7. Seventeen
I walked along the huge hallway of the castle that led to the inner courtyard. I knew I would find the princess most likely in the garden; the place, where long time ago, she first encountered the boy from the Kokiri forest. The same boy I wanted to meet so desperately. A guard lifted his head when he saw me but only gave me a short nod, letting me pass by. As I entered the garden, I saw Zelda sitting on the grass, the hem of her dress untidily resting on her naked legs and hanging down to the ground on both sides. She might still have been a child from the outside, but I knew that deep down inside, she felt the same torment as me. She seemed lost in her thoughts while her fingers played with the blossom of a daisy and she didn't notice me. I cleared my throat to call attention to my presence.
"Oh, it is you, Sheik." She flattened the folds of her dress and patted with her hand on the ground beside her; an inviting gesture. I sat down next to her and stretched my legs.
"What can I do for you?" she asked, guessing rightly that I had not come to simply keep her company.
Once again I cleared my throat. This wasn't an easy matter to discuss for someone like me but I had prepared myself for this conversation. "I'd like to see Link again," I said as calmly as I could.
She raised an eyebrow but didn't look the least surprised. "I just wonder whether he remembers me or not," I added quickly.
"Sheik, I thought you knew that he is not aware that you really exist."
"I know, I know, but...I'm no longer in danger, am I? I mean...I really don't want to keep hiding from him for my whole life. Besides, don't you think he has a right to know?"
"Sheik, don't make it any more complicated as it already is."
I felt my heart drop a little and my childish eyes looked up to her wise, blue orbs. Though smiling softly, I felt the severity behind the mask she was wearing. I wondered if possibly, she wasn't oblivious of my feelings.
"He has left Hyrule," she finally admitted.
"What?" The word bubbled unintentionally from my mouth.
"He said, that he needed some time for himself. I think he felt lost since he didn't know where he belonged." Her eyes reflected her sadness. So this was the reason why she had always seemed so distracted lately. It was not a big surprise that she was fond of him, maybe even to the extent as I was, but unlike me, she didn't even try to hide her feelings.
I nodded and put on a smile to hide my disappointment and shock. "I see."
I don't know whether she saw the deceit on my face or not, but I didn't care. The only thing I wanted was to be alone. I left her without another word and made my way out of the castle.
It was on my seventeenth birthday when my life suddenly changed. Until this day, I had been living on my own and similar to my former life, I had devoted the past years to my training. First, because I had to distract myself and second because I didn't want to lose my ability to fight and move around like a shadow. My brain remembered but my body did not.
As I was currently residing in a hut in the Gerudo Valley, I was a little cut off from civilisation. I usually absolved my training in the battle ground of the Gerudo fortress or in the plain of Hyrule and only returned to my humble home when nightfall came. But that day I was on my way to the castle town as I was short on provision. It was a long walk on foot and unlike most of the travellers I did neither own a horse nor a donkey. I reached the lively town in the late afternoon and only stopped by to refill my bags. For a second I wondered whether I should visit Princess Zelda or not but in the end I decided to head home straight away. The sun was already setting when I set foot on the drawbridge again.
I had been walking for a few hours when I heard a horse galloping into my direction. Seconds later, a mare appeared on the horizon. I was about to get out of the way when I recognized the flaxen horse and the peculiar white mane. "Epona!" I waited until she was a mere metre away from me and instinctively grabbed her reins, forcing her to stop. The rider was unconscious but he somehow had managed to remain on the horse's back. His upper body rested against the mare's neck, his face was buried in her mane. My heart started beating heavier when I realised that he was hurt. He. Link.
8. Old Habits Never Change
Only the scratching of my fingertips against my thigh revealed my nervousness. On the outside I managed to keep up my rigid appearance, but on the inside I was trembling. Link had been inside the water temple for way too long and I couldn't get rid of the bad feeling inside my stomach. I was standing only a few metres away from the temple, but the water had not come back to the dried up lake yet. I was used to waiting but this time waiting had become a torture.
A strange dripping noise caught my attention an I held my breath to listen. The slow and constant dripping changed into a sound of rushing waters and soon the crystal clear liquid filled the lake once again. A loud sigh escaped my lips and my tense body relaxed a little. A human form suddenly appeared on the surface, blood staining the face and hair. I quickly jumped into the lake and pulled the unconscious young man out of the water. I inspected his wounds and upon seeing that, apart from a few scratches, his body was unharmed, I assumed that the water masses had pulled him under, causing him to lose consciousness. I brought him into recovery position and brought my ear to his mouth to check if he was breathing.
"Sheik..."
I watched the boy lying in my bed, not knowing whether I should be worried, anxious or happy about his return. I observed his sleeping face, his slightly parted lips, the frown on his forehead. My gaze fell on the bedsheets, the up and down of his chest as his lungs filled with air and the breath that left his mouth again. I decided to leave the hut, somehow not wanting to be there when he woke up. My wish to see him again was faltering and I just couldn't help it. The mess inside my head and my heart was too disturbing for a coward like me to put up with. A wooden box in the corner of the room caught my eye and I walked over to open it. My fingers touched the cowl I had been wearing in my former life and I brushed over the soft cloth. Putting it over my mouth and nose somehow gave me a reassuring feeling. This was how Link knew me and I secretly hoped that it would help him to recognise me for he had never seen my entire face. And that was a fact.
9. Reunion
The light in the cathedral was dimmed. Ever since Ganondorf managed to get a hold of the Triforce and changed the whole land into a place of darkness, the sun barely made its way through the heavy black clouds. This once light-flooded and luminous building was now always gloomy and depressing. I let my gaze wander around the high walls while I was patiently waiting for the young man whose destiny it was to save Hyrule. A flash of light finally announced his arrival and when my eyes adjusted to the new brightness, the Hero of Time was standing next to the pedestal. I remained silent and invisible in the shadows and decided to observe him a little longer before leaving the safety of the dark. He was standing with his backside to me, the heavy shield and sword fastened on his back. He seemed a little confused and clueless, his eyes scanned his own body a few times. Right, he had just awoken from a seven year's sleep and probably hadn't had the chance yet to fully inspect his now adult self.
"I have been waiting for you, Hero of Time." I stepped out of the shadows.
He instinctively pulled the sword out of its sheath as if his arm hadn't done anything else for the past years, and turned around to face me. His eyes were of the purest blue I had ever seen before.
"Who are you?"
I did what I could do best: I closed my eyes and concentrated on my surrounding, on every breeze, on every sound, on every smell. My senses were on full alert. In this state I could even hear the anxious heartbeat of a mouse. My arm moved of its own volition and I carefully removed my dagger from its sheath. Not a single sound was to be heard. My goal appeared before my inner eye and with a determined move I threw the dagger. When I opened my eyes again, my weapon was stuck in the middle of the trunk of a tree. I smiled to myself; my hard training was paying off at last. I walked over to the tree and pulled the short sword out of the trunk when I heard a noise behind me. I spun around. A loud noise of metal hitting metal resounded when my dagger crashed against the much tougher blade of a skilfully forged sword.
"Sheik?" The blue eyes widened with a mixture of shock and surprise and he immediately let his sword drop. "I mean...Zelda. No, Princess!" He looked confused and scratched his head.
I took a deep breath. Of course, he still thought I didn't exist, that I was nothing but a disguise of the princess. For a moment I considered acting like I did not remember. It could be so easy. I could simply make him believe that I had never met him before. It was so easy to be a coward...but...no! I had to make these lies stop.
"I see, you have returned to Hyrule, Hero of Time." My usual speech.
He looked a little hurt when I called him by his title and not his name.
"Why are you in disguise again? Has something happened to the castle?" He sounded worried.
"The castle is fine. And so is the princess."
The confused look on his face grew bigger and I almost felt sorry for keeping him in suspense.
"I guess I own you an explanation," I finally said and invited him to take a walk with me. He put away the sword he was still holding in his hand and followed me.
"I am not the princess, and I have never been," I explained. "And I really am a Sheikah."
"But I saw you transform into Zelda in the temple of time!" he protested.
"Did you? Zelda never transformed into anyone or anything. She only planned to blind you for a moment. A moment long enough for us to switch positions."
He stopped. "Why? I mean, why did you have to use such tricks?"
I looked at him. "Because we had to. Zelda had to hide from Ganondorf but you needed guidance. That's why she sent me. I acted on her behalf."
"So everything you did was on Zelda's behalf?"
"Indeed."
Something in his face changed. His eyes narrowed a little.
"I see. I should have known that someone like you would not really care about others. As a Sheikah you are indebted to the Royal Family so you had to help her, right?"
I wasn't sure whether I should answer or not. I had never seen him mad at me.
"The Sheikah would not mingle with other people's problems if they weren't forced to do so, right?"
I couldn't really deny it. My folk had always been a tribe that wasn't interacting with others much, except for business. We weren't interested in other people's problems and certainly were too proud to accept help from others. We never asked for it either.
"It must have been a torture to be forced to help me then, I guess," he said coldly.
I took a deep breath. "Do you want to thank me for rescuing you or keep on offending me?" My voice was unintentionally sharp.
"Right! Thanks a lot, Sheikah, for your help but don't worry, I won't bother you anymore. Epona!"
The mare lifted her head and joined her master's side.
"Fine! Just go to your princess and leave me alone." My anger was starting to boil up from the inside and I felt my hand turn into a fist. Control, Sheik, control!
Link grabbed Epona's reins and climbed onto her back. He shot me a last glance, then turned away from me and drove his horse into a gallop. I watched him as he departed, as he ran away from me. When he was out of sight, I punched the tree next to me with my fist and repressed an outcry. I waited more than seven years for his return and now that he finally was back, I had successfully managed to drive him away from me. A little bird chirped its happy song uninterrupted on the branch next to me and its ugly voice drove me over the edge. I threw a needle into its direction but it missed its target. Instead it flew straight into a wasp's nest. I gulped. That meant trouble.