold kiss on his uncovered face.

Jay did not regard him at all, only watched someone searching through the tall grass, finding on lucky occasions, a rupee or a good deku stick. Eros watched as well with more interest than his twin.

"What's our lady doing out there?" he asked. As long as peace remained disputed, the king's child was unsafe in the Hyrule fields. Perhaps the commoner's rags she wore would fool some, but it was a poor disguise in the end. Zelda's grace was exceptional… or so he thought.

Jay elbowed him hard. "That's not our lady. That's Link."

"The hero, huh?" He raised a dusty brow, watching the boy. The same azure eyes of his lady found his gaze. He turned away, and then watched him again. Why be intimidated by a meager copy of his lady's gaze? A soft wind broke though the field tossing the boy's cap in the spring air, where it floated with an uncharacteristic fervor, wildly higher. The winds pulled at the boy's golden tendrils, mussing them. The pale yellow hair caught the sun in its gold sheen. The soldier said nothing, even as the child turned his memorable face and the spiraling golden hair … …not as refined as… as… to him.

"The bastard hero," muttered Jay.

"It can't be, Jay."

"You saw him! That's no fucking green child. It's our king's bastard son."

"He's Zelda's beloved… Someone would have known. Someone would have stopped them, if—if they are siblings—or half siblings." The Goddesses would not allow it, Eros thought, if it were true.

Jay snorted. "Ages ago, siblings were wed to siblings to preserve the purity of the royal families. Zelda is the rightful future Queen, but him… what is he?"

A question with many answers, thought Eros. It began to make sense to both brothers, as they spoke on. Eros listened, his fancy for gossip growing. Rumors have some truth to them, no matter how altered, or exaggerated they become.

"The Hero of Time," Jay said. "On the surface, it's a simple fairytale… a lovely princess, a renegade hero with an enigmatic past, and the evil tearing them apart. But if you strip away the gloss, the glamour of a simple everlasting romance, you'd see the horror."

The soldier was aghast. "The Goddesses would not—"

"Would they, if it meant preserving and protecting their creation, their power?"

Eros thought a bit. "The king. He has done nothing to stop it."

"I know." Why, though? Jay and whores alike came from all over Hyrule claiming the king to have fathered their bastards. With filthy pink toddlers in arms, they came to the gates, demanding His Grace to listen. The king sent them home with fresh loaves of bread and milk, never seen again, when he could have had their tongues fed to dogs for lying.

"But maybe he doesn't."

"Half of Hyrule suspects it, Eros."

*...*...*

"Your Grace, what troubles you this morning?" Impa asked. The king did not turn from the window, as he spied on his daughter and her companion in the royal garden. Zelda and Link had walked through garden after garden, chattering about nothings—the happenings of yesterday, the color of a lovely flower here and there, and each other's charms. Twice had he said how lovely she looked in her dress, a pink gown graced with lilac ribbons, the dressmaker joked it to be made of gossamer fairy wings. Zelda was not innocent, either. She was encouraging the love-struck boy, pushing him away softly, blushing and smiling mischievously at each compliment.

"It's my daughter. She's becoming smitten with the Kokiri, and he of her," he answered after a long pause.

"Young love is nothing to trouble oneself over," Impa asserted. "And the lad is most deserving of her attention. He is her most confiding guardian." The king was silent. "Or will you dismiss him of his title, for his love for the princess?" She hoped to keep the boy near Zelda, for he loved her truly and protected her for this sole reason. He had no fondness for the rupee, nor was he depraved as the king's lecherous soldiers were.

"No, no. I could not." Impa was relieved.

"Then let them be," she said.

Below, Link took Zelda's silk-gloved hand in his own. He planted a light kiss on her neck, as she watched her hand in his. She giggled. The king clenched his jaw. "Bring him to me," he told her.

The Sheikah gave a look of surprise. "Why? He has done nothing wrong." At this, the king shifted his attention from the window to her, deep lines surrounding his eyes in anger.

"You don't question your king, Impa. Ever," he reminded.

Impa looked to the floor for release from his discontent. I forget you're the king as you are my friend. "I'm sorry, Your Grace. I'll call for him," Impa dutifully agreed. She exited with hopes unheard.

The king turned aged blue eyes to the door, hearing the nearing of heavy footfalls, weighed down by iron armor. He went to the lesser suspicious place at the throne. Link entered, gallant in new blue metal and fine leather. He made a handsome knight, no doubt, the king thought. The serving girls did not attempt to hide that fact as they scurried by, smiling.

"You called, Your Grace," he said in a voice that could charm the vilest dragon.

"Yes. Come near." Link shied nearer. He was tall, taller than the king, but the king still looked down to him. The king stood a few steps higher, a few steps below his throne. The boy looked up at him with fluid azure eyes. You have my eyes… the king thought, observing sadly.

Link noticed his upset. "What is wrong, Your Grace?"

"Nothing." The king shook his head, blinking thrice hard. "Sir Link, how would you like to be my new Hand? Davius seeks retire to care for his younger children and ailing wife permanently." If I can't keep you away from us, I'll keep you closer, in my sight. A good plan, but he still hoped for a better one.

Link smiled. The king ascended to the next step, away. But you have her smile…

"Who will be my guardian now?" Zelda frowned, pouting. Unable to resist the satin-pink plumpness of her mouth, Link pressed a finger to her lower lip.

"The twins, Jay and Eros, will take over my job," he said, teasing her shapely lips with his finger.

"It takes more than two men to do your job." She bit his finger lightly. Link smiled.

"I'll still be near."

Zelda let his hand fall. "Nearer to my dad, remember." He thought about it, and looked at her apprehensively. Your father honors him, and you worry him with your needs? The bitterness of guilt rose in her throat. "I am proud of you, nonetheless," she managed to say. "My father might be letting you sit in his chair and try on his crown next."

"If His Grace desires it, then I will do as he bids." Link winked. The princess winked too, looking to his left. He followed her gaze to nothingness, flowerbeds they admired earlier, then felt her kissing him. He tasted the tartness of sour wine and sweet fruit nectar joined in her mouth, and he brushed away gold locks of hair, unsure and not caring of whose they were.

"My lady," someone interrupted.

The two broke the kiss and stood straight, stunned. "Yes?"

"We are at your command, my lady, as of tonight," one twin said- neither Zelda nor Link could distinguish one from the other.

The princess raised her skirts and swerved to her knight. "As of tomorrow morn, soldier. This night, Sir Link is at my command." She placed a hand on Link's armored chest, blue eyes meeting another pair of blue eyes.

Eros and John stiffened as though they had been struck. "Forgive us, then, my lady," the second twin said and they went away.

"This night, Sir Link is at my command," Eros mocked. "Little slut."

"Shh." Jay pulled him to the side. The princess and her knight rode by atop a brown mare, the color of the twins' eyes.

Eros' glare chased them with unavailing rage. "Look, there goes the bastard hero and our brother-fucking lady!"

"Shh. They may hear us!"

The brothers kept traveling, reaching Kakariko Village by midnight. By then, Eros was panting, Jay grinning at him.

"All right," Eros gasped, "we're here. Now, get to your destination and let's get the fuck out."

"So you can get drunk and piss in your armor before you can get out of it, brother?"

"See to your bitch, and I'll worry about my drinking problem." Eros left him to lean on the wooden pen further ahead from the entrance.

"I'm not worrying," behind, his brother said. "I'll be pouring the wine down your throat later."

Picky bastard, Eros thought. All the cunts are the same in the end. A cluck startled him. He drew out his sword and rolled his eyes. "Goddesses, girl. I could have killed you." The girl's mouth was open, the cucco in her arms still. She dropped the cucco and severely slapped him.

"Pig!" The girl gathered the cucco before it got far. "What are you trying to do to my cuccos?"

"Bitch, with what conviction do you accuse me!" He put away his sword, before the idiocy brought with his temper took over. The girl mistook his motion as an attack and ran from him. He caught her by the arm, the morning's incident on his mind. "You're the cucco girl, aren't you? You feed and watch over these demons!"

"I'm Anju, you pig," she said deprecatingly. The cucco escaped her clutch. Anju let it go, exhausted from the monotonous routine of chasing, catching, and chasing again.

He grinned. Anju was sort of pretty—dark blue eyes, like fragments of sapphires, and hair red like peppers that Eros loved so much-not beautiful like his princess, but pretty. "I'm Eros, beautiful," he purred and grabbed her face with a hand, the other lowering to her backside.

Eros never kissed her, alas, but he did get to see stars when she whacked him with something heavy. He felt his weary eyelids bring forth darkness, and his hand torn away from her firm rear.

*...*...*

They were rather nice, some odd green quartzes with red specks. Link sneaked one into his pouch.

"They're called bloodstones," Zelda explained. She found a larger one with the red markings more like blood splatters than tiny specks. "The river is lined with them. Do you know why?"

Link shrugged. He did not care if they had been gold chunks with rubies embedded in them. Her person depreciated the beauty of the night-washed sky and land. He did not deserve her- a king's daughter, his future Queen. Sometimes he thought he was defiling her with his love.

She sat by his side and began to tell the story he cared not about, but listened to anyway. Her honey voice lured him to heed:

"Before Hyrule, there existed a different land—the land of the Goddesses. A different kind of people walked these fields. They were perfect, crafted by the Goddesses' hands. Beautiful high cheekbones, rose-red lips, skin as flawless and white as cream. Eyes like diamonds, without color, but when sun fell upon them, they were violets, greens, oranges—little prisms, like the bands of colors in the sky after rain. They were rain-colored. Their hair were ropes of braided silver, falling to their shoulders, one long braid to the floor. Bodies of …fairy beauty, but clothed, the males were no different from the females. They were all the same- the same faces, the same lives, the same vain.

"Once, a child was born… different. She possessed the same aching sexless beauty of her race, save for her eyes and hair. Her eyes were gold, as the sun, instead of rain. Her hair was the blue of skies.

"Her parents left her at the Goddesses' temple in the secrecy of night. A stranger found and raised her. He called her Blue.

"The stranger protected Blue, fed and kept her beneath a safe and warm roof, but her could not protect her from the others, the silver-haired children and their jealous-wary rain-colored eyes. They spat on her, made her gold eyes weep. Years of this made her miserable, but she was always beautiful.

"At fifteen, as she climbed a tree for a peach, she heard someone call her:

" 'Blue!' It came from below. Blue glanced downward, and when she saw him, she fell.

"The boy caught her and placed her down, laughing. Blue laughed. He had her eyes! her hair! and sorrow beneath his laughter. They were of the same height and age, as well.

" 'When I heard, I came! Two years I looked for my kind—'

" '—and I've found you,' Blue finished. They held each other, laughing, kissing blue hair and closed gold eyes.

"They fell in love. Blue and Azure had four children, all sky-haired and sun-eyed. Happiness that once teased her with hopeless dreams was hers. She began to pray to keep her blessings. One day, at the temple, the Goddesses spoke:

" 'Why do you come? Your sins are without forgiveness. No prayer or song will relieve you.'

" 'I have never sinned. I live for my family… and you,' Blue cried.

" 'To mate with one's own blood is of the greater sins. Pray but it won't save you.'

"And her happiness died with the prayer on her lips."

Link felt the bloodstone through the brown soft leather of his pouch, listening. Zelda went on:

"Blue told everything to Azure.

" 'I thought you knew,' he said matter-of-factly. 'Blue, I thought you wiser…'

"True, she wondered, but the notion always fled from her consciousness when he held one of their children, the others laughing, and she joined the consoling bliss of their games. 'Why?' she asked.

" 'We were in Mother's womb together, but she gave us up when she saw what we were.'

" 'No,' Blue whimpered, ' why did you let me love you?'

"Azure's eyes flashed, hurt. 'You were a part of me, a reflection, my twin… I've loved you since I knew you existed.'

"The next minute she was running, Azure calling her from behind, chasing her. Her legs grew tired and the earth ended. She stood at the edge of a cliff, on the brink of death.

" 'Blue,' Azure cooed, sweat and worry on his face. She thought of nights with him, his seed erupting inside her… the children they made. Then she felt the earth weaken . . .

". . . and she was falling. Azure was not there to catch her.

"They found her pieces and collected them. Her blood was too much to bother to clean, so they left it, splatters, and specks and prints on the sand littered with quartzes as dark and green as the forest.

"Azure and the children disappeared. So did the land, slowly, after ages. The perfection chipped and faded into the Hyrule of today."

Zelda was climbing on top a boulder, when Link realized the story was over. "This used to be a cliff, and that—" she pointed to the river—"was her hair. I already told you about those." She scrunched up her face, disgusted, at the bloodstones. "Get rid of it, Link. It'll only bring bad fortune."

"It's just a tall tale, another fairytale," he murmured. Still, it scared him a bit. The bloodstone stayed in his pouch, even so. Link went to her, placed his hands on her slender waist and lifted her. She wrapped her legs and arms around him.

"Fairytales have happy endings. Blue was a myth." She sounded so smug; he covered her scowling mouth with his.

"Link?" Zelda asked. He stopped kissing her.

"Yes?"

"Do you love me?" She knew he did. It always touched [and hurt] him to hear her ask.

"Until the end of time."

"Then let me ask this of you..." He put her down, and sat with her. There was concern in his eyes, she had not seen since the time Ganondorf had imprisoned her in a jewel in another life. His hands were holding hers, fearing for nothing and yet something without a name in her unsaid request.

"What, my princess?"

She began to undress.

*...*...*

Farore! It was late, almost morning.

Din! Zelda was not home yet; up in burgundy sheets to her cream-pale chin in her fairy-beauty sleep.

Nayru! Link was with her.

The king tossed his crown to the bed, his graying hair exposed to the midnight chill. He paraded down and up the halls, waiting, waiting, and she did not come.

He went and sat on his thrown. He waited. Sleep seduced him; his body betrayed him.

A heavy thud woke him. Bleary, he gasped at the shadow—no, a man. "Goddesses!" he exclaimed, at the sight of the dark man. He remains frozen in his sheets, and the Gerudo lunges at him with a cold dagger blade close to his neck. "You're quite early, aren't you?"

"Not quite," Ganondorf said modestly. Dawn would not come for hours. He threw the dagger onto the bed and shook his dark hands of dust. "You know how easy it is to creep up in here and kill you, whilst your guardsmen sleep at their posts?"

"Only to you, my friend. We are well aware of your dislike of our fancy daylight welcomes." The king saw his humility as a virtue; he loved the Gerudo king as much as he loved his late brothers. He trusted him as much, or even more, with his life.

"I don't require a fanfare and feast for our friendly meetings, and I much enjoy the terror in your Hand's face when he sees me sheathing my berry-stained sword as I leave your room. Where is that fool Davius anyhow?"

"Dismissed. He has much to worry about this days. Link has temporarily filled his place." The look on his face was conspicuously disturbed.

"Sounds like we have much to talk about tonight," Ganondorf said, his Gerudo face gave no indication of reproach, only an open kindness. The king told him everything, while he listened without an expression of horror or outrage. The King of Hyrule never felt safer with his secrets, his life, and his land.

"You cannot tell them, it would destroy them," the Gerudo king said. "But if you rid yourself of him, then the princess will be free of his lust."

"He is my son!" the king cried.

"If you let him live, and merely exile him, she'll hate you… forever, never understanding, always asking Why?" He was pacing now, as if hatching a scheme of his own. "It could look accidental. I can make it look as if the Goddesses had willed his death, Your Grace."

The king fell to his knees. "Farore, Din, Nayru… please forgive me." He nodded. "Do it, my friend."

"Good night, my friend, you need your rest. We'll speak politics after dawn." Ganondorf said nothing else. He left.

The king climbed the stairs to his chamber and crawled into bed, speaking softly, "Forgive me, Cerena…" She was in his thoughts always, the maiden in his long-forgotten youth; a peasant woman, one lowly, as his royal kin would put it. He could see her half-moon smile and dark brown eyes, an innocence taken and desecrated, twist into something hideous—hatred—and the fault was there, deep in his heart.

He loved Zelda, the princess of Hyrule, daughter of the late great Queen of Hyrule and he, more than he ever would love Cerena's son, the child he disowned as it rested incomplete, forming in her belly-Link. Cerena would never be part of his life; he wed his wife and queen, who gifted him with the most beautiful daughter. Zelda. She became the world to him.

"Forgive me…" He would not ask Cerena again, so he asked the goddesses.

"Farore…

"Din…

"Nayru."

*...*...*

They put on their clothes again. The joining of their bodies was a memory, but the cuts were still there, hurting.

"It's like a fairytale!" Zelda said, closing her wounded palms. The bloodied dagger lay blameless on the grass; this was her doing. But it was his love for her that let her cut without demur.

Link was skeptical. "What kind of fairytale has lovers share blood?" It was a silly thing to do, now, he thought. What will the others say? Zelda tightened her fists, then stretched out her fingers. Droplets of red formed along the curve of the wound.

"Ours." Her palms met his in a bloody kiss.

He winced.

*...*...*

Stars were vertiginous. Vomit crept up to his tongue. He sent it back down, swallowing. Two blue stars spun, dancing. The music was strange, the female singing stranger. A woman whispered, "I'mmmm soooorrrryyyy," throughout the song. The dance ended, and the stars faced him, side-by-side. They blinked.

Eros woke. Anju was staring down at him, her sapphire eyes guilty. "I'm sorry." She lifted a large fuchsia rupee. "I didn't think it was that heavy."

His mouth watered. "Give that to me and I'll crawl on hands and knees, naked, and howl like a wolfo." Anju raised her red brows, looking at the rupee. "I'll do anything, Goddesses, oh great cucco lady…"

Jay glanced cock-eyed at his brother. Eros was on the floor, pulling on his boots. A fuchsia rupee winked like a star. He approached him. "So who's whoring, now?" Eros went for his rupee, but Jay beat him to it. He whistled, examining the beautiful glass-stone.

"I earned it."

"Who paid you? A virgin old hag…? An overweight, bald little man…?" Jay was laughing, Eros struggling to pry the rupee out his hands. It was futile. He gave up.

Eros smirked. "It was Princess Zelda. Apparently, Sir Link is terrible in bed." He thrust his pelvis to and fro. "I took her again, and again, and… again. And look at what pretty rupee she gave me."

"The king will kill you," Jay said, laughing louder. The whole village might wake, but he did not give a damn. His brother's eyes were afire, again, with those lies.

"Oh, he came along… and took her from behind, like the bitch she is. He got a nice rupee, too. I took that one from him as he slept."

Jay put out his hand. "I… I… Well," Eros scratched his head. "I bought a blow job with that one." He hung his head, ashamed.

Something winked in the grass. Jay took the pendant in his hand and dangled it in his brother's horror-struck face.

"It was Mother's, you dumbfuck," Jay said. "Don't lose it." He glowered at his brother, his careless, dimwitted brother. "Say it!"

Eros recited the lines behind the pendant: "Her hair like sunlight, eyes like the earth this night. A smile like a half-moon, a beauty ended too soon." He kissed it, below the painting of their smiling mother, on the cursive text reading Cerena.

Satisfied, his brother treaded to the exit. "Let's go. I heard wolfos."

Eros followed.

*...*...*

"They said it was spiders, gigantic onyx spiders!" a girl said, with her arms in the air, forming bony spidery legs.

Her brother spat watermelon seeds, inches from her bare feet. "Please. Everyone knows it was THE GREAT AND EVIL POE KING!"

No one was sure how he died. Only that he died.

He was dead.

The Hero of Time was dead.

And only the Goddesses were to blame.