A/N: Hello fellow readers! While this may not be my first time on this site, this would be my first story ever posted. So hopefully I hope you all enjoy the prologue and leave me any constructive criticism or comments you may have. This is an AU fan-fiction but with a strong indication of Breath of the Wild's universe later implemented. With that being said I hope you all enjoy!
Chapter 1: New Arrival
A woman with medium length brown hair and long ears ran through the forest, clutching tight to a white bundle of clothing in her arms. She whipped her head around several times underneath her hooded black cloak while also making sure to avoid the fallen logs obscuring her path as she had the unfortunate will of stumbling over them occasionally. She panted heavily, tears evident on her face as she ducked under several canopies of the tree branches.
The woman heard the clang of metal clashing through several branches, a louder indication that they were approaching closely ready to run their weapons through her. She fished out her pocket watch that was inside of her pocket of her brown pants, desperately cursing at the face of the hands before concealing it within the bundle of clothing she had.
Time was closing in before she even knew it. She dared a peek behind her again, no longer hearing the rustling but did not think for a moment to stop her pursuit. She looked down at the bundle of clothing she held dear for her life and smiled somberly. She would make sure her mission was done first before anything else. Even at the cost of her own life. Without any sense of direction to her surroundings, she failed to notice the figure in red sneak up to her side and attacked with his weapon at hand.
The woman screamed immediately taking the full blunt as she fell to her side clutching the bundle securely with one hand, making sure it was unharmed, as her other arm and back was struck by the long blade. She whimpered letting the tears flow as she tried to emerge upwards slowly with the outstretched bloodied arm but was stopped by her assailant's foot clamped on her hand.
"It is no use anymore Avarina," the assailant said in a monotonous heavy accent, "your time is over."
Blood seeping through her mouth and eyes overflowing with tears, the aptly named woman Avarina tried to steady the clothing as to not crush it before desperately looking up at her attacker. He was bandaged head to toe in red, black, and white, the red bandages covered his identity so well only his eyes were discernible. Only those soulless piercing black eyes seeded through the slits of the white and red upside-down sigil mask he bore. He placed his longsword that he used, or the shinobigatana, back into the holsters on his back.
"Please… forgive me…let me live not for my sake! It isn't… what you think it is!"
Just then other two similarly dressed men that had been chasing the woman stopped silently behind the brunette, menacing with the same beady black eyes and weapons drawn. "You have wasted our time Avarina. Do you surely believe we will let you live easily after you betrayed us?" He said adding more pressure to her hand, ignoring her screams.
"You-ahh!- don't understand! I… must do this first! Please Ivan, this is important to me!"
"What is that in your possession?" He asked nonchalantly. Avarina stiffened trying to clutch the bundle closer to herself. That act only encouraged Ivan to break the carpal bones in her palm, furthering her desperation loudly and a swift but non-lethal kick to the right side of her face that made her spit blood on the dewy grass and rubble. He made no qualms keeping this a swift death. Her betrayal was as ordered; she was to die before the evening sun. She was fast approaching unconsciousness in her hysterical state as her eyes swelling to a blinding cleft nearly blinding her and sibilated an already damaged first molar; her nose bruised an unusual hodge-podge of violet. She needed more time, a luxury she cursed radically in the past. Avarina insufflated in rapid successions looking up at the apathetic aggressor.
She had to keep stalling him. She knew the deranged psychopath liked torturing his victims in his sorts of macabre methods, an aspect of a life she'd been building up to months in leaving from. Painful and severely damaged her orbicularis oris and mandibular were, she willed her words out. "Nngh, the future…is nigh…the prophecy…is among us. The encroachment nngh…of two worlds…shall collide. My mission *exhale*…my deliverance…will break this…c-cyclical contingency. The oracle…will rise…ahh! …once again!"
She gasped as Ivan did not let up his azoic nature and permeated a hidden blade he had in his form fitting red boot this time into her wrist cutting horizontally through the capillary veins, aerating part of her radius and ulna bones. It was a gruesome sight, sound even as her flesh was slowly serrated from its outline, like paper tearing in half, layered sinews of muscle tissue exposed to the stinging harsh winds and misty air in the evergreen forest she laid in.
She wasn't sure how long she screamed; a dull raspy ache formed the back of her throat as she saw the pool of her blood slowly reach her loose sweaty hair, and the fact that the other two followers had extricated their short knives, or kunais, into her hind legs inhibiting her movements not too long ago, letting their leader work his masterpiece for as long as it took. He was surely a man of patience.
Avarina wondered mildly as her breathing instigated unevenly back and forth in rapid and slow successions fighting her dwindling conscious; why Ivan simply had not taken the bundle from underneath her? No matter how much he pressed into her skin, she made sure her weight did not succumb to the cloth, but he never made the motion to unhinge her valuable arm and sever it from its socket revealing the covert. If her timing had been right from the moment she ran into the forest from the outskirts of the parish to the leisurely yet incongruous fading sunset, the portal was to open at any moment.
How ironic indeed.
Avarina could feel the slow hum of the pocket watch vibrate gently within the clothing she placed in underneath her. She had been crying indefinitely indeed, but the comforting thought of her mission completing throughout made her overly impeding death an easier afterthought. Darkness started to cloud her visions as the fears of clan's retribution were fading into obscurity and with the sort of numbness that came with the stinging pain, she could feel herself slipping away whimpering at the white spots.
As luck would have it however, Ivan was not going to let her death come so easily and had finally severed her hand completely off in one clean swipe, tossing the offending appendage away. The brunette shot up her head from the ground as the agonizing sound of bone and flesh separating reneged her screaming, as the faceless leader knelt before her pulling back her brown hair so that she forced to stare into his baleful eyes.
"I said what is that in your possession?" He had placed the kunai he had used on her hand, pressing it hotly against the scalp of her hairline. It was as if he had completely ignored her previous statement and was less concerned with the fact copious amounts of froth had been flowing out of her mouth. She could feel the hum grow louder and the warmth of the blue portal light encapsulated below further signaled the entry had been complete. All she had to do was activate it with the specific code.
And yet as she willed her voice to speak she found it had been too difficult as her body focused more on the bleeding appendage and repairing itself, panic began to set in again. She had to do this no matter how painful it was and how much the blade was digging into her forehead prickling with fresh blood down her face. Avarina closed her eyes tightly as her newfound quivering vocals began.
"ટી-આ," she began as Ivan continued his tight hold on her hair, "ભવિષ્ય સેટ છે!" As soon as she managed those set of words, a brilliant beaming blue light effervesced from her holding shot quickly into the air like a pillar. Ivan quickly separated Avarina from the clothing as he roughly tossed her to the side, the brunette rolling to a blundering stop, and quickly tried to stab down where she had protected the clothing. The light had blinded him temporarily, but he managed a hit before it had completely dissipated. When the show was over, Ivan removed his arm from his face and looked back in the area. The clothing disappeared. All he managed to embed was the dirt ground, his kunai standing proudly before him. He stared at it with an emotionless expression as his other two men stood before him awaiting his orders, then slowly turned to the woman with the half-lidded eyes and a small victorious smile.
"ભવિષ્યમાં ફેરફાર થશે…" she whispered one last time.
~16 years later~
I am a free spirit.
Or at least I'd like to believe I was.
I wasn't the most popular person in West Necluda High School. I had my natural pratfalls, insecurities like any other normal person, and to be honest I had the grace and sophistication of a dog trying to walk on its hind legs for the first time, and even the dog was better than me. My name is Zelda. Zelda Ramona Harkinian. I had no idea why I was named the way I was, or why my parents chose to stick with the least common name for any girl in the world. Although I have an interesting backstory with my first name when I was adopted, that will come later.
And yes adopted. It would seem my parents had spared no details when they first took me in so long ago and decided to tell me how I came to be when I was seven years old. I had the fortunate will of not bouncing around house to house like I knew so many foster kids often went through, though I never remembered the time I had grew up with any other kids or even going through the adoption process. My mother told me that when she and my dad first took me in I was a year older with the brightest of any smile that she had seen on anyone and from then on, she fell instantly in love with me and had to have me as her daughter.
Her only daughter.
I often felt some guilt now and then that my parents couldn't bear a child of their own and I was their last resort for a little bit of happiness to complete their lives. It was often that little void of emptiness I felt whenever I had little bouts of depression now and then, or simply what my parents had put it as teenage angst and rebelling against a socialist unfair world. It was like growing up as a stranger for so many years where two people you knew supported and fed you without them having to ask for any form of payment or any repercussions. It was a lonely void I tried to hide in the back of my mind growing up, yet, I was never ungrateful of the fact that I had felt the love and joy of being their only child considering the many sacrifices it must have took dealing with a daughter like me, and I did my greatest effort of making sure I was the best daughter ever.
I am a 5'6, seventeen-year-old. My thick dirty blonde hair reached down my natural hourglass shaped hips and I had crystal blue eyes which looked gray under certain lighting. I am considered a beauty and I have a perfect attendance record for three years, with a gratifying straight A record. I tried for most sports and extracurricular activities in my school until eventually I had stuck for the two I'd like the most: track field and tennis. Of course, I ran for student body president and won the second leading position my sophomore year in high school until my term was over, but I enjoyed it for the time being since I managed to make some friends while I still had them, but I never reapplied back into the organization again. People often told me I had a handiness for leadership and that I was smart when it came to handling decisions well and listening to other people's problems.
I'll admit I am a little more than the average teenager when it came to listen to concerns and making the solutions happen. It was in my nature after all and I wanted my reputation intact when I graduated next year, so I tried being friendly without being overly desperate or crazy even when everyone practically hated each other. Friends came and went over my life, but I have three that stuck with me since elementary school. Malon Barten, a beauty queen redhead with dark green eyes and a spirited yet carefree attitude in the glee club who I remembered hating when we were seven over a dispute of toys in class, had been my best friend forever as clichéd as it was but she supported me through my ups and downs and made me feel important as a person as did I in her life.
We've pretty much been inseparable even through our occasional fights and when one of us would have a boyfriend and give the other space for a while. She was pretty much the sister I always wanted, even though she had sisters like her older sister Cremia, who was a junior at Ordon University for agriculture science and her younger sister Romani was still in elementary, I still considered her and everyone else in her family as my second family.
My second friend was the beautiful Saria Evergreen. Like her last name, she has short forest green hair which she dyed freshman year and kept the color since and has deep midnight blue eyes. I'll admit the color definitely worked for her considering that I knew she had platinum blonde hair compared to my dirty blonde before. Saria is a smart-mouth tomboy with an IQ as high as mines and was a part of the dance team. She had jokes but the punchline always fell from either being too lame or corny to begin with but still had never betrayed me or me finding any faults with her at all. She was shorter than the rest of us, but she always managed to be the center of attention, which wasn't necessarily a bad thing.
Last but not least was my tall, athletic guy friend, Groose Ciel D'oiseau. Groose. What more couldn't I say about this guy that could fill up a book? He was tall and muscular of course played football as the quarterback in the team and had this strange habit of wearing his red hair in a sort of pompadour 50's era way. He had beautiful golden eyes but that didn't stop him from flirting with every other girl in school, that was until we became friends again in high school.
The guy is hopelessly in love with me and what I mean by hopelessly was he had been in love with me ever since elementary and had been following me around until I had moved then came back for my freshman year. I never once gave him the time of day for dating because I wanted our relationship as strictly platonic and I never developed any feelings for him like he did for me. Besides he had a bit of an overly aggressive arrogant side which had been a turn off for me, but he did have his days when he knew how to treat a lady, so both sides of the coin worked in his favor.
Yes, I love my friends and especially my family, and yes, I could say I had a pretty normal life with the occasional high school drama, petty short-term boyfriend heartbreaks, betrayals, desires, hopes, and dreams for a future in a world so callous and so beneath me, I still felt happy.
Happiness is forever right?
I hated second guessing myself on an answer so obvious—it was one of my natural pratfalls after all and it showed often when I would make a hefty decision on my own. I guess you could also call it another insecurity of mine, but I always had this feeling that I never belonged in a world that wasn't mines. Not in a sense that I just didn't belong or that I was born in the wrong generation like most of my classmates would often say, but because I never fell too out of sync with everyone else and did just the same with the latest fashion trends and kept up with celebrity-relationship drama. No, it was just I didn't feel too into normality like I thought I was and strangely enough that had been the cause in one of my little bouts of depression.
Though to add-on to it, I never knew who my actual parents were, and I never went through with the heartache of trying to find out to not disappoint my adopters, mainly because even they didn't know who they were, and they showed me enough love and support it garnered my attention away from who I actually was. Maybe it really was for the best I didn't try to search through high and hell for the two people who owed me enough explanation and sixteen years of hidden anger and heartbreak. Yes, it was better for the both of us.
Dreams were often a strange habit of mine while I derail from my narrative a second, and like everyone to dream something different each night or even forget about it, I happen to remember my dreams. Maybe this had some correlation to some other mystic being in another form of my life like reincarnation or something like that weird as it sounded, I didn't know. I never talked to my parents about this aside from the other definition of dreams and futures when it came to be applying where I needed to go to any universities or international colleges of my choice. I, of course, still hadn't decided where and what I wanted to do this late in my life yet, though my parents tried to be the solid ground when it came to my indecisiveness towards my future.
But that's all on a later note.
Now when I say dreams, dreams were supposed to be weird and have no level of reality in the subconscious mind in the first place. Like falling out of bed into the endless sky or having powers to do whatever you wanted without any consequences whatsoever. And I did get those on an occasion or two, but it was never often I had the same dream repeat once every once in a while, since I was fourteen.
This same woman, this same Avarina as she was called was a scenic woman with long brown hair and piercing green eyes. She always wore a long sleeved green top tunic tucked into this long-belted tan pants and wore shin length brown cleated boots with a dagger attached to the right side of her boot. Every time I dreamed of her she was always running with her hair covered with a black cloak she tied around her neck. She always held a bundle of white wrapped clothing tight in her arms and always held out a golden pocket watch, flipping over the cover to check the time.
She always ran in the forest for some reason and she always looked inside the clothing before continuing in her same direction, even though I could never see what she was hiding. And then came the drastic part of the dream I always hated seeing no matter how much I tried to wake myself up or try to dream something else. There were three ninjas or at least I thought they were, that were always chasing her down until it got to a point where it boiled down to a torture scene in a bad terrorist interrogation movie.
I had to lay off on horror movies; they were becoming too realistic for me to take and the dream was becoming more and more lifelike each time I'd seen it.
Of course, I didn't take any part of the dream into reality. It didn't make sense that three ninjas were hunting down a woman for betrayal, exactly the tone from what I picked up from the scene, because ninjas didn't exist, and the woman was obviously dressed way different from my own or my parents.
It didn't make sense at whatever magic, because at this point that was all I could put it at, could even happen making stuff disappear. It just didn't add right to me.
Unfortunately for me, I happened to pick the wrong time to dream about it again. It was spring semester on a Thursday, where the sun was high and sweltering and the cicadas were chirping lazily through the open windows on the school ground. I was in fifth period in Mr. Mizumi class, or what he preferred Professor or Doctor Mizumi to better accommodate our segue to university, and we were in the middle of our advanced animal science lecture as he kept droning on the same lesson plan that we had been learning this week. There were at least twenty of us packed into the tiny room, the air conditioners broken as usual and people were fanning away the heat, as the former Lakeside State University Director walked around his usual route.
The doctor is an old man with a slight hunched back in his late fifties with a buzzard of white balding hair scattered around his cranium as he always wore a blue stocking cap on top. Today he wore a blue and white sweater vest with a white button up and black-tie underneath in addition black pants with shiny black dress shoes. I never did understand his reasoning when he relegated down as a director at a famous marine biomedical university to a high school teacher in an upper middle-class part of town, but I remember him saying at a point in time that, "Knowledge was for everyone and those who attained the knowledge achieved greatness", that's why he loved teaching high schoolers.
Today, we were learning about zoology of the Keaton, a race of extinct foxes with three tails and yellow fur as well as being a subspecies of the fox kingdom. Unfortunately, my interests in the Animalia kingdom were a bit skewed considering that I studied about this late last night while he went on the cladistics of the common ancestor. I drifted off a bit when he put on a slideshow and before I knew it, my head was comfortably cradled by my two crossed arms on my unusually cool laminated desk. I got in a few minutes of sleep, something that I rarely did in class anyways, before I heard the loud slam of a book fall to the ground next to my book bag.
I shot up quickly looking up at the perpetrator momentarily confused, before hearing the small laughter of the class fill my senses. I felt myself blush as I saw the amused crooked grin under the white mustache of the professor looking down at me.
"So nice of you to finally join us, Ms. Harkinian. Hopefully, you don't mind telling me what are the two taxonomies that I had on my slide of the Keaton species, now do you?" I gulped silently at his slight sarcasm as I tried avoiding the piercing eyes around me. Taxonomies, or otherwise known as Owlan taxonomy, was developed by Professor Oolo Owlan who was an ancient Hyrule botanist and zoologist, formalized the modern system of naming organisms called binomial nomenclature. He was known as the founder of modern taxonomy, a practice continued since the ages of Hyrule's first creation, and all his work since had been translated to the modern language. I thought back fast to my notes last night on what I wrote from chapter seven of the animal science book.
"No, I uh, um I know it. The first is Mammalia, since they are able to reproduce as a pair or part of a kinship tie with several other females, and the second one is the scientific name, Callidus vulpes lasciva." I answered in confidence. I actually did remember seeing that in my notes since I knew the professor tended to go over key points in the chapters we were assigned. He grinned widely patting my shoulder, then bended over to pick up the teacher's solution manual he had dropped.
"Studious as usual I see, though I need you awake this time around when you are in my class otherwise you can attend the nurse's office if you're feeling any onset of narcolepsy again." I flushed once more when I heard a few scattered laughter rang around me. I averted my gaze from his old brown graying eyes.
"Sorry..." I murmured. I just wanted him to go now, he wasn't helping anymore to this situation!
"I know, smart as you are. Just don't studying so late next time, sleep is still important for all you youngins," he stated to the others as he began to walk back towards the front of the class. I hid behind the curtain of my hair forcing my eyes to my closed notebook in slight mortification, not adding anything to his comment. I looked at my phone that I placed in the upper right corner of my desk as my Snapchat notifications lit up and looked at the time on the display. 1:38 p.m. Just twenty-two more minutes of this until the last period, I groaned mentally.
OoOoOoO
As the bell rung for the end of the day, I saw my bestie who had been placing books in her locker we shared. I smiled as I crept up silently behind her holding a gray, black belted fedora with a multicolored feather that I had stashed away on top of my books in my book bag. She was startled and turned around quickly when she felt the soft wool land on her fiery hair.
"Now that's a damn fine-looking gal. As she struts her stuff on the runway, she makes all the ladies jealous and the boys fall in love with her with just a single look and flip of her fine ass hair," I proclaimed with a hand to my hip and snapped my fingers while I did. I giggled as Malon started to exaggerate her hips side by side, arms sashaying, and flipped her big wavy red hair while giving me a suggestive look when she pointed down the fedora towards her forehead. She squealed in laughter with me after a while as we hugged briefly. Malon wore the same school's uniform as I did. A short sleeved white button blouse tucked in with a purple tie underneath a black blazer with the school's golden emblem on the lapel, and a short-checkered purple, black, white skirt and one of the school's approved shoes, black and white sneakers. I wore white tennis shoes.
"I swear it's been so boring all day without being able to text my beautiful best friend," I rolled my eyes knowing the pain too well as I rested my back on the lockers next to her.
"I know exactly what you mean. I think Professor Mizumi would've had a heart attack if I even touched my phone. He practically made me recite an entire passage in front of everyone just because I rested my head a little." Malon visibly winced as I handed her one of my books to put in the locker and closed it looking at me in sympathy.
"Ouch. Harsh. I knew his class was hard, but I didn't know he would do that." I shuffled my bag back onto my back as we both began walking towards the crowded entrance with everyone else.
"It's fine, I was able to show him up with one of the best answers he'd heard. I'm just really exhausted from my track and field class. I don't even want to move for an entire year." I groaned rolling out the kinks in my neck. Track had been the last class of the day, and though I enjoyed it as much as tennis, I could do without all the cramps afterwards.
"I don't know how the hell you can do all that running then tennis on your other days. That's way too much for me to go through; I'm just glad we're just painting this time around. I couldn't stand all that sculpting Mr. Pikango had us going through last month." Mr. Pikango was our overly enthusiastic art teacher, who as fun as he was, was a bit too enthusiastic when it came to 'perfecting' our art.
"Well, we wouldn't want to break those pretty nails now, do we? We can't risk having those hands of yours damaged in any way." I smiled as she rolled her eyes sarcastically at me. We made it out to the parking lot to Malon's silver Lexus that her parents gave her, her sixteenth birthday. I was still saving for my own car even though I knew my parents could afford one, but I made it my own personal victory when I will finally buy one for university. At this moment however, I didn't really fit in time for a job. Malon and I buckled in as we threw our stuff into the back seat, and I watched as she backed out slowly before merging into a lane. She turned on the radio to a random station as some recent pop song came on.
"So, you're going to the football game this Friday? Groose would love it if his girl was there cheering him on," I rolled my eyes at her as I placed my fist to my cheek resting my elbow next to the power window and looked at the blurring scenery.
"I'm going obviously. I have my tennis tournament before the game, so I'll be here before it starts." She noticed my change of tone slightly and smiled softly to herself.
"Zelda, why don't you just go out with the guy already? He's practically ready to propose to you with a horse drawn carriage and the world in your hands," she segued. I tucked a loose strand behind my ear, shrugging a bit.
"I'm not interested in him." I heard the inner demon in me repeat this for the millionth time, "I mean, I love him just the same as a bigger brother, but I can't see myself ever falling in love with him…besides I heard a little rumor around school that he likes a certain redhead cutie."
"Don't try flipping the tables on me now, blondie. This isn't about me." She deflected clearly not buying my lie. I turned to her holding out my hands.
"Oh, come on! You guys would make the perfect couple. Red hair, green eyes…your babies would be completely adorable. And I'll be best aunty in the world for them. Hopefully, you'll name your first girl after me." I smiled as Malon rolled her eyes and turned an intersection towards the town square. Afterschool, we sometimes drove to the outlet mall and occasionally shopped for whatever latest trends or shoes came out for a couple of hours, seeing how Malon and I usually had big closets.
"Nice try, but you know I have my eyes for Pipit." Pipit Loft was a graduating senior with chestnut brown hair and ocean blue eyes. He was cool, calm, funny, but not too reserved and he always had this chill spirit that just made you wanna talk to him for hours. I sat back feeling the exasperation slipping through my lips knowing the redhead had been in love with him since last year.
"C'mon Malon, you want a fleeting man over a current one? You had about a million chances to tell him and we're still here at this point. Besides didn't he get back with Karane again?" Karane Gru was his off again-on again senior girlfriend of two years. She was a strawberry-blonde with bright green eyes, and she was known for her brute strength and authoritative attitude on the girls' soccer team, seeing how she was briefly coach at a point.
"It was never official," she singsong, "aside from rumors, I know he's still available for anyone to catch him. Of course, when you got the right assets, darling, anything can work in your favor." She winked flirtatiously at me as I shook my head slightly at her. I knew exactly what she meant, I also knew this fire would get out of control and I would have to step in eventually.
"You're playing with fire…" I muttered lowly. She heard me anyways. We stopped and parked in the parking lot of the mall as I got my small wallet and smartphone from my bag and placed it in the pockets of my skirt.
"Oh c'mon, why're you acting like such a punk? Besides didn't you date that guy Dark, like two years ago?" she continued as we got out the car together and placed the fedora I put on her head in her seat. Dark, or as his real name was Raven Onox, was my obnoxious idiotic ex-boyfriend with typical asshole tendencies. Don't get me wrong, I hated holding grudges against people because I had a lot better to do with my life than to worry about those who were no longer relevant to me. But if there was one guy that could make my skin crawl without me ever revealing that to him, it was that conniving arrogant bastard.
I'll delve a little into my history with the guy.
Back when we were freshmen, Dark was always this handsome little devil with brightly pale skin and jet-black hair that I loved running my fingers through, and these wonderful ambers filled eyes that sometimes looked red when we took pictures together. Anyways when we went out, I thought we had the most wonderful few months together. Come to turn out, I was extremely wrong. Not only would he become jealous with every guy I was friends with or even talk to, he tried keeping me from talking to anyone at all.
He was verbally abusive, always calling me out of my name but he never hit me. He was incredibly vain and selfish whenever we went out to eat in public, and just a plain jackass when it came to anyone else. The final straw came was when he had wanted me to give myself to him. Not only did I refuse him several times, but it turned out he had been cheating on me not once but on several occasions and I caught him in the act with a girl from another school when I went over to visit him. It… was the worst kind of pain ever. The yelling, the verbal threats, the false accusations.
I've never remembered hating someone so much before, I even slapped him as the tears ran down my face as the other hoe ran out somehow escaping all the built-up anger I had for this asshole. I didn't even have the heart to argue anymore. I just broke up with him right there and then, never looking back but with minor regret that I didn't even do any collateral damage when him cheating flashed before my eyes. I was too soft. I still felt like I was to this day, like an entire idiot. He somehow took upon that small weakness of mine and turned the entire situation in his favor when we went back to school, probably on a guise that I was going to expose him as an abusive liar and a cheater that he was. That I apparently broke his heart. I cheated on him with some other guy. I was the manipulative controller in the relationship.
Of course, I denied the rumors as much as I could, even people including my friends who knew me knew I wasn't that type of person, backed me up with their former verities of me. Even Groose managed to scare off half the freshman class without my prior knowledge. Rumors were hateful, annoying little bugs that no matter how much you tried killing off, they will always creep back, and it was even worse when I was accused of cheating with Groose whenever he came to my aid.
Like all rumors though, mine was quickly fading and became uninteresting when I decided to ignore it completely and enjoy my high school career. People eventually started to see the change in my disposition and a tad nonchalant attitude and were willing to see the real, but slightly reserved side of me. My friends honestly were the biggest benefactors in my life. Whatever happened with Dark? He still attended, tried to watch me crumble and fail, obviously dating other girls, which never bothered me once when I gradually dated other guys. He changed schools briefly during our sophomore year when his reputation was slowly growing, then came back the following spring and dated a girl in our grade named Cia, who I'll get into much later. Apparently, they were still dating, still trying to make me mad and jealous, but I showed them I didn't give a flying fuck about their relationship, offering more kindness to kill to their bitter resentment.
I tried to mask the indifference in my face. I honestly didn't care anymore, but it kind of hurt bringing up that painful memory as nonchalantly as Malon did knowing she was as livid the day I told her everything. Malon saw the change in my body language and had an apologetic look in her eyes. "No, I uh, that came out wrong, Zel. I didn't mean him. Sorry."
I'm pretty sure you weren't.
But I couldn't allow myself to be upset again. Not anymore. "Dark who? I don't even know who that is. I hardly think that qualifies me as a punk." I cracked a grin in her direction as I saw her shoulders relaxed a bit. "Come on, if we hurry I'm pretty sure we can find some sales at Nayru West." I grabbed her by the arm gently as she got her purse and we both walked to the shoe and purse store.
OoOoOoO
Malon and I decided to get our eyebrows threaded and filled then went inside a busy coffee shop and ordered our drinks at the counter. As Malon got her extra chocolate mocha with two shots espresso and I, a strawberry-banana protein smoothie, I couldn't help the feeling that I was being constantly watched ever since stepping onto the compound. I looked around discreetly as we were walking to a baths and perfume shop. I watched briefly as Malon tried some of the samples for the season and didn't hear what she said when she gave me a questioning eyebrow.
"Hello? Are you there Zelda?" I blinked once when she stopped in front of me.
"No, I uh, um what did you say um, Mal?" She shook her head as she tried the green jasmine scented spray and spritz a little on the disposable test strips, bringing the aroma to her nose. She chuckled a bit.
"Distracted much? I said, you're definitely going to Orange Mash with me next month, right?"
I sighed. "Ah, I forgot to buy a ticket. You don't think they're sold out yet, are they?" One of the biggest beach concerts on Eventide Island that I had been saving up for somehow became a distant memory during all my practice meets.
"I don't know they always sell fast at this point. I'm hoping the prices aren't too high yet."
I sipped my drink. "How much you buy yours?"
"Fifteen rupees."
"Damn, it's probably doubled at this point. I'll probably check it out later."
"I really want you to come. A lot of cute boys will be there buying us drinks, I know Pipit will show up. That'll be my chance to tell him everything and hopefully be his girlfriend by the end of the night." I did want my friend happy, I really did but I wished Mal wasn't so boy centric sometimes. I've seen her heart broken by too many guys she dated, and it only made me want to protect her more from the worst of the scum and drama. Still, Pipit was never a bad person from my perspective and texting, it was usually Malon who'd choke up whenever she found a guy she liked. If the rumors weren't true, then I was all there for her.
"Just don't choke up," I joked as I rubbed some coconut scented lotion on my hands. I was really tempted to buy this expensive unguent.
Just as Malon was about to give me a sarcastic retort, her phone rang loudly in her pocket and she pulled it out and slid her thumb across the screen placing it on her ear.
"Hey mom," I heard her say while I continued window shopping the soaps and loofahs, "no mom, I'm with Zelda right now…yeah she says hi…no, we're in the town square shopping district…no, mom I haven't even spent that much today. Yeah—…ok, ok, ok, mom I got it. I'll pick her up and take her home. Yeah gotcha, ok bye mom. Love you too, bye." I watched her hang up her phone then shake her head quickly at the home screen before turning to me and placing her phone in her pocket.
"I gotta go pick up Romani from school since mom's busy at the clinic today. You wanna come over?" Malon's mom worked at an animal hospital not too far from the ranch her father made an enterprise from and owned from countless generations of farmers. I shook my head softly as we walked out the store towards her car.
"I can't today Mal. I still have my history test with Mr. Auru, Monday, and I'm still trying to squeeze in as much information I can tonight before the tournament tomorrow. I'll be free Sunday though, what are you doing?"
"I think I have my math test with Mr. Write on Monday too…" she muttered as she unlocked the doors and we both got inside of the sedan. "Yeah, I'll be free Sunday too. I think Cremia is visiting that day, so she'll definitely take us either shopping or to the carnival in Ordon city." I always loved whenever Cremia came over. She was that cooler, older sister that always found the fun places to go to and even one time let Malon and I taste the expensive sweet milk wine, Château Romani, their parents had during their Goddess-mas party.
"Cool beans. I'll be over your place in the morning." I smiled as she drove off the lot.
OoOoOoO
As we picked up Romani and Malon drove to my house as I begrudgingly had to say goodbye to the smaller girl knowing how much she loved me whenever I came over, I walked inside my house shutting off the security system and closed the door. I sighed as I placed my book bag and the fedora by the closet and walked down the hallway to the kitchen to throw my empty cup into the trash. We didn't live lavishly like most of the kids I knew did, but it didn't mean my parents couldn't afford a thing or two. I live in a two story, four bedrooms and three and a half bathrooms. We had our standard flat screen tv in our overly lavish and innate living room my mom loved Feng shui-ing every now and then, as well as the topiary garden she loved tending to that surrounded the exterior of the front of our house.
My dad decided seven years ago that he'd buy a Miyamoto grand piano for me to practice on in one of the previously unoccupied rooms that was near the stairs and front door. Though I was never into classical music like my dad was, I did end up playing a few tunes now and then from some of our favorite movies. Reading and playing wasn't as hard as I thought it would be; my dad had been my teacher during the time when he found it fit during his busy schedules, though I could never equal up to his level.
I ended up back in the piano room and brushed my fingers over the keys until I found myself sitting down on the black cushion bench stool. I noticed the sheet music I left out the other night was the one the I printed based on the music in the movie 'Final Fantasy 15' that my parents and I watched. The composition was based on the running theme throughout the movie and the ending theme of the remaining five minutes of the movie that I absolutely fell in love with.
I licked my lips as the first few notes of the somber, yet beautiful melody rang through the quiet chambers of the house, skillfully mused through my composed fingers. The scene with Noctis and his friends were at the campsite, aged into their older counterparts, was one of the bittersweet moments of the film. I remembered crying a bit as Noctis, King of Lucis, accepting his true faith bidding his goodbyes to Prompto, Ignis, and Gladiolus, telling them how much they really meant to him as the scene transitioned to the dawn of a new day.
I deliberately played slowly, closing my eyes as I pictured the scenes again in my head as the accompanying orchestra joined in. I couldn't ever imagine having to leave the life I was in manifesting a destiny for a new world, but it was such a beautiful fantasy. I segued into the ending parts of the main theme, where the former king's voice, King Regis, began eulogizing Lunafreya and Noctis's wedding. As the scene slowly panned upwards, where the blue petals fell around the decorated throne room and stairs and the tapestry proudly displayed 'Noctis Lucis Caelum CXIV', it rolled to the empty throne chair where the picture Noctis had picked earlier of the younger him and his friends by the Regalia, sat on the arm only to then been picked up by the suddenly appearing newly but passed king.
He then showed the picture to the newly bride Lunafreya, who had been kneeling by his side and held the picture in her hand as Noctis took off his gloves as his touched his wife's face and the two slowly embraced into a slow kiss. They looked at each other fondly for a few seconds as the music picked up a few octaves, then finalizing the impending fantasy as they slow into a deep, peaceful slumber.
I slow to an end as the final notes rang, feeling my mouth split into a slow smile. Thank you. I bowed to no one as I closed the casing to the keyboard.
Before I got emotional again, I picked myself up and headed to my bathroom taking a needed shower. I blew my out my wet hair with the hairdryer, lotion myself, and went in my room to pick out my clothes from my walk-in closet. I wore my tight gray short-sleeved crop top and my black sport active shorts with the white lining, then went to the laundry room down the hall by the guest room with my uniform to wash the basket of clothes of the week. Afterwards, I went back down the stairs with my black flip-flops to grab my backpack and went inside to the living room to start on my homework. Getting an hour in, I decided on a break and checked my phone for updates, and texting back to my messages. Deciding a few more minutes wouldn't hurt, I turned on my flat screen and went to Netflix to watch an old classic, 'Mulan', while hugging a giant white pillow to my body the whole time.
Eighteen minutes in as 'Mulan's Decision' was over, I heard bold knocking on my front door and calmly paused the movie. My parents wouldn't be home until a couple of more hours and they had their own keys and I wasn't expecting any packaging or people over, so I couldn't help the curiosity as I walked over and quickly checked the security monitor screen. I was a bit confused seeing the person on screen, as the person was wearing an odd set of clothing and had a serious look on his face. I couldn't decide if the sword, scabbard, and shield he had on his back when he turned briefly to look behind himself was the real deal or some cosplay like the drama kids did at school. Weird. Cautiously, I opened my door to a handsome dark blond stranger looking at me like I was deer caught in the headlights, then gradually composed his surprised face into a small warm smile.
"…Hi. Can I help you?"
The small, quiet tension was killing me as he continued staring at me and suddenly I began feeling self-conscious about my somewhat revealing outfit, cutting real short to closing the door in his face. He caught himself and went back to his stoic look and suddenly went down on one knee looking at my doormat, with his hand covering his other knee as if he was about to propose to me. I don't know why I felt an anxiety attack coming when he did that, but I was about to interrupt until he spoke.
"Your Highness, it has been so long, but I am pleased to have found you. My name is Link. I am an appointed knight and I was assigned from the king himself of Hyrule, 'King Daphnes Nohansen XXIV', to return with his daughter, Princess Zelda, steadily back home." He looked up at me letting another small smile on his handsome face while I was controlling my heart rate around him.
"Princess, you are next in line as ruler of Hyrule."
After finishing his monologue, I couldn't register the shock or even the words he spoke running through my head. I could only think of the most appropriate words according to my reaction.
What the hell?!
A/N: So again on this rather long prologue, I do intend on changing the rating system due to certain themes I'll be later hinting at. At a point in time I did consider a crossover with FFXV in another story I'm working on but thought better on it and just include a snippet in this first chapter. Btw the language used in Avarina's line is the Gujarati language which would represent the ancient Hylian language. Please r & r! ^ _^
