Author'sNote: Well, it's been a long time but I'm back up and running now. Hopefully we can expect regular updates, and I'll go back and do some structural editing to previous chapters as well. Thanks for sticking with me, everyone!
They had to leave the horses at the edge of the swamp; they were born and bred of the rolling hills of Termina, not the wet marshes and hidden pits of the Deku domain. Still, they had done well, carrying them all the way to the North edge of the Kingdom in a little over a week, and they fetched a good price at the last human village before the murk. Impa liked the swamp; her supplies were getting low, but places like these were perfect for finding the herbs, seeds and roots she needed. Zelda idly knotted and unknotted reeds while she watched the Sheikah work in an iron pot over the fire, which was giving off a smell so sharp it made her nose sting.
The Princess had tried many times to draw her guardian into talking about herself, but Impa was resistant there. It hadn't been an easy life; that much was obvious. Sheikah were like steel, burned and beaten into their purpose, and along with the life there was an almost religious set of rules that they had to follow, and so much of their lore was forbidden to outsiders. Impa mourned the deaths of her superiors not because she had loved them, but because with every rank came new information, new tricks and recipes and knowledge, and when they had died without successors, a greater part of all that had made the Sheikah powerful was lost, gone forever into the ground. Ganon had called Impa the last of a dying breed, and from what little Zelda had gleaned from her, he had been painfully close to the truth.
She tried again. "There are Sheikah here, aren't there? Father mentioned them once."
Impa snorted, crushing seeds against a rock with her knife. "They're… exiles. They're not a clan. They just huddle together for warmth. Not true Sheikah. They bear no loyalty to any crown. They're snakes."
"Snakes can be useful."
Impa scraped the mush into the pot. "Not these ones."
"Why were they exiled?"
"There are lots of reasons. Lots of rules. Pass me that red flower." The princess handed it over; Impa had been picking up seemingly ordinary bits and pieces from the roadside for days. She pulled the petals off, one by one, and shook the flower over the cauldron. Just a few specks of pollen drifted down into the mixture. "Once, they would have been executed or driven off the continent. Now, they can nest here."
Zelda thought about it for a moment. "Some crimes are worse than others," she hazarded. Impa nodded.
"But we do not forgive." She reached into her cloak and pulled out the little metal flask that Zelda had seen her swig from occasionally. She had always carried it, even within the castle. The natural assumption was that it was some kind of alcohol, but Impa spooned up the thin skin from the top of the potion and tipped it in. It steamed in the bottle. She smiled at Zelda. "It's like… a medicine," she said eventually.
"Are you sick?"
"Not that kind of medicine." She blew on the spoon, which was just clinging to a few last drops, and licked them off, wincing. "Have nothing to do with this one, princess."
Folding her arms behind her head, the princess lay back. Around her the ground was as dry as could be found in the marshes, almost an island in the bog, but her feet were wet and cold no matter what she tried. She was learning to get used to it; at least, this time, there was food to be had, and the shakes had mostly gone from her hands, only appearing now for a few moments at a time. "I've never met the Deku," she told Impa after a long silence. "I don't know how to act around them."
"Neither have I. Just be yourself."
"That worked in Termina."
Impa chuckled, to Zelda's chagrin. "A man who will betray a child to one who means to harm her is no ally to you, whether you found out now or in twenty years. Better to find out now. I'm sure you made an impression."
"I have no idea what I'm doing."
"You'll find your way, young one. You have the strength of ancients in you. We see such things."
Though there were plenty of words flowing around her head threatening a sleepless night, Zelda said no more. Sometimes the Sheikah's faith in her was almost disturbingly strong. Still, she needed all the faith she could find, and she was rapidly losing her own. Winter lurked just a little way over the horizon, and there was nowhere safe to hide.
At least the Deku Palace was not too far into the marshes, at least for two people travelling lightly. All around, the world grew hostile and dim, a thick mist blanketing the low, flat ground, and some of the bogs were soaked in a greyish purple water that stung to the touch, so that they had to clamber over logs and rocks. Something followed them – or a whole host of somethings – so that by the end Impa was not sleeping at all, but sitting up all night by the fire looking out all around, matching the red eyes of the darkness with her own. It did not seem to faze her. Whatever was in that concoction she had brewed, it seemed to strengthen her again, and her eyes were bright and lively. Zelda had been sleeping at night, but not easily; the bugs in this soggy, cold part of the world were drawn like gravity to her skin, and she was covered in itching red bites that would not fade away no matter what she did. There were snakes everywhere, drifting through the underbrush, hard-skinned venomous creatures that fed on the larger insects and withstood the acidic water. Impa cooked one, and Zelda threw up on the first bite, but recovered quickly, and eventually decided that while it was a good quick meal in need, it wasn't as good as the wolf she'd killed on her flight from Hyrule.
That wolf – how long ago was that? Two months? It felt like years, and yet it felt like yesterday. Her mind had gotten into the habit of wandering far from her control if she let it, and sometimes it took enormous effort to wrench it back. Hunger was setting in again; they were not short of rations, but did not know when they would next be able to resupply, and with the itching rashes left by the bugs and the rustles in the darkness just beyond the campfire, sleep did not always mean rest, and tended to bring uncomfortable dreams, dreams of wandering through black forests with some looming creature always at her back.
The Deku Palace was not a palace at all, by conventional standards. It looked like it had once been a cluster of enormous trees, hollowed out and surrounded by a solid wall of spiked and painted timbers, approachable only by a narrow wooden bridge suspended just inches above a deep moat of that stinging water. Eyes were everywhere, just on the edge of vision, that rustling sound that the deku made when they walked, and within were snippets of that strange, clicking, squeaking language that they spoke. Zelda had tried to learn it once, and managed to maul a few words, but it was not designed for anything resembling a human mouth.
The gates were shut.
Zelda held her head up high and tried to find that fearless, arrogant place in her head that Impa had used to challenge the King of Termina. She strode across the bridge as if it were the carpet of her father's ballroom, threadbare cloak flowing behind her like a silk skirt, and knocked sharply at the gate.
All those little noises ceased, leaving just the echoes of that knock. After a full minute had passed with no reply, she knocked again, louder. "I am Zelda Adriana of the House of Harkinian," she shouted. "I must speak with your king!"
There was a patter of small but heavy footsteps climbing above them. She went back a few steps and looked up to see a little round head peering over at her, far above. "Open the gate," she called. The head vanished, and the sounds of distant, hurried conversation floated down. Zelda waited patiently, resisting the urge to fold her arms and tap her foot, which was what she was sure Impa was doing behind her.
And then the head reappeared, with the strange, squeaky voice of a mouth not designed to make human sounds. "We have nothing for you," it cried out, and vanished again.
Before Zelda had time to blink, Impa strode forward and hammered on the gate, much harder than Zelda had. It shook in its hinges. "We could knock it down," she suggested sweetly.
"There is nothing for you!" squeaked the little voice again. Impa kicked the gate this time, and was rewarded with the sound of splitting wood somewhere far above them – and then a sharp little dart landed by her feet, and stuck several inches into the bridge, where it started to smoke. "Please leave!"
Zelda caught Impa by the shoulder and pulled her back. "Please!" She felt the desperation creeping into her voice. "I am royalty! I have the right to speak to your king!"
There was another hurried conference above, and that same round face appeared again. Zelda was truly starting to hate it. "You're not royalty any more, little girl!" Zelda had to catch Impa's wrist to stop her from drawing her knife. Another dart landed at their feet. "The king knows what you want, and he says leave," snapped the Deku. "Human wars are human problems, little homeless girl!"
Princess Zelda's mouth fell open. Impa moved to stand between her and the gate again, in case of any more darts. "I can knock him down with one throw," she suggested. "Say the word."
"No." Zelda was looking at the first dart, which had eaten most of the way through the bridge. Even as she watched, it bit through the last of the wood and dropped into the moat below. "These creatures are of no use to me." She turned on her heel and walked slowly back across the bridge, head held high and tears securely trapped behind her eyes. After a mumbled curse she was sure she was not supposed to have heard, Impa followed her away.
The scrubs that had been following them made no attempt to hide now, lining the bushes to watch them go. Many of them were women, by Zelda's guess, and there were several clusters of what could only have been their children. Their rigid little faces were unreadable, but by her guess they did not seem particularly hostile.
"It's alright," Zelda managed to say quietly. "If they choose me, they pit themselves against the king of Termina and the usurper of Hyrule. They're only a little nation."
"And now anyone who chooses you pits himself against Termina, Hyrule and the Deku. Princess, you can't keep doing this forever."
"Of course I can." She scratched idly at a bite on her arm. "You mean I shouldn't. But I have to. You don't have to come with me, Impa. You've done so much…"
As she spoke, a little deku child broke free of the crowd and waddled towards them, watched by its family. In some circumstances it could have been considered cute, with the lopsided yellow flower budding on its head, and one leg much shorter than the other; they didn't seem to grow in any particular sequence. Zelda had no idea how to react when it reached her, and then it spat out a wad of greenish mush.
"Let's go," Impa said coldly, and went to march on, but Zelda stayed. The little one had scooped up some of the mush onto its muzzle and was trying to rub it onto her boot. She crouched down and, tentatively, dipped her hand into the mush. The burning from the bites on her fingers instantly started to cool. She smiled, and gathered up the wad in a leaf. Was it inappropriate to pat a deku child on the head? She did it anyway, carefully avoiding its bud, and stood up. "Yes," she said, her heart feeling just a little lighter. "Let's go."
