The Man Behind the Masks
Chapter 23
Any knowledge of dragons came from the rare campfire stories of the Muryō family as a child. They spoke of gigantic flying wyrms with horned heads that breathed fire. It did puzzle me how these monstrous creatures could fly without wings.
"Hold tight," Elrora's sharp command brought me back to the present.
I grasped her feathers like a lifeline. As we plummeted down the corridor of stars and doors, my cheeks pinned themselves to my ears. The Watarara swerved and jerked following their chieftess. They didn't care about the near miss with an island of cherry blossoms. Trails of pink petals took off into the air. I swear, some of them smiled as they spiralled into nose dives.
"Are these aerial acrobatics necessary? Hylians weren't built to fly on birds!"
"A curious thing to say, considering their ancestry," she said.
Pardon? I thought, however, Elrora didn't elaborate any further. Instead, she came to a halt.
"Why have we -"
Every sound bowed to it; silence made my ear drums throb. It came again. The rumble of a roar, shrillness of a shriek and a grumbling groan that stretched across the entire space. For a moment, it paralysed the Watarara. Their wide eyes swallowed the small trembling pupils within them.
Elrora gathered herself. "We must hurry."
The second round of frantic flight made the first seem like a leisurely stroll. I understood now, avoiding the creature meant staying ahead. As the chieftess swooped and turned between narrow rocks it created barriers. Endless spins made me dizzy. But no matter how much distance the Watarara tried to create, the raw energy came closer and closer.
"Where's that confounded gate?" Guufo cursed.
Even in the slipstream, the flock began to tire. Some of the younglings had only just gained their wings from the growth ceremony. They huffed and puffed, trying to stay airborne. At this rate, they would lose sight of the group leaders.
I couldn't shake off the growing sense of unease, like when a spider slowly crawled up my leg in the summer. "Elrora, could you humour me and try any gate?"
She made a beeline for a doorway that led towards a lush green forest. Her beak, which should have slipped through, bounced back. The chieftess tried to open other portals with no luck.
"This has never happened before," Elrora said.
There could be a number of reasons why. Unfortunately, I suspected foul play from another source. Ganondorf.
"Ronri, look out!"
Yasei's warning was blown away by a great gust. The entire flock scattered. A swirling tower of dark cloud moved rapidly in their direction. Increasing in power, anything nearby found itself dragged towards it. The whole dimension strained against the force with shock waves. They rippled through the doorways, making them contort out of shape.
"So, he found us after all. This is Tatsumaki – our resident dragon."
That's the dragon? I thought in disbelief. Quite a defensive strategy. Who in their right mind would hide in a tornado?
"If this continues the corridor is going to rip apart. What say you?" Elrora's question hung heavily in the air. "If we distract the beast the portals may open again."
"That's rather a big if!" I shouted above the howling winds.
Still, I clapped my hands and set up the ammunition as my answer. Silver discs glittered in the strange light as they surrounded us. We surged forward. My honed survival instincts completely abandoned. When had danger and I become inseparable bedfellows? I began to chuckle. I didn't recognize myself. The immaculate accountant from Kawaranai had transformed into a wild, raging berserker.
My silver discs disappeared into the spiralling mass. Elrora swerved which nearly threw me off. Smaller twisters gave chase as they drove us back.
"Any ideas?" She came around for another pass.
The ride grew so bumpy that I threw my arms around her neck. "We need to get inside."
"Inside?"
"The tornado," I clarified. A squawk came from Elrora. "I have an idea, but no matter what, you must fly straight through."
From everything I knew about my power, bending time and space was at the heart of it. I could move objects, even people, from one place to another. This idea stretched beyond those boundaries. Is it possible? Should it be possible? I glared at the tornado. I'm out my depth.
"You have always been out of your depth. That is why I have come."
That voice. At once I felt a strangling clamminess spread throughout my body.
His tone was light, almost casual. "You are getting the hang of things I see. Becoming quite the little magician."
Why can't you leave me alone, Azamuku?
He tsked. "Don't you remember your promise?"
Flakes of ash fell from the sky. Even though this couldn't be real, my mind betrayed me. I clasped my hands together and tried to keep the screaming skeletal faces at bay. The dead hovered over the edges of my memory, ready to force their way through. The Triforce, I recalled in alarm. The rebirth of the Interlopers.
"Excellent!" He lay on his back and floated lazily through the air. "If you intend to reach the Sacred Realm, simply follow your instincts. Remember how we met?"
A life time ago. When a stranger offered assistance to retrieve Guru-Guru from the army barracks. You spoke to me from within the wall.
"Indeed, I passed through spatial matter." He stroked long jagged nails through his silver hair. "Imagine like a child. Do you not feel the creative desire stirring within? To seize control rather than be a mere spectator?"
I couldn't deny that feeling had caught me off guard more than once. What else can I do with this? Such a frightening question really. Akisin had asked once if any man could resist the temptation of power. At the time I said I could, because power was dangerous!
"You ask if it is possible." Azamuku tossed back his head and laughed. "Instead ask: what can stop me?"
In a flash all returned to chaos. Almost on top of the tornado, Elrora flapped frantically to prevent us from being sucked into oblivion. The bright yellow feathers of her crest spiked up. "Ronri, now is the time."
If what Azamuku said is true, then this should work, I thought, despite the cocktail of excitement and terror churning inside my stomach. With my eyes closed, I imagined the swirling mass of cloud with a gaping hole. I could make that hole happen. I could pass through the wild winds and emerge on the other side without a scratch. A familiar heat built up in my fingertips. I feared it no longer.
"Go!"
Shoom! The energy pulse forced me back. I only just managed to grab a fistful of feathers as Elrora dived towards the glowing spot that had appeared. An irritating crackle fizzed in my ears, like a loose piece of wax that refused to budge. Then with a loud pop I could hear again.
"Did we make it?" Elrora asked in disbelief. "I can't see him."
A bluff? I tried to get my head around this fact, but it still wouldn't sink in. Tatsumaki existed within a tornado's illusion. The outer shell was powerful and twisted with a ferocity that would convince almost anything to stay away. Inside, a dense green fog and a slight breeze stirred.
We flew on through the fog, eerie silence made it difficult to pin point his exact position. I had no choice and focused on the nefarious life force. "He's definitely in here," I gasped, the uncontrollable anger of the creature hurt my brain. If I tried to pull away from his aura, however, I lost all trace again. "This fog is so thick…it's unnatural."
Further in, an awful smell clung to the air. The stench reminded me of a deer carcass Yasei and I discovered in the woods one day. I remembered the body, infested with wriggling maggots, and the beautiful swift violets-stained red. I pinched my nose. To see death out in the open like that. Two children, torn between sadness and morbid curiosity. I went to find it the next day, but it had already disappeared.
"We're very close," I whispered to Elrora. "I just wish we could do something about this fog."
"There is a way," she replied.
The Watarara Chieftess shook her wings and as she did so, they shone brightly for a moment. She flapped, sending a shockwave of rainbow coloured light into the murky green. It cut through the fog revealing pearly white rocks. Is this another island? I wondered. Coming closer, the smell increased ten-fold and I swallowed bile back down my throat. There were red strands that hung from those rocks and something cold and wet dripped down my back.
"Ganon's breath!" I dug my heels hard into Elrora's sides just as two grey eyes narrowed into slits.
My body jerked to the right. Sharp daggers from above chomped together, narrowly missing the Watarara's tail feathers. Further blasts of rainbow coloured light dispelled more fog, and ultimately revealed the beast. The campfire stories and encyclopaedias failed miserably to capture even a horrifying fraction of what I saw right now.
Tatsumaki roared and thrashed his large tail. This dragon was a far cry from a thin, flying snake with no wings. Muscular arms and legs teemed with silver scales. Smoke plumed from hairy nostrils.
"We have no quarrel with you," Elrora shouted. "Let my people go and we shall part peacefully."
Tatsumaki's voice rumbled. His words were torturously slow as if recalling the Hylian language had to be dragged from his memory. "Peace? You harbour that." A jagged claw at least two metres long, pointed accusingly at me.
"He is not to blame for what happened to your kin."
"Lies."
Huh? The dragons started it, didn't they? I rubbed my temples, bringing up old arguments years after the fact wouldn't help. Like the Interlopers and the Goddesses there were always two sides. Would history recall every detail accurately? Probably not, nor stories, songs or sonnets. They were only fragments of the truth. A truth based on those who made the records or spoke the words.
"The human in exchange," the dragon snarled.
The proud Watarara Chieftess tossed her head.
"Don't waste this chance, Elrora. You must get everyone to safety," I reminded her. Even if this was a trick, Yasei and Kilton were relying on me. Slipping down from the perch, I instantly missed the security of her warm feathers. Yes, what a sight it must have been to see little old me floating about in this crazy dimension!
"Ronri, I cannot in good conscience leave you here."
My fake smile had been perfected for occasions such as this. "It would be irresponsible to put the safety of the flock at stake for one person. Not only this generation, but the generation of future Watarara. Can your conscience allow that too?"
As expected, the Chieftess struggled with such a question. Naïve morals and making wise decisions did not always go hand in hand. She still saw the rules of this world in black and white. Elrora bowed her head. "What about your friends?"
"Tell Yasei…" I stopped. What should I tell her? I would have liked to see her face one last time. Haven't I regretted this once before? My thoughts were a mess. My heart, goodness my heart. I tried again. "Tell her to warn King Hyrule about the shadow beast and…not to be angry with me."
"May the Goddesses of Hyrule place their blessings upon you," Elrora said.
I flinched. Whenever the Goddesses were mentioned, I remembered the helpless bodies as they struggled against a bright light. "Thank you, that is very kind. Don't worry, all will be well."
As Elrora spread her wings and took off, I wrestled with a shameful desire to call her back. Now the dragon and I were alone.
Author's note - I'll have a 5 week break from Fan Fiction Friday, tagging with David Nystrom with The Era Without a Hero - but I'll be back ;)