Disclaimer: I don't Zelda or any characters that may have appeared in any Zelda game.
A. N. Ah! Yes. One of my favorites Did I ever mentioned that I had started a long time ago another fic and that I didn't like it so I threw it away? Well, after that long-winded fic of mine I came up with the idea of the Tales: short and sweet, just like the stories I like.
Enough! Read on and tell what do you think of this fic!
The Lady of the Lost Woods: The Fierce Wars
A gray dawn approached the mourning city, as if the goddesses were trying to match the sky's hue with the hearts of the Hylians. The first rays of morning brightness that reached the market could only uncover from the shadows many people sitting on the deserted streets of the town. Lying on the floor and leaning to the central well was a weeping woman clutching a small medallion shaped like a heart and with the picture of a man engraved in it. By the bazaar, a man sitting in front of the door nibbling on a hard biscuit that the owner of the store had kindly given to him two days ago was about to finish his breakfast. Sitting next to him was a figure of a woman clad in an old cloak travel-stained and dirty, alternatively begging to the store owner and to his nearby neighbour for some food. On the other side of the town center were more people of not too different appearance and condition all of them shivering by the cold wind that had come with the morning light. Some of them had their heads nodded in despair, while others gazed at the fortress that once had provided a little ray of hope time ago, though it was not so in those days. The castle that at times of peace showed great majesty was now somehow making every citizen that looked at it be aware that its proud crown and towers were just a little haven in the midst of a sea of evil. The great Hyrule Castle of the kings of old would not aid them in the Great War that had kindled in the once peaceful country. Victory could only be achieved by arms. Yet it was not by lack of them that the Hylians saw triumph very far away and unconquerable. What is the use of an ancient and great craft in the making of blades if there is none left to wield them? But even weakness in numbers was not the cause of their hopelessness. No, It was not lack of valour or men. It was lack of faith that kept the Hylians dreading their lives and cursing their existence. For there is not any weapon more powerful than despair. And he who knows how to wield this blade is the most dangerous enemy one can have.
Dyni woke up with no sound at all about her. It was not strange, however, to find that silence had been occupying laugher and merrymaking's places for many a long year. She got up slowly and went to her baby's cradle just a few steps away from her bed which had become quite big since her husband had left to do battle with the king's enemies. She hated the awful lot of space that the bed offered every night after dusk. She preferred to remain awake instead of calling for the memory of the father of her child, probably in a pavilion away from her warm embrace. The baby was soundly asleep and she thought he looked just like her husband, except that the child did not have his gray eyes, but her blue. His hair was short and the proud parents could not tell whether he had his mother's golden strands or his father's brown locks. The child seemed not to care about anything at all, though, as long as his mother would stay near him. And what baby can be happier than the one with his loving mother holding him in her arms and keeping him warm?
The sounds of approaching footsteps coming up the stairs made Dyni turn to the door, holding to the groundless (some would say absurd) hope that her husband would return at the moment and tell her that the war was over and happiness would return soon and so would peace. Instead, a knock came through the door and a voice calling for her.
"Lady Dainúviel! Are you awake?"
"Yes, Lampa."
"Would you be needing something?"
"Nothing, thank you Lampa."
"What about breakfast, my lady?"
"I'm not hungry, thank you."
The footsteps sounded again until they died away in the tower's stairs. Dyni yawned and took the cold cup of tea that she had left the night before. She took a sip and sighed. She was hungry indeed, but she did not want to talk to anybody at the moment. Loneliness was by now an old companion, and she had become used to her. The only person she allowed near her was her baby. And perhaps her husband… in her dreams. There, he would often return to the drawbridge with his broken men and notched swords but with their proud battle standard waving in the free air. And she would be happy and sing:
It's been a long time
Now you're coming back home
You've been away now
O! How I've been alone.
But he would reply, with tears filling his eyes:
Wait, till I come back to your side.
We shall forget the tears we cried.
But if your heart breaks, don't wait.
Send me away.
And she would sing again:
But my heart is strong.
I shall wait for long.
But please don't delay.
And then he would smile, and turn his back to her. And she would wake up with tears flowing from her eyes.
Dyni realized suddenly that it had been a week since the queen had dearly departed to the goddesses' side, leaving the heir to the throne behind: A beautiful girl whose destiny was either to rule the peaceful and prosperous realm of Hyrule, or order the devastated wasteland that once was the last remnant of the Hylia. After washing her face in a near jar, the lady sighed again as she walked to her room's entrance and opened the door. The hall and the stairs were empty and not a sound could be heard. She headed downstairs into the main entrance hall, and there she saw the royal guards standing by the main staircase leading to the throne room. She walked towards the stairs and answered with a slight bow to the greetings of the soldiers. She climbed up all the way of the long staircase till she stood in front of the closed door leading into the king's presence. She paused for a moment and thought about the queen again. A single tear rolled over her cheek. She opened the doors.
The throne room was a magnificently decorated room with a single great window facing the courtyard. Rich suits of armour were displayed at both sides of the entrance and above it was displayed an emblem of the sacred Golden Power. A violet carpet stretched from the door to the king's seat. Many paintings hung from the walls including one of the previous king and a representation of the creation of Hyrule. Dyni was especially fond of one that depicted a Hylian of pure blood, unmingled with common people. He had golden hair and gray eyes that shone with wisdom. A straight and thin nose gave him a kind appearance that somehow resembled of her husband. Besides the paintings, many crossed swords belonging to the kings of old were shown with pride by the royal family. These had all the royal emblem of the Triforce on them. And though it was obvious their antiquity, the emblem seemed not to be affected by the passing of years and was as if newly forged. The rich curtains hanging about the window were said to be made by the Hylia as one of the few things their craft was able to preserve from their long absence.
Dyni walked to the throne and bowed before the king. He had his head sunken in deep thought and was finding hard to notice anything, or anyone, around him. She stood there until the man, feeling a presence, raised his head; and in his grief-stricken face a smile appeared.
"What wouldst thou be needing, O lady Dainúviel?" he asked.
"I came to see if you needed my services," she answered.
"Hath you now? Although it is not thy duty to be at my command you come in my moment of woe. I thank thee! But thine is not a service I need, though thy beauty is by itself a great aid to me. Blessed is, indeed, thy husband, for having such a fair and kind woman as mother of his child! Alas for me! For I lost a woman that shared these same virtues!"
The king was silent for a moment again, and then he looked at the single window leading to courtyard and smiled bitterly again.
"Mine daughter," he said, "is now in the care of a young Sheikah woman who has sworn to protect her with her life. This woman is the daughter of the same that thy husband asked me to give thee as a bodyguard."
"Is it Impa then?" Dyni asked.
"Yea," the king assented, "I deem that she shall prove to be great a caretaker as her mother is."
Dyni thought of Impa as a kind young woman, yet bred for war: the role of surrogate mother of the princess was not one that she would have expected the Sheikah to choose.
Before she left, a question that had been burning in her mind but had been quite forgotten was kindled again.
"Sire, if you will not be needing me I shall go. But may I ask for the name of the princess?"
"It is an ancient custom," the king replied, "that every firstborn female born unto this family should be named Zelda. Thus, my daughter's name that is."
"Zelda… That is a beautiful name."
"I know," the king said sighing, "It was her mother's name. But pray tell me, what be thy son's name? Surely he has his father's?
"No, my lord," said Dyni, "His name is Link, like one his ancestors."
"Indeed. Well, lady Dainúviel if you be not needing anything from me, then I thank thee again and bid you to pray for our men in the battle."
"Every night I do so, my lord."
With this, Dyni bowed before the king and walked for the door. To pray for our men in the battle, was praying for war correct? But she would not be praying for war, she would be praying for their lives. But it occurred to her that to pray for the lives of the Hylians would be to pray for the destruction of other races. Would the goddesses grant any mortal that wish? She resolved to pray, then, for the end of the war. Any end? A positive end, that is. What was a positive end in that conflict? For one of the races to win? If that happened so, other races may lose, and to lose would mean death. So what good was to pray for anything in a war?
A sudden feeling of another presence made Dyni look back to the king's seat. Out of the shadows unseen a Sheikah was now standing beside the king. He was whispering something to the king that made him stand up and inquire in a loud voice:
"Driven whither?!"
"To the ranch, lord," answered the Sheikah in an almost whisper. He was wearing a blue suit without cloak and with a linen cloth with the red Sheikah eye covering his chest. His dirty boots made no sound as he followed the king into a nearby table, richly adorned like everything else, with a rolled map over it. The Sheikah took the map and stretched it over the table again. It was an atlas of the realm. The king began to mutter some words, apparently suggestions, and the Sheikah would only shake his head in disapproval muttering something too.
At last, the king turned his head to Dyni and she had slight startle and continued to walk towards the door. The king bade her to stop and to come nearer.
"Lady Dainúviel!" he said, "If thou wert only a simple woman then I would command you not to hear what you need not. But, alas! You are the wife of my most trusted captain, therefore these ill tidings concern you as much as they concern me."
Dyni felt a shudder go all the way up her spine. "What tidings might those be, lord?"
"We lost the battle a few hours ago, and the Gerudo now have control over the north-eastern part of our nation. The entrance to Zora's River is theirs now, and the Zoras have allied with them. Thus, Kakariko is undefendable and the surviving troops are now trapped and besieged at Lon Lon Ranch."
Although she already felt it, Dyni still asked: "But why would those tidings concern me, my lord?" She immediately blushed for having asked such an obvious question.
The Sheikah bowed to the king and spoke to her.
"By leave of his majesty, I must tell you that your husband, captain of the Hylian army, has been grievously wounded by a poisoned arrow. I left the ranch in stealth two hours ago, and he was alive. But I cannot tell if he is still.
Tears began to blur Dyni's sight. The king stirred up nervously.
"I was bidden to haste for the castle to call for reinforcements. They are scarcely two-hundred against five-hundred. All of the knights have been dismounted while many of the Gerudo horse archers are still about. The wounded are equal on both armies, but the thieves are already tending theirs. The Hylians have nothing to heal their own."
A small tear rolled over her smooth cheek, but she quickly flicked it away. The king frowned with his head bowed.
"In his most delirious fevers," the Sheikah continued in a lower voice, as if only intened for Dyni's listening, "the captain asks for his wife. He lovingly calls her by Dyni and mutters time and again that the forest is the only place left safe."
Suddenly, the king took the map abruptly and tore it in pieces. He bellowed, with hate in his voice, calling for his captains and for his personal guards. Dyni, taken by surprise, looked at the king. But in the place where a tired man, drown in sorrow and suffocated by grief, had stood, now a kingly warrior was revealed. He took his sword and swept his cape, and behold! He was clad in shining chain mail and about his waist was a girth with a silver sheath hanging from it. He sheathed his blade and called again.
"So! The Gerudo have humiliated my army!" He cried with surprising fury. "Well! Let us see, then, if advantage in numbers was their only advantage in the battle yonder! To me! To me! We ride now to war! Let all healthy and brave man go with me! To war!
To war I ride now.
To honour the cause,
Of those who before me bow.
And should I perish in the front
Let there not be those who cowardice daunt!
The door opened, and in came his bodyguard and the door ward of the entrance.
"We heard a call from our king," they said. "What might he be needing?"
"I go to war now!" the king replied. "Wilt ye come with me?"
A sudden silence overcame the hall. The king (and Dyni) could feel the wavering of his men in the awkward silence. So he spoke to them.
"We hope, we that dwell beneath the sky, for a change in the world where none shall perish. Where none shall be able to call his neighbour an enemy, and peace shall rule all the living things. Then will Hyrule, last realm of the Hylia, be blessed by the goddesses and prosperity shall come again. But until that day is come, I shall watch upon my kingdom and will protect it by all means necessary against all enemy, even against itself! The first army is broken, but the Hylians are not through yet! Hylians! Will ye aid your kinsmen? Will you protect your wives and children? Will you honour the dead by making their passing not futile? Will you not ride to war with me?"
Within a second of silence, the Sheikah warrior that had been almost hidden in the shadows of the corner where the sun's light did not reach and the torch's light could not cover sprang to the front and spoke to the men.
"Despair is one thing, but cowardice is another. Did you not hear what your king just said?"
Silence.
"Despair is a mighty weapon, but it can be notched by another: Valour."
Some mutters could be heard within the soldiers.
"Come on now, Hylians!" said the Sheikah crossly, "The king commands you to go to a just war war! Obey him!"
The gathered men were now about fifty. One of them, suddenly, noticed Dyni, still standing besides the king, and same man recognized her.
"Why is the captain's wife in the throne room?" he asked.
"Because my husband has been wounded," she said so everybody could hear. "Wounded during a battle for his family and for his nation. He, too, suffered the terror of being so close to death. Yet he ignored it and went forth, ever thinking of me. Is that a sign of weakness? No! He loved me, but he loved his country also. So why are you still lingering here, when you should be out there in his aid?" Although she had said these words with pride, she immediately repented of them: she felt arrogant.
"To the brave feeling, a valiant heart," the Sheikah said, noticing her awkwardness. Some men lifted their head feeling a lighter heart. "We Sheikah shall help you as the true shadows of the Hylians that we are, though not in the ways of arms. But help needs courage and a sword besides it. Will you let the lady weep in her grief and her woe unheeded?"
Many soldiers gazed at Dyni, and noticed her beauty. She truly looked like a Hylian maiden from the eldest days, with her long, golden hair, and her deep blue eyes.
"Today is the day that we shall cleave our path to victory," the king said with some of the men nodding and muttering in approval. "This is the time when the last Hylians that dwell in the realm shall prove again their blessing with the goddesses." Many men heeded with impassible attention to their sovereign. "This is the day when our enemies shall know fear at the sound of our horses' thundering hooves. This is the day when we set Hyrule to the Hylians! So I ask ye again! Will ye ride with me to battle?"
A deafening roar swept throughout the room, causing many more guards to come. At the sight of their king in his mail and his soldiers ready for battle, all of the guards joined the gathering troops. Soon, the king left his room with a hundred Hylians following him and strode along the stairs heading for the market to gather more. Only Dyni and the Sheikah were left in the hall of the king.
Both were silent for a while, looking at the doors that now were wide open. Suddenly the Sheikah spoke to Dyni.
"I was sent here for another reason too."
"Excuse me?" said Dyni eyeing at him.
"The captain also told me to take his wife to the woods where she would be safe."
"What?"
"I must escort you to the Lost Woods along with your son."
"The captain told you that?" she asked, picturing the forest and shivering at the only thought of going there. "But I do not want to leave my people in their hardest moment! I want to stay with them if the king would not let me ride with him to see my husband!"
"Yet I was bidden to do so," the Sheikah said, and as these words were spoken out of the shadows came another figure clad in blue with a chest plate with the Sheikah eye too. She wore a belt with a long knife on the back of it at waist-height, her red eyes sparkling in the twilight of the corner, and her short, silvery hair tied in a ponytail.
"It is exactly as my kinsman says, my lady."
"Lampa!" Dyni cried in surprise.
"We must take you and the child to the woods," the mysterious Sheikah said, "By wish of my captain will you let us?"
Dyni felt no desire to run to the forest, being the Lost Woods their refuge. But the child was ever on her mind, and she thought fleeing would ensure some kind of protection.
"When would we be arriving?" she asked not being sure yet.
"We would have to travel by night, on foot and quietly," the male Sheikah said. "Also, we are not sure what path to take; if the king and his men defeat the enemy by today, in straight line we should go, but if battle drags on until tomorrow, I must fulfill my oath and go to war with my king. Therefore, a path around the ranch would be the best, and only my kinswoman would accompany you. But to answer your question: the longest time would be a night's walk."
Again, going to the Lost Woods?
"But I have heard legends," Dyni said, unsurely. "Legends that tell of the curse of the forest. Everyone that goes there becomes a monster"
"To that, I have no answer. I do not believe in such tales."
"An incredulous Sheikah?" Dyni asked.
"No, milady but I have been in the Lost Woods before, and naught has happened to me ever."
"But the road must be perilous," Dyni said, pondering hastily over the matter.
"Perilous, and full of dread, milady. Yet, it is the safest choice for the family of the captain."
Dyni was not so convinced of the later, but it was her husband's choice.
"I shall go with you then," she said. "But I hate to leave my people in this hour of utter darkness. I hate to expose my son to this journey, too. But should the darkness cover us all and there was anything I could do to keep him safe I would cross the Lost Woods ten times to ensure his life and health. Thus, I do not go for my safety, I go for his."
To the south, a while later, the king had gathered enough Hylians for the battle. Soon, emptying the armories and bidding farewell to the women and children, the Hylian army was ready to go to the aid of the captain. To the common folk were added the knights that still remained in the castle, so that the king had two-hundred mounted knights and a thousand men on foot, all armed with iron shields and broad swords. The sovereign blew his ancient war horn and the blast echoed throughout the city lifting part of the heavy weight that that had lain in the hearts of the Hylians for so long. Amidst the cheers and clapping the drawbridge was lowered and the proud army went forth from the city. But before they exited the king spoke again.
"Today is the day when we tip the balance of war in our favor. The enemy is strong, the Gerudo are agile and the Zoras too, but they cannot breach through our mail with ease. So I say to ye Hylians: do not despair if we are outnumbered, for the strength of the enemy may be in numbers but not in weapons. Our craft in the fabrication of arms is ancient and well preserved. The scimitars shall break asunder before our broad-swords, the arrows shall bounce harmlessly from our shields and neither their cavalry nor their foot-soldiers shall stand a charge by our brave knights. It is today, thus, that the glory and splendour of the ancient Hylia shall be brought forth to the realm again, even if it is for a short time. I will call brother to all men that fall today in the defense of the kingdom. Therefore, let no man forget this day! Let the enemy shiver at the sound of the horn! Let us go now! May Din protect us, may Nayru counsel us, and may Farore aid us!"
With these words, the hylian army finally set way to the ranch, still amidst the cheers and clapping of the citizens. Hope had been rekindled again in their hearts.
A. N. Nope, it's not over yet. Unlike most fics regarding Link's mother, I actually took the time and described with detail all of the way from the castle to the wood. Next chapter will deal with that!