TWENTY-ONE
LINK'S ACCOUNT: NECESSITY

Master Link of Hyrule

For the second time this hour, I am wondering how I could be so foolish.

As I materialise in front of the Princess, I count my luck that she is not angry with me. In fact, she seems relieved. I take quick advantage, and go to pull her up from the floor where I rudely abandoned her.

No, I think. We must not touch! Imagine you are back in the Castle, and imagine what you would not do in front of her father!

This is a good rule. I hurry her onto the platform, our hands barely touching. I am dying for a gasp of fresh air, and as we materialise out of the shrine I take a good lungful. My head has never felt so weightless, my hands so numb.

She is not yours, Link. She never was, and never will be. You have made yourself a sinner and a seductor, no better than the fairy, who you wrongly blame for her seduction of you.

I must undo the damage I have just done.

She steps weakly in front of me, and I let her find her own footing, conflicted and disgraced with myself. She is searching my face for something, once again, maybe something I might give away with a careless expression. I leave my face as blank as I can, imagining she is a foe, checking for a weakness.

I remember before we became familiar, the long silences between us and how at first, I let them foster. It might be damaging to our relationship to go back to that state… but maybe we have gone too far in the other direction.

I remain calm and silent on the exterior, while my emotions pound my insides like rocks in a plunge pool, crushed by the waterfall.

"Link, will you please look at me?"

I know what she will do even before she knows, I think. As her lips search for mine, I turn my head slowly, and her lips softly brush against my jawline. My heart races, but I must not let anything show. Back to the way things were, with me repressing every emotion I ever thought I might have had, until repression was the normal state, and emotions were as faint as a line in the sand.

It would be a terrifying practise, like gradually losing my sight after years of perfect vision, but it would put us back as we should be: she the Princess, and me her loyal servant.

She draws back sharply, a little gasp leaving her, as if she cannot believe my impudence. I can feel a sigh building up, and I let it out as evenly and as quietly as I can.

"Look at me!"

Her voice cracks. I can see the hurt I'm causing her, and I wish with all my heart that I'd thought clearly before kissing her.

All of the physical pain I have felt, strangely, I cannot remember: bones have been broken, Guardians have shot me with their laser fire, and skin has torn painfully, slowly apart and had to knit itself back together as I watched the wounds for sepsis. I remember injuries that hurt so badly that I cried or vomited or worse, but it's as if my brain is telling me that all those things once happened without the evidence to convincingly reminding me. Like somebody is telling me the story of my own body. Perhaps it is yet another side-effect of my restorative sleep.

But this pain I feel now with stay within me until I die, like a broken arrow.

She strikes me across the face as quick as a flash, and reasonably hard. My cheek stings and reddens, and I keep my head turned in case she wants to strike again. Somehow, she doesn't, and I hear her footsteps beat away.

She won't want me to, but I know I must follow her. I do so at what I think is a safe distance. Halfway to the path, she turns on her heel. I am stood on the log bridge, most of the way across.

I am in danger of leaking emotion, like a broken vessel. I don't look at her, instead bowing my head, which she hopefully sees as a sign of contrition. If I look at her, the game is up: I don't know if I am brave enough to risk another embrace, simply because I am unsure if I can endure the pain of having to pull away from her again. It is best this way.

She says we should going back to Impa's, and I instantly know that this could be close to the last time we see each other: I know that the plan is for a group of us, led by me, to infiltrate the Yiga hideout in Gerudo. The Princess will certainly not be coming with us if Impa and I get our say in things, but this will drive us apart faster than all my stoic silences combined.

I can only look at her, pleading somewhere behind my eyes, saying what I cannot say, knowing I will risk another slap – or worse for both of us, another kiss.

Will she understand?

She does not love me: I am sure of it. Maybe she believes she does, but she must be mistaking her feelings for something else: dependence? Yes, she has come to depend on me, and it is time to break that dependency: for she will someday be a Queen, and I a retired Knight, if I am supremely lucky to live long enough. Perhaps if after all of this she still looks favourably upon me, I can hope to become a well-paid and respected General, if I haven't ruined my chances.

I can tell myself that it's enough. I can tell myself all I want, but a broken heart won't listen.