Author's Notes: Well, this one hit me while reading the fic 'Shadowed' by Demi-goddess of OCs, so I promptly asked if she'd mind me borrowing the original race she created in it to do so. That said, this is a giftfic, something I almost never do. This takes place in the somewhat dim and murky time after the end of Ocarina of Time, and a long time before Twilight Princess. It might also be somewhat of an alternate timeline thing, given that I don't know where Demi is taking Shadow. Warning, some sadness and death here.
Death of Dreams
By BlackLadyCharon
If there's one thing I've learned over the years since Gannon's defeat, it's that Hero is nowhere near as stupid as he acts at times. You'd think missing seven years of his life would leave him clueless about a lot of things. Yeah, right, I wish. Hero's definitely not stupid. As he's fond of reminding me, Sheikah body armor is skin tight, and displays everything to an advantage. Which meant he could spot Princess Zelda subbing for me right off, given the lack of a distinctive bulge in one certain area. I know the armor's skin tight too, given the amount of times that fact has kept Hero's groping hands, wanted and unwanted, off of my actual skin.
I still have to kill him for grabbing my butt in the middle of a fight with dondongo's. Though that one may have been a genuine accident.
"See anything interesting, Sheik?"
"Not yet, Hero. Not yet."
"Oi! I have a name! Why can't you ever call me Link?" Ah, Hero's familiar harping about me not calling him by his given name. Oh, I call him Link, alright. In the bedchamber, nowhere else. Outside of our room, I'm a proper Sheikah, or as much as I can be. Warriorhood got dropped on me like a Goron brother hug, suddenly, frighteningly, and uncomfortably. I've learned to survive it, like everything else the Goddesses have shoved into my life.
Except him. I can never quite predict him.
"Tell me again why Zelda's worried?" I sigh. Head like a sieve, my Hero. Can't remember for more then two hours if it was important, unless it's how to kill a monster. Why again did the Goddesses hook me up with him? Oh yes, compatible souls. Usually, I just stay in the background, keep the smaller large nasties off of Hero's back while he clears the temple's and whacks Gannon. I'm the shadow, the unmentioned, unheard, and unappreciated part of Hero's legend. Though I've made a nice, big splash this time. Someone had to lead him around by the nose and teach him, and if you think I'd let Zelda hold my harp, forget it. It's mine, in all capital letters. Just like Hero is.
"What do you know of the Xiomar, Hero?"
"Nothing. Enlighten me, please?"
"To shorten what would be a time consuming, long explanation that would send you to sleep, the King of Hyrule several generations back got the bright idea of having a tribe blood oathed to protect him. The Sheikah and the Xiomar 'competed' for the right. The Sheikah won, and the Xiomar were driven out completely, as the other tribes raised a fuss when they sought to settle down in their established territories. The King refused to bury the dead honorably, the Sheikah killed him for it. Half the tribe settled down, buried the dead, and went about life. The other half went and got the Goddesses attention and wrath by trying to take over the Sacred Realm and got banished to an inbetween place, becoming the Twili, who you also don't know." Yeah, I'm really simplifying this, but Hero's already lived enough blood and death. He doesn't need the whole, sad and sorry tale. "Then Gannon killed almost everyone but me and Impa. The tribe's condemned to a slow, faltering death as I'm the last male, and let's face it, I'm not going to have kids. Not unless the Goddesses decide to wreak even more have on both of our lives." I finger the broken Goron's Ruby while I talk, smiling a little under my mask. He broke a shard off and returned it to the Ruby's resting place, but the rest he gave to me. It reminded him of my eyes, he said. Of me, his true love.
It's his way of saying if he's mine, I'm his. I don't object to it. I'm just vain enough to like it when someone as handsome as Hero gives me a bauble. A sacred bauble, to top it off.
"So, to condense it, something's going on here, and Zelda wants more info?"
"Yes." About then, Epona and Nyx reach the highest and narrowest part of the pass, and we discover that we won't be sending more information back to Zelda. There's a frigging army winding its way towards us. The Xiomaran's are up to something, alright.
Invasion. Guess they want payback for being thrown out of Hyrule.
I look back at Hero.
"Think we can hold if you send Navi back to get Zelda and reinforcements?"
"Of course we can, Sheik. We're the Hero and the Sheikah, after all. We can do anything!" He's grinning that wide, loveable grin of his. Foolish dreams. Foolish Hero. But when he smiles at me like that, I can't help but think we can do anything too.
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I've lost track of how long we've been doing this, running on adrenaline, a small cache of red potions and fairies, and bitter, desperate hope. Gotta have been three days, maybe four. We've been scavenging weapons off of any dead Xiomaran we feel we can safely reach, though Hero overestimated once and got an arrow in his ass.
There's always the one who'll settle for watching you dance about in pain like a total Raka instead of killing you. Sadists.
"Holding up?" Hero's worried about me. Cute, but he's in worse shape then I am. I'm tired, battered, and thankful that the Nayru's Love spell apparently has a secondary use of curing poison, but Hero's got his shield strapped to his arm constantly because it's the only thing holding the bone in place, puncture wounds, and less armor than I do. Not to mention bruised and cracked ribs. I should be worrying about Hero, not him about me.
"Yes."
"Shit, they're working up courage for another charge." The first time, the Xiomarans laughed at us, mocked us. A half grown boy and a filthy Sheikah. They thought that they had the advantage with their numbers.
They don't laugh when they come at us now. They know the strength of our fangs.
The fight begins, really a brief skirmish compared to what it was earlier. Something strikes me as wrong. They're a distraction, a cover. When they retreat, I start to look to see what the plan is that they bought time to complete.
I see it all too well when an arrow zings past me, narrowly missing slicing my throat open to sink deep and true into Hero's throat. The last of the fairies flutters out to heal that one, but the second one pierces both the poor fairy and Link's neck again. Time stops, his blood spattering and trailing across my face like bloody tears. I find myself kneeling next to him, mind still numb as my mouth babbles without my conscious control, begging him to stay with me, to not leave his Shadow alone and cold. He smiles, sadly, convulsing as he tries to speak to me. His hands weakly press something into mine, and almost without looking, I know what it is. Then life flees.
I'm cold, alone, empty. The death of dreams, mine and his, screams through me, ripping at my soul. Then I hear them jeering. Mocking him. Claiming that only a weakling would ally with a filthy, unclean Sheikah. They say that if this is Hyrule's Hero, they will have no trouble defeating us. They laugh. They are the enemy, the Xiomaran. They are the ones causing my pain. There is only one thing left to do.
Destroy them.
I stand slowly, jerkily. I am not mortally wounded physically, not yet. But my soul has already been dealt the deathblow. I will welcome the blade that cleaves life from my breast. From within my wraps, I withdraw the Goron's Ruby, clenching it tightly in hand with what Hero gave me, feeling the items grind together as I slowly begin advancing.
They're stupid, the Xiomaran's. They toy with me, surrounding me, drawing me into the heart of their army. They think that I'm almost harmless now, even when I still kill some of them. They can deal with me at their leisure. That suits my plan just fine. Some of them will escape, most likely, but the majority of them won't. Finally, I find myself facing the leader. He smirks, arrogant, confident.
Deceived.
"So, an unclean beast of the Twilight dared to stain the Hero of Time? What will you do now, Sheikah? You have nowhere to run."
So much I could say, much of it rude and nasty. All of it true. But I don't bother. There is a time for such things, and it is not now. I've made it here, at the cost of my blood trailing out behind me. So much of it, so much of my life and energy spilled like water to accomplish this. It will take what is left to finish it. I can't afford to waste time. So I answer him with two simple words. A spell, powerful enough normally, but more then redoubled with my life, heart and tattered soul poured into it. Redoubled yet again by being held next to the Spiritual Stone of Fire, the stone of the Goddess it belongs to.
"Din's Fire."
The dull world explodes in red, yellow, orange, and near the base of the flames a blue as pure as Hero's eyes. Then darkness greets me, and I falter and fall, knowing I'll never remember what happens next. I never do, just as I can never recall precisely all of my lives near Hero.
The Goddesses strive to spare us both that pain, at least.
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The fire raged for a day after Zelda arrived.
The few Xiomaran's they'd found wandering witless and half scorched on their side of the pass could only babble about a bestial, evil Sheikah who had cast tainted, unclean magic at them. Zelda recognized Din's Fire, though, and dismissed them out of hand. Doubtless any left alive on the other side of the flames had retreated home in disgrace.
No, the Xiomar would need time to rebuild their numbers, and to wait for Hyrule to forget the danger of them and be off guard again.
It didn't tell her what had happened to Sheik or Link.
When the fire finally raged its last, and the pass cooled enough that her men could tolerate it, she sent them to look. After the sun set, they returned, bearing the only two things the fire had not destroyed.
Sheik's body and the Goron's Ruby.
Zelda shuddered at the sight of the slight, mangled frame, the charred hands that gripped the Ruby and the shattered spell crystal for Din's Fire. The worst thing about the dead body though, was the quiet, despairing expression on Sheik's face. That told her more then anything else. Closing her eyes, she stepped forward, her gloved hand brushing the eyelids down over the accusing, blank eyes. The men looked at her, and she spoke, mourning.
"Take him and bury him, someplace far and secure. Leave the Ruby with him. Tell no one but me where you buried him. Let him rest safe from desecration by those who hate the Sheikah." The men hesitantly nodded, wrapping the body and carrying it away. Zelda stayed, looking out over the rocks cracked with crazed lines by heat and mourning.
Mourning for a Hero, a Sheikah, and the death of a pleasant, peaceful dream.
Fin
As I've said, I don't know where Demi is taking her own fic, so this probably won't match what she does, but it makes for an interesting alternate piece. I don't know why, but the idea of the Xiomaran's being vindictive and bitter enough to try invading the old fashioned, forceful way first and Sheik being the one to kick their asses back home to have to plot carefully next time struck me all in a blow. Hopefully, Demi-San will like this little piece, though I'm eager to know what everyone else thinks of it too.