The Open Sky
~.~
For once you have tasted flight, you will walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been and there you will long to return.
Leonardo Da Vinci
~.~
He spends his days on horseback, galloping joyously over hill and over dale, just feeling the wind in his hair and the sun on his back. He knows that Epona enjoys it just as much as he does; she loves to run and run and run until she can run no more and lies exhausted but exhilarated with her rider at her side, far from where they left off, far from home, but that doesn't matter because all she needs to do to get back is to stretch her legs again and run. When he's atop his beautiful flaxen chestnut mare, he feels like he's flying. If he closes his eyes, he can imagine passing through the misty clouds, the haze cold and wet but refreshing too. He imagines racing the wind and diving so fast that he could no longer hear his own cries of elation.
At these times, Epona, fleet-footed though she was, just didn't seem to be fast enough, despite the fact that he'd never met a faster horse. She still could not compare to- compare to what? What could he possibly compare her to...?
...a flash of ruby feathers, a distant screech of pleasure, an insistent breeze tugging at his clothes, a sense of eternal friendship and affection...
...the pain of loss and grievance, the severing of a bond deeper than any ocean, the feeling of betrayal and treachery and then the deep-rooted regret and guilt of one led astray finally realising the extent of his actions...
He didn't know where these strange emotional visions came from, but embraced them all with a faint sense of duty. He would bear the burden of these mistakes, only subconsciously knowing that he was the one to have made them.
~.~
He wanders the streets of the city in the sky and wonders what it might have been like when people still lived here (and he is sure they had, no question about it ; the oocca, smart as they are, couldn't have built all this without thumbs). There would have been the town square there, in the centre, and a clump of houses just over there. That broken bridge would've led to, to a school, no, an academy. Yes, he can see it clearly: an academy where young sky-people would train to become, uh, knights! Yes, that's it. Here, they would be trained in the arts of swordsmanship and taught the codes of chivalry and duty and honour. If he had lived here in those times, he would've trained there and been their best student in the history of the establishment.
He looks out over the ever-shifting sea of clouds and wonders how those ancient sky-people could ever have left. This place, this city so far above the clouds, so far from the surface and all its monsters, this place is beautiful, and he feels no less manly for having thought that. If, once upon a time, he had lived here, he would never have left, bar the end of the world or something equally ridiculous (although given his current situation, it's not quite as ridiculous a notion as it once was). If the world was in danger and only he could save it, it would be selfish not to, even if he was leaving Paradise.
He wonders how they got around. Surely this lonely little island was far too small to support a population large enough to need an academy for knights-in-training? Perhaps they grew their food on those smaller islands he can see in the distance if he squints hard enough? Yes, that seems plausible. But...transport. How would they have reached those far-off islets? Perhaps...perhaps they flew there, on, on dragonback. That would explain the Argorok's presence, would it not? Yes, so these sky-people, they trained to be knights and grew crops on distant floating islands that they reached upon the backs of dragons, each one a different colour. His, he thinks, his would be red, red like Epona. A natural red.
This life, it sounds wonderful to him. He wishes the Door of Time could've been located here instead of within the lonely Sacred Grove. He might've been able to meet the locals and ride one of their dragons. Just the thought of soaring through the nacreous clouds excites him more than any of the adrenalin rushes he's ever gotten during his long and perilous journey.
He smiles wryly. That life, it would be nice, if it were true. But really, it's just wishful thinking.
~.~
The best days for him are those that are bright and sunny and crystal-clear, when the sea is calm and when the wind is in his face. He glides across the waves in his small red boat as smoothly as if the ocean were made of glass; it's almost as if he and his sailboat are floating. Only the sea spray and the calls of the seagulls as they dive and swoop around them can break the illusion and even then, one could imagine the spray to be a bank of clouds and the gulls part of one's flock. The sun shines and warms him inside and out and when he's out on the open sea with no obstacles for miles, he shuts his too-blue eyes and listens to the sounds of the sea, interspersed with the cries of the birds his sister so loves and the flapping of the sail. Sometimes he spots a postman gliding overhead and he envies them, just a little, and wonders what it must be like to have wings and if Valoo might give him one of his scales if he asked nicely enough.
~.~
He knows he shouldn't, it's been drilled into him by Alfonzo since he took his first steps towards becoming a Royal Engineer, but he does it anyway. He enjoys leaning out the train window too much to stop and think about the danger he is putting himself in, instead closing his eyes and letting the wind play with his unruly blond hair. He imagines himself soaring above the clouds, great crimson wings spread out either side of him like the scarlet sails of some vast yacht. He fantasises about gliding just above the cloud barrier, close enough to touch, and about performing astounding aerial manoeuvres that should by all rights kill him stone dead.
And then the moment is broken by Zelda's shrill voice urging him to keep his eyes firmly on the tracks ahead, and not turned inwards to one of his 'silly distracting daydreams'.
Sometimes, he almost envies her; not the part where her body has been stolen by a demon and his accomplice in order to house some foul demon lord, but the part where she can fly and soar and glide and swoop, just like he has always dreamed of as far back as he can remember.
~.~
His dreams are consumed by flight. No time for nightmares about all the horrors he has witnessed, these weightless dreams always take precedence. There, in that land of wispy, pearly clouds and the cerulean sky, he ascends towards the sun only to plummet like a stone and, just before hitting the cloud barrier, skilfully pulls up and instead skims just above it, passing his hand through the fluffy sea. He banks and swerves and soars and glides and when he awakes, adrenalin still courses through his veins and his eyes and thoughts don't leave that open sky until he must concentrate on something else or risk forfeiting his life.
Disclaimer: Fanfiction. The clue's in the name.
A/N: I might have written more if I had ever played more games than these few, but I haven't. Number one is Ocarina of Time, two is Twilight Princess, three is Wind Waker, four is Spirit Tracks and five is any or all. Maybe I'll add to this at a later date when I've played more Zelda games. I'd also like to add that the sole reason this exists is because of that quote - it was used in CivIV and I immediately thought of this.
Thank you for reading and until the next time,
Idoloni