Disclaimer: I do not own Legend of Zelda, its ideas, or its characters. I do love it though :)

Lorek

The sun was stooping low in the sky now, casting long shadows amidst the branches and the trees. Tall shadows crept up the sides of trees as the forest began to surrender itself to darkness. Time to go.

Lorek sat up and stretched, yawning. He'd been sitting up in this nook between a branch and the tree's trunk for hours now, waiting for some game to pass him by. He had a couple of pigeons hooked on his belt, but he wished he'd done a little better. He'd gotten a late start to hunting today, but he thought he'd be able to make up for it. If only a deer would come by…

Lorek settled back into his tree, deciding to wait a little bit longer. The only thing waiting for him at home was dinner with his mother, Bryn, and her boyfriend Arceus. Arceus didn't eat with them often, so whenever he was over his mother had to make a fuss about everything. Bryn was always in a bad mood, complaining about her swollen ankles and her "grotesquely huge" stomach. Well what did you expect when you got pregnant? That a baby growing inside you just wouldn't require room?

In truth, the only part of dinner Lorek was really dreading was the Arceus part. Even though Bryn's belly looked like it was about to pop and the healer had told her the baby would be coming any day, Arceus was rarely around. He was always off practicing with his blade, or out hunting, or… well, doing anything except spend time with his future child's mother. And to top it off, he and Lorek had never really gotten around great in the first place so the negligent father act was making Lorek want to snap.

The darkness in the forest was spreading, the pink and orange sky becoming less visible through the trees. Lorek knew his way around the forest in the dark, but his mother would be mad if he got home too late. He slung his bow over his shoulder, slid himself to the edge of the branch, but froze when he began to hear rustling in the bushes. Slowly, silently, he climbed back up onto the branch to look at the source of the sound. He was about to draw his bow, but a flash of jet black hair made him stop. A girl?

She wasn't anyone from his tribe. She also didn't look like anyone he'd seen from his sister tribe. A Blackwood? No, she wouldn't be this far south. Besides, her skin tone was all wrong, it was a nut brown and the Blackwoods were relatively pale. She seemed to be in a rush to get somewhere. Her clothes were dirty and torn in a few places, and small scrapes on her arms gleamed red with blood. Where is she off to in such a hurry?

Lorek slowly lowered himself down the tree, never taking his eyes off of her. He tried to follow her brisk pace, but with all the leaves on the ground his footsteps were crunchy and noisy. Lorek was used to sitting in a tree waiting for his targets and sniping them down… he wasn't quite so accustomed to chasing his targets. He followed her as she darted through the trees, but she was moving too quickly, and he couldn't keep up without making too much noise. He traced where he thought she had gone to a clearing, but the slim dark-haired girl was nowhere in sight. Damn. I wonder who that was anyway?

Suddenly, he felt the coldness and sharpness of steel pressing against his throat. "You follow me," she stated, pushing the tip of her dagger slightly into his neck. Her voice was thick with some accent Lorek didn't recognize. "Who are you? Who are your people?"

"Lorek. From the Black Raven tribe. And who are you?"

She didn't answer. Instead she replied, "You lie. I have never heard of… Black Raven."

"I guess we try to keep a low profile."

She didn't respond. A long silence passed, and a chilly wind began to blow. The girl had removed the blade from the surface of his skin, but it hovered only inches away. She seemed to be thinking. Lorek began, "You know, we could-"

"Quiet!" she whispered fervently in his ear. He heard the sound of branches being pushed aside, as someone entered the clearing. Heavy footsteps pushed smashed through the brush, and a large, big-bellied man entered the clearing. His eyes fell on the two of them, and he immediately slid his claymore from its sheath. "Hey, let him go." Man Gordo, am I happy to see you. Gordo was a big man, with thick arms and legs as thick as tree trunks and a broad chest. Lorek remembered Gordo from his childhood when he was slimmer, back when he was more muscle and less fat. Now, that was reversed.

The girl didn't moved, not seeming threatened. Truth be told, when Gordo's cheeks became flushed he looked more like a jolly, big-bellied Santa than a swordsman, but his strength made him deadly with his two-handed claymore.

The girl, sensing she'd lost the battle, thrust Lorek forward, dagger still in hand as she sprinted through the woods. Almost immediately her foot caught a root, and she fell forward on her face. Lorek seized the opportunity to climb on top of her and pin her down, pulling two struggling wrists together to her lower back. Gordo lumbered over. "Who do we have here?"

Lorek shrugged. "Don't know. Won't tell me her name. She doesn't sound like she's from around here."

"Doesn't look like she's from around here either. Guess you're coming back with us," Gordo snickered, pulling some rope from his waistband to tie her wrists with.

When Lorek got up and allowed her to stand up, Gordo gave him a hard slap on the back. "Came at just the right time didn't I?"

The dark-haired girl in front of him stared Lorek down with cool icy blue eyes, her small lips tightly pursed. He had a feeling that she wasn't afraid to hurt someone. "Yeah," Lorek said, "you really did."

When Lorek and Gordo got back to the village, night had already fallen. They put the girl in the confines of a hollowed-out tree, closed its wooden gates, and wrapped them up tightly with rope. "We'll figure out what to do with you in the morning," Lorek told her. They hadn't gotten a word out of her the whole walk home- she seemed determined to stay silent. She took every step with her chin held high and took every effort to keep her eyes averted from her catchers, but Lorek had caught her glance once and spotted something in those cold blue eyes that almost looked like fear. With the deep earthy tones of her skin blending into the night, her unsettling blue eyes stood out from behind the bars of the cell.

As soon as they'd walked a few steps away, Gordo grunted, "What a weird girl." Lorek was pretty sure she could still hear them, so he didn't respond.

"Goodnight Gordo," he called as Gordo ascended the ladder pressed up against one of the thick trees across from the tree cell. "Goodnight Lorek… try not to get attacked by any more strange ladies tonight," he chuckled. Lorek could hear his soft laughter as he climbed up into his shack embedded in the trees. Lorek wove his way through the densely packed trees to his own treehome, climbing up just beneath a thick layer of the forest's canopy. He pushed aside the woven tangle of branches covering the entryway to reveal his mom and Bryn sleeping in the back of a small wooden hovel. He could hear Bryn's soft snoring. And no Arceus by her side… what a shock. What was Lorek expecting, the father of Bryn's child to actually try to be by her side when she went into labor? If he's not in this kid's life after it's born, I'm going to give him a piece of my mind.

Lorek let the woven vines fall back in place, crossing a small rope bridge between trees to the small wooden shack he called home. He crawled into his bed, pulled a thin layer of furs over him, and thought about his near-death experience with this strange girl and her dagger.

When he awoke the next morning startled by shouts, his room filled with heavy gray smoke, Lorek found himself in a near-death experience all over again.

Author's note: Link, Zelda, Ganon, and all your favorite Legend of Zelda characters will have different names. Why? Well maybe I don't want to give up the identity of my characters so easily… ;)

Anyway, I haven't done this in a long time, so please be critical in your reviews! I want to get better!