The ride home is pleasant (no surprise jumps over logs yet), but I am reluctant to leave our icy paradise. I look back wistfully at the disappearing slopes, wondering how soon we could travel back there. Although, I think as a large yawn commandeers my mouth for a good ten seconds, I will be grateful to return home to a warm bed and a comforting sleep. From the slack way Link's hands are resting on the reins and a mirrored version of my own yawn, I can tell Link is thinking similar thoughts.
Perhaps it is both of our sleep-soaked minds or the illusion of safety that we have hidden behind in these past months, but neither of us reacts quickly enough when Epona rears violently, a terrified, terrible noise ripping from her throat. We both fall heavily to the ground, her equine screaming ringing through the air as I hear a sickening crunching noise. A shadow hand grabs me by the neck from my prone position and lifts me easily into the air; the other hand wraps around my wrist. A frozen, nauseating pain circles my wrist, and I struggle desperately to breathe against the pressure on my throat. My other wrist soon faces the same treatment, and as I glance down, I notice two rings covering each respective wrist, the purple and black colors moving like sluggish lava.
Our assailant, seeming to have finished with me at the moment, tosses me roughly to the side; my body slams harshly against a tree, and I feel blood seep through my hair. I watch through fuzzy vision as he moves toward Link, who (I can guess from the cracking sound I heard) has broken his leg. He struggles to stand up and draw his sword, favoring the useless appendage, but is ruthlessly punched back down. Link soon receives the same treatment as I: ugly bruise-like rings circling each wrist. Epona attempts to defend her master despite her horror, wildly kicking and biting at the attacker. He, despite the danger, grabs her by the reins and reels in her closer until they are eye-to-eye. She grows still.
"You should have been mine, beauty," he growls at her. Screaming and braying, Epona rips her way out of his grasp, leaving him clutching a torn bridle, and bolts wildly away at a furious pace. He throws the bridle and Link to the ground, giving no care for either.
His shape is familiar, and I dare to ask, "…Hieronymous?"
He laughs, a chilling and mirthless sound, and turns to me. "Not quite, Princess."
I nearly choke on my own revulsion. What stands before me might once have been Hieronymous, but that face is decaying, the flesh slowly dripping off like paint. His evil eyes leer at me cruelly, and I can nearly feel the hate rolling off of him. The face emerging from behind Hieronymous' is that of, despite my quick denial…Ganondorf.
"Thought I was gone, I suppose?" He asks as he steps toward me, "You thought your precious Sacred Realm could cage me?" He stares down at me with contempt. "You believed I was mere flesh and bone, so easily trapped, but I am much more than that." He clenches his fist and turns its back to me, his Triforce glinting with a sickly light. "I am Power. I am a force of this world. You can no more be rid of me than you can be rid of the air you breathe or—" A slicing sound is heard, and the tip of the Link's sword emerges from Ganondorf's chest. He slowly turns his head to find a panting Link still holding on to the hilt. Reaching back, he rips Link off of the hilt and throws him violently to the ground. "Did you not hear me, boy? I am more than flesh now," he thunders as he pulls the blade effortlessly out of his chest, quickly tossing the sword aside. The hole in his chest knits together slowly, impossibly. A cruel grin darkens his features as he holds his hand out, a pulsing ball of electricity forming in his palm. Without warning, he flings the electricity at Link, chuckling as Link yells against the pain vibrating through him.
"Excruciating, isn't it?" He queries sardonically at the writhing figure before him. I lift my hands up, calling the Sheikah magic to my mind while his back is turned. "I am afraid you will find that impossible, Princess," he says to me over his shoulder, startling me. Not knowing his meaning, I release the magic anyway, only to find that it is swallowed into nothing as soon as it flows into the purple-black rings. He laughs at my stunned, horrified expression, and lifts his own hands up. There is suddenly a pressure on my conscious, and I fight the urge to faint. My efforts are useless, though, and soon the forest fades to black.
Consciousness finally pushes through, and I open my eyes to shadows. The utter darkness of the cell is only broken by a guttering torch throwing orange light on the black. My head feels fuzzy, and I gingerly inspect the now-clotted head injury from before. I hear the heavy clink of metal as I do so, and notice the manacles firmly clamped on each wrist and ankle. Huh. Apparently Ganondorf is under the impression magical restriction is not enough.
"Link?" I call out among the shadows, a faint hope believing he might be hidden here with me. However, I hear no reply, and I know Ganondorf would never be so stupid.
Ganondorf…The mere thought of him brings bile into my throat. How could he possibly have returned? We imprisoned him in the most secure place to ever exist. What had he said about being a…part? No, a force in the world…What had he meant? How could even that spring him from the Sacred Realms? And to think, I had been living with…oh dear Goddesses, am I married to him? Had there ever been a Hieronymous, or had he been Ganondorf in disguise the entire time? Surely the Goddesses would not be that cruel. Whoever, or whatever, Hieronymous had been, he no longer exists, I tell myself forcefully. Although, this freedom does not feel as exhilarating as I had always imagined, for I doubt now I will ever be able to exercise it.
The cell door slams open, breaking me out of thought. Automatically, my head turns to the sudden light bursting through the doorway and the dark shadow clomping through. Low, humorless laughter echoes emptily off the walls, chilling me with its familiarity.
"Hello, Princess. I trust you are comfortable. Unfortunately, I do not think I can match the incredible…hospitality…of the prison you placed me in," he drawls cynically, hatred burning off of him. He kicks me viciously, and I hiss in pain as my head strikes the hard stone behind me. He then grabs me roughly by the hair so we are eye-to-eye and growls, "This is what you get for defying me, you idiot girl. Either by slavery or death, Hyrule was always mine. You just happened to choose death for your country. Now, with this war, I will only grow stronger, and soon there shall be nothing I do not rule, including that damned Sheikah woman and her followers," Ganondorf promises maliciously. He pauses and glances at me, sneering. "Quite frankly, the very presence of you makes me ill," he says darkly and forcefully shoves me to the floor; the coincidence of us thinking alike feeds a sort of bitter amusement to my consciousness.
Against the grimy floor, I hear Ganondorf exit, his quick bootsteps fading down the hallway. Once again, I am left alone with the flickering torch, and even its insentient light seems malevolent. Up until now, the whole process left me in a stunned, dreamy state where nothing seemed real. Now, however, the awful reality of the situation strikes me, and horror invades my senses. Ganondorf is alive, and is on some sort of mad conquest of the entire world, the majority of my people are mindless monsters fighting in his name, and the people I thought were safe are probably only days away from capture. How could the Goddesses allow this to happen? Was there not something Link or I could have done to prevent this?
How could I have let this happen?
It is only by the tightening of my stomach that I know time passes. As I have not died from starvation or dehydration, I know that it cannot have been a terribly long time. I am given plenty of time to wonder whether Ganondorf is having trouble finding time to kill me, or whether he has simply chosen this cell as my executioner. I also wonder constantly about Link, and whether Ganondorf has killed him yet. Part of me prays Link is dead, that Ganondorf is not torturing him. The selfish part of me hopes he is still alive, still breathing and beautiful.
The torch guttered out long ago, leaving me suffocated in silence. There is nothing but the occasional clink of metal as I shift my position on the floor. Time and time again, I try using my magic, some absurd hope leading me to believe if I try long enough, it will work. The purple rings swallow it every time, though, and I begin to realize that maybe there is not a way out. I have felt like this before, when Ganondorf trapped me within in magic diamond in order to lure Link to the castle, but I have lost the hope I felt then. There is no Link to save me now.
Goddesses, I implore you: please do not let my country die. If you will not aid me, release me from this cell, then at least ensure my peoples' safety. Lead them to another land, a land without Ganondorf, protect them from him...strike him down into a pile of smoldering ash…do something.
The cold, oppressive silence of the cell is the only sound that greets me.