Author's note:
We're back in the present, finally.
A draft of this one had been sitting in my laptop for almost a year. Hopefully you'll enjoy this as much as I did writing it!
A fair warning, dark themes ahead.
Chapter XXII
The Nomad
Part III
"Lookie here, lad", the old man said squinting his eyes, "I haven't got the foggiest what an Oxen is, and I don't care. Now go pester someone else with your bedroom affairs. You can't satisfy your lady, that's not my problem". Link looked at the old nomad-salesman for a full minute. Flabbergasted.
"Lookie?", Link whispered incredulously. Zelda was fighting a fit of maniacal laughter behind him, but she was also blushing furiously. He turned around to see her.
"Lookie?", Zelda burst out laughing. So loud in fact, that the old man, who was a good twenty meters away from her turned around and shook his head. Link felt the need to explain to the man that Oxen was what he thought the plural for Ox was.
"Don't... say anything", Link mumbled. "Come on". He pulled the reins gently and Sonne walked slowly behind him. Zelda followed in his stead. Her laughter died out a few miles later, when the joke had finally felt old.
It was a couple of hours later, having done quite some backtracking, when they reached Crennel Valley, that Link spotted a giant Beetle walking on its hind legs...
"Beedle?", he whispered. "Beedle!", he positively shouted. The giant Beetle-looking merchant jumped and screeched. He then comically fell to the ground with a loud thud. His arms and legs wailing in the air, not being able to get up because of the sheer weight he carried all the time in his portable shop.
Link made Sonne trot a little to catch up with him. He helped his merchant friend get up. His humongous backpack stayed in the ground. Zelda quickly caught up with them. Beedle looked at her, amazed, as if he'd never seen her in his life. The look became a stare, which made Zelda hold on to her smile too long for it to be natural.
"Er...", Link began. "Hey Beedle!", he said trying to sound casual. "Long time, no see!". Beedle, who was still openly staring at Zelda's face blinked more than a couple of times and then turned to Link.
"What? OH. HEEEEY!", he shouted as if Link were at Crennel peak, and not uncomfortably close to his face.
"Yeah, hey", Link said with less enthusiasm this time. Beedle didn't seem to care or was just too used to people being weirded out by him.
"Sorry", he said sheepishly, "Figured I'd do the startling and you'd do the shouting this time around". Beedle looked at him, the joke had missed its mark. Zelda giggled softly behind him.
"Right... er. Look. The prin- Her Majesty and I need to run some… uh- errands, but our horses won't do the trick anymore. I figured If anyone knew where to find another way of carrying one's things, well, it'd be you". Link eyed the dangerously big backpack.
Beedle looked at him intently, rubbing his chin as he did. He seemed lost in thought.
"Have you tried, perchance, riding bears?", he said this very seriously. Link fought back the urge to snort. Because yes, he had tried riding them.
"No, can't say I have", Link lied. "But I don't think a wild animal like that would work. We had something sturdier and docile in mind". Trying to lead him on the answer he wanted.
"Buck?", Beedle offered.
"Nope, those antlers are deadly, and they're smaller than a horse".
"Stallhorse?"
"Cool looking, but very uncomfortable, believe me", he said eyeing Zelda.
"Whooly Rhinoceros?"
"Love them, but they're too much on the wild side, you know?", Beedle furrowed his brow.
"Do you know if there's a way we could maybe use some cattle?", Link finally said.
"That's it!", Beedle shouted at the same time, startling Link and Sonne.
"Water buffalo!" Beedle shouted. Link was sure he'd shout Oxen, for some reason...
"Wat- what?", Link said.
"Yes! I'm sure you have seen them! People used to hunt them for their tasty meat!"
"But Beedle, they're even more dangerous than bears. I need a tame animal!", Link said losing his temper.
"Well, closest thing you gonna get, it the Hateno cow, friend", Beedle said matter-of-factly. Link sighed.
"Let me help you with your... shop". Together they lifted the backpack-shop, and after a few attempts, Beedle managed to carry it and with a single wave of his hand he bid them good bye. His eyes falling into Zelda´s face yet again.
"I don't remember him being that... 'stary' ", Zelda said visibly uncomfortable.
"One mystery at a time, Highness". Link said determined.
"We're coming home", Link muttered.
He'd been walking for weeks now. His legs could take the punishment, as well as his stomach. He was used to prolonged periods of time without sustenance. One week was nothing. He'd seen the Zora relic, along with a few unexpected surprises, he thought to himself, but he concentrated hard on meeting Vah Medoh.
The thick and moldy linen cape he wore kept him warm, as the cool winds kept cutting the hardened skin of his face without mercy as he reached the vast green valley of central Hyrule. To his right, an enormous castle rose above everything else. Five rocky prisms rose diagonally towards it. A cloud of dust was lazily flying away with the eastern winds.
I coveted those winds, I suppose.
An echoing voice whispered somewhere.
He felt nauseated, his eyes were failing to focus clearly, and his head started to spin. He knew hunger played no part in this.
"Not yet. I have to keep going", he said to the wind. He shivered and continued walking. Far in the distance he saw a figure flying away from the castle. From where he was, the figure looked nothing more than a speck of dust, but thinking hard, it looked very much like a giant bird.
The bird started to fly west. He followed.
Teba's fears came true when he had to tell Saki all about his encounter with the flying giantess. When Tulin wasn't around, he told her about Revali too.
"You hit your head hard", she said pushing him against the mattress. "You need to rest before you see any more ghosts around here".
"It wasn't a ghost!", he protested. "He was as real as you and me!". Saki shushed him.
"Okay, you'll tell me all about it in the morning, now you need to sleep". She had mended his wing, so he was stuck with sleeping with his face towards the ceiling.
"He's real", he muttered. Saki placed her wing gently over his chest. "Revali is real", he said before giving in to exhaustion.
The next morning. He left without so much an 'I´ve got to go' to Saki and a quick peck on her forehead. He thought he could catch a warm updraft and he wouldn't have to make an effort to reach Medoh's resting place. Surely enough, the warm currents took him up with only just one bat of his good wing and barely any effort on the other. The sun was barely a faint line on the horizon when he reached the left wing of Medoh. Turns out, landing was not as easy.
"I see that recklessness is a family trait", a familiar voice stated somewhere near the control panel. He heard him as if he were right beside him. And he was.
"I lied earlier". He said non-chalantly. "I have information that you should know. That... he should know". He said with a tinge of hurt in his voice.
"I learned something as well", Teba replied to a surprised Revali.
As he continued his journey across the valley overlooked by the castle, images started to fly by inside his head. He was stabbed, sealed, banished. A fainter image showed him an endless ocean. The face of a small kid thrusting a sword over his head came to his mind too. A young man driving a blade into his skull. It played differently each time, but each time the outcome was the same. He died. Yet, there he was, pacing his way towards his destiny, whichever that meant.
These toys are too much for you!
Every time one of those images appeared inside his head, a swelling feeling of anger took over him, and a searing hot pain cleaved his insides. As if some sort of beast was fighting its way out of his chest.
No, it wasn´t just anger.
It was hatred.
But why?
Welcome to my castle.
His right hand started to hurt whenever he had any of these memories.
Maybe it's finally time...
"Teba, for the third time, I´m not deaf, just dead. Stop shouting", an exasperated Revali said calmly. Teba had been pacing from one side to the other, recalling his encounter with the giantess, and the conversation he had overheard moments prior.
"But don't you see? We must tell Link! He needs to know!", Teba said urgently, preparing to fly away. Revali placed his wing over his shoulder.
"Why is it everyone thinks of Link in times like these? The person that needs to know this is none other than Princess Zelda. Not her shining knight". Revali's voice carried a coldness Teba had never heard of.
"If you're done acting like an eaglet and listen to me you just might save them both, and Hyrule while we're at it". Revali floated silently before him, waiting.
"You- you're right. Forgive me". Revali held out his wing and shook his head calmly.
"Nothing to forgive. Now listen carefully", he looked at him dead in the eyes. Teba suddenly felt like a small squirrel. Revali's gaze was so imposing he felt like he towered over him, even though Teba was clearly at least half a head taller.
"When we -the champions, died, our bodies were desecrated by malice. The corrupt monsters that had made their homes inside every divine beast merged with our limp corpses and patiently waited for the champion to make his way to the innermost chamber of each machine. When Link slayed them all, the magic that bind us to the beast was lifted, and so we were able to grant a fraction of our powers to him", Teba did not dare interupt him.
"When I died", Revali's face changed for a moment as he clearly relived his last moments, "a voice that was not of this world spoke to me. The best way I can describe it is it was the voice of a conscience that was not mine. This... thing said to me that my duty with this world had just begun.
"'My master will come one day. Help him. It is critical that you aid him in his quest to banish the darkness once and for all. The seal mustn't come undone. Please relay this information to the other champions, as I fear my voice cannot reach my master's ears. ", the Cobalt rito quoted.
"As I said, when Link killed the blight and I lent him my powers, I thought that was what the voice had meant all those years ago", Revali closed his eyes, as if bracing for what came next. Teba held his breath unconsciously.
"The... thing, Zelda and Link defeated in Hyrule Field was not Ganon. It was merely a phantom of his true power, merged with… something else", Teba's arms tingled and his legs shook. He felt fear for the first time in his life.
"What could be worse than the genocidal rampage that almost wiped out the entire Kingdom?", Teba asked to the skies.
"Ganondorf, the true king of evil", Revali replied grimly.
"Hylia..."
Night had covered him before he could reach his destination. An odd sense of peace filled his chest. It was at night when he felt the memories fade away, only to wake him up with the break of dawn. He feared sleep above all else, but he needed it, his muscles had begun to ache.
"Din, grant me strength".
"Are you saying there is something worse than the Calamity?", Teba asked fearfully. The shorter rito nodded gravely.
"See, when I died and Link freed all of our spirits, we joined King Bosphoramus in a place he kept calling the Sacred Realm. He told us about how the queen descended from an ancestral blood line that went all the way back to the Goddess Hylia herself. And how he, was a direct descendant from one of the most infamous royal families in Hyrule, the one that went to war with the Gerudo tribe all those millennia ago, the blood of the king that ultimately led Hyrule to its demise before the fabled Hero of Time stopped Ganondorf and helped the princess seal Ganondorf away in that very same Realm, until he broke free, killing one of the sages that watched over his seal in the process".
Teba's beak was wide open. He was having some trouble understanding all of this.
"At the time he had broken free, many thousands of years had passed, and Hyrule had become a very different place, where Hylians had ultimately wiped out the Gerudo living in their land. It had become a bleak place, only a shadow of the great Kingdom it had once been. A fruit ripe and for the taking. Ganondorf used different methods that time, by sending in a puppet from a shadow real in which he had disguised himself as a god. He had failed again, thwarted by the Hero of Twilight and the Princess".
Revali gave Teba some time to take the information in. When had all this had happened if Calamity Ganon had once tried to overtake Hyrule ten thousand years ago? This couldn't be possible at all.
"I'm afraid it's not the end of it. We also found out this had been happening at the same time, but in different times", Teba noticed how Revali emphasized the last word… "See, Ganondorf is one of the most, if not the most powerful being in existence, except maybe for the three Original Goddesses, as he is able to travel between different versions of the same worlds". Teba had to sit down.
"In one of them, Hyrule is nothing but an endless ocean with some scattered islands, and Ganondorf still tried to force his way to the throne", Revali sighed, "you see where this is going?". Teba frowned and nodded slowly. "Ganondorf is our true enemy then", he said, determined.
Revali smiled at his sudden bravery. "He is, but there is an enormous problem". Teba looked at him quizzically, "Ganondorf is immortal, he cannot be killed, only sealed". Teba looked confused.
"But how did any of those heroes defeat him if he wasn't killed?", Revali smiled sadly.
"They killed him", he stated. "The real problem is that killing him means only a long nap for him because his soul is just so full of power and desire for revenge, that he keeps coming back, awakening, or breaking out from any realm he's been ever sent into. He's basically a god. The only thing that keeps him at bay is that sword our own hero now carries behind his back". Revali suddenly was lost in thought.
"According to King Bosphoramus, the only way we can stop him is to end the cycle. You wouldn't know this, but the three of them have the power of the Goddesses residing inside their souls, Link and Zelda's stay dormant until the time comes and the Goddesses need their champions. This is a power lent by the goddesses themselves. With Ganondorf, though. It is a very different matter." Teba was just used to being surprised at this point.
"How do you mean?", he asked tentatively. A pair of eagles were fighting some hundred meters above them, the prey was a wild fox. They dove furiously, landing somewhere near the control pod of Medoh. Feathers were flying everywhere.
"Piss off! Revali said, sending a wave of blue flames that scared the eagles away, taking their fighting elsewhere. "It doesn't matter if Din grants him her power or not", Teba looked at him to let him know to go on, "Id doesn't matter if she does it or not, because he has her power. He was born with it". Teba's beak truly hung from his face now.
"What?!", he said. Revali replied his surprise with a sad smile.
"He is the only son of the Goddess of power, Din. This is the true reason behind his enormous power, and how he is able to keep his body after so many eons. In order to stop the cycle, his soul must be ripped from his body, and the only beings capable of doing this are the Goddesses. Farore and Nayru lend their powers to their vessels with every age, but in doing so they basically seal the souls of their champions, so their powers don't mingle with them, to keep their hearts and thoughts their own. Otherwise, their minds would be corrupted by the divine power and they would be too powerful to control. We would be dealing with two more godly beings".
"Then all we have to do is find a way to break that seal, that way we would have an advantage over him for the first time in history!", exclaimed triumphantly the white eagle. Revali shook his head in disbelief.
"We can´t do that, as much as I'd love to see a rito ripping that hylian to pieces. We can't have Link or Zelda lose their true selves to that kind of power. In order to seal Ganondorf's soul away from his body, they will need their souls intact. What you need to do is find them and relay this information to them!". Revali sentenced.
Teba looked less resolved than before.
"There's something I need to tell you before I take off…", Revali eyed him suspiciously.
"I have to thank you for letting me catch up, Revali", a deep, raspy voice said behind them. Even at such heights and with all the gusts of wind, they heard him as if he were whispering in their ears.
Teba had just realized who's voice that must have been, when a searing pain cut through his spine and his head turned on it's own accord, he heard a loud crack and suddenly stopped feeling altogether.
"Ganondorf!", he heard Revali in the distance.
"Fly away little blue dove, this ship is rightfully mine, as is everything and everyone else". The last thing he saw was a pair of golden sandals an inch away from his face. One of the feet elevated and he felt no more.
He had to hurry and get to the desert before the pair of them knew what had happened. The quickest way was now aboard Medoh.
A blue flame, Revali, had just shot straight down, no doubt going to warn the two kids about him.
"Ha!", he scoffed loudly as he mentally began to turn the titanic ship on. An otherworldly screech confirmed his job well done.
He would be in the desert in a few hours.
I shall rule them all, once and for all.
Author's note 2:
Well folks, this is it, were nearing the bit of the trailer, but how are all the dots going to connect together you say?
Just wait and see :)
More Ganondorf to come in the next few chapters. Also, I wonder what will happen to Buliara, and the Gerudo, now that the heir to the throne is coming back?
More importantly, will Link and Zelda ever get ahold their Ox?
... hmmm questions, questions...
