Seven
On the upper deck of the warship Auric Raptor, Daskin and his father stood at the railing near the bow of the huge airship, looking out at the camp. Hundreds of tents, illuminated by torches and bonfires, covered almost all of the clear space next to the river, stretching back out of sight into the thick, murky jungle. The stars overhead shone brightly, almost enough that one could see without any torches tonight.
Daskin idly drummed his fingers against the hilt of his sword, glancing over at his father. Link looked much the same as he had when they'd parted, nearly eight years ago, but somehow, he looked a little more tired, more careworn, as the constant hiking and fighting through the jungle took its toll.
Despite that, Daskin knew very well his father was the equal or better of any man in a fight, even though he no longer bore the Triforce of Courage. Daskin smirked, remembering his mother's joke that Link was so tough that he'd send death itself packing when it came for him.
Daskin frowned, thinking back on the moment when the Triforce piece had manifested within his friends, but his father's voice penetrated his thoughts.
"You're wondering why it didn't go to you, aren't you?" Link asked, his expression knowing.
Daskin smirked; his father had hit on his exact thoughts. "Mom been teaching you mind-reading tricks, there, Pop?" he asked teasingly.
Link smiled, an amused glint in his eyes. "As far as I know, that isn't something your mother can do, though I do suspect sometimes."
Daskin laughed, but after a moment sobered. "I am, actually," he said, answering his father's question.
"There have been a number of Heroes in our family," Link said, serious again as he looked out at the encampment. He placed both hands on the railing in front of him. "But," he said, glancing over at his son, "the Triforce of Courage is not tied to our bloodline the way Wisdom is to the Royal Family's. Courage goes to whoever is most worthy, or whomever Farore chooses, if she is so inclined."
Daskin nodded silently, trying not to let his thoughts show on his face.
"As it so happens," Link continued, "several of my ancestors and yours had that special quality needed of Heroes, and so they were chosen when needed." A serious, mildly reproving note entered his voice, and he met Daskin's eyes, the same qualities in his expression, "But, this is coincidence. Just because you're my son does not mean that you should have automatically gotten Courage when the Triforce split, that you had a right to it and were entitled to become the Hero because of your blood."
His conversation with Lynaka earlier drifted back through Daskin's mind, and he smiled slightly, feeling slightly foolish for not coming to the conclusion himself.
"Your friend Lynaka has that quality," Link said, gesturing down at the warship beneath their feet. "She has Courage for a very good reason, whatever that may be. I suspect her mission for her mother may be tied up in all that's happening somehow, though I do not know quite how just yet."
Daskin was about to speak, but his father continued. He looked over at his son, making sure to keep eye contact through his next statement. "But don't let that think you don't have anything to contribute to her quest, Daskin," he said. He pulled off his glove and pushed up his sleeve, revealing the glowing blue-green Twili tattoo on his left forearm, reminiscent of Daskin's mother's markings. "Your mother didn't need a piece of the Triforce to be a hero, and that's just what she is."
Link shifted position, leaning against the railing facing his son. "On our first journey together, my quest to free Hyrule from Zant and Ganondorf, your mother was rude, sarcastic and controlling in the early stages, interested only in her own cause, freeing the Twilight Realm from the same men. I hated her at first."
Daskin was surprised at this; he'd never heard either of his parents talk about their first quest this way.
"She told me only what she thought I needed to know to further her agenda," Link continued. "She was only willing to help me so far as it would also help her for the first few weeks, until we cleared the Lakebed Temple and retrieved the last Fused Shadow."
"I've heard this part," Daskin said. "Zant did something to Mother right after that that really hurt her, and you had to go to Zelda for help."
Link nodded. "From that point on, your mother saw things differently. Her time in this world had given her a greater understanding, a greater perspective on things. She only got more powerful from there, and once she had all the Fused Shadows back again, she was more powerful than almost any wizard or sorcerer in both worlds. During the Oocca War, she was an invaluable help, so much that I doubt we would have won without her." He gave his son a meaningful look.
Daskin smiled understandingly. "I see what you're getting at."
Link smiled himself. "Good." He adjusted the sword at his side as he straightened, which Daskin noted was the same sword he'd had all of Daskin's life; one made in Link's home village of Ordon by his friend Rusl decades ago.
The former Hero raised his hand, the one with the Twili markings. "Do you want to go see your mother? I can take us right to the Mirror of Twilight."
"Yes, I do," Daskin said, but then he paused, a thought crossing his mind. "But how are we going to get back? There isn't a portal near here, is there?"
"Your mother made me a stone that functions as an anchor point the same way the portals do," Link replied. "I keep it with my tent, so I can go back and visit her whenever I can, but go right back to the army without any delay."
Daskin nodded, remembering the portal stone now. He'd forgotten all about it. "All right, let's go," he said, looking forward to seeing his mother again.
"You may want to disable whatever disguise you're using before we use the Mirror," Link said, gesturing at him. "It would probably make things go a little smoother."
"Oh, right," said Daskin, looking down at himself. He'd gotten so used to the enchantment that made him appear to be a full-blooded human that he didn't even notice it anymore. "I'll do that after we go to the Arbiter's Grounds."
"Let's go, then," Link said. The markings on his arm glowed brighter for a moment, and then the world around them disappeared as father and son dissolved into black squares.
---
---
Lynaka woke suddenly, but she remained motionless, feigning sleep as she tried to determine what it was that had awoken her. Her mother had trained her to awaken quickly, for one never knew when enemies were about. Thus, it took Lynaka only moments to go from sound sleep to full alertness.
She heard a quiet footstep, and knew at once that a previous step was what had roused her. Making as if she had shifted in her sleep, she slid a hand beneath her pillow and took hold of the knife there.
The footsteps stopped next to her bed, and Lynaka tensed her muscles, preparing to spring up at the person.
"Wake up, Hero!" an unfamiliar woman's voice said urgently. "Your camp is under attack!"
Lynaka sat up in one lightning-quick movement, her knife at the ready. Her eyes focused on the figure next to her bed instantly, taking in as much detail as she could as quickly as possible in the dim light filtering in from the camp outside.
The woman standing next to her bunk in the cabin aboard the Auric Raptor appeared to be in her mid-twenties, with short auburn hair and the red eyes of a Sheikah. Her clothes were dark-colored and functional, and a short sword hung from her belt, along with an array of knives and a few pouches. Her hands were not on her weapons, and her posture was not one of threat, so Lynaka relaxed, but only slightly.
"Who are you?" Lynaka said tightly, swinging her legs out of her bunk as she reached for her boots with her other hand. The deck was cold beneath her feet, helping to bring her further into alertness.
"My name is Val," the woman said. "We do not have time for explanations, Hero. You must go to the defense of your allies immediately."
Lynaka finished putting on her boots and tucked the cuffs of her pants inside, securing the buckles next. As she stood, she grabbed her sword belt and buckled it on as she followed the woman from her cabin. She saw her sister open the door of her own cabin, barefoot and still a little bleary from being awoken by the noise.
"What is happening?" Erike asked, looking at Lynaka. The silent question in her expression as to the identity of Lynaka's companion was plain, tinged with just a hint of suspicion.
"A surprise attack," Lynaka said, nodding toward Val as she finished buckling her sword belt and lifted her scimitar a few inches to make sure it was clear in the scabbard. "She warned me about it."
All trace of tiredness immediately vanished from Erike's face, replaced in an instant with alertness as she ducked back inside her room to retrieve her own boots and scimitar.
"Who is attacking?" Lynaka asked Val as she and the stranger broke into a jog, heading for an outside hatch. She heard multiple alarm bells ringing and shouting now, the camp sentries having noticed the attackers, followed by the sound of steel clashing and screams.
Her question was answered by the scene outside as they emerged from the warship. Lynaka drew her scimitar, feeling a surge of adrenaline flow through her as her combat reflexes leaped to the fore.
An enormous horde of men in black and purple uniforms, brandishing a variety of gleaming weapons, was swarming over the camp like a plague of locusts, screaming fiercely as they savagely cut down anything moving that they could find. Men and women, roused from sleep by the commotion, struggled to hold them off, but the enemy force was too large and the attack too sudden for even the disciplined soldiers of Lord Fenris' force to get into proper formation quickly enough.
Lynaka absorbed all this in only a moment, immediately sprinting into the thick of the fighting with her scimitar held high. Questions could wait; the invaders' charge needed to be broken, now.
One of the enemy soldiers, his face painted with fierce black and red streaks, cut down a Balacruf soldier and then spun, screaming like a lunatic as he spotted Lynaka. She steeled herself as he began running for her, and as he drew close, she ducked under his initial swing with his huge, heavy battle-axe.
Lynaka whirled, cutting the soldier's legs out from under him as he tried to turn around, and as he fell, she reversed her grip on her scimitar and plunged it through his chest, piercing his heart.
Surprising her, the enemy soldier burst into a cloud of choking black smoke upon his death. Lynaka paused for just a moment to process this; she knew powerful sorcerers could imbue their servants with a taint of Shadow magic, to control them, and the bodies burst into smoke from the force of the taint being released. Many of the enemies her parents fought during the war had done the same thing, under the control of the Dark Lord.
She had, however, never heard of this being done to a human, only monsters. What was going on here? Who were these people?
Her distraction lasted only an instant, and Lynaka moved on, filing the information away to think on later. A crowd of creature-soldiers, howling and screaming like demented banshees, hurled themselves at a Hyrule Soldier just now emerging from his tent. He valiantly held them off for a few moments, but one of the creature-soldiers circled around behind him, wickedly curved sword raised over its head. Before the brute could strike, Lynaka climbed on top of a wagon next to the tent and leaped off in a long slashing jump attack, destroying the enemy soldier with one powerful blow.
Lynaka then spun to kick another creature-soldier behind the knee, decapitating it as it fell, and waved away the smoke as she moved on to the next. The Hylian soldier stabbed another through the chest, then blocked another attack with his shield before finishing off the last creature-soldier.
He nodded in thanks to Lynaka before moving on, charging at another enemy who was attacking one of his fellow Hylians.
Lynaka saw a human man in only a pair of pants, a sword in one hand and a Hylian shield in the other, leap from his tent as a group of the creature-soldiers set it aflame, then charge them, skillfully dodging and blocking before striking back.
At a shout of challenge behind her, Lynaka turned to see her sister Erike vault from a fallen tree-trunk and somersault over a creature-soldier's head before impaling it on her landing. The enemy howled as it exploded into smoke, attracting the attention of another band of the brutes.
Lynaka sprinted over to help, but even as she arrived, the stranger Val whirled through an acrobatic series of slashes, moving almost too fast to follow. She jumped up, planting her foot in the center of one creature-soldier's chest, and pushed off, back-flipping over the head of another before sweeping her sword out in a long slash that cut both of them down.
As Lynaka reached her sister and Val, the young warrior stabbed another creature-soldier from behind, pausing only to jerk her weapon free of the toppling body before she leaped in a whirling slash at another who was trying to sneak up on her sister.
Erike nodded in thanks, dropping in a sweep kick to trip another enemy soldier as it charged past, and Val finished the creature off with a stab, moving away as another cloud of smoke joined the already choking haze.
At a pause in the combat, Lynaka moved closer to Val, intending to ask her what she knew. Around them, the air was filled with smoke from both defeated enemy soldiers and tents they had set aflame, the stench powerful enough to make her eyes water. The only illumination, it seemed, came from flames, which danced in imitation of the stars above, countless pinpricks of light emanating from torches held by enemies and allies alike. Flaming tents cast greater light, revealing the innumerable skirmishes raging about the camp as the army tried desperately to hold off the invaders.
Lynaka turned as she heard the thundering boom of cannon-fire, and saw the muzzle flashes as gunners aboard the Auric Raptor opened fire on the crowd of creature-soldiers still swarming in at the edges of the camp. Huge sections of the enemy army puffed into more of the orange-specked smoke, some flying high into the air before vanishing.
Val had to shout to make herself heard. "A sorcerer is controlling this horde!" she yelled in Lynaka's ear. "We have to find him and kill him to stop them!"
Lynaka nodded sharply, gesturing for her sister to join them. "Do you know where he could be?" she shouted back, competing with the howls of the creature-soldiers and the screams of the humans and Hylians to be heard.
"Probably somewhere he can see most of the battle," Val replied, wincing as a wagon a few yards away exploded under a missed shot by a Balacruf gunner. "Look in the trees!"
"In the trees?" Lynaka said to herself, incredulous. There were trees everywhere!
Just as she was wondering how to locate the sorcerer controlling the horde, he foolishly did it for her; Lynaka saw a blast of magic charging high up in a tree a few dozen yards away, and as she focused on its source, the beam screamed down and incinerated part of Lord Fenris' tent.
Fortunately, Lynaka knew, Lord Fenris wasn't in it, and neither was Daskin; they were off talking somewhere. Now that Lynaka thought about it, she hadn't seen either of them since dinner last night. The battle should have attracted their attention; where were they?
She pushed the thought from her mind as she hunted for an item she knew she would need; she didn't have time to go back for her own, so a scavenged one would have to do.
Inside a supply wagon, Lynaka found what she sought: a bow and a quiver full of arrows. She observed immediately upon stringing the bow and testing it that it wasn't nearly as powerful as her own bow, one her father had made for her, but again, it would have to do.
Lynaka tossed another bow and quiver to Erike, then quickly explained her plan as best she could over the deafening racket of the battle. Erike nodded, understanding immediately, and gripped her sister's forearm in a warrior's salute.
"It's dangerous," Lynaka said.
"There would be no honor in it otherwise," Erike replied, grinning with a ferocity reminiscent of their mother.
Lynaka grinned back, nodding once before they separated. Val was busily engaged with a group of enemies, so Lynaka didn't have time to explain her plan to the mysterious warrior. She just had to hope the Sheikah woman would pick up on it and follow along.
---
---
Immediately upon regaining his form in the Mirror Chamber of the Arbiter's Grounds, Daskin summoned what little magic he had and dispelled the enchantment making him appear to be a human. The only real difference, he knew, was that his skin was now a bluish shade of gray like his mother's, and his hair was more orange, also like hers.
However, his eyes remained blue, his one feature that marked him as different than other Twili. Blue eyes were just as unusual in the Twilight Realm as orange or yellow eyes were in the Light World; were he not a prince, he knew, the other children would have teased him mercilessly, as the other Gerudo had Lynaka's sister Erike. Most races apparently did not take kindly to those who looked markedly different than what was considered 'normal', which, he thought to himself, was rather stupid, but that was just how mortals were.
Seeing a suspicious expression on his father's face brought Daskin out of his thoughts, and his hand dropped to his sword out of unconscious habit.
"What is it?" he asked Link.
"There's no one here," Link said quietly, his hand on the hilt of his own sword.
He was right, Daskin saw; every time he'd been here previously, there had been five or six guards in the chamber itself, plus dozens more throughout the ancient building. The Gerudo and the Hylians both had people patrolling the Arbiter's Grounds, mainly to guard the Mirror of Twilight, one of two known exits from the Twilight Realm. The other was in the dungeon of Hyrule Castle, under guard there, as well.
Link took a deep breath, sniffing several times. "Do you smell that?" he asked his son.
"Okay, you got me," Daskin said, smirking. "I haven't had a bath in a few days." He playfully gestured back at his father. "You ought to know all about that, since you've done a bit of adventuring yourself."
Link gave his son a wry look, chuckling shortly, but his smile faded as he pointed at a still dark shape, barely visible in the dim moonlight, slumped next the dormant Mirror. "There's one of the guards," he said quietly.
Daskin moved forward, drawing his sword as he did so, and looked around for the other guards. They were there, all right, but they were all dead.
"That's what that smell is," Link said tightly. "It's the smell of a Shadow taint after it's been released. They fought back, it looks like, only the enemy didn't leave any bodies behind."
Daskin frowned as he nodded; mages specializing in the dark arts often left a Shadow taint in their servants to better control them, and it usually destroyed the body once whatever monster it was controlling died or was killed, leaving only black smoke behind.
"Only one reason a dark mage would assault the Mirror Chamber," Daskin said, pointing up at the silent disk of the Mirror of Twilight.
Link nodded once, shifting his grip on his sword. "Let's go."
The two of them charged up the stone steps of the Mirror's platform, and since Link was faster, he stepped on the area in front of the Mirror that activated it. A glowing white platform appeared before the dark round disk as it tilted back and suddenly shone, projecting a cone of white light filled with glyphs and other symbols onto the massive black plinth at the other end of the coliseum-like chamber.
Daskin and Link ran up the steps of the glowing platform and let themselves be sucked into the whirling, glowing vortex forming in the center of the black plinth.
A moment later, they regained form in the Twilight Realm, and Daskin paused for a moment to take a deep breath of the pleasantly scented air of the world in which he had been born.
However, the Twilight Realm was anything but serene in that moment; as soon as Daskin could hear again, the sounds of battle assaulted him, shouts, screams, and the clash of metal echoing off the square-angled stone buildings of his family's palace, punctuated with the whine of magic blasts.
The golden sky, covered with an ever-present layer of dark purple clouds, was filled with Twili, hurling balls and beams of magic from their hands at a multitude of invaders, who wore black-and-purple uniforms, their faces painted with streaks of red and black. The muted colors produced by the Twilight Realm's atmosphere gave an odd cast to the flame from their torches, producing a surreal effect when combined with the chaos of the battle.
Reflexes ingrained into him by both parents brought Daskin up to a high state of alertness, and he immediately charged for the nearest invader, sword at the ready. The hulking brute turned, mouth splitting in a horrific grin as he raised his club, but Daskin was too fast, and ran the creature-soldier through before he had time to react further. The brute grunted, toppling to the ground before exploding into orange-flecked black smoke.
Nearby, Link was demonstrating why he was a swordsman renowned throughout both worlds; he moved with the speed, power and skill granted to him by both his innate talent with the blade and decades of experience as he cut down all the enemies that came within reach of his sword.
Link grunted as he slammed his shield into the side of one of the creature-soldiers, and when it stumbled, he launched himself into a full flip over its head, greeting its head with his blade on the way. He finished it off with a final thrust once he landed, spinning almost in the same movement to cut the legs out from underneath another of the monstrous warriors. Without pausing, he whirled his blade once and stabbed down into the enemy's chest, finishing it off.
Daskin half-smiled despite the situation at seeing his father in action again; these creatures had no idea how much trouble they were in now.
"Find your mother!" Link shouted over his shoulder as he charged another group of the creatures, smashing some of them off of the narrow stone walkway with his shield before bringing his sword to bear on the rest.
Daskin nodded once, sprinting off through the battle on paths he knew so well he could navigate them with his eyes closed, slashing at more of the ugly soldiers on the way. As it turned out, he didn't have to look for long; his mother found them instead.
Long dark robes flapping behind her at the speed of her flight, Midna soared in at the group of creature-soldiers attacking her husband and unleashed a blast of deadly blue-green energy from her hands, vaporizing the majority of them instantly.
"About time you showed up!" Midna said to Link as she touched down next to him. She leaned to one side and knocked another creature-soldier off the walkway with a blast of magic before he could respond.
"Yeah, I figured you needed me to come save you again," Link replied with a grin. He glanced over his wife's shoulder as Daskin ran back down the ramp toward them, and she turned to see what he was looking at.
A creature-soldier jumped in his way suddenly, and Daskin used his momentum to fuel a leap as he planted a hand on the surprised enemy's shoulder. Once his feet hit stone again, he whirled and stabbed the creature-soldier quickly before slashing again, tripping the enemy warrior over the side of the walkway.
He turned back to see his mother approaching, an expression halfway between relief and reproval on her face, and before Daskin had a chance to say anything, Midna caught him up in a tight hug.
As she pulled back and looked him in the eye, Daskin was momentarily startled to realize that he was taller than her, if only by an inch or so. His mother had towered over him his entire life, so it was quite a surprise after not having seen her in years. She looked much the same as the last time he had seen her; Twili did not age in the same way those from the Light World did, so even though she was a few years older than his father, she looked more than a decade younger by human standards.
"It's about time you showed up, too," Midna said quietly, smiling tightly as she clasped her son's shoulder. He grinned back, somewhat embarrassedly, not quite able to think of a reply.
"But," she said, gesturing off at the rest of the horde, "we can talk later, once we get all these brutes out of our house, okay?"
"You got it," Daskin said, grinning again.
Fittingly, he thought, the first thing the three of them did when they were all in the same place was fight, though this time not with each other. As a family, Link, Midna and Daskin aided the other Twili in finishing off the rest of the creature-soldiers, charging through the halls of the Palace of Twilight with weapons and magic at the ready.
---
---
After finding appropriate cover, Erike nocked an arrow and fired a shot at the source of the magic blast they had seen earlier. Lynaka knew it was too dark to see the sorcerer from her position, but Erike's role in the plan was not to kill the enemy mage.
That was Lynaka's job.
As she had expected, Lynaka noted a stream of thin, light blue energy soar back at Erike, missing completely as the younger girl dodged it. While her sister ran to her next position, Lynaka sprinted through the foliage, pushing aside ferns and dodging roots and branches. She was making a lot of noise, she knew, but the battle was making even more, so she hoped her approach would not be noticed.
Erike fired another arrow on the run, leaping behind a tree-trunk a moment later, and Lynaka looked along the retaliating beam to confirm the position of the enemy mage. She nocked an arrow of her own, holding it in position but not stretched back as she moved closer.
When Lynaka neared the tree she thought the sorcerer was in, Erike shot again, and Lynaka grinned as she heard a pained grunt above her; despite the darkness, her sister had somehow managed to hit the enemy mage. She filed that away to congratulate her sister on once the battle was over.
By the light of his own magic blast, Lynaka took aim at the sorcerer. He was tall and thin, dressed in heavily brocaded robes of black and purple, and his hair was long and light-colored; she couldn't tell the exact color in the dim light.
Now that she was close enough to make him out in the branches overhead, Lynaka drew a careful bead on the mage, who was still unaware she was below him. Pausing for just a moment to ensure the accuracy of her shot -she was unlikely to get a second- she let her arrow fly.
Lynaka smiled in fierce satisfaction as she heard a shocked grunt and then a series of crashes as the sorcerer toppled from his perch. Quickly, she slung the bow across her back and drew her scimitar, following the crashes until, with a dull thump and a further grunt of pain, the enemy mage landed at her feet.
She noted as she raised her blade that the man's face was young, but somehow drawn and withered, unnatural and ugly. His eyes had no pupils, but were a solid, faintly glowing purple. Lynaka filed this detail away also, then spun her blade twice and plunged it downwards.
Once the purple glow had faded from the mage's eyes, Lynaka withdrew her scimitar and wiped it off on his robes. He did not fade away, she noted, and decided to come back for his corpse once his minions had been mopped up. Perhaps he had something on him that could provide a clue as to who this army belonged to and why it was here, other than to attack the Hyrule Army and the Balacruf.
Lynaka jogged back into the clearing, looking around, and noted with satisfaction that the creature-soldiers were stumbling around confusedly, stupidly blundering into one another without their master's guidance.
The allied army drew courage from this, and the survivors attacked the monsters with renewed ferocity, shouting challenges. The black-and-purple-uniformed men, their faces painted in savage patterns of black and red, quickly began a retreat, fleeing chaotically back into the jungle. Hyrulian and Balacruf commanders rallied their troops and formed up, driving the rest of the creature-soldiers off into the jungle and the river, and cut down any that were too slow.
Lynaka brought up her bow and nocked an arrow, drawing a bead on a particular soldier whose uniform was slightly more decorative than the others, his face-paint applied with a little more precision. She let the arrow fly, and as she had intended, it slammed into his calf muscle, sending him sprawling to the ground.
She drew her scimitar as she ran over to the groaning man, and before he could flee or do something to himself, she hit him solidly over the back of the head with the pommel. He collapsed in an ugly, stinking heap at her feet, his body odor almost powerful enough to make her eyes water on its own, without the smoke's help.
Lynaka kicked him in the side, disgusted. As if she needed another reason to loathe these people…
The young warrior waited next to her prisoner as the rest of the creature-soldiers fled, shooting any that came within range or appeared about to attack her or someone else. Several times, she had to dispatch a group of the creature-soldiers that fled past her but stopped to attack, moving more clumsily than when their master had been directing them.
At the sound of multiple running footsteps behind her, Lynaka turned to see Aeron approaching along with Zelda, Impa, Erike and Val. Aeron's gray-streaked dark brown hair was soaked with sweat, and his open uniform jacket was ripped and cut in several places. One of the sleeves was slashed nearly off, and the fabric and the skin beneath was wet with blood. His sword was in his hand, stained with something black and sticky, like wet ash. He wore no shirt beneath his jacket, Lynaka noticed, and was in very good shape, the contours of his muscles gleaming with sweat and blood.
Somewhat embarrassed, she turned her attention to the rest of the group, noting that Zelda and Impa both had their weapons out and had been fighting, also, their clothes and blades spattered with grime and muck.
"Lynaka, there you are," Aeron said as he came to a stop next to her. "Erike told us you were over this way."
He was breathing heavily, Lynaka noticed by the light from Zelda's torch, and had a few other shallow wounds besides the deep one on his arm.
Lynaka was about to answer him when Zelda touched her shoulder and said, "You're bleeding," with intense concern in her tone.
"I am?" Lynaka said, surprised, as she looked over at her shoulder. With even greater surprise, she noticed that the wound was deep, and blood covered almost all of her shoulder, streaming in runnels down her arm. How in the world had she not felt this before?
As she calmed down, allowing Zelda to tend to her wound, Lynaka suddenly realized her muscles were sore, and she gritted her teeth at the fire in her shoulder from the gash there. She hadn't felt any of this during the battle, but now it was all catching up to her, including a muscle in her leg she had pulled sometime during the skirmish.
"It's the Triforce of Courage," Val said suddenly. "It dulls your sense of pain while you're fighting, so you can keep going." She peered at Lynaka curiously. "Do you feel any stronger?"
With surprise, Lynaka noted that she did. Despite her tiredness, she did feel an odd sense of vibrancy that seemed at odds with her aches. She had attributed it to just leftover adrenaline from the battle, but now that she thought about it, this did feel much different than an ordinary rush.
"Your Triforce gathers the energy of those you defeat and draws it into you," Val said, a knowing look on her face. "The more you fight, the stronger you will become."
Lynaka's question was interrupted by a hiss of indrawn breath at the sting when Zelda cleaned her wound with a bit of alcohol.
"Sorry," said the princess, giving Lynaka an apologetic look. She withdrew a strip of white cloth from the bag at her side and began to wrap the wound, pausing once to push a bit of her dark red hair behind an ear.
"Who are you?" Aeron said to Val, giving voice to the question Lynaka had been about to ask herself. He glanced down as Impa expertly cleaned his own gash, nodding his thanks before looking back up to hear the answer.
"I am Valakyriena, Emissary of the Golden Goddesses," the woman replied formally. Then she smiled. "But please, call me Val."
Lynaka noticed Impa's eyes narrow slightly at this, though the Sheikah warrior said nothing, continuing to bind Aeron's wound.
The name did sound vaguely familiar to Lynaka, and she knew she had heard it before somewhere, likely one of her father's stories about the war.
"I know you," Zelda said as she tied off Lynaka's bandage. "You helped my mother and Lord Fenris near the end of the Oocca War. We haven't met before, though, I believe."
"No, Your Highness, we have not," Val replied. "But you are correct."
Lynaka was puzzled at this; by all appearances, Val was in her early twenties, but for what Zelda had said to be true, she would have to be in at least her forties by now, about the same age as Lord Fenris.
Val glanced over at Lynaka, apparently seeing the young warrior's question in her expression, for she explained, "Members of my order age very slowly, as part of their gifts from the Goddesses."
"How many members are in this order?" Aeron asked, sheathing his sword so he could hold his wound with his good hand.
"Majacen is the only other Emissary I know of that is active at this time," Val replied. "There are very few direct servants of the Goddesses in the mortal realms aside from the Triforce Bearers." She showed them the prominent Triforce symbol on the pommel of her short sword. "My role is as an advisor and ally to the Triforce Bearers, particularly the Bearer of Courage, while the Wizard takes a wider role in mortal affairs."
"So you're not a mortal, then?" Lynaka asked, trying to ignore the stench from the prisoner at her feet.
"Not like you, no," Val replied. She gestured to the battleground around them, strewn with the bodies of fallen humans and Hylians and the wreckage left behind by the horde. "I do not think this is the best place for this discussion," she said. "Perhaps once you all are rested and recovered from your wounds?"
"I agree," said Zelda. "We have much to talk about, but only when you are rested." She turned to Lynaka and Aeron, addressing them with the tone of royal command she reserved for when she was particularly serious. "Especially you two," she said, her tone and her expression making it expressly clear she would accept no objections. "Both of you are to go to your bunks and sleep for as long as you can, and then you're not to get up until you have those wounds looked at by a doctor, is that understood?"
Aeron grinned amiably, bowing in a way that was teasingly mocking. "As you command, Your Highness," he said. "I wouldn't dream of disobeying you."
"See that you don't," Zelda said, smiling despite herself.
Lynaka chuckled. If Zelda was like this with Aeron, she wondered what the princess was like with his brother, her fiancé.
As a passing breeze stirred her prisoner's stench again and reminded her of his presence, Lynaka grimaced as she looked down at the creature-soldier she had knocked out. "You might want to take this… thing to one of your holding cells," she said to Aeron. "Use men you don't mind inflicting his stink on." She smirked.
Aeron grimaced himself, glancing down at the unconscious creature-soldier. "Oh, is that what that is?" he said. "I thought there was a dead animal nearby."
"No, but there is a corpse you should look at," Lynaka said, gesturing off where she'd left the dead mage. "I killed the sorcerer who was controlling this army and left him under that tree over there."
"Are you all right?" Zelda asked, an odd inflection in her voice.
"I'm fine," Lynaka replied, understanding what she meant. "He's not the first man I've killed."
She scowled briefly before banishing the memory of that occurrence, not wanting to think of that just now. She noticed her sister similarly scowling at her own dark memory of that event before also forcibly banishing it.
Lynaka wasn't fine, but she wasn't about to admit that to any of the others. Despite the fact that she had killed before, she took no pleasure in it; sometimes it needed to be done, and that was it. She would sort through her feelings on her own, in private.
Still, she understood Zelda's concern; slaying monsters was one thing, but killing humans was something entirely different. Privately, Lynaka hoped she never got used to it, felt the guilt every time, as terrible as it was. The day she felt nothing at killing other sentient beings would be the day she would throw away her scimitar, she resolved.
Pushing these painful thoughts aside for now, Lynaka led the others over to the dead sorcerer, glancing behind as Aeron gestured for two of his men to bring the prisoner back to his ship. She tried not to laugh at their expressions of distaste as they hoisted the unconscious creature-soldier up and carried him off, making sure to leave all of his weapons behind for later collection.
Once they arrived at the tree, Aeron gave the mage's corpse a critical inspection, refraining from touching it. He drew his sword and prodded a few of the pouches on the sorcerer's belt with the point, murmuring softly to himself. Lynaka watched him for a moment, wondering what his thoughts were on the enemy magic-wielder.
"Never seen anyone like him before," Aeron said finally. "Or his men; I haven't ever seen uniforms like that." He looked up at the others, his sharp violet eyes passing over each of them in turn. "Have you?"
All but Val silently shook their heads or voiced a quick negative. At the Emissary's grim look of recognition, Lynaka turned to her, about to ask what she knew.
But, Val volunteered it before Lynaka could speak. "The Divine Host," she said gravely. "An army openly devoted to the Dark God. It is as Majacen feared; they are active again."
Lynaka was torn between her desire for sleep and her curiosity, but Zelda decided for all of them.
"As much as I am interested in hearing your explanation, Val," she said, a bit tiredly, "it should wait until tomorrow morning, when we are all thinking clearly enough to understand it." She glanced at the others. "Is that all right with you?"
Lynaka nodded; Val's explanation sounded complicated, more than she wanted to process right now. She had exhausted her energy, and now wanted nothing more than to collapse on her bunk.
"Very well," said Aeron, sheathing his sword again. "I'll order a double watch for the rest of the night in case they decide to try again, though I don't think they will, without their commander." He gestured down at the corpse. "I'll have a few of my men bring this back to the Raptor, too, so we can look it over more closely in the morning." His jaw set with determination and more than a little anger. "I want to know who this fellow is and why he and his brutes decided to attack my camp and kill my men."
So did Lynaka, but right now, it was all she could do to keep on her feet. Gratefully, she followed the others back to the Auric Raptor, where she moved as quickly as she was able through the warship's halls until she found her cabin. Once inside, she paused only long enough to drop her weapons on the floor and pull off her boots before stretching out on her bunk and falling asleep.
---
---
About an hour into the battle in the Twilight Realm, Midna announced that she felt another magic-user nearby, one definitely not Twili, and the three of them ran in the directions she indicated, making a direct course for the throne room at the top of the palace.
Once they burst into the wide, high-ceilinged hall that led up to the throne room, they spotted the mage; it was a young-looking human woman in heavy black and purple robes with pale skin and long, curly black hair that crackled as though a current ran through it.
She glared at the three of them with glowing purple eyes that had no pupils, bringing her hands together to launch a thick stream of pale blue energy in their direction. Midna stopped and planted her feet wide, throwing a wide magic shield in front of her son and husband.
Daskin peered through the shield to see the enemy sorceress frown at this; clearly, she had been expecting no such resistance, but, Daskin thought smugly, she hadn't realized his mother was one of the most powerful magic-users in both worlds. Only someone wielding a piece of the Triforce had a chance of overcoming her.
"I'm going to give you one chance to explain yourself," Midna called up to the sorceress. "If you surrender, I may let you leave in one piece."
From her perch on one of the ledges jutting out from the high stone walls, the sorceress made her answer plain: she threw another beam of pale blue energy down at them.
"Want to do it the hard way, do you?" Midna said challengingly, grinning over at Link. "I'll handle this, Mr. Hero. You stay put."
Link arched an eyebrow and gestured with a broad wave, as if to say, she's all yours.
Daskin wiggled his fingers at the sorceress in a mocking good-bye wave as Midna took off and shot like an arrow at the enemy mage, her hands spread wide.
The sorceress fired blast after blast at the incoming Queen of Twilight, who dodged some with acrobatic twists and blocked others with briefly conjured shields. Finally, her long orange hair crackling with her own power, Midna hovered in place before the black-and-purple-robed sorceress and let a ball of blue-green energy charge in either hand.
"Last chance," she said, a slight echo in her voice from the power thrumming within her. Her eyes glowed with the power of the Fused Shadows, turning the same unique Twili shade of blue-green as the markings on her arms and legs, which also began to glow more intensely.
Daskin could see real fear on the sorceress' face now, and he grinned as he impudently called up to her, "You're in trouble now!"
"He's a bright boy," Midna said, her voice echoing more strongly now. "You should listen to him."
She brought one hand up and slowly, quite deliberately blasted a hole straight through the wall behind the sorceress, revealing the dark clouds, golden sky, and endless drop outside the palace walls.
Daskin watched his mother float closer to the sorceress, bringing up her other hand and its glowing, thrumming sphere of energy. She brought to mind the image of a vengeful goddess, crackling with power as she defended her home and people.
"You can either tell all your thugs to lay down their weapons and stop wrecking my home," Midna said, her voice low and dangerous, echoing thunderously with power, "or I knock you outside and let what's left of you fall for the rest of eternity."
She hovered closer, getting in the sorceress' face, with only the ball of magic between them. "What's it going to be?"
The sorceress, her eerie glowing purple eyes meeting Midna's resolutely, replied, in a surprisingly rich voice tinged with a cultured-sounding accent Daskin did not recognize, "You can kill me, but my master will bring me back a hundred times more powerful, Twili witch!"
"Tell him 'hi' for me, then," Midna said sardonically, and released the blast of magic.
Bolts of blue-green energy crackling over her body, the sorceress soared backwards through the hole in the wall, screaming as she fell. Midna gave her a mocking wave, her markings and her eyes slowly losing their powerful glow. By the time she turned around, she was back to normal.
"I'm guessing Mom wins most of your arguments, eh?" Daskin said teasingly to Link.
Link sighed humorously. "Most of them, yeah," he agreed with a smile.
"Oh, I let him have one now and then to preserve his fragile male ego," Midna said, smirking as she touched down next to them.
"My what?" Link exclaimed, feigning outrage.
"Nothing, dear," Midna said sweetly, kissing him on the cheek. She winked at Daskin as she put an arm around her husband's waist, and Link gave her a mock-suspicious look, fighting a grin.
Daskin laughed as he sheathed his sword, and a moment later his parents joined him, the first time in a long, long time.
Much too long, Daskin thought.
"All right," Midna said once the moment was over. "Let's go make sure the rest of these things are out of here, and then we need to talk."
Daskin sighed heavily. "Yes, we do," he agreed.
---
Author's Note: Well, that took much too long. Sorry for the delay, everybody, but there were a number of factors that contributed to it. Anyway, I'm back to writing now, currently two chapters ahead of this, so Chapter 8 will be up sometime next week. Thanks for reading!