Zelda has a dream that she's standing in front of a wall. She's asked Bolson Construction and the Gorons and Harth and Cecelia to build a wall one-hundred feet high around the castle. It looks like the stonework from which the castle itself is made, like the stonework that was once Castle Town. It's a building method that no longer exists.
She stands before the wall that stretches to the sky and stretches out in either direction as far as she can see. She's only aware that the castle is behind it because it's a dream, and she therefore knows these things. It's blank, uneven gray stone without gates or window. She brushes her fingers over a stone, and the whole thing rocks—from the top down. It sways and then collapses on top of her. She feels the blow of every stone and the weight presses her into the ground, flattens her, smashes her.
"Why didn't you use mortar?" she asks. She's enraged. She's distraught.
Link blinks down at her. (Somehow she can see him, even though she's under a pile of stones. It's a dream. It's not real. It makes no sense.) He looks down at her with a concerned crease between his eyebrows and says, "We don't use mortar in the future. Didn't you know that?"
She wakes shaking and gasping, tangled in a sweaty blanket, and Link pulls her into his arms. "Shh. Just a dream, Zelda. It's alright."
For a second, she doesn't want to hug him back.
But it wasn't real. None of that happened.
She grabs his thin undershirt in both fists and buries her face in his neck.
It's been a very long time since she's had a run-of-the-mill anxiety dream. At least she didn't dream that all her teeth fell out. She hates those.
She grips Link tight and forces her breathing to calm.
Even as she settles and Link pulls back to check on her and wipes away tears she didn't know she'd shed, even when he eventually goes back to his own bed before the innkeeper's reprieve at throwing fruit at him runs out, she can't shake the feeling that she's missed something. Something obvious. Something important. She lies awake and tries to figure it out.
#
The opening feast is set on low tables on Revali's landing, stretched in arcs around a round, central podium painted on the side with triangles and oak leaves. Zelda is in charge of writing the contestant's names with a paint brush, black ink, and immaculate handwriting. The Rito take turns strutting to the podium, declaring, "I will take on the trials!" then giving a speech about how great they are. The speeches have mixed success as the Rito have no problem announcing what they think of the contestant, their plans for once they're the Champion, and their fashion choices. When the contestant has finished their speech, they look to Zelda. She stands, writes their name, and everyone cheers.
Several of the contestants she's only met briefly, and she's thankful that Link leans in, looking as if he's whispering a joke or sweet nothings, as he reminds her of their names. There's Mazli, who waited for the dragon and Huck and Verla and Rufflu and Nav. There's Harth, the blacksmith, who receives more cheering than most contestants, and there's Fyson, the shop keeper from Tarrey Town, who receives more heckling than most contestants.
"You don't even live here any more!"
"I am a Rito," he says haughtily, "and since I've seen the world, I am the most qualified to defend against it. Vah Medoh would allow the Slippery Falcon to reach every corner of Hyrule, bringing the glory of the Rito to the world! It is my destiny. I've heard my name called on the wind." He poses dramatically, a wing flung out to the distant horizon.
Except for his mother, who whistles in approval, the rest of the gathered Rito boo. Zelda stands from her meal and writes Fyson's name.
There's a lull before the next contestant announces themselves. There's no set schedule—the contestants declare themselves when they think it will be most dramatic. Zelda's not sure how the meal will ever end.
But now, as the evening gets later, there's a tension in the air, as if they're waiting for something specific. She half expects Kaneli to stand and make a speech or announce his own candidacy. She half expects that Link will stand up and announce that he's not entering. She certainly hopes they aren't expecting her to do anything. Maybe she should say something at the end. Is this the end?
Amali stands from her low table and winds her way forward. Zelda perks in interest. Amali hadn't mentioned entering the trials, but Zelda can't deny that she's excited for her new friend. Amali's back is straight, her head held high.
The audience deflates, a bit of the tension draining away. This is not what they are waiting for.
She steps on to the podium, and the audience quiets.
"I will take on the trials," she announces. "I have been inside Vah Medoh. I braved the beast to help Zelda reach where she could not and activate all but the the last control unit, which will bring Vah Medoh to life. I've seen how glorious she is inside, how wonderful. I will not stand aside to let someone else become her pilot without a fight.
"I've done the calculations," she says, surprising Zelda again by pulling a slip of paper from her pocket. She doesn't hold it up like a visual aid or like evidence, but rather holds it like a talisman. The way her feathers stroke it is almost reverent. "Vah Medoh can make a circuit of Hyrule in three days. She can stop at all the major settlements on a regular schedule, and with that, we can re-open regular trade with even the farthest settlements. Exotic fish from Lurelin. Fabric from Hateno. Gems from Gerudo Town." As she mentions each place, she gestures towards specific people who she knows to be interested in such happenings. "We could transport messages—think of it! Regular communication with every part of Hyrule! We could even transport people. You all know how I've always wanted to see the world, how I want my daughters to see it. I want to experience it—but more than that, I want to help rebuild it, help it thrive. I hear my name called on the wind."
Zelda stares in awe blosoming into hope. This is perfect! This is exceptional! Had Amali been listening to Zelda's prattling about rebuilding Hyrule, or had she come up with this on her own? Vah Medoh traveling in a reliable cycle! Connecting the country once again. Bringing them together, sharing their resources. Mail! Zelda could send mail!
"Sure," someone sneers. "Become the Champion and steal Vah Medoh away so you can hunt for your husband."
Zelda whips around so fast that pain lights in her neck, but she can't identify who said such a cruel thing. Everyone is snickering.
Amali's head is still held high. Zelda's is too as she stands are writes Amali's name with more force than she ought.
Amali sits, and the tension in the air is back. It fizzles on a low simmer until, finally, Teba stands up. The Rito's chatter dies, but their feathers are so puffed in excitement that they still make noise. Beside her, Link straightens in interest.
"I will take on the trials," Teba declares. His voice is strong and carrying, and everyone instantly cheers. "I braved the beast while it was in flight! I braved it when it shot from the sky anything it could reach! I braved the wrath of the Divine Beast to help Link reach where he could not and bring Vah Medoh to heel, so she would no longer threaten our skies."
The audience cheers. Zelda's stomach twists.
"I have proven myself worthy once, and I will do so again. Once I'm Champion, I will use Vah Medoh to ensure no one ever again threatens our skies. I've heard my name called on the wind. I will be the next Champion."
The audience explodes in excitement, and it's only when Link touches her arm that she realizes she needs to write Teba's name. Thankfully, everyone is too busy congratulating him to notice her slip-up.
The feast ends soon after. All together, nine Rito enter the competition.
The feast ends, but the Rito are still celebrating and will late into the night.
Zelda grabs Link's elbow the moment everyone seems preoccupied. She drags him downstairs, and keeps dragging him until they're tucked in the alcove before the statue of the goddess. Link picks up that she needs to talk rather than kiss him, and he keeps his distance when she finally pulls to a stop and spins on him.
She has so many questions and doesn't know how to phrase any of them. What's going on with Teba? Why is everyone—even other contestants—cheering for him so hard? Why does this feel so off? Why...just why? What's happening? She doesn't know how to express that there's a gap in her understanding, and she can't see the size or shape of it, but she knows it's there and she knows that Teba's somehow involved.
She finally lands on, "What was that?"
He frowns at her. His words are careful as if he's trying not to set her off. "Which part?"
"The...the cheering!" Which isn't really it. But Link's face clears, and he nods.
"Teba's going to be the next Champion."
"What?"
He shrugs. "He was their best fighter even before he helped me get to the Divine Beast. He's a fast flyer and he's good with a bow. He's a shoe-in for all the trials."
"But he helped us set the rules for the trials! That's practically cheating."
"Only the flight range trial. You can't visit the flight range without Teba being involved. And I pushed back on most of the rules he suggested. Slowed down the time limit."
She vaguely recalls that that's true. "Are you telling me that I organized these trials even though a winner had already been decided upon?"
He shakes his head. "No no no. You see, all the Rito all want to be Champion. If Kaneli just appointed Teba, everyone would be bitter about it. But when Teba tramples over everyone in the trials, they'll all accept him as the best of them. They'll all accept that he's the Champion who beat them fair and square. They can be mad that they lost the tournament instead of mad that Kaneli or Teba didn't give them a chance."
Zelda presses her hands to her cheeks. Here's the mortar she was missing. Here's the hole she didn't know was there.
She's been so stupid!
Link shifts and rubs the back of his neck. "At least...At least I think that's what's happening. I might be wrong?"
She shoots him a glare. Lying to protect her feelings is the opposite of helpful. "You could have mentioned this."
He winces. "You...really want Amali to win, don't you?"
She doesn't answer. She doesn't have to. It's hard to swallow how much her ignorance has set her up for disappointment. But more than that, it's awful to know that she missed such a crucial political component. She's supposed to understand everyone's relationships to one another. She's supposed to know everyone's angle. She used to be so good at that.
And now... she has no idea what's happening. She planned this whole event without realizing what was going on.
She groans and drags her hands up to her hair—an anxious gesture she picked up in childhood. She's startled to find her hair covered by a kerchief. Just as it has been every day for months. Her breathing is short. Her hands start to shake.
"Zelda? Zelda, hey."
He takes her by the elbows. She can feel his hands, but she can't see him. Dark splotches creep around the edges of her vision, when they clear, she's back at the spring of wisdom, standing in freezing water, not knowing what to do.
"Come back to me, Zel. Stay with me."
She blinks. She's still looking into the face of the goddess statue, but it's a different statue. Her brows have smoothed with age, her smile worn. A hand on Zelda's cheek draws her face away. Link is ducked down to look in her eyes, his face filled with worry. He swallows. "I think you need some rest."
He doesn't sound sure that will fix anything.
She's not sure either, but she nods. She needs a glass of water. "Can we..." She clears her throat. "Can we not sleep at the inn tonight? I want—I just—" She has a death grip on his sleeves. "Would that be too—"
"No. No, of course. I don't think they'll miss us. Let's..." He looks to the sky to think, then pulls the slate from her hip. He stares at the map for a long moment, then nods to himself and tucks her tight against his chest. She presses her face to his shoulder and he slips the slate into her hand.
She doesn't know where they're going when they arrive at the shrine near the flight range. Sleeping at the flight range isn't exactly getting away from it all, but she supposes that it will at least be quiet and private with everyone distracted at the village. But Link takes her hand and leads her down a different path, past the flight range and into the cold. It's a thankfully short trek before they arrive at a cabin.
"It's so travelers can prepare before they head into Herba," he says, his voice low, still trying to soothe her nerves. He starts a fire in the hearth, but it's still freezing inside. The wood shelter creeks in the wind. Link pulls out an enormous flame blade and slips it under the bed to warm it, and Zelda takes off her boots and the ruby circlet digging into her scalp. She keeps her coat on and slips under a thick quilt, pulling it up to her ears and curling into a ball. Link follows her a moment later, pulling her back tight to his chest and wrapping his arms around her. He's like a second blanket and she sags into him.
She just...she just needs a moment. It really shouldn't be such a big deal. She's not going to do anything different tomorrow from how she planned it. She just...doesn't understand how the future works.
"Okay?" Link whispers.
She's not sure why she whispers back, except it's nice to have quiet. It's nice to let herself keep slipping into a dream-like state. "Are you asking about this hug or my mental state?"
"Either," he says.
"The hug is nice."
He nods and holds her tighter, pressing a kiss to the top of her hair. "I'm sorry," he says.
"It's not your fault," she says. "It's mine." It's her fault they were locked away for a hundred years. It's her fault the world fell into ruin.
Link holds very still. Then he shifts her, turning her in his arms to face him. She refuses to meet his eyes until he tips up her chin.
"The Calamity was the Calamity's fault."
She can barely breathe. She wants to look away, but can't. She can feel tears welling behind her eyes. "I was talking about the Rito," she lies.
He quirks a smile and rolls his eyes. "Oh. Well." He twists her back around and folds around her back, shielding her from the cold.
Zelda falls asleep listening to the howl of the wind and the crackle of the dancing fire.
#
It's still dark when she wakes in the morning, but she can tell from how clear her head is that she needed the rest. Sometime in the night, she rolled over to wrap her arms around Link's chest and tangle her legs with his. Sometime in the night, she got too warm with the quilt and the fire, and she stripped off her coat. Link must have done the same, because he's down to his undershirt and his favorite soft pants. He's so warm that she snuggles closer, nuzzling into his chest. She can't imagine ever leaving the warm cocoon of this quilt.
Link lazily reaches up to brush her hair from her face. His fingers drift to trace the contours of her ear. It tickles like a shudder that she wants to lean into. She wants to feel it go on and on, building and building. She squirms closer to him, and he wakes more, a tension drawing taut in the muscles under her cheek. She turns to kiss his sternum through his thin shirt, to feel his muscles wind tighter. She works her way up, slowly marking a trail from his chest to his collar bone and up his neck. She makes it even with his jaw before he snaps, pulling her into a kiss that's deep as his devotion and warm as the fire. Hands trail up her back and up her arms as they wrap around his neck. She lets his kisses drown out the rumble of her thoughts, the thrill of his touch overwhelming the buzz of her anxieties.
He rolls on top of her. Her fingers dig into the muscles of his back. She pulls a leg up to hook over his hip, and he grabs her thigh to hold her close, his fingers dimpling her flesh before dragging to find her rear and pull her even closer. Their angle shifts and—ooh!
She arches her back and gasps, and he bites his lip and ducks his head to press his forehead to her shoulder. He's breathing so hard, and yet holding himself so still over her.
"Link." It sounds too much like begging. He makes a noise too close to a whimper and presses the tiniest kiss to her shoulder. It's teasing in all the wrong ways, and she squirms away, which means they rock against one another again, and both end up gasping once more. He clutches at her, one arm tight around her waist, grabbing a fistful of her shirt at her side, one hand tangled with hers against their shared pillow. His fingers clench and unclench and clench again.
She swallows hard. She sends up a prayer, praying he won't reject her at her most vulnerable, he won't tear himself away along with the blanket to leave her freezing and alone. Squeezing his hand, she rolls her hips.
He groans and moves to meet her, and they fall into a rhythm as their kisses turn desperate, and he frantically strokes back her hair from her face and her nails dig into his arm.
"Zelda, I—"
"I know."
"Goddess, the way you move."
She laughs, and it breaks him. He seals his lips so firmly over hers that she can't think. His rhythm falters and his breathing stutters and she's dizzy and weightless and flying until Link sags over her, barely catching himself on his forearm. He's panting and boneless, and she reaches up to brush sweaty bangs from his forehead.
He kisses at her palm, then nuzzles into her hand like a puppy. His words slur when he says, "I'm sorry. That...wasn't the most dignified thing I've ever done."
She snorts.
He smiles, opening his eyes to look at her with so much love it makes her ache, bending to kiss her lightly, tenderly.
"You okay?" he whispers.
"Yes," she says. "I'm...very okay."
He laughs, burying his smile in her hair, his shoulders shaking under her hand.
#
They're an easy walk to the flight range, and they arrive well before anyone else. The festivities must have gone late into the night. They have a fair bit of set up to do, and yet she has everything organized enough that they're almost set up by the time the first Rito trickle in. Harth sails into the flight range to make a slow lap. Mazli keeps pulling back his bow, aiming, then setting it down. Again and again. Harth pulls out his bow then draws and shoots five arrows, one two three four five, all into the same spot on a nearby tree. They all land in a tight pattern except one, which splits one of the previous arrows only to bounce off when it hits the arrowhead. Amali spends a long time getting her children settled in the stands. Zelda wishes she could get some practice time in instead of worrying about her kids, but Link seems even more agitated by it than Zelda. For a moment, she thinks he might walk over and babysit, but then a chorus of whistles and cheers erupts as Teba lands. The girls are distracted enough that Amali can get away and join the other contestants in the lookout hut with Zelda and Link.
Each contestant will make one circle around the flight range, hitting as many targets as possible with a bow and arrow. For each distinct target they hit, they will receive a point. The targets are rigged to emit a puff of colored, chalky powder when struck, making scoring easier. Each contestant has one minute to complete a full circuit of the flight range. Failure to reach the landing pad in that time period will result in a forfeit of any points earned. If the contestant reaches the end with time to spare, they will receive an additional point for every five seconds they have left over.
Rumor has it that Teba can circle the flight range in thirty seconds and still hit all twenty-four targets. Zelda knows better than to put too much stock in rumors. But there's the distinct echo of truth to them that tells her these reports are only slightly exaggerated.
It's intimidating. She is intimidated.
The highest score they possibly expect to see is 30. Zelda expects the vast majority of the contestants will score under ten.
She is correct.
Most of Rufflu's arrows miss, but he doesn't slow down enough to notice, and comes in way under time, at which point he's absolutely shocked to see that his score is so low. Mazli hits eighteen of the targets and lands five seconds too late. Huck hits nine and is right on time. Verla gets an exciting twelve with an added point for being quick. And Nav gets a solid six. Harth is up next, and even though he can feel the weather changing in the wound in his side, and Zelda can see him cringe as he throws himself off the landing, he still gets sixteen targets and lands ten seconds early.
Amali's kids have brought signs: each of them holds a single letter of their mother's name. Cree's A is upside-down. As Amali stands at the launch point, she lifts a blue feather on a necklace to her beak in what might be a kiss or might be a prayer. She stretches her wings, adjusts her grip on her bow, and when the cymbal rings, she's gone, hurtling low into the range, rolling onto her back and firing upward. It doesn't seem like it should work, but it does. The targets puff one after another, boom boom boom boom boom, then a breath as she takes another great stroke of her wings, and then they're exploding again. She's breathtakingly fast, and soars upward at the end, grabbing the landing from below to stop the timer.
She did it in 42 seconds and hit 15 targets. "Three for each of my girls," she gasps. She's breathing so hard her chest sucks in and out abnormally. She blinks like she's forgotten where she is, like she circled the flight range so fast it made her dizzy.
The crowd that heckled her the night before is cheering. They whistle and chant her name, and she has the presence of mind to lift her bow in the air as she goes to take her seat, and the cheering grows like the surge of the tide.
Fyson is next. He does a back flip off the landing, then spins around the range with the fastest time yet. This is primarily because he doesn't take a single shot at a target. He focuses entirely on speed. Link openly scoffs. The crowd boos. At the very end, Fyson hits the target right in front of the landing, which bangs and puffs out a cloud of smoke that makes his acrobatic flip onto the landing that much more spectacular. It's just ridiculous and showy enough that half the crowd whistles for him. He takes an elaborate bow, and ends up with more points than half of the other contestants.
Teba goes last. Because of course he does. Zelda can't even really hold it against him, the crowd is so enthusiastic. He rolls his shoulders and leans to the side, reaching almost to the ground to stretch his side muscles. He holds out his wings, ready for one great stroke, one burst of speed when the gong sounds. The sound and the burst of air hit Zelda at the same time. He hits three targets before leveling off at mid-height. Another flap of his wings, and he pulls into a tight spin that rockets him half way around the range. Arrows burst from him in a spiral, hitting targets so closely together that they sound like firecrackers. Another flap and another spin brings him nearly to the landing, and—as a joke, as a last minute decision—he mimics Fyson's move. He hits the target under the landing and ends his trial by vanishing into the chalk cloud.
The crowd was a constant roar throughout his trial, but as Zelda writes up his score—20 targets in 34 seconds: 25 points to take the lead—the flight range rings with wild enthusiasm. Teba holds up his bow in a surprisingly humble gesture. Before he heads down to the stands, he catches his breath in the relative privacy of the lookout hut with just Zelda and Link as witness. His chest sucks in and out abnormally.
#
AN: Rating Change? Rating Change!