Saria looked at him with worried blue eyes as Link stood, looking around as if he'd lost something incredibly important.
"Link!" She popped up and grabbed his arm, stopping the excited teen mid-turn.
"Saria!" his hand found hers and squeezed it tightly so she hugged him, sensing a great unease coming from him.
It took a few minutes to calm him down, but when he did he whispered "Okay."
His friend backed up to look at his face. "Okay?"
"Let's find your island."
It took a few seconds for Saria to process his words, but when she did her eyes lit up with pure joy. "Really!? But you said it wasn't possible."
"I know, but I- I had a dream just now..." as he proceeded to tell her about the dream, Link noticed the colour returning to the world, so he went on. She was overjoyed that he shared his experience and tried desperately to understand the way he described the feeling of the experience. He appreciated that she didn't question the plausibility of a real dream like that or his faith and determination acquired from it. She understood him, making him feel guilty he'd ever doubted her faith in their ability to do what they now were going to.
They discussed plans until the sun set, the goal seemed more and more achievable by the moment, like a great strategy in a game of capture-the-flag they played as kids on school trips. The two would always carry the rest of their teams when they worked together, Link having a good sense of offence and Saria easily thinking of defence. When pitted against each other, games could last for an eternity, Saria's flag too well hidden and Link's assessment of his and the other team allowing each player to be used to the best advantage. It seemed that together, any problem could be solved.
They kept talking as they removed all the fairy bottles from the trees so as not to litter and when they had finished Saria handed him the fake candle from one of the bottles. Its blue light didn't seem to be faded from a drained battery like the others, it was still vibrant. "I noticed you looking at that one a lot." Saria mentioned as he looked at her with a raised eyebrow. "It's the fairy one."
He nodded and looked at the candle, picking up a couple of bags filled with bottles at take to Saria's house and display in her room or store somewhere, he'd not asked. "Thank you."
Saria herself carried some bags and nodded, "Of course. It's special to you, and me in a way, too." She giggled. "It marks the start of our great adventure and our guide. Like a compass!"
"Or a Navigation system." He agreed, then paused. Saria looked at him, puzzled. "Sorry, I just remembered I never got her name."
Saria thought about that "Well, I think 'The Fairy' works for now, considering we've never known another one. When you see her again you can ask."
Link's friend sounded positive they'd meet again, and some of her confidence filled him as well. Suddenly, as if struck by lightning, Link had a solution to one of the few remaining problems of their trip: Actually navigating to the island no one had information on.
"Saria, what if Professor. Gullon had a chart of the old sea? The Rito used to all be post workers, right? They'd probably need charts to stay oriented."
"Link, that's brilliant!"
And so the next day they found themselves on their teacher's doorstep, having made several calls and begged a fair few of the receivers. After Link had finally gotten up they'd begun to track down anything they could find on the Rito, and it seemed their quest was at an end.
Link knocked three times and they waited in silence, the beautiful and large yard filled with birds eating from feeders and playing in bird baths. After several minutes the door was pulled open by a young Rito boy of no more than ten who looked up at them wearily.
Link didn't really know what to tell the child, but Saria had his back. "Hello! I'm Saria and this is Link. We're students of Professor Gullon, is he home?"
"Daddy's in the kitchen…" The child muttered, returning into the home and leaving the door open for them. Saria and Link left their shoes at the (closed) door and followed until a kind-looking rito with a long white ponytail greeted them. "Hello, I'm Mrs. Gullon. My husband will be busy for just a few minutes, please take a seat in the living room."
She pointed them to the room so they went in and sat down. The child Rito was curled up on a beanbag, playing a game on the tv, one Link recognized. The child seemed to be having difficulty, as the controller was not designed for the talon-like rito fingernails. Link smiled sympathetically.
"You know, they have different control configurations in the menu screen. You can play around until it feels more comfortable." He suggested.
The boy blinked at him for long enough to make Link feel more than awkward, then pulled up the menu and did as the teen had suggested. "You have elf ears." was the child's reaction, though the tips of his own ears came to a slight point.
"I'm not an elf…" Link muttered dejectedly.
Saria laughed next to him. "You'd think you were another species or something." She whispered, examining her friends' defined feature. Pointed ears were becoming less and less popular as the ancient blood they came from had become far less than prevalent. Ears as long as Link's were nearly unheard of outside of a fantasy race called elves, popular in video games and books, and even Saria's shorter ones stood out in a crowd. She'd always been proud of the unique characteristic, but Link had always felt awkward when his genetic abnormality was pointed out.
After trying a few different configurations, the child nodded in contentment. "It's a lot easier now!" He said happily.
"I bet." Link agreed, having noticed a drastic change in the child's control in-game. "You can even find special controllers online adapted to Rito hands, look it up sometime." Too absorbed in his new advantage, the child didn't really hear the suggestion.
"Link? Saria?" Professor Gullon had arrived, standing in the doorway.
Both teens jumped at the voice, half expecting to need to answer a question. The teacher laughed and sat down in an armchair adjacent to the couch they'd claimed.
"Hi, Professor!" Saria greeted cheerfully.
The Rito raised an eyebrow. "Hello. What can I thank for the unexpected company?" he asked skeptically.
"We're looking for a chart of the Great Sea." Link told him.
The teacher immediately seemed intrigued. "Oh? For the assignment I gave you?"
"Er, no, actually." Link looked at Saria.
The girl smiled. "No, we're going to find an island."
Professor Gullon seemed amused. "The sea calls to you, does it?"
"Something like that." Link replied, fingering the candle in his jacket pocket.
"Avin, get my special map, please." The teacher told his son. "Carefully!" He added as Avin paused the game and set off at a sprint so as to return to his game more quickly.
"So, you have one?" Saria asked hopefully.
The professor nodded. "Yes, but it's so fade in places it's unreadable. The Hero of Winds used it. Fish all over the sea drew in each sector of it, I imagine their handwriting was no help to its illegibility." he looked at Link as he said it, but the teen seemed lost in thought and offered no protest to the prospect of magic fish. Satisfied, he took the retrieved map from his impatient son and spread it on the coffee table before them.
"Wow…" Saria breathed as the map's appearance made its age evident.
The owner was evidently proud. "The rito never used maps, we have a good sense of direction, but my distant relative rescued this chart and preserved it as an artifact." Link looked at the map, leaning over it to try and decipher the many notes written on the aged parchment. "Can you read it? The writing is almost as bad as your own." the rRito teased.
"Not really." Link chuckled. "The characters look really weird, so that doesn't help."
"An outdated style of lettering." The birdman agreed.
Saria pointed, being careful not to touch the paper itself. "Look, it says 'forest' here, I think!"
All three of them looked closer. Even Avin paused his game and came over, deciding that something his father was so engaged in had to be interesting.
"Yep. Forest." He declared.
Link smirked. "Oh?"
"It's forest." Avin told him stubbornly.
"Could we copy this, or would that ruin it?" Saria asked, smiling as if she'd won the lottery.
"I have a scanner in my office." And so it was that the four of them went to his office and made a copy of the ancient map.
The students were about to leave when Professor Gullon stopped Link. He mentioned Saria to give them privacy, so she did.
"Link, why the sudden trip?" He asked.
The blonde shrugged. "We decided to go to celebrate our last summer together." he felt saying it, but it was true. That and chasing down a fairy in a dream, but the professor didn't need to know that.
"Your blood is catching up with you." The rito observed, nodding to Link's ears. "I wish you well on your journey. Keep Saria safe." he smiled in a way that made Link a bit skeptical, but before he could start on the blood comment the teacher clapped him on the shoulder and returned inside.
The next few days were spent gathering all the supplies the two would need that they couldn't get at the post. They were pretty far inland and planned to take the train out to the shore where Saria's family boat...thing. Link wasn't quite sure that it was, exactly. They ended up with two suitcases each and Saria had an extra backpack.
Link's grandmother drove them to the train station and fussed over the both of them until Link had promised they'd be safe at least fifty times.
Once finally on the train, they sat back in their compartment and relaxed. Since it would be an overnight journey, they had gotten a compartment with beds and were soon sitting on the same one, talking about all the things they still had to do and what it would be like to finally make it out to sea.
Link hadn't been sailing for years, though he'd loved it the times he'd gone. His grandpa had taught him how to sail when he was younger and he'd done some research, determined to be a good enough sailor that they wouldn't need to be ferried.
Unfortunately, it didn't work out quite like that.
They arrived at the harbor and after waiting around for half an hour, Saria sighed. Her uncle was supposed to pick them up and lead them to the docks, but he was nowhere to be seen. "He's so unreliable." She told Link as they set off to the most likely place they'd find him: the local milk bar. It was hard rolling two large luggage containers each over the peir, and Saria struggled even though Link took her extra bag.
When they reached the bar, Link was left outside to guard the bags and Saria went inside.
She found her uncle sitting forlornly over a glass of whole milk and put a hand to her face, knowing already that he'd lost a fair amount of money if her deduction was correct.
"Hey, Uncle." she said, putting a hand on his shoulder. The man practically fell out of his chair and turned on her in alarm. "Wha- Saria?" He asked in surprise.
"Yep. Uncle, you were supposed to take us down to your boat, remember?" she looked more disappointed than mad, which made the older man uncomfortably guilty.
He was a tall man with a thin moustache and goatee. He also wore a traditional blue captain's coat and a plain blue button-up, though both were thoroughly creased from negligence.
"Er… was that today?" he tried futilely.
"Yes. Link is waiting outside,"
her uncle narrowed his eyes. "Who is this Link character? He'll be on my boat after all."
Saria smiled, though she was disappointed her uncle was so far out of the loop. "He's my best friend, I've known him for as long as I can remember…"
"Hm… Well, better meet the kid." The man grunted, looking longingly at his glass. He sighed and got up, digging through his pockets and pulling out a handful of rupees. He blinked at the gems and slowly picked out a couple of them to toss on the counter.
The bartender glared as a few of them clattered onto the floor.
Saria's uncle left but the girl lingered, putting some of her own rupees on the counter with a smile at the tender.
Outside, Link stepped back a bit as a man came out, squinting in the sunlight. He smiled, giving the man a lot of space. He wasn't one to judge, but the man seemed to give off a 'stay out of my way' vibe, so that's what the teen did.
"Link?" Saria came out behind the man, standing a bit too close for Link to assume they had no relation.
"Linebeck, I presume?" Link asked the man, who squinted at him.
"Yeah... Luke?"
"Link." Saria corrected with an apologetic smile.
"Hey, kid. How well do you follow directions?" Linebeck asked, leaning over the shorter boy. Link came to 5' 6", while this man hit maybe 5' 11".
Link backed up half a step. "Er… Well, I guess."
"You guess what?"
Saria chuckled. "He meant he follows directions well."
"Good! Then let's go." Linebeck was off, surprisingly more stable than Link had expected him to be. The teen sighed and picked up the bags he was charged with whilst Saria grabbed hers and tugged them behind her, catching up to her uncle quickly. Link trotted after, lingering behind a bit.
"Thank you so much for letting us use your boat." Saria told Linebeck.
The man glanced down at her somewhat awkwardly. "Yeah, well, you're family and what not. Figured I should probably help you out. So long as you and Larry stay out of my way there won't be any problems."
Saria paused on the sidewalk. "You're coming with us?"
Linebeck laughed. "Obviously! You think I'm going to leave my boat in the hands of a few kids?"
She laughed awkwardly. "Oh, right. Makes sense." She slowed down to be in sync with Link, who raised an eyebrow at her worried look. "We're going to have some… company on our trip."
"Your uncle?"
"Yes." She sighed. "I'm sorry."
"Hey, it's fine." He smiled. "I was actually worried about handling a boat by myself." he admitted.
"Ahoy, lovebirds!" They two had stopped on the pier and Linebeck had called to them from the deck of his boat.
Link looked up at the captain and raised an eyebrow.
The ship was a mess with peeling paint and splintered wood. It looked like someone had been barely keeping it together, like a tattered child's blanket for which sewing had long ago been lost as an option for repair.
"Uh... " Link couldn't make out the cracked and faded lettering, but he saw something resembling 'S. L eb k',
Saria laughed nervously. "Well, at least it's floating."
"It's enough for me." Link said, suddenly feeling optimistic. "Come on, Saria!" The childish feeling from the dream forest surfaced, giving him the push he needed.
Saria wasn't convinced until she saw the look in his eye. "Okay!" She agreed, tugging her luggage towards the worn boat. Link fell in half a step behind,
Once boarded they left port quickly, Link following Linebeck's instructions while SAria stood at the bow looking out over the sea.
Luckily, the weathered captain had prepared for their journey, stocking up blankets, food, water, and the like for the trip and had had it loaded before they got there. Link and Saria paid their share of it. Now all that was left to put away was their luggage, which had been left on the deck during the excitement of leaving.
"Alright, kid." Linebeck told Link once they were steady and on-course."It's about time you got all this stuff down to your room." he said, nudging one of Saria's bags with his toe.
"Wait, as in singular room?" He asked, looking at Linebeck with wide eyes.
The seaman chuckled "Didn't think I would trust you? I don't care what you do, just keep it quiet." he said, as if doing Link a favor.
"Sir, we're just friends." Link said, glancing at Saria who was still content staring over the railing.
The captain raised an eyebrow. "Well, sharing a room might fix that."
"No." Link shook his head. "There's no 'fixing' it. Saria should have her own room."
Linebeck almost seemed threatened. "There are only two bedrooms!"
"Then I'll sleep elsewhere."
The captain sighed in relief. "Well, alright then. You can tuck yourself pretty much anywhere you like."
"Is there a problem?" Saria asked, coming to join the conversation at the wheel.
Link shook his head at the same time Linkbeck assured :not at all."
"So, where are we all sleeping?" she asked, picking up one of hersuitcases.
"You've a room below deck." The captain told her.
"Okay!' she turned to Link. "What about you?"
Knowing she would just make a big deal out if it, Link shoulk his head. "Your uncle was going ot show me."
Funny thing about being raised with someone: you can read them quite well.
"Link." she scolded. Linkbeck tried to excuse himself but she snagged the end of his coat.
"I'll find somewhere." the teen said, unable to look her in the eye.
She turned a skeptical eye to her uncle. "You didn't give him a place to sleep?" she asked sadly.
The older man shifted uncomfortably under her disappointment. "Well, I did. Something came up is all." he grunted, trying to sound lke he didn't care either way.
"Well, we could share, Link." she suggested, looking down shyly. She hoped he didn;t think it would be weird.
"Saria, you deserve your own room." he tried to argue.
She gave him a look that clearly said 'don't try to pull noble crap on me'. "YOU deserve a room just as much as I."
"I couldn't just-"
"The kid can share my room if it will stop you bickering." Linebeck announced suddenly, taking Link and Saria both by surprise. The captain folded his arms. "Really, it's a stupid room."
And so it was that Link ended up tucking his things under an end table beside the couch he'd be sleeping on. A quick dinner had revealed that all three of the ship's occupants were ready to turn in, and the younger passengers gave a hug goodnight. Saria gave Linebeck a peck on the cheek for his sacrifice and the boys returned to the captain's quarters.
Link pulled off his shirt and stretched leaving Linebeck to roll his eyes as he buttoned his pyjama shirt. Silk, by the look of it. "Get a shirt on, Boy." He told Link, who smirked.
"Distracted?" he teased, happy to be on the sea and away from the city on an adventure with his closest friend and her crazy uncle.
"Don't get any funny ideas." Linebeck glared, obviously not amused. "It gets colder than hell in here. Last time I give you advice."
Link shrugged, pulling out a plain t-shirt from his bag. "Sorry, I didn't mean to offend you."
"I'm not that shallow, no matter what you may hear." the captain assured. "Though, I feel I should ask: You're obviously close,and that hug was more than casual, but you're not with Saria? Are you…?"
Link chuckled. "No, Saria and I just grew up like siblings, I look at her as a sister. She feels the same."
"Things change." Linebeck warned. "Not like I care about your little teen tragedy, I just feel depressed by your ignorance. You say she doesn't like you, but have you ever asked?"
Link shook his head. "She basically told me-"
Linebeck pointed at him. "But you've never asked?"
"I've never had reason to." Link said, starting to get irritated.
Linebeck chuckled. "She'd say yes. Even if she herself thinks she wouldn't, she'd agree if you asked."
"Well, I'm not going to ask." Link was glaring now.
"Suit yourself. You're missing out on good blood." Linebeck chuckled and laid down.
Link rolled his eyes and turned off the lamp on the table beside him, the last light in the room. Curled up in blankets, he was left to his thoughts. Saria was never a concern, they both agreed on that, but his mind strayed to Zelda and if she would say yes.
He decided he'd just have to find out once he got home and asked her out.
Hey! Thanks for reading, my friends. I'm doing very well with this story, surprisingly. You're great motivation. Thank you for the reviews, I really appreciate the feedback. Reviews with what I'm doing well and what I am not will help both of us. I hope you enjoyed!
