A few quick notes:
1. This story is rated T due to some very violent content.
2. The story is actually completed, and I intend to post a new chapter weekly.
3. I don't own any Legend of Zelda character or setting. I'm just borrowing them and I hope Nintendo won't mind too much.
4. Thank you so much for reading (and for reviewing)!
5. I have created a forum for this story (yes, I'm desperate for feedback). You can find it under the "My Forums" link on my profile page.
Chapter 9: The Hero's Test
Zelda collapsed on her knees when she saw Link fall back from the altar. This couldn't be happening. After all that, after the sheer triumph and joy they had felt when the medallions had restored the sword, it couldn't be that they could not have the Master Sword. It was destined to be Link's! Why was it stuck in that altar?
She got up and went for a closer look. The slit in the rock in which the Master Sword was embedded was, far from tight, actually a bit loose. She grabbed the handle and moved the sword around in its hole without trouble. She pulled: the sword did not come. She could almost feel it grabbing at the rock, refusing to budge.
"Why?" A voice asked.
It sounded so far from Link's usual voice that she had to turn around to confirm there was nobody else there. The sight that greeted her was nothing to lift her spirits: Link had gotten up from his back, but had only made it to his knees. He was shaking with sobs and he was pounding the ground with his fists. She clenched her jaw to keep herself from tutting at him.
Some hero she was paired with, she thought bitterly. She had had to drag him through every step, and now this? She felt like crying too; she had no desire to have to be the one staying calm and collected, and she certainly didn't want to comfort him. He was supposed to be the bravest soul in Hyrule, for crying out loud! Not this pathetic, sobbing wreck of a boy!
"Stop it!" She cried angrily. "STOP CRYING! GET UP!"
"I know why." Link sobbed. "I just don't deserve it. I'm too useless."
"You're only useless because you WANT to be! I'll bet that's why the sword rejected you: deep down, you want it to! Now, you have an excuse not to fight Ganon!"
Link didn't seem to hear her, or at least, he ignored her completely.
"I don't want to die..." He sobbed. "Ganon is just going to kill me if I don't have the Master Sword! I know he can only kill me once this time, and I know that at least, the Master Sword won't be broken next time, but... I thought I could win! I thought I had a chance!"
"I knew it! You're already rationalizing not fighting Ganon! Well, I've got news for you! We'll get that sword out of that altar if we have to gnaw it out!"
This, at last, caught Link's attention.
"You think we can get it?" He asked, looking up at her for the first time and not sobbing at all anymore. "I don't have to go fight Ganon without it?"
Zelda's eyebrows shot up and she let out a small gasp of shock.
"You were going to fight Ganon anyway?" She asked, goggling at Link.
Link frowned at her.
"What did you THINK I was going to do?" He asked.
"I... but… without the Master Sword, you wouldn't stand a chance!"
"I know that." He said irritably. He hesitated a second before he said the rest: he really wanted Zelda to understand, even though he expected he was going to sound a bit melodramatic. "But I'd try anyway. I'm not going to be reborn into a better Hero until I die, so if I can't beat Ganon, it's better if I die soon. And I don't think I can kill myself, so..." He trailed off. Since he couldn't work up the courage to kill himself, the logical thing to do was to get Ganon to do the job, but he didn't like to think about the actual process.
Zelda didn't know what to say. She felt like the worst person in the world: Link had regained his hope without so much of a hesitation when she had declared they would get the Master Sword no matter what. He had trusted her completely, while she had been chewing him up because she had assumed he was the coward everyone believed him to be. Coward indeed…
"I... I'm..." She staggered. She wanted to apologize, but the words suddenly didn't seem to be enough. She had never felt so rotten in her whole life.
Link, on the other hand, had not actually heard a word she was saying before she had promised they would get the Master Sword, so he was not at all upset with her: quite the contrary. She had given him back hope, and he was feeling much better for it.
"So how do we do it?" He asked. "You don't really want to use our teeth, do you? I still got them all, but I don't think I can break a rock with them."
He had gotten up and was walking around the altar, examining its every angle. Zelda was completely astonished by his change of attitude. He trusted her that much? Or was he just particularly good at making himself whole-heartedly believe whatever he wanted to believe?
"Hey!" He said when he reached the front. "I think there's something here, under the moss!"
Zelda brushed the matter aside as something she had no control over and rushed to his side. She could just make out a glimmer of gold under the moss and lichen on the altar. She started brushing, soon imitated by Link. They quickly unveiled a small rectangular golden plate, marked with Hylian symbols.
"Hylian?" Link asked.
Zelda nodded. "Even older than what I've learned." She said. "I can only make out some of the words..."
"The true... can't read the next few... pendants of courage, power and wisdom - those three words never changed. They're actually the same in Hyrulian." Zelda commented.
"That's all you can read?"
"Wait, that word earlier, that's Hero. The true Hero... the pendants... and it ends with Sword of Evil Bane. I think I know what this says." She said. She sighed.
"What?"
"It's the very thing that didn't work last time… I didn't think of it at all. Historically, there were supposed to be safety measures to ensure the Hero could not take the sword unless he was strong enough to face evil. Some historians think the first Hero was sent seven years into the future so that he did not face Ganon as a child."
"Yeah…" Link said pensively. "That makes sense. He said he was really a kid, and when I went back, he said he beat Ganon and became a kid again seven years before."
"It is said that the safety measure evolved over time, which makes sense." Zelda continued. "The land changed, old training grounds disappeared, artefacts were lost... you know. But there was always supposed to be some kind of task for the Hero to accomplish to earn the Master Sword."
"And right now, it has to do with those pendants?" Link guessed.
Zelda nodded.
Link frowned, and kicked the altar.
"So how come I didn't have any problem taking you last time, you stupid sword?" He yelled. "I was only 5 years old!"
"I don't understand it either." Zelda sighed. "Maybe the safety measure were long gone, but just... reactivated after last time?"
"AH! That's a whole lot of good!" Link shouted angrily at the sword, kicking the altar again.
"But that's not how magic works..." Zelda said, refuting her own argument. "Permanent magic like that doesn't wear out, and it certainly doesn't spontaneously reappear."
"You know what? I'm going to go see." Link said. "Maybe I did do whatever the sword wants. Maybe it's really easy. I'll hide in the trees so he doesn't see me."
Zelda nodded without enthusiasm, but Link didn't see her. His body had already sunk against the altar, his mind gone into the past.
He got up, as usual, only a few seconds later. He looked disgusted.
"They were there." He said. "Three pendants, right on the altar. I'm not sure I even noticed them. I just ran up, took the sword and ran off. Someone put them there for me… I don't know who the idiot is…"
"It was probably Ganon." Zelda guessed.
Link's face fell briefly, before recomposing into sheer rage.
"Din blasted Nayru forsaken PIG!" He yelled. He kicked the altar again, because it was the nearest thing he could kick.
"So he didn't do anything with the pendants, you say?" Zelda asked. "They were just there on the altar, and he took the sword without any problem?"
"Yes." Link hissed, still busy kicking the altar.
"It seems like we just need to gather the pendants here, then. That's good." She said, smiling. "I mean," she added upon seeing his doubtful look, "it's still a problem that we have to get them, but at least there isn't any spell we have to chant or anything like that."
"But we don't know where they are! What if Ganon has them?"
"Well, that's possible. But I think it's more likely that like the Master Sword, they've returned to their natural places."
"But we don't know where THAT is, either!"
Zelda looked surprised, and like something had just dawned on her.
"That's why you look so worried!" She said. "It's the first time you've ever heard of those pendants, isn't it?"
Link just looked at her, puzzled.
"The pendants of the Goddesses, made from the sacred stones. It doesn't ring a bell? Well, no matter. The point is, they're in the old Three Wonders."
"The what?" Link asked, dumbfounded.
"Never heard of them either? Well, most people haven't." Zelda said, looking extremely pleased with herself. "The Three Wonders were the three biggest, most magnificent structures at one time: the Eastern Palace, the Desert Temple and the Tower of Hera. They're very old, so there is probably not much left of them, but if the pendants went back to their homes, they will be in the ruins."
"You know where those places are?" Link asked.
"Yes." Zelda answered confidently. "Roughly."
"Roughly?"
"The Eastern Palace will probably be the easiest," she continued, ignoring the interruption, "so I'd rather start there. If the pendant is not there, we can at least avoid going to the desert or to Death Mountain. It would be faster to start with the desert, but it's just too dangerous to go there unless we know for sure that we have to."
"Death Mountain?" Link exclaimed, his face suddenly drained of all colour. "One of those things is on Death Mountain?"
"The Tower of Hera." Zelda confirmed. "Don't worry. I'm sure Death Mountain can't be as bad as they say."
Link shuddered, not sharing her optimism.
"Well, it's not like we have a choice." He sighed. "Should we get going now?"
Zelda looked uncertain.
"I don't like leaving when it's getting late like this." She said. "Almost half of the day is gone already. But on the other hand, it will take more than a day of walk to get all the way east, and that's where the palace is. So, we'll be outside of the Woods at night no matter what."
"I really think Ganon knows we're here." Link said thoughtfully. "I think we should try to be really far from here before we're out at night."
Zelda nodded.
"You're right." She said. "We'll leave as soon as the sun rises."
They both slept that night, pretty much passing out as soon as the night fell. They were jerked awake by the sound of howling beasts.
Link shot up to a sitting position and whipped his head around, seeing nothing at first, but extending his arm towards Zelda to shake and wake her anyway. His hand found hers, and she squeezed to let him know she was awake. Link looked slowly around, looking for a gap in the circle of eyes he could now just make out.
The Wolfos howled again. Link tore up, grabbing Zelda's hand, and running blindly towards the only gap he had seen. He hit a tree head first and bounced back from it, falling on his backside. Zelda felt him hitting something and managed to stop in time to stay up. She helped him back to his feet and started going around the tree, but felt Link pulling her up. Understanding he was climbing the tree, she let go of his hand and started climbing too.
Link had not climbed a tree since he had started work at 6 years old, but his hands and feet were finding branches and knots with a supernatural ease. He could feel Zelda's hands brushing his ankles, so he knew she was right behind him. He could hear the Wolfos growling, howling and scratching, and could feel the vibration when they clawed and jumped at the tree. They were already out of reach, but he kept climbing, wanting to put as much distance as possible between the monsters and himself. He only stopped when he ran out of holds, just as he reached a big fat branch that was almost perfectly level with the ground. He scurried on it and sat, hissing at Zelda to get on as well. She followed and they stayed there for what seemed like hours, listening to the Wolfos trying to get up the tree. Their noises were eventually augmented by the sound of rattling bones and piggish grunts as they were joined by Stalfos and Moblins.
"That sounds like Moblins!" Link whispered. "But... they're not real!"
"Yes, they are." Zelda whispered back. "Why are we whispering? They know we're here."
"You're… you're right." Link said, forcing himself to speak in a normal tone but unable to keep his voice from shaking.
Zelda put a hand on his shoulder, and found that it was not just his voice shaking, but his whole body. She could understand why: it was dark and they were surrounded by an army of monsters: two things he feared all in one. She blinked in the dark. Link hadn't had any problem on any of the previous few nights with the darkness, yet she had been sure that it was indeed one of his phobias.
"Link... aren't you afraid of the dark?" She asked.
"Yes." He snapped.
"I thought so… I wonder why the dark didn't bother you last night, or the ones before that. I mean, we haven't even had night candles like at my house."
"I just... felt safe. I thought monsters never went into the Lost Woods." Link said, feeling very foolish to have made such an assumption.
Zelda did not answer, and as they waited, the noise below them grew steadily worse. Link found himself wishing the Lost Woods lived up to their legend a bit more, although he didn't really think all the monsters turning into StalChildren, who were, if he was not mistaken, just slightly smaller Stalfos, would help all that much. He gripped the branch they were both sitting on with his hands, wondering how long he'd resist the urge to seek shelter in Zelda's arms. He could feel himself shaking, he thought his heart was about to jump out of his chest, and he felt more terrified each minute that passed.
Zelda was terrified as well, and her only company being a shivering and nearly hyperventilating 'hero' was not in the least reassuring. She wanted to hug Link, half to provide him with some comfort and half to provide herself with some, but she did not dare. He didn't seem to want to touch her. She nuzzled against the trunk of the tree instead.
Below them, the monsters were getting louder and louder as their numbers swelled. From their position, Zelda and Link could only see the horde's glowing eyes when they looked up, and so, had no idea exactly how many there were. From the volume of the noise, they could only guess there were a lot.
Ganon's minions were trying to cut the tree down, but they couldn't even get through the bark. They were very afraid: they knew they were not welcomed in the Lost Woods, and they feared what would happen to them if they did not leave soon. At the same time, they were completely bound by Ganon's order to bring him the boy and the girl if they were found, and they could not leave without them until they started melting in the sun. So, even though they desperately wanted to leave the Lost Woods and even though their simple minds already understood that they would not succeed in bringing the tree down, they kept trying. The sun rose with all the monsters Ganon had sent into the Lost Woods grouped around the tree at the top of which sat the exhausted and trembling boy and girl. The Wolfos were still clawing and howling, the Stalfos were still hitting the tree with their swords and screaming, and the Moblins were still using their various weapons, or in some cases, their claws, to try to pierce the bark and down the tree, without success. Zelda and Link had long since abandoned their pride and were holding each other close, each of them shaking as much as the other.
When the Deku Tree woke at dawn, he knew only two things: two friends were hiding in his branches, and monsters were trying to down him to get at them. The presence of the monsters would have been unacceptable any time, but the threat they represented to whoever it was he could feel hiding on him was what decided him to take decisive action and to give them the most severe punishment the Lost Woods were capable of inflicting.
The noise suddenly stopped and when it did not start again for several minutes, Link and Zelda slowly opened their eyes and peered downward. They gasped.
Zelda didn't know whether she felt more relieved or more horrified. Below them, as far as they could see, the floor of the forest was covered with them: every little bit of space between the trees was occupied, and to leave the forest, it was obvious that she and Link would have to walk over them.
"They're statues?" She heard Link ask next to her.
"Yes." A voice answered before she could. It was a powerful, booming voice, yet the tone was gentle. The gentleness was completely lost on Link, who cried out and held her tighter.
"Who's there?" Zelda asked loudly.
"There is no need to shout, young girl." The voice answered. "I am the tree you are in."
Zelda froze and tightened her own grip on Link. They were in a tree that turned living things to stone? She expected Link to start shaking all over again, and was doing a good job convincing herself that it was to reassure him that she was holding him so tight, but Link let go of her, thankfully not going so far as to make her let go of him, and lifted his head, looking at the trunk.
"You talk!" He said. "Did you help me climb last night?"
Zelda stared at him, stunned.
"I thought I was only dreaming." The tree answered. "I had a dream where a long lost friend was in great danger and was trying to climb on me, and in my dream, I guided his hands to my knots and branches. A long lost friend... yes. Yes, I thought so. I do know you."
"You're the Great Deku Tree, right?" Link asked. "And you remember me? But that was really long ago..."
"I don't remember you. I KNOW you. You are the Hero. I will know you no matter how many times you are reborn. So did my ancestors, so will my descendants."
"Link... what is going on?" Zelda asked. "You know that tree?"
Link nodded. "I saw it when I went back to see the Hero of Time after he beat Ganon. He scared me half to death, but he was friends with the Hero."
"You saw the Hero of Time AFTER he defeated Ganon?" The Great Deku Tree asked.
"Yeah." Link confirmed. "And you. But it was really long ago, it's no wonder you don't remember."
"After he defeated Ganon, the Hero of Time disappeared, never to return." The Tree said. "The rumour was that the Princess arranged for him to grow up into an alternate version of Hyrule, where Ganon never ruled. If you have met him after his victory, those rumours must have been true, and you must have met him and my ancestor in this alternate Hyrule."
The Tree smiled.
"Thank you, Hero. I am glad to finally find out for sure that my child was all right."
"So that wasn't really you…" Link mused. It explained why the Princess had buried the medallions for the Hero. She knew if he buried them, it would be in that other Hyrule, not the one the medallions needed to be in.
Zelda finally let go of him and turned to look at the trunk too. "Thank YOU." She said to it. "You saved our lives."
"You must be the Princess." The tree said. "Yes... I can feel the aura. You are welcomed."
"I don't mean to be rude," Zelda said. "But we must get going. We meant to leave the Woods at the crack of dawn and that was almost half an hour ago."
"Right." Link said.
They climbed down the tree onto the pile of statues, which were already half covered in vegetation, thanked the Deku Tree profusely, and after a quick check of their map, were on their way.
Ganon, back in the President's body, could just barely restrain himself from ripping apart everyone nearby. His monsters, who, on his orders, had been scouring the Lost Woods for the boy and the girl, had just been somehow destroyed, all at once. Ganon could not imagine the boy having done that: even the most dangerous heroes armed with a full arsenal would not have been able to kill that many monsters at once.
Not knowing what had happened was infuriating, but if it had only been a few dozens of his monsters, it would not have bothered him all that much. It would have been nagging enough for him to do his best to try and find out how his minions had been disposed of, but it would have been simple curiosity driving him, not the blinding rage he felt now.
The problem was that he had been impatient, and sent every last one of his Stalfos, Wolfos and Moblins into the Lost Woods. His whole army, all of the creatures smart enough to actually obey commands, every last one of his slaves, were lost. He would now have to hunt down the Hero and Princess alone, and if he did not want to have to deal with the Hyrulians trying to hunt HIM down, he still had to keep in control of the President's body. That meant he had to spend as much time inside that weak and useless body, playing President, as he did in his own body. He could not afford to spend another day away from his 'host': the last time he had tried, the President had almost managed to regain control.
Despite the Presidential Guards looking for them, without Ganon himself or monsters to threaten them, the boy and the girl would be able to move from one location to another, making the search for them more difficult. Ganon clenched his teeth and tightened his lips to keep himself from snarling. He turned his attention back on the farmers that were currently begging him to reduce their quotas. He silenced them with a hand gesture, denied their request and sent them away crying. He smiled in spite of himself: there would obviously be some executions at that farm this month.
Once the farmers were gone, he called the guards and ordered for the edge of the Lost Woods to be lined with guards so that nobody could get out without being caught.
It was less than an hour since dawn when guards from all over Hyrule started to arrive at the Lost Woods. Link and Zelda had escaped them by a mere half hour.
"Aren't you hungry?" Link asked. "I'm hungry."
It was a perfectly legitimate question: they had not eaten anything but fruits for days and were generally hungry all the time. And today, they had left the Woods without any breakfast at all. She sighed and admitted that yes, she was hungry too.
"Good!" Link said. "Let's go see if Kariko can slip us some food. She told me some of their quotas are easy to reach." He chose not to elaborate on his friend's cursing about the supervisors' taking all the surplus for themselves.
Zelda considered for a moment before following Link, who was already walking south, towards the town's farms. Her stomach grumbled. She trotted to catch up.
"We have to be very careful." She said. "Nobody else than your friend should see us."
Link nodded and led the way to the right farm.
They had to creep along for nearly an hour, hiding behind the taller crops and any big object they could find, before Link finally found Kariko. She was feeding the cuckoos, and had a look on her face that plainly said she would have much rather been feeding herself with said cuckoos. There was nobody else around.
Zelda was trying to stop herself from staring before Link's friend noticed them, but it was difficult. The poor girl was hideous. Zelda tried to imagine the face as it might have been if half of it had not been missing, and came up with a mental image of a spectacularly ugly girl. She shook her head to chase the thought, but her eyes went straight to Kariko again. In addition to her scars, she was sunburnt, just like most farm workers. Zelda idly wondered whether the scarred tissue was more sensitive than the undamaged skin. She didn't have time to consider the matter further, as Link tapped her shoulder to signal he was about to reveal himself.
Kariko was staring into space in their general direction. Link got up partway from behind the wheel-barrel they were using as a hiding place and waved. Kariko gasped and dropped her basket of chicken feed. She looked quickly around, then rushed to the wheel-barrel. She went right around it and threw herself in Link's arms.
"You're alive!" She whispered, hugging him. She sounded beyond relieved.
"You thought I was dead? Why?" He asked, returning the unexpected hug.
Kariko backed away, but she was grinning in joy. Zelda would have loved to think Kariko looked better when she smiled, but if anything, it made her look worse.
"They say the guards chased you into the Lost Woods." Kariko said, still whispering. "I can't believe they think you're a murderer!" She added.
"The President made that up because he works for Ganon." Zelda whispered as an explanation.
Kariko turned to her, her remaining eye narrowed in a scowl.
"You." She hissed. "You're Zelda, aren't you?"
Zelda swallowed her saliva and nodded.
"You're crazy." Kariko stated. "Go fight Ganon… AH! He's already dead, for crying out loud! I don't know how you dragged Link into this..."
She turned to Link.
"Why are you doing this?" She asked. "And where have you been? How did you stay safe? Lately, anyone who goes out at night gets killed!"
"We were in the Lost Woods..." Link started.
"You were? So the guards really did chase you in there? How did you get out? Dekussay is going to be really happy! We thought you were dead! But you didn't answer me. Why are you playing along with her?" Kariko said, putting all the contempt and disdain in the world into the pronoun and looking sideways at Zelda with a disgusted look on her face.
"Because we need to defeat Ganon!" Link answered as if it should have been obvious.
Kariko looked at him with pity, and shot Zelda a murderous look.
"Link... you don't really believe that, do you? She:" she pointed at Zelda. "Is not a wise Princess, she's a crazy supervisor. And you? Come on! You're a coward! A nice coward, and I really like you, but you're not a Hero! And Ganon! We killed him about 900 years ago!"
"I believe I'm the Hero because I remember my last battle with Ganon." Link cut in when Kariko paused for breath. "We went to the museum on Farore Day, and I saw my skeleton, and it made me remember it. I remember EVERYTHING about it, like it happened yesterday." He shuddered. "And it wasn't a dream, trust me."
Kariko swallowed her saliva. Link's argument was rather hard to counter.
"Well, it explains the ears." She sighed. "But how do you know she's the Princess? I still say she's crazy, and she was just lucky to find you. And Ganon? He's GONE. Whoever you are, you don't need to fight a monster that's not there! And even if he was, you can't even fight!"
Zelda tucked her hair behind her pointy ears and coughed a bit. Kariko turned towards her, looking quite furious that Zelda dared to try and say something. Her jaw fell.
"That doesn't prove anything." She said, but it was clear that she didn't believe that herself.
"I also remember encounters with Ganon." Zelda whispered, starting to feel quite angry with Link's friend. "Who, by the way, IS back and is responsible, along with his army of monsters, for all the murders. And whether you believe me or not about this, your friend", she pointed at Link, "is hungry and we came to see you hoping you could give us some food. We need to get going, so can you or can't you?"
Kariko hesitated. The quotas this month were insanely high, and would be very difficult to reach. She went through the different stocks they had, trying to think of one for which even this month's quota would not be a problem, and could only think of one, which happened to be close at hand as well.
"How about some eggs?" She asked Link. "I don't know if I can give you anything else."
Link grinned.
"That would be great!" He said. "I don't care if we have to eat them raw..."
"We won't. We can cook them on a stone in ashes." Zelda said. "Thank you." She said to Kariko, smiling the smile of peace.
Kariko rolled her eye.
"I still hate you." She said. "If anything happens to Link… "
"I'll never forgive myself and will gladly let you kill me slowly and painfully." Zelda interrupted her.
Kariko rolled her eye again.
"You're not going to have to LET me." She said.
She got up and went into the cuckoo den. She came back a few minutes later with 12 eggs, which Zelda put into her bag. Kariko turned to Link, and much to his surprise, hugged him again.
"I'm really happy you're okay." She said into his shoulder. "Take care, all right?"
Link nodded, at a loss for word. If Kariko hadn't been so nasty to Zelda, called him a coward and had not talked too much for him to even be able to answer her questions, he would have thought she was a fake.
Zelda poked him and he disengaged himself from the hug, smiled in what he hoped was a reassuring manner at Kariko, and turned to leave through the corn field that was a few steps away from the wheel-barrel. He felt a hand on his shoulder and turned his head. Kariko had a blank expression on her face, but her eye was burning a hole into the spot between his.
"So, you're sure about this? You're the Hero, and Ganon is back, and you have to fight him?" She said.
Link nodded. Kariko sagged a bit, looking utterly miserable.
"Good luck." She said. She had meant to try to talk him out of it, but he looked so certain of himself that she didn't think she'd accomplish anything more than get him angry and waste his time.
Link smiled at her, thanked her and ran the few steps to the corn. Kariko watched the pair disappear into the corn, clenched her teeth and went back to the cuckoos.
Zelda refused to stop as long as they were still near town, so they kept walking east until the morning changed into the afternoon. They had passed the last outskirt houses a while ago, and there was nothing around them but open fields dotted with a few trees. They weren't following the road, so the fields around them were unbroken and it looked like they might go on forever.
Link started picking any branches he could find on the ground near the trees, hoping Zelda would take the hint and finally stop. She did, took the branches from Link and started to build a fire.
"We're far enough from anyone now, I think we're safe to stop for a bit." She said. "We'll still need to walk until night time after we eat, though. You're not too tired, are you?"
"I'm going to be fine once I eat." Link said. "I'm going to go find a stream or something while you cook. Aren't you thirsty?"
"Yes." Zelda answered with a small chuckle. "But I filled my water pouch in the Woods last night, before we went to sleep. I don't remember whether it was from a river, a waterfall, a puddle or a great big lake, but it's full."
"Why didn't you tell me?" Link scowled. "I've been thirsty all day!"
"Sorry." Zelda said. "But you didn't ask, and besides, we don't know how long that water has to last, so we need to save it. Find me two rocks to start the fire, would you?"
Link grumbled something about water not being that hard to find, but got up and looked for the rocks she had requested anyway. He wanted the fire going and the eggs cooking even more than he wanted to annoy her. He found suitable rocks fairly quickly, brought them back to her, and took a few steps back to avoid any sparks and to be a safe distance from the fire once it got going, which didn't take long.
"Now, let's see..." Zelda said, getting up. She looked around and started digging. Link went in behind her to see what she was doing just as she was extracting two flat topped rocks from the ground. She squirted a bit of water on them and used her skirt to wipe them clean of the dust that was on them, then dropped one right next to the fire and the other one a pace or two further.
"We just have to wait until this stone is hot from the fire, then we crack the eggs on it and hopefully, they'll cook."
"You don't know for sure?" Link asked. "Hey, weren't you going to put the stone in the ashes? Do you know what you're doing at all?"
"I know I need a hot flat surface to cook the eggs on, so I'm trying to get a flat rock to become hot!" Zelda said angrily. "The ashes would be fine if you want to wait an hour, but I don't, so I'm trying to save time!"
"Just asking." Link said, making a peaceful gesture with his hands.
Zelda grunted at him and made a drop of water fall from her pouch to the stone. Link wanted to ask why she had done that, but thought better of it.
"I'm sorry about Kariko." He said instead, trying to make peace although he didn't know why she was angry. "She's almost always mean, even with me and Dekussay, but she doesn't actually mean it."
"She meant it for me." Zelda said. "But it's okay. She gave us some food, so it was a good thing we went to see her. I'm sorry for getting angry."
She almost didn't add in the apology, but she meant it. Link's asking whether she knew what she was doing had hit a nerve, because she really didn't. She was going east because the Eastern Temple was in the East. She didn't actually know quite where it was, though, and she had no idea whether there would be anything left of it, or whether the pendant would be there after all. Here they were, in the open, with Ganon and who knew what else after them, having barely escaped death the night before, and she didn't even know exactly where to go and what they would find there. None of that was Link's fault, however, and she had no right to take it out on him.
"It's okay." Link said, relieved. He could understand how Zelda felt: he too was feeling angry a lot lately. "Can you cook the eggs yet?" He asked, more to change the subject than out of impatience.
"I'm waiting for the stone to be hot enough." Zelda said. She dripped a drop of water on the stone again, and this time, it hissed. "There, that should do it."
She cooked them 3 eggs each, using a flatter branch among the ones Link had picked up as a spatula and transferring the cooked eggs to the second flat stone she had brought. Although they ended up with very messy eggs that they had to eat with their fingers and although they had no bread to soak the yolks with this time, Link was so hungry that he enjoyed them even more than the first time he had had fried eggs. They ate quickly, put out the fire and set out again, veering a bit north. Link wondered if the fire's ashes would give away where they had been, but Zelda just shrugged the matter aside.
"If he looks for signs of us here, it will be because he already knows we are going east, and a single fire won't tell him which way we went from there."
"Do you think he knows we're going to go get the pendants? What if he's waiting for us at that Palace?" Link asked, voicing a worry he had had ever since they had left the Lost Woods.
Zelda did not answer for a long time.
"I'm sorry, I just don't know." She finally said. "If he is, we're dead. I'm hoping he'll assume we don't know about the pendants and where to find them, or at least that he can't be out during the day at all."
Link left it at that and they walked without mentioning Ganon again until the sun set. They stopped for the night, but neither of them slept, too afraid of being caught by Ganon or his monsters.
No monster found them, and they didn't even hear any screams attesting that they had found anyone else.
They ate their remaining eggs the following morning and set out again.
"We should have gotten you a sword." Zelda sighed shortly after they had started to walk. "We're completely unarmed. I should have thought of that... I wanted to get you one when we went to the library, remember? I haven't thought of it since. Stupid!" She scolded herself.
She sounded miserable and Link, although he felt like refusing to even consider getting a sword other than the one he would have to fight Ganon with, took pity on her and tried to reassure her instead.
"There's a town this way." He said soothingly, pointing ahead of them. "See the smoke?"
Zelda looked where he was pointing and could see, coming from right on the other side of the low hill they were climbing, smoke rising into the sky.
"There might be a sword shop!" She said happily.
Now that she was not so gloomy anymore, Link's fear took priority over his pity for her again.
"I don't really want a sword, though." He said. "I know I HAVE to use to Master Sword, but I don't want one until then. And anyway, we don't have any money to buy one."
Zelda ignored his protest entirely, except for the practical part of it.
"We're not going to buy one." She said. "We'll steal one. If we bought one, it would be reported and Ganon would hear about a boy and a girl buying a sword, and would guess it's us."
"But if we steal one, Ganon is going to hear about that too, isn't he? And I don't WANT one."
"He won't. Swords get stolen all the time, we used to have to count them every morning and one or two a month would go missing. People swipe them to try and defend themselves at night."
"But I don't WANT a sword!"
"I know," she said, finally acknowledging this part of his argument, "but you need practice and you need something to defend yourself with. Would you rather have a sword if we come face to face with a monster in that palace, or not have one?"
"I bet I can run faster without one."
"You can't run. Not until we find the pendant or until we're sure it's not in there."
"We could make the shop miss their quota." Link said as a last resort. He knew that if swords got stolen regularly, that scenario wasn't likely, but he was running out of arguments.
Zelda cast her eyes down and stopped walking, her head hung low. Link stopped too and stood there looking at her, waiting for her to argue back that they were trying to save the world and that they really needed a sword, and that it was the only way. She didn't say anything, so he eventually got closer to her and bent down to look at her face to face. He backed away immediately, shocked: she was crying.
"Zelda?" He called. "Why are you crying?"
"Because you're right." She said with a trembling voice. "They can probably make up one missing sword, but what if they can't? I... I just don't know what else to do. We can't go on without any weapon, we can't go on just running away... even the Lost Woods aren't safe anymore!"
"Yes they are." Link lied, trying to be reassuring. "The Great Deku Tree turned all those monsters into statues! I bet he can do it again!"
"In the morning, he did." Zelda said, her voice still trembling. She looked and sounded like she was trying very hard not to burst into tears again. "And they were attacking him, they were all close to him. He didn't do anything all night, and I don't think he would have known the monsters were there if they had stayed away from him."
"Where do the swords go when they leave the shop?" Link asked, hardly believing he was actually trying to help Zelda figure out how to make him carry a sword around. "Can we try to get one from there?"
"In our town, they go to Town Hall until they are taken to the soldiers, guards and merchants." Zelda said. "But if we take one from there, we may get a guard into trouble."
"Will they notice if there's one missing?" Link asked. "You think they count them every day?"
Zelda shrugged.
"I don't know." She admitted. "But I doubt they stay in storage long. Even assuming they are stored in Town Hall and we can find where that is in this town, chances are there will be nothing there."
Link sighed, defeated. He didn't know what else to suggest, although at least, Zelda was calm again.
"Let's keep walking." Zelda said after a minute. "We might think of something when we get there."
They arrived at the town less than an hour later, and found its streets to be just like the ones in their own town during the day: practically deserted. They first passed farms, and then dorms, indicating they were in the lower class side of town.
"We should try to see if we can find Town Hall. We might be able to see how many guards there are around the sheds... assuming the shops' productions are in sheds at Town Hall here too, anyway." Zelda whispered as they walked. "I can only see two other options if we can't steal a sword from there: the sword shop or a high class house - to swipe one someone else stole. I don't really want to do either." She added.
"How about we just forget about it?" Link suggested helpfully, whispering as well. "I think I told you before, I don't WANT..."
"You need one." Zelda interrupted. "Look, I'll help you carry it, alright? Whenever you can't take it anymore, I'll take it for a while."
"Maybe you could just keep it and fight the monsters for me?" Link said. "Who says you're not going to be better at this than me?"
"I'm not nearly as good with my hands as you are, for one thing." Zelda said. "I also think you need all the practice you can get before you face Ganon and him, I really can't fight for you."
Link sighed resignedly. They stopped talking, both of them looking around for the downtown area. Zelda finally spotted a flag in between buildings and, hoping it was in front of a public building, headed in that direction.
The flag, it turned out, was in front of the very building they had been looking for: Town Hall. They walked the streets around it, looking for sheds and guards. They found the sheds, in behind the building, but there were no guards around. Zelda frowned.
"No guards..." She murmured.
"How many are there at home?"
"I don't know." Zelda answered truthfully. "I've never actually been to Town Hall other than with school, and then, there were extra guards to guide us and tell us what everything was about."
Having no idea that almost all the guards in Hyrule were now around the Lost Woods to try and catch them when they came out, Zelda had to assume another reason behind the sheds not being watched.
"It's probably because they're empty." She said. "There's no guard because there's nothing to guard in there. But let's look anyway, just in case."
She looked around, making sure there was nobody in the vicinity. She then walked right towards the shed, trying to look like she belonged there. She made it to the nearest one, opened the door and peered inside. She gasped. She stood at the doorway, staring inside the shed.
Link swallowed his saliva, knowing he should join her but feeling like something was bound to jump at him if he walked in the open. He braced himself and ran to Zelda as fast as he could. He looked past her shoulder into the shed and his eyes widened. The shed was very big, and was completely filled with swords: there were piles upon piles, almost all the way to the ceiling.
"Whoa." He said. "I never thought we made that many swords every month! Unless… do you think the shop in this town is bigger?"
"I think this is at least 10 years worth of swords." She said. "Look at the dust on some of these piles!"
"But if they have extra swords here, why did they increase the quota for our shop?"
"You don't understand." Zelda said. "Some of these swords have been here for years. And there are so many... our quota used to be about 300 a month, and even now it's still only 500, and there are thousands here. With that many swords just sitting in storage, all the sword shops should be given very small quotas, or even closed for a few months. Last time we didn't fill our quota... they executed four people, but the few swords we were missing didn't even matter!"
"So you're saying it would be okay to stop making swords for a while? But then, why did our quota go up?"
"Busy work..." Zelda murmured angrily. "It's just busy work! We're working ourselves sore to meet insane quotas and it's just busy work! They could at least distribute the swords to the population! We need to get out of here quick, Link. They can't want anyone to know about this, so whatever the reason is that we haven't seen any guards yet, it won't last."
She grabbed the nearest sword and suddenly thought she couldn't really just walk out with a sword and expect not to be noticed. She had to hide the weapon until they were out of town.
"I need something to attach this to my leg, so I can hide it under my skirt." She said, looking around.
Link looked around too, but there was nothing at all remotely resembling a piece of string around. He pondered ripping part of his clothes off, and looked down at himself, wondering where the least inconvenient place to be missing a piece of fabric would be. That's when he noticed the string that held the head opening on his tunic closed to his neck. He took it off and handed it to Zelda.
"Will that do?" He asked. "I lost it once and I didn't have one for days, and nobody asked me any question."
"Your tunic being green will probably attract more attention than it being opened at the top anyway." Zelda said, smiling and taking the string. "I think it's long enough... turn around, please."
Link did as told and killed the minute it took Zelda to tie the sword around her thigh by looking out for guards. He saw none.
"Still no guards?" Zelda asked when she was done, joining him at the door.
"No." Link said. "How about we get out of town as fast as we can? I don't like being here... I'm afraid someone is going to see us."
Zelda nodded and they walked as fast as they could without actually running until they were out of the little town. They saw no one safe for a few children playing.
Zelda untied the sword as soon as they passed the last farm and gladly took it off her leg. The tip of it had scratched the side of her calf pretty badly. She did not want to put the image of the sword maiming her while she carried it into Link's head so she didn't mention it.
They had to stop walking when the sun set: the night was too dark to keep going. Link clenched his jaw and gulped. He did not think he could go without sleep for another night.
"Maybe we can take turns staying awake, so we can wake the other up if anything comes this way. We're pretty far from that town, so maybe it will be as quiet as last night, but we can't count on it." Zelda said.
He nodded. "Do you want to sleep first?" He asked.
"Sure." She said, too tired to return the courtesy he was showing. She lied down and was asleep within seconds.
Link stayed up until the moon finally rose, with no idea how much of the night was left. He had waited for the moon to rise simply because with the glow of the moon, it was not as dark and he would be able to relax enough to sleep.
Like the night before, he didn't hear anything. He found himself wondering whether it was possible that all the monsters had been in the Lost Woods the previous night.
He woke Zelda up and promptly fell asleep.
She woke him up the following morning, just as the sun was rising, and after a drink of water, they set out again.
"Did you hear any screams last night?" Link asked almost as soon as they started walking.
"A short one, coming from far away." Zelda answered. "How about you?"
"Nothing. I wonder if the monsters that got turned into statues were killing a lot, and I wonder if there are any left."
"I've been wondering about that too." Zelda said. "It's possible Ganon is the only one left murdering people, I suppose... it would be nice. Less victims, and..." she stopped, suddenly looking very ashamed.
"What?"
"Well, if Ganon is the only one left murdering people, we'll know he is far when we hear faraway screams and close when we hear close ones." Zelda muttered.
The idea left Link happy to have a way to know where Ganon was and utterly miserable to find himself happy about people being murdered. He tried to tell himself that it was the fact that less people were being killed that was useful, but he still felt like a monster.
"I really hope I can win." He said after a few minutes.
"Me too." Zelda said.
They were both quiet until they stopped for a break hours later, each lost in their own thoughts.
Zelda had been carrying the sword until their break, but handed it to Link as they got up to head east again.
Link stared at the sword and started shaking. The blade was naked and did not look friendly at all. He looked at Zelda with the best pleading look he could muster, but she gave him the same look right back, still holding the sword out to him, handle first.
Link looked at the sword again, trying to concentrate on the handle. He had grabbed the Master Sword's handle, he had to be able to grab that one. He willed his hand to move towards the handle and to close on it. He then jerked his hand back with a yelp and it was all he could do not to take a few steps away from the sword.
Zelda was patiently holding the sword out, her face expressionless. If Link had bothered to try and guess what she was actually feeling, he would have bet on anger and disappointment, mostly because that was pretty well how he felt about himself at the moment. He grabbed the sword again, and concentrated on not letting go of it. After a while, Zelda let go and he was holding the sword by himself. It fell downward a bit before he could adjust to the weight that Zelda had been carrying, and then he was holding it parallel to the ground, pointy part as far away from himself as he could. Zelda took a step sideways so the sword would not be pointed right at her anymore.
She smiled, very proud of Link. He did not seem to notice, concentrated as he was on holding the sword. She had kept herself from showing any emotion while he was trying to grab the handle, to avoid distracting him, but she had felt like grinning: he was actually trying to take the sword, without any threat to him if he didn't!
Link eventually made some movements with the sword, swinging it very slowly and carefully. He held it from then on, if rather stiffly, and never asked Zelda to take it back. The following morning, he even started talking again and his eyes were no longer constantly locked on the blade. There had been no screams again that night, safe for one that sounded very far away.