Wind Chimes: Chapter 2

Away with the wind.

Author's Note: I'm not sure I'm too happy with chapter one, so I think I'll be rewriting it. Here is chapter two after much demand :D I'm glad so many people liked it, even though I feel that chapter one isn't good at all D: I am very grateful for every review I get, every favourite, every story alert, everything! Except flames. Those I do not enjoy. Constructive criticism always helps :D I am truly grateful! Sorry it's not too long, but I wanted to end it with a sort of climax (: Besides, I need to sleep -.-' I hope you enjoy it! On with the show!

P.S My old keyboard broke, and this new one doesn't work properly. If there are any 'g's or 'k's missing then it's because of that, and I missed them whilst proof-reading.

P.P.S I chose writing this over finishing a project due in two weeks. If I get an 'F' I know who to blame! XD

Love you all :3 3 3 3

May the wind be with you!

Zelda sharply turned around, only to find nothing behind her. The sudden shift in the environment around her was drastic, and was proof enough that Vaati had suddenly appeared. She looked around her, but her eyes were only met with the familiar plane of lush grass, intricate stone statues and detailed carvings. She could still feel his presence, buzzing gently yet energetically, waiting for her to make a move. A gentle wind began to blow through the sacred shrine, with heady scents riding it, mocking Zelda.

Everything is fine, it seemed to say, relax. Relax and sleep.

Zelda's eyes began to feel heavy. She began feeling as if she needed to yawn and struggled to remain awake. Her visionbegan to swim, and the tears that sometimes accompanied fatigue readily came. While her vision fogged over, she could see through the drowsiness-induced tears and mist, a vague purple shape, waling up to her with confident strides. She snapped her eyes open, and adrenaline began pounding through her system, only to find that no one was there.

She steadied herself, before she could show her shock.

Calm down, he's playing with you. Do not let him win, at any cost!

With this mental pep talk, Zelda looked around her once again, and began to take note of her surroundings. There were only two things that had changed. The first thing was the seal: what had previously been a solid chunk of craved granite was cracked and splintered with what looked like a great force. Pieces of the rock lay scattered around the area, the sorry and final proof of Vaati's escape. The Four Sword was still there, impaled into the ground. It didn't look as if it had changed. Behind the sword, the second change was evident. Zelda would never know how Vaati did it, it was magic she had not thought possible.

The carvings on the rock face before had depicted a sun and a sword. So elegant they had been, having been carved by a true master at the trade. Before, what had been beautiful yet elegant in its simple yet intricate design, had been radically altered by none other than Vaati. The stone that had framed the embellishment in the stone now was a complex carving of wind, entangled in itself. Where the sun had been shining down on the sword in the previous carving. It now lay blocked out by dark storm clouds, with winds raging in the background. In the foreground the sword was gone, and in it's place lay the depict of a shining light. Out of the sides of the carving came to clawed hands, as if they were going to lunge for the light. The two hands seemed to be made of darker stone than the rest, with elaborate ornamentation embellished on them.

They radiated a sinister quality and Zelda wanted nothing more than to smash the stonework. It scared her, especially since she had a shrewd guess as to what the shining light was. She wondered how Vaati had managed to accomplish this feat. It was no easy task, to even changed the pattern on a piece of wood, even embroidery, yet alone something as hard and unchanging as stone.

Zelda walked towards the sword, suddenly weary as to why Vaati would leave such a dangerous weapon in reach of an enemy. She edged towards it cautiously and stretched out her arm as soon as

she was in grabbing distance of it. Her fingertips had barely clutched the hilt of the sword before she felt a bigger hand encase her own. She held in a gasp, and turned her head slowly upwards to glare at the ex-prisoner. He smiled pleasantly back down at her.

"You didn't really think that I'd just leave this lying here, did you?" His voice held that mocking lilt to it, the one that bothered and irritated Zelda like nothing else did. Her father's counselors used to talk to her like that, conversing with her about mundane things, such as the weather or the harvest, as if she was below talking about serious matters, such as the state's economy and the latest threats to the kingdom.

"No,"she replied. "I did not." Neither of them relinquished their grips on the sword. It was a subtle play for power, as if the winner of this little scuffle would hold more power over the other. Childish, yet psychologically important. Whoever won would be left feeling inferior and would have the upper hand, especially since it was more than just a symbol for power. It was a sword, and a weapon was a weapon after all. Zelda felt she would feel safer if it was in her hands.

Vaati smirked, seeming to sense her distress. Violet clashed with red and the battle of wills began.

"How did you escape?"

Vaati sat back on his, seeming to think about the question he had been asked. "A stroke of genius mixed with luck is what secured my eventual escape."

"Care to expand on this so called stroke of genius?"

"Come now, princess," he practically sang,"I'm sure you can make sense of everything that has been happening lately. You are not unintelligent, despite the fact that people seem to dress you in the borrowed robes of fools'."

"The way my father's council treats me is none of your concern."She resisted the frown that was at her lips at his mention of their ill-treatment of her. As for what had been happening... "The dreams,"she said after a slight pause. "You've been using them to escape."

"True," he said, pleased she had figured it out. "But how?"

Zelda pondered on this. "If I were to pose a theory...you have been letting your pith seep into my dreams, to form your consciousness somewhere else...yet you are not truly here yet."

Vaati was silent for a few moments, not displeased that Zelda had acutely surmised his method of escape, just mildly shocked that she had managed to do so in such a short span of time. His mouth soon formed that familiar smirk. "Well done, princess. Your looks aren't the only things that do you justice, so it seems." His hold on her hand tightened, before he placed his other hand over his own. The sword began humming, and his own magic began resonating through it. Zelda felt the sword quiver beneath her fingers, and she tried using her own magic in an attempt to stifle Vaati's. His hands began wavering to solidity and gaseous form, yet still they had not relinquished their grip. Zelda tried to elbow him, to make him let go, when the humming stopped. When she looked at the

sword again, she was shaken. The only thing left, was the hilt in her hands.

Vaati openly grinned at her, before letting go. "You may have it now, if you wish."

Zelda loosely held the gold hilt in her hands, when she slowly looked up at Vaati. He held the blade gently, as if scared it might shatter. Zelda's initial shock died away, to be replaced by a cold clammy calmness.

He lifted the sword up to his face, inspecting the keen metal, before his smirk turned bitter. "Unbelievable," he said.

Zelda remained silent, allowing him to continue.

His eyes met hers, and a simmering anger was present in them. "This blade, this toy of a weapon, was my one weakness. What was made by the Picori, can be undone by the Picori."

"Yet you are no longer one of them, are you?"

He gave her a chilling smile, before saying, "One is never far from one's roots. Yet, you are right, in a way. I am far better than any of those miniscule rodents."

"Yet their blade was your downfall."

He quoted himself: "What was made by the Picori, can be undone by the Picori. What a short-term memory you have. The magical cap that was made by Ezlo was made by a Picori, obviously. The blade was also made by the Picori , remember? Are you managing to keep up with me, princess?"

Zelda shot him a look of cold anger.

He smirked in reply and continued. "Good, you are. They were both Picori made, and their magic was equally strong. The only reason why the Four sword overpowered me was because the Minish cap was meant for good, and so Ezlo's magic within it reacted with the sword's and doubled it's strength, thus sealing me in it." He took a deep breath. "It won't happen again," he stated quietly.

"Oh, really?" It was the first time Zelda had ever directed sarcasm at someone other than herself. It was refreshing.

He rightly interpreted the look in her eyes as a challenge, and simpered tauntingly. "Little princess, how easily you scorn things unbeknown to you. If you think am another of those blundering petty villains, so common in each town, you are sorely mistaken. I will forgive you of this slight this time, but make sure that this mistake does not repeat itself, or I will become very irritated."

Zelda was unruffled by his threat. She tranquilly placed her hands behind her back, building her magic up in the palms' of her hands, trying not to alert Vaati to the displacement spell that was about to occur. If she could get the sword back in her hands, she'd have a good chance of stopping him. There was no way to contact anyone for help, seeing as telepathy took a lot of concentration and time. She had to act fast.

She flung a ball of buzzing magic at the sword, sure that it would hit it. Vaati, almost casually, moved the blade out of the way and flung his own arm out. The sphere of magic disintegrated upon coming into contact with Vaati's limb. She rapidly created a whip out of magic, and tried to whisk his feet out from beneath him. He tried to move backwards, not expecting this sort of attack. His left foot got caught in the fiery whip, and he let out a snarl of pain, before he fell to the ground. Zelda was about to form another sphere, when he hurled the blade up into the air. In a matter of seconds, black shadows engulfed it, and formed an irregular globe. It suddenly turned pure white, and light radiated from it. Both Zelda and Vaati had to shield their eyes as the illumination increased. The fierce glow painted everything in black and white, star colours contrasting each other. Suddenly, four rays of light emitted from the glowing orb. When it suddenly stopped, neither the sphere of light nor the blade was there.

Vaati gripped the whip with a deep grimace, before yanking on it, so that Zelda soon joined him on the ground. He grabbed her around the neck, and hissed in her ear, "Say still!"

Feeling that his grip around her throat was tightening, she quickly took his advice.

He pushed himself off the ground, his hand still at her throat.

"What did you do to the sword?" Zelda asked quietly.

"I shattered it."

Zelda quickly caught onto what those four rays of light were. "Into four pieces." It was not a question.

He nodded in confirmation. His face had turned blank and had lost the look of malicious joy that had spread across his features when he had been mocking her. Zelda feared this blank look. She could read him more, predict what he was going to do more when he was angry. If he had learned how to control himself, then she would have a hard time analyzing his next move.

It reminded her of when she would play chess with her father. She had started at a young age, her mind already sharp from hours of reading books and listening to people discuss heavy topics. She took delight in planning her moves, rejoiced in the cunning strategies her father tried to teach her, relished when she made a move he did not expect. It was only when she had started getting older, that he went started giving as good as he got and stopped spoon-feeding her. He did not want her to have anymore easy victories, so that the matches she did win could be savoured. His face would go curiously blank during these games, now no-longer dropping hints as to what piece she should play next. It was at those moments that Zelda would be unsure of herself, and second guess her thinking. She would look straight into her father's eyes, trying to guess his next thought, or distract him from his concentration.

And here she was, using the same methods to try read Vaati, to no avail.

His deep-set seriousness broke when he found her staring at him. "Saw something you like?" he grinned.

Zelda remained silent, at a loss for words, never having anyone address in such a casual manner before.

"Thought so," he smirked.

Her mouth tipped down into a slight frown, before saying, " I was just merely surprised that someone with a height and build similar to my own would have such a firm hold."

It was Vaati's turn to frown, having caught onto the implied insult towards his masculinity. He gripped her throat harder in reply, before saying, "I never understood the appeal women saw in buff men."

Zelda almost laughed in frustration. Her she was almost getting strangled while he discussed tastes in men. She placed her own hands on his, trying to wriggle out of his grip.

"Now, now," he said, "stop struggling."

He pulled her towards him, and pressed her back against his front. Zelda felt lean muscles that she was sure that no woman would ever have. He released her throat and quickly secured her around the waist with both arms. The breeze, which had been present all throughout the exchange, picked up to something stronger, and soon turned into a gale. The wind whipped their hair about, blowing it from side to side and whipping their faces. The gale transformed into a miniature hurricane, which, for some reason, did not damage the surrounding monuments, nor did it pull up any grass and stones into it's vortex. It moved towards Zelda and Vaati. Vaati stood stock still, waiting for it to devour them both, whilst Zelda frantically tried to claw away from Vaati.

The steady-moving swirl of air, reached them both, and Zelda felt the sort of weightlessness that she was accustomed to while swimming. Her eyes closed shut, scared that she'd see the world moving below her and fall. The squall tore at her dress, making it move ferociously in all directions. It felt like an eternity had flown by, ironically enough, before the weightless feeling was gone and her feet hit solid ground. She felt Vaati's arms tighten for a second, before removing them from around her waist. When she opened her eyes again, the first thing she saw was a pure white marble floor. She turned to look at Vaati, waiting for an explanation for where they were.

"Welcome," he said, "to my palace in the sky."

Zelda did not resist as Vaati took her gently by the hand and led her through marble halls. The large corridor they were passing through had no walls, just gigantic white columns that held up a marble roof. The bases and the tops of the columns had old ornamentation on them, and Zelda did not doubt the bright ore's authenticity. She looked through the columns, only to see white cumulus clouds and patches of forget-me-not blue sky. Strangely enough, it was not cold, nor was there even the slightest hint of a breeze nor was she feeling nauseous from being so high up above the ground.

Vaati lead them along at a leisurely pace, letting Zelda observe her surroundings, before he stopped in front of a vast door. In the middle of the door was a giant eye, old in colour with an amethyst for the pupil. Several rubies surround it to form a giant circle around it. Vaati placed his index finger on the middle of the door, before making a vertical slicing motion with his arm. The door creaked open, groaning in protest after years of not having opened for anyone.

Zelda was lead into a throne room. Towards the back of the vast room, there were steps that lead up to a platform. On this platform sat a throne. Elegant carvings of gusts and breezes adorned the throne, with moon stones set into it at regular intervals. The throne was also gold, yet different from the bright aurate that had adorned the columns and the door; this gold was almost silver in colour. It had to be white gold, the most valuable kind.

Vaati strode to the middle of the room, and withdrew the hilt of the Four Sword from underneath his cloak.

When did he take that? Zelda thought.

He held the hilt out before him, and stood still for a few moments, before releasing the it. The hilt didn't drop as Zelda expected it to, but levitated a bit more than a mater away from the ground, surrounded by a sphere of lavender light.

"And there it shall stay," Vaati announced. "Proof of my triumph over that sword."

"Yet it had no wielder, so how was that indeed a triumph? Blades do not triumph on their own. They are just an extension of the arm."

Vaati sent her a glare that chilled her very bone-marrow, though she chose to hide that fact. His lips were pursed in a tight line, the blood having drained from them so that they were a paler version of purple than the hue of his skin colour. His eyes narrowed and he said in a quiet voice: "I think you forget your place, Zelda." He had dropped the formality that was her title.

"You have no right to call me by my name."

He raised a condescending eyebrow. "No right? You are no longer in Hyrule, little girl, and thus you have no power, both political and magical. Here, we are in my domain, so you play by my rules. I am King here. You are merely a pawn."

He too a menacing step towards her, yet she did not give ground. He loomed over her, his face a mask of cold fury. "Now that we are on the topic, let us discuss your stay here. You will be staying her for a rather long time, I'm afraid."

"How long?"

"How long what?"

"How long will I be staying here?"

"You're forgetting something important."

They had reached a stalemate. Zelda had a shrewd idea of what he was expecting, yet she would not give it to him.

"I disagree. Answer my question."

It happened very fast. Vaati sighed and looked disappointed, as if she was an old friend who forgot that his birthday was today. He rubbed the bridge of his nose with two fingers, before he hauled her by the front of the plain cotton dress she had worn when she had been in a hurry to get to the shrine. He pulled her face close to his, before whispering: "How many times must you be put in our place, girl? I thought you were intelligent. Here, as I said earlier, I am King. I am Master. Address me as such."

She gave him a cold look before replying: "Never."

His hand suddenly flew up, about to backhand her face, when he regained his self-control and stopped himself. He took a few deep breaths, before regaining his composure. He lowered his hand. "Fine then, Zelda, two can play at that game."

She narrowed her eyes, and they both stood motionless, staring each other down. Vaati eventually released her. "You will be staying here as a... well, guest isn't exactly the right word..."

"How about prisoner?" Zelda supplied with a hint of sarcasm.

"No, that won't do either." He seemed to be in deep thought for a few seconds, before replying, "I've got it! How about betrothed?"

"What?"

"You don't approve?" He sighed in mock defeat. "Oh well, you'll learn to live with it. You'll eventually learn to live with being my wife also."

Zelda was speechless with shock. She had received marriage proposals in the past, yet this was not even that. This was sheer deceleration of ownership. She, at last, managed to find her voice: "I will never marry you."

"Oh? I guess I'll just have to make do with you as my mistress."

She physically recoiled from the thought, and began taking slow steps away from him.

"What are you going to do, Zelda? The door only opens for me, and jumping off is an option I rather you didn't take."

As angry and disgusted she was at him, she knew he was right. Nevertheless, she still continued to back away from him, before an idea struck her.

Teleportation. I can teleport.

Truth be told, she had not completely learned how to teleport from such a huge distance. She had only recently mastered the act of teleporting short distances, such as from the castle the Lon Lon Ranch. It took a long time, she would have to start immediately.

Vaati took two quick strides towards her, before taking both her hands in his own. His face leaned close to hers, and hovered for a heartbeat, before plunging and sealing her lips with his own.