notes: This is written for Shink Week, although I didn't do any other prompts. Please don't try to argue with me about Sheik's gender. I'm not getting into it.
prompt: silence
disclaimer: The Legend of Zelda is not mine.
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"One way or another, it will all end tomorrow," she murmured, tugging absently at the bandages covering her hands.
The last sliver of sun was disappearing behind the mountains, taking the warmth of the day with it. Sheik didn't mind; the cold made her feel clean. The stars were still veiled, and the sky was a thick field of black. The desert was spread out like a tapestry beneath their perch on the arm of the goddess statue, and she watched the sand blow in the wind.
Link did not reply. That was one of the first things she'd noticed about him—he rarely spoke unless asked a question. When he had just been a Kokiri from the forest and she had just been a naïve princess, she had thought his silence was strange. Now, Sheik didn't mind. She knew he listened to her every word.
She looked back at where he leaned back on his elbows, her eyes trailing along his long legs, the corded muscles in his arms, the stubborn set to his jaw. His fairy was asleep on his shoulder, her glow soft and faint. Link had spent past several days in the Spirit Temple, and she could see the bruises on his arms, a split in his lip, the weariness weighing down his shoulders. There was a haunted look in his eyes as he gazed out over the desert, and Sheik swallowed back the familiar pangs of guilt and empathy stabbing at her heart. It was the same after every temple.
She lowered herself down next to him, feeling the cool stone under her back, and let the minutes tick by with no sound but the howling of the wind. Tomorrow, she could finally reveal herself to him. Tomorrow, they would fight Ganondorf.
"Are you afraid?" Sheik asked.
Link's lips twitched to the side, and he turned his head to look at her. "Are you?" he countered.
She searched for the answer within herself. When she found it, it was almost surprising. "No," she answered honestly. "I'm angry. I'm ready to kill Ganondorf for what he's done to Hyrule." And I'm ready to win back my rightful throne, Zelda added silently. After over seven years of holding together a bleeding kingdom with her own hands, she was more than prepared.
Link nodded, understanding. "And you?" Sheik prompted. "Are you afraid?"
He took a deep breath and let it out in a rush, then shifted to turn his gaze up to the sky. It was so long before he replied that she wasn't sure he was going to answer at all. "Yes," Link admitted slowly. "Always."
She could see the boy in him then, and Sheik wanted nothing more than to pull him into her arms and shield him from the cruelty of the world. But all she could do was slide closer to him until their sides pressed together, and she breathed the scent of horses and leather and the forest.
"I will be right beside you the whole time," she whispered into his shoulder. "I'll keep you safe. I'll watch your back. Will you watch mine?"
"Always," Link said again, but there was warmth in his voice this time. Sheik reached down to take his hand, and their fingers locked together tightly, fierce and desperate.
Above them, the stars were coming out.
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