It was black.
Not the color, this was far darker than that. Shadows were everywhere, and nowhere, for they required the presence of light. This was its total absence. Night could not be it either, for the moon's glowing presence was there with the guiding stars as well. No light, no good, nothing. All was a single, black, deep, cold, endless dark.
Something stirred from within this great hole, a soul in anguish, one all-to-familiar. It's presence brought forth pain within the heart, fresh scars upon the soul being torn open. The being laughed, and a golden light flashed once above it. A shadowy hand reached up to touch the light, and all turned to darkness.
Time flashed forward. Now beheld was twilight, a beautiful sky of both dusk and dawn. Darkness and light met at this place, neither leaving a true imprint. It was truly only a shadow, but beautiful nonetheless. But today was different. The soft orange light bled crimson down upon a palace of obsidian. The Palace of Twilight it was; wrecked, ruined, and destroyed. Inside, the clashing of souls locked in combat could be heard. A figure in green ran inward at the base of the citadel, driven by fear and worry, praying to the goddesses he was not to late.
Past monsters and traps, a great door, and into a throne room lit by turquoise light. There, the green-clad hero stopped. A great beast stood in the throne room, a glowing white scar slashed down his chest. A great mane of vivid orange hair fell around a face of black fur, two bloodstained tusks glinting in the soft, teal light. The hero wobbled, then fell to his knees. On one of the horns, a limp form impaled. Beautiful fiery hair hung limp and stained with the blood of its owner. The adventurer's shining sword clanged heavily to the ground, the blade's light extinguishing without a sound. A cloak of royalty hung about her form, her golden eyes were forever shut.
Midna.
The beast roared in triumph. The man screamed in heart-wrenching agony.
Link screamed in unison as he sat up right in his bed, nearly going over the small boat's edge as it rocked with his sleep's former trashing. His sheets were drenched in a cold sweat, along with his white villager's tunic. No dead corpse or fiend greeted him though, just the soft, cool wind blowing across lake Hylia. The stars and moonlight illuminated the lake and its many inhabitants: dozens of multicolored fish and the occasional zora fishing at the bottom.
The Hero of Twilight, now nearing adulthood, who had saved not just one world, but two, stared at the his limp fishing line hanging loosely off the boat's end as he recalled the nightmare in his head. It had been two months since he had parted with Zelda and Midna, and in that time he had done nothing heroic. More just the opposite in fact. Link had only returned to Ordon Village to restock his supplies, talking to no one while home and leaving just as quietly as he arrived to wander from place to place. He'd even stolen food from time to time. Borrowing a boat from Iza, the adventurer had navigated the rapids, coming down to let his boat drift on the Lake's surface, just in the hopes of having one night's peaceful rest under the stars. But every night, a new nightmare would greet him. He had a heartache that he couldn't cure by himself, nor could the beauty of nature around him. The hero's eyes closed, and he saw in his mind the cruel memory again.
The desert was cool, no harsh winds blew atop the tallest area of the Arbiter's grounds. The sun was high, but little heat baked upon the three gathered there.
Link and Zelda stood across from Midna, her black twili cloak blowing gently in the soft winds. Her head was bowed, and a tear came down across her face. Link did not cry though, to him this was not an eternal goodbye. In his mind, he would return to the Twilight Realm just as soon as life here had settled back down. The hero didn't foresee the event that was about to happen, one that would crack his heart in two.
Midna's tear glowed softly leaving her face as she spoke the words that haunted him. "Link…" Her hand reached up before the tear, holding for a second in the air. "I…" her hand came down gently, pushing the glowing droplet across the small plateau.
"See you later…"
Characteristic of her, he thought. That moment though, was the last of happiness he had. His eye caught the tear as it floated up to the Mirror of Twilight… and drifted right through it. A pool of violet energy formed where the droplet entered, and spread rapidly across the mirror, cracking the sacred glass in countless ways that Zant had only dreamed of accomplishing. Fully realizing what she had done, he turned only to watch her dissolve into a stream of white particles in the Mirror's light, passing through the portal on the obsidian rock.
With a final crack, the mirror of twilight exploded in a flash of shards.
Link opened his eyes, staring at the lake and his reflection. His blond-brown hair was unkept, and no longer held the fine part it once did. It was limp and greasy, falling where the wind blew it. The green cap that was part of his Hero's tunic was packed away with his things. He put it away to stay under the radar, as many had heard of the green-clad hero who had fought back the monsters of Zant's twilight army. His sapphire eyes stared at him with an ache few could understand.
What was she going to say? The thought, combined with his nightmares and her absence, all swirled around in his head and caught like a lump in his stomach and chest. His heart was heavy as lead, at it felt like a weight and burden as no other. The truth was; as much as she bothered him and bossed him around, as much as she had taunted and teased him, she had stood up for the light as much as her own world. She had defied Ganondorf, despite the formidable chosen power he wielded. And, she had made him feel complete. Despite his self-denial, he knew it in his heart. During their time together;
He had fallen in love.
It wasn't sudden, it wasn't absolute. At the beginning, he hadn't even set out for her. The villager turned hero had been out to save his childhood friend – one he had actually saw himself together with at the time. Link had hated the little imp who rode him around like a horse. She had treated him like a servant, a slave. He several times wanted to buck her off and maul the princess of twilight. But time passed. She told him of truth, and spoke of defiance. She had courage, defying the "king" of twilight. Zant had left her for dead, and he rode through rain and time to save her. He didn't know why, until now. They had fought together in the realm of twilight, and she had sacrificed herself to try and stop Ganon's raging spirit. When the light spirits had brought her back, the hero could only gape at her true form. Link had spent so long chasing Ilia, he'd miss the real beauty in front of him the whole time.
A single tear hit the water. It surprised Link, for not even as a child had he ever cried; or so Rusl had told him. Leaning back in the boat, he waited in the pain of his heartache for oblivion to claim him. Nightmare and reality, they were just two different pains to him now. The hero didn't care which he drifted consciously within, not anymore.