Link's Awakening

Chapter Twelve: The Conch Horn

So there I was, down in the swamp's hidden grotto, having lost Bow-wow, and faced against an enemy that my sword couldn't hurt. Well, it didn't take a genius to figure out that I should have been attacking the thing's bottle the entire time, but it was a little late to come to that conclusion, being that my arms were tied down. Did you ever have a moment, though, when you were so fatigued and frustrated that you couldn't see the obvious solution that was right under your nose? I had one of those moments right then, lying in the murky shallow water while my enemy prepared to crush my body, when I remembered the other thing I was carrying.

Struggling to free his arms from the constricting rings of red smoke, Link got nowhere as the clown gathered more and more smoke above his head, preparing to throw it down on him like a boulder, making the young man wish that the light of the Coral Triangle didn't allow him to see what was about to… wait a second… that's right, he was still wearing the Coral Triangle around his neck! With less than seconds to spare before the floating creature would have crushed him, Link used his arms' limited motion to grab the striker, and then everything in front of him distorted when the young man began to hit the triangle.

Just like when the Moblin Captain had done so, Link was safe while the clown screamed, covering his ears while the gathered smoke vanished, and then the thing quickly retreated down into the bottle. As soon as it was gone, the ring around his arms vanished, but there probably wasn't much time before the floating creature recovered after he stopped hitting the instrument, so as fast as he could, the young man raised up his blade and brought it down onto the bottle with all his might.

SMASH! A large amount of red energy was released as soon as his sword made contact, knocking Link back down while the bottle's outer covering was completely shattered, and he wasn't sure, but… it sounded like a scream was mixed in with the small explosion as the last of the red smoke evaporated. Once again the grotto fell silent, with only the glow of the Coral Triangle to let him see anything… wait a second, no, there was another light source now… and it was coming from right where the clown's bottle had been.

The glow from the new object matched the one coming from the triangle, and once the young man got up to his knees in order to look at it, he found himself looking down at a large kind of seashell while he thought he heard that same music playing again for just a second. The clown had been telling the truth, he had been guarding this thing, the uh… Conch Horn, was it? If this was another of the Instruments of the Sirens, then it was his third out of, uh… eight, was it the owl said there were? Anyway, Link had to get out of there and find Bow-wow, so he tucked the horn under his arm, and headed back down the tunnel.

Now that there was no fear or mystery left to this place, the walk back out into the swamp took a lot less time, and he had hoped that the rain had stopped falling by now… it hadn't. Seeming like every time the young man just started to get dried off, he would just get soaked again, so he trudged his way back through the swamp's shallow water, heading away from the hidden grotto, since that was the general direction of the forest, and uh… hopefully with the added light from the Conch Horn, Link would be able to find his way back through the trees to Mabe Village on his own.

Finally, he was able to step out of the water, feeling the ground gradually get harder while making his way toward the tree line, and it was nice to have the canopy of leaves blocking the rain again. Now all he had to do was somehow navigate his way down the twisting paths, but before the young man could even make a decision on which way he wanted to try, there was a rustling in the branches immediately above him. Reflexively looking up and holding the horn so that he could see better, Link was both relieved and disappointed at the same time when he saw that the owl had returned.

"So, you managed to find both the Coral Triangle and the Conch Horn." The animal said, still glaring at him judgmentally. "The Wind Fish has noticed your progress, but I remain skeptical… after all, one can only rely on dumb luck in the absence of skill for so long."

"Dumb luck?!" The young man demanded. "I'll have you know that I've had plenty of training, years of it in fact, so why can't you just admit that I'm doing a good job?"

The owl just stared at him for a second, before bursting out into a mixture of hoots and hysterical laughter, mocking Link's words in a high pitch voice, before reminding him that he could have never beaten the Moblin Captain without the help of Bow-wow, whom he had managed to lose. The animal also reminded him that it was purely by chance that he had originally survived the Tail Cave, not with strategy, and without the aid of the Coral Triangle, the clown in the grotto would have certainly killed him.

"Foolish boy, the Wind Fish isn't the only one whose attention you have drawn." The owl continued. "There are those on this island, those with great power, who will do anything it takes to stop you in your quest to gather the instruments. What you have seen so far are the weaker of their numbers, those left behind when the original guardians were defeated by their leader… and if he discovers what you're up to…

The animal's words trailed off, leaving it just sitting up there silently on the branch for s time, before suddenly instructing Link to hide the instruments and then to keep a low profile for a time. With that, the owl flew off, vanishing up into the trees, and leaving Link to think about the animal's cryptic warning. However, it was still raining, and the young man needed to get back to Mabe Village, so he chose a path and followed it, leaving the thinking for a time when he wasn't soaking wet and exhausted.

It took a while, a lot longer than he cared to admit, actually, but finally after a couple hours of wandering around, tripping over roots, and getting smacked in the face by low hanging branches, Link found himself leaving the tree line once again. This was it, the northern edge of Mabe Village, and… and he was going to have to tell Madam Meow-Meow what happened to her pet. First things first, the Instruments of the Sirens needed to be hidden away, at least on that he and the owl agreed, so the young man made his way to Marin's house, where thankfully no one was home.

A better spot was going to be needed for the rest of the instruments, since the horn and triangle just barely fit under Tarin's bed next to the cello, and now… now he was not looking forward to what was going to happen next. Walking out the door and back into the rain, Link slowly walked toward the house, while trying to think of how he was going to break the news, when something suddenly barked excitedly at him before licking his face with that prickly tongue.

Bow-wow? Without the glow of the instruments, it was a lot harder to see what was happening right in front of him, but eventually the young man was able to figure out that the big creature really was right in front of him. Not only that, but the end of its chain-like tail was tied to a wooden post in the center of the yard. Had the creature simply returned home on its own after the clown made it disappear to… wherever it had been sent? On second thought, who cares? Madam Meow-Meow's pet was home, and now everything was going to be just fine.

These suspicions were proven correct as soon as he walked into the cottage, with Tarin confirming that Bow-wow had shown up a couple hours ago, with everyone assuming that it had escaped while Link was fighting off the Moblins. The young man didn't want to tell them about the grotto, or the instruments for that matter, so he went along with this story, and just like that everyone was happy. Marin gave him a big hug, and Madam Meow-Meow was so happy that she grabbed his face and gave him a kiss… one that felt like her lips were covering most of his face, and left him all sloppy when she finally pulled back.

Damn it, that wasn't the kiss he had been hoping for, but now that everything had been resolved, Link just wanted to go to bed. Of course, Marin wanted to hear all about what happened with the Moblins, and the young man couldn't just tell her not to worry about it, so he gave her a really condensed version that was… exaggerated to put it lightly. In the version Link told her, he had defeated the Moblin Captain single handedly, caring more about Bow-wow's safety than his own, resulting in the young woman giving him another kiss on the cheek.

So after one last walk through the rain, the three of them finally got back to the cottage, where Link was able to sleep on the smaller guest bed… wishing that he was able to have his arms around Marin. Within a few minutes the lanterns were blown out, and the others in the house were snoring, while Link tried to stay awake long enough to go over his plan for tomorrow. It wasn't like he knew where any more of the instruments were located, so he couldn't look for them, but what he could do was look for Tracy.

That name the young man had seen written on the map in the library with a heart drawn around it… this was his best lead for finding the last castaway that washed up on the island all those years ago. Yes, tomorrow morning bright and early, he was going to take one more look at the map of Koholint Island, and then Link would find her. Either that, or he would just build a raft and start paddling his way off the island across the open water… such an undertaking would be extremely dangerous even with calm seas, so that plan would be left as a last resort… man, he really hoped that this Tracy person would be able to help him.