Dark Horizon
Prologue: Ripples
Something.
Vague, but that was the only word that came to mind to describe it. A faint whisper on the wind that night as the shadows slivered away from the fire at his back, hissing silently at this unwelcome brightness brought to their domain.
It had been for but a moment, but something had roused him, an unidentifiable itch triggered by a non-entity existing on the edge of perception. A ripple that had lapped the shores of his unconscious mind.
"Mmmm… what is it?", a sleepy voice interjected overlain by a soft whiny, twin hues of russet from very different sources shifting in the firelight as their owners regarded him.
What indeed.
"… Nothing, if you're awake you should go home", he smiled faintly at the irritable grumbling that statement provoked and gazed out thoughtfully into the night.
It was as if somewhere, thousands of miles away, someone had dropped a penny into the centre of a previously still pond. That was what this sudden sensation reminded him of, though it made it's implications no clearer.
As to how this seemingly innocuous event had gotten his attention…
He had a feeling it might not have been his attention per se it had aroused.
"Your Majesty, please see reason", the attendant finally spoke, his voice dangerously close to shrill toward the end.
He shrank back a little as the woman before him arched one slender eyebrow in his direction, though felt a little foolish when all she did was smirk at his reaction. All of her subjects were used to being toyed with to some degree. Yet somehow she always left one feeling that the previous occasion would be the last, making the next equally surprising and somewhat embarrassing.
The third occupant of this remote stretch of land, that jutted out into the abyss of the Twilight Realm like a plank from a ship, offered up a screeching warble and tried to bully its way to its feet against the weight of the blackened chains that held it.
It failed. Collapsing, it still glared at the two Twili, both tall and waif like in different regards. Where one was feminine, pleasing to the eye if a rather unusual shade of blue, the other was willowy to the extreme, his oval, eyeless head bobbing with concealed nervousness as he wrung thin, bird like hands together.
Attendant Ulli was shamefaced to realise that his abased reaction to the possibility of offending the royal presence had allowed her to take one step closer to the loathsome creature. The one he had spent the better part of a day trying to convince her to let be destroyed, as it should be.
"You believe I'm in danger?", she asked with deceptive sweetness, ruby eyes dancing with a strange mirth. The very same he had seen there since the fiery haired young woman before him had walked out of the throne room on one of his subordinates, the morning prior.
Taking a slow, soothing breath, and straightening disobedient shocks of coal black hair, Ulli bent slightly in a half bow, "Of course not Majesty".
He cocked his head curiously when she sighed, and pondered on why she might seem disappointed by his answer.
"The Librarians confirmed that those islands are uncharted, just as I already suspected. That's a day wasted to tell me what I already knew", she spoke at length, folding her arms and twisting to regard him more fully; the headdress that marked her peerless station rattling musically.
"We have never needed those isles my Queen, there has always been enough space for us here, few of our race that are left…", he watched her for a moment, fancying he actually caught a flicker of tension in her brow.
A dangerous tact, as his words carried two meanings. One, that which he aimed to impart, was a reminder that she was last of the current royal line thanks to the Traitor Zant's rebellion. The second, one he hoped to avoid, would bring to mind the whispers in the court; the ones that claimed their queen had enlisted the aid of a Light Dweller, even brought him back to their realm and allowed the way between the worlds to be sealed again for all time.
The beast at their feet snarled, a feeble choking sound.
"Be silent", Midna whispered, her eyes seeming to darken a shade or two for a moment as the winged abomination spasmed, twitching unnaturally before falling still and quiet, beady eyes fixed on her watchfully.
Created from dark magics, this thing was one of Zant's flying minions, few of whom still remained.
In a place that had long since become saturated in Shadow Magic, this monstrosity could continue to exist even with the Master of the spell that had created it long dead, drawing on the black energies that had sunk into the very rocks beneath their feet.
As a creature of dark powers, its will was slave to any Shadow Master strong enough to control it, and the Queen of Twilight certainly held enough power.
It was what she wanted to use that control for that attendant Ulli was so opposed to.
"I'm all too aware of the plight of our Kingdom", she replied, her answer, much like his reminder, of double meaning, possibly answering both implications at once.
"However", she smiled as his almost hopeful expression fell, "I'm still going."
The attendant became nervous, watching the lithe female form begin to mount the bird bare-back. Despair of losing her and losing what peace their people had finally attained gripped his eyes. With a warbled cry the beast began to flap its wings, straining now against the chains keeping it earth-bound.
With a simple flick of her wrist and a lick of shadow magic the chain's lock spat ebony sparks and snapped; dropping open from the beast's neck.
With a final despearate cry from his throat the Attendant spoke.
"Majesty, please take other's with you! The Guard, some of the other Masters, anyone!"
Midna regarded him a moment, the thrill of flight entering her veins. This was much different from the simple hovering spell she'd made so much use of that year ago. It was terrifying and intoxicating all at once, and yet in a way, strangely familiar.
With an impish smile she blew him a kiss and with her will she bound the creature to her planned flight into the unknown. A final check of the satchel at her hip confirmed its security. The powerful remnants contained within would come in handy even if only a fraction of their true might remained easily assessable.
Whether that would be as a means to defend herself or… something else, something related to that faint pull she still felt from the brooding onyx isles in the distance, she was unsure. But where was the thrill in an adventure where one knew exactly what they faced?
Glancing down as the ground retreated swiftly beneath her, the Twilight Queen caught sight of the small gathering her leaving had prompted, a number of her people clustered around a violet faced Ulli as the older Twili made sharp hand gestures at them.
Her people truly were an unusual race, she reflected. Here a Twili with an eyeless face like her attendant, there one with the recessed head and wide staring orange orbs that passed for eyes amongst most of the commoners.
As her gaze roamed she picked out more; one young male with an rather pronounced nose by the standards of their species. Traces of the Hylian traits that the royal line embodied by some virtue of her blood that slowed the decaying touch of this Realm.
In amongst the crowd she spotted a few of black robed Masters, their jade embroidery standing out in stark contrast.
Originally of course the term 'Master', had only applied to the original three who formed the Fused Shadow, but over time it had been diluted to apply to any Twili of sufficient age and/or magical prowess, and came along with the title of Twilight Regent regardless.
The old men and women starred after her solemnly, knowing that at this range, and with the power she possessed- even without the swirling nexus of dark energy they would sense from the fragments- they would be unable to seize control of the creature she rode and guide her back. No matter how much Ulli clearly wanted them to try.
Turning back to the horizon and banishing the thought even as it brewed that a few of those below would probably welcome the chance to vie for power in her absence, Midna heeled her ride onward.
Marvelling at the rush of the wind in her hair and its artic bite on her pale blue skin at this altitude, the auburn haired woman reflected on what she hoped to find out here.
There had been three Masters at the time the Twili had been banished, and yet for all her searching, she could find no mention of the other two. Only her Father's line was recorded, back to Master Ar'thel, as if his fellows had simply never existed…
If she was right, there was something very important to her people waiting for her on those islands.
"Something stirs… something dark from Hyrule's past", deep and rich, the lone voice echoed emptily around the hollowed caverns of this realm. A place cast in crystal and silver, that shifted in shape and size like water and yet reflected the voice along its planes like rock.
"A whisper, nothing more, that threat is over", another answered, hushed tones that came from everywhere and yet nowhere, hidden.
"This is not that", a third, distorted, as if the speaker spoke from a great distance, "This goes back against the flow of events, or would try to"
"It is not the Cycle", a fourth, spicy and exotic, "Another foe, another place… the land where the sun always sets"
"It is of no matter", the third added, "She will fail, measures were taken to prevent this".
"No… the Hero still lives, and She has been touched by the Light", a grim silence fell upon the entities gathered as they mulled the Elder's words.
"Everything is different now."
Different. Reversed. Three Masters of Shadow had emerged with power and knowledge from leading a tribe to claim the Golden Pieces. Those who once dwelt in the light had fallen to shadow and had been punished for it. And there they had remained for centuries.
In twilight.
Yet, one from those tainted bloodlines had come forth and bathed in light, carrying it with her back into the darkness. And the Hero had summoned forth the darkness to bear within his blade to defeat Hyrule's ancient enemy. Yes, with these reversals everything was different.
Everything.
A/N: Just a little taster of an upcoming fic co-authored by myself and Zephros, audience reactions required