Prompt No.15
Word count: ~2030
Universe: Breath of the Wild; sequel to "No.11 — Stitches"
Pairings: Zelink
Rating: K
Themes: Trauma, stitches, scars, memory loss, healing

Scars

At first, when she dreamed of freedom, she would dream of a rebuilt kingdom, and of prosperity, and of peace that would last for generations. But when freedom finally came, she found herself reveling in much simpler pleasures. Fresh air. Cool rain. Warm sunshine. The gentle pull on her hair when the wind blew. The smell of grass. The sweet taste of springwater. She spent the first few days up well before dawn, basking in the unfathomable beauty of the sunrise. But between long days of travel and turbulent, breathless nights, her companion began to insist she prioritize sleeping.

He promised sunrises would still be there after she had recovered.

It had been nearly two weeks since the Princess and the Hero left the skeleton of Hyrule Castle behind them, looming over their battlefield like a hollow tombstone. They found themselves wandering back to his modest home in Hateno relatively quickly—not that they were short on invitations to stay elsewhere, of course, but after everything they had both been through they were drawn to the peace and quiet and the promise of a little solitude.

She didn't bother trying to sleep alone in the loft. She already knew from experience, having woken up screaming in Impa's house that first night in Kakariko, that the nightmares were worse when he wasn't beside her, and that once they took hold she took solace in no one else. And as for him, he rested much easier with his arm protectively wrapped around the person he had fought so hard to save.

A clatter sounded across the house, where Link was partway through fixing them an early supper, and she started. She set down her mug of tea, turning away from the fire and getting up on her knees.

There was a beat of silence, his hands clasped out of sight, before he finally muttered, "That was careless."

She stepped out of the blankets that had pooled around her legs, joining him as he turned around and coaxing one hand out from under the other. His palm was sliced clean open, the red starting to run down his wrist, and she clucked her tongue at him.

"It looks deep."

"It's not bad."

She passed him a knowing look, turning to fetch a basin. "You always say that."

She sent him to sit at the fireplace, filled the bowl with hot water from the kettle, and then opened the chest she had arranged with such great care in the corner. She had hoped its prominent placement would suggest it was used often—it was a gift from Prima, the girl who ran the inn, so she could fashion some of her own clothes—but the truth was she rarely opened it. She was quite content at this stage to simply throw one of Link's extra tunics over her head with some of the leggings he had bought her in town. Worrying about fabric colors and dress patterns still felt all so… frivolous.

She tossed a cloth into the basin and found a needle and some thread, and settled back in her pile of blankets, wringing the cloth and pressing it into his palm. He studied her tools obliquely, watching her moisten the ends of the thread between her lips and twist them into a knot.

"I don't think this is what Prima had in mind."

"Yes, well. I won't tell if you won't." She dabbed at the wound with the cloth, inspecting the damage as she cleaned the edges, and frowned. "What were you doing?"

"Chopping vegetables."

Her brow furrowed. "With what?"

He paused; then, "A Demon Carver."

She puffed a breathless, incredulous laugh.

"It's good to know some things never change," she scoffed, and then dropped the cloth in the bowl and brought the needle to bear on his injury. "Ready?"

She glanced up at him when he didn't answer. He was watching her with the most peculiar, hesitant expression, one she hadn't seen in so long, and it whisked her breath away gently as a summer breeze.

"I can manage."

"It's no bother," she shrugged, smiling faintly. "It isn't as though I haven't done this for you before."

"Oh," he said, flatly, and her heart stopped.

And just like that, the air in the room was sweltering and too thick, and she felt like an absolute fool for saying it as though he should have known. Her lips parted, so softly, to try to mend her clumsiness, but then clapped shut. Not all cuts were so easily mended.

Her needle still hovered awkwardly beside the wound. Finally, she prompted again, "May I?"

He nodded, and she dove headlong into her work, burying herself in the task so she didn't have to look him in the eye. He murmured, when she was nearly done, "So fast."

"You've given me plenty of practice," she smiled plastically, knotting the end of the thread, and when she was satisfied turned to put her things away. "I wasn't very good at it at first. I know for a fact I've left more than one scar on you."

He huffed a breath of dry humor. "I have a lot of those."

She clutched the basin to her ribs, her heart squeezing at a memory. When she looked at him he was wearing the same, plastic smile she had worn not a minute ago.

"I can't remember where I got half of them."

Something inside her ached, suddenly, like an old wound. She put the bowl aside, moving on muscle memory, drifting to touch him, to comfort him, as she had so many times before—but that was in another era, she remembered numbly, and reeled herself in. The way she wanted to touch him now… they weren't there yet.

"Like this one," he murmured, absently feeling the mark on his wrist. "It runs all the way up my arm. Can't remember how I got it for the life of me."

"Rock climbing," she answered automatically. "You lost your grip on the Dueling Peaks. Goddesses only know what possessed you to go up there in the first place."

When she met his eyes again, they were transfixed. Spellbound.

"Do you… know the story behind any of the others?"

"This one," she whispered, hardly able to find her voice, softly touching the base of his throat where the scar peeked out from his neckline, and swallowed. "I'd never stitched anyone before."

There was another hushed, stifling moment, his eyes boring so deeply into hers it was beginning to burn. Then he reached over his shoulders and slowly peeled his tunic over his head, revealing the pale jigsaw pieces scattered beneath.

Before she could think better of it she had drifted involuntarily forward, brow creased, tracing the jagged lines etched down his body, and loosed a shuddering sigh. "So many new ones…"

"I know it must seem strange—" he breathed, trembling whenever her fingertips stroked a new mark, but she shook her head. She understood. The scars were evidence of what he had lost. Pieces of missing memory he could see with his own eyes, littered all over his body and serving as a constant reminder.

She whispered, "It's not strange."

He bowed his head, staring down at the webwork of stories scarred all over him, and swallowed. He looked almost ashamed—not of the scars, but of the fact that he couldn't remember getting them. She hadn't seen him looking so vulnerable since before their reunion. It struck her, like a dull spear in her heart, how intimate it all was.

"You were grazed by an arrow here," she told him, his eyes flickering involuntarily to hers as she ran cool fingertips down the shooting star on his neck. "It was before you were my knight, so I don't know the whole story. But knowing you it was probably something ridiculous."

He flashed her a fleeting, wry half-smile, so similar to the one he used to wear when they were first becoming acquainted, and it made her heart skip. His voice was gravel. "What else?"

"You said you got this one taming wild horses," she said, touching a mark raised over his ribs. The way he was looking at her was making the fireplace feel too warm. "I've never seen you thrown for as long as I've known you. You must have been young…"

And then, slowly, deliberately, he took her other wrist, drawing her hand silently to his mouth as he listened, and pressed a kiss to her palm.

She froze, heart full to bursting as he pressed deeper into her hand, closing his eyes under her fingertips; he murmured into her skin, "Keep going."

She reached for the mark cutting across his chest shakily, the pale scar warm and magnetic beneath her hand. "That was a training accident."

He murmured more encouragement, breathing deep, and her insides reduced to jelly.

She traced scars down his arms, up his torso, across his chest, remembering wounds and choked apologies and a selflessness she could never hope to deserve. Her hand came to rest on the milky gash blown open across his middle, where it looked like something had torn right through him, and the unwelcome heat of before enshrouded her again like a blanket.

But before she could dwell his eyes were drawing her out of it, vibrant as nightshade. He kissed her fingertips before pressing them to his throat, giving her both hands to remember with. She was paralyzed again, hyperaware of her breath, of his pulse beating a steady rhythm through his jugular. He whispered, "Don't stop."

And suddenly she was a slave to that voice, wracking her brain for the smallest details as she recounted every story, remembered every scar, and he would always reward her, tracing her ankle with deliberate slowness, or pressing another kiss to the inside of her wrist, or, as he grew more bold, gently nipping the underside of her chin, or the needy place where her jaw met her ear—and every time she would lose her breath and lean into him, aching to be closer, he would urge her, More.

He was insatiable, and so was she, and between the two of them the cycle might never have stopped if not for her running out of scars she recognized.

She swallowed, watery-eyed, breathless, and whispered, touching it, "That just leaves this one."

"The Calamity," he murmured, eyes going distant as he dipped into foggy memory, and she nodded. "Robbie told me some of it."

She could see the Guardian beam in her mind's eye, a bolt of lightning sheathed in blue, tearing through fields and leaving fire in its wake; tearing through him, and leaving blood. That was one story she wasn't eager to relive. He seemed to know without having to be told.

"I…" he began, eyes receding, but then thought better of whatever he meant to say. "Thank you."

She nodded, shuddering, and wiped a stray tear as it fluttered out of her eye with her wrist. Her lips twisted, trembling, and she spat out bitterly, the words little more than a harsh whisper, "I'm so sorry, Link."

He blinked, the spell that had fallen over him so long ago suddenly broken. "What for?"

"If you hadn't been named my knight, your life could've been—I don't know, something else, something peaceful. If it wasn't for me, you would still have your memories—"

"Zelda," he frowned, unamused. "If it wasn't for you, I would be dead."

She turned to hide behind a curtain of hair, holding her arms. The warmth and heat of earlier evaporated, doused by a healthy dose of reality. She wasn't about to be so easily consoled. But then he sighed at her and pulled her into his arms, and she was powerless to resist.

"Do you honestly think, if I had to live it over, that I wouldn't do it all again?" he murmured, pressing his face into her hair. "You have just as many scars as I do, Zelda. Yours just aren't visible from the outside."

She melted into his embrace, breathless, trembling, frightened, and wondered, absently, what a scar from a century of imprisonment with the Calamity might look like.