"When fact becomes legend, print the legend." -Maxwell Scott
Truer words have never been spoken. What was the world really like during Link's adventures in Hyrule? The history penned by Zelda and her scribes can hardly be trusted, and this tale is the key as to why.
A/N: This. Is an ordeal. I have had this story in the works for ten years now (Really? Yes. It's worth it.) Ever since I picked up that grey N64 controller on that fateful Xmas morning, I saw plot holes and inconsistencies everywhere in Hyrule. I also saw tons of opportunities for detail-oriented back-story. Little things, like potions, masks, music, even landscape, all these details that OoT adapters take for granted because WE KNOW WHERE THEY ARE AND WHAT THEY LOOK LIKE. What if we don't? What if...Zelda constructed her legend as carefully as the game designers? Look past all the trappings of canonical fact, and be prepared to experience a totally new Hyrule.
For supplementary information and some updates, visit my livejournal at thay117.
Welcome to The To Be Trilogy, Book One: To Be Courageous.
The midnight forest echoed with high-pitched Ki-yi-yi's and the deep tum tum tum of many drums. The smells of sweaty, dusty, oily bodies mixed with wood smoke, scorched flour, composting fruit and greasy meat breezed past discerning nostrils. A palpable air of festival pervaded the earth and for miles around, even the wolves, owls and elk gave stray shouts of celebration. In the Great Clearing, thirty compact figures danced and dashed around a huge bonfire, each painted and decorated in their finest paints and decorations, yipping and ki-yi-yi-ing with abandon. Above their heads, an erratic cloud of tiny sparks suspended on opaque dragonfly wings swirled and dipped in rhythm with the beat. Many of the people wore nothing, and all lovingly painted themselves in swirling black, purple, yellow, red and green designs. Several of them pounded on their drums, a deerskin stretched over a bark ring, shook rawhide rattles filled with clay beads, sent the shrill tones of a reed flute into the night, echoing the owls, or contributed to a raucous, out-of-sync chorus of "The Circle Song."
"A time around again again again
Spinning with arms out out out
Stamping with legs strong strong strong
Together we beat the drum drum drum!
Another Circle, the year complete,
We dance we dance we dance!"
Another instrument joined the fray. It was a sweet, bird-like tone, and a boy sitting on the outer edge of the circle smiled when he identified the source.
A girl, completely nude like the others now, stood swaying and staring at the fire like one in trance. Her body was daubed in rainbow colors, corn flower blue eyes rimmed in chalk white and her yellow hair was absolutely green with sticky pine resin, rolled into wild dreadlocks and flourished with dozens of clacking bone beads and the flight feathers of songbirds. A pink winged spark fluttered above her head unobtrusively. She held a small object to her mouth, cradling it gently as fleet fingers darted over the holes in the little round body. The loud and enthusiastic celebration abruptly quieted as her song climbed in tempo and octave. Her cheeks puffed in-out-in-out as bird calls erupted from her little clay ocarina. Someone started clapping in a quick tattoo, which the girl matched with a simple and repetitive melody played at breakneck speed. Soon, the rhythm was too fast for their hands to keep time, yet she tweeted faster and faster, the notes spiraling up and up the scale! Finally, her tireless tune ended on a shrill fweet, leaving an atmosphere of expectance hanging.
All the winged sparks descended from their cloud, one for every person gathered round yon fire.
Except for one boy, the one at the outside of the fire circle, but no one was paying attention to him now. All eyes were on the ocarina player.
"Brothers and sisters," she said lovingly, outstretching her arms as if to embrace them. "We have completed another circle on the earth. The cycle of seasons has turned once more to this, the Long Day, when the sun shows itself for our accomplishments, which are good and many." Her smile tightened. She was in her element now, her ceremonial timbre pouring carefully chosen words, her hands expressively forming shapes and pantomiming simply. "We have both lost and gained a brother this past year. Rido, the Weaver, left us in the late winter. His Grown-Up form, the snow bunting, warned us of the last vicious blizzard, and many who would have been caught out in the storm safely bedded down until the sun returned. We thank you and we honor you, Rido Weaver Snow Bunting." With deliberate care, she emptied the contents of a small leather pouch into her hand and flung the mix of club moss spores, white bird feathers and a hank of blonde hair into the hungry fire, which roared in a magnesium flash. The odor of burning hair drifted outwards.
"We thank you and honor you," confirmed the mass.
"The newest brother came to us one moon after Rido Grew Up," said the girl, pride overtaking thanksgiving. "Lido, whose hands are too tiny and uncoordinated for craft, is in the care of Laria, the Brewer. It was she who picked him from the branches of the Deku Tree, and her fairy, Badi, named the fairy of Lido Mari."
A second girl with a cheery yellow face carrying a toddler half her size on her hip stepped up to face the congregation. "Thank you, Saria," Laria placed a soft touch on the green-haired girl's painted shoulder to show her companionship. Then she addressed her peers. "While Lido may be too small and unwise, his voice is big and his legs are strong. Lido did not learn to walk." Laria's grin split open to reveal even white teeth. "I must keep a hold of him, for he is ever running. He leapt over crawling and runs swifter than the falling stars!"
"So leash him!" crowed a merry voice.
"You cannot leash what you cannot catch!" someone else shouted.
"If you could reach him, perhaps tie him in a sack and hang him from a tree with your ferments, Laria!"
Knees were slapped in glee and laughter shook the crowd. Little Lido scowled, apparently aware the joy was at his expense, but his displeasure melted as Saria handed him a bone cracked down the middle, slobbering and sucking up the fatty marrow. Laria faded back into the crowd with her charge and Saria commanded the center again.
"Earlier on this day, as we do every year, we held an audience with the Great Deku Tree, our Protector and the Source of All Life in Kokiri. As the Children of the Forest, our physical shape is adapted to best experience the Joys of Life." Saria let the familiar pleasure of appreciation wash over her, the feeling spilling into the visibly relaxing crowd. "These are small things, every day things, like the soil, like pebbles and spider webs and big things like the sky and life and meat. Our minds are quick as the darting humming bird, crafty as the weasel, patient as the evergreen and free spirited as the wind itself! Our hearts all beat as One," Saria glanced in the opposite direction, a subtle signal for the drummers to softly pick up the music again, but quiet enough that she would still be heard. "And each year, the Great Deku Tree charges us with the task of learning as much as our heads will hold." A corner of her mouth quirked. "During this, the Short Night, we recount our trials and trails.
"Mido Lead Hunter, please step forward."
A stocky boy painted in blood red circles designating his rank came into the firelight followed by a bobbing pink fairy. Saria squared her body with his.
"Tell us what you have learned this year."
Mido grinned slyly. "Modesty must be just as important as the spear or club to a hunter." His eyes crinkled in arrogant delight.
A little crease formed between Saria's eyebrows, but she nodded sagely and thanked Mido for his wisdom.
"We thank you," intoned the crowd. Mido bowed and exchanged places with "Fado Gut-Stringer" and so many did not see the nasty glare between him and the boy at the edge of the circle. Saria continued to call up her companions one by one, each responding with funny or serious lessons learned since the previous year. Sharing the stories of the lessons was unnecessary. The Kokiri band was only thirty-two strong and no happening, however small, went unnoticed. The Wisdom Ceremony only reinforced their bonds with each other and did not reveal anything unknown, though this would change by the end of the night.
The number of those who had not yet shared dwindled as stars faded and the sky lightened until at last, just a few hours before the sun would peek over the fluttering treetops, only one boy remained.
"Link the Fairyless," Saria called out, and below the tireless rhythm, she could hear a few derogatory snickers and whispers. He emerged out of the throng, two hands taller than the rest and sloppily painted white zig zags covered his limbs and torso and his sky blue eyes were circled in charcoal—the Kokiri signs of improbability.
"Link," Saria clapped a pigment-covered shoulder and leaned close. She smelled of pine and sweat, rendered fat and minerals. She was expectant, exhausted and excited as she whispered, "Have you thought of anything else to say?"
"Yes," was all he said, and they drew apart. Link stood, tired looking like the rest of them, but spine straight as a fir tree. "I have learned that some hunts are not always rewarding." His voice was soft, rasping, like something broken and put back together, though iron backed his speech. "The Kokiri must learn to be more clever than their prey. Hoof and antler are still harder than flesh, and even the doe can kick." Though Link addressed everyone, he directed his will towards Mido, who was looking more and more sour by the second. "We must have more respect for our quarry, or we will come back from hunts with less than we started."
"What are you trying to say?" Mido spat, unable to keep his mouth shut any longer. "Are you accusing the Kokiri of disrespecting the animals we hunt?"
"Not all of them," Link growled pointedly, the tips of his long ears burning red.
Everyone gasped. Never, in the history of Korokdom, had there been such open hostility and dispute during the Short Night. Nobody dared to breath as Link and Mido, who was pushing his way to the front of the circle, stared each other down.
"Listen, Fairyless," Mido breathed furiously. "You already ruined the Long Day hunt, why stop there?"
Link pulled in closer, and used his extra height to look down on Mido, like an alpha wolf might do to a lesser member of the pack. "They should know what really-"
"They were there, they know-"
"Only what you've told them-"
"Are you calling me a liar?" Mido said loudly, and the drumming stopped completely. "You would dare accuse the Lead Hunter of the Kokiri-"
"Yes!" Link bellowed and gripped his hay-colored scalp in frustration. "For all that I have ever done in this forest, everything a Kokiri must do to live life and survive, the same as you, you've always put me down and shit on my accomplishments. This is the last straw. This is the end of it. Thirteen cycles is long enough." He stomped his left foot, finalizing his claim.
But instead of giving up tactfully, for all of the Children of the Forest knew of Mido's hatred of the Fairyless, some indulging it and others bearing much disdain, Mido smirked and built his argument.
"The Earth and Moon. The Sun and Earth. The flower and the bee. The rock and the moss. Trees and leaves. All things are Two," With a pinpointed disgust, he glared at Link. "Except you. You are One, and as such-"
"He is One with the Kokiri, Mido," Saria finally intervened, sensing the time was right for the case Link and she had discussed. "This is the celebration of One-ness, between all of us. So. He is not outwardly more than Two." The shaman-girl studied the blonde boy painted in chalk, as though confirming his lack of companion. Her own fairy accented the difference even better. "Perhaps he is more than the rest of us." Saria considered the instigator who was nearly hopping mad and eager to refute. From the crowd, little gasps and chatter filled the air. "When I plucked him from the Deku Tree, as must happen with all Kokiri, and when I saw he had no fairy for my Niva to name, I was afraid and did not understand. How can One not be Two?" Her face scrunched while she punctuated her words with fingers forming numbers. "But the Deku Tree asked me, as the Wisest, to raise and train this strange One. As the circles completed, and Link the Fairyless grew wiser, I realized that I must be his Two."
Cries of disbelief rang out through the clearing.
"But you are Two yourself! You cannot be his!" shouted a conservative girl with chains of pink lady slipper flowers woven into her yellow hair.
"Because I am not his Two, Lalia," Saria explained calmly. "Niva and I are two. But Niva and I and Link are Three."
Outcries turned to uproar. There had never been any mention of Threes before!
"How can he be Three? He's barely even One!" Mido seethed through clenched jaws.
Saria waited for more words, but Mido obviously had none. At least, not words that wouldn't threaten his Wisest.
Link felt a twitch of hope in his gut. He might actually win this time!
"What about the Deku Tree?" Saria posed the question openly.
"What about the Deku Tree?" Mido crossed his arms, challenge in every line of muscle.
"He produced every one of us. He bonds a fairy, a spirit of wisdom, to each of us, so that we may know our forest and all things within it. The Deku Tree also produced this forest and all things within it from his wellspring of Life. So. He is one, and yet, all the strands of the Web of Life connect to him and he is Infinite. He is more than two, yet less. Link is One, and yet, more than Two."
The silence was stunning. There was no wind and neither wolf nor night bird added their voices to the dark forest. Link looked at Mido, who's mouth worked with no sound and he wanted to cry his victory, no little thanks to Saria in her wisdom. However, her comparison between himself and the Deku Tree had been unexpected, and he felt uneasy about what repercussions might come of it. He hoped for the best, and maybe, with some luck and hard work, his ostracism would lessen.
"We have indeed learned many lessons this year, Brothers and Sisters," Saria intoned importantly, deliberately gazing into each Kokiri's eyes until they acknowledged her. "I have decided to call this The Year of Numbers, which change and are ever constant. Year of Numbers, you have passed us by and we greet the beginning of the next circle." With a last flourish, Saria dumped a watertight basket over the long burned down coals in a show of steam and sudden darkness.
The trance Saria's argument begat suddenly broke and the more liberal Children of the Forest cheered for celebration of a new year. Ki-yi's chimed as Laria brought forth a skin paunch filled with dark purple juice. As taught by her predecessor and his fairy, she knew the secrets of drink-craft, how to crush fruit or vegetation and ferment the resulting juice in breathable bladders suspended from certain trees. She knew thousands of recipes, and could make any condition-specific drink, for everything from a cold to poison ivy sores. Laria was a medicine girl, the keeper of the village's physical wellbeing. It was her honest opinion, unlike the boy who trained her, that the alcoholic drinks encouraged goodwill and necessary socialization, in controlled proportions. Her true secret was in the dosage. As long as everyone shared equally, the pleasant, heady buzz would quickly escalate and crash hard into deep, revitalizing sleep. When Laria had first proposed the idea to Saria, the Wisest had instantly seen the benefit of such a substance. Of course, the rest of them would neither care about nor appreciate the subtle jab at their restraint and personal responsibility. The Kokiri, though highly and wonderfully knowledgeable about their forest home, were, after all, only children.
Each Brother and Sister guzzled down a healthy gulp or two of the alcohol, recoiling at the uncommon aromatic quality of drink. When the nearly empty paunch traveled into Link's hands, he stopped, unsure if he too could participate in this new tradition. Laria smiled and called out, "It's a new year, you doe! Drink!" The congregation shared a healthy laugh, already forgiving the botched hunt, and enfolding Link a little closer into the society. His eyes welled with tears and his throat burned as he gulped the last dregs from the wineskin.
Saria pulled close, clapping him heartily on the shoulder, smearing her rainbow paint over his and leading him into the wildly dancing villagers. The New Year song now erupted from the undulating crowd: the sun was rising over the black treetops.
"Another circuit around the fire,
Our hearts are aflame with life,
Each living being is separate,
But all must begin and end together…"
Link sang in his throaty, breaking rasp, drowned out by the others, and glad for it. Glad for the new life, glad for the new year, glad for everything…almost everything. He noticed one body slipping away from the new light, slinking with contempt and tense with anger, and Link wondered what Mido's fairy would be saying. Did she approve of his coercion and depreciating? He would never know and he let the rush of drink take his mind into the dawn of a new day.