Zelda stared up at the ceiling of her room. It had felt like forever since she had last been in her own bed, despite having only been a few days. But no matter how comfortable it may have been, there were too many thoughts swirling around her head from everything going on that there was no way she would be able to sleep. And even if she was able to, it wouldn't have been a very restful sleep.
After lying awake for what must have been at least half-an-hour, Zelda sat up and looked around. If she couldn't sleep, she might as well try and find something to keep her mind focused. She got up, picked up a small lantern and headed out of her room, not exactly sure where she was going. She felt the familiar presence of Impa following in the shadows as she headed down the hallway. Sometimes the princess wondered if her attendant ever slept.
The castle grounds seemed ominously cold and empty. Even more so than when she and the others had arrived. The small light produced from her lantern cast shadows across the faces of the many guards and royal attendants that she passed by. It was hard for her to imagine how powerful Vaati must be in order to have turned them all to stone so easily. It was even harder for her to imagine that they would have to fight something so powerful so soon. She had no idea how they would be able to do it but they had to find a way to rescue everyone.
After a while, Zelda found herself in the castle gardens. She had visited this area so often that it was almost like she had just instinctively made her way there. She walked over to her favorite spot and sat down on one of the benches there. The stone was cold thanks to the night air, particularly since she was wearing nothing for warmth over her old nightgown. She tried not to pay much attention to the cold, however, and focused her attention on the pedestal in front of her. It was weird not seeing the Four Sword there. The legendary blade had been embedded in the stone since long before her time. It was a constant. Always there no matter how much everything else changed in her life. She had taken comfort in the sword's presence, even if she had never realized it before. But now it was gone and the evil it had sealed away had been unleashed.
It was strange to think about. She had spent a lot of her time right here. Right next to where the evil monster that was now threatening Hyrule had lain dormant for centuries. Yet in all that time she had never really felt it. Sure, she had known that the Four Sword had been used to seal away a great evil long ago, but it had never felt like there was anything particularly off before. Now that she thought about it, she would have expected that being near such great evil would have filled her with a sense of dread, that she would be able to feel the malice emanating from the blade. But it had never been that way before. If anything, she had always felt a sense of peace being here. Perhaps that was just a testament to the power of the seal.
Zelda got up again and continued wandering the grounds. There was no sense dwelling on this now. Though a question did pop into her head. Why now? Vaati had been sealed within that blade for generations without any issue, so what had allowed the Wind Sage to escape now? And there were so many other things all happening at once. Vaati, Bongo Bongo, that creature in the Ice Cavern, the Dodongos, whatever had happened to the Kokiri's guardian before she met Link. And all of this right as they were supposed to be working towards bringing peace to Hyrule. She couldn't help but think of her dreams. There was the original, where the boy in green stood as a light against the darkness that the man in black armor. And there was the new one, where she stood alongside both the boy in green and the man in black along with seven others against a darkness which surrounded Hyrule from all sides.
This was it. It must have been. So many evil forces awakening or reawakening at once. All striking separately yet it was almost as if there was something coordinating all of it. It must have been the darkness from her dream, the current one, yet what could have been behind it. Then there were the people in her dream. Link was clearly the boy in green, and Ganondorf the man in black. Impa, Darunia, Saria and Ruto were four of the seven that would stand with them. She supposed Nabooru must have been the fifth, but that still left two more. Who were they? When would they be joining them? The more she thought the more questions she had. She still didn't even know what had caused her dream to change so dramatically all of a sudden. All of her questions quickly fell to the back of her mind, however, as she turned a corner on the path leading to the royal crypt.
"Father!"
The young princess nearly dropped her lantern as she spotted the stone remains of her father and she ran over to him. He was petrified, just like nearly all the men in Hyrule. That was not a surprise. She had fully expected to find him that way and had mentally prepared for it. What did catch her by surprise was the took of pain etched into his face as he clutched a spot on his side and knelt close to the ground. He was injured, badly. The light of her lantern reflected off a small pool of dried blood that had collected under his injury. Unlike everyone else that she had seen so far, who had seemingly been turned to stone before they knew anything was wrong, the king had been attacked first.
Impa emerged from the shadows to stand by Zelda, fell onto her father's petrified body and began to cry. The Sheikah placed a comforting hand on the sobbing princesses' shoulder. They remained like that for a while, before Zelda was finally able to give in to her fatigue from the very stressful day and drifted off to sleep. Impa then picked up the young princess and carried her back to her room. On the way there, she even allowed herself to shed a tear for everything that had happened. Even if they did manage to defeat Vaati and rescue everyone, this would still be remembered as one of the greatest tragedies in Hyrule's history.
Everyone gathered in the castle's entrance hall the next morning. The atmosphere seemed a bit less ominous in the morning light than it had been before though there was still a sense of apprehension in the air as the group of Hyrulians prepared themselves for what was ahead. Once everyone was prepared, they set out with hardly a word uttered between them until they reached Castle Town.
As they marched through the once-bustling market square, Zelda glanced to a tall brick building to the east of town, which stood out atop the nearby shops. She stopped for a moment, an idea forming in her head as she stared out at the Temple of Time.
"What is it?" Impa asked the princess.
"Hm?" Zelda turned back to the others, who were clearly wondering what she was thinking. "Oh, nothing. Well, actually a thought did just occur to me. I think I may know what we could use to defeat Vaati."
"That's great!" Darunia slapped the young princess on the shoulder, almost knocking her over. "What is it?"
"I was just thinking, if we could gather the three Spiritual Stones, then we could open up the Door of Time where the Master Sword is said to be kept. With the Blade of Evil's Bane, I'm sure that defeating Vaati would be much easier."
"I'm not so sure about that." Ganondorf couldn't help but feel a sense of déjà vu.
"Why not?" Zelda was confused by this reaction.
"Because if the legends are true, then opening the Door of Time means opening the way to the Sacred Realm, where the Triforce is kept. It's possible that whoever or whatever is behind everything that's going on right now has set everything up just to force us to open the Sacred Realm so that they can lay an ambush and take the Triforce for themselves." Ganondorf explained. "Or at least that's what I would do if I wanted to take over Hyrule."
"He does have a point. This could be a trap." Impa glanced towards Nabooru quickly before turning her gaze back to Princess Zelda.
"Alright." Zelda was a bit disheartened that her idea to try and turn things around for their favor was so quickly shut down, though had to admit to herself that she hadn't really thought it through before suggesting it. "I guess that we'll just continue as planned. Um, does anyone actually know how to get to the Tower of Hera, though?"
"I know the way." Darunia spoke up. "I don't think that anyone's actually gone there in years, at least as far as I know, so I don't know what state the path will be in. Still, it shouldn't be very difficult to get there, just long."
"Then I suppose it would be best to let you lead the way, then." Zelda nodded to the Goron chief.
"Alright! Everyone, follow me!" Darunia ran up to the front of the group and continued running out to the edge of town. The Goron was surprisingly fast for his size and weight, forcing everyone else to run after him in order to keep up.
"Slow down!" Ganondorf shouted once they had reached the drawbridge leading out to Hyrule Field.
"What's wrong?" Darunia slowed to a halt and turned to face his companions.
"We can't just run the whole way." Ganondorf pointed out. "We'll all be utterly exhausted long before we get there."
"Oh, right." Darunia scratched the back of his head awkwardly. "Sometimes I forget the rest of you don't have the same level of stamina that we Gorons have. Guess I'll take it slower from here."
With that, Darunia continued at a much slower pace, allowing the others to keep up without any more issues. The rest of the trip East back to Kakariko Village proved uneventful. After taking a moment to rest in the empty village, it was time to head back up to Death Mountain.
The gate blocking off the mountain pass had been left open and the guard who normally stood guard there was gone, likely having been helping to evacuate the town's residents during the fire before Vaati was unleashed. Even if he was there, however, it wouldn't have been any better as he would have been nothing more than a petrified statue. Several tektites hopped around the mountain trail on the other side but they were no match for Darunia and Ganondorf's heavy weapons as they cleared the way for the others.
Hiking up the side of one of Hyrule's largest mountains wasn't easy for the members of the group not used to such a climb, which was nearly all of them. As such, they had to stop and take several breaks as they ascended Death Mountain. By the time they nearly reached the mountain's peak, over half the day had gone by and it was decided that they should break for lunch before continuing around to the other side of the mountain, where their destination stood waiting for them.
"How much further is it?" Ruto complained, sitting on a small boulder and rubbing her aching webbed feet.
"We're pretty close." Darunia said, plopping down on the rough ground. "Getting up here was the hard part. The rest of the trip should be easy enough."
"It would be easier if it weren't so dark out." Zelda said, looking up at the shadowy clouds that continued to ominously swirl about overhead.
"It's not that dark out here." Saria pointed out.
"That's because you live in a forest." Zelda countered. "You're used to the sun being blocked out by the trees."
"True." Saria pondered that. "I guess I never really thought about that before. Although I think the hardest part of getting up here was those parts we had to actually climb."
"Sorry we don't have a better way up here." Darunia apologized. "We never really felt there was a need to since normally people don't come up this far unless they want to climb the mountain. To my knowledge, no one's even gone to the Tower of Hera itself in a few hundred years."
"You have nothing to apologize for." Zelda replied. "It's not like anyone ever thought that there would ever be a need to explore the tower so long after it was abandoned."
"What exactly is the Tower of Hera, anyway?" Navi asked. "I've never heard of it before now."
"The Tower of Hera is said to have been an ancient temple built in the early days of Hyrule." Impa explained. "Most records of it have been lost to history and the structure has become shrouded in myth as a result. However, legends say that the Hylians originally came from a land in the sky and that the tower was built as a way for the ancient Hylians to honor their past. Whether that is actually true or not is a matter of speculation and it is unlikely that we will ever know for sure."
"Interesting…" Darunia stroked his beard. "According to Goron legend, the Tower of Hera was supposed to have been made by the Gorons and Hylians together under the direction of the three Goddesses in order to house an ancient relic within its walls. They say that one day when the land of Hyrule is threatened by a darkness, a hero chosen by the Goddess Farore will have to overcome the temple's trials and claim the ancient treasure in order to use it to save the land from evil."
"That is also a possibility." Impa nodded. "It happens to sound like many Hylian and Sheikah legends, as well."
"Hey, maybe one of us is the hero!" Darunia suggested jokingly.
"Perhaps so." Impa agreed, to Darunia's surprise. "We will likely learn more after we reach the tower. For now, we should eat and regain our strength. Whatever lies ahead, we will need to be prepared for anything."