Chapter 9: With Every Step
As baba serpents slithered out from the walls, enclosing around his position, Link sprinted for the only reachable exit. He leapt sideways in his run to avoid being bitten by the teeth dripping with prolonged hunger. With a hop he propelled himself up one of the totem poles, tucking the boomerang inside his belt as he went. He had no time to center his balance atop the pole before the serpents above him began stretching their heads downward, and he leapt unsteadily for the opening in the wall.
Roughly, he caught onto the roots of several baba serpents nested there, and without delay he climbed their limbs to reach the crack a few feet above. His monkey friend had been able to stick to his tunic all the while. Just as the owners of Link's rope came at him, jaws snapping, he had lifted himself up and over.
Link fell through the opening head-first and dropped several feet before his hand latched onto a recess in the bark. His body jerked upright again and he was left dangling. Though grimacing at the strain put on his arm, he had to be thankful for being able to escape his previous predicament. However, his luck had gone from good to bad-for being stuck on the outside of a tree-to worse-for it was his sore shoulder that now kept him from falling into the abyss of the giant grove.
It was then he realized his monkey companion was no longer with him. Where it had gone he had no idea. It had been on his back when he had flown out of the lair. Now, he could only guess that it had fallen into the unknown below him.
Link bemoaned the death of the animal, for her felt entirely responsible. It had put its trust in him. His failure to protect it fueled his determination to press on.
He let out a grunt, from both the stress being put on his shoulder and his overall situation. He scanned the bark for another handhold, yet the several outcroppings he could find were meters below him. He moaned in frustration, but with an intake of breath he released his fear, and after angling himself, let go.
He fell five meters until his left hand skidded across a patch of bark and stopped at a rock. He grabbed hold quickly before he could descend any farther. Pieces of stray bark tumbled over his head, broken loose when his feet had made intermittent contact with the tree on his descent. As the splinters flew past him to fall into the abyss below, Link looked up to see that his handhold was solid. In the same glance, he remembered that this arm was also injured. Though his right shoulder could rest from its tenderness, he had momentarily forgotten it was his left forearm that had been torn by a baba serpent during his altercation with the baboon. The splits in his skin now dripped with thin trails of blood, which stained his white sleeve.
Yet, all pain aside, he would need his entire body to escape from his predicament. He stretched his legs out and his feet found crevices to hold himself aloft. Ignoring the annoying throbs in his shoulder, he gave in to the fact of needing it as well.
Just as Link was about to begin his descent, he lifted his head at the sound of loud repeating squawks. Holding onto a vine, his monkey friend swung toward him, and a wave of relief splashed through him at seeing it alive. It was evident, though, that the animal would knock into him at its current rate of speed. Link tried to accelerate his movements, but it was no use.
The monkey slammed into Link, causing him to lose his grip.
Screaming, he fell.
He tried to catch onto something … anything to keep him from falling.
At last, Link felt a prickly vine latch around his wrist. He looked in its direction, but his eyes were met by that of another monkey. It was not a vine that had seized him after all, but a tiny monkey hand instead. Its other hand grappled a hanging vine. Thankful but confused, Link rode the wind within the monkey's grasp, glad to sail anywhere but down.
At the height of the vine's swing, the monkey let go and they fell into the hollow of another tree. The thick canopy above made the daytime seem to shift directly into night. He could see monkeys peering down, up, and across at him from their perches in the trees encircling them. Their eyes revealed an emotion that Link rarely saw from their race. They were afraid, but not of him … of something lingering in the wood. Their eyes beckoned him. The mysticism about them and about this place, this deeper, darker corner of the giants' wood, made Link feel how isolated her had been from the world and its secrets, its wonders. There was so much to discover, so much he did not know about the world.
Link turned to his rescuer. It looked quizzically at him for a moment but then clutched onto one of the vines dangling at its head. Pointing toward another tree just across the chasm, it held out the vine to him. Oddly, he felt he understood the deeper meaning of what the monkey and its friends wanted of him.
He took hold of the leafy rope and kicked off the edge of the hollow. He soared through the air just like one of the monkeys, and landed moments later on the projection of bark his savior had indicated. He released his grasp on the vine and it fell back through the air gently, swaying peacefully. Link cast a glance back at the monkeys.
Next moment, he entered the tree; it was larger than the others he had yet explored. Making his way through the gnarled corridor, he could hear the distinct trickle of rushing water, and it continued to grow in volume as he neared a central chamber.
He soon came to the end of the passage and was awestruck by the enormity of the chamber. Another tree grew inside of the tree, at least six meters in diameter if not more at its base but grew thinner as it spiraled upward. Leafy vines hung down at various spots, coiling around the tree's higher boughs. Three waterfalls crashed down into the chamber from above, the water spilling in from an unknown source from outside the chamber. The droplets had amassed in the bottom of the huge oval-shaped room and wrapped around the center tree; though, it was apparent that the floor of the space was slanted or that there was a drop-off, for Link could move several meters into the room before reaching the shoreline. He looked into his muddled reflection and could not see any sign of the bottom. He also could not understand what had caused the water to turn a violet color. Perhaps it was the decaying bark amassed around him.
A plank of wood floated in the water, and a few rotted stumps smaller than the central tree jutted up only a few feet above the water. Just as he bent down to take a closer inspection of the water, it began to churn in front of the tree, the entire place rumbling loudly. Giant ripples flew outward from the growing bubbles, and in the next instant, two long-necked serpents shot out of the pool. They tossed their large red heads and grumbled and squealed at Link's presence. Slimy drool dripped from their razor teeth, hungering for Link's flesh, snapping their maws at him.
This is what has those monkeys so spooked?
Link smiled. No problem.
As one of the serpents then lurched forward to crunch on his thin waist, Link drew his sword as he sidestepped, and slashed the blade down fiercely at its leafy textured head. Roaring, it drew back. Another low rumble vibrated the room, and from within the rippling bubbles of the water, another serpent burst from the depths. However, Link noted-as it threw its head from side to side, shaking the droplets from its body and onto the shore-that this serpent was of an unmatched size. A giant.
Link had been told stories of the creature Diababa from mythical tales Rusl had told him as a boy. No one had ever seen such a creature, but there were cave drawings in several of the deeper paths within Faron that depicted the Diababa. Rusl had show these to Link, and now the drawings came to life before Link. The elongated neck of enormously thick leather-like skin and a backside protected by hard red scales. Its head was as large as four normal-sized serpents' heads. A crown of slithering red tendrils flexed from its neck joint, its only eye placed delicately on the end of its watery tongue. He had only ever heard one story involving a Diababa plant. Through that tale-which had involved four nomads allegedly disappearing after facing it-Link knew its defensive tactics and its weaknesses.
It roared loudly at Link, nearly shattering his ability to hear altogether. Water and saliva dripped from its triangularly three-jawed mouth. It then spat out a steady spray of violet liquid, and Link just had enough time to race out of the way and bring up his shield as a defense. The Diababa plant was way out of reach, but he did not want to chance any encounter with the violet water it sat in. If it used such liquid as a defense, he did not want to find out what would become of him if he jumped into the stew and covered his entire body with it.
To his surprise however, he heard the squeaks of a monkey. Looking up he found that the baboon that had once been his enemy had reappeared to aid him. From its perch from one of the tree's high branches, it swung down on a vine dangling from the ceiling. It swept Link up just in time to save him from a biting jaw of one of the smaller heads. They swung in a wide arch, reaching the wall of the chamber. The baboon stretched out its hairy feet and immediately upon making contact with the wall, it shoved off from the bark. As they arched back and came within reach of the Diababa head, the baboon released Link and continued on its way to grab hold of a tree branch again, watching.
Link landed on the Diababa's neck and threw a hand out to grab onto one of its red-plated scales. It wriggled at his weight, but he managed to climb up its neck, ducking every so often as the serpents bordering him and the main body bit at him. Without thinking, Link immediately grabbed for the item he had newly acquired. He gave the boomerang a good sendoff with a flick of the wrist, and its feathers cut like ice through a serpent's leafy neck. The head fell into the water, and as the Diababa tossed Link around, he managed to watch as the dismembered head struggled to reach the shoreline.
Wrestling the Diababa grew harder in the following moments, and Link could not spare another moment in the distraction of the baba serpents, one of which still snapped at him. Link battled the Diababa like a wild stallion, fighting against its attempts to unseat him. It spewed another jet of violet vomit, but the acidic droplets fell nowhere near Link. After a few minutes of constant struggle, Link finally reached the crown. He dove past the red tendrils for its jaw. He did not need to pry its teeth apart, for as it tossed about, its mouth remained open, shouting roars of anger and displeasure.
Crouching under the assault of the remaining serpent, Link then thrust his sword down between the monster's jaw bones. The metal made direct contact with the Diababa's eye socket, the sharp blade slicing through it, blinding it. Then, as it threw itself around, Link twisted his body about and slid down its side to hold himself suspended at its underbelly. With a roar all his own, Link shot his blade several times in and out of its skin.
Link barely had time to climb to its back again and leap to the shore before the entire plant began wriggling and sloshing about in the water. As the severed baba head bounced toward Link, chomping its jaws, he slammed the point of his sword straight through it until the steel point hit the ground beneath, punctuating the kill of the Diababa. All the while, he had watched as the dying plant stretched out its long, shriveling necks as they decayed before his eyes. Their heads wilted and withered and cracked; then, with a loud, snapping pop, the existence of the Diababa disappeared behind the dark haze it became. It was then shattered into tiny black shards, bursting outward then sucking back in to create a most curious fragment that landed with a resounding thump of stone.
Link bent over and picked it up, looking over the strange markings of the grey object, which seemed as if it were supposed to fit against another piece of the same texture and color. It was then that Midna popped out of his shadow to stand before him.
"Well done!" she giggled. "That's what I was looking for." Her black hair, tipped with a red hand, grabbed the fragment from him. "A Fused Shadow."
She brought it eye-level and inspected it. As she looked over it, she spoke, her eyes never averting from the object. "It's what the light spirit called dark power. And do you remember what that spirit said? About how you had to match the power of the King of Shadows?" She left that statement for him to ponder alone and looked up at him, seemingly satisfied about the fragment. "There are a total of three Fused Shadows. I think the other light spirits have the rest." She smiled crookedly. "If you want to know exactly what Fused Shadows are … well, I'll tell you if you help me find the other two. So, I guess you better do your best to find them, huh?"
Her black hair shrunk back into the head of her darkened form, still smiling at him. Link was not sure why, but even though he still had no reason to trust her, he felt compelled to help Midna find the other pieces. Perhaps it was human curiosity or the plea for help from the spirits. Yes, he was doing this for them … and for all of Hyrule. But truthfully, he imagined that the true reason he had agreed to journey with Midna to the far reaches of Hyrule was due to his one hope of finding the lost Ordonians.
Link looked above with the intent to give a silent thanks to his baboon ally, but he found that it had already gone. He turned back and watched as the violet tint of the pool receded and took on a more natural color and shine.
Why are you being so selfish? Link berated himself, as he removed his belt and all its accessories and laid them on the ground at the shoreline. This is not just about what I want. He removed his green cap and placed it with the rest of his acquired possessions. This is about Hyrule, all the places I have never been. He sat and unlaced his boots and set them aside. Princess Zelda needs my help. With her locked away, he was the only one who could act.
He stood and dipped a foot into the water, testing it and finding it pleasing. Might as well. He thought this would perhaps be the last time he would be afforded the luxury of a bath.
Link had only intended to cleanse his wounds and soothe his tender muscles with a quick swim and massage from the waterfalls, but now was as good a time as any to clean his entire body of the filth he had acquired. Besides, the delay annoyed Midna … and he admitted he quite enjoyed seeing her angry. She had already protested with: "What are you doing? Stop wasting time!" She removed herself from his shadow as if afraid of getting wet.
Link had disrobed down to his white leggings and leapt into the warm crystal waters, unintentionally splashing Midna when entering. He surfaced momentarily and wiped the water from his eyes. Treading, he scrubbed his forearm with his hand then swam to take refuge under a waterfall. He let the droplets clean the cuts further as he mused.
Ilia and the children are my friends, and Epona I care for dearly, but all I can do is hope. Hope that I'll cross paths with them. Maybe … they'll be wherever I end up next. Maybe … maybe they're all right. But what if they're hurt somewhere? Ilia took a blow to the head... That thought brought great pain to him, a greater pain to which none of his injuries could ever amount. Ilia could be out there somewhere, bleeding to death … and he was not with her.
Link gritted his teeth. Stop thinking like that! She's fine! When I find her... But Link stopped short of that thought. He did not want to think in what state he might find her. He only told himself that when all of this was over, he would find her. It was not that he was giving up hope. He could never do that.
But he was beginning to understand … this journey had to come first. He would not stop looking. It was just that there was something much greater at stake.
I have to continue … for Princess Zelda, for Hyrule... But I am not giving up, Ilia. I'm not. I will never. I wonder where you and the others are with every step. I wish I could tell you … tell you that I'll find you, but in this evil...
He could not think it … not yet. He did not want to yet finish the sentence that would have ended: I'm not sure I will...