All right, so this one's butt long. So what? The next's one really short. So BEAR WITH IT.
Chapter Eighteen
Krysu saw, out of the corner of her eye, that Nabooru was having about as much success as she had. The girl wasn't really anything special, but the boy was amazing. Although "nothing special" with Sheikah doesn't exactly mean the same thing it does with Hylians.
She stumbled slightly, lost her footing for a second and barely caught herself, blocking the Sheikan girl's sword an inch in front of her face.
Their swords were locked. Suddenly, with a malicious grin, the girl shoved down and to the side, then forward, with her blade. Krysu gasped in surprise as she nearly fell to her knees and her sword arm was forced behind her. (Okay, people who cannot picture it, go like this: put your index fingers (hopefully you have two) together like an X. Take the one that's closest to you and force the other one downward, then away from you, then backward. If done correctly, a shooting pain should pulse through your fingers). Krysu tried to stifle a cry of pain, but a soft groan escaped. Maybe it was more like a scream. A small scream. A mini-scream, if you will.
Nabooru's head snapped up, and she focused her gaze on Krysu, who managed to whisper, "No!" desperately before the boy attacked.
Nabooru drew her legs up to her chest and kicked out, slamming her feet into his chest and forcing him to stumble back. She leapt to her feet, and Krysu tripped the Sheikah boy as he passed. Krysu wrenched herself free of the girl's grip, and turned to Nabooru.
"You know, this whole 'information gathering' thing isn't exactly working."
"I know," she grumbled.
"You--" the girl gasped, but before she could finish, a thin, rupee-sized sheet of green glass sliced through the air into her throat. She clutched at it, and blood gushed through her fingers. The boy looked up too, but barely choked out a strangled, "Melissa!" as another glass sliver neatly decapitated him.
Krysu recognized the pieces of glass. They were from the bottle she'd found. She'd given them to Ganondorf.
"No way," Nabooru said, twisting around to see a figure disappearing into the darkness.
"So," Krysu murmured to herself, "they were useful after all."
"Krysu!" Nabooru hissed in her painfully familiar way, and she took her by the arm and pulled her into the Fortress. "We need to find Ganondorf."
"Yeah," she replied dully, noting the panic in her ex-best-friend's voice and remembering how Nabooru had practically killed herself trying to save her, and how for about three seconds they'd been friends again, and even how Nabooru had begun to seem less annoyingly confident and less rude and mean and everything Krysu had hated, all too late. And, just like that, the wall was back up. "Let's go."
They ducked into a shadow and disappeared into the Fortress, following Ganondorf's footsteps.
He knew who it was the second the hand was on his shoulder. "Stop it," he said tiredly. He was sick of her morals and her rules. He was right, and he knew it. She'd just have to deal.
"But Ganondorf--"
"Mom." He grabbed her wrist and shoved her away from him. "Stop."
She just stared at him, her eyes big and vulnerable. He slammed the door behind him as he made his way down the hall, toward voices. He heard a muffled scream and smiled. Krysu or Nabooru's work, definitely. They were the most brutal warriors he had, and finally he could see why.
He closed in on a wandering Hylian, who pocketed a glass pendant, searching for the more precious treasures they had hidden.
Ganondorf drew his sword with a loud clang. The Hylian whirled around, his hands rising to protect his face, forgetting about his dagger altogether. Not that it would have made much difference.
Phwit. A slight whoosh of air, a flick of his wrist, and the man was dead on the ground. A few feet away, his head smacked against the wall. It was almost too effortless. It wasn't fun. And all of a sudden he needed it to be fun.
He picked up the head, carelessly carved out some of the insides and the eyes, and stuck it up on a lantern. The light shone through the mouth, eyes, and nostrils. It made him laugh, so he picked up the Hylian's limp body and slung it over a simple wooden table, arranging the arms so that it looked like it was reaching for its head. He chuckled darkly, bitterly, turning away from the grotesque art display. He wanted to laugh and cry and throw up and hit something, all at once.
They thought he was savage? He'd show them savage.
"OY! 'Enry! Wha's takin' so long, eh?"
Ganondorf whirled around, blocking "Henry" from view, although why he was protecting these Hylians was unknown to him.
"Eh?" this next drunken man stopped in his tracks, staring up at Ganondorf (who had gotten almost too tall for the corridor and as bulked-up as his black horse, which was saying a lot). "Who're you?"
"I hope they're not all as drunk as you are," Ganondorf informed him. "Or 'Henry.'" He stepped aside, allowed the Hylian about five seconds to gape in horror, to fill his eyes with this spectacle, to realize what the Gerudo were capable of--what Ganondorf was capable of. Just as he opened his mouth to shout a warning, Ganondorf shoved his scimitar forward, and sliced a gaping hole from the base of the man's neck to the waistband of his pants.
Hearing the thud, Aveni stuck her head out of the door. Her eyes narrowed in disapproval. "I hope you've learned a lesson, technique, something due to all this reckless violence," she scolded.
Ganondorf nodded, surprising himself by his defiance. Nabooru often told him that he was too soft, and let too many people, including herself, walk over him at times. "Yes, I did," he replied easily. "I've learned that Hylians are weak, selfish, pampered, unprepared creatures the world is better off without. And they have really ugly pants."
Aveni scowled at him and shut herself into the room again. He didn't bother to worry about her.
He slowly led himself to the main area, the largest part of the Fortress, where'd he'd seen most of the Hylians. His heart was pumping like it did after a hard training session with Nabooru--she'd kept to her promise, but her "strict training sessions" weren't very strict--and his blood was rushing in his ears, growing steadily louder and blocking out other sounds.
Ganondorf silently entered the cafeteria, keeping close to the walls. The Hylians didn't notice as they tended to wounded. He assumed they were Hylians, because who would help an enemy? He saw that several Gerudo were bandaged and sitting up, and he felt a thrill of pride at the Gerudo loyalty--which was quickly squashed as he made a mental note to scold whoever it was for not reporting to him immediately for instructions. He was the King, wasn't he? People usually did report to their King, right? Probably even the dim-witted Hylians reported to their equally moronic King.
At the mention of their name, his hatred for the Hylians intensified painfully. He zeroed in on one of them, hands clenched on the scimitar eagerly. Even his sword wanted revenge. He was pumped. He was ready. He was excited. This was his chance.
This is my chance? His inner voice chastised him. This is my chance? What is your chance? To slaughter twenty-plus Hylians? To start the largest war in Din knows how long? Or just to unleash years of hatred and barely contained violence, to get revenge on these people for what others of this same race, nameless people of nameless faces of nameless times? What did they do? Why do you hate them, for what their ancestors did?
Angrily Ganondorf shoved these thoughts out of his head. That was all wrong. That was a twisted point of view. It didn't make sense. Not to him. His senses were all hyper-alert. He could see everything, hear everything, smell everything. He could smell the blood that covered the floor, he could smell the anxiety the Hylians still felt as they searched for the rogue Gerudo.
Slowly he crept up behind a Hylian, feeling his heartbeat speed up in anticipation.
Slam! The Hylian went flying and landed on top of the guard post, impaled on one of the spikes that adorned the top of the wall. Exactly where Ganondorf had aimed him.
The others turned around, trying to find out who had attacked the soldier. Ganondorf raised his sword nonchalantly, and their eyes focused on him, varying degrees of hate in their expressions. He wanted all of them to attack him at once, so that he could show them what he was capable of.
They all lunged at him, shouting "Huzzah!" over and over again.
Time slowed down and sped up. Things became blurry and clearer than ever. He was trapped in between senses, and he seemed to have extra senses he didn't fully understand. He could feel heat from each Hylian, smell blood, taste their fear, and hear their hearts pounding. It was almost painful, but he blocked all these things out and just reacted. Block this. Dodge that. Lunge, pull back, stab, jerk upward and into the air. He had split-second reactions, doing everything perfectly. He was in a fog and able to see perfectly. He was different, stronger than he'd imagined he could be.
He was ready for the war. He'd get an army and blow those damn Hylians and their Sheikan slaves away, and prove to everyone that the Gerudo weren't weak.
He slammed his sword into three Hylians at once, barely feeling any soreness in his muscles. He ducked underneath another blade and ran back the way he'd come. Every one of the soldiers followed him, either not suspecting a trap or not caring.
He needed something huge. He wanted them all dead, one burst of power, strong enough to destroy them all. Complete and total control over these people's pitiful lives. He stepped outside for a split second, having lost the Hylians. He needed them to find him.
A few feet away, two girls were fighting a boy and girl. He noticed that the boy and girl had pointy ears, and in hindsight saw that they had red eyes. But, in that moment, he saw the ears and grabbed the first thing his hand touched in his pocket.
Glass slivers, shining bright in the moonlight, labels still on them. He ran his finger over the sharp edge, drawing blood. Staring at it for a moment, he pondered the pure simpleness of weapons. A little talent, and someone was dead. He smiled, and flicked his wrist. It sliced straight into the girl's voice throat, sending her reeling backward. One more flick, and the boy was down. Ganondorf stepped backward, and turned to go inside.
His hands tingled. He looked down at them, remembering when he'd studied magic with Koume and Kotake. He'd learned a lot, but not enough for what he'd planned. He didn't even know the right words . . .
Suddenly they were there, along with a strength he had never had, not even that night. He held onto it, kept it beneath the surface. He just needed them to get close enough for him to use it.
One of the girls whirled around, and a familiar voice said, "Ganondorf--" but he was gone, his footsteps ringing in his ears.
There were so many voices echoing in his head. The voices of the Hylians as they followed his trail grew louder, drowning out the sounds of Nabooru and Aveni and himself. They were only a few corridors away; two minutes at best.
Bam! Nabooru and Krysu both whirled around the corner, and he recognized them as the girls he'd saved.
Bam! Aveni slammed out of the room, and stood in front of Ganondorf, her hands on her hips and her wiry hair standing on end. He realized that he was back where he'd started.
Bam! The Hylians all entered from the other end of the corridor. When they saw Ganondorf standing nose to nose with Aveni--both of whom were very intimidating people--and Nabooru and Krysu flanking him with their swords drawn, they froze. Four angry, armed Gerudo standing in a small hallway with a dead Hylian lantern next to them was quite a sight to behold. Recovering from their shock, they started screaming and doing the whole sword-raising thing and the hurrahing thing, and Ganondorf grew very, very annoyed with them all.
"There are less of them," Nabooru said softly.
"Duh. I killed a lot of them," Ganondorf replied impatiently.
"How many did you kill!?" she asked in shock.
Ganondorf didn't answer.
"Not that many," Krysu answered. "There's no way he could have killed that many. No way."
He realized that Krysu was right, but he didn't care. There were enough of them. Krysu and Aveni had moved behind him, looking the way normal guards should. Nabooru was right in front of him protectively, her scimitar a whirling streak of silver as she swung it in front of them.
The Hylians had stopped, looking from one Gerudo to another worriedly. They were obviously wondering why they weren't dead yet. Nabooru leaned forward slightly, her scimitar still pointed toward them, and the Hylians rushed forward in a panicked attack.
Ganondorf grabbed her by the wrist and pulled her so that she was behind him. She lost her balance and fell to the floor. He put one foot on her stomach gently, deciding that was probably a safe place for her. Then he did this weird looking punch-forward-with-one-arm-and-an-open-hand thing that looked really stupid for a about half a second until a big ball-o'-purple-crackly-electricy-roasty-toasty-death blasted from his hand and filled the corridor. He shouted the words he'd heard before, feeling the same power course through him.
"Greu di ductiiu, eoh yanya noku, kalahna!"
What the hell did that mean? He had no clue. It was some sort of ancient Gerudo, or Hylian. He really didn't care. It was a spell and it was awesome.
Ganondorf took Aveni and Krysu by the hands and yanked them to the ground, forgetting Nabooru was under his foot. She cried out, and shoved his foot off her. He stumbled backward, and Krysu's hand was ripped from his. He reached out blindly, and felt her arm. He shoved her toward Aveni and wrapped his arm around Nabooru's waist, pulling her to him. A tornado-esque wind roared all around where they knelt, taking Nabooru's long hair (still not tied up) and whipping it all around them. A wave of blistering heat, then freezing cold, then sudden electricity, making the air crackle and hard to breathe. The wind whipped at them, and the heat was agonizing, but he held on to Nabooru and kept his hand out. It was shaking, and blast after blast shook the corridor.
Stop it! A voice, familiar and squawking, commanded. You'll kill yourself!
Get out of the way! You'll be fried! This voice had the same old-person squawk, and was as familiar as the first. They crammed into his mind, shoving out other thoughts.
Stop, damn it!
"Ganondorf!" Nabooru cried. "Please stop! I--breathe!" Some of her words were lost in the wind, but he understood, and a wave of hopelessness, almost as crippling as the heat, washed over him.
Cut off the connection!
"I can't!" he shouted, not sure who he was talking to.
You must!
"Hurry!" Nabooru pleaded.
"I . . . can't . . ."
I'll help you! The women's' voices blended into one, and something strong shoved against his hand, pushing against the spell. Blood rushed loud and fast and hot through his veins and in his ears, full of the strength he'd been lacking. The wind was softer now, but blowing around in all directions. He thought he'd heard Aveni or Krysu--not Nabooru, never Nabooru--screaming, but he wasn't sure. His heart pounded somewhere around his throat and the blood was flowing and everything was hidden by a film of blackish gunk that covered his eyes even though he had them wide open and searching. Feeling the wind change direction and slap his face like a thousand needles, he squeezed them shut and ducked his head. Blasts still rocketed from his hand, but with less force.
Concentrate!
He did. Letting the strength in his blood mix with adrenaline, he fought like a madman, forcing the power down until it was gone. The wind died down, too, but the blood gushing and his heart pounding and his mind screaming with adrenaline would not be quieted.
Finally his muscles collapsed, and Nabooru fell with him into a heap onto the floor. He didn't open his eyes, fearing the black gunk would block his vision again.
The voice split into two again, and he slowly began to register the familiarity.
Good. They sounded as weary as he felt. That's very good--for now, at least.
"I couldn't do it," he whispered.
You will. With time and training, you will. Come back. You have amazing potential--that's why we raised you. We helped you realize your purpose. You need our training to realize your destiny.
He didn't answer. He didn't know how.
SMACK. His hand went to his cheek, which was bright pink and smarting. "I didn't even do anything this time," he moaned, slightly delirious. He opened his eyes just enough to see Nabooru leaning over him, her expression frantic. The gunk made it hard to see much more without making it look like he was conscious.
"Ganondorf? Ganondorf? Wake up, you idiot! Did you say something? I can't hear you; you're mumbling. Can you open your eyes? What was that you said earlier? You couldn't do what? You did a lot, Ganondorf, some of which I am going to be seriously pissed about if you're okay. Oh! I have news, too! But first, you have to be awake."
He seriously considered closing his eyes and falling back into blackness, but Nabooru was raising her hand again, presumably to hit him some more. Fast as ever, he reached out and grabbed her wrist, his lips curving into a small smile. She froze, looking down at him in surprise. He opened his eyes, blinking the gunk out of them, and sat up. He ran his finger along his eyelid and studied it. The black-red blood clung to his finger like some gross mutant ameba. Unable to see where he was hurt, he traced his finger up the trail of blood: over his eyebrows, across his forehead, into the hairline. Suddenly the skin dropped away from under his finger. More blood than he thought was in his body poured out of it. He pushed into it with a gentlest of pressures and felt bone.
That's my skull, he thought numbly. The cut went to my skull. I'm touching it.
The blood trickled from the wound over his hand and down his arm, making it look like his arm was severely mangled. He stared at the blood for a long time. Then realization sank in and with it came a sudden, staggering amount of pain.
"Ah!" He clapped his hands to his forehead, pushing down to stop the bleeding. "Aaaagh! Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow, ow, ow . . ." With each ow, he tried to make it stop bleeding, causing another ow.
Nabooru grabbed his hands and pulled them away from his head. "Here." She placed them on her shoulders. She leaned backward, reaching for something she could wrap around his head. Finding nothing amidst the wreckage, she pulled off her thin shirt, revealing a plain white strapless bra. Ganondorf rolled his eyes and glared defiantly at the wall to his left. "How practical," he muttered sarcastically.
"Hey, I am nothing if not practical," she informed him, clearly not embarrassed at all; merely amused that Ganondorf was. She rolled her shoulders back, displaying it proudly and smirking evilly. He didn't even glance at her--he just shook his messy shoulder-length red hair so that it hung between them.
Nabooru wrapped her shirt around his head, trying to make as painless as possible and failing. He refused to turn her way as she chattered about trivial things like war and devastation. What did that matter in comparison to . . .
"What is your problem?" Nabooru demanded, putting a hand on her hip. "Are you gay or something and didn't tell me?"
"WHAT?! No!" he exclaimed, gaping at her. "No way!"
She pouted. "Am I ugly, then?"
"No!" He really didn't like this cross-examination. It was like a test with all too many ways to fail.
She grinned for a split second. "I know. So, I'm hot, and you're not gay . . ."
He turned back to the wall with a sigh. "So . . . ?"
"So why won't you look at me? That wall can't be that interesting."
"I'm normal." Their relationship had taken a bizarre turn, and he was barely hanging on. "I don't do this a lot, you know!"
"The whole relationship thing, or the whole 'eyeing-people's-boobs' thing?"
"The relationship--" He stopped to think that through, trying to figure out the trick to that question. "Both!"
"There's a first time for everything," she said teasingly.
He not-so-gently shoved her off him and stomped over to the corner, crossing his arms and glaring. She followed him.
"Farore, you need to relax. I was only joking!" He didn't turn around. She bit her lip. "I'm sorry. I wouldn't have taken it that far, but it was so much fun. You should have seen your face . . . it was hilarious." He glanced at her over his shoulder. She looked sincere, but with her there really was no way to tell. So he continued to glare at the corner.
Thud. Something tugged onto his arm, and he looked down to see Nabooru, one hand clamped onto his, and the second balled into a fist against her chest. "Oh Goddesses, how I have sinned! I have gone against my King and made fun of my boyfriend--I think. It's quite possible, or maybe probable or even definite. Who knows? And I don't care because he likes me and is a damn good kisser! Anyway, I have caused him grief and sadness and woe and these are terrible deeds! I should have respected his uncomfortableness around boobs, but instead I was cruel and teasingful and thus there is no other punishment! I must be thrown to the rabid monkey priests! Oh, people I have wronged, forgive me! Forgive me! Augggh!" With another wailing screech, she fell backward.
Ganondorf laughed. There really wasn't anything else he could have done. Besides, that was the most sincere thing she could possibly say--it wasn't a very easy thing for her.
He took her hand and pulled her up. "Those rabid monkey priests aren't getting you without a fight," he said with a grudging smile. She beamed. It was involuntary, a reflex reaction. She hid her relief and happiness beneath another smirk. But he didn't mind. At least he knew that her love was there. Way down there.
Nabooru shrugged. "I'm really not sure where I would have found rabid monkey priests, anyway." Then she grinned and crossed her arms over her chest. "Don't worry--no boob exposure."
He took her hands and interlocked their fingers, kissing her on the nose. "I might have been overreacting a little." He gave her a somber look. "I was only doing it for your amusement."
"And I was only groveling for yours," she answered quickly.
"Of course." His face was inches from hers.
"Of course," she breathed.
"Oh thank Din you're all right, Your Highness," Krysu said, elbowing her way between them.
Ganondorf stepped back quickly, away from Krysu but also away from Nabooru. To cover her frustration at her ex-friend, she grabbed a piece of leather and deftly tied her hair back into a high ponytail.
"It looks cute like that," he said with a smile. "Why don't you wear it like that more often?"
She sighed and rolled her eyes. "Because then I'd look like everyone else!"
Krysu grabbed Ganondorf's hand. "I was so worried you'd gotten hurt!" she gushed. "Come quick, see Aveni!"
She hurried toward the room Aveni had been hiding in, not giving Ganondorf time to look around. The door was ajar, and inside it looked like a tornado had hit it. Krysu had a few shallow cuts, but for the most part had missed the worst of the attack. He thanked the Goddesses for that. Aveni was sitting propped up against an overturned crate, nursing a gash on her arm that ran from her forearm to a little past her elbow. She was bruised all over and clearly shaken. She had followed Nabooru's example in dressing her wound; and if it was disturbing to see your girlfriend in a bra, it was downright alarming to see your mother in one.
Fully believing he'd be scarred for life, Ganondorf looked at Krysu, the only Gerudo left wearing a shirt, and evidently the only one still sane. "What happened?" he asked, confused.
"I'd like to know that for myself," Aveni retorted, glancing up from her cut to give Ganondorf a flat glare. He met her gaze unflinchingly. "I haven't even gone outside, but I heard from Krysu that it was shocking."
"I, uh, didn't . . . actually notice," he confessed, a hint of a blush creeping up his neck and coloring his cheeks a lovely shade of magenta.
"He had more . . . distracting things to think about," Krysu said with a meaningful look at the doorway, where Nabooru was leaning.
"Nabooru!" Ganondorf exclaimed, as though just realizing she was there. "I totally forgot! ARE YOU HURT?!" He looked her over in sudden panic.
"No! Well, sort of . . ."
"How can you be sort of hurt?" he wondered incredulously. "You're either hurt or you're not hurt. There's nothing in between."
"Yeah, well, Nabooru has a talent for proving people wrong," Krysu muttered.
"It's nothing, really. I just reopened that one little scratch I got earlier . . ."
"Which one?"
"Oh, I don't know. It's just reopened, and bleeding a little. But it's no big deal!" she added hastily.
"Wait. Is this 'scratch' the horrible evil cut that almost tore you in two?"
"One of them, yeah . . . seriously, relax. You're like a mother cucco or something."
He suddenly noticed that she had her hands behind her back. He snatched them and pulled them apart. He gaped at her bloodstained hands in horror. In one fluid motion, he whirled her around, started to take off his shirt, got his head stuck in the arm hole, wrestled with it for a while, finally got it off, and wrapped it around her waist. Actually, only the whirling around part was fluid.
"I'm fine!" Nabooru insisted as he tightened his makeshift bandage. "Ow!"
"Fine, huh?" Ganondorf said with an exasperated expression. She could be so frustrating.
She held her head high. "Yes." She strode out the door. Immediately she froze in her tracks. "Ganondorf?" she called back to him.
"Yeah?" He was helping Aveni and Krysu put the room together.
"Have you had a chance to look around yet?" Her voice rose several octaves.
"No . . . why? Are you okay? Are there any Hylians--oh Goddess." He froze, as motionless as Nabooru.
The first thing he noticed was the blood. It was everywhere--splattered on the walls, the floor, the ceiling--everywhere. Bodies littered the floor in pools of blood. Some had died from the pots and glass and weapons the wind tossed around carelessly; others had been roasted alive. He stepped over a smoking corpse and slowly made his way down the hall, until he was where they had been standing. The entire corridor was doused in blood and scorched black--where they had been, however, it was a pristine white, speckled with only a few drops of blood. He put his hand to it. It was hot, like sand that had been baking in the sun, but no black scorches, no unsurvivable heat. It seemed like there was a little circle around them that he'd made unconsciously, that had protected them from the spell. The only injuries they'd received was when the wind had changed direction, blowing toward them and weakening the barrier. But they were much better off than the others.
This magic . . . this power he had learned . . . it could win their war.
It could save them . . .
I lost control, he thought, jerked back into harsh reality. I couldn't control the spell. It would have kept going if they hadn't helped me. It would have kept going until we were dead. And there would have been nothing I could have done to stop it. He walked around the circle, smearing blood and ashes that were on his boots across it. If I could learn . . . I could be stronger. I could be the strongest magician there ever was, the strongest king there ever was.
"Ganondorf?" Nabooru's voice was so faint, lost in the hugeness of his realization.
I want to learn magic. I want to learn how to control it, how to summon it. I want to learn how to destroy cities in an instant, how to snuff out lives in a moment. The destructive magic I'd never even looked at; I want to do it. I want to . . . I want to . . .
"Kill," he whispered, feeling a tremor of shock ran down his spine. But he felt no regret. War was killing.
"Ganondorf! What are you thinking?!" Her voice was growing louder as she came closer, slipping on the blood.
"Have you ever wanted to kill someone before?" he asked, keeping his head down.
"Krysu sometimes, when she steals my stuff," she answered with a shrug, coming closer every few seconds. "You sometimes, when you're annoying." She gave him a small smile.
"No," he replied, having trouble breathing. "Not like that. I . . . I want to kill them."
"What?"
"I want to kill them all. All the Hylians. All the Sheikah. For what they've done to us. I want them all dead." The words were true, but as fiercely as he wanted them to die, he wished just as strongly that he could go back to the way he was before.
Was this person him?
"I . . . I don't know who this is," he continued, his voice barely more than a whisper. "I don't know who this is, or why he won't leave. I . . . don't know . . ."
"Ganondorf . . ." And suddenly she was there, with her arms around him and her face buried in his shoulder, and he was holding her up as much as she was holding him up, and they just stood there, holding onto each other.
"Don't go anywhere," he told her.
"Of course not. I don't have anywhere to go."
Aveni leaned against the doorjamb, watching the door at the end of the hall. She'd thought she heard voices coming from that direction. She knew the first group was too small to be all of them. There was bound to be more.
"Ganondorf--" she began, but he had stiffened too, glaring at the door. Nabooru pulled away, looking up at him with wide eyes. She didn't have to tell him anymore. Krysu looked happier, at least. She drew her scimitars and walked to Ganondorf's side. Nabooru did the same, still looking at Ganondorf curiously.
"What?" she asked.
Aveni stood next to him, holding her sword out, ready to fight.
"What?" Nabooru repeated. Then she heard it. They all stood in a line, slightly battered, facing the door.
Nabooru was watching Ganondorf, trying to figure out if he was okay.
Krysu was looking at both of them, jealous as hell and searching for weaknesses in their relationship, cracks that she could use to wedge between them.
Aveni was also scrutinizing her son, hoping he wouldn't use that spell again. She didn't think any of them could take it.
Ganondorf ignored the other two pairs of eyes on him, focusing only on Nabooru. He smiled, like everything was dandy and he wasn't going insane. She bit her lip and nodded, her overconfident self seeming to have left her. He heard the voices growing louder and he forced his gaze back to the door. He didn't have it in him to use that spell.
They all poured in--about half the size of the first group. These were the stragglers; the ones who had barely escaped death; the last Hylians in the Gerudo Fortress.
Ganondorf didn't even wait for the others. He just lunged forward. He had the exact same feeling he'd had before, in the cafeteria. Only this time he thought it might be wrong to think that way. But it didn't stop him from seeing the awesome clarity and feeling the strength. It didn't stop him from killing every single Hylian in that hall in a few minutes.
When he was done, he let the sword drop from his hand, and leaned forward, putting his hands on his knees and breathing hard.
Nabooru, Aveni, and Krysu were all standing in the same place they'd been in before. They hadn't moved an inch. But, feeling his gaze sweep over her, Nabooru rushed forward. She tripped over something and, looking down, saw a head. Its eyes were wide open and staring. Stumbling to a halt a few feet away, she noticed that there were three bodies between them and that he had killed them all. She couldn't make herself go any farther. "A-are oh . . .y-y-y . . ." She stopped to compose herself and rearrange the words in her mind so that they made sense. She never stammered, and rarely had trouble getting her words to sound right before. She stuffed her hands in her pockets and tried not think about what that meant. Exhaling deeply, she tried again. "Are you okay?" Still feeling uncomfortable, she took her hands out of her pockets, wrung her hands, and shoved them back in.
"I . . . guess so." He straightened, and Nabooru realized, for the first time, just how tall Ganondorf was. He was a full head and shoulders above her. He was so much stronger, too. She'd never noticed how strong he was, either. She couldn't look up at him, it couldn't sink in how powerful he was, what he was capable of.
"That was . . . something." What was wrong with them? Could fifty deaths really ruin a relationship?
"I did what I had to do," he snapped.
"I never said you didn't!"
"You implied it."
"I didn't mean it like that! What kind of thickheaded moron are you, to slaughter so many and then blame me?!" She was pissed now.
"So you do think that--"
"No, damn it! What the hell is wrong with you!"
"Me? What the hell's wrong with you?!"
"Nothing! You're the one with the crazy killing fetish! Not me!"
No. She clapped her hands over her mouth, panicked. How could she have said that, after what he'd told her?
He just glared at her, his jaw tight and his eyes furious. He turned and left, slamming the door behind him.
She wanted to die. She also wanted to take him with her.
"Nabooru?" Aveni asked, right behind her.
"Waaaagh! What?" Nabooru turned and sighed. "What do you want!"
Aveni didn't even flinch. "Could you go check and make sure their aren't any Hylians left, then help Krysu get rid of the . . ." She gestured to the blood and the bodies.
"Yeah, I know." Nabooru put her hands over her eyes, rubbing the exhaustion out of them. "Sure. Whatever."
"Thank you." As Nabooru turned to leave, Aveni added, "You were right, you know. They aren't all bad, and Ganondorf is a thickheaded moron."
"Yeah." They shared little half-smiles, all either of them could manage. Krysu sighed and exited the opposite door Ganondorf had left. Once she was gone, Aveni gave Nabooru a pleading look.
"Please don't judge him too harshly. Everything you said only confirmed what he thought. He's guilty, and doesn't want to be."
"I . . . I know," Nabooru answered thickly. To hide the tears and the lump in her throat, she turned and made her way to the door.
"Nabooru? Last thing, I promise. . . . Being strong is not a Gerudo's main purpose. Loyalty, skill, intelligence. That's what we are. Hiding emotions is not our goal. Let the Sheikah be the spies."
"Do you always give this much advice to people?" Nabooru asked.
Aveni laughed and shook her head. "I've just wanted to say that to you for a long time and never had the chance."
"Thanks . . . I guess." She nodded awkwardly and left, making her way through the familiar tunnels of the Fortress, checking to make sure that all the Hylians were gone and relieving the Gerudo of their duties. Then she went back downstairs and cleared out all the bodies, shoving them in an underground room filled with ice they had under the Fortress and throwing salt at them. There would be a meeting to decide what to do with them later. That was more meat than they got in a year.
Finally she collapsed on her bed in her room, too exhausted to take off her shoes or untie her hair. With a weary sigh, she hauled herself out of bed to throw on her nightshirt and take out her hair tie.
Meanwhile Ganondorf was roaming the halls, looking for somewhere to go. On his way back to his room he ran into Krysu. She stopped, then smiled shyly. "Hey . . . sir."
"Hi." It came out sounding more like a question than a greeting, but he didn't have energy for anything more.
"You alright? You look a little . . . preoccupied."
"That's a way to put it," he answered with a small laugh, running a hand through his hair.
"Anything I can do?"
"Uh . . . no. I don't see any way you can help."
"I do," she answered, flicking her hair over her shoulder. "I can listen." She wiggled her ears for emphasis. "What could it hurt?"
This was a very bad idea. Even he, stupid as he was, could see that. This was Nabooru's ex-best-friend. He wasn't sure how, but they hated each other. There was no way that could have been smart.
And yet . . . maybe it was just having someone bother to listen to him. Or maybe it was the fact that Krysu looked so concerned and understanding.
"Yeah. Thanks."
Her smile lit up the hallway, open and slightly coy. "Great! Come on." She gently took him by the wrist, as though afraid he'd run away. Which was what he should've done. But he followed her to her room.
He sat down gingerly on her bed. She placed her hands in her lap and turned to him eagerly. "Go ahead, Your Majesty."
"Thanks," he repeated. He took a deep breath and blurted out everything; how he thought he was going crazy and trying to kill everything, and how Nabooru seemed to alternate from compassionate to distant about it.
During this whole rant, he expected Krysu to look disgusted or sympathetic or at least interested. But she spent most of it brushing out her long hair or touching up a bit of her ocher-and-pale-blue makeup. Every few minutes she'd make an commiserating noise, but without conviction. Once he'd finished, Krysu sat there for about three minutes, not realizing he wasn't still speaking. When she did, she murmured, "That's tough." She put down her hair brush and turned away from the mirror, slightly pursing her gold-tinted lips. "That's real tough. In fact, I don't see how you'd handle it without someone to talk to, and frankly, I don't think Nabooru's very kind to you." She leaned forward. "She's not great at 'being there' for others. All she cares about is herself. She needs to be the center of attention, and to be better than anyone else. I'm not like that."
He pushed Krysu away. "You have no idea what you're talking about."
She looked offended. "Yes I do!"
"Nabooru's not like that. Maybe she seems that way to you, but she listens to people, she's sweet--to an extent--and she's a hell of a lot better person than you are!"
"Guys," Krysu said, acting like she was an expert, though she only knew him and a few Hylians she'd met in the Market. "You're all clueless."
"That's not true! I--" Ganondorf suddenly wondered why he was telling Krysu this, when the person who had never heard it before, who--despite her devil-may-care sarcasm--needed to hear it. What was Krysu to him? Nothing.
What was Nabooru to him?
Everything.
"I've gotta go," he said brusquely, and flung the door open.
"Wait!" Krysu begged, grabbing his arm and staring up at him with pleading eyes. "You what? What were you going to say? Don't you want to talk more?"
"Not to you." And he was gone, his heart pounding in his ears, blocking out all other thought.
Nabooru was sitting on the edge of her bed, exactly where Krysu had been, brushing her hair with an identical brush. The only difference was the frown on her expression and that her face was washed clean of makeup. She gently removed her jewelry, looking at her nightshirt (a ratty old blue Hylian men's tunic with the name "Bob" embroidered in yellow letters across the breast) with a sigh. She'd love a new shirt, but she couldn't.
"Oh, well," she said, straightening out the shirt so that "Bob" could be read clearly. "No big deal." She picked up her brush again and began smoothing out her red hair.
The knock of the door make her start, and the brush left several little indents on the side of her head and neck. (History lesson! The Gerudo brushes were fairly crude, and were made out of spare bits of metal and wood, so they were somewhat sharp when stabbed into one's skull). "This better be good!" she snarled, dabbing the tiny drops of blood on her neck.
Outside, Ganondorf was trying to decide whether or not to knock again when he heard an oath, then the door swung open. Nabooru's expression turned from impatience to shocked disbelief.
"Ganondorf?" she asked incredulously.
He wordlessly took her face in his hands and kissed her, gently drawing them both back into the room.
The door slammed shut.
Koume and Kotake both collapsed onto their couch, breathing hard. They were worn out.
"That was a success," Koume said.
"That went very well," Kotake agreed. "I think with a little nudge, he will be delightfully evil."
"I can't wait!" Koume conjured two glass goblets and some whiskey from thin air, and they clinked their glasses together.
"When you told me what you had planned, I thought it couldn't possibly work," Kotake confessed.
"Always have faith in me," her sister said wisely, sipping her drink.
"Of course . . ." Kotake murmured, staring into space. "How did you make it work, anyway? All I did was the spell."
Koume leaned forward in her seat. "You know that spell you cast every morning on Ganondorf's food when he was growing up with us?"
"Mm-hmm. And it never helped. He was still as skinny and muscleless as a stick."
"Well, it turns out that you needed to increase the ingredients by about three times to make it work."
"You've been doing that for all this time?"
"Of course. I've been casting that spell on the Leevers out here. When the girls pick them and bring them in, they give extras to the King. All the girls are stronger, but he is the strongest. That way, their army is powerful. Also, I've been keeping tabs on him. He's prepared for war, though he doesn't want it. He's made allies with the Moblins, and is looking for more creatures to have join them."
"All right, so he's got an army," Kotake prompted. "He didn't want to fight."
"I know. He's too soft for an evil ruler. He needed much more backbone. So I gave him some. And what better time than during an attack, completely in the fault of the Hylians?"
"You had perfect timing, to pop into his mind at such a convenient occasion," her twin commented. "If I hadn't known you weren't a meddler, I would be suspicious of such a coincidence." She raised her bushy white eyebrows. "At any rate, I'm curious."
"I didn't meddle!" Koume exclaimed, shaking her head. "Honestly! . . . Let's just say that a certain old man gets a voice in his head that says the Gerudo had the Triforce. Suppose this voice calls itself one of the Goddesses. This old man is very excited. He goes into a bar and starts to spread a rumor that the Gerudo are trying to use the Triforce to take over Hyrule. When questioned, he says that he hears this message from the Goddesses. Several men get excited, and grab weapons to attack. They have no plan, but they run into a few Sheikah and convince them to come along. These Hylians are slightly tipsy, so they have inadvertently altered the story a bit, claiming that the King ordered them to attack the Fortress. This group all came together and attacked the Fortress. At this time, I . . . tweaked Ganondorf's emotions, playing up the anger and hate and sort of ignoring forgiveness and sympathy. Of course, I had to completely wipe out reason and throw in a lust of magic. That's where you come in, I believe."
"Brilliant!" Kotake cheered.
"I know," Koume replied, cackling. Then she sat up and closed her eyes, mumbling under her breath. A few minutes later she opened her eyes and smiled, settling back down.
"What?" Kotake demanded. "How did you meddle?"
"Well . . . The King has discovered the attack. He is investigating the rumor, finding it true. He is growing angry, both at the Gerudo and at his own people. He is all too ready for the war. When he asks around for the old man who started this whole thing off, he discovers that the man is dead. Reasons are unknown."
Oooh . . . tuh-ric-kay! (Which is tricky, for you normal people. By the way, if you ARE normal, what the hell are you doing reading my story?) What will happen?? Hmm? Hmm? . . . Damned if I know. But, thanks to my dear friend myshadowspirit, who spent the better part of an hour designing an outline with me, I have a vague idea! But you don't! Muhahaha! P.s. Thank you, Jackie. That was a lifesaver. This chapter is dedicated to you. And it's not such a bad chapter to dedicate. I think I'll dedicate all my chapters to people. That would be fun.
