Chapter 9

Aftermath

Malon stared, her eyes wide, into those that had simply given up; eyes that may as well have belonged to a stranger.

"What did you say?" she asked, hoping she had misheard.

"Kill me," Link repeated, his voice as weak and pitiable as the first instance.

"...What happened?" Malon asked, looking him over.

"Thomas has been taking me to some village." Link summarized, "All the people do there is beat me... I can't take it anymore."

Her friend's words tore Malon's heart asunder. She leaned forward and took him into her arms as she began to tear up. "Link..." she barely whispered.

"I'm tired of living like this," the boy continued, "Kill me."

"I can't do that," Malon's voice trembled.

"Please..."

The word was like a dagger straight to the heart; she had never before heard it pass his lips. It only proved to intensify the situation.

"Link," Malon spoke to him, "I could never do that... You're my best friend... l-... I care about you..."

The girl allowed a needed moment to pass before she continued.

"I know it's hard...but dying isn't gonna do anything to help."

Link shoved her away. After landing on her rear, Malon looked up at his rising form, distorted by her tears.

"What would would know?!" he tried to yell through newfound strength, "You don't go through what we go through; you don't work like us! All you half to do is sit and look pretty on your ranch!"

Malon stared for a moment, tears still filling eyes widened by shock at what she was hearing. "Link," she said, "you don't really mean that..."

"Shut up," he strained in bitter parting.

Link turned, and started on his way back "home".

"Link!" Malon called, "Link, wait!" She sprung to her feet to go after him, and hesitated. Speaking any more to him would probably make the situation worse... She decided it'd be better to leave him be for now...

The morning after Falla's return was shrouded with despondency. The girl in question did nothing but sit in bed for most of the day, a dejected expression carved into her face. The first time she went to the bathroom that day, the others could hear her weeping as they passed by. The other girls decided it would be best if they left her alone - they simply didn't know what they could possibly say to her.

The hours passed by that day with, thankfully, no additional fallout from Falla's ordeal from the previous day.

"So what do you think's going on over there?" one girl whispered as she and the others ate lunch in the backyard.

"Over where?" asked another.

The first girl rose a finger to her lips, indicating what sort of conversation she meant to have. "You know...on the other side of the building. Falla got punished because she saw that girl get shot, right? Clearly something out of the ordinary was going on. I was just wondering what happened next, after Falla ran away."

"Shh!" Aesha cut in. She nodded towards the door, where one of the subjects of conversation stood.

"Falla!" one of the girls exclaimed.

Falla shut the door behind her before she joined her friends at the table.

Linkle watched on. The bruises on the girl's face seem to have gotten even worse, having turned to deeper shades of red and purple. Her depressed gaze was heart-wrenching.

"We're having burgers!" one girl exclaimed excitedly, "Your favorite!"

Aesha stood up, "Here," she said, "I'll get you a plate!"

The girls were always fed three times a day. They were usually given whatever they wanted, within reason (the girls would make a request to a caretaker, and would receive the meal a week later on that day. Otherwise, the cartakers selected meals), and James would decide how much food they receive.

"A-Anyway," a girl spoke, "how do you guys feel about pets?"

"'Pets'?" asked another, "What's that?"

"An animal Humans keep for companionship! I was thinking about asking the caretakers for one."

"What's an animal?" asked the same girl.

"Are you serious?"

Falla listened in, her eyes locking onto each girl as they spoke. Her eyes grew sadder and sadder all the while.

"Here."

She jolted. Her eyes lit up a little as Aesha handed her a plate with a burger.

"Aesha!" one of the girls called, "We were talking about asking the caretakers for a pet! What do you think?"

"A pet? Why-"

"Falla!" Linkle shouted.

The entire table broke into a panic as Falla's hands flew to her neck as her mouth hung open.

Wasting little time, Aesha grabbed the girl from behind, both fists forming a ball at her diaphragm, and stroked upward. After a few repetitions, Falla finally spit up the large chunk of food she had tried to eat.

"Are you okay?!" one girl asked her.

"Give her some space," Aesha responded in Falla's place.

As the everyone's excitement died down, Falla suddenly pounded two fists in the table, tears of frustration brimming in her eyes. She turned and storned away, back into the manor.

Linkle jolted when the door slammed behind her friend.

That was a horrible thing to witness, she thought. And what was worse was how hard this must all be for Falla. She got up and ran inside after her.

"Linkle!" Aesha called for her, "Wait!"

Inside, Linkle could hear yelling and wordless shouts of rage and sorrow that eventually broke down into sobs and wimpers. She peeked into the bedroom, where Falla sat on her bed, covered by her sheets. She approached the girl.

"Falla..." she said as she reached out to touch her. The girl shoved her away, another shout making clear her wish to be alone.

But Linkle wouldn't let that stop her.

She took a deep breath, "You were right, Falla!"

Falla's commotion quited to sniffles.

"It doesn't matter who you were in the past - what matters is who you are now! And I know who I wanna be now... I wanna be like you! I want to do for you, what you did for me!"

Falla removed herself from underneath her blankets as Linkle continued.

"You helped me feel better about myself, and now I want to do the same for you! Aesha told us about the things you won't be able to do anymore, but you can still have fun like you used to, right? Like-...the flowers! You can make those-...uh...things you made for Epha's birthday! And-...uh...we can still run around, and...play, and-

Linkle paused as Falla stood up on the floor in front of her. With no warning, she closed in...

...and hugged her.

Linkle blinked several times, surprise freezing her body over. She could still hear Falla's sniffling as she burried her head into her shoulder. Linkle returned the the gesture.

She thought back on the two years since she arrived at the estate - at how hard Falla tried to cheer her up whenever she felt down, which was often. That's who she wanted to be for her friend. Someone who would always be there for her, now, and always. Her past didn't matter - it never mattered. Yes, she still felt what she did to her brother was reprehensible, and she knew she'd probably never forgive herself for it, but now it was time to bury the past, she decided, because this was who she was now.

"James," Charles called as he knocked on the door to his employer's bedroom.

"Come in," he called back.

Inside, James was seated on his bed almost the same as when Charles last saw him. He shut the door behind him. "Have you decided what we're gonna do about the girls yet?"

"No."

"You know we could always keep going like this," Charles suggested, "I'm sure those girls'll still do what we tell them to do."

"But they're morale will still be low," James responded.

"Why does it matter?"

"Because I want to raise children here, Charles. I'm not getting any younger. This operation was years in the making. If we can't do this the way we outlined it, who knows how long it'll take to restore the estate?"

"We could always sell the girls back to their owners." Charles suggested, "Or better yet, sell them here. We could take pictographs of the girls and put them in the papers with an advertisement. The slavers will go crazy for them!"

"No." James told him, "If we let them go, they'll tell other girls about this place, and word will spread; we'll be ruined before we start!"

Charles tried to blink away his bewilderment, "Hyrule's a big place, James. How is anyone gonna know they're-"

"But we can't keep keep them here either." James said, ignoring his advisor as he lowered his head into a hand in contemplation, "We can't keep three groups of girls separated without using the other buildings - and they aren't renovated yet..."

"James?" Charles called, "James!"

"We'll have to get rid of them..."

"How? You just said we can't!"

James continued his mumbling. It was as if Charles wasn't even there.

"JAMES!" he finally shouted.

"Charles," James began, "I need you to go and see how the girls are doing."

"What? Haven't you been listening to me?"

"Charles, go! I need to think!"

Charles sighed. He chalked James's behavior up to simple stress, and decided waiting this whole thing out was the best option.

Linkle and Falla remained by each other's side until the other girls decided to check on them. There, they apologised profusely, fearing that they made Falla uncomfortable somehow while they were eating lunch.

"You're sure we didn't make you uncomfortable?"

Falla shook sure head, smiling through the pain of her injuries.

"So what did you guys talk about?" another girl asked Linkle.

Just then, a loud gasp silenced the room.

"EPHA!"

The girls turned their attention to the door, where their former roommate stood.

Suddenly, Epha found herself crowded. The girls trampled her with hugs and emotional sentiments describing how badly they missed her.

"What are you doing here?" a girl asked after the commotion died down.

"I left my corsage in my drawer." Epha explained, "So one of my caretakers brought me here to get it back!" Epha looked right at Aesha as her sentence concluded, "I'm going to my drawer to get it!"

Aesha watched on as Epha went over to her old dresser, and opened the top drawer. The look she gave her was obviously intentional. The first thing she thought of was the emphasis placed on her words.

"...one of my caretakers..."

This was probably so that none of the girls would bring up anything that was only for their ears. She looked at the door. The caretaker was probably around the corner - out of view for anyone in the room. Had Epha not said anything, one of them would have slipped up.

"Remember all the talks we used to have?" Epha said, clearly referring to their talks on where they were, and why they were there. She stared at the folded sheet of paper she had looked to replace her birthday present with and sighed.

"Hey!"

All the girls in the room froze at the sound of a foreign voice.

"What's going on?" Charles asked the caretaker.

"One of the girls left something in their old room," the caretaker explained, stepping into the doorway, "so I brought her here to get it."

"Several days is a pretty long time to remember you forgot something." Charles commented. He stepped into the room to look at the girls. They all watched him, still frozen in their tracks. "So what was it you forgot?" he asked as he approached Epha.

"A-choo!"

Charles turned to look at Aesha, who proceeded to fake a sniff. His eyes then locked onto Falla, the discolor on her face catching his attention. The second they met eyes, she moved to hide behind Linkle. He sighed.

"James told me to check on the girls." he explained to the caretaker, "I'll go with you back to the west wing to check on the others."

"Okay." The woman turned to Epha, "Are you done here?"

"Uh-huh! I just gotta say good-bye to everyone first."

The girl went to all her former roommates, hugging them and bidding them farewell all the while.

She went to Aesha and hugged her tight. "I left a note in the drawer," she whispered, "Read it after we leave."

She went to Linkle, pausing as she layed eyes on Falla. After a split second of stunned silence, she grabbed her by the face. "What happened?!" she asked, "Did you fall out of one of the trees again?!"

Falla opened her mouth to show the girl what had happened in her absence, earning a sharp, horrified gasp.

"Let's go," Charles called.

Epha took a few steps away, her eyes still on the cause of her horrified expression. "Bye," she told her before she turned to leave with the two adults. Once they were a good distance away, Aesha shut the door.

"Guys," Aesha spoke in a low voice, "Epha really came through for us. Quick, look in her drawer!"

One of the girls went over to the dresser, and from it, retreived a folded piece of paper. After unfolding the sheet, she her eyes scanned its contents.

"*GASP!*"

"What?!" Aesha asked.

"I can't read."

Aesha frowned, "Give it here." After receiving the paper, she read aloud what Epha had written:

Hey evrywon! the letter started, Its ben a wild cupl of days for me in my new rum. I reely mis yu gis and I think about yu evryday! I no i culd get in a lot ov trubl for this, but ime guna uze this opertunity to tel yu gis wy we wer brot heer.

Shyla, who was still seated on her bed, began to listen in as Aesha continued to read aloud, her tone weakening and quieting all the while.

The place they were brought to was indeed a brothel, where the girls' job was to, in Epha's words, "have sex" with customers. Epha would then going on to explain how, exactly this is done.

Aesha finished reading, though the look on her face suggested that she may have needed to read it again to properly grasp what she had learned.

"I was afraid that that was the type of place we were brought to." one girl admitted, "But I didn't want to admit it to myself..."

"I-I mean," another girl stammered, "it's not all that bad, right? I mean no matter what our job is, they still treat us good here."

"Are you serious?!" Shyla shouted as she stood from her bed, "All we're gonna be are a bunch of playthings for any weirdo who comes through here! Is that what you want?!"

"Well-...it's better than being a slave!"

"We're still gonna be slaves!"

"And besides," Aesha added, "You've seen what happens if we make them angry. Look what they did to Falla...and what they did to one of the girls over in the west wing. I don't know about you guys, but I'd take a lashing any day over that..."

"But-..." another girl started, "we still get to eat what we want, right? And we get to play all day, and sleep in as long as we want!"

Yet another girl spoke up, her voice trembling, "When I was little," she said, "my mom told me we weren't supposed to let anyone touch us there..."

"So what are we gonna do?! It's not not like we can just get up and leave just because we don't like it here!"

"I dunno about you guys," Shyla spoke, "but that's exactly what I'm doing!"

The room fell into silence...

"What?" Aesha asked her.

"You heard me!" she said, her voice beginning to tremble, "l'm not gonna lie down for some guy I don't even know! ...I'm leaving...if any of you want to come, great. If not, then I guess this is good-bye."

Shyla started toward the door.

"Wait!" Aesha called.

"You're not gonna stop me!"

"I'm not trying to!" She took a deep breath, "We're coming with you!"

"No we're not!" a girl responded.

"Think about it!" Aesha told her, "If James was willing to punish Falla and that other girl the way he did, who knows what he'll do to us if Shyla leaves!"

The room fell into silence once again, aside from bits and pieces of meager protests.

"Besides," Aesha continued, "if you're really gonna escape from here, you'll need some help."

To be Continued!

Bonus Chapter

Backstory; Part 4

The Hole... It was the place misbehaving slaves were sent to; a place intended to silence the cries of rebellion of what came to be the natural order of Hyrule. A visit there was like a toss of a coin. At times, slaves sent to The Hole were attacked by the Keese that lived there, a proper punishment, Philip would say, for the slaves who disrespected him. Other times, the darkness within the reaches of their imprisonment was almost therapeutic in how it mellowed the slaves into a state of mind that brought about the eventual submission to their livelihoods; to the "the way things are supposed to be" as Philip would put it.

These factors, however, had no such effects on Link.

To him, the darkness acted as a furnace - it assisted his anger in tempering his increasing hatred for Philip, for all Humans, and for the complacent slaves that welcomed their treatment of him; the slaves that did nothing, even as the Humans who killed his father - their friend - stood just in front of them.

He hated them, he decided as tears streamed down his face, he hated all of them.