Chapter 14: Fallen

There was danger, boundless all-devouring danger and razor-keen death, and she fell in its clutches. Something unfolded like spreading wings, and just for an instant she was a bird fighting the consuming storm in the same moment as flinging out her hands to catch herself – there was a light-

Stiff discomfort seemed to fill every part of her body. Something touched her shoulder, light but insistent.

"Wake up. Can you hear me?" The voice sounded old, kindly, strangely accented.

Zelda grimaced. What kind of a position was she lying in? She felt strangely sprawled, bruised as if she'd come through a tempest. A tempest – the spinning black cloud – they'd been flying, and –

She gasped, opening her eyes. Half her vision was filled with grass; the other half with an old, wrinkled face gazing down at her from beneath a decorated hood, faded tattoos distorted and seamed by age. A bony hand patted her shoulder and withdrew.

"Be at peace, child of the sky. You are safe."

"Wh…?" Zelda struggled to draw her uncooperative arms and legs in, to lie tidily on one side. Everything ached. Beyond the grass, and the old woman, she could see trees… huge trees. Had she ever been to an island with trees that large? Everything seemed slightly shadowy, clouded over, and strange sounds surrounded her.

"Be careful," the old woman cautioned her. "You are lucky not to be badly hurt. You have fallen a long way."

"Fallen?"

"Fallen," the stranger repeated. "You were fortunate, I think. Something great and dark gathered in the clouds, and I felt a deep foreboding." Was it Zelda's imagination, or did a shadow touch the old woman's deeply lined face at the words? "I feared something terrible would happen, and I watched the sky. But then I saw a spray of light, and something falling within it. So I came outside, to where it fell, and found you, child of the sky."

Something cold and incredible settled into Zelda's bones. The words seemed impossible and yet felt true. "If I fell… then… where am I?" She swallowed. "Is this the surface?"

The old woman didn't laugh, shocked or mocking; simply nodded her head in calm assent. "You are below the clouds now, child of the sky, as others have fallen before you. I am sorry you have fallen, but glad to be able to welcome you." She smiled, the expression rearranging the creases of her face, as Zelda took it all in and felt the unlikely twin feelings of horror and excitement jolt in her chest. "I am Mahra Impa, but you may call me simply Impa until my companion returns." Something about that made her chuckle softly. "Tell me, what is your name?"

"Zelda." Slowly, stiffly, Zelda pushed herself up into a sitting position, looking up at the clouds above, then around herself. Past the old woman, she could see tree-draped stonework. They had buildings, down here on the surface? And trees – huge trees – and whatever was making all that noise from all around her? The part of her that longed to look beyond the barriers, beneath the clouds that floored her world, exulted; the rest felt a rising panic. Even her Loftwing was out of reach, though she cast about mentally for the familiar contact: it was drawn by distance to almost nothing, a hollowness that wasn't quite death. "I'm… Zelda."

Mahra Impa smiled. "Do you think you can stand, Zelda?"

Rather than answer at once, she cautiously tried it, stiff and off-balance. The air felt thick and heavy, and a little too warm. Everything seemed to crowd in on her, an ominous, unbearable pressure. "Yes," she managed.

"Good!" The old woman was definitely pleased, even relieved. "Then come, follow me. The Temple of the Great Seal will shelter you for the moment." She turned, gesturing to the greenery-cloaked building behind her. "It is safe, protected, as long as no shadow peers too closely. Come."

Zelda followed the old woman as she made her way to heavy-looking doors in the side of the building, pushing hard against one until it grated open. The sound of stone on stone seemed harsh and wrong, incongruous somehow. She stepped inside behind Mahra Impa, letting the door slowly grate shut behind them, and her breath caught.

She was inside a vast, echoing hall, with a long tongue of stone extending from right to left from the base of a huge set of stairs. It was lit by weak, cloudy light pouring through a hole in the roof that had once been a decorative window, and it was empty. Shadows gathered in the corners, roots or branches snaked along the walls where patient life had overcome solid stonework. Absurdly, she pictured it light and airy and welcoming, filled with people in a reverential hush. But she and the old woman were the only people there.

Mahra Impa made her way across the stone floor with the unconcern of lifelong familiarity, and Zelda ran a few quick steps to catch up, following her into a kind of garden chamber set through arches in the opposite wall, another hole in the ceiling above spilling light down to the plants below. Incongruous simple stools were set about, and the old woman sat on one with a quiet sigh. Zelda took another, sitting facing her, still all too conscious of the ache throughout her body.

"What is this place, Impa?"

"It is the Temple of the Great Seal." The old woman gestured to the right, the direction that had been left when they entered; the direction that for some reason Zelda hadn't particularly looked in. "Outside, an ancient and terrible evil is bound by the goddess' power… and the binding grows thin. Do not pass those doors, young Zelda."

Zelda swallowed, hard. She had no real reason to, but she believed the old woman's words utterly. "I won't." She looked around again. "Is there anyone else here?"

"Not at present. Young Impa is my assigned assistant, but she went to take a message to those who should know it. Those who will receive you, when she returns." She smiled again, reassuringly. "As her servants, we welcome all those of the goddess' people who her grace no longer protects. So we will welcome you, Zelda. We know these lands will be strange to you, but we will teach you to live here, as we do."

. . .

Zelda sat for a while, the ache in her body slowly lessening, asking questions and listening to Mahra Impa, whose accented, soothing old voice helped to make everything feel a little more normal, to stave off the moment when the real truth of her position crashed in on her as she could feel it would. Her people were called the Sheikah, and they were sworn to the goddess. They knew about the goddess, and about Skyloft and the other islands. They had legends about the raising of the islands to take the goddess' people to safety, at once strangely different from and yet similar to the fragments of tales Zelda knew, listening to fairy stories or reading the books from her father's library, with the demons that most people thought were just another part of the myth a solid fact and an implacable foe. But weakened, by the goddess' great seal, until she could return and end what she began so long ago.

And as she listened, she felt something nameless: not just the faint, seeping dread that seemed to emanate from the doors Mahra Impa had told her never to pass through, but something… else. Like a call, like a voice on the edge of hearing, an insistent instinct. As if someone had asked her to do something, but she'd forgotten what it was. Finally, the conversation drew to a close, and Zelda could sit for only a few minutes longer before the need to be doing something drove her to her feet.

"May I go outside, Impa?"

The old woman looked slightly surprised beneath the hood of her red robe. "Of course you may, but keep close to the temple. It is said that those from Skyloft get easily lost here. And do not forget that foreboding I felt, child. The demon lord's forces may be near. Can you defend yourself, if you must?"

"Yes." That, at least, Zelda could say with confident ease. She wasn't the best fighter in the Academy – when it came to swordsmanship, that was Link, despite how rarely he seemed to really apply himself – but she was more than good enough to hold her own against her classmates. Realisation hit a moment later, and she looked down. "Well… I could if I had my sword."

Mahra Impa smiled. "That is good. You will learn, here, not to walk without a weapon… for now, at the back of the temple, at the foot of the steps, there is a low chest, longer than your arm. Take whatever you like from within it. It is for our use, after all."

Slightly confused but willing to obey, Zelda left the weakly sunlit garden and re-entered the temple proper, turning to her left to look to the base of the stairs. The shadows cloaked whatever was there, but as she approached, she saw there was not just one chest, but several, and a couple of small cupboards, all tucked away unobtrusively into the recess between the stairs and the back wall. Only one was long and low, and she knelt and opened it.

Inside, a small collection of weapons gleamed softly in the dim light. Surprised, Zelda gazed at them for several moments before hesitantly reaching in to take a sword. It felt balanced in her hand, looking recently oiled and razor-sharp; it was a little heavier and shorter than her favourite training blade, but it was more than enough. She picked up a scabbard to match it, and closed the lid, sheathing the sword and then immediately feeling slightly stupid. She could fight in a dress, but it was hardly ideal. Why hadn't she changed clothes before flying out with Link?

The mundanity of the thought was almost her undoing, and she stifled a sob, and then another. As if she could have expected this, this impossible landing below the clouds on the day of the Wing Ceremony – as if she could have expected the storm, she and Link – and Link –

Mahra Impa hurried out into the temple at the sounds to see her crying quietly in front of the supply corner, a sheathed sword in one hand and the other pressed to her face. Moving quickly despite her shuffling gait, she made her way to the young woman and put a thin, robed arm around her.

"There, there, child…"

Zelda struggled to stop crying and speak through her tears. "My- my best friend, he- we were flying together when the storm-" It was all darkness, a whirling terror of images in her head that didn't make sense. Shearing wind, spinning, blackness. Had he been reaching for her? Or had she tried to save him? What had happened?!

"If your friend fell, we will find him," the old woman said soothingly. "The Sheikah will find him. Nothing escapes our eye, if we will it."

Zelda nodded tearfully, wanting desperately to believe it. "This sword – can I take this sword?"

Mahra Impa barely glanced at it. "Of course. But listen, child of the sky – we will search for your friend, and if he has fallen we will find him. You must not wander far from the temple, though I know… I know you want to look for him." She smiled, her old eyes bright despite the shadow of her hood. "I was your age too, once, you know. And if I were, ooh, several decades younger, I would let you come with me and we would look. But now we must wait, until young Impa returns, and she will look for him and take you to safety. So you can go out, if you wish, but do not let the temple out of your sight." She turned Zelda to face her, serious, bony hands light but strong on her arms. "If you get lost in these deep woods, it will be you we will be looking for as well, and you will not find your way. Do you understand?"

Zelda nodded again, forcing herself to speak past the lump in her throat. "I understand."

"Good." She released her, patting her arm gently. "Then be careful, and do not be too long."

She sniffed, wiped her eyes, and gave a final nod. "I won't."

With that, Zelda turned and slowly, carrying her new sword, made her way to the great side doors and out of the ancient building.

The long-promised Zelda chapters and other half of the story!

Patch Notes
- Visitor from the sky now armed as befits dangerous environment.
- Zelda going into danger alone explained.

Short patch notes, long patch explanation! So we already previously covered the note "max-level powers removed from Impa", but now here we see a lot more of it in action, rather than just not having a seal over a door to force you to follow the line the game wants.

However I try, there is no sensible, logical, or even remotely rational reason that I can come up with for Impa to be randomly immortal (until she decides not to be for also no sensible reason) – and it makes far more sense of Zelda ever being allowed to wander off alone if she's not, and if she simply doesn't realise who and what this girl is until it's too late. So what we have here is two Impas: the elderly, respected Mahra Impa whose duty in her last years is to guard the sacred and holy temple, and the young, up-and-coming Impa from a couple of generations down the line, who's currently assigned as a guard/assistant/general aide, and who is currently off reporting to some other Sheikah, but will soon be back. Mahra Impa does, of course, know her legends, but she hasn't yet connected the skyfallen girl on her own to the foretold duo her people are hypothetically expecting. (She'll work this out before tomorrow, when Link turns up, but more on that later.)