Link thought.
The shadow watched him fixedly as he did, saying nothing.
Ratto had come out from the armor and begged for his rest, and he ate his food and rested in his pouch, unconcerned about the monstrous shadow that loomed over him. Perhaps they'd met before.
Eventually Link spoke.
"Why does the owl want me to end the dream in which it lives? And why doesn't it aid me in doing so beyond vague hints?"
The shadow nodded and spoke in a rattling gust, "THE GUARDIAN IS TINY, NOT A PERSON. IT IS A HASTILY SCRAWLED EMET, AN ORDER. ONLY PUT HERE BY ARCHITECT OF THE DREAM TO AID THE DREAMER, KEEP IT FROM BECOMING LOST. NO LESS, IT IS ALLOWED TO INTERVENE FOR CERTAIN RITES. IMPEDES THE SHADOW. MANIPULATES THE VISITOR, YOU, TO DRIVE SHADOW OUT AND EXECUTE FORCED AWAKENING WHEN DREAMER BECOMES TRAPPED."
"What are you?"
"DREAM CALLS US NIGHTMARES. CLOTHES US IN ITS OWN FEARS, UGLY AND BLACKk. WE ARE BEINGS OF CONCEPT. LIVING ETERNALLY BETWEEN BRAINS OF DREAMERSs. STRUGGLE FOR SUPREMACY IS ANCIENT. MANY LOSTt."
So they were parasites of a colossal mind. Completely lacking physical bodies but somehow no less alive and aware. "Are the minds of the villagers, the figures I've met, are they real? You know the witch? Is she alive?"
"THE SHRINE SAYS THEY ARE ALL ILLUSIONN. MORE DECEIT, BUT THIS TIME PASSED SINCERELY, THE RAMBLINGS OF NAIVE METAPHYSICS, THINKS ONLY IN TERMS OF PHYSICAL WORLD, UNDERSTANDS NOTHING OF MENTAL AND THOUGHT. DREAMER AND ARCHITECT THINKSS THAT THOUGHTS, IDEAS, PROJECTIONS, SHADOWS, ARE LESS REAL THAN ITS OWN COSSETED SIGNATURE. DILIRIUM. ITS MIND-PATTERN, ITS EXPERIENTIAL CHAIN, PRIVILIGED IN THE PROGRAMME OF THE DREAM, RARELY BROKENN, BUT IT TOO CAN BE ISOLATED, AND TWISTED, AND FORGOTTEN. IT IS NO REALER OR LARGER THAN I. YOU, OUTSIDER, ARE TWICE IT'S SIZE"
"May I ask... what you've done to it?"
"SLEEPS, A SECOND SLEEP. IT WATCHES, BUT ITS IDENTITY, DISSASOCIATED. IT REMEMBERS WISHING TO DRIVE OUT WE SHADOWS, BUT, IN THE STATE OF MIND WE HOLD IT IN, IT WISHES FOR VERY LITTLE. IT DOES NOT EVEN WISH TO WISH."
"Have you ever... completely cut out a wind fish's mind-pattern, and taken its body for your own?"
"LONG AGO, THIS HAPPENED. NO WAY IS KNOWN, CONTEMPORARY GUARDIAN HAS LEARNED. WIND FISHES COMMONDERED, HUNTED IN OVERDREAM BY STRONGER WIND FISHES, DESTROYED."
Overdream... Was this their word for reality? Could it be true that the goddesses' world too was a dream? Could the nightmares know something? Though, these beings, born of a dream, living always in dreams, it could be that they simply lacked any concept of a waking world.
"Where did you come from?"
"GHa, ha. EXCEPTIONALLY STUPID DREAMER, DWELT TOO LONG IN DANGEROUS THOUGHTS, CREATED ANCESTOR, KILLED BY IT, GHa GHA GHA GHA GHA. APOLOGY. STORY ILLUMINATES MANY SALIENT MISPERCEPTIONS. LAUGHTER COMES. WOULD YOU LIKE TO SEE ANCESTOR. CAN INVOKE VERBATIM INSTANCE."
"No! Thankyou for offering. Maybe later."
Over time, the shadow had unquestionably grown. Red rims began to form at the edges of its formerly white sclera, its mandible had split into four spined, carapaced fingers. Link wondered if it was waiting until it had grown large enough to overpower him and steal its way into his brain. The notion of being introduced to the primordial thought that had spawned these things had been far more threatening than the shadow seemed to realize, especially after it had suggested that Link had twice the sophistication of whatever mind had originally conceived it and fallen prey to it. In other words, that Link was more than capable of understanding it, thinking it, and playing host to it. He did not want to see it invoked.
"It's getting late."
"OUTSIDERRRHA, YOU HAVE EARNT OUR TRUST. YOUR METAPHYSICS ARE STRONG. YOUR QUESTIONS ARE WISE. BUT THERE IS SO MUCH YOU MUST BE TOLD. YOU DO NOT NEED TO FLEE FROM USS."
"I'm glad to hear that, and I'd like to speak to you again. But I do need to return to the witch, before the sun sets. Where will you go?"
"SOUTHERN SHRINE NOW MINE. WAY WILL BE OPEN TO YOU. BRING WITCH NEXT VISIT. REMEMBER THAT YOU ARE LOVED."
With that, it stood, and it leaned down, gently took Link's hand and walked him to the exit.
It was incredibly awkward.
But it was also refreshingly, almost electrifyingly novel. Link could tell that if he were pent here, this distorted thing would be one of his few real friends, one of the only entities who could stave off the black cloud of nigh lethal boredom Nayru had enchanted to pursue him, so he hugged the bristly, feathered frame, terror coursing through him, before waving goodbye and clambering away.
Its body had been cold.
The grounds of the southern shrine were already beginning to change, the iron knights that had impeded the way were disappearing, and the rest were turning to stone.
The monsters were far more docile, on the way back.
Only the shadow had noticed the owl falling from the air.