Paya is incensed. When the full story comes out that Dorian was blackmailed by the Yiga and that he abandoned his post to run off and find Link instead of being upfront with Impa, she's too angry to form words. Her anger turns into a stream of consonants and rapid pacing. She can't fathom Dorian's behavior. Zelda's heart goes out to the man, but Paya is adamant that real Sheikah would sacrifice anything.
This world view makes Zelda horribly uncomfortable.
They're talking only after the girls have collapsed in relieved, boneless heaps, and are tucked away in the bed. Zelda, Link, and Paya stand outside in the night, trying to keep their voices low as Link and Paya discuss if they have the authority to kick Dorian out of the Sheikah for failing to do the one job every Sheikah has: protecting the princess. Link doesn't, but Paya does. And will. As soon as she gets her hands on him. Zelda attempts to soothe her with some questionable tea that one of the koroks brings to them, but Paya's too wound up to drink it. Zelda sniffs it and thinks that might be for the best.
"Why don't we re-frame it," she says. "Dorian's parting with the Sheikah will be less of a demand of exile and more of a voluntary measure to protect his family for good. If Dorian and the girls go into hiding, the Yiga will no longer threaten his children, and he has shown that their safety is their highest priority. With Dorian in hiding, the Yiga can no longer use him against us."
Link thinks on that and nods. He likes Dorian, and he gets why he would protect his family first. Link's mostly irritated that something like this has happened more than once, as if he's disappointed Dorian hasn't learned from past events.
It doesn't escape Zelda's notice that, in front of Paya, there's no mention of the previous incident or incidents. Link is keeping those to himself, probably for Dorian's benefit.
The plan now is for Link to help Dorian set up a new identity and a new home in Tarrey Town. Zelda makes a list of everything they will need, then tears the page from her journal. Money. New clothes. New names. Hair dye. They'll need to retrieve a scant few sentimental items from their home in Kakariko. They'll need to decide who knows what.
Link also needs to go pick up Dorian, whom he left waiting somewhere in the desert while Link warped the children to safety. Link shows no signs that he's in a rush to retrieve him. If you ask Zelda, both Link and Paya are acting uncharitable—almost petty. But it seems ungrateful to say so.
"I'm sorry to ask you to babysit," Link says, walking a bit away from the Deku Tree for the barest scrap of a private conversation.
Zelda waves him off. "Don't be ridiculous. They're asleep anyway, so it's hardly difficult."
Link grins at her.
"Just don't make a habit of it," she says.
"You missed me," he says.
"Of course, I missed you. I was worried sick. But it's over now, so shoo."
"I missed you too." And then he warps away.
Despite her lack of bed, Zelda sleeps, snuggled up with a pile of koroks on the floor by the fire. The koroks twitch in their sleep, their bodies rattling so softly it keeps nightmares at bay.
The girls are clingy and tearful in the morning. Paya tries to get them to play tag (apparently a favorite) while Zelda cooks mushroom omelets, but they would much rather each claim a lap and clutch at arms and necks and shirts. Zelda's proud that she manages to cook one handed without burning anything.
Sometime in the night, Link stopped by to drop off instructions written in Gerudo and dye that will turn the girls' hair dark brown. From the wording of the instructions, Zelda can tell that the woman who wrote the instructions thinks Link is an idiot. The dye looks like mud and stains clothes, and the girls will not let go of whoever's holding them, so they all end up standing in the pool in waist deep water in their underwear, rubbing butter into the girls' foreheads and ears and the backs of their necks so the dye doesn't stain their skin. Then Paya holds both girls, while Zelda massages the dye into their scalps while wearing a pair of gloves that instantly turn rust red. The color gives her pause, but they keep going. They cover the girls' hair in Zelda's least favorite kerchiefs and let the dye sit until lunch. When they wash it out...the girls have red hair.
"It was supposed to be brown!" Zelda says, checking the instructions again. "Did I mistranslate something? Did I miss a step? Perhaps the red comes through more strongly when you start with white hair."
It doesn't look bad. Just...unexpected. And different. The girls are almost unrecognizable, especially when Zelda braids half their hair back instead of putting it up in Sheikah knots.
The girls still aren't ready to play, but they're more talkative. Zelda tears pages from her journal, and they spend some time coloring. Then the koroks help her get a set of spherical seeds together so they can play marbles. Then they make flower crowns. Then Zelda runs out of ideas, and it's only midafternoon, and the girls don't like her scavenger hunt idea and they don't want to hear about pulleys or elevators or smelting. Paya finds a large piece of tree bark and scrounges up some berries they can use as paint equivalents, and has the girls paint a picture, which she will then carve into a hundred pieces and have them put back together again as a puzzle. This turns out to be both uninteresting and a lot of work for Paya. Maybe Zelda can quickly sew together a couple of dolls? Children like dolls, right?
The girls are overly-relieved to see Link when he appears again in the afternoon with new clothes for the girls. Maybe its lack of sleep, but he's downright startled by the girls' new hair. The girls announce that they like the new braids. They don't mention the color, but they don't say they hate it, so Link shrugs. Dorian hasn't had time to dye his hair yet. Link leaves with the rest of the dye and a sparkle in his eye, like he's looking forward to not telling Dorian about his future red hair.
Zelda doesn't like the way the girls' clothes fit them and takes it upon herself to do some tailoring. This leaves entertaining the children to Paya, who takes the marbles and invents a game called "How Far Can I Throw This?" It's a success.
Link interrupts dinner to announce that everything's as ready as it's going to be, and he's ready to take the girls to see their dad. Ready to take them to see their new home. They cry as they hug Paya goodbye. It's hard to tell if they realize they'll never see her again. Link sweeps a kid onto each hip, gives Zelda an exhausted smile, and warps them away.
An hour later, he's back, ready to take Paya back to Hateno, where she can report everyone's safety and the cover story that Dorian was injured, and Since he is no longer able to keep up with his duties, he has retired a remote beach near Lurian Village.
Paya startles when Zelda hugs her goodbye.
The solitude of the forest is almost peaceful after a long day trying to keep children engaged, but she can feel panic creeping in, as if it's rolling into the glade with the fog. Thankfully, Link's not gone long, and when he returns, he flops down beside her to lie on the floor with a groan. He closes his eyes. "We should forget rebuilding Hyrule and start a business offering transportation services using the slate. We'd be rich in a week."
"You would have to charge people for your services."
"Don't tempt me."
She smiles down at him, the tightness in her chest finally loosening completely. "Have you eaten?"
"No."
"I cooked."
He opens his eyes. "You did?"
He sits up and serves himself everything that's left of dinner.
"We bought the house from Hudson instead of Bolson, so it was a decent price," he says between mouthfuls. "This is good."
"It's fine."
He shoves her with his shoulder, then just leans against her. "The girls have their own room. They like that. They wouldn't let go of their dad though. He carried Koko on the walk from the shrine, and she fell asleep before we even got into town."
"They wouldn't let go of Paya or me today either. It made dying their hair difficult."
Link grins. "Dorian's hair is even redder. We had to go to a stable out in Tabantha where he could get it cut really short. And he shaved. He looks weird, but not half bad."
He drops his empty bowl to the ground and lies back again with a groan. She scoots down as primly as she can to settle beside him, and he stretches out an arm, inviting her closer. She flicks her hair out of the way and snuggles into his side, resting her head on his shoulder, where she can feel the warmth of him. It's distressingly good to have him back. She ought to be more embarrassed that she's so pathetic.
"Are you okay?" he asks.
"Yes. I just worry for you, and when I worry...I guess my sealing powers think they're being called upon. And without anywhere to go they just..." She makes a meaningless gesture with her fingers. "They make me itchy."
He nods as if he knew that. "Did you sleep?"
"Yes."
"Enough?"
"Did you sleep?" she counters.
"No."
"Sleep now then." She closes her eyes and snuggles into his shoulder. She smells much nicer than she did when they were sharing the hammock, and she'd feel pleased with herself if she wasn't now a bit embarrassed about the past.
He taps her lower back. "Come on. Don't fall asleep on the floor."
"We won't fit in the bed. It's too small."
He scoffs and pulls her groggily to her feet. They don't both fit in the bed, so he levers a hip under hers and pulls her half on top of him. She's not going to fight about it.
His body doesn't soften the way it usually does when he dozes off. His breath stays shallow, as if he's trying not to disturb her. She looks up at him, and he's frowning at the ceiling, a hand on his forehead, pushing back his bangs, his elbow in the air. She glides her hand up his chest, his neck, to his face to stroke his cheek.
He blinks and then starts talking. "Koko and Cottla dug a little...indention under the bars of their cell. Not very deep, because they're so little. The Yiga didn't even notice. But it let the girls escape. Koko said they got out three times. She said one time they made it half way through the canyon before they caught her, but I don't know how she would know that. When they caught her the last time, they put a manacle on her. Around her middle, because they didn't have anything small enough to go around her wrists or ankles. I had to pry the damn thing open with my sword."
His fingers trace high on Zelda's waist, soothing the stretch where the manacle would rest.
"But Cottla, she's good at hide-and-seek. She hid and the Yiga couldn't find her, and I couldn't find her. I looked everywhere. In holes and behind crates and behind tapestries and under tables. I had to look for her while also hiding from the Yiga. I looked for days. I didn't know if she was even still inside the hideout. Maybe she got out and she was in the canyon or passed out in the desert or freezing in the highlands. Or maybe they'd just killed her. And the time limit I'd given Paya was creeping up. And the Yiga knew Koko was gone, and they were out looking for her and Dorian, and they were going to find them any minute, and they were starting to notice that I was moving things around inside. I was going to have to leave without Cottla. But I didn't know if I could. How could I leave her there?"
He sighs, his eyes still on the ceiling.
"But you found her," Zelda says.
"I found her. I was ready to just take on the whole Yiga clan, so I could shout for her to come out. But then I found her. Under a wood decking. Probably a two-foot clearance between the decking and the ground. People had been walking over her for days. I'd walked over her a dozen times. Getting her out without getting caught was a nightmare."
She strokes his cheek again. "I'm grateful."
He looks down at her. "For what?"
"That you saved them. That you were brave. That you care. It's my fault they were put in danger, so I'm grateful you brought the situation to a successful conclusion."
He shakes his head slightly. "It's my fault. If I'd just sent Dorian into hiding after last time, this wouldn't have happened."
"The Yiga would have designed a new threat."
"But not one involving children."
"Not on involving Sheikah children."
He pushes the hand on his forehead over his eyes. "We need to do something about them. I thought they'd scatter without a leader, but now they're worse than ever."
"Later," she says, her fingers brushing his cheek. "This was a victory. Celebrate it. At least for tonight."
His eyes are bright as he looks at her—looks at her so long and so candid that she ought to look away. He looks at her as if he can see everything about her, and yet he doesn't look away. And she lets him look. And the longer she holds his eyes, the tighter and thicker and the air grows around them, the more inevitable this moment feels. Her hand slips from his cheek to the back of his neck, ready to guide him in when he moves. But he doesn't. And it's painful.
"Zelda," he breathes, and she shivers at the sound of her name on his tongue. "There's a korok on your head."
From right beside her ear comes, a rattle and a "Twee hee!"
Zelda shrieks and jerks away, throwing a half dozen koroks off the bed.