Chapter Three
The Necklace

"Yes of course it's difficult Rael," Elane replied, "but I can't change what has happened. He isn't coming back." Elane didn't speak sadly or with anger, jus with a cold acceptance of a harsh reality. "Truth be told it doesn't feel like he has left yet. I can still feel him, Rael. I feel as though he's just behind me, or around those dunes."

Rael kept his eyes trained to the campfire. He thought that if he looked up into Elane's eyes he would cry, because he knew the pain all too well himself. After two days walking southwards along the river, they were now deep inside the passes of the northern Gerudo Mountains. Those two hot days over sand and rock with a diminishing food supply had been almost unbearable. In the dry west of Hyrule the sun was brutal and relentless, and he felt the burn in his skin at all times. The freezing chill of night was a harsh contrast, and Rael thanked the gods that they had managed to find some dead wood by the riverside here. They huddled closely together for warmth and sat closely to the fire.

"What was it like… how did you… did you feel that way about your father when he…" Elane struggled to say the words because she knew how sensitive Rael was about his father's death. She did not mean Link his birth-father, she meant Brash – or 'Resh' as Rael had known him – the man who had raised him and Ralis and died during the Kairin invasion.

Rael breathed deeply. Thinking specifically of his father was hard, especially at a time like this where there was little comfort. "I did not know my Da had died for several weeks. When Zelda showed me the body in the Palace my world crashed around me. I pushed her to the ground, attacked soldiers… it was as though I had nothing to lose any more and I wanted to die. But it passed."

"Is that what had happened before? The night I found you crying in your bedchamber?" Elane placed her hand on his sympathetically.

"Yes," said Rael. "But after my own loss, I don't understand why you have reacted so differently."

Elane shrugged her shoulders and brushed her hair out of her eyes with her free hand. "You had a lot more on your mind. You were worried for Ralis too, he was still sick then."

Rael nodded, and said nothing else. A cold wind whistled through the rocky valley, and Rael was thankful that they had found a shallow cave in which to sleep tonight. In the distance a nocturnal bird hooted and squawked. Rael supposed it could have been an owl, but this far west?

"Rael," said Elane, "that night in Hylia, you asked me something. You saw a pendant that I was wearing around my neck." Rael could only vaguely remember a purple gemstone shaped into an 'S', but he nodded. Elane reached behind her neck, and unfastened what turned out to be a long gold chain with, as he remembered, a pendant shaped like an 'S' hanging from it. It was large for a simple necklace.

"You said it was an heirloom of your family," Rael said, remembering.

She held it out in front of him, and it spun slowly on the end of its chain. "It's made of amethyst," said Elane, "a snake. And you see it has emerald eyes."

"It must be worth a lot of money…" Rael said slowly.

Elane laughed, "Yes I suppose so. But I think it is more than just a necklace Rael."

Rael took it from her, turning over the expensive jewel in his hands. It was heavier than it looked. "Why, Elane?" he asked.

Elane heaved a sigh, shifting uncomfortably. "It's why I came with you." Rael shot her a puzzled look, and Elane responded, "Why, did you think I was walking into a land of death for my own amusement? …We all have purposes Rael." Elane gazed into the stars, and smiled. "We're all here for a reason, aren't we."

Rael shook his head, thinking about his own purpose. He thought about Daran. Where was he now? "Why is the necklace your reason, Elane?" Rael asked sleepily.

"Zelda told me… She…" Elane turned to her face to his and continued, "About a day before we parted ways, Zelda came to me and told me that she had had a vision about me. She said that I should remember the song of my childhood."

Rael laughed bitterly, "So she has her claws in you too. You knew what she meant then?"

"I did. I knew what she meant because it had been on my mind. She is frighteningly perceptive." Rael threw a piece of wood onto the fire and sparks burst upwards before falling in a fountain of red and yellow. For a moment the flames flared and sent a brief wave of heat along his arms. But it passed quickly and left him feeling colder. Elane shivered and shifted closer to him.

"So she told you to remember a song," Rael said.

"Well," said Elane, "she did not really need to. It had been on my mind. I think she knew that though."

"What was it?" said Rael, a little impatiently. Elane turned her shoulders away from him, looking offended. "Sorry," he said. "It's cold, I'm tired…"

"Yes," said Elane, "well… the song. It isn't so much a song as a child's rhyme, or… my father used to tell me. Thinking about it, it reminds me of the necklace. Father used to wear it until he said I was old enough to inherit and…" Elane saw Rael was still waiting to hear the song. "Scorpions and lizards plague the sand; there is chaos and hunger in the land. The snake is lost, yet will be seen… glory upon the amethyst queen."

Rael swayed slightly as he thought about this. "The amethyst queen? Is that the Gerudo queen then?" he asked.

Elane nodded. "The queen who sits upon the Amethyst Throne, yes. The part about scorpions and lizards refers to the divided Gerudos under the banners of Ramades and Jaendral. Chaos and hunger speaks for itself. As for 'the snake is lost, yet will be seen', well…" she indicated the necklace that had been put down in the dirt. "I don't know what it is for, but I am sure that I am supposed to take it to Queen Lana. I feel that she needs it."

"It must be a sign about the war," Rael said, scooping it up. He put his arms behind Elane's neck and fastened it again. "Keep it safe then. It is important." She tucked it under her tunic.

At that moment Rael wanted to be alone, to find some space to be with his own thoughts, but he could not leave Elane by herself. So he shut his eyes and imagined he was somewhere else, walking along the seashores of the meadows outside Taran Kaey as he did in his childhood. The sand was soft not coarse, and moist rather than dry. The skies were a soft blue, and the sun a warm comfort not a harsh foe. Here he was happy. He was a child again, maybe eight or nine years of age. He pictured himself sitting in the sand and gazing out across a calm sea. Somewhere beyond that vast blue was Kaira, but it was a friend not a foe, and he had no worries.

A voice called to him, he turned to see his brother bounding across the sand towards him. He hurried barefoot along the dunes and rolled down the sand bank, skidding and sliding and laughing joyfully. Ralis was fifteen, a young man, tall with a strong youthful body. "Little brother," he said, hoping over the sand and planting himself down beside Rael, "I thought I had lost you!" He playfully scooped sand up and threw at him. The sand melted into nothing in Rael's dream.

Rael laughed, throwing sand back. "I was just here."

"No," said Ralis, confused, "you walked away from me and disappeared."

Rael shook his head. "I was always here. You ran away from me." Ralis did not look like he remembered any such event. Rael was shocked; his brother did not remember leaving him? "You left me alone!" he shouted, standing up and trying to square up to his brother. Ralis stood up, towering over him.

"You abandoned me Rael!" he shouted back, growing taller and more menacing. The sky grew dark all around and thunder boomed in the distance.

"You ran away from me and left me all alone! I was lost without you!" Rael shouted, suddenly feeling taller and stronger and older.

The eyes of an adult Ralis were wide with rage, yet a tear was trickled down his cheek. "Don't you blame me for your choices, Rael! I'm your brother you should have stayed with me!"

"I am my own man! I don't need you any more!" He turned to run away from his brother, and his eyes opened to the dark desert night. All was quiet. Elane was resting against his shoulder, still awake. He had not disturbed her. The dream had felt to real at the end, as though he were actually talking to Ralis. Perhaps it was possible for him to commune with his brother through his dreams. He would have to try and control this and use it to his advantage.

"What are you thinking, Rael?" Elane asked him.

Rael could not tell her exactly, so he told her something else on his mind. "I am wondering if I am doing what is right. Or, what the right thing to do is. Daran said I must destroy Ralis, or he will destroy all that is good in the world and cover it in darkness. But is it wrong to kill? Is it wrong to kill my brother?"

"I don't know," said Elane quietly. "Yes, I suppose. But what are wrong and right?"

"Perhaps they are just a point of view. Perhaps good and evil, and everything they are about, are just a point of view. The Kairin soldiers are men just like us, good men with wives and children, just following orders. Yet we see them as evil because they invade us and kill us. Likewise they think we are evil, because their lords have corrupted their minds."

Elane touched Rael's hand. "I don't think so. If a man toils hard in the fields to feed his hungry family, and never voices his own pains, then that is truly good. But if a man assaults and abuses a woman, that is always evil. Some things are constant, Rael, so focus on what you know to be right and wrong in your heart."

"Thank you," said Rael. A thought crossed his mind. What if the same man did both of those things? He did not mention this to Elane as she was already half-way to sleep. "Good night." He lay back into his blankets and curled up. Elane fell backwards with him and lay close, setting her head to rest by his shoulders.

Rael dreamed. He saw a grand hall of steel and stone. And a man made of shadows.