A/N: This is the sequel to You Never Spend Any Time With Me so you should read that first. I wasn't originally going to do any more with the storyline, but one of my reviewers (you know who you are!) suggested that the boat be magical so that Ruto and Link could explore the world. Thanks for the idea! I'll try my best to run with it. This is going to be my second chaptered fic, and I'm going to try really hard to be way better about updating then last time. Anyways, I hope you like it! Please let me know what you think, whether something is good or needs to be improved I always like to know.

Disclaimer: I don't own The Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time, or any of the other Zelda games for that matter. Ruto and Link are not my creations, but I can take credit for Kyoudai Ryuou.

As Long as We're Together

Asparagus Altar-Ego

Part One

The little red model ship bobbed on the gentle waves in Zora's domain. It floated further out into the deep water, and, with a laugh, Ruto chased after it.

"Come on Link," Ruto called.

Link hurried to follow, but he didn't catch up to her until the boat stopped moving, Ruto was a faster swimmer than he was.

"It sails pretty good, huh?"

Link nodded, although it was a little difficult to do while treading water. His green clothes were darkened by the water that soaked them, and where his blond hair hit the water it too took on a darker, water-logged hue.

Ruto smiled at him, her back was to the little red model ship, which she'd told Link was called The King of Red Lions, so she didn't see when the ship began to grow. It had started out the size of Link's head, but in a matter of moments grew to the size of a sailboat.

Hearing Link's gasp of surprise, Ruto spun around, purple eyes widening in shock, "Link! It's gotten bigger! How...?"

Link shook his head.

"You don't know?" Ruto asked, "But you were looking right at it?"

Link tried to shrug but just ended up with a mouth full of water. He coughed.

"It's really more of a boat now then a ship isn't it..." Ruto shook her head, "Whatever. Let's check it out. You first."

Link didn't really appreciate being ordered around, but he was curious too, so he swam forward and clambered onto the boat. He stood unsteadily on the deck, before falling over.

"Link!" Ruto gasped.

He raised one hand above the side of the boat and made a thumbs up gesture.

Ruto glared at the boat, "Hmmph. Stupid boy, making me worry." She swam forward and slid gracefully onto the boat. She looked around, putting her hands on slender blue hips, "Well, this is nice." She glanced at Link, who was laying awkwardly in the bottom of the ship. She walked gracefully along the deck to stand in the front of the boat.

"This is really nice." Ruto commented, "We could go all sorts of places in this."

Link nodded. A boat was much more useful than a model ship, even if playing with the model ship had been fun.

"Only..." Ruto spun slowly, looking around at the enclosed cavern of Zora's domain, "How will we get it out of here?"

Standing up cautiously, Link thought about that. Unless the boat would shrink again, it would be awfully hard to get out of the cavern. Obviously it couldn't go via underwater routes, and Link didn't think he could carry it over land by himself. Maybe if Ruto helped... No, not even then.

Suddenly the boat shook underneath them.

"Whoa!" Link yelped, tumbling back into the bottom of the boat.

"What's happening?" Ruto cried as she clutched the side of the boat desperately. A blue light started to surround the boat, and it occurred to Link that it might be a good idea to abandon ship. He crawled forward towards Ruto intending to pull her off with him, but, like always seemed to happen in this sort of situation, he was too slow. There was a blinding flash of blue light, and when his vision cleared, they were no longer in Zora's domain.

"Where are we?" the knuckles on Ruto's blue hands were white from clinging to the side of the boat.

Link shrugged, but since Ruto was looking around and not at him she didn't see his response.

"You know, things would be easier if you'd just talk," Ruto observed, "next time I ask you a question please respond." This time she looked at him to see his reaction.

Link shook his head.

Ruto snorted in a rather un-princess-like manner. "You know, since we're engaged, you need to learn to say something sometimes. I'm fine with making all the decisions and everything, but really, I've hardly ever heard you speak." She looked around again, before looking back at him, "Seriously, where are we?"

Link looked around. They were in the middle of a lake, in the distance he could see buildings, but they were too far off for him to make out what they looked like. Surrounding them were three rock spires of varying heights which protruded from the water's depths. The breeze was cold, and the trees he could see all had brightly colored autumn leaves. It didn't look like anywhere he'd been before, and the last time Link checked it was summer.

He shrugged.

Ruto hissed in irritation. "Can't you just say I don't know?"

Link shrugged again, smirking at her.

She stomped her foot, apparently forgetting that they were in a boat, "You're doing this on purpose!"

He laughed.

"This situation is not funny, we have no idea where we are and..." she trailed off, mouth hanging open in shock, eyes fixated on something behind him.

Slowly, Link scooted until he was turned around. A rather large serpent was looking at them, its head raised on a long thin neck as it examined them. Link gulped, he really didn't want to fight a giant serpent armed only with the Kokiri sword and a slingshot while standing in a small, rather unreliable red boat.

The serpent tilted it's whiskered gray-blue head to one side as if studying them. Glancing down at the water, Link could see the shadow of its long body under the water.

Ruto found her voice again then, "Link!" She hissed, "It's a water dragon."

"What?" He hissed back.

Ruto allowed herself to gloat a moment because she'd gotten him to speak, before she addressed the dragon, "What do you want dragon?"

Link gave her a look that said he thought she was crazy—dragons were dangerous! They ate Gorons and all kinds of terrible stuff.

"I'm sorry to have brought you here so unexpectedly," the dragons voice was low and rich when it spoke, "but I need your help."

Ruto leaned over and hissed to Link, "Maybe Lord Jabu Jabu told him we were good at taking care of problems."

Link rolled his eyes. Why was it always him?

Ruto punched him in the arm, "Hey, don't worry. As long as we're together we can take care of anything."

Link frowned, sure, he'd do whatever it took, but he really hoped he wouldn't have to carry Ruto on his head while doing it this time.

"A great evil has swept across this land," the dragon told them, "the people have struggled to turn it back, but I fear it is in vain. I, Kyoudai Ryuou, cannot help them, for the evil has passed beyond my reach. You must help them, Hero of Time, to vanquish this evil."

Link nodded once. That was usually all it took to get people to tell him more, but Kyoudai Ryuou, Link decided to think of him as Kyou, just looked at him expectantly. Apparently he wasn't going to tell them anything else. Link sighed, Kyou had to know more than what he'd just said. What kind of evil? Where exactly? What did he need to do?

Link stood up carefully and looked into Kyou's swirling blue eyes, "Tell me more."