Well, here's another update. Sorry for the wait, but holiday season caught me up and stuff. I hope you all enjoy. Many pages.

Life

Life's a constantly fleeting thing, more fickle and irritating then time itself is. People are constantly trying to figure out who they are in life, what their purpose is and everything like that. No one truly ever finds the answers to these questions. They live life as best they can, living, seeing, being what they try to be, but never being it.

Life is all too short and all too long all at once. Life goes by too fast when it should go slow and all too slowly when it should move quickly. It works with time to annoy everyone and everything. It is merciless and all the more crueler then time, never allowing anyone peace of mind.

In life, hard works avails to nothing. However, no work avails to less then nothing. People must work, and never get a reward. They try to hard and not hard enough all at the same time. In life, nothing's ever good enough, but at the same time, its too good. Some feel that the answer to "what is life?" is being individual and unique. Being one of a kind would be good enough for them.


Link opened the door and walked in, the others following him. Inside the inn was comfortable looking. There were potted plants in all the corners, knick-knacks rested on the shelves over the desk. On the desk was a worn old parchment tome. In it was inked carefully the names off all the guests of the inn for the last hundred years. It rested open, the ebony ink on the pages absorbing the sunlight cast onto it from the windows. Along the wall facing the desk were several benches for clients to sit on.

The noise of their footsteps were stifled, no noise came from any point inside or outside the building. Link listened intently for several minutes. He heard nothing but the breathing from the people nearby. He couldn't catch the everyday sounds he was used to inside the inn. It was as if no one was inside. His expression became grim and serious, the silence troubled him and put him on edge.

Link strode to the corridor behind the stairs. The dull thud of his footsteps didn't echo on the wooden floor. He walked to the end of the corridor. He glanced inside the room to his right. He froze. Inside the room was not how it was supposed to be. It was dark and shadowy, almost like the middle of the night. Inside was a cloaked figure; Link recognized it as the man from earlier who had tried to kill the royal family.

Link reached up over his right shoulder to grab the silver hilt of his sword, but was stopped short by a deep baritone. "Don't try. You wouldn't stand a chance. I'm just here to tell you something. Don't fight your fate. You couldn't, even if you wanted to."

Link froze at the sound of the voice, the evil drawl that came from the cloaked man. He couldn't even see the smallest hint at the face. He didn't think that something should be that shadowed naturally. Still, there was something tantalizingly familiar about him; perhaps he had met this man on one of his many quests. Then he realized with a start that Navi wasn't anywhere near him. He couldn't catch the faint chiming sound of her constant movement about his person. The cloaked figure laughed evilly at the teenaged swordsman.

The room spiraled out of his thought and he felt an overwhelming sense of confusion and bewilderment. He closed his eyes to regain his senses. When he opened them again, he was standing in the lobby of Stock Pot Inn. The royal family was behind him. He heard the hustle of people outside the inn and a silent man in his twenties was standing behind the desk looking at him. Link felt like a Goron band was drumming a tattoo in his skull. He held back all signs of pain for the time being.

"Link! What happened?" Navi half shouted into the air.

Link could feel the stares of all the people in the room on his back and front. This elicited a small twitch at the corner of his mouth and the slightest flush to crawl up his face. He continued to walk into the room, shaking his head to show that nothing was wrong. It was a lie. He and Navi both knew this, but the others accepted his response. The well-dressed man shook his head, he knew that Link was one to keep his problems to himself. He addressed the others first. After they were gone he would force an answer out of Link as to why he had suddenly looked dazed the moment he walked into the inn.

"Good afternoon. My name's Kafei, you must be the Harkinian royal family scheduled to stay here for the remainder of the week," the king nodded.

"Yes, we thank you for allowing our stay."

"Not a problem. You came during the least busy month of the year for us." The young man reached under the counter and pulled up some keys. He turned his head back towards the doorframe behind him. "Anju! Could you come over here?"

There was a small crashing sound from the back area, and Kafei flinched from the sound. A young woman only a year younger then Kafei came from around the staircase. Her blue skirt swished around her calves as she jogged into the room. Her red hair was somewhat disheveled.

"Yes, Kafei?"

Kafei smiled at her and held out the keys to her. "Could you show our guests to their rooms, please?"

"Oh." Then she spotted the people in the inn. Her blue eyes widened. "Yes, of course." She accepted the keys and inspected their tags and waved them to follow her up the stairs. Link stood off to the side, allowing them to pass, when the King gave him a questioning look Link shrugged and Navi spoke up.

"You're staying here for four days after today. Link thinks that it would be best if he let you settle in for the rest of the day, and he'll meet you here tomorrow morning to show you around. Besides, he has stuff he needs to do today."

The king nodded and walked towards the staircase. Anju led them up to their rooms. Before Zelda passed by Navi, the small fairy whispered something into the princess's ear, "Met us outside the gate later; its right across from the entrance to the Inn to your left."

On the upper floor before they went into their rooms to settle in for the day, Anju made an announcement. Her voice wavered as she spoke. "W-we serve dinner at seven for our guests," she bit her lip apprehensively before hastily adding something. "T-that is if you'd like it."

The queen smiled at the much younger girl. "Thank you, we'd appreciate it."

Anju nodded and ran down the steps, nearly tripping in the process.

Downstairs Kafei had stopped Link from exiting the building the moment the last skirt had disappeared up the stairs.

"What happened when you came in here, Link? You just froze for nearly a minute."

Navi took a moment to get a good response from Link. "He just zoned out is all."

Kafei, having years of practice conversing with the boy shook his head, looking at Link, and paying no heed to Navi. "That's unlike you, Link."

Link just shrugged his shoulders, nodded his head at the son of the mayor. He strode out of the building before Kafei could get in another word edgewise. "Hey! Link-" The door slammed shut, cutting off the statement.

In Zelda's room Impa was moving about, trying to unpack the stuff the princess needed for her four day stay in Clock Town. Zelda sat down at the edge of the bed in the room. "It's really different here Impa. Its not like anyplace I've been before, not even Kakariko village." Impa shot Zelda a disgruntled look almost immediately. Her red eyes were narrowed a little. "Oh, right, sorry, Impa." Zelda stood up. "Let me help with that, it's boring just doing nothing."

Impa shook her head. "Sorry, Zelda. I can't let you." Zelda sighed explosively and sat back down on the bed, falling backwards. "There are a few hours until dinner, perhaps you would like to go outside and sit under the awning?"

"Oh yes. Do you mind?" Zelda jumped up off of the bed and hurried out of the room. Impa smiled and shook her head at the girl's energy.

Zelda quietly slipped down the stairs and out of the Inn. She looked to her right and to her left several times. She spotted an open doorway to her right, but could see South Clock Town. To the left she saw a guard and the outer fields. There was no one around for the moment.

She slipped back into the lobby of the inn and double-checked that there was no one there. Being sure that she was quite alone Zelda invoked a magical power that she had learned from her Sheikah bodyguard. Her elegant dress changed to rough blue tight shirt and pants with a loose white shirt with the Sheikah symbol on the front. Her blonde hair became shorter, rougher and gained a red tint. The bangs were swept to the right side of her face. They covered one of her now red eyes and some of the white bandages that masked the lower part of her face.

She reopened the door of the inn and sprinted out of it and to the door on her left. Once past the guard she sat down on the track structure that wound around the walls of Clock Town. She looked up and spotted Link far in front of her and slightly to her right. He hadn't noticed her coming out of the town. His attention was focused solely on his sorrel mare. The glowing blue orb that circled his head saw Zelda however. She seemed to call attention to her because Link stopped patting Epona's mane. He turned around to look at Zelda's altered form, and smiled gratefully. He led the mare along with him over to the noble.

Link rested an arm on the mare's back, leaning against her casually. Zelda stood up and turned back to normal. "Hey, Link."

Link nodded, Navi spoke up for him. "Hey. So...to get to the point, Link wants to know why you're here."

Zelda chuckled. Given the nasty look Link had tossed at his fairy ally she figured that he hadn't wanted Navi to ask that. "My parents and I are on our way to Greater Termina, they decided to stay here for a few days is all."

After Link's nod for accepting the answer, Navi spoke up. "And half of the royal guard." Link stood in shock for a few moments after she had said it. Then he gave her a twisted, and even nastier look then before. She had the nerve to say that? He hadn't even wanted her to come close to saying that.

Zelda shot Navi a quizzical look. Link groaned mentally, drumming his fingers in a feign of strained patience on his horse's side. Although he was still angry with Navi, it was a personal annoyance of his that people would look at Navi and not him when she spoke for him. By far it outdid his anger towards the fairy, for the moment. "What? I'm just speaking his thoughts. That was him, Zelda." Personally, Navi was enjoying making Link squirm. Under her blue glow she was grinning in triumph as she heard Link cursing her mentally.

Zelda cast her questioning expression to Link. In response he shrugged, deciding to forgive the fairy, but if Navi did something like that again it was time for the bottle. Navi froze in midair. She nearly fell to the ground after catching the thought wave from Link. Although his face was as stoic as ever he was laughing at Navi in his head.

Zelda paused and stared at Link for a long moment. After a minute Link noticed her gaze. He fidgeted minutely under the gaze, but for the most part he remained stoic. It was hard for Zelda to tell if the little red on his face from the sunset or embarrassment. After a while she decided that it had to be the sunset.

"You know, Link. I've been wondering something."

"What?" Navi had flown back up from Link's thought earlier.

"Well," she leaned back against the wall, "You look different. It's the outfit. It's a lot darker than it was. I mean," she suddenly lost her stereotypical cool under his quirked eyebrow and confused expression. "Not that you look bad or anything. You look good...it's just that..." She froze at the words that had just come out of her mouth. She had an expression equivalent of a fish's.

What surprised her more was the unexpected, almost inaudible, chuckle that came from Link. She was completely flabbergasted; she hadn't even seen him smirk before. She thought that Link didn't have a sense of humor. He never made any noise; he was even practically silent when he walked!

She blinked several times and her jaw dropped slightly as the chuckle nearly became a laugh. After a minute Link pulled himself back together and leaned against Epona indifferently once again, eyes emotionless and mouth a straight line. Zelda too gained back her normal calm, and began to question if he had even chuckled in the first place.

"Maybe you should go back in before someone notices. Besides, Link has stuff to do, places to go, and people to not see." Zelda smiled at the last part. "Oh, and Link says it's great to see you again."

Zelda nodded to Link. "It's good to see you too, Link." she turned back into Sheik and rushed back into town and to the inn. Fortunately, her absence hadn't been noticed. She got in the door just in time to get dragged into a family discussion.

Link climbed onto Epona's back and rode off on the fields to do what Navi had been saying he needed to do all day. He sent idle threats to the fairy for her behavior earlier as he rode. He hadn't found it nearly as funny as the fairy had.