Bit of a long chapter tonight, plus a long conversation between Link and Saria. Just warning, it's a bit in-depth. Ah well. Disclaimers in Ch. 1.

Ch. 13

Wind over the lake: the image of inner truth.

-I Ching (The Book of Changes)

Saria woke to the lonely howl of the wind, tumbling over the barren fields. She sighed, and closed her eyes, when everything came back to her. I told him too soon, she realized. He wasn't ready... maybe he never would have been... Her thoughts were interrupted by a voice that made her sit up in surprise.

"Stop laying there like a rock and come and have some breakfast," Link said, mimicking the tone that Malon often used to wake him in the morning. Saria sat up to see him perched on a rock over the smoldering campfire, with some sort of meat sizzling on a flat hot-rock. She looked at him in amazement, and he put down the chipped piece of rock he'd been moving the meat around with.

"I only have one question for you right now," He said softly. Saria came over to sit by him, and nodded for him to continue.

"Has my life just been one whole lie?" He asked, refusing to look up at her. Saria sighed, and reached out tentatively to touch his shoulder.

"No, Link. The things you've done... I saw you rescue Epona back from the soldiers at Hyrule Castle... I watched you win the race with the Gorons... No, Link, this is your life, and it was never a waste. You've done so many good things, Link! For Talon and his ranch, for the Gorons, for the Great Deku Tree... Just because you never had to fight an evil like Ganandorf, doesn't mean you aren't a hero."

Link sighed, and moved his shoulder out from under her hand. She clasped her hands in her lap, and waited. Finally, he looked up.

"I don't care about that hero stuff," He said. "I just want to know if this has all been some kind of sick joke... If I've been living a lie..."

"No," She said fervently. "Link, when it changed, it changed for all of us... Hyrule itself went back in time, and wiped itself clean of evil... It was reborn, and had a chance to live peacefully. The only difference with you was that you were too close, too connected, and to give you a life of peace, we had to take all of the remnants of your violent past away, including-"

"My life," He said softly. She hesitated, and then nodded. Link scraped the sizzling meat around again over the fire. "I went far away last night," He began. "...And I didn't know what I was going to do... All I could think about was... Had I wasted my life? Was everything I knew just...?" Link shook his head. "But... I came this far for the answers, and I'm not going to stop until I have all of them. So for better or for worse, I'm putting my trust into you, a complete stranger, and hoping you can put me in the right direction."

Saria looked up at him, but he kept his eyes on the meat.

"It's burning," She said. Link nodded, and scooped the sizzling meat from the rock, making little sounds of pain as his fingers burned. Saria made an exasperated sound, and held out an edge of her cloak. "For goodness sakes, Link!" She said, trying to settle the suddenly slippery food in her lap. She looked up in surprise at the sound of laughter, and saw Link's expression of mirth. She shook her head at him, and clucked in a motherly tone. "You haven't changed a bit," She chided him, and was relieved.

*************

After breakfast, Link turned serious again, a very interesting trait that he had always possessed, even when he was a child when Saria had known him.

"I still want some answers," He said, and she turned to sit in front of him again. He took a moment to think, before beginning.

"You said something about paradoxes... What did you mean?"

"Well," She started. "When we changed the time and made the seal, it automatically meant that we couldn't tamper with it anymore, and anything that happened afterwards would be up to the people of Hyrule... which," She added, "Was crazy... to think that there would be no further danger... Anyhow, everything was returned pretty much to its normal self, several months before Ganandorf started to cause trouble, and seven years before you saved Hyrule." She watched his expression worriedly, but he only nodded for her to continue. "The problem that caused the paradoxes, however, was the fact that in the former Hyrule, the Sages came forth out of need, but suddenly Hyrule didn't need them. The only exceptions were Darunia, who happened to be a Goron chief after all, because of his ancestral line, and Impa, who as the last of the Sheikah race needed to guard the royal family... The problem in that case would have been that..." Saria paused and sighed. "This is really going to get confusing, Link. I've always had trouble trying to figure it out."

Link frowned. "Go on, anyway. I'll try to understand as much as I can."

Saria nodded. "Well, anyway... The problem would have been that if Impa was not there to guard Zelda, then anything that could get past a soldier guard could get to her, which would have made the whole thing obsolete, since Zelda was the one who held and breathed life into one of the Triforce pieces that we needed. So somehow fate willed that Impa become reality in our split Hyrule... and..." Saria shook her head in frustration. "Do you get it? We all had to become Sages, or like I said before, the whole process of the sealing away the former Hyrule would have become obsolete since we were never there to make or hold the seal..." She trailed off.

"Okay..." Link said slowly, his head already beginning to hurt. "So you were just... called forth?" Saria nodded. "By..."

"By Rauru, the Sage of Light, through our own powers, or residual powers..."

"But then, if you were called forth... then that meant that your selves, or this Rauru, already existed, and had somehow come over into 'this' Hyrule as well..."

"Exactly," Saria said with relief. "You were always a fast learner, Link." She said with a smile. Link shrugged with a small grin.

"All right, so Darunia and Impa were not hard to 'call forth'. Either Darunia really died while fighting the monster in Death Mountain, or he faked his death, to go and... what... join with the other Darunia?"

"Sort of," Saria said. "Thats way too complicated for me. Our selves in this world, if we existed in this world, obviously had no idea of any other life, or power that they had possessed, and it was just like the case with you. They began to see visions and have dreams-"

"Wait," Link cut in, his voice panicked. "Does that mean..."

"No, don't worry," Saria reassured him. "The only reason that there were two of each of us was because one was an entity of power and the other was the living being. You are the only Link there ever was."

Link looked relieved. "So, it was like merging, or joining, to become one entity each, and Darunia and Impa were called first because they were the easiest to get... what about the others?"

"Well," She continued. "That was the tricky part, I mean," She added, "The trickiest of all the tricky parts." Link grinned, and she went on. "When we went back in time, first wanted to try and wipe out our own existence without wiping ourselves out. If we just left them alone, it would create another paradox, since two of one person can't live at the same time."

"So if I knew you, and you gave me the ocarina, then how did I not know you?" Link asked, confusing himself.

"That's one of the biggest paradoxes of them all," Saria sighed. "Aside from my entity self, I was never real in this life... or, thats what I thought. However, you had the ocarina when the other life shifted away, and somehow you had it in this life, because otherwise you couldn't have learned Zelda's lullaby, which for some reason must be more important than we thought, if fate made a concession for you to appear with it now. The difference was that you have the same childhood past now that you had then, and since you remembered being given an ocarina, you had an ocarina... You don't seem too happy to be getting the answers you wanted, Link," She kidded him gently. Link dropped his head into his hands, and groaned.

"Maybe I should have never asked you for them," He muttered.

Saria smiled, before continuing. "Somehow, I don't think we'll ever really know how, my former self seemed to shift through my entity self and into this life after you left the Forest for good. I think it may have been fate trying to give a reason behind the ocarina, and my entity self... but anyway, thats what happened. However, when I went to join with my entity self, I found that I couldn't because I had begun to age!"

"How?" Link asked. "I didn't know Kokiri could do that."

"Well, they aren't supposed to. But somehow I did. Maybe it was a compromise so that I was able to live as a seperate being from the entity Saria in this life and know you..."

"Was knowing me that important?" Link asked in confusion.

"...Yes, Link," She said quietly. "It was to me."

It took him by surprise, and he looked away for a moment in embarrassment to get his bearings. Finally, he looked back.

"And since you weren't exactly the same anymore, probably because you left the enchantment of the forest and lost the Kokiri childishness," He began again. "You couldn't join like Darunia and Impa could... I've met Darunia's son and seen Impa... I don't think they're that prone to change, anyway, so that accounts for that." Link blinked in surprise, and shook his head. "I've never thought so much in my life," He decided, and Saria smiled.

"So what did you do?" He asked.

"I met with my entity self, and learned about everything that had happened, which of course, I had done, and in turn, remembered. But, unlike the Sages, I decided secretly that what they had done was a mistake: to change Hyrule like that just because the land was bloody... It made room for a lot of bad things to happen, and now there aren't even any Sages to call forth," She said, biting her lip. "They condemned themselves to watch over that seal forever."

"So then what did you do?" Link repeated.

"Well," She said, "My first priority was my family, the Kokiri, and I returned to the Great Deku Tree. But also... I wanted to see how you were doing because... I knew that you would be fine wherever you went, Link, but I m- ... I was worried about you, and I wanted to make sure you were doing okay on your own. After that, I just went home... back to the forest, and went to stay at the Forest Temple to be able to help and aid my entity self from the physical plane of Hyrule." Saria tipped her head to the side in the strange way from before. "I gave you the ocarina, Link, but I wonder if you remember the song, or if I ever even taught it to you... Do you want to try it?"

Link thought about it carefully for awhile, before turning to her. "I..." he hesitated. "Yeah..." He stood up and went over to the saddlebag to retrieve his ocarina, and when he had returned, Saria was holding one identical to it. Link suddenly felt shaky, and he had to sit down quickly.

"What is it?" She asked, leaning forward. Link put a hand to his head, and blinked a few times rapidly.

"I... don't know. Just some kind of dizziness..."

"A memory," She said, "You're having them more rapidly now..."

"How long will I keep having them?"

"That's one of my biggest worries," She sighed. "I'm not sure how long... When the Sages of this world started to have them, it was when the original Sages started to make themselves known in the world, and then the ones of this time, well, awakened..."

"How did mine awaken?"

"I'm not sure about that one, either," Saria said apologetically. "You'll have to try and communicate to the Sages about that, now that the damage is done."

"I thought I was talking to a Sage," Link said with a slight grin.

"No," She laughed, "I'm no Sage, Link. I guess I could be, in a way... but I chose not to... in fact, that may be the reason I started to age... Because I chose to."

Link mulled over this for a moment. "Why would you choose to forsake eternal life like that?"

Saria shrugged. "A lot of reasons, mostly thanks to you. You taught me, inadvertently, that there was more to life than I was seeing... The forest will always be a part of me, but also I began to yearn for a real life... To grow up..."

She shook her head, as if to clear the train of thought. "You have a lot more questions, I know, but I can't really answer all of them... In fact, I wasn't even supposed to make myself known to you, Link."

He looked up, startled. "Why not?"

"Because they, the Sages, didn't want to take the chance of you somehow remembering me. After you went to speak to Zelda about your dreams, they decided to keep quiet, even after they saw you so lost." Saria's dark eyes flashed angrily. "It was a terrible thing to do, because they were condemning you to wander through life searching for who you were and going mad... I finally stepped in, after you got in enough trouble." She frowned. "I wasn't even sure if I was going to tell you anything..." She shook her head again, and lapsed into silence.

"So what's going to happen to you?" Link asked after a while.

"Well, I'll probably go before them... but I don't think they can actually do anything to me..." She chewed her bottom lip in thought, and then shrugged. "Even if they could do something, it doesn't matter. You needed to know the truth."

Link sighed, and tipped his head back to note the high position of the sun. They'd spent the morning and most of the afternoon talking, and now Link was anxious to be doing something again. He stood up, feeling restless, and went back to his saddlebags, absent-mindedly dropping his ocarina into a loose pouch. He searched around, and found where his sword was. Pulling it out, he admired the keen razor sharp edge in the overhead sunlight, twisting it this way and that, and slashing experimentally. Saria watched him curiously.

"Do you know how to use that?"

He stopped, and looked a bit miffed. "I guess not. I was trying to look impressive."

The quiet young woman couldn't help it. She burst out laughing, and Link's frown deepened in embarrassment. He rested the blade's tip in the earth, and leaned against it.

"What, you know how?" He challenged. Saria shook her head though, and stood up. She unwrapped the tied cloak from around her traveling outfit, and let it fall back onto the rock she'd been sitting on. Link staggered in disbelief, and she immediately looked at him in concern.

"What is it?" She asked.

He shook his head. "Your clothes look... familiar...maybe... I don't know." He averted his eyes in confusion, and started to fiddle with the sword, turning its point in the soft earth. Saria reached over her shoulder, and pulled a small bow around, presenting it to him.

"This is the Fairy Bow," She continued, hoping to cover his embarrassment. "You carried it before... I took it from the Forest Temple for self-defense, but I haven't really ever needed to use it." Link walked up and peered at it in curiosity. He had never been close to a bow before, and reached out his hand to run a finger up the smooth wooden frame. The grain was a light, golden colored material, and he recognized it for Deku wood. Designs were carved into it and stained, and it was very ornamental.

"Do you know how to use that?" Link joked, finally handing it back. She smiled, and, in the blink of an eye, had strung an arrow and shot it towards a distant spot. Before Link could even turn, it had slammed into the spot with a hollow thud. His eyes widened in amazement. "Wow," He added.

Saria grinned. "I had a lot of time to practice. Five years to be exact. Not on any moving targets, mind you..." She drifted over to unearth the arrow which had sunken in deeply, and returned, cleaning streaks of dirt from it. Link pulled his blade from the ground, and tried a slashing move, lunging forward to bring the sword straight down.

"Hyah!" He said fearsomely. Saria couldn't help but giggle. He turned back and sighed dramatically.

"I just started!" He defended himself.

"Don't worry about it, warrior," She teased him. "You'll be great... It just may take awhile."

*************

After the short sword practice, Link saddled Epona up, and took out the Goron map to find his position again.

"Where can I find the Sages?" He said, turning to see Saria bundling her cloak up. She looked up in surprise.

"Find them? They aren't exactly... in Hyrule, Link." She bit her lip.

"Huh? What do you mean?" He asked, tying the buckles on the saddlebags. Epona knickered at him when he accidentally tightened one, and he loosened it apologetically.

"The Sages call people to them by summoning them... The only other way I can think of finding them is-"

"The Ocarina of Time," Link supplied. "I saw the inscription in the temple... That wall, is it a doorway to the Sages?"

"It's a doorway to the Chamber of Time," She said, watching him freeze as he was clipping Epona's reins on her mouthpiece.

"Chamber of Time?" He asked. "But I thought..."

"It's useless now," She assured him. "The Master Sword was... Whoops," She sighed, upon seeing his startled features.

"Sword? What sword?" He said, coming around Epona.

"The Sword of... Look, just forget it for now. When we get there, if we ever do, I'll try to explain it a little better."

"So you're coming with me?" He asked curiously.

"Unless you want to do this alone," She said, feeling suddenly shy. "I guess you could manage it-"

"No, I was just wondering if you were... Come on." He pulled himself up onto Epona's back, and turned, holding out a hand. She took it, and he pulled her up behind him again. Epona shifted about at the added weight, but he settled her. He could understand, though. It was strange for him to have someone else with them, too.

*************

"...So, I went to find Mido, and he was furious! His fairy was buzzing like a woodland stinger, and Mido's face kept twisting around like he'd eaten something really sour..."

Link laughed. "That sounds like Mido."

She nodded from behind him. "So then I went to find you, and you weren't anywhere! I got together a few fairies, and we went to go search you out, because I knew that you were the only one who knew where Mido's staff was..." She was telling him a story she usually told Hylians she met, with the slight exception of 'you' instead of 'Link', as she was talking about one of his childhood misadventures.

"I never thought I was that bad!" Link said. Saria grinned.

"Well, maybe without me around, you might have been a little more Mr. Innocent, but I don't know..."

"What? Did you get me into trouble?" Link asked, twisting around to see her expression. Saria tipped her head to the side in the way she always did, and grinned with embarrassment.

"I suppose I kinda did. You and Mido must have fought a lot more when I was around..."

Link suddenly remembered the dream he had had while he was with the Gorons.

"Wait a minute... Did I ever try to give you flowers?"

She started, and her mouth dropped open.

"So it was you! I remember... I think I fell... because you said I had passed out..."
"You remembered that?" She said, blushing. The effect was terrific, the red contrasting with her green hair and blue-black eyes. Link laughed again.

"I guess so. What happened?" He asked, turning back around to see the trail Epona was plodding along. Saria squirmed a bit in embarrassment.

"Mido brought me flower blossoms from one of the trees deep in the Lost Forest... because, oh, I can't remember, it must have been something important though, because one of the Know-It-All brothers went out to find some blossoms, too." She thought about it for a moment. "So, when Mido came back, I think he made a really big deal out of it, and was showing off... you know how he does."

Link nodded. "So what happened?"

"Well, he was telling everyone, and he of course had to go and brag to the most stubborn-headed, competitive Kokiri ever to walk the forest path..."

"Who?"

"You!" She exclaimed, and Link rolled his eyes.

"I don't remember ever being as bad as you portray me being."

"Well that's because you never had a reason to show off, either. In a way it may have been better for you that I wasn't really around. You got into a lot of messes because of that stubborn streak of yours!" She suddenly had to hold back the urge to playfully tweak his ear, shocked at the idea of an act that had come so naturally to her when they were children.

"Yeah right," Link said, oblivious to her sudden reaction. "What did I do?"

"Um," She focused on the story again. "You got pretty mad, and stomped off. When I didn't see you after a while, I went around trying to find you, and guess what you had decided to do!"

"Ignore all of the childish squabbling?"

"You wish," She teased. "I finally tried the Great Deku Tree's meadow... and guess what?"

"Do I want to know?"

"Probably not. You were hanging from His limbs!"

Link whipped around in the saddle in shock. "I was not!"

"Yes you were!" She laughed. "You were determined to go straight up to the top boughs, and get some flower blossoms from the Great Deku Tree!"

Link sighed dramatically, and shook his head.

"But I fell?"

"Yep. But not at first. I was so scared! I kept calling for you to come down before you hurt yourself, but you said you wanted to get the flowers. I tried to say they weren't that important, but I guess you were too fixed on outdoing Mido!"

"So what happened?"

"You got them! You went straight up into the branches, and came straight down! I thought... well, I thought that was it, you hit like a ton of rocks. I was so upset..." She trailed off for a moment in memory. "But when I went over to you, you started to move around, and I told you that-"

"I had passed out," Link supplied, eyes faraway. Saria nodded, then, realizing he couldn't see her, voiced her answer.

"Yes, you did... You told me you were climbing up, and then I saw the flowers in your hand... the most beautiful flowers I think I've ever seen... anywhere."

It was Link's turn to squirm in embarrassment, though he knew that he couldn't have been the same person who had done that. That had been another Link... another time... hadn't it?

"I wish I could have known you," He suddenly blurted out, before he could stop himself. Saria quieted down for a moment, and he berated himself for the ridiculous outburst.

"I wish you could remember, Link," She said softly. "Because it's there... We were good friends, the best, and I felt terrible when you left, though I knew that was your destiny... I guess that's the difference between the Sage and me. She could accept it, I couldn't."

They rode in silence for a time more, both lost in their own thoughts.