A/N: I own nothing except a copy of this great game. Second note: A single singer is demarked in italics "like this", while a crowd singing is demarked "like this."

His hearing came back first.

It a ringing in the ears, followed by voices. They were muffled, as though someone had stuffed cotton in his ears. Then came thinking. Wait, what happened? He willed his eyes open. Too quickly. His head was pounding something awful, like he'd taken a hammer to the side of the skull. It was throbbing, and it made his eyes hurt. He closed them again, blinked once, and opened them again to see Lana kneeling beside him. His vision was blurry, but there was no mistaking that blue hair.

"Ssh, be still Link." She said. "You got banged up pretty good. I'm trying to fix you up good as new."

Link groaned in pain, and nodded. He wasn't quite at the point of comprehension where he could see what was going on. They were just outside of the Valley of Seers now, right at the point where the decaying land met the life and vibrance of the Hyrulian plains. The Ravagers and Hyrulian soldiers, those that had survived, had all retreated out here and were aimlessly wandering about. There was no drive to do anything, because how could they react to what they saw in front of them.

Across the land, there were three…openings that stood from the ground and seemed to rise up into the heavens. Around the portals were the landscape of the land that they knew, but within the boundaries of these massive openings were…somewhere else. It was like looking at a massive painting with the framing removed, and the blurry way the landscape within seemed to form gave everyone a great sense of unease.

Link groaned, feeling some of Lana's magic begin to take hold. He sat up slowly, with Lana reaching in and putting her hand behind his neck for stability.

"Where's…Ishaka?" Link managed to ask. Lana sighed.

"He's over there." She said. She pointed with her free hand, and Link looked in the direction she was pointing. There was the Ravager captain, sitting with his legs crossed, staring aimlessly at the ground. His pipe was lit and smelled of something sweet, but he wasn't smoking it. It just hung limply off of his bottom lip.

He looked like hell. A fading bruise around his eye, several nasty lacerations and cuts on his face, and deep bags under his eyes. But the most shocking thing was the fact that he had shaved his beard. Link vaguely remembered seeing him struck by Cia's dark lightning, and remembered a horrible smell like burning hair when he had run back to save the man. Ishaka must have shaved the rest of it off, down to a much more manageable stubble. He looked very young.

Ishaka looked up at Link, and offered a weak smile.

"'Ey there, 'ero." He said. He coughed a little bit. "Sleep well?"

Link nodded. Ishaka chuckled a little bit.

"Tha's good, tha's good. 'Fraid we mighta lost yeh back there." He turned around over his shoulder and pointed to the distance. "Ain't them some pretty ligh' shows, miss Lana?" He asked. He was speaking jovially, but Link and Lana could sense a deep pain inside of him. It would come out. It was only a matter of time.

"Those…those are the Gates of Souls…" Lana said. "I…I didn't think that it was possible. That kind of power of magic? I…I didn't know Cia could, oh Goddesses, this is-" She trailed off. Ishaka snorted.

"Welp, if'n yer not too thrill'd 'bout them, I'm gonna take a shot inna dark an' guess they ain't good." He started smoking again, but at this point it was clear he was just doing it to take his mind off of something.

At that moment, Impa and Sheik made their way to the group.

"Oh good, you're awake, Link." Impa said. "I was terrified that we'd lost both you and Ishaka here." Sheik nodded gravely.

"Indeed. The actions of this sorceress are beyond anything that I thought was possible. This is a grave development." He said. Impa looked at her, an eyebrow raised.

"Ah, yes." Impa began. "While we're on the subject, let's talk about this, hmm?"

With frightening speed, she had pulled out a dagger hidden in her sleeve, and was now pressing it against the side of Sheik's neck.

"Impa!" Lana shouted, springing up to her feet (and letting go of Link's head, who fell to the ground with a pained grunt).

"Getting some answers." Impa said. "While you have been more than accommodating to our questions, this one here has some explaining to do." She turned back towards Sheik, and gave the young man a withering look. "Speak."

"Speak of what?" Sheik asked. Through this entire exchange, the masked man had not even flinched nor batted an eye at the prospect of having his throat slashed by an enraged Sheikah warrior. Impa snarled.

"Do not play coy with me, boy." Impa said. "Think of the circumstances that we found you: while looking for the princess, a fact that Cia would no doubt have knowledge of, you appear out of nowhere and lead us through the Eldin Caves. You assure us that the princess is not dead, and you were supportive of an expedition to the Valley of Seers. And then, we walk into a trap that robs Link of the Triforce of Courage…and you of the Triforce of Wisdom." Impa took a deep breath. "I'm going to give you one chance. You will tell us exactly how you came upon the Triforce of Wisdom. You will tell us of your ties to Cia. And you will tell us where the princess is."

"And if you do not like the answers?" Sheik asked. Only his eyes were visible, but Link could see that he looked positively bored by Impa's threats.

"We'll see." Somehow those two words were more terrifying than any complicated death threat Impa could have gone with. The tension hung over the group like a cloud, and was enough to draw the attention of some of the nearby Ravagers and Hyrulians. Ishaka had staggered back up to his feet, and was waving them to stand by.

For now.

"My name is Sheik." The young man began. "And you are correct to wonder why I was in control of the Triforce of Wisdom. Such an artifact is the Royal Family's by birthright. The only ways for the current holder to relinquish control is by death, or by willing transferal to another. Of course, I doubt the princess would be pleased to see that I have lost her gift to another method: forcible extraction by supreme dark magic."

"Do you take me for a fool, boy?" Impa asked. "Do you expect me to believe you came across the princess, who proceeded to willingly give you the Triforce of Courage, an artifact blessed by the Goddesses?"

"Yes."

Ishaka bit his lip to keep from whistling. This Sheik had stones.

"You'd better be more specific." Impa said. She pressed the knife dangerously close to Sheik's carotid artery. Sheik raised an eyebrow.

"You assume the alternative is that I killed her and stole the Triforce?" He asked. Impa seethed in silence. At this silent accusation, Sheik's bored expression became annoyed. "Then clearly you do not know your princess as well as you thought, Impa."

"What on earth are you implying?" Impa asked.

"Do you seriously believe that a single Sheikah warrior such as myself could defeat the princess of Hyrule? Do you really think that she is such a harmless daffodil that the very thought of combat causes her to shiver in fear? No, she could have killed me at any time if she wanted to." His cheekbones seemed to rise up. The masked man was smiling. "She nearly did, come to think of it. I was walking through some woods to the northwest of the Castle town, when *thwock!* An arrow grazed my nose and embedded itself in the tree I was leaning against. She'd thought I was an agent of the dark, and only at the last possible moment did she recognize and correct her error."

He continued after a brief pause.

"She remembered me from when we were younger. My father had come in years ago, while the king of Hyrule was still alive, as one of the many tribals pledging allegiance to the realm. I remember you. You had to be called from the meeting because you needed to train for your test to become an expert in San-Sotuka's style of combat. You caused an awful ruckus, if I remember correctly."

Despite herself, Impa snorted. "Caused a ruckus," indeed. If merely folding her arms and pretending not to hear Lord Fawlty squawking that she needed to leave the throne room was causing a ruckus, then her sticking her tongue out as she left was worthy of an international incident. She also had a memory of several young-looking tribals who were allowed to interact with the princess. Perhaps this "Sheik" was one of them.

"Continue." Impa said. Sheik nodded.

"Well, she asked me if I remembered her. She was wearing…well, she certainly wasn't dressed up like a princess. More like a beggard. I said yes. You don't fail to recognize a princess who was nice to you, despite her social standing against your, even if she is wearing a disguise. She asked me if I could do something most important for her. I asked what it was. She held out her hand…and for the first time in my life I knew why men spent so much time competing for the favor of the Goddesses. That Triforce was beautiful, beyond compare. She asked me to safeguard it, and to find her loyal lieutenant, a mountainous man old beyond his years, and the hero. She said I would recognize him when I saw him. I spotted you first, Impa. You were leading the army out from the castle and into the plains towards the Eldin Caves. I quietly tracked you until it was illogical not to reveal myself, and then joined in your quest to stop Cia. I hoped that the princess would be able to reveal herself there, but alas I was mistaken."

"What do you mean, reveal herself there?" Impa asked.

"That's the thing." Sheik said. "She disappeared as soon as she gave me the Triforce. I mean, I blinked, and then she was gone. I wondered for a moment if I hadn't hallucinated the entire thing, only to feel the glow of the Triforce in my hand to remember that it was all real. Everything else, you know because I have never been let out of your sight. Honestly, I wonder if she does not get tired of your vigilance, Impa."

The Sheikah warrior ignored the playful jab, and stared long and hard at Sheik. Then she sighed.

"…Bizarrely plausible." She admitted. She slowly sheathed the knife.

"There's still plenty more that I would like to know, 'Sheik', but for now there are more important things to worry about. Right now, we need to deal with…whatever it is that those things are." She gestured to the glowing gates in the distance. "I think the wisest course of action is to rendezvous with Lord Grantham, and plan from there."

"I wonder what he will say?" Proxi asked, having emerged from hiding to sit on Link's shoulder.

"I didn't ask for this!"

The shout echoed across the halls of the Hyrulian castle, enough to make even the most stoic of Royal Guardsmen briefly flit their eyes in the direction of the outburst, before quietly returning to their post. Impa winced, and made a lowering motion with her hands.

"Elijah, keep it down!" She said. "The wrong person might hear you and think that there's something truly to despair about!"

"Impa, our subjects aren't blind!" Grantham said. He was pacing frantically across the room, one of his hands continually running through his hair. "Everyone can see those…gates as clear as day across the horizon. Do you have any idea what gossip can do to stoke fear? And by the Goddesses, this makes it easy! You could summon Gaius* through those portals! What on earth am I supposed to tell the nobles? That we have the situation under control? By Hylia, I spent literally the entire morning after you got back keeping them from voting to imprison you, Impa!" He said.

That dropped like a bomb. Everyone stared at him in shock. Sheik was the first to speak.

"Who led the motion?"

"Who else? Fawlty." Grantham spat bitterly on the stone floor. "He thought that Impa lied about having the situation under control, and got enough of the more spineless nobles to back a motion to have her imprisoned for…some trumped up charge of treason. I don't know, it was something they cooked up to make themselves feel like they were in control."

"Did it come close, gen'ral?" Ishaka asked. Grantham sighed, and shook his head.

"Thankfully, no. Lord Reedus, by virtue of being Lord Judicial, is the one that would ultimately sign off on such an order. And he was just as annoyed if not moreso than I was at this lunacy. The majority of my day was just talking them off of the ledge." He smirked. "I think I caught Reedus doodling on Fawlty's motion for arrest during the proceedings."

"If Reedus gave me a few minutes alone with Fawlty, I can assure you that his charges against me would have some merit." Impa said. Grantham laughed. It was the first time that his worried façade had broken.

"Oh dear, that would be something! I would pay to see that, though of course you're right and you would be imprisoned with merit. Though I appreciate the joke, Impa." He said.

Impa chuckled with him, though Ishaka had to bite his lip to keep from laughing: Impa was doing one of those "Haha just kidding…but seriously I meant it" laughs. He was apparently the only one to catch this.

"All jokes aside, we need to deal with this now. Who knows what Cia has planned?" Grantham asked. "And I am going to take a guess that she went through one of the portals. What is she looking for?"

"What she's looking for I can't say." Impa said. "But I agree. We must take the fight to her, again."

"Though what I propose is…going to be difficult." Grantham said. "You're going to have to hit all of them at the same time."

"What?" Impa asked. "That's absurd, Elijah, you and I both know that stretches our soldiers to the breaking point and-"

"-and it's the only thing that kept the council agreeing to fund your expedition." Grantham cut her off. "I told them that you would do it, and they believed me. You don't want your one ally to be deposed, do you?"

"That is remarkably cynical, Elijah." Impa said, crossing her arms across her chest.

"Got a better plan?" Grantham asked. Impa sighed and shook her head. No. No, she did not.

"Then how will we split everyone up?" Lana asked. Everyone turned to look at her, and she blushed in embarrassment. "Er, I mean, I figured that that was a given considering what we're supposed to do and-"

"No, no, that's brilliant Lana!" Impa said. "Practical, really. Let's see…" She was doing the mental math in her head, rubbing the bottom of her chin as she did so. "One of the portals, Link can go through. He is probably the most dominant of us in this group, so I think he can handle it by himself."

Link smirked in appreciation.

"Sheik and I will go through the next portal." Impa said. "I might need some backup."

That was a bold-faced lie. Impa could rip through an army of Bokoblins like a grain thresher if she wanted to. The reality that everyone figured was that she wanted to keep an eye on Sheik. The slight eye roll that the masked man gave further proved that he was aware of this. Thankfully, he said nothing.

"That leaves…Lana, take Ishaka and go through the next portal." Imp said. "That should be everyone. Any complaints?"

Lana looked slightly worried that she was going with Ishaka, judging by the slight glance she sent his way. Matters weren't helped when he let out a booming laugh, and hoisted her up on his shoulders. Lana let out a squeal of shock, and put a hand to her heart to calm her breathing once she was safely up.

"Hee hee hee! Jes' you an' me, miss Lana! We gonna take whatev'r th' world throws at us, innit tha' right?"

"Um…yes! Yes it is!" Lana said. Everyone else sort of smiled, and just shook their heads.

Later that night, as everyone lay asleep in wait for the inevitable journey that tomorrow would bring, once again Ishaka was alone on the balcony, having a smoke to himself. And once again, he felt a presence beside him.

"Yeh need ta stop doin' this. One a these days I'ma gonna lash out an' hurt some'un'." He said, partially joking.

"I could tell that something was bothering you." Sheik said, stepping out from the shadows. "You're normally much more…relaxed in your jovial nature. Today, some of those moments felt forced. Like you were keeping up appearances."

"Nah, I be fine, Sheik!" Ishaka said. "Yer jes' bein' a good kid, but I be fine."

"Right. And I was born yesterday." Sheik said. He hopped up and took a seat on the ledge, his back facing the abyss in front of them. He stared at Ishaka with those mysterious eyes. "What is it that bothers you so?"

There was a pause. Ishaka took a deep drag from his pipe. He let out a sigh.

"I 'ad a dream."

"Understandable. Most people do."

"Not like tha', ya ordo." Ishaka said. Sheik smiled, but the Ravager captain didn't see it. "It was a…I gues' it t'was less of a dream, an', an' more like an omen, yeh know?"

"I think so." Sheik said. "What was it about?"

"I was inna field. Dark. Grey. Ain't no signs a' intell'gent life anywhere." Ishaka said. "Thought I was dead. Cert'nly felt tha' way. I get up ta my feet, an' I hear a voice. Female. Pretty…" He trailed off, as if remembering the moment vividly. "Could jes' tell tha' th' lady tha' own'd tha' voice would blow me away."

"What was she saying?" Sheik asked.

"T'was 'ard ta make out at firs'." Ishaka said. "But…but then it got loud'r. She was sayin' 'I got plans fer ya, I hope yeh can find me.' An' I 'member shoutin' out, 'where? Where do I fin' yeh?' An' then th' voice is righ' in front'a me. 'Yeh'll fin' me,' she says, 'within th' fire yeh've been runnin' from.'" He looked at Sheik and shrugged. "Tha's when I woke up, an' miss Lana was treatin' me."

"That is quite the dream." Sheik said. He sighed. "I cannot tell you much, other than that clearly the Goddesses must have plans for you, Ishaka." Ishaka heard this, and frowned.

"Pfft. Sure they do." He started walking away. "I'm gonna go ta sleep. G'night, Sheik. See ya in th' morn." He genially made a motion like doffing a cap, and then walked back inside. Sheik watched him go, until he had disappeared into the blackness of the night. Then he turned back around, positioning himself so that his feet hung over the ledge of the balcony. Sighing, he looked down at his hand, where the scorched burn that once held the Triforce was.

It was getting hot. He lowered his face wraps, and felt the refreshingly cool wind blow against the lower half of his face. He took out his harp, and gently plucked the strings.

And as the moon rose in the night sky, it was greeted with the soft sounds of a sad song.

A/N: Hope you enjoyed this interlude. We begin the true meat of the story next chapter. Leave a review if you can. They'll always much appreciated.

HYRULIAN CODEX

Gaius – A popular Hyrulian myth. In the beginning, when the three Goddesses created the earth and all of existence, they realized that they needed a large being to serve as the base upon which all life could grow. And so Din, Goddess of Fire, created a massive rocky behemoth named 'Gaius' who was to serve as the earth itself. But Gaius had no intention of serving the three Goddesses, and began to thrash across the land, nearly shattering the earth itself. In the end, Din was forced to solicit her 'sisters' Nayru and Farore for help, and together the three cast Gaius into an eternal sleep,by spreading a cloud of miasmic gas that outstretched across all of existence in itself. This gas became the air that all living things need, and from there, life could grow and flourish on him. The only signs of his existence, Hyrulians like to tell their children, are the mountains across the land: for they are the pieces of Gaius that are too far above creation to be sufficiently influenced by the miasma, and so retain their rocky appearance. It is a popular folktale that at the end of time, the miasma will wear off, and Gaius will be free to rampage once more.