AN: Hello again! Here's another chapter for all your wonderful people, because I'm going away this weekend :D, and I wanted to have this up before I left. I'm going to my first ever anime convention! Yay! geek alert, geek alert

But, being serious for a moment, here's just a quick note about this chapter. I use 'Sacred Realm' and the 'Promised Land' interchangeably, meaning there are exactly the same place. Hopefully, this will also explain things a little more.

Chapter 12 - Surrender

Zelda's POV:

My head sunk into my knees. Over and over again I kept cursing myself, but most of all, I cursed Agahnim. 'How could we have all been so blind? How could I have not seen what his intentions were?'

The same questions kept coming back, revolving around my mind and plaguing my sleep. It had been months, almost a year now, since I had been back at the Northern Palace. It had been during that time that I'd given birth to my daughter too. Link had had to go on ahead back to Hyrule Castle while Impa, Saria and myself remained stationary in the palace. Meanwhile, Darunia, Ruto, and Nabooru were scattered all over Hyrule to search diligently for the true Hero of Time, but each so far had come to no avail.

The building had already begun and was well underway by the time Impa and I reached Hyrule Castle again. My father had reclaimed his position on the throne and had, without my knowledge, appointed a man named Agahnim to be his assistant during these dark times. I remember hearing the news in a cold sweat, thinking immediately back some distant memory when Ganonndorf himself had tried to weasel into the royal court. It was faint and hardly recallable, but I knew that somehow, and somewhere, it had happened…and now the same thing would happen all over again.

No sooner had my father appointed him, Agahnim had taken charge of the new building of the castle, drawing out new plans for rooms, dungeons and obscure chambers for himself. As soon as I had heard of this, I had had my doubts and my suspicions. As much as I wanted to raise my darling daughter, something came to me in a dream, advising me strongly to entrust my daughter to someone else. I remembered awaking very suddenly with the same distant memory of this happening before. I had told both Impa and Saria about my dream, and it was Saria that had volunteered to keep my child safely in the Northern Palace, unknown to Agahnim and to the rest of Hyrule.

And I praised the goddesses that I had left her with Saria, for now I was trapped in the finished dungeons of the new Hyrule Castle. The plotting figurehead had been Agahnim, determined to follow in the 'great Ganon's footsteps' and reach the Promised Land using the descendants of an early race of sages that had originally made the seal around the Sacred Realm. Along with myself, Agahnim had tracked down and kidnapped six other maidens like myself, locking each of us in the specially designed dungeons. New guards and soldiers had been appointed to watch us all day and all night, not one of them ever seeming to tire. Every waking second they were alert with keen eyes and pricked ears. Even my father, the King of this forsaken land, had been overthrown, and Agahnim now claimed complete control over Hyrule. I never knew what had exactly happened to my father. He had been trapped down here for some time before guards came and took him away. I had never been told anything since, or had heard anything of his whereabouts.

It was dark down here. The dungeons had been placed underground, providing hardly any route of escape, and had presented the most appalling living conditions. The stone floors were hard and cold, and there was a permanent smell of urine and sweat filtering through the air. More often than not, I awoke with my head spinning with nausea. Sometimes the other maidens would cry and whimper in their cells, followed by a painful scream, as the guard would snap his whip and beat them until they stopped crying.

Every night I had tried to contact Link with hopeful thoughts. After he had left, I had lost track of his whereabouts also. I was surprised however that Agahnim didn't seem to see him as a threat, despite foiling Ganon's plans to reign over Hyrule twice before. But one by one, each maiden was removed forcefully from her cell and taken up the dark, sealed off staircase and never seen again. Agahnim was acting now, sacrificing each descendant to break the seal to the Promised Land that Ganon had already sabotaged into a dark, ravenous land. In his snarling voice, he had once told me on the day of my capture that he knew about the world-wide time reversal that had taken place in Hyrule twelve years ago. He had known about how Ganonndorf had broken through to the Sacred Realm when the Hero of Time had removed the Master Sword; how Ganonndorf had touched the Triforce, splitting it into the three separate pieces, and using his own to control the Promised Land. Ganonndorf had then extended his dark empire to the living world of Hyrule in that seven years of hell, until the Hero of Time awoke from his grave and banished him back to the Sacred Realm: the Promised Land that he had destroyed.

I had sat there quivering, as each and every single memory came flooding back, reliving the whole ordeal all too vividly in my head. "H-How is that possible? How could you know?" I had said with a shaking voice, but he didn't answer my question.

"Your precious sages have kept my master locked away in his world for far too long. He grows restless, and it will be with your help that I will break the seal of your sages and bring Ganon back into this world!" He had laughed cruelly as tears slid down my cheeks. "You helped him before too, didn't you princess? You and the Hero of Time are the real villains to this world. You instructed our dear Link to collect the three sacred stones and open the portal - "

I lunged out and slapped him. "Don't you dare mention his name!" The tears still watered my eyes, but my anger had quelled their desire to fall. He only sneered and ordered the guards to lock me away.

Ever since I have sat here in the same spot, numb and cold, pleading with the goddesses for Link to come and be found by the sages. I had always kept my mind alert for any incoming messages from them, but each of them remained silent, not reporting anything at all. Sometimes I had tried to send them telepathic messages but each time they gave a negative answer. Yet all of them had told me that they had found him at one point or another, only to have him disappear right before their very eyes, just like he had done in that graveyard all those months ago.

'Link, what's happening to you?' I thought. The more I thought about him though, the worse my head seemed to ring. 'Not again…' I held my head with both my hands, rubbing my forehead and temple as a buzzing headache swarmed over me. The darkness seemed to become even blacker in my eyes, growing like a black mould around the midnight vault of the dungeon. I leant against the cold, grimy wall, not finding any solace to this paining screech driving through my ears. Sound became lost, feeling and touch paralysed, and sight became devoid of every colour as something grabbed and pulled inside my head.

---

I heard another frightened scream as I opened my eyes, but the blinding light forced them closed. I didn't remember ever seeing such bright, strong colours as I eased myself into the strange place I had been taken too. Huge, tall statues loomed above me, all holding stone swords in such an arrangement that a small circle was formed as I looked up. Great pillars rose to the ceilings around the small raised platform I was lying on, and a staircase led down and then split as two stairwells hugged the sloping floor leading to another doorway.

"W-Who are you?" a young voice cried. "Where on earth did you just come from?"

I moaned as I sat up, the light seeming to grow ever bolder. I looked toward the source of the sound and my heart suddenly beat faster as I saw a small, little girl, no more than ten years of age, dressed uncannily like myself. Her large, dark eyes stared at me, terrified and wide, but as I caught her stare, her mouth dropped open slightly. Her hands shook and with timid steps she inched closer to me.

"Mother?" she whispered, and for a moment longer she stared at me, scrutinising every aspect of me before there were tears flying form her eyes and her small arms wrapped tightly around me. "It's really you, mother! I never thought… - It's me, Tetra!" she sobbed.

"Tetra," I said softly, knowing I had heard that name before, and with a sudden realisation, I knew that it had been the name of my daughter's baby girl…my granddaughter. But that Zelda had died. I looked at myself as Tetra sobbed in my arms. It was I, my own self. I wasn't in the body of another, I wasn't trapped someone else's mind. I could think and control my own actions…

"Tetra," I said more firmly, "I'm not who you think I am."

Her tears ceased and her head snapped up, looking at me in disbelief. "But… It can't be! You look - you look so much like her, and…and…"

I smiled slightly and stroked her soft hair, as if I really was her mother. "Dry your eyes, Tetra." She sniffed and backed away embarrassed, rubbing her wet face with her white, gloved hands.

For the first time I really looked around and saw just where the colourful light came from in such a chamber. All around the crescent shaped wall to my right were beautiful stained glass windows, each depicting the six sages, and the true, black monstrous form of Ganon was crowned in the middle with spectacular fiery reds and oranges. The light from outside shone in through the windows, casting an array of rainbow colours over every surface in definable shapes, throwing the images onto the walls. But my eyes were drawn away from the greens, reds, blues, purples and oranges; to that dark, black figure bearing it's two enormous swords. I kept staring at them, Ganon's glowing yellow eyes, when suddenly an image reared its ugly head and rushed toward me in my mind.

I remembered that night; the storm and the organ playing; the moaning of the door and the battle between light and darkness; the strong hand grasping mine as together Link and I ran through the crumbling chambers of Ganon's fortress. And then…the awful and foul transformation from man to demon, and the horrible cries and screeching roars as Ganon stomped toward us…

I looked away quickly, breathing a little harder than before. I rested a hand over my heart, finding it beating furiously against my ribs. I turned my head to see that Tetra had seated herself a little way away from me, her head in her knees, sobbing quietly. I composed myself, finding it difficult not to envision the stained glass window springing to life just like in my memory. Swallowing, I crouched by her side, my hand moving from my chest to her trembling shoulder.

"I'm sorry, Tetra," I said, knowing that my daughter had been said to be the splitting image of myself. But I was still very curious to know what had become of my daughter to result in Tetra being trapped alone in this odd place.

"Please tell me though," I paused, "what happened to your mother?" Tetra seemed taken aback by the question. "How did it come to be that you were separated from her?"

Tetra looked away. "It happened a long time ago. I was very young, but after my grandmother died, a lot of people began exploring the seas. My mother told me that they'd discovered a small island where we could live. We were sailing there when…pirates attacked our boat. They…kidnapped me, taking me away from both my parents," she said with some difficulty.

"The mistress had heard some rumour they call the 'Triumph Forks'. They are meant to hold a great power, and they had been informed that they were on our boat.

"They then kidnapped me, and the mistress raised me as her own daughter because this." Tetra paused to fiddle with a necklace hung about her neck. "But when she died, she left me to be the heir to her pirates and her ship. I then became the head of the pirates and sailed across the seas. I never knew what happened to my parents."

I looked intently at the cord of taut string and her small hand clutching something, asking if I could see it. Tetra complied and slipped it from around her neck and my eyes widening when I saw the very golden triangle I had given my daughter on my deathbed: the Triforce of Wisdom. 'That was what they must have been after,' I thought. But as soon as it touched my fingers, a wave of golden light shot forward and when I looked again, the Triforce had vanished, leaving the simple cord in my hand.

"Where did it go?" Tetra said anxiously. I raised my right hand, showing the glowing golden triangle shining on the back of it. "H-How?"

"Do you know what this is, Tetra?"

"The King said it was something called a Triforce," she replied, still mystified.

'The King? Could it really be that my father is still alive?' "This is the Triforce of Wisdom, one of the three pieces of the legendary Triforce. This is the one that I once possessed."

"But it was my mother that owned that!" Tetra argued.

"And her mother before her owned it too," I added, "and her mother, and so on. It has been passed down for many generations, Tetra."

"But that - "

"I'm sorry, Tetra," I interrupted, taking her hand. "But I must ask you to speak again. I promise that I will answer all your questions, but I must ask one more thing before you do. Why exactly are you here?"

Tetra protested, but I insisted that she spoke. I needed to know just what had happened, before our time ran out. If Agahnim had succeeded and such rumours were all over Hyrule, then there might not just be Ganondorf plotting to capture the Triforce pieces… I only hoped that Agahnim had been defeated in his plans. I prayed against all hope that Ganondorf might still be locked away in the Sacred Realm. But even when Tetra's answer came, I was still as unprepared.

"Link and I were rescuing his sister from Ganondorf." I blinked and must have squeezed Tetra's hand tightly, for she stared at me strangely, but I said nothing and loosened my hand from hers. Tetra continued but kept glancing at me warily.

"Link's sister, Aryll, was captured by Ganondorf's monster, Helmoric King, instead of myself. We were sailing near Outset Island, Link's home, when it got me. My crew managed to hit it, but it dropped me in the forest at the top of the island. Link came to see if I was all right, but when we came back out again, his sister was snatched away. The idiot wanted to try and fly after her but I caught him before he killed himself," she said with a faint smile.

"Link came aboard with us to sail to the Forbidden Fortress, a long way north from Outset. We got him there and he went to rescue his sister. I didn't see him till a long time after, when we met again on Windfall, when he managed to steal our bombs. We kept an eye on him, but didn't interfere. We headed back to the Forbidden Fortress and I met Link there again, where my pirates rescued his sister and two other prisoners. Link fought off Helmoric King, and he and I went to confront Ganondorf. But he…he was far too strong, even with Link's Master Sword. He called me Princess Zelda, but I didn't know what he was talking about at the time. Then one of the Rito and Valoo, the dragon from Dragon Roost Island, came and saved us.

"Link brought me here, and the King of Red Lions appeared and told me that what Ganondorf had said was true. I am of the Princess Zelda's bloodline, and I now hold her Triforce," she said looking at me with a frightened glaze in her eyes. "Link is now renewing the Master Sword's power and finding the Triforce of Courage that has been scattered into the sea, and I am to wait here until he returns."

I was silent. How could Ganondorf possibly be still raging terror after all these years?

"The poor boy was all dressed up in that ridiculous, green outfit too. Damn the man of legends," she continued bitterly. "If he hadn't disappeared, none of us would be right here! My mother wouldn't have been so insistent on searching for her father and I wouldn't have been kidnapped!"

My patience snapped. "Her father was a courageous man," I said with a shaking determination.

"How do you know? What's courageous about leaving your wife and child and throwing the whole land into chaos? How can sending your country into an unbreakable age of darkness be courageous? My mother used to tell me stories of what a great man he was, but now I don't believe how she could still have that faith to find him and prove herself right."

"You are the one who knows nothing of Link. He was a brave and noble man, willing to sacrifice his life for my kingdom. He was ready to give up seven years of his life to stay and protect Hyrule. He defeated that monster you see on that wall," I said pointing to Ganon's stained window. "If you want to blame someone, blame me, for it was I who initially caused this mess. I…" I sighed. "I sent Link and Hyrule back in time and ruined the fabric of the ages. Because of my actions, Link died and Ganondorf claimed Hyrule as his own."

Tetra was staring at me again with that same disbelief as before. "W-Who are you?"

"I promised that I would answer your questions. What you are about to hear, Tetra, is the story of your grandmother, the part of the story your mother never told you." I took a deep breath and averted my eyes. "I am Princess Zelda, heir to the throne of Hyrule. I am from the past, and in my time, it will be another seventy years or so until you are born. But in my age, time has been torn, and because of such matters, Link, your rightful grandfather and man of legends, passed across the border of Hyrule years before he was meant to, breaking the seal holding Ganondorf in the Sacred Realm. He crossed the borders, searching for a dear companion that had aided him in the catastrophic battle with Ganon. That is how history has happened.

"But time has been disrupted in my world, causing Link to cross that border long before he was due to do so. The Triforce cannot hold the seal outside of Hyrule, and so Ganon was freed from his prison. I was forced into hiding, taking refuge in the north of Hyrule, and gave birth to your mother. But when Ganon was sealed temporarily away by another hero, I returned to Hyrule Castle only to find a man called Agahnim wanting to break the seal and enter the Sacred Realm. I believe that he succeeded in doing so, and now Ganondorf wants to find the Triforce again and reclaim what he believes to be his kingdom. But that is mere history.

"Link and myself have been slipping through time ever since, and that is how I came here. But because my form exists in the future, I became trapped in their body each time I came into the future. Now, my form has died, and so I come here as my own person. Link, I believe, has travelled through time as I am now, as a new, separate person. Being trapped in your grandmother's body, I have seen him unchanged from the man that I know, and ever since that one encounter the hope of knowing that he is alive is what spurred your grandmother and your own mother on to find him. I, as your grandmother, had seen him alive when I had thought him to be dead."

My voice began to shake and a lump formed in my throat. "You don't understand what I felt, being trapped inside a mind that isn't mine. You don't know of the immense sorrow that destroys that brief hope. Your grandmother loved Link so very much, as I do too. She knew the importance of Link's departure, and of his feelings toward his dear faerie, and so she let him go. But he never came back, even when Ganon was freed. There was no hero to save the kingdom. But when your she saw him, she thought that it was her own husband, but I knew it was the Link from my world. I cannot describe how it felt to know what a false hope she lived with…"

I broke off, covering my wet eyes with my hand.

"I'm sorry," Tetra mumbled. "I…didn't know."

"I promise you, Tetra, that you'll live in a good world, with your mother and father when this is over," I said, my voice still quivering.

A sudden crash thundered above us. Tetra gasped and moved closer to me as we heard a clattering of hoofed feet tap on the ceiling above us. Our eyes immediately locked upon the single doorway, and a pack of grunting Moblins piled into the vicinity, down the steps, and up to our platform. Each of them carried long, sharp spears and as they neared us, they pointed them directly at us. A dark shape moved through them, fluid and frightening to us both. Tetra clutched my arms, and I realised that if I weren't there, she'd have to suffer through this all alone. The black figure eventually came into view and Tetra cried out when we saw the familiar red hair, the dark skin and the menacing eyes that both of us had seen far too closely. But he looked puzzled.

"Princess Zelda? How? How can it be? You died seven years ago!"

I stood up, Tetra hiding behind me as I held her hand. "It seems that time has conspired against you, Ganondorf. Seven years is unlucky for you isn't it?" I said with a cruel gloat, feeling a familiar resolution in my words to that day in Ganon's Fortress.

He growled and ordered his Moblins closer. The spearheads touched my neck, but I didn't flinch. "You seem very unwilling to die, Princess. I admire your determination," he said advancing, tilting my chin up with his disgusting fingers. I spat at him, watching with satisfaction as he stepped away, wiping away the spittle that slid down his face.

But through the silence, there was another pair of footsteps running across the still stone. We all watched in expectation, every head turned toward that dark doorway, the quiet wavering as impatient grunts and scoffs came from the Moblins. The footsteps came down the staircase from above, sounding unsure about where they were going, almost as if they were limping. They were slow, cautious, with a heavy stride. This was no boy; this intruder was a man.

He came down, hidden in the darkness, but at the mere shape I felt my heart leap in my chest and my breathing stop. Everyone held their breath as a sword was unsheathed and Link stepped forward into the light, the different shades of colour resting gently on his tunic. His eyes caught mine nearly instantly, and an invisible line of flying emotions passed between us. His eyes were blazing with an anxiety of danger as he spied Ganondorf standing metres away from me, but I couldn't have been happier to see him as I was now.

"Link," I breathed with a smile. Tetra looked up at me and then to Link, a faint awe plastered on her features.

Ganondorf yelled in fury, but I caught the small glimpse of fear that flashed across his face before it disappeared. "LINK?!" he stammered. The fear haunted him again and he gritted his teeth. "Do I have to kill your ghost as well to finally get rid of you?" he yelled at Link.

"Your memory seems a little fogged, Ganondorf," Link said holding his sword up in the direction of his advisory. "I'm the one that killed you and sent you back to where you came from."

Ganondorf cackled. "Link, yours is the memory that needs reminding. That day you rode back to find your precious wife, I was the one that killed you. Your Master Sword, the sword of Evil's Bane, had been sealed away and your broken Triforce provided you with nothing but your idiocy to face me once again. An ordinary sword like the very one you hold now can do no harm to me. But I assure you, your death was slow and painful just like my very own when you forced me to unleash my true form. You will never understand the excruciating pain, the self-sacrifice I undertook to accomplish the transformation. I made sure you suffered the same fate, and your blood split over the entire castle, and in the rivers. There is no possible way that you could still be alive!"

Now it was Link's turn to smirk, seemingly strangely confident. "But that Link was not me."

"That's impossible!" Ganondorf looked frantically from side to side. His glowing eyes settled upon me with a sly and hungry grin fixed on his lips. He reached out and grabbed my arm, restraining my hands behind my back. A Moblin seized Tetra by her neck and brought her beside me.

"Zelda!" Link cried, but my face was forced to look at Ganondorf.

"I don't quite know how you managed to pull this one off, Princess, but you'll pay for your meddling," he said close against my face.

Without another thing said, there was a blinding flash of light and the beautiful, bright colours had vanished, replaced by the dull, cold tones of stone. I also realised that Tetra wasn't with me anymore. It was a large circular room, a tower devoid of any staircase.

"Welcome to my fortress, Princess! Let us see the legendary Hero rescue you this time!" he said in a grand voice, throwing his arms wide.

I couldn't help but look around, but before I knew it, he slapped me to the ground and knelt above me, his figure seeming larger than the tower itself. His hands punched my face and stomach again and again, each blow delivering more force than the last. I cried out and struggled to defend myself but his knees were holding my hands and arms down to the floor, and for the first time, I truly felt terrified.

"There will be no mistakes this time, Princess. I will take your Triforce, and then kill you both! There'll be no one to stop me! Without the Master Sword, Link is nothing, and that puny runt will never succeed in defeating me after I call upon the Triforce!"

"You've made a mistake already," I said hoarsely. Ganondorf froze slightly, interested in my comment. "You've already assumed that the boy will be defeated. He's the one with the Master Sword - "

"Silence!" he shouted as he jerked me against the stone floor.

"He will kill you!" I finished, looking at him spitefully out of the corner of my eye.

Enraged, he hit me again. "Were you never taught any manners as a child, Zelda? Well, let me teach you the meaning of being silent!"

His hand seized my neck, squeezing it tightly. My breath was forced out of me. I couldn't breathe. Ganondorf grinned slyly, moving his knees off my hands, and immediately my fingers wrapped themselves around his cloaked arm, trying in vain to move his firm hold. Still holding my throat, his other hand then caught my right hand, curling like a claw around my wrist.

"Give it to me."

I resisted, struggling even more for the sweet taste of air in my lungs.

"Give the Triforce to me!" Ganondorf squeezed my neck tighter; his nails piercing my skin like needles. I couldn't find anymore air. He began chanting words and finally his grip lessened as I fell into the darkness, a power draining away as I surrendered the Triforce in a helpless daze, drifting between the borderline of the unconscious and the conscious. He wouldn't kill me, yet. He'd make sure I was there to see Link writhe and squirm under his power before bringing the Triforce forward and commanding his wish before our very eyes.

Then he would kill us both.

AN: Just a note to Sage of Hyrule. I hope this clears things up a bit. But yes, Link and Zelda were originally from OoT, but after the time reversal happened, and therefore weren't meant to have the memories of what happened. But having lived through them, they begin to remember what happened.

Also, just being general now, I know I'm sort of altering the Wind Waker ending just a tad. But I promise that it'll be necessary. So, until next time!