Link refuses to rent a sand seal when he can just catch one, and no arguing that he actually has to catch two will change his mind. He's at it for an hour, catching one seal only to have it duck away as soon as he lets go of it to catch another, catching another, then scaring off a third as he rushes towards it behind a sand seal. They could have walked there by now. Zelda heads back to town, rents one herself, and catches up with him.

"I almost had it," he shouts as they skate over the sand side-by-side, ten feet apart.

"I know."

A pod of sand seals scatters as they approach the spot on the map, and the blue glowing ring stands out against the pale sand, against the monochromatic landscape.

Link picks up speed and blasts through it, Zelda only a second behind as the blue glow shoots forward to form the next marker. She makes it her goal to keep up, and she takes the corners hard, swinging wide, driving the sand-seal harder to keep up. Two seal lengths behind. One seal length behind. Sand spews out behind her and behind Link in dusty waves, a thousand needles to her face and arms and a dry cloud that sucks every bit of moisture from her skin. As they swerve between ruins, she pushes out of his wake to come up beside him, racing parallel as columns flick by between them. As he flies through another blue marker, he catches her eye and grins, and she realizes that they're easily keeping pace with the challenge and he's going this fast to race her. She bends her knees and urges her seal faster, pushing ahead for a brief second before they hit another curve. She's on the outside track and at the end of it he comes out in front, bends low, and bursts into the straight away towards the final marker. She clenches her jaw, narrows her eyes and gives a shout of encouragement to her seal, swerving to the side and up a sand dune. She's airborne and bracing herself, and she barely keeps the shield from skipping out from under her as she lands and skips and flies past the finish line, just to the right of the marker, just a breath ahead of Link.

As the shrine rumbles and rises, he lets go of his seal and rolls through the sand. Zelda skids to a stop, stumbling a bit as she hops off her shield, but she manages to keep her feet. She offers him a hand to help him up, but once he grabs her wrist, he just pulls he down on top of him. With a squeak, she lands hard with her elbow in his stomach, and all the wind is knocked from him. As soon as he can breathe again, he's laughing. His hair is full of sand, and his skin is warm and dry. There's a thin layer of dust between his lip and hers when he pulls her down and she laughs at the chalky feel of it, which just gets him to kiss her more so she gets even more sand in her mouth.

She looks him in the eye from an inch away and smirks. "I beat you."

He gives her a goofy grin, and agrees, "You did."

"Because you let me win."

"You can't prove that."

"You let me win because you like me."

"Or maybe I just like the view from second place."

She makes sure to shove on him as she pushes herself upright.

The shrine has another electric puzzle, and she does a good job reigning in her enthusiasm, if she does say so herself. Maybe because she knows it exists, and maybe this one-with its metallic, climbable blocks-has fewer different ways to conduct the electricity. She's able to investigate one aspect more deeply: how far can the electricity jump without a conductive surface? How does the presence of the magnesis rune affect the flow of electricity?

She finds that it's simple to provide power and activate the switch, thus opening a door, but the difficult part comes in the fact that they then cannot reach the door as all the blocks they need to climb are dangerous to touch. She must rearrange the blocks, provide her and Link a safe path up, then find a way to arrange the blocks back so they'll power the switch while standing in an awkward position.

She steps toward a sparking block to see how it can move and how far, and Link snags her belt from behind, pulling her up short.

"I'm fine. I'm not any where near it. And even if I was, the current here is far less than what runs through the main control unit on Vah Naboris, and I survived every one of those shocks."

Link is oddly quiet at this, and she looks up from the slate expecting him to be frowning at her or giving her a blank stare intended to compel her to be more safety conscious. (As if Link would know what "safety conscious" looks like.)

Instead he looks dismayed. It's enough to get her to lower the slate. "What is it?"

"Naboris shocked you?"

"Yes, of course. They all did, actually, to some degree or another. And a few of the guardians. And the pool at the Shrine of Resurrection. But Vah Naboris was expectedly the most potent. It was the way of things running current through tech that had been buried for eons. Faulty wiring all over the place." She waves a hand. "But that was ages ago."

He's still frowning. "Did I—" He cuts himself off.

"Yes?"

"Did I—" He sigh. "Did I have something to say about this Before? I must have. Have we been having this argument for a hundred years?"

The shrine is cold, but she hasn't noticed until this second. Quietly, she says, "I was rarely up to my elbows in Sheikah technology after you came along. Most of my dealings with the Sheikah technology ended when you were promoted."

"When I was promoted?"

"Yes."

He slowly shakes his head. "I don't..."

She huffs and turns back to the slate, jabbing at icons at random. "I'd rather not discuss how I was trying to deactivate a defective guardian, only to have you pull me away, have it aim a honing beam at my chest, and then have you destroy it! And suddenly the next day you were my knight escort and I was no longer allowed to be near any technology until the Sheikah declared it functional. No. We are not having the same argument, because there was no argument, because I was not consulted."

He's silent. The indignation and humiliation and shame and anger of that moment a hundred years ago flare in her chest as, at the same time, she feels immensely guilty for talking to him about the way he used to be. She feels guilty for how furious she was at him when he was only doing his job, when he turned out to be so steadfast and supportive and kind and loyal, and here she is still upset.

He exhales loudly. "I'm telling you...that guy sounds miserable. I don't know what you saw in him."

It startles a laugh from her, and she turns to look up at him. He gives her a mock judging look that reminds her that the man in front of her has done nothing wrong. It makes her a bit bashful now that she lashed out. She reaches up and traces the leather of his baldric from the center of his chest to his shoulder. "He was very concerned for my well being."

He looks at her for a long moment, then reaches into his stores, pulls out the rubber fish head, and hands it to her.

She takes it. Then stores it away in one of her magically enhanced pouches. She lifts the slate again and walks a few careful steps away, ready to finally move this block.

"Now this is an argument that looks familiar."

Without looking back, she sing-songs, "Would you like to bribe me into wearing it?"

His answer is a very strong, very certain, "Yes."

#

His weight is a secure pressure atop her as he kisses her down into the pillows. They smile and hum against each other's lips, without any real reason except that they enjoy each other's company. They're unhurried and playful and she can thread her fingers through his hair and enjoy it.

One of his hands drags up her arm, stretching it up over her head before lacing his fingers through hers. He stretches her upward, her spine and arm lengthening until he's strung her taught like a bow. If he plucks her, she'll sing.

His hand trails back down her body, but she keeps her arm raised, giving him a long, straight length of bared skin. His thumb rubs circles into her flesh, fingers finding her soft spots, finding places she gives under his touch. He brushes teasingly close to the side of her breast, then caresses down her ribs and flank. Her leg slips from her skirt, and he pulls up her thigh so he can feel her, down to her calf, down until he encircles her able with his fingers.

She giggles, and he kisses up the sound. He's just traced the length of her, fingertip to foot, and he touched less than six inches of fabric as he did so. The thought makes her shiver.

He strokes back up, all the way up her body, setting the whole length of her alight until he tangles his fingers once again with hers, stretching her up another half inch more, until she gasps at the delicious way she's spread out beneath him. When he heads back down again, his kisses are deeper, their breathing harsher, his thumb more insistent.

When he reaches her ankle, he pulls away enough to take her in. Her hand falls away from his hair, from his shoulder, and the heated look he gives her has her dragging that hand up from her ribs to her collar bone, where she presses down to keep herself in check, to simulate the weight that has vanished from above her. And maybe she's breathing harder than she needs to, but her body rolls with every gasp, and his eyes follow the motion.

There's a deft shift of his grip, and then he's holding her knee from underneath with her calf draped over his bicep. She imagines. It would be so easy for him to slip that had upward, inside her skirt, his thumb rubbing deep circles the whole, whole way. She imagines. I t would be so so easy to hook her knee over his shoulder and drag him downward and close. She moans at the thought and closes her eyes. Her whole body sings, and she presses her hand tighter against her chest and her leg tighter against his arm to keep herself from squirming.

He hasn't moved. She opens her eyes, expecting him to be looking at her thoughtfully, as if he's come up with an even better idea. She opens her eyes, expecting him to tease her into begging him to kiss the inside of her knee, which she'll refuse and he'll love that she refuses and he'll kiss the inside of her knee.

Instead, he's not looking at her at all. He's gone absolutely still, looking back over his shoulder.

As if he's heard something.

She tries to get her breathing under control enough to listen, and props herself up on her elbows. Her pulse is throbbing and loud and demanding attention. She draws a breath to ask (she was going to whisper, she was) but he holds up a hand to still her.

A long moment eeks out of her every tensed muscle as they both hold absolutely still. He leans forward, and it's shocking how there's not even the quiet shift of fabric. He murmurs in her ear, so softly that it doesn't carry, so softly that it might be a dream. "Take the slate, go upstairs, and hide. Warp away if you have to."

Her stomach cramps in fear. He squeezes her once right above the knee, then whispers, "Go!" He's up so quickly it steals her breath. He moves fast and silent along the balcony, Master Sword in hand, towards Vah Naboris' central room and the lower level.

She snatches the slate from half under a mountain of pillows and runs, trying to move on her tiptoes so her toes don't slap against the cooling stone, hiking up her skirt with her free hand so it doesn't trip her or flap loudly as she runs. Her breathing is still not under control, and the shift in her heartbeat from arousal to panic is sickening.

The door at the other end of the balcony leads into the central room where the catwalk leads up toward the camel's top humps. She lingers in the doorway rather than dash through the main room, trying to adjust her vision to the darkness inside the Divine Beast. If Link is in the room, he's being too stealthy to see. A moment of looking, and she activates the slate, switches over to the stasis rune, and sweeps it across the area. Link lights up bright yellow, his back tight to the wall, his sword held so it doesn't catch the small amount of light there is. Even knowing he's there, she can't see him without the slate.

Then two figures move out from beneath one of the catwalks criss-crossing the central room. They stand out in bright yellow on the slate, the sharp curves of their sickles, their high pony tails, their masks when they turn to signal to one another. They move like shadows, shifting and wafting, and Zelda holds in a gasp. Fear seizes her throat.

The Yiga are aboard the Divine Beast.

They head away from her, towards the ramp up to her and Link's balcony. They'll have to pass Link to get to her. She presses the slate tight to her chest to block its light, sends up a prayer to the Goddess, and takes a slow step onto the walkway, trusting the darkness to hide her. She tries to move the way she saw the Yiga move, like slipping through water, then stilling. She's a trick of the mind. No one can see her.

No one can see her, because in the dark she can barely see the walkway under her feet. Her toes brush the edge and she stops herself from panicking, stops herself from gasping, from throwing out her arms for balance, from jerking backwards and drawing attention. She's holding her breath, and she'd be seeing spots if it wasn't so dark. She draws her foot back, turns to the left and moves slowly toward the doorway. She's so close that she has to hold herself back from running. She has to hold herself back from looking over her shoulder. She desperately wants to know the Yiga's progress. She's moving too slowly. They're going to catch her. They've already seen her!

Her foot touches the edge of the round doorway, and she lifts her foot higher than she needs to to cross the threshold. She doesn't want to stub her toe. She steps over the edge and lets herself duck out of sight. Her heart pounds and she releases a slow, slow breath, parting her lips so she barely whistles. She realizes that she barely breathed as she crossed the bridge. She wants to gasp, wants to hyperventilate. Her vision would be spotty if it wasn't already dark.

She lifts the slate and peeks out the doorway. Link has not moved. The Yiga are only now at the foot of the ramp on which Link stands. Maybe she didn't take that long to cross after all. They're still moving slowly, and she takes that to mean they didn't see her.

They definitely haven't seen Link.

He barely shifts his sword before he darts forwards and strikes the first Yiga, taking him entirely by surprise. He makes a stifled noise and doubles over the Master Sword, and Link plants a foot against the Yiga's chest and kicks him off the end of his sword, sending him flying backward into his partner, who stumbles under the weight. Link takes a flying leap into the pile of Yiga, ready to plunge a sword into the second Yiga's chest, but the Yiga is fast. He rolls out from under his comrade and vanishes. Link stands, tensed and ready for the Yiga to reappear, dodging suddenly to the side as the Yiga poofs back into existence, sickle at the ready. His laugh reverberates through the room, and Zelda feels sick as Link blocks two swings of the Yiga's blade and makes a lunge of his own. Two quick slashes and the Yiga stumbles, darts back, then falls into a crouch beside his fallen comrade. He takes his friend by the wrist and they vanish in a flash of light and a flurry of paper scraps.

Link stands over the body. The only sound his huffing breath. Something in the air keeps him tense. Something in the air keeps Zelda's fingers in a death grip around the slate.

Then there's a laugh. Deeper than the last. It rumbles like thunder and a Yiga appears from beneath her. He's head and shoulders taller than his lithe associates, his chest like a barrel and his sword longer than Zelda is tall. He towers over Link, who lowers himself into a fighting stance. The blademaster only walks slowly forward.

"You don't belong here," Link growls.

The blademaster continues to stalk forward, and Zelda assumes that he isn't going to speak before he surprises her with a voice that round and deep, almost musical in its laughter. "On the contrary. I think I do belong here. My people helped build this weapon. And when they were done, after the Divine Beasts showed themselves to be everything they claimed to be and more, then the people of Hyrule were afraid. Your people sent us into exile. Your people buried these works of wonder." He comes to a stop, a good twenty feet from Link. "We won't let the Divine Beasts be buried again. We will no longer stay in exile. Hyrule will rue the day they banished us."

Zelda holds back being sick. She child's the slate so hard her fingers cramp. The Yiga want the Divine Beasts.

The blademaster lifts his blade. "As Vah Naboris' future pilot, I order you to give me the Sheikah Slate, and I'll spare your life."

Link doesn't bother answering. He just throws himself forward so they clash together with the rhythmic clang of steel against steel. Link gets a few hits in against his armor, and he lazily drags his sword back, telegraphing the huge swipe of his arm that sends a slice of wind through the air. Link backflips over the swipe, and rushes in for more blows that have the blademaster's back arching. The blademaster jumps away, the movement unnatural, and he brings his hands together in a gesture she's seen Impa do a hundred years ago when she was meditating. A chant doubles and triples as it echos against the walls. There's a building roar like the groans of lost souls. Link braces himself.

She gasps as the floor cracks. A fissure opens, glowing red, a column of steam rising from it as it burrows towards Link at terrifying speed, and there's no way it should be able to put a dent in Vah Naboris, and yet.

at the last second, Link jumps, pulls out his paraglider, and the steam launches him high. When he's over the Yiga, he drops, landing almost directly atop the blademaster with his sword ready, the Yiga is thrown back and Link tears his sword from the ground, and the Yiga launches a final attack, but Link is faster. It's like time has sped up. He wails again and again on the Yiga, and when the blademaster drops his massive sword and stumbles back, he's clutching at his side. He's huffing loudly behind his mask. He lifts a shaking hand into the air and snaps his fingers. He disappears in a flash and a flurry of paper.

Link holds tense and ready for a long moment. Zelda can't breathe waiting for the next attack. Then Link is running, sheathing his sword as he bolts up the ramp. Zelda twists back into the dark little hallway and collapses against the wall beside the door, her back to the cold stone, the slate rising and falling where it's pressed to her chest. The pounding of her heart mixed with the pounding of Link's feet as he flies through the doorway, and she has to reach out and grab his arm so he doesn't bolt right past.

He grabs the hilt of his sword, but stops when he sees it's her-when he recognizes the touch of her hand, the rhythm of her breathing, because it's too dark to really see. He reaches for her as she reaches for him, enveloping each other.

She gasps, "They want Vah Naboris."

"They can't have her."

"They want the slate."

"They can't have that either."

She hugs him tight and presses her forehead and the bridge of her nose into his neck. His sweat smells different from what she's used to. It's an anxious sweat. She presses a kiss to his skin, and it tastes different too.

He squeezes her tighter. "Come on."

"Where are we going?"

"Gerudo Town where we'll be safe. Tomorrow, we're taking care of our Yiga problem."