He leaned against the ancient, yellowed column, clutching his wounded arm. The bodies of four brown-skinned ReDeads lay beside him, their masked faces as blank and soulless as ever. It was hard to believe that these creatures, blind and sluggish, had nearly taken his life.
The bite hurt. Bad. Any sane man would have fled Ikana at the first sight of its inhabitants. He did not have such luxuries.
Sharp had spoken of the king as an ally, but, given the welcoming he'd already received, Link expected another battle. Perhaps it would be his last.
For the hundredth time, Link wondered what had befallen this twisted land. Its people drew blades and then asked for his aid once their attempts to murder him failed. A man, driven by some morbid curiosity, set up residence in the fallen kingdom and brought his daughter with him. Something had gone wrong, infecting his body and mind with the form of a mummified Gibdo. Link was sure he would have turned on her if he hadn't intervened.
While noble, that rescue was as fleeting as the rest of his deeds. Unless he was ready to face it in the next twenty-four hours, the moon would force him to flee back in time, and everything would be undone. Flat would stay imprisoned, Pamela would die at her father's hand, and Sharp would prey on anyone that entered his cave.
As hard as it had been, his fight against Ganondorf had felt simpler. It had felt meaningful. He needed only to look at the Zora he'd unfrozen or the Gorons he'd saved from Volvagia to see the fruits of his labor.
It was different in Termina. His actions, however heroic, rarely ever amounted to anything permanent. His transformations tore and warped his body in such as agonizing manner that he feared they would eventually destroy it altogether.
"What are you waiting for?" Tatl buzzed impatiently.
"Nothing." He shook his head. There would be time for self-pity later. He had a job to do.
He advanced slowly through the passage, tightly clutching the Gilded Sword and Mirror Shield. Blood and small chunks of flesh coated his blade, a sharp contrast to its polished beauty.
He arrived at a circular door, marked with the alphabet of some forgotten tongue. He pushed it open.
The room was a small, rectangular chamber. A red carpet ran along the floor to a large, empty throne. Strange symbols and patterns adorned its walls.
Surprisingly, two open windows were present, giving it an ample supply of sunlight.
"It's empty" Tatl observed.
"Quiet." To the swordsman, this room's apparent emptiness was more menacing than any direct confrontation.
"You have arrived." A large, skeletal figure appeared in the throne. Two dog-faced, armed Stalfos stood beside him, blades at the ready.
"My servants fall namelessly before your sword," he said. "The light you bring is an abomination." Red drapes fell over the windows, removing the excess of sun.
"I work to save this land and those surrounding it," Link said. "Your people throw themselves at me. I must defend myself."
The king leaned forward in his chair, fixing Link with the paranoid, unhinged stare of a man who saw threats everywhere he looked.
"You seek to destroy us! You hunt my people like animals!" His eyes lit up as he saw Link's bloody sword. "How many lives have you claimed with that blade?" The king looked to his guards and motioned. "Kill him!"
The two Stalfos sprinted across the room, bearing down on him in seconds. Link met the first with a blade across the chest, turning its fragile ribcage to white powder. Its split frame fell to the floor lamely.
The second guard banged his sword against Link's shield, sending sparks through the air. One slice removed its arm. Another severed its head.
"Your soldiers are clumsy," Link panted. "Their bones are fragile from decay. If an adolescent can defeat them, how could they possibly stand up to another army?"
The king grinned.
"Link! Behind you!" He sidestepped just in time to evade a blow from one of the Stalfos. In the space of a few seconds, the warriors had reassembled, healing completely from their former injuries.
He parried another strike, bashing his opponent in the head with his shield. A slash from the Gilded Sword cut splintered it through the ribcage.
The second combatant smirked, lowered its weapons, and allowed the Gilded Sword to slice diagonally through its stomach.
Link gasped. They were toying with him, he realized. Eventually, they would tire of this game, and he would face them at their full strength.
"The curtains! Burn them down!" Tatl shouted.
Link pulled out his shortbow, concentrated, and sent a flaming arrow at one of the windows. The covering caught fire and burned away, enveloping the young swordsman in a shaft of light.
The king's smirk disappeared.
Link caught the sunlight with his shield, sending a ray at the bodies of the fallen soldiers. Empowered by the magic of the ancient weapon, it broke down their bones in a flood of golden sparks.
The king stared disbelievingly.
Link walked towards him, a look of absolute disgust on his face. "I'm sure that, despite the circumstances, their deaths angered you. In your mind, I should have lowered my blade and allowed myself to die," he said.
The king said nothing.
"This bloodshed accomplishes nothing. Do not add to it." The ancient ruler failed to respond.
"Sharp said you wanted an audience with me. Can we please speak?"
For a moment, the king looked like he was considering his suggestion. Then, he jumped off his chair, a rectangular shield and a huge longsword appearing in his hands. He stood a full head taller than most men, towering over the young Hylian.
"Very well," Link said. He readied his blade.
The Stalfos charged him with a shout, swinging his weapon in a close arc. Link blocked it, the force of the blow sending waves of numbness through his arm. He jabbed, but the king easily turned it aside, smashing his shield into Link's face. The swordsman stumbled back and staggered, blood running from his nostrils.
A wave of purple gas burst from the king's mouth, blurring Link's vision and nearly making him vomit.
The awful, oversized blade came forward for a final strike.
Link caught it on his shield, knowing any attempt at a parry would end in disaster. He counterattacked, slicing away the fragile sword arm of his adversary.
Another blast of poisonous air flew into his lungs, filling his ears with a sharp ringing and nearly blinding him.
He cut the king's legs from out under him.
Link stumbled back into the light, slowly bringing his shield up for a kill. His limbs felt like they were made of lead.
The king reached up and detached his head, turning transparent and paying no heed to an incoming ray of reflected sun.
The disembodied skull flew through the air at Link, jaws spread wide. It went straight through the light of the Mirror Shield.
A second before it bit down, he jammed the Gilded Sword up through its mouth and skull, cracking the old bone. It fell to the ground, thrashing futilely against the steel in its core.
The body rematerialized. Link hit it with a ray from the Mirror Shield, dissolving it in a flood of sparks. The head at his feet ceased its struggle. At the same instant, his gas-induced sickness dissipated.
He removed his blade from the severed skull, crushing it to powder with his boot.
The swordsman leaned against the wall, wiping sweat from his brow.
"That was pointless," Tatl said.
"Yeah." Link sat down in the king's throne. "I think Sharp tried to get me killed."
"We should pay him another visit," Tatl said angrily.
"Look out!" The ghostly skulls of the fallen Ikanian soldiers bore down on him, glowing with purple light. He had no time to react.
They passed straight through him.
"It didn't work!" The larger of the two skulls shouted.
"This is your fault," the smaller one replied. "You wanted to play games with him."
"I didn't know he could do that!"
"All the more reason to kill him quickly."
"Well, you shouldn't have gone along with me."
"Enough!" the two skulls screamed as they disappeared into clouds of purple fire.
"My name is Igos du Ikana. I apologize for that display." The king's ghostly, glowing head hovered in the air, swaying back and forth. "For everything. Majora cursed us. As long as I remained in that body, I could not hear you."
"Those two still didn't," Link said skeptically.
"The war changed them," Igos replied. "They went from hot-headed to truly brutal. Majora's curse played only a small role in their demeanor."
"I understand." Link frowned. "I have heard much about your kingdom."
"Our war with the Garo destroyed us," the king said. "It filled us with a bloodlust that would not allow us to rest. Majora simply redirected it."
"Towards all of the living." Tatl fidgeted around Link's cap.
"Yes," the king said. "He opened Stone Tower, enslaving its guardian and using its power as a conduit to flood Ikana with its energy."
"The giant." Link breathed. Each of Termina's deities had been enslaved by the Skull Kid—or Majora, as the being in his mask was called—and imprisoned in the bodies of monsters, their strength subverted to ruin the lands they watched over.
"Stone Tower attracts forces and entities from other worlds, perhaps Majora's own," Igos explained. "It existed long before the kingdom around it. Its walls are stronger than they have any right to be. A thousand soldiers could not topple it."
"Then what are we supposed to do?" Tatl punctuated her sentence with a ringing noise.
"The giant can restore the seal. You must venture into the tower free him."
"Great. Another monster-infested, trap-ridden, oversized torture chamber that someone with a sick sense of humor called a temple," Tatl said. "I can't wait."
"The Tower's interior seems designed to confound any who would scale it," Igos said. "There are mechanisms there that require several men to activate."
"We don't have several men," Link said.
"Flat composed a song that creates a solid, soulless clone of anyone who plays it. He called it the Elegy of Emptiness," Igos replied. "I know something of you, swordsman. You can change form. You will have one of each."
Link shifted uncomfortably at the thought of more agonizing transformations.
"What?" Igos noticed his fidgeting.
"Nothing. Nothing important." Link collected himself. He pulled out his ocarina. "Teach me the song."
"I will." The king bobbed his head in different directions, spelling out the notes. Link copied them with his ocarina. Right, left, right, down, right, up, left. It was a low, mournful melody. When the last note left the Ocarina of Time, Link was covered by a column of green light. He stepped forward.
A replica stood behind him, polished and childlike. Its face was twisted a toothy, insincere grin that seemed to promise violent intentions.
"Beautiful," Tatl observed. "It looks like it wants to slit your throat."
"He did say soulless." Link swung a fist at the clone. It passed straight through. "It seems to share some qualities with spirits, though."
"It's a construct of dark energy," Igos said. "A soldier that will not falter in the night."
"Don't most soldiers, oh, I don't know, move?" Tatl asked.
"Don't be so literal." Link patted the fairy on the head.
He looked at Igos's floating skull. "I should go now. Perhaps I can finish my quest without resetting time. Perhaps Ikana will never know the moon's fall."
"I have nothing to fear for myself," Igos said. "My time has passed. I ask only that you save what remains of my kingdom."
"I will," Link promised.
"Farewell, swordsman. You fight bravely and violently, but you have restraint. You have honor. My people and the Garo would still flourish if they had possessed such qualities."
"Thank you."
The skull disappeared, suddenly and abruptly, leaving no trace of its presence.
The swordsman and his companion left Ikana castle, encountering no resistance.