Disclaimer: I don't own Legend of Zelda or any of the characters in the Zelda series (if I did, I wouldn't waste my time here). I'm not making any money of this and if I forgot anything else in this disclaimer I did or didn't do that as well.

Chapter 24 - Masks part 2

The boat slowly moved through the swamp water while Romani rested her head on Link's shoulder.

"This is nice," Romani whispered, "promise me there won't be any undead at the end of this trip?"

"I promise," Link laughed, "you're right, this is nice. Maybe we have to come back later to do this again, or maybe sail in the Great Bay ocean."

"Are we going there now?"

Link shook his head.

"I think it's best we go to Snowhead first, then we make a little stop in Clocktown and then we go on to the Great Bay, I'm sure we can throw together a big party there."

"Will you play the guitar again?"

"The guitar, the drums, the ocarina or Deku pipes, any thing you want." He smiled and kissed her.

The boat came to an abrupt end when the tour was finished and they cursed the boats for going this fast.

"Where to?" Link stood already on the shore, safe on the ground, away from water.

"Snowhead, to see the Gorons."

"Ah, good, it will be good to see Gorons again." Link said with a big smile.

"It will be." Link copied that smile.

After a long trip over the snowy fields they entered the Goron village. The Gorons outside looked surprised to see non-Gorons in their village, even more surprised than to see an unknown Goron. Link ignored them and entered the halls to see the Goron Elder, if he was still alive, he thought, because the guy had been pretty old ten years ago. He was in the throne room with a young Goron with white hair in a ponytail. He looked surprised to see Link and the kid looked suspicious.

"It's good to see you're still in great health." Link said.

"Do I know you?" the Goron Elder asked in a crackled voice.

"I am Link, I passed here ten years ago, when there was the trouble on Snowhead."

"Ah yes," the Elder nodded, "the trouble our great hero Darmani ended. He died shortly afterwards, again," He chuckled, "but I'm sure he will arise again when the time calls him forth."

"I'm afraid not," Link said seriously, "Darmani was dead before I got here, I rescued his soul and he granted me the power to turn into a Goron with this mask," Link took out the mask, "the person you thought was Darmani, was me. I'm sorry."

The Elder looked vacantly at the mask.

"It... it was you? Then we owe a great deal to you..."

"No!" the kid yelled, "that's not true, it was Darmani and not you!"

He jumped forward and grabbed Link's throat. Goro reacted and twisted the kid's wrist. He let go with a small cry of pain.

"That was a big mistake," the kid hissed while he was rubbing his sore wrist, "I'm the son of the Goron Elder."

"And I'm Link, the son of the Goron Big Brother of the Death Mountain Gorons of Hyrule. I'm not afraid of you."

Link couldn't help himself letting out a little smile. The Goron could handle someone about two, three years older than him, good.

"Mashka, please," the Elder stopped him, "if this indeed is the soul of Darmani," Link gave him the mask, "we must honour it properly and not fight in it's presence."

"Very well," the kid said with a look that could kill, "but this isn't over yet."

"I, eh, I will treat this with the proper respect, thank you, Link, but I think it is best for you to leave at once, we Gorons don't really socialize with other races."

"But this..." Link motioned to keep Goro silent.

"Very well, it was an honour to meet you again."

"Yes, yes, hum." The Elder mumbled and turned to hang the mask behind the throne.

Link and his friends turned around and left the Goron Halls.

"Who does he think he is?" Goro shouted, "you're Darmani's bloodbrother, that means he should treat you with the proper respect."

"Calm down, Goro, these Gorons tend to live by themselves, and..."

"It's like they're ashamed they were saved by you and not a Goron. Don't they know they could have died if it weren't for you?"

"Let me tell you something important of the hero business, Goro, not everything you do is appreciated by people and you may have to do a lot of things to get your goal that some people consider as not honourable. You just don't care about that. You do what you have to do, and try to save them, even if they practically hate you for it."

Goro seemed to calm down a bit, but was still angered.

"I feel almost ashamed that I have met them."

Link shrugged.

"If it makes you feel better, a lot of Gorons I have met are more open."

"So," Romani asked, "do we go immediately to the Great Bay?"

"First Clocktown and then the ocean."

"Hm. More water?" Goro objected.

They sat in the western part of town where Link had found ten years ago a perfect little restaurant not for from the post office. People tried not to stare openly but they could feel the eyes glow. Link and Romani seemed not to be bothered by this and Goro tried his best to ignore it. Apparently it came with the job. People seemed to distrust fully equipped adventurers when there was no trouble. No one had spoken much during the meal but now it was just waiting for the first person to discuss the behaviour of the Gorons of Snowhead. Luckily for Goro, Link was the first to drop the powderkeg.

"Romani, when you wandered the land, did the Gorons already seem so... aggressive?"

"I'm afraid so," Romani nodded, "they always distrust people from the rest of Tempora, whether from Clocktown, Zora bay or the swamps. They could handle their own problems, and if they couldn't, they always said they could rely on Darmani, the great hero that came back from the dead."

"Guess you bursted a bubble there." Goro said with a weak smile.

Link nodded grim.

"I must say," Goro continued, "this is completely different then in Hyrule, where we all have a tight connection."

"I wouldn't say that," Romani interrupted, "if you didn't have the right connections you couldn't get in either, Goron, Zora, Gerudo or even Castletown. But I must say, it was a lot easier to make connections."

"I had my connection thanks to Zelda," Link mused, "but I'm sure I would have gotten where I needed to be in time, but time was something that I didn't have."

They all sat silent for a few more minutes.

"I hope the Zora's are different." Goro sighed.

"They are," Romani said, "because of the band the Indigo-go's they tend to go all around Tempora, except Snowhead."

"Yeah, I saw them last year, when you came back." Goro nodded to Link.

"Well, I don't think we'll end our journey on a downnote." Link smiled and drank the last of his milk.

"It will, when they don't celebrate on the shore," objected Goro, "there's no way I'm getting to close to that much water."

Goro regretted his statement a few hours later. Even the shore seemed to unease the Goron.

"Don't worry," the fisherman said, "now it's still low tide."

"You mean, it gets bigger?" the Goron shouted.

Link laughed and turned to Romani.

"So, who goes to the Zora and who stays behind to babysit Goro?"

Goro grunted at the remark "babysit".

"I can get them, if you want," the fisherman said, "I mean, you're that kid that stopped the moon from falling, right? So I guess I owe you that much."

Link nodded and thanked the fisherman when he got out his boat and set sail to the Zora cape.

"When we're not here, just wait for a few moments." He shouted.

"Why, where are we going?" Goro asked.

"There was something I didn't do when I stopped Majora, something that might come in handy as a refuge to escape from the daily routine." Link smiled and walked towards the house next to the fisherman's hut. "Did I ever tell you about the spider's curse?"

"You mentioned something about that," Romani answered, "something about a hundred spiders in Hyrule that had cursed a family?"

Link nodded as he entered the small house.

"Well, there was something similar here as well." He said as he took out a bomb and placed it in front of the back wall.

With a small bang the wall exploded and revealed the passage to the lower section of the house.

"Well, what do you know." Romani smiled.

"Ready to go spider squishing?" Link asked Goro.

Goro just let out a big grin.

After they got rid of the last spider, they returned to the beachhouse. Link wasn't surprised to see a man waiting for them.

"Wow, I didn't know this thing had an underground section. Can I buy it?"

"No, sorry," Link nodded his head, "this is for personal use."

"Too bad." The man said, turned around and left.

"Personal use?" Romani smiled.

"It's seems bigger than I can remember. It would be good to have a refuge here at the bay. In fact, there is one at the swamp as well."

"In that case, let's go there too sometime."

When they exited the beachhouse, the fisherman just arrived with some Zora. Link recognised Lulu, Evans and Jappa, as well as Lulu's two sons, Link and Mikau.

"The fisherman said you wanted to see us. What can we do to help?" Lulu asked.

"I wished to finally return this to you." Link said and showed Mikau's mask.

"This... this is how you transformed in Mikau, isn't it?" Lulu asked.

Link just nodded.

"From what I could gather from information about the other masks, I believe it is actually his soul."

Lulu wiped away a tear.

"No," she said while he forced a smile, "I mustn't cry, this is a joyous day, for Mikau has returned to us."

She invited Link to Zora cape but he had to decline since the young Goron couldn't come along. Lulu then simply decided to bring the band to shore and have a great feast there. It was starting to be morning when the last bonfires died...