A Princess' Destiny

Chapter 16: Pieces of a Plan, Part Three; Culmination of Events

An eerie fog arose from the well. It covered all the ground of Kakariko Valley. The mist fled every powerful footstep the Gerudo King landed. An army followed behind him. They passed the well, and through the tunnel under the windmill, right into the graveyard. Two almost spectral figures flew over him into a cave upon a high cliff. Ganondorf raised his hand mightily, revealing the symbol of the Triforce on the back of it. As though being pulled by his iridescent hand, he rose up to the entrance of the cave and entered…

Impa stood before Zelda now, and played a song on a harp. A sad tune, very dark. It seemed to carry with it the sound of a funeral or a sorrowful goodbye. And yet it interested Zelda enough to memorize it…

Zelda awoke to find herself inside the house where they had spied upon Ganondorf the night before. Impa was watching her intently, taking few breaks to look up to the window over Zelda's head. Zelda didn't remember why they stayed the night, nor even falling asleep.

"Impa, why…"

Her attendant quickly shushed her. "They're right outside," she whispered.

Zelda sat up and turned to look out. Ganondorf was still at the Temple, and was making a grand speech. All she could make out from this distance was something about the Triforce and Kakariko. Her thoughts turned to her vision.

"You fell unconscious the moment you spotted Ganondorf, so we had to stay here," Impa explained.

"Then the vision…" Zelda started. "Impa, Ganondorf is marching on Kakariko. I believe it will be soon."

"Yes, he's been holding something of a pep rally out there for a while now. They went back to the castle over night. I wonder how things went when he saw Talia… Oh my, Princess! This is my fault! He thinks he'll find me in Kakariko and avenge his daughter's scar!"

"The scar was my doing, Impa," Zelda reminded. "But I don't think he's going to find anyone in particular. In my vision he went to the graveyard, to a cave on a cliff."

"The Shadow Temple," Impa said. "There are kept the bodies of great warriors from the Hundred Years' War, from every side. It is a shrine to the goddesses, as are the other temples in Hyrule, but its altars can be desecrated for his evil intentions easily!"

Zelda noticed a small, portable harp leaning in the corner of the burnt out building. It appeared only lightly licked by the fires. She walked over to it, somewhat unconsciously.

"Princess?"

Zelda picked it up and played the sad, sorrowful tune she had heard in her dream. Impa listened intently until Zelda had finished.

"That song sounds somehow familiar, Princess," Impa said. "Where did you learn it?"

"From you. In my dream last night."

"A dream that vivid must…" Impa stopped and listened to the sounds carried on the air. Ganondorf wasn't speaking, but the crowd was cheering.

"What is it Impa?"

"Shush. Do you not hear that?"

"No, I don't," replied Zelda, quietly.

"The voices… they are of those rousing!"

"What are you talking about?"

Ganondorf's army was on the move now, and soon Ganondorf stood at the gate. He raised his marked hand and skeletal children rose from the ground. Such a thing had never occurred in sunlight before. Zelda was amazed at the power Ganondorf now held.

The skeletons joined the Gerudo army as they forded the moat and marched on toward Kakariko Village.

"Impa, it's happening!" Zelda practically shouted.

Impa was covering her ears. "That song, Zelda! What was it? It has opened my ears to the voices of the dead children!"

"Impa…" Zelda watched her bodyguard in her pain. After a moment, she removed her hands from her ears. "They are far enough away that they will leave me in peace now," Impa said. "Mostly. We must make haste to the valley of shadow, Princess! Things are transpiring too fast!"

They leapt from their window and ran through the now vacated streets of the ruined town. Hurrying out to their horses, they saddled up, and rushed back to Kakariko.

A fog rose from the well, covering the ground of Kakariko valley. The mist fled every step the horses took. Zelda caught sight of the army marching into the graveyard. Impa covered her ears again.

"We are too near, Princess! Look around at the spirits!"

Zelda pulled the lens from her belt and peered through. Spirits flew all across the sky, as they had before. Occasionally one would fly into the shrouded ground and rose in a skeletal form. The spirits of the children were rousing. Their king had come.

Zelda dropped from her horse and shook her head violently with her hands.

"Go, Princess! Their voices carry so much grief! So much pain and loss! They were children! Children!" Impa's voice was high and loud now.

People started coming out of houses. Crying and screaming was audible from inside. Mostly men revealed themselves while women and children hid from the horrid sight.

"Impa, what is it?" one man asked.

"The grief! The anguish! Why can Ganondorf not let them rest on the other side!"

"That evil man has cursed her!" he decided. "Let us go!" The men arranged themselves and rushed to the graveyard. This wasn't right. Something horrible was about to happen now, and Zelda knew it. She rushed to Impa's side.

"Go!" Impa shouted. "Stop this, Princess!" Zelda started to run, but Impa stopped her. "Miss Zelda! Hide your clothes! He cannot know yet!"

Zelda took a quick look at herself. She was wearing her Sheikah leotard, but no bandage mask. She rushed into the nearest house and put on a white night gown to cover her Sheikah clothes.

When she came out again, the sky was covered in the cloud that had risen from the well. Dark magic was about. She saw two figures scream by in the air toward the cemetery. It was time to hurry to stop Ganondorf from doing whatever he was doing.

Her body had been tempered by Sheikah training. Her legs stretched to their limits as she rushed for the graveyard. When she arrived, she saw a battle waging, men's dead bodies falling atop their forefathers'. This was not how it was supposed to happen.

She spotted Ganondorf near the cave entrance. Dampe the grave keeper stood in his path. He held his shovel in defense. Ganondorf raised one hand and backslapped the old man at the base of his jaw. As she ran toward him she heard bone crack and saw the grave keeper's head turn farther than it should as he fell to the ground, limp.

Zelda ran at Ganondorf, a thousand futile plans against him running through her head. She knew that when she approached him she would seal her own doom. So why did she do it? All she could think of as reason was that no one else could. No one else should.

It was she who had received all these visions of him, she who had spoken with the gods concerning him, she who had plotted against him, she who had led him straight to the Triforce, she who had inherited a part of it herself. Now, with her hero gone, she was the only one able to stop him. Or so she hoped. As she ran near, he didn't even flinch. He just smiled. He smirked at her, grinned evilly as she came at him with every intention of stopping him. His seven days ended now.

Suddenly she was airborne, her legs kicking frantically and her arms caught up in the sky. Two small, old women on brooms carried her high, up to the cave. They cackled at her and Ganondorf laughed evilly.

She was thrown bodily into the cave. She fell down a short staircase and cracked her head on a large rock. As the world spun around her, she saw the two old women float into the room and Ganondorf come up with his arm above her, as in her dream.

She knew she was in terrible trouble. Not only was Ganondorf upon her, but these two women. Whether it was her concussion or the direction of the goddesses, she realized who these women had to be.

In her studies of religion, and through her studies of the Book of Mudora she had learned of Twinrova. Twinrova was supposedly the mother of all monsters, and was said to take the earthly form of two old women. She could grant great powers over black magic to any who would give up their soul's place on the other side.

This had to be where Ganondorf derived his magic… originally. Now he had a piece of the Triforce's power to help him.

Zelda started to pull herself up, but felt faint and fell to the ground again.

"Kotake! Koume!" Ganondorf said. "Place her upon the altar!"

"I thought you said you could do this alone, Ganondorf," one of the witches said.

"Yeah, we just came to watch your awesome Triforce of Power at work! Even we cannot do this, or did you not think we would have?"

"No matter how much power this takes, it still requires a sacrifice. I would have used that ingrate of a daughter. But she committed suicide?"

"Right before our eyes, Ganondorf. Gutted like a fish."

"Would we lie to you? Nabooru is gone. She was leading the rebellion against you."

"She would have made an excellent successor, had she not been so spiteful." Ganondorf rose from his melancholy. "Place her upon the altar!"

"Don't take that tone with us! Remember who gave you your start, Ganondorf."

"If you hadn't come to us for power, where would you be now?"

"Let's get on with it before she comes to her senses!" he said.

"Don't worry about that. This will keep her."

She vaguely saw one witch making strange motions and suddenly she got very cold. Her head felt heavy and achy. She reached for it and touched something very cold crowning it. She drifted somewhere between cognition and the opposite.

Her body was lifted and set atop the rock she'd bumped her head on. One of the witches started circling the cavern. Torches were spread out through the room and she started lighting them with magic while Ganondorf chanted.

After a while he paused. "Now you must set her aflame, Koume!" The witch reached toward Zelda while he resumed his chant.

A flame sprouted in her hands as she came close. Though Zelda wasn't completely aware, she knew burning was bad. Her icy crown began to melt. She hoped something would happen, something would save her, very soon.

"Wait!" Ganondorf interrupted his own chanting, and Koume paused. "What is that?"

He stepped toward Zelda and grabbed hold of her right wrist. He stared at the mark of the Triforce on the back of her hand. He laughed. "Already, I have two pieces in my possession! And to think I was about to let it slip through my fingers!"

He folded his right hand over his. She could see his Triforce of Power on the back of his hand. It started glowing wildly, and ringing. Her body started burning with intense heat. This couldn't be happening! She was suddenly very awake. The ice freezing her head melted around her.

She was about to lose the Triforce of Wisdom, and be sacrificed for Ganondorf's dark deeds! This couldn't be allowed to happen! It certainly wasn't what the goddesses wanted! Her body began emitting intense heat once again. Ganondorf released her hand and the marks of the Triforce stopped glowing and ringing.

A dome of fire burst from Zelda once more. Every torch was lit. Kotake, the witch who had frozen Zelda, ran to her sister's side. Ganondorf was unscathed. The cave began rumbling. A pentacle upon the altar glowed brightly. Ganondorf began laughing greatly, and the witches glowed intensely. Lightning crashed outside.

Everything turned bright. When it calmed again, Zelda saw that the sisters were gone, and in their place stood one tall, Gerudo-like woman. Ganondorf was at first ecstatic, then dismayed.

"Where is he?" he cried.

"He is here!" the woman said in the voices of the witches. Zelda felt cold breath on her face, but saw no one. She raised the eye of truth to her face and leapt back. Through it, she saw a creature that wasn't there before. It had one eye and a wicked, phantom look. Two hands as large as cattle supported themselves on the ground, somehow holding up the immense head-body that wasn't even connected to the appendages.

Knowing not what else to do, she screamed and fell backward, dropping the lens. She drew backward, staring at the air where the creature had been.

Ganondorf grabbed the lens from the ground and looked through it.

"Great Lord Bongo," he said. "Phantom Shadow of the other world!"

"Great and powerful brother," the woman added.

A whisper, and at once a howl, replied. "Sister Twinrova, who is this that cannot even see me with his own eyes?"

"This is Ganondorf, who possesses more power now than I have myself! He has called you from your rest for a great cause!"

"Grant me an army of the dead, frightening one," Ganondorf said. "Together, you, I, and your sister shall rule this realm in an age of darkness!"

Zelda could do nothing, but watch wide-eyed in horror as this unfolded before her eyes. Ganondorf, having forgotten all about Zelda, now started laughing with the two demons and left the cavern with them.

She ran out to the entrance and looked down in horror. In the rain that fiercely poured, dead Hylians and Gerudos were scattered across the cemetery. The living ones still fought atop the bodies of their fallen comrades. But all the Stalchildren had turned to bone on the ground.

Zelda heard an incredible howl, and all those dead and buried in the graveyard rose as skeletons. They tore through the Hylian peasantry and stole their weapons for themselves. It all happened in a matter of moments.

Zelda prayed for the souls of all that had just been killed, and asked for the goddesses to bring an end to this quickly. Suddenly, a figure appeared from the tunnel. Impa.

"The children have stopped crying, Ganondorf!" Impa cried. "But all those just lost shall have vengeance!"

The skeletal army prepared for attack, but Ganondorf stopped them.

"The king of Hyrule requires amusement," he said. "Great Lord Bongo, care to do the honors?"

Zelda heard a mighty thud. A large handprint was embedded in the ground beside Ganondorf.

"Bongo!" Impa exclaimed. "The Shadow of the other side? You have dug deep into dark magic, Ganondorf. It will soon claim your life for the debt you owe!"

"Actually, I have your Princess to thank for his return to this side."

Impa gaped in awe at this, but was invisibly mauled. She was thrust back into the stone wall of the tunnel. She jumped back and out of the tunnel into the village.

Ganondorf laughed. He and Twinrova rushed through the entrance to the village.

Zelda could not see what was transpiring. She climbed out silently to the top of the natural cliff wall around the cemetery. She ran along it to the hill with the windmill. From here she could see all of the fight that could be seen with the naked eye.

Impa stood perfectly still, with her eyes closed. What was she doing! Zelda waited anxiously for what would occur next.

She jumped in the air and flipped. A building nearby shook violently, as though some sort of seismic force had hit it. Could Impa sense this beast without seeing it? If this creature chose to be silent, it would be silent. And as far as Zelda could tell, it was silent. Impa must be hearing it on another level, like the souls of the Stalchildren.

How had Impa gained this ability? Zelda herself was the only one she knew who could hear the dead, and only when they wanted her to.

Impa stood still, making all kinds of symbols with her hands. Most of which she had seen. She spotted light and shadow several times, along with earth. Finally, she jumped into the air, and Zelda could make out the slightest difference in the rainfall, as though the creature was coming toward the hill. It stopped at the well, however.

This was when Impa struck. Still airborne, Impa spun around and unleashed a disc of energy that flew over the well and stopped. Then it sank down into the well, and Zelda heard the same howl one more time, echoing from the bowels of the well.

Twinrova cried out in her two voices and rushed Impa. Impa dropped a flash pellet and disappeared. Zelda took off across the hill, making for Death Mountain. She was met on the way by Impa, who took her up and used her jumping technique up the rocky cliffs.