Balance of Power Chapter 2: Withered World

Ocean air cleaved across the deck, whipping damp strands of blonde hair across Lissa's face. Though she was nearing the middle of her third decade she had been on a ship a grand total of eight days throughout her entire life. Or at least she had before this. It had been weeks since she saw land. The sun was gone again—she had lost exact count of the days. Her sleep cycle had her up throughout the night peering off across the dark waves as the lanterns at the ship's sides lit the waters with shimmering orange and yellow patterns.

The ship's sway instilled a real, visceral fear in her that she would never see flat ground again. These men that they had conscripted to transport them across the vast sea had tricked them and sought to only sail them out into the endless blue. Provisions could only last so long. She didn't dare ask how much longer it would be.

She watched the endless panorama of the ocean's horizon for any sign of light or land.

Warm hands caught her shoulder and the small of her back. She gazed over to see a familiar chiseled jawline etched out against the firelight glow of lantern light and the wild, blond spikes of hair billowing like wheat in the field. He kissed her cheek before steering her toward the aft of the ship.

"You'll come down with something, Mother," said Owain. He was one of two children she'd had with Sir Frederick Gwaine. Frederick passed away shortly after their fifteenth anniversary, a victim of The False Eye Plague that engulfed their continent. For the population of Ylisse, it was the first of many divine signs that the royal family had lost the favor of the Divine Dragon.

Lissa shrugged and his hands slipped off of her with a shawl in his grasp. She reached up to pinch it out of his hands. "I'm not some decrepit thing," she said. "I can care for myself."

Could she? Chrom or Frederick or Emm or someone had always been there. After their parents died it seemed that her siblings surrounded themselves with friends for their benefit and hers. But that was years ago, Lissa had been at this alone for a while. She tended to the needs of what remained of her family. Circumstances didn't care what her role had been, it was be tempered by fire or snuffed out.

"Grima's breath…I know you're just looking out for me, Owain," she said. There had been so many of them. Her sister died of a mysterious illness, though she lived to meet Lissa's first born and Chrom's daughters. Their little clan tried to unite Ylisse and turn it into the place the Warrior King Marth and the First Exalt had wanted it to be.

Her House's exile had really been her fault. It was the logical progression of things after Chrom vanished. No one trusted the girl who didn't carry the Brand of the Exalt lead the country. No one wanted to trust the weak branch of the family tree that descended from a man who abandoned his home.

Ylisse wanted to be proud the proud nation they once were. Though the previous generation was steeped in blood from the numerous wars, they had been celebrated as the greatest generation. Her people wanted the kind of pride that came from being feared and she wasn't going to fan the flames of conflict after peace had come at such a cost, so they found someone who would.

Owain's eyes followed the movements of the ship's crew as they worked cleaning the deck. Most of the men were a rough sort with loose fitted clothing of the desert tribes, but there were all manners of people in the mix. Some with skin lighter than him and others reddened in splotches by the sun and others still with the cinnamon colored skin of the Flavians. "Why are they all so well armed?" Asked Owain.

Lissa hadn't paid attention, but all different types blades that followed no real conventions were seen throughout the crew. Some had a second sword on their other hip, while others carried ornate weapons beset with jewels. "There could be dangers at sea. Pirates like in the old stories," she said, though even she sounded unconvinced.

"They're more likely to run into a water spout or some sea beast, for which I doubt a few blades will be of much good. You didn't tell them who we were, did you?" Asked Owain.

"Gods, Owain, of course not, but with your cousin walking around here with that legendary sword on her hip might cause someone to figure it out." Lucina, her niece, carried their family's heirloom sword forged by the Divine Dragon Naga herself: the Falchion. Though it could pass for an ordinary sword, there was some risk that these men might have heard tales of it.

Lissa wasn't above fighting if it came to that and she had support from her son, daughter, and nieces if it came to it. But she had tired of swinging her axe. It never truly solved anything in the long run. The older Lissa got the more she wondered if her sister's pacifism would have saved them if they had just adhered to her wishes.

There was the thunderous gallop of small boots on the wood of the deck. A petite girl with her blue hair up in twin-tails landed right in front of Lissa with a rehearsed pose. "When we get there you think it would be awesome if I hit them with this pose and then said something cool like, 'just who the Hell do you think we are'? Huh, Aunt, Lissa?"

Lissa laughed. "Maybe ease up a bit, Cynthia, we don't want to scare threaten them, we'll be in their homeland." She assumed Cynthia had been speaking about the people of this far off land, the Hylians. She glanced out across the blackness of the sea, ripples of light catching the odd wave here and there. "How much further away could it possibly be?"

"Oh," Cynthia said. "I'd offer to take Belfire to scout ahead, but I don't think even a Pegasus would make it to land at this point. Also, I can't swim…"

"And with your sense of direction you'd just end up lost, half-pint." Owain said mushing his fist down on the top of her head and roughly rubbing his knuckles into her scalp.

Cynthia gritted her teeth, growling out her next set of words. "Ow, cut that out. Aunt Lissa!"

Lissa covered her mouth with her hand, still clutching the shawl she had stolen back from her son. Owain deftly stepped back as Cynthia swatted at him, but she caught him in the face with her second attempt. She was small and fierce the way her mother had been, but Owain was not without and riposte. The pair had been sparring together since they could hold a stick.

"This voyage has me a little more than on edge. I wish you would join us below decks—I feel it's too open out here." Lucina didn't make much noise when she moved, despite being in boots and carrying a broadsword at her hip.

Lucina was her other niece, the oldest of the children, and nearly a carbon copy of Lissa's brother Chrom. At least when it came to personality. Both she and her sister, Cynthia had inherited their mother's soft features and warm inviting smile—though Lucina never smiled anymore.

"If I go back down there I'm likely to go insane" Lissa said.

"Better to have you insane than dead." Lucina glanced at her sister and cousin, making sure that their rough housing wasn't at risk of hitting her. "There are too many weapons up here—something seems off."

Lissa had heard it all before. "Do you think the hero of Hyrule can help us?" She asked.

"I still say that it's an exaggeration," Lucina replied. "I won't believe someone could be that good until I've crossed blades with them myself."

"Oh, were going to take the throne back yourself without getting hacked to pieces? It's going to take more than just blood for us to reclaim what was ours." Lissa said.

Lucina scoffed. "This Hero is just a bard's tale from distant shores. No one has heard from Hyrule in over a century. What made them reappear?"

The hollow sound of brass slamming against something hard and heavy shook the silence from the air. It seemed as if it were a signal for an oncoming threat or some form of emergency. Then a man yelled from the uppermost part of the mast. "Land! There's land hard to port!"

There, against the darkened purples of the night sky was the jagged, mountainous coastline of their destination. How had they not noticed it? It was massive, stretching the length of the horizon. All Lissa could see was the distant shoreline now.

"Bring her around!" Yelled the captain. He spoke with an accent that Lissa couldn't place.

Lissa fingered the thin chain around her neck that held her wedding ring, spinning rapidly between her hands. "You can ask them when we get there."


Zelda held a clammy hand to the girl's forehead, counting the jerky rises and falls of the girl's chest. It wasn't speculation anymore, there was a fever present. They would have to deal with that too.

As an initial test of their new filtration system, Zelda assumed someone would get a glass of water or wash some clothes. What were the chances that someone would go into labor at the very moment her project reached completion?

This village's experiment was an automated water-well that fed from its source into a filtration tank filled with gravel, sand, and carbon and stored water for the use of those nearby. These were designs modified by Robbie and herself, but it was mostly guess work based on ancient Sheikah technology. Among the benefits of all this, she hoped it would stave off infections from waterborne pathogens. The blue flame of the pump's generator stuttered; if there was a time for this system to fail this was not it.

Zelda eyed the freckled face of her patient and she stared back through fright widened green eyes. The girl's hair was darkened with sweat and slicked against her cheeks and forehead. Her age was hard to discern, but Zelda was sure of herself being a few years older.

"What's your name, petal?" Zelda asks keeping her voice level.

"C-corinth," the girl said through a grunt.

Zelda grabbed her at the shoulder, pushing her flat against the worn mattress. "It's nice to meet you Corinth, this bound to be memorable day of introductions for both of us," Zelda let out a small laugh and Corinth smiled in return. The girl's whole body was too warm.

That wasn't a thing in the few books she had read on childbirth. A high temperature was rarely a desired omen. They needed something cold to help control the fever. Summer was in its death-throes, but putting up quite a fight. The nearest cool water or ice would be miles up near the peak of Lanayru Mountain.

Though she knew someone who could make infinite ice at any source of water.

"Link." Zelda's thick blonde hair whipped over shoulder as she turned to face her Champion. He stood as far away from the situation as the cramped hut would allow. "Take the Slate out to the river and use the Cryonis rune to make ice, then break it and bring it here; as much as you can carry. We need to cool Corinth down."

Link nodded and ran out the door.

"Is something wrong?" Asked a plump woman with reddened skin and curly, brown hair. Zelda assumed this was The man was skinny and pale with most of his face hidden behind a mustache.

"She's running a slight fever." Zelda said before placing a hand on Corinth's exposed knee. "I need to check and see how far along you are, is that okay?" The girl nodded. "In the meantime I am going to need you to keep breathing the way I showed you: take nice, slow, deep breaths. In through your nose and out through the mouth."

Corinth nodded licking at her chapped lips before letting her head fall back into the bed. "Am I going to be…okay?"

"Everything's just wonderful," Zelda said. Flipping back the hem of the girl's skirts, Zelda checks for signs that they might be entering the next stage. "Breathe. You're doing lovely, petal."

The process became short stints of calming breathing punctuated by sharp, yelps of surprised pain. Zelda took a small bowl of gray liquid with a sponge floating in it. She soaked up some of this liquid and wiped it against Corinth's lips, dribbling some of it into her mouth.

"What is this?" Corinth asked.

"I won't lie; I've never given birth, but I can imagine that the pain is about to get worse. This is Ironshroom extract mixed with an elixir to combat that, but I need you to be brave and trust me."

Zelda coached her through a few more rounds of relaxed breathing, placing the bowl of extract aside. She repeated the same motions: after the breathing it was time mop the sweat away from the girl's eyes, she would feed her drops of water from a sponge, and then check her temperature again while reminding her how to breath. Finally she would check to see if there had been in changes in the baby's status.

A crowd was gathered outside in stunned silence, Link was forced to push his way through them with two buckets of crushed ice hanging from his hands. "Sorry it took a while, an Octorok popped up out of nowhere and knocked—"

"Thank you. Then you should have been more careful," Zelda said taking the first of the buckets from Link. "Sit the other down here." Zelda pointed to a spot on the floor against the side of the table. The ice would be too cold to pack directly against Corinth's skin. Zelda, instead asks for stockings which she fills with ice until they're stretched and long. She places these around the girl's shoulders and neck and over her forehead.

Corinth's cries were getting louder despite the Ironsrhoom Extract. Zelda stooped down for a hurried check on the baby. Its head had appeared was pressed up against the vaginal opening, but after a moment it will slip back inside and disappear from view. Of course there are fluids and other things present, but Zelda doesn't think it wise to dwell on that.

"Corinth, when the baby's head pushes against the tissue down there you should feel an intense burn," Zelda said just as the girl let out a deep guttural sound. "We're going to need to start pushing extra hard. We're almost there."

Corinth nodded, gritting her teeth against this next round of pain.

Zelda guided the baby's head out, cradling it with her palm. It was much smaller than she expected, much smaller than any human had any right to be. Keeping her touch feather gentle, she wicks the mucilaginous fluid from around the newborn's eyes, nose, and mouth. The shoulders are out before she even realizes it. Link surrounded the little one with blankets to preserve the body heat as Zelda got down at the foot of the bed to cuddle the baby close.

The child struggled weakly against Zelda as toweled him off. He takes a gasping breath and then cries out in a shrill, gurgling voice. "I need knife," said Zelda. Link's hand grabbed for the hilt of the Master Sword and the scabbard rattled as he drew it. "Did you wipe that off after you fought the Octorok?"

Link dropped the sword back into the holster without a sound. The man near the door dashed over and unhooked an ivory handled knife from his belt. He heated the blade up, letting it glow red for just a moment before cooling it in the water. He handed it to Link for her to finish the job, though it is Zelda who directed Link where to cut.

Zelda cradled the baby in one arm, pulling it up against her breast and resting it in the nook made by the bend of her elbow. She stood to her full height, balancing on her knees for a moment before getting onto her feet. Once she was up the numbed tension of the room seemed to dissipate. The child made small, confused sounds and Zelda, going off instinct or just what she had seen others do with babies bounced her arms and shoulders to placate it.

"Princess, may I hold him? Corinth asked, her voice is weaker now.

Zelda could no longer keep the baby from its mother and pressed the him into Corinth's arms, being sure that the younger girl had hold of him before letting go. The baby's glossy eyes stared back at Zelda and he flailed against the blankets as she backed away. How could she have missed it before? The left hand was normal, but the right arm ended in what was little more than a nub extending out from the gnarled shape of a hand. There were three fingernails distinct on the flat surface of the appendage: two complete nails and one partial sliver.

In a last quick motion, Zelda covered the child's arm up discreetly. "Is there a father we should notify?"

The pale mustached man answered touching the Princess with a work-roughened hand. "I'm the father." He looked to be twice Zelda's age and was balding on the top of the head. What hair he had left he had pulled into a slender ponytail.

"Please, don't touch me." Zelda's words were not angry by any stretch, but they brimmed with the possibility. "My apologies, I had assumed you to be Corinth's father," she added.

"Oh, I am."

"Then we are mistaken again. I am looking for the father of the newborn. As part of the naming tradition—"

Zelda is cut off by the mustached man. "I mean, I am both. She's my daughter and that's my son."

"I see." Zelda said as she washed her hands with hardy soap in a basin of water. She looked to Link. The hero wore his usual scowl, but said nothing. "May I speak to you outside Mister…" Zelda asked.

"Ulysses Cavanaugh."

"Mister Cavanaugh, can I see you outside for a moment?" Zelda said.

Cavanaugh nodded and followed her out, Link trailed them. It wasn't until Zelda and Cavanaugh are near the tree line that leads out of the village that she stopped. "The Hylian Royal family has been absent for the better part of a century and, perhaps in that absence the world has had to resort to more primitive standards. May I ask, how old is Corinth?"

"Fifteen." Cavanaugh said.

Link leaned against the rock wall that formed the natural barrier around the town with his arms folded. A pair of large dragonflies twirled in front of his face causing him to blow at them absently.

"At fifteen and freshly into motherhood, she's had her first menses and is considered a grown woman who can own property and marry, but the law does not allow for close familial intermarriages. It leads to the situation in there." Zelda explained.

"The girl is prone to illness and my sister is past her child bearing years…if I was going to keep viable offspring I was out of options."

"What I am saying is it never was an option."

"You're right, you like weren't nowhere to be found, Princess. You want to show up now and act like we need to abide by some royal's idea of right and wrong?"

Zelda's fingers moved at her sides, but she kept her hands pressed against her hips. She breathed the way she had told Corinth to, keeping herself calm. "This isn't about the royal laws, this is about natural selection. Lacking law enforcement, the law, or education your own instinct should lead you away from copulating with relatives of close blood relation. The reason for this is on that child's tiny hand in there!" Her own excitement escaped in those last words, but she did nothing to quell it after.

"I don't need some hoity-toity girl telling me what to do with my family." Cavanaugh pressed his fingers into his own chest. "You got that, Princess?" He took a quick step forward, reaching up. Perhaps he meant to get in her face and point, but the blade of the Master Sword appeared between Zelda and Cavanaugh reflecting a partial picture back at each of them.

Cavanaugh glanced to his side, lowering his hand and staring Link down. In the months since the fall of Calamity Ganon bards had spread the tale, even across the sea. People wanted to be Link or perhaps have their way with him. No one wanted to fight him.

"Your son has a birth defect that fused part of his limb together," said Zelda. "This and Corinth's propensity toward illness could be caused directly by coupling of close blood relatives: brothers, sisters, daughters and fathers. I can't say I am equipped to enforce this law this time or strip a farther, no matter how questionable his bloodline might seem, away from his children. I am, however, saying," Zelda reached up and pushed the Master sword down so she was looking Cavanaugh right in the eye again. "Do not let me find out these unions continue or I will be forced to act upon you to the fullest extent of the law."

"What am I supposed to say to that?" Cavanaugh asked throwing his hands out to the side.

Link's voice is low and isn't the voice people typically expect out of a man who hasn't yet seen his twentieth name-day. "You're supposed to say 'yes, your grace,' and bow."


Keeping her bare breasts clasped behind one arm to conceal them, Zelda bathed in a shallow creek walled off by thick trunked trees that lined its banks. Link was within earshot as always. His back was pressed into the ribbed surface of the tree's trunk facing off toward the most likely avenue someone would take for an attack. He worked the Master Sword with a whetstone. It was a comforting sort of habit, though the Master Sword had never shown signs of dulling. It kept him from worrying that Calamity Ganon had another trap laying in wait for them.

"Can you believe that someone would sleep with their own child…a child that they had with their own sister. It's bloody disgusting is what it is." Zelda's hands splashed at the water, slapping the surface in anger. Link peeked around to see her standing with her back to him, her palms skimming the water, interrupting it's subtle current. Her long blonde hair was silvery with water and hung down to her waist—it had been some time since she had cut it, Link guessed over a century, but most of those years didn't count.

"I'm sorry about how I conducted myself. And I am doubly sorry about depriving you from rest in the comfort of a warm bed. I just…I refuse to stay in that place. I couldn't stand it." Zelda said.

Link sighed. "You're passionate. It's what people like about you."

"People used to think of me as a spoiled scholar. I am the Princess who failed this Kingdom and the things that happen here are my fault. The last one hundred years is my fault," she said.

"By that measure, they're my fault too. Tell me, Princess, who was the hero who lost three of his comrades and nearly died himself? Who is the hero who slept one hundred years while his charge held back evil incarnate?" Link stopped sharpening the sword for enough time to speak and returned to his task.

Zelda slapped the water again. "I suppose you're right. It is just hard to reconcile the reality of what I was to do with what happened."

"This is the hand we were dealt. Might as well roll with the punches." Link said. Air all around them fills with electricity and insects chirping nearby are different. Link pulled his shield from its resting place, backing closer to the riverbank to be near Zelda. "Did you hear that?" He whispered.

"I don't hear anything?" Zelda said.

A short, feminine figure sprang down from the side of the nearby rocks, bounding toward the two of them with a joyous screech. Link jammed the Master Sword in the soil and dropped his shield as the figure rushed toward him. In the light of the setting sun he can see his suspicions were correct. A blonde woman, shorter than himself with a round face and big blue eyes comes galloping toward him. Her pigtails swing wildly from side to side as she moved in a running, half dancing motion.

She playfully punched at his abs with small, rapid fire jabs. "Hey there great grand uncle!" She said brightly before her mouth widened into a toothy grin.

"Linka…how did you find us?" Link asked as he stared down at his niece and only remaining blood relative.

"Oh. I heard about Miss Zelda's water thing. I figured you'd have to go back this way and I just kinda searched around." Linka said. She leaned to the side to see around Link and waved at the Princess, jumping up and down. "Hiya, Miss Zelda!"

"Linka, it's good to see you're well," Zelda said

Linka tugged at the ends of her braided pigtails, avoiding eye contact with the Princess. "You know me, Miss Zelda, I'm always well," she said before giggling.

"What made you hunt us down in the first place?" Asked Link.

"Um," Linka dropped to sit crossed-legged with her back against the tree trunk facing her uncle and the Princess. She removed the only weapons she carried from her person, two large crossbows, and laid them across her lap. "That tall sexy Zora friend of yours just popped out of the water near where I was napping. He asked if I had seen you and said that it was an emergency."

"Prince Sidon? I shall change into a set of my extra clothes," Zelda said.

Link rolled his eyes. "I like how when she said 'tall sexy Zora' you knew exactly who she meant…"

Behind him he could hear Zelda stepping out of the water and the sound of her wet feet plodding across the grass. "Jealousy's a bad look on you, Link," she said. "Did Sidon say where to meet him?"

"Zora's domain. If it's okay Miss Zelda I'd like to come?" Linka asked.

"We would be honored to have your assistance," Zelda said.

Linka's smile beamed. "You hear that Uncle Link? We're going on an adventure."