What you recognize I don't own. Link returned to Hyrule only a few months after the events in Majora's Mask, however he returned without Navi who simply couldn't be found. Once he returned he joined the Hyrule military becoming a knight and due to his skills managed to become the youngest Captain ever at only seventeen. Two years later though during a battle Link is captured by the enemy and shortly thereafter is presumed dead, killed by his captors, with proof being his bloodstained green tunic that he always wore, his weapons (one of which was unknowingly the Master Sword which he had been given in secret) and an instrument that he always carried with him (when he had returned Link gave back the Ocarina of Time to Zelda who later gave him a replica of the instrument). Four years later on what would have been Links twenty-third birthday as far as everyone knew there's a new darkness rising. The Sages are unable to halt it in it's track and are wounded, with Nabooru in a coma, Saria in the Castle severely injured and only able to survive due to her status as a Sage and the rest of the Sages with minor physical injuries but depressed and feeling hopeless. What they don't know however is that there is someone about to be discovered in Kokiri forest, one who has been fighting the darkness that is coming, they have been doing so alone and mainly through defiance for they are found with injuries and obvious signs of torture. They also have few if any memories from before four years ago and even those memories are spotty, but everyone including the person will suspect it's for protection though from what they are unsure of. But memories are not always lost and sometimes those believed gone forever are not as gone as believed. And by the way the Kokiri know that Saria is the Sage of the Forest and since she has to occasionally leave the forest to do her duties as a Sage with her help they have managed to set up a means of communicating with Castle Town and more importantly Princess Zelda in an emergency since she would be the most likely person to know Saria's current whereabouts. The Kokiri thus also have an agreement to allow soldiers into their homes at need and will occasionally take them into the Lost Woods and make sure that they (and any Hylian's that enter accidentally) are protected from it's dangers in regards to their fate of being in there without a fairy (this agreement was important because there had been a few times a soldier had gotten separated from the troop and somehow entered the Lost Woods and since not all soldiers were made aware of the Kokiri the Kokiri protected the separated soldiers in secret while letting Zelda know where that soldier was so that his people could bring him back home). And also travel time is going to be realistic to a degree, instead of sheer minutes in game time depending on the location travel takes about a day or two even on horseback, though part of the message system the Kokiri use is messenger birds which also takes time

The group of six people were in obvious physical or emotional distress, they were also surrounded by guards and medical personnel for they were the Sages that had helped the Hero of Time and one of them was also the Princess thus the reason for all the security. They had been recovering from battle for three days now and it was obvious that Nabooru might never wake up and that Saria would take months to completely heal from her own injuries. Meanwhile the Princess looked out the window and simply sighed

"What is it Zelda?"

"It's just...I miss him Ruto, if not for what happened four years ago he would be twenty-three and due to his unique weapon might have turned the tide, or at the very least slowed down this mysterious enemy that we are now fighting"

Everyone who was awake suddenly also sighed and looked even more depressed because there was only one person that Zelda could be talking about due to the fact that they were the only person never mentioned by name because it hurt everyone to even think about that person much less speak their name and so they had gotten to the point that if they had to reference them it would be in general terms like him or he

"In any case we must be prepared for another attack, weaker though our numbers will be"

"Yes indeed, but first...I think that we should do something that should have been done not only days ago but four years ago, at least by the six of us even if only four are physically able to do so"

Saria speaks up

"Zelda I can..."

"Stay in bed until the doctor releases you from it, you know as well as I do that you're lucky to be alive with all your limbs intact"

And so somberly the four able bodied sages go to a graveyard within the courtyard of the castle and finally not only celebrate Link's birthday but also truly mourn and say goodbye to him, for when he had been declared dead four years earlier shortly after his nineteenth birthday they hadn't felt right celebrating it and neither did they truly acknowledge his death despite the proof they had before their eyes, what they didn't realize was that by finally doing so they could finally say his name, not without pain still, but everyone knew only that would be a possibility with time, but just the ability to say the name would be a start. They also realized that the Royal Court and the guards would have to know that they could say that name once more because it had basically become taboo to do so through lessons learned with pain (the Sages were deemed quick tempered regarding that name and more than one person had ended up with a black eye or broken nose for speaking the name in their presence, either that or the group became even more depressed depending on what was happening at the time the name had been spoken. Even the King was not spared their sorrowful wrath, though he got off lighter due to who he was)