Midna could have sworn that she would never be able to rest enough to fall asleep with Zelda lying next to her, but somehow, through the night, she must have managed to do so despite her doubts, for she woke up the next morning to see the sunlight coming in through the window, illuminating the room.
For a moment she simply lay there, completely at ease, but then she looked down, trying to decide the reason for why something was tickling her arm and felt the dream she must still be in the middle of almost smiling at her.
Zelda was lying in her arms, having placed her head into the little dip between Midna's shoulder and neck, lying with her hair spread over her cheek, making it so that the light hit it. In that moment, Midna was sure that she had been blind for all those months, for as she looked at Zelda, she began to see colours in her hair that had never been there before, red, copper, blonde, and almost white strands of hairs peeking out from beneath the brown colour she had come to know and adore.
She would have been content to stay like that forever, which, of course, meant that Zelda woke up the next moment, blinking slowly, before she too realised how they had come to lay quite close to each other during the night, her cheeks becoming tinged with redness as she muttered an apology while untangling herself from Midna. That was for the better. After all, if anything went wrong now, if Midna would walk onto the deck of the ship with Zelda only to find out that their lie had been found out, a guard dragging her away from their princess, it would have felt even worse if she had been forced to let go of Zelda after having confessed to her that she was not sure she would be able to stay so close to her, allowing Zelda to sleep in her bed again.
Her thoughts flying through her head was almost enough to distract her from how Zelda tried to talk to her while getting dressed, and what little words that still managed to reach her were easy to ignore simply by focusing on absolutely nothing except for all the buttons and clasps that had to be closed to secure the dress Anju had brought to her, making it so that Midna almost did not have to force herself to continue to stare directly into the wall in front of her.
Not even as they stepped out into the hallway, Madame Aroma soon joining them as they reached the hall, did Zelda stop talking with her, though the subject of just how Zelda would try her best to convince her father to let her saviour stay in a room close to Zelda's own quarters soon became a conversation about how she could not wait to tell her father about how brave Midna had been while saving her, how she had stayed willingly, risking her own chances of escape, just to make sure that Zelda would be able to escape as well.
Really, by the time Madame Aroma interrupted their conversation, Midna was almost relieved, almost greeting the chance to not have to hide the fact that each word out of Zelda's mouth only made her even more certain that the realisation from the day before had not just been the result of anxiousness and lack of sleep. It would have been so much easier that way. Then, Midna might have been able to walk directly towards what might very well be her death, finding comfort in the fact that she had not left any unfinished business, that this was all she could ever have hoped to achieve in her life, getting the one chance of showing Ganondorf that no matter how many lies he might try to spread, she would never believe him. But now, no amount of thoughts about how she might be able to have her revenge in a couple of days was enough to make her forget about the panic in Zelda's voice that night, how she was about to bring Zelda back to the very place she had fought so hard to leave in the first place. If anything went wrong, if Midna was caught, she did not even have to wonder what would happen to Zelda. The way Zelda continued to clench and unclench her fists, grabbing fistfuls of fabric from the front of her dress, seemingly not paying attention to the fact that she was making the fabric become creased, was enough for her to know the answer to that question, to know that failure might result in death for Midna, but that, for Zelda, it would be synonymous with the fate of being flown to Labrynna immediately to marry a prince she had never met.
"My husband has already talked with the guards." Madame Aroma began to walk towards a door in the back of the room, seemingly so certain that they could barely wait to follow her, to get back to the castle, that she did not turn around to make sure that they were walking along with her. "They arrived a little past five this morning, so they should be more than ready to get the two of you back home. Or—I suppose it might really just be one of you." she sent Midna a look, and as Midna looked down at the front of her dress, she could see how she had missed one of the buttons in her haste to get dressed that morning.
Fiddling with the button in question, but soon coming to the realisation that she would not be able to take care of it due to how she had then skipped a button all the way down, Midna followed along, just a few steps behind Zelda, as Madame Aroma showed them into a little courtyard behind the house.
"There." Madame Aroma nodded towards a blue gate in front of them, already in the process of digging through her pockets, soon taking out a bunch of keys, her search for the right one making the metal clatter. "The ship is just outside the town, waiting for you in the Termina Fields. My husband thought that you might prefer not having to go through the town again and have to leave through the main gates, a decision that both Anju and Kafei agreed with him on." she paused for a moment, turning around to roll her eyes at them, almost like she was expecting for them to find it ridiculous. "Yes, I know, I tried to tell them that after everything you two have been through, you would only feel safer with a couple of extra guards around you, but then I began to really think about it, and I have to admit that they might be right. Although I would not say that the people here are all that curious, it is not every day we have to princess of Hyrule and… her saviour here with us."
Finally, she found the right key. It felt almost like she was trying her best to make the time it took for her to turn it drag on for eternity, and, considering what little interaction she had been able to have with her over the last couple of days, Midna would not have been surprised if that was really the case, but, at last, Madame Aroma pushed the door open.
Midna had waited for that to happen, had almost made the world she would then step out into become freedom in her mind to a point where it was enough to make her have to take a step back as she saw the soldier waiting for her on the other side of the gates. For a moment, she could feel how the fear, the irrational thought that they had found out about her, made her blood feel more like ice than anything else, the fact that she froze completely being the thing that saved her as it was what kept her from turning around and attempting to flee, giving away the truth. But then, she was able to breathe again, able to tell herself that this was all part of the plan, that the ship behind the guard was even larger than the Shadow, the crest of the Hyrulean royal family decorating both the hull and the mainsail. They would not have sent such a regal ship for her if they had known about her. She had to have faith, not only in Zelda, but also in the plan and herself, those were the only things standing between her and an early demise.
Still, not even the fact that she should have known better, that it was sure to make the soldier become a little more suspicious of her, was enough to keep Midna from instinctively reaching out for Zelda's hand as they walked out of the gate, leaving both Madame Aroma's overly enthusiastic attempts at making them feel welcome, Anju and Kafei's grief, and what little sense of safety the house had been able to offer them behind to instead put themselves into a position where they had no choice other than to depend fully on the plan they had thought of back at the base, a plan that was by no means safe.
"Your Royal Highness." the soldier bowed, keeping his gaze fixed on the ground as Zelda walked over to him. "We have been sent by the king to ensure that you will return home safely."
"Thank you…?"
"Captain Onox."
Though the man did not move, did not give any indication that he would ever look up to meet her gaze, Zelda still smiled at him. "Thank you, Captain Onox. I will make sure to remember that name when my father asks me about who was the one to make certain that we would not be attacked while flying back home. Now, if you will allow it, Midna and I will make our way onto the ship." Zelda moved to step around him, having already halfway pulled Midna along when Onox stepped to the side, blocking her path.
"My apologies, princess," Onox said, though his voice did not exactly make the apology seem all that sincere, "but I have received my orders directly from the king. I am to not let anyone but you into the cabin. If Midna wants to come with us, she will have to stay in another room."
"I am sorry." Zelda turned, sending Midna a glance, telling her to remain silent, not that there was any need for any of that. Right then, Midna knew better than to attempt to change the guard's mind. She was not dumb enough to think that anything she would have been able to think of would ever be able to achieve more, to bring them closer to their goal, than Zelda's polite behaviour as she tilted her head to the side, looking like she was sure that she had misheard. "I understand that you have your orders, but Midna was the person to make my escape possible in the first place. Surely, my father will be able to understand that, I just have to explain it to him, which I will make certain to do the moment we arrive back at the castle."
"I am sure that you will make the king change his mind." Onox sent Zelda a poisonous smile, looking like he was not at all sorry for how he proceeded to step forwards, reached out to close his fist around Midna's wrist. "But the king was very clear about how I was to not let anyone be close to you under any circumstances. So if she has to come back to the castle with us, she will have to stay in another room."
Only the fact that Zelda looked even more panicked than she felt in that moment, her mouth opening and closing at such a speed that Midna was not certain just how many arguments Zelda were going through, trying to find the one that would make the guard let go of her right in that instant, only to find herself without anything to say, reaching the conclusion that, no matter what she might have been able to sling at him, her words as a princess would never be able to outweigh those uttered by a king, kept Midna from pulling her hand closer to herself, twisting around in such a way that she would immediately gain the upper hand in the fight that would undoubtedly follow next. Instead, she tried her best to push down the little tendrils of fear creeping through her body, putting on a smile she hoped did not look too fake as she began to walk along next to Onox, grateful for the fact that her height allowed her to move slowly, with even steps, rather than how she would have had to run to keep up with him if she had been shorter.
As she was lead up on the plank that connected the deck of the ship with the ground, the royal family of Hyrule apparently being above such things as rope ladders, Midna could hear how Zelda had given up as well, simply walking alongside the guard who had come to escort her to her cabin.
It was not good, not good at all, Midna was forced to admit that. They had barely made it away from Clock Town, and the plan was already beginning to fall apart around them, but as she was able to hear that Zelda was at least not panicking, she was able to find a little bit of peace in that. Maybe Zelda would be able to think of something, maybe she would be able to figure out a way for them to communicate with each other before they would be brought into the castle. In fact, the moment Midna had thought of the idea, she already knew that it would be the case, that, in just a few moments, Zelda would have formed the plan that would make it so that the soldiers had no other choice than to let them at least talk with each other. She just had to keep up the pretence of being a girl from a tiny village who had never even met the king's guards, much less seen a ship as impressive as the one she found herself on moments later for a little bit longer, then their goal would be within reach. Then, neither Midna nor Zelda would ever have to pretend again.
She tried to find a little bit of warmth in the idea of such a future as the soldier led her below deck, walking through a corridor that looked almost like it was a perfect copy of the one in her own ship, opening up the door only to reveal to her that, much like the rooms she had passed by on the Shadow, the rooms here were also almost perfectly square, only one of the walls letting her know that they had not left the ship after all with the slight curve to it.
If Midna had had the strength and the courage to do so, she should have resisted, have tried to fight her way off the ship, doing exactly what she had told Anju she had done and go to rescue Zelda. But, no matter how much her stomach ached, trying to tell her that it was not a good idea to continue in this direction, Midna could not deny the fact that, even though she would be brought back to the castle in a manner unlike what she and Zelda had planned for, they would still achieve the first step of Renado and Shad's plan as to how to overthrow the king. And really, with the dream so close to her fingertips, how would Midna ever have been able to let her fears control her now, make herself give in to them and try to flee? It was not only a matter of how, plan or no plan, this ship would still take her to Hyrule Castle and the king, but also that any attempt at escape would most likely end with her being captured and brought back despite anything she might say or do. So, trying her best to force herself not to panic, Midna stepped into the room, moving quickly so that she would not give Onox any reason to try to push her into the room.
Midna had barely even turned around, trying her best to catch a glimpse of the captain, before he had shut the door behind her. Already before she heard the sound of the metal twisting around inside the lock, she knew that she would not be allowed to roam freely around the ship, not while the princess was aboard. So much for having been the person responsible for the rescue of the princess of Hyrule, or at least that was what she hoped. This, all of this, it had to simply be a sign that the king really did not care too much about his daughter, that he was not naïve enough to let anyone walk around his ship while in the air, nothing other than that. When all was said and done, Midna supposed that she could not exactly blame him for that, not when she was there to try to get close enough to him and his son to make Zelda become the queen of the kingdom.
The ship creaked around her, the wooden planks giving a little as the steam engine began to groan loudly, slowly filling the balloon above their heads with warm air. Before long, Midna could feel how the solid ground disappeared from below them, the airship becoming light enough to take to the skies. Being down here, below deck, rather than standing at the rudder where she should have been, it felt like someone had tied a piece of cloth over her eyes. She could feel how the ship moved, giving in to the power of the wind that roared around them, leaning to the side ever so slightly, a particularly sudden gust of wind almost making Midna fall over onto the thin bed that had been pushed up against the wall. If anything happened, should they somehow figure out that they would need to do more than just this, Midna could not see how she would be able to fight, not with how they had taken away one of her senses.
Deep breaths. That was all she could do now. Fight to remain calm. In just a moment, they would be at Hyrule Castle, Midna knew that, had studied the maps of the land. The distance from Clock Town to Castle Town was barely more than a day if the journey was made on an airship; she did not have to spend much time in here. Soon enough, she would be able to walk alongside Zelda into the castle, putting up the façade again as Zelda would present her as the person responsible for having saved the princess of Hyrule, urging her father to show her gratitude by giving her a bedroom close to her own. It would be fine, Midna just had to ignore the feeling of something already having gone wrong for a little bit longer.
The ceiling above her creaked, and then, the sound so muffled that it took Midna a moment to realise that it was not simply a figment of her imagination, Zelda's whispering voice filled the room. Looking up towards the ceiling, Midna tried to picture where she was, feeling how her stomach made it seem like she was falling through the air as she realised how she must be directly beneath the cabin.
"Midna?" Zelda kept her voice low, so low that Midna could tell that her struggles to hear what she was saying was not only due to the layer of wood that separated them, that Zelda was doing everything she could not to let anyone hear her. "Midna, can you hear me? Are you all right?"
She had to be lying on the floor, whispering the words directly to the floorboards, Midna realised. Glancing around the room, she tried her best to figure out a way for her to elevate herself, a way that would allow her to do the same. At last, she had to admit that, other than the bed, there was nothing in the room that would allow her to do the same, but, considering that, no matter what, it had to be better than nothing, Midna climbed up on top of the thin mattress, not pausing for even a moment to kick off the tiny shoes she had been given back at the mayor's house. With how the floors had looked so clean that there had to have been a small army of maids hiding somewhere, cleaning them whenever they would not look, she doubted that it would leave any telling footprints on the bed, and that was assuming that the guards would even bother to look. For now, it was about Midna having to be able to answer Zelda before the silence would be enough for her to assume the worst.
Craning her neck, struggling for a moment against the unfamiliar feeling of the sleeves of the dress, Midna reached upwards, placing her hands flat against the ceiling. "Yes," she said, clapping once against the wooden planks to make sure that, even if Zelda would not be able to hear her, she would still be able to know that she was perhaps not entirely all right, but at least alive, "I am right here, Zelda."
"Goddesses!" Midna did not have to think twice to figure out what the reason for Zelda's uneven breathing was; she could already hear the tears in her voice as she continued. "I am so sorry; I thought that—I don't know what I was thinking. Arguably, I did not think at all, for if I had paused for even a moment to think things through, I should have been able to know that my father would never have allowed for you to stay with me in my cabin. Midna, I am so sorry, I—"
"Hey, it is all right." it really wasn't, not when Midna in that moment could say without even a shadow of a doubt that they were both thinking about the same thing, how, if the king would not even let her stay with Zelda for a day while being flown back to the castle, they would probably have to come up with a plan to answer the question of just what they would do when he would refuse Zelda's plea to let Midna stay close to her in Hyrule Castle, but she had to make sure that Zelda would not be given yet another reason to cry. "Zelda, I am right here. They gave me the room below yours—I am still right here, I am just below you rather than next to you. Really, I am sure that we are actually closer to each other this way than we would have been if I had been able to stay in the same room."
Zelda was silent for so long that Midna was almost certain that she had not been able to hear her, but, just as Midna was about to repeat herself, Zelda finally responded, her voice suddenly sounding like she had spent hours crying rather than just a few minutes. "I know. You are right. It is just… Midna, if anything goes wrong, if I—if it turns out that I am not able to convince my father about letting you stay, I just want you to know that the only thing I would have changed would be the choice to have you come with me."
"Don't say that. I would never have allowed you to return back home completely alone, not after everything you have told me about that place." when Zelda did not answer, neither expressing grief, nor joy, Midna decided to continue. Moving up onto the tip of her feet, forcing herself to ignore the discomfort of the new shoes, the way they did not at all bend even a little the way her boots had done, Midna brought herself a few centimetres closer to the ceiling, and, as such, Zelda. "Everything will be fine, I promise you that much. I will personally make sure that you will not be alone once we get back to the castle. Zelda, no matter what might happen, you will not be sent to Labrynna, do you hear me?"
Midna could almost hear how Zelda shook her head at her as she answered. "And here I thought that I was the one of us whose job it was to remain optimistic no matter what." a dry laugh, no drop of humour to be found anywhere, made it through the floor between them. "Midna, if this fails, you will not be able to do anything. None of us will. That is why you have to listen to me right now when I say that, should this go wrong, I am so sorry for everything. I should not have brought you along, I should not have brought any of you along, not when I knew how vulnerable they all are now."
"But I insisted on going along with you and this plan, so none of that matters now." more than anything, Midna wished that she would be able to push through the wood, but no matter how hard she pressed the palms of her hands against the surface, it did not give in, instead remaining in place, separating her from Zelda. So, trying her best to ignore her own feelings of how it was all spinning out of control, she forced her voice to remain calm. Now, it was about making sure that, if this would really be their last moments together, Zelda would not have a reason to cry. "Zelda, no matter what happens, I promise you that I don't regret it. Just… look, panicking does not help us at all right now, so why don't you try to get some sleep? If you are anything like me, you did not get the chance to sleep that well this night, though I assume that—" she was barely able to interrupt herself in time, cutting in just before she would have shared her struggle with Zelda, telling her the reason for why she had lain awake until well into the night, instead trying to pass the pause off as her needing to clear her throat, "I assume that it would be better if we are fully rested when we arrive at the castle."
"Why do you sound so much like you are repeating what I have told you?" as Zelda spoke, Midna could almost hear the smile through the floor.
Hoping that the same would be the case for Zelda, she did not try to fight against the smile that made its way onto her face. Even as the ship fought to sail against the wind, making the entire world tilt around her, almost like it wanted to warn her about what would await her once the journey came to an end, she was not able to deny the fact that as long as she was at least able to know that Zelda was not scared, she would be able to sleep through the night without thinking about what would happen next. "Maybe because I have learnt a lot from you? Because you make sense?"
This time, Zelda's laugh sounded almost sincere. "Now, why does that sound like one of the biggest lies you have ever told me?" she continued almost immediately, only leaving enough time for Midna to smile up at the little imperfections in the wood. "But, for what it is worth, I think that the same might be the case the other way around. You really have taught me more than I could ever explain to you, Midna. All of this, everything that has happened, I would not change any of it if I got the chance. I realise that it sounds selfish, but," a sigh made its way through the floor, "I suppose that is just the way it is with these kinds of… well, things. It makes us selfish."
Wondering if there was a porthole up in Zelda's cabin, allowing the rays of the sun to come into the room, painting Zelda in golden sunlight, Midna could only agree with that. "You are right. So let us be selfish for just a moment longer and not think about what awaits us at the end of this journey. Zelda, please, try to lie down for a moment, I promise you that everything will be fine. I have already come to terms with this; I will make sure that the base will not suffer even if we have already let the plan fall apart, I just have to listen to you tell me that you will be all right as well."
"I—I can't promise you that I will."
"Then try."
If anyone would have told her, just four months ago that this would be how she would spend what might very well become her last day of freedom, talking to a ceiling and hoping that the wood would allow her voice to pass through, carrying attempts at comforting the princess up into the cabin above her, Midna would not even have bothered to respond to such claims with anything other than a loud laugh. But here she was, in that exact situation, and despite the fact that there was still something about it all that felt almost unreal, she was not able to tear herself away, not when she had still not heard Zelda make the promise.
And then, just as Midna had been about to find herself with no other choice than to accept the fact that she would have to go to sleep not knowing if Zelda was going to be all right in the end, the silence in the room came to an end.
"If I promise you this, Midna, will you then promise me that you will do everything you can possibly do to survive all of this? No, don't answer just yet; I want to make sure that you will hear each and every word of this. I have to know that, should this fail—rather, even if everything goes according to plan, you will not just stand there, waiting for the guards to seize you once you have made me the queen. I have to know that I am not bringing you back to the castle just to let you become a martyr."
It was not until Zelda brought up the possibility of that happening that Midna realised that she might even have hoped that it would be the end for her. It was not exactly a case of her wanting to let it end like that, wanting to meet the end of her life inside the castle, but somehow, she must have been aware of the fact that the true Twilight Princess being killed by the king's guards after freeing the Twilight Realm would provide Zelda with the perfect opportunity to issue a demand for the country to be allowed to return to its previous state of freedom once more, revealing how she had come to know its late princess and as such try to form a closer bond between herself and the next ruler.
"Zelda…" it was so tempting to agree with her and let Zelda convince her that she did not have to bring that sacrifice, but even then, Midna would have been a fool if she had thought that it could really be so simple, that she could promise her that she would be able to go through this and come out alive on the other side. Maybe Zelda wanted for her to simply lie to her, but as she stood there, aware of just how suspicious it would be if anyone were to open the door in that moment, Midna was not able to bring herself to lie, not when Zelda sounded like the only thing keeping her from falling apart completely was the fact that she could talk with her.
"Promise me."
"I will try my best to survive." that was the best thing she could say, not trying to make promises she might not be able to keep. And really, was it not a big enough offer to bring, to swear that she had given up the thought of letting Zelda leave all of this as the perfect queen? Midna thought so.
Maybe Zelda was able to tell that it was all she could get, for while she did not exactly sound like she tried to hide the disappointment in her voice as she answered, she had at least stopped crying. "Thank you."
Midna did not answer. Was there anything she could have said? What did you tell the person you might just have realised you would never want to be separated from again when you were both about to land within Hyrule Castle in less than two days, knowing that, even if you both made it out alive, there was no saying what the consequences of the plan would be? She did not know the answer to that, and so, Midna remained quiet.
It did not take long before the worries about the fate that awaited them had claimed most of her energy, leaving Midna to sink down onto the bed, soon finding her way into a restless sleep.