2

present: six months after ganondorf's defeat

Link loved the sound of the rain against the windowsill. As gently as he could, he lifted her arm from its position across his chest and swung his legs over the side of the bed. The cold of the tile against his bare feet sent chills running up his spine, but he liked it. It felt natural. He stood up, maintaining his quietness for the sake of the sleeping princess, and tiptoed across the room to the window. He sat against it and watched the small, glowing silhouettes of the raindrops press against the glass and slide down, each being replaced by another droplet. They reminded Link of teardrops, and the sound reminded him of the pitter-patter of his heart beating inside of his chest.

The darkness that enshrouded the land outside enthralled him. Each night, he found himself more and more astonished by the sheer beauty of it. It was a different beauty than sunlight, different than twilight. For Link, the twilight had long ago lost the beauty that so many claimed for it. But the night still had so much to offer him; in it, the discoveries of an entirely new world were hiding, waiting for him to eagerly stumble upon them. And there was a strange, calming silence in the night. Even in the midst of the rain, there was silence, and there was something so incredibly lovely about it.

Desires for sleep tugged at the edges of his eyelids, but Link couldn't let himself fall asleep. The shadow would come back if he drifted into slumber, no matter how light. The shadow would be there, laughing with its red eyes and dark face and a voice that sounded too much like his own. The nightmares were enough to keep him awake, and had been for months.

The girl in the bed across the room shifted in her position and pulled the blanket more tightly around her naked body. Link watched her for a few moments, hardly letting himself breathe. He could see her eyelids fluttering in her sleep.

"What kind of dreams are you having, Princess?" he mumbled. "They must be so different from mine, huh?"

Link allowed his legs to drag him away from the windowsill and kneel in front of the bed so that he could look at her face more closely. Her breathing was rhythmic, harmonizing with the continuous droplets of rain, and her body moved ever so slightly with each breath. Link put his icy fingers against her cheek and felt them instantly begin to get warmer. Then he stroked her shoulder with the tips of his fingers, traced patterns down her arm, watched her body unconsciously respond to his touch. But she did not wake up, and Link was glad. He was, for good reasons, afraid of the princess—he knew that she was falling in love with him. He could see it in the glimmer of her eyes when she looked at him, he could feel it in the passion of her kiss, sense it in the tingles of her skin. Zelda was falling in love with him.

"You don't seem like you're having a bad dream, Princess," he whispered. "At least, I hope you're not."

Sometimes, Link still felt uncomfortable calling her Zelda because he didn't want to make her think that he was falling in love with her, as she was with him. But he acknowledged that that idea made him quite the hypocrite, while he knelt beside the bed where she was sleeping in the middle of the night, his skin still tingling from the pressure of her lips. He couldn't claim that he didn't enjoy feeling her in his arms, or pressing his body against hers, or hearing her breathe at night. But he didn't love her, and he wasn't sure that he ever could.

Just then, her eyes opened. Link's fingers were still running up and down her arm when they did. She looked at him for a few moments, eyes still drooping with the remains of sleep, and then she smiled.

"Hi."

Link liked her voice, too, because it was smooth and sounded like music. But in that instant, it didn't sound right. It sounded very, very wrong.

"Hey."

"What are you doing?"

"Watching you breathe and tracing patterns on your arm."

"Mm."

She reached out and ran her fingers through the wild tangles of his hair, as if she hadn't heard him. Then she propped herself up on her elbow, letting the blanket slide down ever so slightly.

"Why aren't you asleep yet...?"

"I'm not tired."

Link never felt bad lying to Zelda about anything, but he wasn't sure why. The words always seemed to flow so smoothly out of his mouth, even when they were tainted with untruthfulness. If she ever noticed, then she was uncannily good at hiding it. Or, she simply didn't care.

"Oh?" She leaned forward, let her hand rest on the back of his neck, and kissed him. As she pulled away, she let her tongue momentarily graze his lower lip. "Well you should get some rest."

"Maybe I should."

"Is the rain keeping you awake?"

"...Yeah. Yeah, it is."

"Come here, darling."

Zelda gestured toward the empty spot beside her, and Link reluctantly slipped into the bed. He hadn't wanted her to wake up because she would interrupt the magical silence of the night. And regardless of how wonderful her voice sounded, there was still something strange about it at night. Something unnatural. He wanted her to go back to sleep, dream wonderful dreams, continue being fooled into believing that he loved her. That would've made everything so much simpler. Now, she would lull him to sleep without any knowledge of the horrible monster that lay in wait inside of his sleeping mind, and he couldn't do anything about it. All he could do was listen to that musical voice and slip, albeit hesitantly, into bed.

"Close your eyes."

He did what she asked, and before he could cringe at the ominous images behind his eyelids, she wrapped her arms around him and pulled his body into hers. Link knew that his skin was cold; he could feel the lack of warmth deep within his bones. But the princess was warm, and the blankets were soft, and he was in an atmosphere of safety. Safety, however, was not the type of emotion Link was feeling. He hadn't experienced that emotion in months, and he wasn't about to start feeling it at that moment. He couldn't remember what safety felt like anyway.

"Just listen to my breathing. Relax."

She pressed her lips against his forehead, ran her hands along his back, and let her breathing fall into his ear. Zelda breathed in, and out...in...out...

The last thing he remembered wondering before falling asleep was why he couldn't bring himself to love her.

The room was white. White and horribly eerie. And when Link stepped forward, there was water beneath his feet. Shallow water—enough to wet the soles of his boots, but nothing more. He stared down and saw his reflection, wide-eyed and pale, staring back up at him, and for a moment he was fooled into believing that the water was much deeper than it was. It made him hesitate, questioning whether he would tumble into an endless abyss of water, before stepping forward.

Link walked and felt the air become heavy upon his shoulders. The force made him gasp for breath. He felt as if he were suffocating beneath the tension of the atmosphere and the inevitable fact that something was waiting for him. He was doomed, and the burden of knowing that was heavy. Turning around, he saw the door standing like an island, isolated and locked behind him. He turned to his right: nothing but pure whiteness. He turned to his left: again, nothing. He faced forward, still panting and struggling to maintain his breathing, and saw another isolated door. It seemed to be miles away. And in between the two doors was a single tree. Link had seen the tree so many times before, but its presence still made his knees buckle. The tree was black and leafless. It stood like a dying soldier, erect but broken, surrounded by an air of sorrow and loneliness. There was nothing but the tree, and he felt sorry for it.

He began moving toward the tree when it wailed his name.

Each time the tree wailed, he quickened his steps. Its voice sounded so urgent, as if it were crying out with its last breath for him to come closer...closer...closer. He found himself standing in front of the ashen tree, out of breath and crouched over, crying, "I'm here! Let me help you!"

Still, the tree continued wailing. It said his name over and over again until it echoed endlessly in the air and hung there like a lifeless body. Link reached his hand out to stroke the tree's slim body, to comfort it, to make it stop saying his name. He begged it. The tree ignored him and continued wailing. He felt the tears of terror and frustration stinging his bloodshot eyes as he cried again, "I'm here! I'm here! I'm here!" It didn't seem to be able to feel his touch against its trunk. It screamed as if he were miles away, even though he was right there in front of it. "Stop, stop, stop," he pleaded uselessly. Hopeless and haunted, he let his voice die, placed both of his hands on the tree, and leaned forward against it with his eyes tightly closed.

Just then, he felt something appear beneath his hands, something other than the tree. He felt it breathe under his palms, and his eyes shot open.

Link stood, face to face with a shadow.

It had appeared before him, leaning carelessly against the tree with a distorted sneer on its face. But when he looked into his piercing red eyes, Link froze. The water on the ground became like deep, deep mud, and he couldn't move a single inch. All he could do was glare into the shadow's eyes and struggle to pull his hands from its shoulders. But the shadow had lifted its hands and grabbed onto Link's. He couldn't move.

"Stop struggling," the shadow said. "You'll only make it worse."

The words flipped a switch in his brain, and he jumped to life. With a desperate leap backward, Link drew his blue-hilted sword and snarled. The shadow just threw its ugly head back and laughed a cackling, maniacal laugh. Then it took a step forward but kept its arms crossed leisurely across its chest. It looked as if it were floating on the water as it made its way ominously toward him. The air became like ice.

"Come on, you don't really want to fight me, do you?" it taunted.

Link jumped forward with his sword raised and brought it down, envisioning the shadow being sliced in half and disappearing forever. But before his sword could make contact, the shadow evaporated.

"I thought you would've realized by now..." Its voice came from behind. "Those tricks don't work on me."

Link let out a savage yell and whirled around, swinging his sword desperately. Suddenly and harshly, he was thrown backwards by his weapon's collision with another. As he stumbled, he saw the shadow twirling its own sword in its hand. Its left hand. The sword was pure black, and it smelled of blood. While Link struggled to find his footing, the shadow was unfazed. It slowly began walking toward him, letting its sword swing from side to side.

"You know already," it laughed. "You can't beat me."

When it attacked, he was hardly ready for it. Link brought up his sword just in time, and sparks flew. It swung again, pushing him back, laughing the whole way through. Link didn't know what to do. His skills with the sword, so sharp and honed, were nothing to this shadow. Then it began to imitate him. Link jabbed at the shadow; it jabbed straight back but with more power, nearly leaving him on the ground. He swung horizontally; it swung horizontally as well, but made Link's wrist snap and ache. And through this mirrored dance of parries and jabs and slices, he tried to make out its facial features, but they were obscured in the darkness.

"What do you want? Leave me alone!" Link screamed.

"Hah!"

He ducked as the shadow's sword flew just above his head. But then it stepped forward.

"Too slow."

It brought the sword down against Link's arm, and as the blood began seeping through his tunic, he let out a shriek of pain. He tried to overcome the initial blindness of the searing pain, but the shadow brought the hilt of its terrible black sword down onto his left shoulder. His sword fell with a splash into the shallow water at his feet as he screamed again—a hoarse, bloodcurdling scream.

"Tsk, tsk, we're getting rusty, huh?"

The shadow let its sword fall diagonally across Link's chest. The sight of blood rushing down his skin, tainting the silvery water, made him too lightheaded to feel the pain. Everything became foggy.

"That can't be your best...can it, o great hero?"

It drove him backward, jabbing lightly into his chest with the tip of its sword with each step. Link felt himself slipping in and out of consciousness—one moment he was calm and dizzy, the next he was writhing in the type of pain that was utterly blinding. Suddenly, with holes of blood in his tunic, he could be driven back no further. His back was against the tree, staining its black skin red. The shadow was laughing. It stood a couple of steps away from Link, watching in glory as he screamed and helplessly watched his own blood flow.

"Wh...who are you?" he managed.

The shadow stepped forward into the light, and Link saw who it was.

He saw himself with red eyes, black hair, nearly transparent skin, and a disgustingly pleased grin.

"I'm you."

The shadow brought his sword to his lips and licked the blood dripping from its blade. Then he licked his own lips and continued walking forward. The smile on his face was one of content, of satisfaction, of absolute carelessness.

"Except that I'm better."

The shadow was suddenly right there, his face a hair's width from Link's, whispering in his ear. He lifted the sword and gently pressed it to Link's neck, drawing one quick gasp of breath. He was suffocating, leaning against that tree in a puddle of his own blood, feeling a shadow of him take pleasure in his pain. Each moment the pain grew worse. He wasn't sure how much more he could stand.

"Do you know why I'm better? Huh?"

The shadow pressed the sword against Link's neck, just enough to draw blood from the thin line in his skin. As Link leaned his head back against the tree, praying for relief from this torture, the shadow chuckled in his ear and pressed him harder against the tree.

"Tell me, Link," he continued, "Why am I here?"

"To...torture...me..."

"No, but...good guess."

The shadow swiped his finger along the blood of Link's neck, drawing another scream, and then let his finger brush Link's jaw line. It left a red trail on his face.

"I'm here to give you purpose."

"I...have...purpose..." Link was hardly able to speak.

"No. No, you don't." The shadow pressed his entire mouth to Link's ear. "You don't have purpose. And you're going insane without it. That's why I'm here."

"I'm...not..."

"You're useless now. You fulfilled your purpose already."

"I..."

"Shh. Don't even bother trying to say anything," he sneered. Then he grabbed Link's lapel, pulled him away from the tree slightly, and then harshly pushed him back against it. Link could feel his bones trembling underneath his skin. "You know I'm right."

Finally, the shadow stepped backward, and Link fell to his knees. Then his shadow began circling, twisting his sword and making ripples in the water.

"You have no purpose," he continued, thinking aloud more than anything. He sounded as if he were speaking to himself. "But, actually, you do. Don't you? At least, you could. I can give it to you."

"How...?" Link croaked. He lay on his stomach in the water, his bloodstained cheek pressed to the ground, watching the shadow walk circles around him. "I have...nothing left...to fight."

"Of course you do. You have plenty to fight."

"No..."

"You finished fighting one thing, right?"

The shadow stopped and kneeled down, lifting Link's face so that he could look into his eyes. He squeezed his cheeks in his hand, bared his disgustingly white teeth, and licked his lips.

"So, find something else. Fighting gives you purpose, doesn't it?"

Link had no more energy to speak. All he could do was lay there, eyelids drooping as his shadow glared at him.

"So fight," he whispered. "Fighting is fighting, no matter with whom or against whom. Fight anything. Fight everything. Do you understand now why I'm here?"

The shadow stood up, leaving Link to drift into darkness. Just before he did, he heard one more thing.

"I am your purpose."