Chapter 34: The Second Trial
The three of them, later that evening, were talking.
"I don't know how I escaped." Zelda began. "I fell asleep in the dungeon. I had a dream…"
Ereb gave her a quick look. "A dream?"
She nodded, and looked a bit self conscious. "Yes, Ereb. A dream. A dream about you, actually."
Link noticed her blush a bit, embarrassed, but Ereb seemed to be lost in another place. He suddenly shook his head, as if snatched back into reality. His stare was intense as he looked again at Zelda. "What happened in the dream?" he asked urgently.
She blushed more profusely, now thoroughly embarrassed. "You were…" she paused a few moments. "…you were in a black place. There was a beam of light, and a sword at its center. You picked it up. Something appeared behind you, and it spoke to you…"
Ereb shook his head. "A mask." He said.
Zelda now looked a bit alarmed. Her blush faded to an ashen white. "..Yes." she whispered.
Ereb closed his eyes. Link felt like someone watching through a window.
After a time, Ereb reached into his pouch and pulled something out. Link gasped. Zelda's face grew even more pale.
It was half of a mask. A mask they all knew very well. A mask that had haunted all their dreams. A mask that was fragmented and broken.
Ereb held it out to Zelda. "This mask." It was not a question. It was not even questioning. It was a fact.
She again nodded.
"And what did it say?"
She spoke as if from a long distance. "it said words I could not understand. You spoke back. And then there was another voice. Loud. Evil."
At that moment, Link heard a voice himself. It was quiet and sinister, dark and fell. Like the whisper of a hissing breeze. A breeze unfathomably cold.
"ASHI coMblante…"
He shivered. The other two had not heard it.
And then they both looked at him. Their faces were hard. Their eyes were cold. The broken mask glowed…
He blinked. They were back to normal. The mask glowed no more. He felt a chill crawling down his spine. He shivered.
And a light erupted in their midst.
Ganondorf was on the throne again. He was not happy. Not at all.
He had just personally executed each and every one of those who had fled the Kokiri Forest. They had come back expecting mercy. Expecting understanding.
And he had shown them mercy. He had understood.
He had understood that they were cowards who could not chase down two hundred weak villagers. He had shown them the mercy of leaving them alive until they had finished telling the story.
And then his mercy had dried up in the sudden flames of his wrath.
The floor was stained with their blood. He observed the dark blots with little interest. They were marks of failure, but not of his own failure. They were marks of the failure of his servants. Marks of misplaced faith.
The faith that erecting an outside barracks to house a portion of his army had been a good idea. In the days after the forced exodus, the townspeople had hastily constructed multiple structures for shelter, that within another few days had become a small village. Its buildings had not been large or completely dry, but they had been better to the townspeople than sleeping under the stars.
And then Ganondorf had worried a bit. With the townspeople altogether as they were, it was likely they would start planning their rebellion sooner. And he had called Stalg. He had told him to house a few hundred troops within the village, posting sentries in multiple areas.
And the plan had worked for two days.
But the actions of the villagers had been so swift and unexpected that Ganondorf himself had not learned about them until it was far too late. He had not heard the warning bell.
But there were advantages to this situation. It was hard to see at first, but they were there.
Firstly, the beasts who escaped the slaughter in the forest fringes had given him the important information of Where. The rebels had fled into the Kokiri Forest.
Secondly, this change in events gave him time to prepare for what was undoubtedly being planned in the rebel camps. The coming storm would be weathered if he had a chance to strengthen his defenses before it broke.
And thirdly, this gave his spy extra time to report back. The spy was well planted, he knew. Very well planted. The spy would bring back all the information he needed.
He laughed. His mood was changing as he thought of the surprise the rebels would get as they left their forest refuge…
The light aroused different feelings in all of them, because they knew what it was.
In Zelda, there was a solemnity and sadness that took hold of her. She was happy to see her father, but it was not the same as it had been. This was her father's ghost. This was a being of great power, of great wisdom, given form but not substance. This was her father as seen through a window in a soundproof room. They could read each other's lips, but would never speak in the way they once had.
In Ereb, there arose a great confusion and wonder. The last time he had seen the ghost had been for a brief instant on Hyrule Fields after his return, and that had been a strange meeting. He had not even gotten a word out when the ghost had transported him to a miserable mountaintop. He had wandered for days down its slope and up the next, always keeping Death Mountain in his sights.
And yet his transportation had reunited him with Link. He smiled at his friend, but his smile suddenly vanished as his eyes took in what he was seeing.
Link was not himself.
The person that had taken his place looked like Link, but couldn't be.
His eyes were blazing with a ferocious power Ereb had never seen before. His features, cast into shadow by the light of the Ghost King, contorted his appearance into something dark. His fist was clenched. The other was on the hilt of his sword.
The Ghost King said nothing. He snapped his fingers, and they both, Link, and the ghost, disappeared.
They reappeared by a still pool. Flowers of a dozen varieties grew by the pool, indifferent to those passing them. Birds twittered quietly in the branches of a lone tree, whose roots grew half in the water and half in the earth.
Clouds shielded the pool from the sun. The sky beyond them was an ominous grey.
And the Ghost King sighed.
"I have brought you here for an important purpose, Link." He said expressionlessly.
Link ignored him. He didn't care that he was now reunited with Ereb. The present state of things did not justify the Ghost's actions in his eyes. But he knew after a few moments that silence would not end the inevitable conversation any quicker. He finally turned to the Ghost.
"And what is that purpose?" he asked, his face a mask for the turmoil brooding within.
The Ghost King was silent for a long moment. "Actually, for two purposes." He amended. "The first is to talk with you. I know you hate me. You think I betrayed you, that my actions led to Ereb's tragic disappearance, and his near death."
Link nodded. He had control of his anger for the moment. He would at least hear the beast, he reasoned, before he crushed him.
"And more than that." He said, voice low. "You lied to me. You made me think the mask was safe, that it would not hurt us."
"Did I?" the Ghost broke in. "I said nothing to you. I instructed Old Majora, not you."
"And through Old Majora, me and Ereb!" Link's voice was rising. "How dare you act as though you didn't know what you were doing! You knew all along that if I knew you wanted me to take the mask, I would. I should have listened to Ereb. I should have, but didn't! I reassured him! Because of you!"
There was a long pause. The birds had stopped twittering. It was as though nature itself was awaiting the Ghost King's reply.
But when it came, it was so quiet that Link could barely hear it. "But I was not the one who cursed it."
Link shook his head. "But you knew it was cursed. You told me so yourself, in the Kokiri Forest the day after he disappeared! And you also told me that you had known of the Oracle of Doom." He was pale with suppressed anger.
"And then, I came across Jade, the other beast who doesn't answer anything directly. And then he stuffs the same garbage down my throat! I'm sick of it all! SICK!"
He stepped back, eyes blazing. He shook his head. "And then you appear. And you look at me without emotion, without sorrow." As he glared at the Ghost King, his anger fired into rage. The Ghost's face showed no more emotion than it had on the night Link had broken his leg.
"Without even caring." He growled. "All you care about is your blasted self righteous talk of paths and fate!"
The Ghost King still remained silent. Link turned away and dropped to the ground. Tears welled up in his eyes. "Do you even know how much I suffered? What Ereb went through? What happened to Sir Marcus?"
He heard no reply, so he continued. "Sir Marcus was murdered by Ganondorf. I was alone for days. And even before that, we were without Ereb. And Ereb went from nightmare to nightmare, and almost died."
He found his tears running down his face. He didn't care.
"That sword." The Ghost King said. "Where did you find it?"
Link found himself wishing he could find it protruding from the Ghost's chest. "In Death Mountain." He muttered. "Right before I was ambushed by the Shadow you told me about."
He looked over his shoulder, and was enraged to find the Ghost smiling. He was on his feet with sword in hand before he even realized it. And the next moment, he was slashing the nothingness that was the Ghost's body.
And the Ghost still smiled. He waited a while, and then snapped his fingers. Link found himself blasted ten feet backwards. He slammed heavily into the tree, and fell into the water.
"I told you to take the sword." Said the Ghost, smile now gone. "I made sure you did so, before the Shadow I warned you about was able to strike. And I protected you from being attacked any sooner by the Shadow. The night I appeared in Jade's hut, the Shadow was blinded. It had been listening at the window. It fled before it found out too much, because of me."
Link clambered out of the pool, sopping wet and furious. "I handled him fine in the mountain. I even had strength to go up and down it later, and to run farther than I ever had before when I saw Ereb."
"That was not your strength." Said the Ghost. "It was the power of that sword. The blade gives power beyond the wielder's own abilities. Without it, and without my interference to make sure you got it, you would have been overcome by the Shadow."
Link couldn't believe his ears. His anger and hatred had brooded from his sadness and misery for so long, that he had never even connected these occurrences with the Ghost.
"I freed Zelda. I have not betrayed you. I did not tell you everything, because there were things you needed to learn yourself."
Link shook his head. "I…I…"
The Ghost smiled.
Link felt all his emotions mixing into a great formless mass until his mind was blank. He didn't know what to say. He didn't know what to do anymore.
And the Ghost placed his hand over Link's shoulder. "You have suffered more than any other. And yet you have accomplished things no mere boy could. You are more than a mere boy. Much more."
Link was still lost in the emptiness of his feelings. He heard the words, but could not even form an answer to them.
"You have passed a trial, destroying a fire worm. You have faced the horrors of the massacre of the Sacred Chamber, and have crossed blades with foul beasts. You have witnessed a great friend's death at the hands of your enemy. You have been betrayed. You lost a friend for what seemed an eternity when the mask whisked Ereb to the other dimension. You fell and broke a leg."
Hearing this account of his quest was different than it had been to actually live through it. The deeds sounded noble and heroic. The losses seemed even more tragic. The remembered pains were more acute.
He looked up at the King. The Ghost's face was hard. The smile had faded again. The silence of the pool was absolute.
"And you lived. You continued. You persevered. And all the while, you believed me to have betrayed you. Your belief was unfounded, but well rooted. And I am afraid I did nothing but fertilize the soil of your doubt."
Link nodded. His feeling had returned. He felt better than he had in weeks.
In nearly two months.
And he was able to smile now. His eyes no longer blazed with a flame of hatred. He observed, or so it seemed to him, that he was standing on a tall tower, looking out a window down at all the events leading up to this moment. His fuel, his drive, his strength, had been anger.
Anger at the Ghost King. Anger at Ganondorf. Anger at the world.
But he saw, in this high place, that he no longer needed it.
Talking to the Ghost had somehow changed him.
He was roused from his thoughts by the voice of the Ghost.
"You have passed the second trial." He said.
Link turned to him, confused.
"The first trial was one of bravery. You showed it when you alone ventured into the tunnel and fought the fire worm. You succeeded in that trial. And now you have, after so long, passed the second. A trial of wisdom. I can see, in your eyes, that you have learned much in this time."
Link nodded. The statement seemed too solemn for mere words.
"And now, I send you to complete the third and final trial of the Hero."
Link frowned. "Trial of the Hero? I thought the trials were for my Knighthood."
The Ghost smiled. "They were, Link. But they are more than tests of your abilities. They are also lessons you learn. Wisdom you gain."
Link nodded. "I am ready, I think."
The Ghost King's eyes bored into him. "Are you sure? The final trial is one that will be far more difficult than the first trials. It tests your heart. Your choices will be the key to the lock."
Link, though puzzled by the King's words, felt sure. He was ready. He must pass the final trial.
"Yes." he said. One word, but it spoke of much more than assent to a question.
The Ghost King nodded, and snapped his fingers. Link felt himself being whisked away on a cloud of light.