The puppet hung lifeless from the ceiling, delicate chains piercing skin and muscle alike, suspending it limply. It was far from intact; one arm wrenched from its socket, fingers missing, scars littering its false skin, and its eyes – the glossy red had gone dull, and even its features seemed blurry. The king eyed it with a sneer, debating simply banishing it. It had served its purpose, shattering the faith of the hero so completely that his victory over it rang hollow, and serving as an inadvertent distraction to the traitor; it had lured her into the darkness where his gaze was clearest, revealing a hideous fault in their plans – their hearts.
Amber eyes swept over the broken puppet once more, before he slowly lifted the smoky gem from its pedestal and crushed it with an absent magical blow; the shadow rose slowly, sinking into the puppet. The carcass gave a sharp jerk, and light came to inhuman eyes; confusion and pain warred for dominance, before both faded. The chains retracted, and it – he – collapsed to the stone floor, infrequent breaths wracking his ruined body. Clothes materialized onto his body as the king retreated from the room, letting the creation's innate magics do their work; it perturbed him that the image in his mind never wavered, that the creature would be so easily mended to retain that hated form.
He passed the crystal case, where it stood suspended within, gleaming proudly in the flickering torchlight. He didn't dare glance at it, the creeping fear he would deny with his dying breath prickling in the back of his mind. He didn't dare let his mind wander to the verdant cloth draped over a rotting body, whose soul allowed him this freedom, this power. He contained a shudder, fury swamping him as he stalked into the throne room, mind racing. He did not know regret, and he did not care about those he had hurt.
He had not made a mistake that festered like an old wound in his heart.
He was awake again, inexplicably; his master had revived him, bound him to a construct resembling his greatest foe. The form was not without bittersweet memories for the creature as well; a misconception had led to the downfall of his light doppelganger, and a mistake had granted the shadow a heart.
Love. It was crippling, it lingered, burning long after the object of one's affections were gone – and his was certainly gone, punished for her role in standing against darkness's reign. He had not seen her execution; he hadn't needed to. It was said one could sense, innately, the status of their true love – if only it was a lie, for he could not deny the sensation of his heart shattering, being torn to pieces and bleeding out.
The conflicting sensations of hate-tinged triumph and desperate anguish could not disguise the faint twinge – regret. The king would deny it, he had no doubt. But it was there, nonetheless, and as he limped into the flame-lit throne room, he felt the pain of the other, saw it in amber eyes and hawkish features. To resemble one who had offered him the impossible gave him a power over the other like nothing he could have imagined, but he would not exploit it, despite the heavy thirst for vengeance for his beloved. To have lost a love that never was left a stain on the soul, especially when you had been the cause of their fall.
"Ganondorf." The king gazed at the ceiling, jaw tight.
"Shadow." He inclined his head, eyes sweeping across the room wearily.
"It will not be long now – have you called me to release me from the contract? I will not be bound to a demon, no matter how powerful." The Gerudo laughed harshly, fingers curling into white-knuckled fists.
"I cannot. And what are you to speak ill of demons? Are you not one yourself?" The shadow rolled his eyes, moving closer.
"I am not." King and shadow met one another's gaze, recognizing and acquiescing to the pain within. They could see within each other the loss they had caused, and knew no pain could be more exquisitely impossible to escape. The king exhaled, eyes lowering some as they swept over him. The twinge was there again, stronger; the hungry gaze shadowed by heavy regret, and pain – inescapable pain.
The shadow met his gaze squarely, but the rage was there, banked and smoldering. HE imagined he could look into his eyes and see the memories; the brief liaison, the affection that blossomed into ill-fated love, a love that lasted through her first betrayal but could not withstand her death. Only a fool would believe love could conquer that eternal sleep, for none could escape ending. Even this creature, so well versed in death and all its causes, all its intricacies, that he could not rejoin her in death.
"We should not have loved them." The shadow's laugh was subdued.
"A power-hungry king should not fall for his foe."
"A shadow beast should not fall for the queen of light." The stench of death hung still in the air, but it was overshadowed by the clinging regret, and the faint whispers of love, be it unrequited or passionately embraced. The Goddesses saw the wheel turn once more, and the conflict begun anew, but They remembered the love between impossible pairs and knew their pain, their love, was endless.
A/N: Short ridiculously vague oneshot. It is currently 12:58 am, I should be sleeping, but after reading people complaining about Link/Dark Link (dear gods, I hate the Internet sometimes), I remember I wanted to write something with REQUITED Dark Link/Zelda (...yes, that's a bizarre leap of logic). So. It's unrequited Ganondorf/Link, requited Dark Link/Zelda (Sheik). Notice the parentheses? They met first as Sheik, but when she was revealed, he didn't stop loving her. Uhg. This is sooooo short, but I needed to get it out of my system. -.-; Hope you enjoyed, even if it made not a modicum of sense. XD