CHAPTER 1 – FIRST DAY
Zelda trudged through the snow towards the enormous castle looming up into the sky before her.
Hyrule High: her new high school and her new home.
Her black combat boots crunched loudly with each step and her breaths puffed out in small clouds of mist. It was undoubtedly one of the most prestigious high schools in the world, founded by the old Hylian royal family a few hundreds of years ago, but Zelda couldn't bring herself to feel excited.
She didn't.
Being a daughter of the school's chairman, and Goth on top of that made her a target for bullies. It didn't matter what school she went to.
Which is why, she told herself, she would keep low, be invisible, stay out of sight. Teachers from her previous schools were often only reminded of her existence during exams at the end of the year and even then none of them could put a name to her. That was good. She could manage that. She liked it that way, wanted it that way.
She reached the enormous double doors and gazed at them for a while, overwhelmed by their sheer size and grandeur.
They towered above her, dark wood and decorated with old, detailed and intricate carvings of images and scenes from history. Zelda reached for the enormous metal ring. But her hand froze in mid-reach.
What if she couldn't keep to the shadows? Then the bullies would surely find her. Her chest felt tight with anxiety, but she willed herself to be brave. She had to be. She took a deep breath before closing her hand over the ring and pulling the giant door towards her.
Closing her eyes, Zelda stepped inside. She was immediately greeted by warmth, but when she opened her eyes, everyone was staring at her. They all appeared to have stopped what they had previously been doing. She wasn't sure of what to do, so she simply stared back and it only took a few minutes before the students seemed to forget about her and move back to completing whatever tasks they had been doing before.
Zelda sighed with relief and closed the door behind her. She scanned the great entrance hall, all ancient stone and lit by giant chandeliers. The modern, red metal lockers that lined some of the walls seemed obnoxiously out of place, but Zelda took comfort from the familiarity.
She pulled a crumpled piece of paper out of her coat's pocket and attempted to smooth it out enough for the printed font to be legible. She needed to find her room in the girls' dormitories.
It was early evening, which meant that the school day had already finished and she still had a couple of hours before dinner. There were directions on the piece of paper, so Zelda read the first one out.
"Take the first set of stairs," she quoted and searched the hall. She didn't have to look very far since a fairly short, but very wide and large stone staircase stood parallel to the entrance doors. From there, there were two thinner staircases leading up in opposite directions.
There were also tall rectangular archways on either side of Zelda, but she doubted the staircase she was looking for was through either of those.
"Then take the next staircase on the left," she read and looked up again. That was a start at least. She set forward towards stairs.
No one seemed to pay her any mind and Zelda nearly smiled until she passed a particular group of pretty girls leaning against the row of lockers to the left of the first staircase. The main girl, Zelda could obviously tell she was the leader, was tall, slender with dark red hair and icy blue eyes. She looked Zelda up and down, whispered something to the others, causing them all to start sniggering.
Zelda froze; she knew their kind. She should have known that it was only a matter of time before they found her…
The redhead starting walking towards her, a nasty smile plastered onto her face. Zelda didn't know what to do; she felt like she had been turned into stone. She wanted to run, but she couldn't. The redhead had nearly reached her.
Someone grabbed Zelda by the arm, jerking her roughly out of the way of the redhead's path. A new redhead, equally tall, if not taller. She put one arm around Zelda's shoulders, keeping her tightly at her side. She used her other arm to give the first redhead her middle finger, mouthing 'fuck off' with a smirk.
The first redhead stopped in her tracks. She scowled at them before stalking back over to her group. The group shot them dirty looks before moving off through the archway on the left.
Zelda watched them go before looking up at her saviour. The girl winked at her, releasing her before running her fingers through her firey red hair. It wasn't as dark as the first girl's; it was brighter and more of an orangey-red, like flames.
"That was a close one, newbie," she grinned and glanced at where the group had gone with a scowl, "They love their fresh meat."
Zelda shuddered at the thought and the girl threaded their arms, moving towards the staircase and dragging a surprised Zelda with her.
"You were headed to the dorms right?"
"How did you know that?"
The girl shrugged. "Lucky guess."
"Oh."
Zelda didn't know what else to say.
"I'm Midna by the way," the girl said, rescuing Zelda from an awkward silence. She winked again. "Don't wear it out."
Zelda found herself speechless again, because for the first time, someone was actually being nice to her. Someone she didn't even know was being kind to her.
"I'm Zelda."
Midna led her up the next flight of stairs and down corridor after corridor until they reached a long spiralling staircase that took them up to the girls' dormitory. It was at the top of one of the castle's tall narrow towers, narrow in comparison to the rest, but still enormous.
Midna finally released Zelda and placed her hands on her hips, surveying the corridor lined on either side by ornate wooden doors.
"So which one's yours?" she gave Zelda a questioning glance, "Do you know?"
Zelda looked down at the piece of paper she still had in her hand. She frowned.
"It just says: 'End of hallway'."
Midna mouthed a silent 'oh'. She gave Zelda a strange look.
"So you're the princess of the castle."
Zelda blanched.
"What?"
"The chairman's daughter," Midna shrugged, "That room's been reserved for you."
Zelda sighed. Typical of her father, always treating her as though she were above the other students, only because she was his daughter and not someone else's.
Midna pointed at the two rooms adjacent to Zelda's.
"Those rooms are also for special cases. Mine's the one on the left," she grinned at Zelda, "That makes us neighbours, newbie."
"Special cases?" Zelda looked at Midna questioningly. Who was this girl?
Midna noticed and shrugged. "I'm kinda the princess of the Twilight Vale and whatever."
She was royalty? Zelda didn't know what to say. She would never have guessed that Midna was royalty. She'd never been in the presence of royalty before. Would she have to act differently? Speak a certain way? She didn't know what to do.
"Should I be… bowing to you?"
Midna pulled a face. "What? No. Ew, don't do that."
And that was that.
Midna grabbed Zelda by the arm again and dragged her forwards.
"Don't just stand there; let's go check out your room."
"Okay."
Her room was large, but not enormous. There furniture was old, ornate and wooden, pretty with a double four poster bed, a desk and wardrobe.
"All the rooms actually look like this," Midna noted, looking around, "It's just that ours are a tad larger. But not by much."
She winked at Zelda, "So we're not that special, see?"
Zelda took the time to really look at Midna.
She was pretty. Her hair was short in a pixie cut that suited her delicate impish features and her skin was incredibly pale. It made sense because she was from the Twilight Vale and the sun never touched there.
Like Zelda, Midna dressed in all black: black skinny-jeans, a black tee and black boots. She had tattoos too, on her arms. They were a mixture of swirling and geometric black lines that intertwined with one another.
Zelda thought they were really cool.
"Let's get some food," Midna hooted and dragged Zelda back out the room.
The cafeteria was enormous. It had to have been. It would have hosted enormous feasts and parties, fed armies, way back in the past
Zelda let Midna lead the way, weaving their way through rows of circular wooden tables.
Zelda saw the first redhead, being fawned over by her 'followers' and seated next to a boy that made Zelda stop in her tracks.
The redhead was hanging on him, she was all over him, but he barely spared her a glance. He looked sullen, moody, irritable. He was gorgeous, golden-haired and blue-eyed. His features were delicate, like Midna's, almost elfish.
Midna noticed where Zelda was looking and pulled a disgusted face.
"That's Malon and her herd of sheep."
"And the boy?"
Midna rolled her eyes.
"Link. Her tool-of-a-boyfriend."
"Oh."
Zelda didn't know why she felt so disappointed in him. She didn't even know him! But still… She gave him one last glance before following Midna again. She could have sworn he had looked up at her, at the last minute, but she doubted it. Why would he?
Midna pointed at the last table, the one right in the corner of the room, with a satisfied smirk on her face.
"That's where we sit, Zellie."
There were three people already seated there and they all gave Zelda reassuring smiles. The two girls did anyway; the boy didn't smile but tilted his head with acknowledgement.
Each girl had dyed her hair a fairly outrageous colour, one blue and one emerald green. The boy had black hair, but he looked strikingly like Midna, with the same skin tone and the same unnaturally red eyes, though his were flecked with yellow.
They reached the table and Midna cleared her throat.
"Guys, this is Zellie. She's new, so be nice."
The green-haired girl smiled. "I'm Saria."
"I'm Ruto," the other girl said.
"That's my cousin, Zant," Midna introduced the boy for him as he didn't really seem inclined to speak and Zelda nodded with understanding. It made sense.
"He dyed his hair black," Midna whispered in her ear, "The traitor." Zelda laughed and tried to picture Zant with Midna's firey red hair.
"OH MY GOOOOD!"
They all turned to face the source of the scream and Midna burst out into raucous laughter, because standing and covered with food, was Malon. A few of her sheep were frantically trying to sooth the redhead's hysteria and at least attempt to control some of the mess. Link just watched the scene in front of him with a bored expression.
"I wonder how that happened," Zant finally spoke and Ruto pointed with a smirk to where a tiny girl with silver hair darted lithely from the scene, easily disappearing into the rapidly growing crowd of students.
"Navi, bless her," Midna wiped her eyes, unable to contain her mirth at seeing Malon suffer.
It wasn't long before the silver-haired Navi suddenly appeared at their table and flicked her fringe from her eyes.
"Hey," she grinned, craning her head to the side and tapping her ear, "Listen."
Malon wailed again, completely melodramatic, making it a much bigger crisis than it really was. If anyone could bring the cafeteria to a standstill, it was Malon. The table laughed.
"How'd you do it?" Ruto demanded and Navi flicked a strand of hair over her shoulder.
"I tripped a sheep. Her tray went flying," she smirked, "It found its target. I didn't know who it would hit but I'm so glad it hit her."
Zelda just smiled, feeling uncharacteristically content. She enjoyed just sitting quietly through dinner, smiling and enjoying her new friends' banter and antics. None of them judged her, none of them questioned her, and that was all Zelda ever needed.
It was something she had never had before.
"… hey, Zellie are you even listening?" Midna gently shook Zelda out of her busy thoughts by the shoulders, chuckling at the brunette's stunned expression. The others were looking at her too.
"Oh, sorry," Zelda blushed, expecting judgement, a scolding, a slap. She flinched, waiting and Midna's eyes widened with surprise before she immediately frowned with concern, seeming to recognize Zelda's reaction and exactly what Zelda was thinking in an instant.
"Hey, Zellie," she said softly, gently keeping her hands on Zelda's shoulders, "No one here's going to do that to you. You don't have to be afraid of that anymore, okay?"
"We'll protect you."
Zelda didn't know what to say, what to think. Only that Midna's words and the kind expressions on the faces of the others, even Zant, had hit her like a sledgehammer to the chest. She felt tears threatening to overflow. Normally she wouldn't have cared what others thought; she felt as though she had been impervious to the opinions of others after being bullied for so long. But here, for the first time, someone was offering to protect her instead. It was the complete opposite to what she was used to.
It was overwhelming.
"Thank you."