Hi! Soooooo sorry for the lack of updating! What has it been a month?! Man do I feel bad about that. But I do hope this will make up for it and the other chapters as well. The reason for my lack of updating has to be the 'Prince of Persia' game which I bought a month ago? Don't really remember the exact date but I've been hooked, mate! I will try to update more frequently, hope you haven't given up on me, cause I will finish this no matter what. That will be my New Year's Revolution ... nah, I'm joking, but I will make one that I can not keep. Hehe have it good everybody! And Marry Christmas.
So, enough about me, how you been?
The wind gradually picked up in the late afternoon, and the setting sun could be seen near the horizon coloring everything in its reach into a mild shade of orange. The light lit up the cracks of a little barn over at the Lon Lon Ranch and in it Malon sat alone, racing through her thoughts for several hours.
A man with brown hair loosely bound in a small ponytail, walked with definite steps over the smoothly moving grass. Quickly he caste a glance over at the shadows at the right edge of the barn as he passed the corner only stopping as his chubby hands reached the barn door.
He opened the door with a sudden force, leaving it widely open to let the sun reach inside, he squinted his eyes as he walked into the dim room. He was looking for his daughter
Malon had just gotten the last patch of hay and stood with her back against the door failing to notice the sharp light that finally made it into the darkness.
"That's the last of 'em," Talon said as he finally made it through to one of the stables boxes. He saw Malon cleaning its floor and he leaned his shoulder against a tree pole. "I think you're done now," he said with a determined voice.
Malon brushed back her hair in an annoyed manner, and turned her head in his direction, giving him a swift glare telling him to leave her alone. "I think I can tell for myself when I'm done." She gave him the same determined attitude as he'd given her.
Talon didn't care to notice her anger; he'd seen it so many times before. Her way of trying to make him leave only made him more persistent to stay. "You couldn't avoid it forever you know. I mean it was bound to happen."
"It was not bound to happen." Malon got a hold of a small patch of hay and placed it into the corner of the box. "It was never 'bound' to happen."
Talon watched Malon doing some minor, unnecessary adjustments, before he said: "so you mean that all of this was just a huge coincidence? That neither of them throughout their lives, would ever meet? Not even once?"
At first Malon pretended to be far too busy with her work to even hear what her father had said. She really didn't have any answer to her father's question. Of course Malon had hopped for them to never meet, but somewhere along the line, Malon knew it was impossible to avoid them from seeing each other, no matter how much she wished for it never to happen.
"Malon," Her father said as he slowly circled one of his temples. He noticed that she was struggling to ignore him. "You can't keep on doing this."
"Keep on doing what?" Malon asked as she spun around to meet her father. "What can't I keep doing?"
Talon saw the flash of defensiveness in her glare and decided to change the main topic a little. "Couldn't you've at least thanked the lad? I mean after he found Kayla?"
"Thank him?" Malon hissed as she bent down to pick up the empty black bucket which she'd filled with fresh water just some minutes before. "I have nothing to thank him for. He did nothing to deserve it."
Talon pushed himself off the pole and knitted his dark eyebrow together. "What do you mean?" He asked. "The lad did do something good for a change; don't you think you should've thanked him for it?"
Malon felt the strong glow of sun spiking her eyes as it slowly made its way down the horizon, she covered her face, trying to put off its harsh blaze. "Whose side are you on dad?" she said squinting at her father. "I mean you keep protecting him no matter what I say or do."
"I do not protect him." Talon progressively shook his head. "I just said that you could've thanked him."
"Maybe," Malon felt the venom in the tiny word as she little by little felt herself giving into something she did not like. "But there was no time to do so. I mean he's so …," she paused for a moment as she tried to come up with a good alternative to what she thought of him. "… obnoxious. You should have heard him talk; he kept calling me 'miss high and mighty'."
Talon cleared his throat. "Well," he mumbled as a cold breeze came inside the barn making Malon shudder. "Sometimes, you have to agree; you are a little …. difficult"
"See? You're defending him!"
"I'm not defending him, but I do think you should have showed him some sort of gratitude. And by punishing Kayla like you did for stealing an apple …,"
"Don't you dare go there," Malon grimly said. "Kayla should've known better. That's not how I raised her, and for her to go to bed early without me, reading her any bedtime stories is not a punishment!"
"Malon, you didn't really listen to her reason to why she stole it."
"It doesn't matter, there is no good reason for thievery, dad." Malon had to squint harder as she brought her hand closer to her face trying to keep the eye-contact she had with her father as the sun nearly blinded her. "That's how you raised me. And that's how I'm going to raise Kayla."
All of a sudden Talon started smiling even though he could find nothing witty with the situation. The unexpected idea that had entered his head came as a blow. But it was no situation update for Talon, because on some level he'd always been aware of it. "Malon," he said. "I highly doubt the reason for your outburst has anything to do with Kayla. And you can't con me into saying that it has." Talon tightly crossed his arms. "This is all about him isn't it?"
Malon widely opened her mouth. In just matter of seconds it felt like her father had gone hostile towards her. He'd promised her that he would stand next to her no matter what. Once upon a time when she had been standing on a very shaky path, her father had told her he would help her figure the whole thing out. And he had even told her that he would protect her. But when did this new circumstance come…?
Malon looked at him with her mouth big enough for ten and surprisingly became aware of the suns piercing light creating a mirror image of herself in her father's big brown eyes. She grimly looked at her lengthy radiant hair which she knew her man had liked, and instantaneously she felt disgusted. Possibly it was a reflex, but as of this moment her looks sickened her the most. She loathed every bit of what he'd touched on her.
"Malon?" Talon bent down to meet her. "Am I not correct? You're still having feelings for him aren't you?"
"No." Her answer came like a hiss through clenched teeth. But of course she couldn't say she hated him. She didn't love him nearly enough to hate him. "He's moved on dad. He's a knight now … someone else's knight in shiny armor."
"What?" Talon raised his furry eyebrows. "I didn't catch the last part?"
"Nothing," Malon mumbled as her mind was racing with fresh judgments. "He belonged to someone else now. Someone with hair blond like silk and eyes like the bottom of the deepest lake."
"I'm going to go look on Kayla." Her answer sounded vague, but Talon didn't stop her as she passed him, leaving the black bucket to fall onto the hard ground of the barn.
XxXxXxX
"Kayla?" Malon, tenderly-hearted knocked on the old tanned door, guiding her to her old room, which now belonged to her young daughter. Everything looked pretty much as she'd left it, only much more papers filled the walls. Kayla had used crayons, coloring everything she'd scrambled down on a blank piece of paper. It could be anything from heaven to earth; it never ceased to amaze Malon. Kayla had such full-size fantasy.
"Yes?" Kayla sulkily replied from under the covers of her bed. Her answer was very short-lived, as she desired to show her mother just how despondent she felt.
Malon sat down on the edge of the bed struggling to remember what she wanted to say. "You know I don't like to yell at you?" She mumbled as her head sought the reason to why she'd gotten here.
"Maybe." A somewhat softer sound came out from under Kayla's cover that she had drawn over herself creating a big bulge.
"Can't you just come out of there?" Malon placed a hand on the washed-out cover trying to get it off of her daughter so she could see her face but as Kayla kicked back, striving to keep it on Malon felt how her fury unpredictably came back and she hastily stood up. "Fine!" she hissed. "Stay like that then."
And with that Malon stomped out of the room immediately feeling guilty about her outraged reaction.
XxXxXxX
After Malon'd left Kayla's room she'd gone to bed, in which she'd stayed for practically three hours now. She'd been looking out her bedroom window at the clouded sky hoping to get a glimpse of the moon which hid itself behind the gray clouds. The house had been dark and awfully quiet ever since everyone had fallen asleep which Malon also tried to do, but had unintentionally given up as she'd failed miserably to sleep ever since she'd meet Link again. But there was also one particular memory that tugged her brain, making her writhe between her sheets.
XxXxXxX
"You know what?" A smooth voice asked. "I think you're beautiful, you shouldn't try to hide it." She smiled and he came up close and lovingly removed her blue ribbon holding her hair up in a messy farm-like due. She could felt how the hand brushed through the loosened hair while she moved in closer and felt everything slip away from her.
In a funny provocative manner Malon took a step back as her feelings began to overwhelm, she cooked an eyebrow and with a loud snort she placed her hands on her hips. "So you're telling me that I look ugly without my hair going down my shoulders, are you?"
"No, no," he smiled while shook his head. "What I meant to say, was that I think you look beautiful…no matter how; with your hair in a braid or ponytail, but right now all I know is that you look like an angel, you always do with your hair free"
Malon just rolled her eyes at him as he was teasingly moving away from her, and with the wind in her face she spun around to continue tending to the last of her chore for the day. She'd been trying to finish it for hours but always gotten interrupted by mischievously-stupid questions she thought with a laugh. But now she was more then determined to complete it since she was aware of the fact that the full-moon was out.
Just as she was about to begin, she felt someone else's presence somewhere behind her, it was too close for her own comfort and she noticed she'd gotten a little spooked and shills now ran down her back. Quickly she spun around.
"Hi," a voice breathed.
"Hi?" She said as she'd realized who it was. "You almost gave me a heart attack." There was no respond and so she looked closer, she was puzzled…was it anger she saw in his eyes. He'd never looked at her like that before and surprisingly it made Malon realize how cold it had gotten outside as the barn stood open. The whistling of the winds made her skin crawl.
"You're cold." The observation came from his lips even before Malon herself had realized it. Suddenly she felt two arms around her, caressing her, trying to prevent the warmth of her body to leave.
They stood like that, still and alone in the night, listening at the wind which magically whistled past them both. In the corner of her eye, Malon could see the left side of his face being painted by the grayish light of the moon bringing out a somewhat harshness, making his eye gleam with depths of night. The lantern hanging on the barn wall swayed in the wind and a flickering light reached out on them both.
Suddenly a gust made it through one of the small cracks of the barn and the light darkened. Leaving only the guiding light of the moon and stars to shine in the night.
Malon could feel how his arms tightened around her and his breath was near her ear as he whispered. "You okay?"
Malon slowly nodded as her grip tensed around his green tunic. "I'm fine," she mumbled and looked up at him. She wanted to tell him that she no longer was cold, that she no longer could feel anything but that of her blood, pumping in her veins but her mouth became mute.
And then it happened.
Everything went to fast for Malon's mind to follow. All she could remember was his voice echoing; "You're sure about this?" And his wonderful sapphire blue eyes looking calmly down at hers as if searching for something deep inside of her. She nodded; "Yes".
XxXxXxX
Malon quickly threw of her cover and dragged herself out of bed. She paid no attention to the moon as it finally peeked out, out of its hiding place behind the clouds and reached down at her with its enchanting beauty. This time Malon was determined. This time all memories were going to disappear.
"No more." She told herself, feeling a tear run down her cheek. She lit the lantern hanging from down the ceiling. She was searching for something and rapidly searched through her bottom drawer. Then right there, right underneath her clothes was a sliver scissor, it shined beautifully in her hand. Malon had bought it at a marked some years ago but had never even thought of what her mind now told her to. She'd hidden it well so that Kayla wouldn't do what she herself now planned, which Malon had decided, she had to. She saw her reflection in the glomming steel. Their time had passed and she had to finish it, she knew that the time had come. The time were at last Malon had gained the courage and rage she had sought to get ride of him.
Without a second thought Malon took out the scissor in a firm grip, feeling its coldness in her shaking hands …
She blew out the lantern flame and completely sank down to her knees. Ignoring how her body trembled from her sobbing cries, she drew out a chunk of her red hair and without as much as a hesitation she cut it off.
She watched how the long piece of hair soundlessly fell down to the floor as she warily brought down the scissor to study the red piece which now laid dead on the floor. She picked it up letting the moon shun its light on it, and remembered how he'd stoked it. How she had felt his worm breath on her ear … with a muffled shriek Malon dropped the lock of hair and frantically started to cut another, and another.
"No more beautiful," she mumbled with trembling lips.
"No more will you be with me," she said to herself as tears recklessly rolled down her face. "No more will my hair be beautiful."
No more.