My damnation was ascertained the same instant my faith was replaced with revelation. My god was nothing more than a manipulative charlatan who spent his days duping children. But who would believe me? The fact that I was not Kokiri was, at the very least, suspected by the entire population. How could I convince them of what I witnessed? Worse than that, how was I, a boy of ten, going to perorate louder than The Great Deku Tree himself?

"He has to die."

At first the utterance seemed deranged, even to me. I was brought there by a servant of The Great Deku Tree in good faith. My father had made himself vulnerable, allowing me into his core, because he trusted his son. Even if he had been able to peer through this vessel of flesh and into my soul, at that instant he would have seen only innocence (assuming such a thing truly exists). Mere hours later, standing amongst his roots if he had used that same postulate ability he would have seen bile and hate. Enough animosity to drive a son towards the murder of his father.

Instead of crushing Gohma like the insect she was, I allowed her to continue her destructive nesting. It happened so quickly. In just minutes that demon arachnid ruined the base of the great oak. As I sit here now I shiver, not because of this "alluring" "temperate" cell, but from recalling her uncouth movement.

It is typical for folk to fear spiders, yes? Wasps and the sort too? I asked Craven – my name for my warden – but in his established manner he did not deem me worthy of an answer. I am obliged to ask because despite my sojourn I have a poor understanding of the common man's revulsions. Only that I appear to rank somewhere on that list.

Gohma wriggled and writhed about, lashing at the roots imprisoning her as though she shared my exasperation. When she grew tired the parasitic queen would lay eggs and allow her children to wreak havoc. The monster and her spawn stayed far away from me, fearing the sting of my borrowed blade. I watched these proceedings until I heard an emphatic moan ripple through the roots. That was it. that was what I had been waiting for. The death throes of The Great Deku Tree.

My use for Gohma was expended. With laughable ease I exterminated the disease I had originally been summoned to erase. I cleaned my blade, adjusted my tunic, then ascended to the confrontation that was waiting on the surface. Except there was no confrontation. The Great Deku Tree was indeed dying, but he mistook my murderous intentions, for failure. The old fool. He "comforted" me, assuring me that my failure was not a sign of ineptitude. With his last words he bid me protect the village, and his children.

I considered his end, their beginning. The beginning of a new life, free from a tyrant who relied on deception.

My asininity should be listed amongst my sins. I could not imagine being so wrong.

The mourning was to be expected. Sweet dulcet lambs. They cried until their bodies could no longer produce the salt for proper tears.

The questions were expected. Curious children being curious children. The Kokiri wanted to know how their father died. Why I was the one who was summoned. Why I smelled like death and decay.

The fairy was not expected. That termagant piss! The Great Deku Tree had sent a spy to watch over me whilst I carried out his task. Somehow she had avoided detection and chose then, that moment in front of the entire village, to reveal my abhorrent crime.

For those of you ignorant of fairies, it is known that they cannot lie. A fairy, through the entirety of its damned life, cannot utter a single phrase that even eludes fact.

"Link chose to let The Great Deku Tree perish!" she cried. Gasps and quivers rolled through the congregation. "The Great Deku Tree's blood is on his hands!"

The congregation quickly became a mob. I was chased out of my adopted village without even an opportunity to defend myself. I escaped into the Lost Woods, a place where Kokiri dare not enter.

I thought the whole matter was just-as-well. They did not need me to usher them into –what I thought at the time was – an era of enlightenment. Surely it was the path of the hero (though I never truly considered myself as such. Surely none of you do either) to find himself desolate. Instead of wallowing in self-pity I decided to break the first rule of my deceased ruler.

Do not leave the forest.

I left the forest and just at its edge, I saw her.

My love.

My dear.

My sweet.

The light to my fire.

My soul.

Saria.

Know this now reader: Despite my hands drawing the life from her alluring, ravishing, beautiful, pulchritudinous body. Her death is not MY sin.

Author's Note: The rating will be jumping up to "M" in a couple chapters.