Excuse the lateness of this chapter. I think I last published in August. Senior year is harder than it was supposed to be, garh! Anyway, I wrote this chapter months ago, and I could polish it and add to it and make it perfect in my mind and bring it up to my new standards, but I value my youth; so here it is!
Incase you've forgotten what the story is about, here's some reiteration: Tarun works is a royal guard; he, along with many others of his occupation, protect the most important people of Hyrule. Sia, a high priestess, requests his company one night. He gets there in time to see her kidnapped by a small, dark creature, who attacks him. After being knocked unconscious, he wakes up and is interrogated by Zelda. Then, the story flashbacks to his life in Selorn, where he is love with his childhood friend Ruth and works for her father, Rizo. Tarun, an adolescent at this point, is extremely ambitious but hesitant to leave. He is surprised to find that Aro, his coworker and best friend, is equally ambitious and intends to leave for Hyrule soon.
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Chapter 3
Ruth
The sun baked him every minute of the cloudless day, but when it descended into the horizon, a cool wind swept in from the forest. Tarun and Aro put away their tools, collected a small but sufficient sum of fifteen rupees from Rizo.
As Aro walked away, Rizo beckoned Tarun. "I've something to give you, lad; something you'll appreciate. Stop by tonight."
Exhausted but but satisfied with the day's work, and perplexed by Rizo's unusual invitation, Tarun sauntered to the small wooden cabin that had once been the home of his parents. It was a quaint, single-roomed place hugged by the forest and standing slightly away from the rest of village, with weathered logs and sparse adornments to meet a guest's eyes. The interior was equally mediocre; there, pragmatism overruled aestheticism. Accordingly, the house fit Tarun like clothing (which, irrespective of the house, was becoming increasingly unfit for him), but it was a wonder how both his parents could have lived together within such a tiny space, even for the short time that they did so.
Suddenly, he felt himself wondering about his parents and what his grandmother had once--and only once--disclosed about their undoing. In all of the golden years that had passed by, Tarun had easily dismissed the incident. Now, it detached itself from the whole of his memories and addressed his consciousness. Your parents, Tarun? What impels you to make such an inquiry? Curiosity, you say? Curiosity can be lethal! Remember the fate of Curias the Lethally Curious? No, I'm not trying to change the subject! Let's just leave it at this: your parents died heroically defending the people of Hyrule--and of this I make no exaggerations or stretches of the imagination. Further details I cannot reveal, at least not yet. You do not yet understand the realm of adults; you have something that people my age envy.
While he was stripping to take a bath, he imagined, albeit briefly, that he was his father, stripping himself of mighty, golden armor after an intense battle protecting the princess. Perhaps it really would be like that in a few years. Perhaps he could be a hero like his father.
"Someday. But not today," he soliloquized.
"Hmm?" peeped a voice.
Tarun jumped. From outside, a girl leaned in on the window of the cabin."Sorry, am I interrupting anything?" Ruth said, smiling wryly. Tarun grinned, partially from the euphoria that coincided with her sight; partially because while his pants were still fortuitously attached to his body, his biceps and abdominal muscles--fairly recent developments--stood triumphantly exposed.
"Of course not," Tarun smirked, "You're just in time for the show."
Something about Ruth's laughter hinted at her unspoken observations regarding his physique.
She sighed. "How was Dad?"
"Brutal! He made me and Aro go to the woods and chop like ten trees down for lumber! What's he going to use it for?"
"I dunno...a fire?"
"With a fire like that he'll burn down the whole forest! Anyway, it was too much today. We left some of it tomorrow, though he's making me pick the tomatoes tomorrow (and who knows what ridiculous project he has for Aro?) so I don't know if we'll have time."
"You probably should have done it today. Don't you remember the old story of Princess Procrastina? Never leave for the future what you can accomplish in the present." she recited.
Ah, another tale spun by his grandmother. Tarun's light exhalation through his nostrils signified a chuckle, but his response was solemn. "What if the present doesn't offer the right opportunities?"
What am I talking about? I have the best opportunities! Whom else would she love but me? True, save for Aro, they were the only adolescents in the entire village. They had indeed known each other for their entire lives. But this could be more of an obstacle than an advantage. What if they had become like siblings?
"Is something bothering you?"
He met her eyes.
If only you knew that "something" was you...
"I dunno. I'm just tired, that's all." He imitated a yawn as best he could.
She didn't seem convinced.
"Hey," he said, "you up for a walk tonight?"
"I have a lot of nothing to do, but I think I can make the time."
"Good. It'll be just you and me--under the stars." He said lightly, restraining a love so eager to be liberated.
"I thought you'd never ask."
Silence. Was she merely playing along? Or was she, like him, trying desperately to express a difficult emotion?
"I'll leave you now to wash; I don't want your rather prevalent odor to ruin an otherwise magical evening," she said, her light spirit lingering even as she departed. But on a subconscious level Tarun believed that she was sending him some sort of message; it was something about the way she said "magical"--something subtle within her tone when she said "I thought you'd never ask"--that fueled his hopes.
But they were hopes accompanied by dread. He had to tell her; if not his sake, at least for their sake, lest they both be deprived of the mystic experience that was love--the sacred materialization of physical, mental, and spiritual intimacy, extolled by the compassionate, damned by the lonely, existing nevertheless as a prime component of human nature--an exclusion for which his cowardice would be wholly responsible. He could not live with that unharnessed potential, could not thrive with such regret, could not depart from his otherwise simplistic existence before completing this singular task, lest it be his fate to wander the wide world alone, to gaze into sunrises that were best fit for a pair.