The Conquerer

Chapter IV: The Cortège

The lush grass of King Link's swamp-turned-pasture flowed past the Princess's cortège like the rolling waves of the ocean they had crossed to get here. The Princess's advisors had counseled her against making port in the actual country of Termina, so they had instead sailed south along the coast, docking south of Termina in a remote land known to its inhabitants as Holodrum. The natives had been friendly, offering the visiting Princess a great deal of hospitality as she passed through their nation. They had docked on the southern beach, and then worked their way up through plains—and a brief tundra region that Zelda could still remember with a brief shudder—before skirting the northern mountains and entering this area: Woodfall.

According to the locals, this region used to be nothing but inhospitable marshlands, until the enterprising King Link took it upon himself to arrange for the area to be terraformed. He'd had the swamps drained, the land cultivated, and countless trees cut down. Of course, before he could do any of that, he'd had to deal with the region's inhabitants—the surly Deku, who, apparently, had had a veritable Kingdom of their own in this land. This information surprised Zelda, who had always regarded the Deku as wily creatures, somewhat intelligent but incapable of organized society in any real sense. Still, they hadn't stood up well against Link, once he'd begun his personal war against them.

Link… How odd, that she should think so familiarly of him, after knowing him for so short of a time. She'd met him—what? Thirty years past? She'd sent him on a task, and met him again only as he completed it, and she had no knowledge of the intervening events. Oh, what a strange time. She had spent long hours wondering what interactions Link might have had with her future self, but had always resigned herself to not knowing. And she certainly couldn't discuss her relationship with Link with anyone else, for obvious reasons. But what a surprise! First to find out that there was land across the Great Sea—then to find out that it was a populated country—and then to find out that Link was the King of this country! It seemed like too much of a coincidence to dismiss. But she supposed she would know when they arrived in Novus Aevum.

The Princess actually viewed the passing terrain through a window in her carriage, looking out onto the changing scenery with tired eyes and, perhaps, a more tired heart. Outwardly, she was as beautiful as she had ever been: Her skin was no less fair than the day she had taken her father's throne; her hair no less wheat-yellow; and her wardrobe, well, it had not diminished in elegance. Today, her skirts were divided for riding, though she doubted she would be taking advantage of that particular detail. Well, you never knew.

"Fascinating, isn't it?" came the thoughtful voice of Sito Midas, who sat in the carriage across from Zelda, facing her. Concealed in his Nayrusé Sheikah garb and a dark blue cloak that enshrouded him like a blanket, only his face—and only most of that—was visible, staring out the open window at the land they passed while riding northward.

In the near distance, an average-sized flat-topped mountain rose out of the surrounding plains. As local folklore would have it, the place was some kind of magical spring, and because of that, it stubbornly refused to submit to the terraforming that had changed the land around it. For about a mile in every direction, the land around that smallish mountain was as wet and marshy as it had ever been. The last remnants of the Deku tribe supposedly made their home in that tiny region, and were unbelievably fierce to any human intruders in their last refuge. King Link's war, it seemed, had not been easy on them.

"A little disheartening," Zelda responded quietly. He saved Hyrule… Possibly the world. Has he defeated the menace posed by Ganondorf, only to pose a similar menace himself? I hope that word-of-mouth has not related his actions accurately, for if he is truly the tyrant that the stories paint… But I suppose I never really knew him, did I?

"Oh, the terraforming?" Sito said. "Perhaps it doesn't speak very much to the benevolence of this King… Link, was it? An odd name. But no, my Honored Lady, I was speaking of this country's ecosystem, its culture, its land. Such a diverse place. Our dear kingdom has many different lands within its bounds, but this place… For such a small kingdom, it spans an incredible range of climates and landscapes. Natural swamp here, though it has been made into plains; a wasteland to the east, according to officials; and if the stories are to be trusted, even a vast tundra and ice-capped mountainous region to the north! I almost wish we could abandon this ambassadorial trip and simply explore!"

The Princess laughed despite herself, and turned her eyes back to the window. The flat-topped swamp mountain loomed on the horizon, a lawless rebel spitting in the face of the King's rapidly-growing empire. She wondered what really caused it to resist the King's terraforming. Was it truly magic? Lately, it almost seemed that magic was fading from the world. The Gorons had become more reclusive, the Zora more tight-lipped, and the Deku positively xenophobic. Could it be that they had heard of what was happening here, in this obscure corner of the world, and decided to shut their doors to humans? Zelda hoped not. She hoped this King was not the monster he was beginning to seem. She hoped… She hoped… She hoped so many things, but hope did not mean much to a monarch. Not in practice, anyway.

"Oh, do stop brooding, Princess," Sito said. "I only made you smile a moment ago, and there you are again, sulking. What has got you so down, my Lady?"

Such familiarity could get a man beheaded in previous regencies, and could still result in imprisonment. But Sito was an old friend of the Princess's, with emphasis on the 'old', and she had always tolerated his quirks. After all, calling her 'my Lady' and speaking to her as a friend were not the only unusual—and slightly illegal—things he'd ever done in her presence. Somehow, his demeanor made it all seem somehow… acceptable? Amusing, even. She was inclined to think he did it on purpose, but that didn't make her like him any less.

"I had hoped that the King of a newly-discovered nation would be a benevolent and kind ruler…" Zelda mused, "but I suppose we would not be so lucky."

"Ah, we know little about him as of yet. Only that he has a taste for order. Perhaps his kingdom has a surplus of population? If we had the same problem, we might well resort to deforestation of the Deku Forest and even the Lost Woods, in order to house more people. Everything is dictated by circumstance, my Lady, especially for monarchs such as King Link and yourself. I would advise you not to judge him too harshly until you speak with him."

Zelda nodded. "You give good advice, as ever, Thane Midas."

He made a sour face, and Zelda could not suppress another laugh. He hated being addressed by his royal title—or any at all, in fact.

"I try," he said wryly, "But unfortunately, I often fall short of perfection, as do we all. I urge you always, my Lady, not to regard me as a fount of infinite and perfect wisdom. We must all make our own decisions, and we must all sift for our own truth through the desert of falsehoods which the Goddesses have given us."

Zelda smiled. "Another kernel of wisdom from our resident sage."

Sito actually cursed under his breath, and she saw his lips go round in preparation for him to address her as 'Woman'. But he stopped himself, grinned, and shook his head. "You'll not make me drop my guard so easily, Princess! I shall be off now, and allow you some time alone—as much as you can steal, that is, before you've another visitor." He rose, and silently moved to the door of the still-moving carriage. The door opened, and Zelda shook her head.

"Still can't be bothered to have an ordinary exit?" she asked him wryly, and he only grinned and touched his forehead in a casual salute to Zelda, before hopping backward out of the carriage. She had no doubt that he would be out of sight before he hit the ground, but she didn't bother to try and watch. She'd seen too many of his Shiekah tricks to be particularly fascinated by them anymore. And, after all, she'd seen some of their inner workings during the brief time she'd spent in hiding in the Académie Sheikah as a child, so it wasn't as if their antics were new to her.

With something of a start, Zelda realized Sito had been right—how she was brooding! Barely a moment on her own, and already deep in thought! She hadn't always been so… introverted. No. Once, she had been a woman of action, a woman of means. Had her years as a monarch turned her into a sulky, quiet woman? A monarch who spent more time thinking than working?

No! What she needed was time out in the open air, and an activity to take her mind off of… well, everything. She rose and started to move for the door, but scarcely a moment later, she heard a muffled, "Whoa!" And barely had time to grab the lip of the window before the carriage came to an unusually abrupt halt. As the carriage settled back, Zelda was ingloriously thrown off her balance and flopped back down into her seat. She immediately began to rise again, struggling to straighten her regalia before someone opened the door to—

"My Lady? My Lady, are you awake in there? I should like to speak with you."

Oh. Never mind. She sat back and nodded to herself with a small sigh. The door to the carriage opened, and her son, Tueur, was visible beyond it, astride his silver-maned black charger, Gith. The boy was scarcely 17, and already able to control the beast as if it were an extension of his own body.

"Ah, were you about to leave the carriage?" he asked.

"No, no," she said with a concealed sigh. "Not if you would like to talk, dear boy."

He concealed his disdain well, but she knew he hated any form of affectionate address, even from his mother. He'd never even had a lover, though his gallant and adventurous manner had earned him many feminine callers over the years. Zelda hadn't had the heart to marry him off as her father had done to her. (Her marriage had been a necessity, of course, but she had never truly loved Sidrua, even unto his dying breath.)

"Ha! As if I would allow you the chance to rope me into some political game, my Lady!" Zelda, in her turn, winced at his term of address. Technically it was correct for a member of the Royal Family to address another as such, but sometimes she wished he would call her 'mom,' or at least 'mother.' He hadn't used either of those words for years. "Come and ride with me! I have been aching for some company in the saddle, but these Shiekah guards are too intent on their duty to entertain me with a little sport. Here, I'll—" He leaned to the side and called to someone, "Bring the Princess's mare! Her Ladyship wishes to ride for a while, and enjoy the air."

"Tueur," Zelda began, but stopped and shook her head with a soft laugh. "Thank you, dear boy." She climbed down out of the carriage with the hand of a retainer to steady her, and then mounted her white mare, Alba, with as much assistance. (She realized with a private smile, as her skirts settled about her legs, that her earlier musings on the subject had, indeed, been incorrect.)

"Come! Let us ride ahead. It really riles up our Shiekah guard when I do that; I cannot wait to see how they react when we both do it!"

Laughing despite the rebellious suggestion, Zelda glanced over at the nearest of the guards, who rode a dappled grey charger behind the carriage. He regarded her with a wry smile, as if to say, 'He's right, but go ahead.'

Nodding almost imperceptibly, she turned back to her son. "Yes," she said, "I think that sounds like a capital idea."

So the Princess and her Princely son drove their horses out in front of the Sheikah guard—the visible parts of it, anyway; there were probably already advance forces as far ahead as Novus Aevum, knowing how the stealthy Sheikah operated—and spent upwards of three hours riding to and fro ahead of the cortège, with only a minimum of dialogue between them. Eventually, though, Zelda pulled up, exhausted from the day's activities, and her son's charger reared theatrically beside her.

"Tired, my Lady?" he asked, and his expression belied his casual tone. "Shall we go back?"

"No," Zelda said, wiping unceremoniously at her forehead with her sleeve. Conventions be damned, she probably already smelled like a horse wrangler; no sense acting like anything else. "No, I simply need to slow down a bit." So saying, she pushed her mare forward into a slow walk, patting at Alba's neck as she did so. The mare whinnied appreciatively, and Zelda shook her head at realizing she hadn't brought any treats for the horse.

"Ah," Tueur said. "Then we'll walk." He caught up and held pace with her.

"And talk," Zelda said, ignoring Tueur's wince. "Tueur… I know why you are unsatisfied with your lot, but you must at least try to act the part while we are here. At least in Novus Aevum. I have been hearing… disturbing things about this King's methods, and I think it would be best if we do not present a vulnerable front to him."

"Vulnerable?" Tueur repeated questioningly, but he knew what she meant. "'Solidarity in the face of adversity,' hm?" he quoted from one of the texts he'd had to read as a part of his Princely instruction. Zelda nodded in response.

"Yes. If he thinks there is internal strife, he may decide that Hyrule is ripe for invasion… I do not know whether we could prove him wrong, but the outcome of such a conflict is entirely beside the point. A war would devastate both lands, and allowing one to begin is unacceptable, both for you and for me."

"I understand," he said, but the cold feeling in the pit of Zelda's stomach told her that perhaps he did not. Still, it wouldn't do to press the issue.

"And as to your studies," she began, to be interrupted with a scoff.

"I know, my Lady. I have been keeping up with them on the road. As well as can be expected, anyway, with all the work that is to be done."

It was Zelda's turn to scoff—but she refrained, instead quirking her lips in a small smirk. "The work that is to be done, Tueur, can be done by others, and should be , if you have other tasks which you must complete. Such as schoolwork. Your tutors are the best in the land, Tueur, but even they cannot teach you if you will not learn."

Tueur sighed breezily. "I know, my Lady. I know. But studying all the time… I need to be out in the sun, on a horse, with a sword in my hand. Preferably chasing something. I can't live on mathematics and politics and linguistics alone."

"Why not ask your tutors if you can study while riding? Surely they would not object to teaching you on horseback. The Princess herself is having such a conversation, is she not?"

Tueur seemed to consider this a moment. Then he gave a half-grin and said, "Perhaps. But you are looking a little faint, my Lady. I have tired you out quite enough for my liking. Shall we go back? I will even try to find Thane Midas, so that you can enjoy his conversation while you rest."

"Conversing with that man," Zelda said wryly, "is not rest. But, yes, we should go back. We are not as well protected, this far from the cortège."

"The Sheikah," Tueur said without missing a beat, "are everywhere. We are perfectly safe wherever we go, my Lady."

"Still," Zelda said just as smoothly, "I do not like the idea of invisible watchers. Let us go back to the carriage, and rest."

"Ah, you may do so if you wish, my Lady, but I think I should like to ride some more."

Zelda shrugged as if to say she was unsurprised and her plans unaffected, and then wheeled around to trot back to the cortège. She'd had quite enough activity for now; both physical and mental, and arguing with her son was much more exhausting than horseback riding.

- - -

"Don't you think it has great historical value, though?" Amrick had been starry-eyed and chatty ever since visiting the old Deku Palace.

"Historical value isn't worth much in light of what it took to get the palace away from the Deku," Mera replied firmly. "Think of how many must have died. And now it's just a tourist attraction!"

"But what a magnificent tourist attraction!" Amrick persisted. "Think of all that could be learned from studying that palace. The cultural gems that could be hidden inside it!"

"What good will knowing about the culture do if we destroy that culture?" Mera retorted. A moment later, a voice from behind them caused Mera to jump.

"A wise sentiment, my dear Mera!" She almost startled her horse into a gallop, but managed to bring the beast under control. Amrick, she noted sourly, hadn't even appeared to react.

"Master Sito!" she exclaimed, pleased at seeing him. "Where have you been these past few days?"

The older man rode up between the two fledgling Sheikah as they parted to let him pass.

"Why, preparing for this very journey, of course. But as I was saying, though you have a wise sentiment, Mera, there is little to be accomplished by holding onto the past and regretting the mistakes of others. It would be difficult now to restore the Deku Palace to its former state, so why should the scientific community cripple itself by neglecting to learn what might be learned from it? After all, it wasn't scientists that waged war against the Deku. It was soldiers. If anyone should repent, it is the soldiers… Or perhaps their leader. But we shall see, will we not?"

Mera grunted to herself, disappointed that Sito had sided with Amrick. And of course, the boy didn't seem smug at all. Smug bastard.

"I regret that I wasn't able to oversee either of your tests," Sito said mournfully to both Amrick and Mera. "How did they go?"

"Amrick nearly got himself killed," Mera said with a grin, "but he managed all right."

"I! I almost got myself killed!" Amrick exclaimed, laughing. "I returned to the testing chamber in need of a bandage. It was Mera here who required the attentions of a Disai healer for nearly twenty minutes before she could even rise. All in all, I think I did quite well."

Mera stuck out her tongue in a deliberately childish gesture, and Sito, instead of reprimanding their unprofessionalism as another elder might have done, simply laughed gleefully to himself.

"Oh, how I wish I could be young again. But my old bones serve me well enough, I suppose. We must all work with what we have been given, no? We'll be stopping soon, young ones. Enjoy your sleep tonight, for we will reach Novus Aevum tomorrow evening, and I daresay none of the Shiekah will get much sleep tomorrow night."

A lump wedged itself in Mera's throat, and it wouldn't go down, even when she swallowed. Novus Aevum… not a dark or evil name, but an ominous one, which seemed mysterious and foreboding, a shroud that covered the city it described, keeping it hidden until they were able to pierce that shroud and see what it really concealed.

"Stopping soon?" Amrick said abruptly. "Why would we stop soon? There's still a good hour or two of sunlight left. No reason to make camp so soon."

"Unless," Mera began, to be interrupted by the halting of the main bulk of the cortège up ahead. "Unless we've found somewhere better than the ground to sleep?"

- - -

The discovery of the ranch had been unexpected, but not exactly surprising. Its owner, one Grog, was very accommodating—once his foreign guests had offered to pay him for room and board for the night. As soon as the glittering ruppees of the Royal Family's coffers crossed his line of sight, he was eager to offer them all that he possessed. And, Mera thought rather oddly, he seemed very eager to show off a flock of cuccos that he'd raised on his farm.

Most of the Shiekah, of course, made camp as usual, in the open land within the bounds of the ranch; the Princess and her son, as well as many of her closest advisors and several very high-ranking guards, made their bed within the farmhouse. Once everything was set up, Mera and Amrick and the other low-ranking guards found themselves free of obligations until sunset, when they would need to return for myriad reasons.

Mera and Amrick spirited themselves away to explore, as did many other young guards. Mera suspected that Amrick had romance on his mind, but she was more interested in exploring. She had always liked farms, and this one was very large—at least, as far as she knew about farms. They went around the farmhouse and farther back into the property. Off to the right, there was a small barn, beside some cultivated ground that could be growing any number of vegetables. Mera thought she recognized stalks of corn, but she wouldn't have bet on it.

"Look, over there," Mera said, pointing off in the direction of the barn. As soon as Amrick looked, she deftly flicked a Deku nut at the ground, vanishing swiftly before he could recover from the temporary paralyzing effects. When time began to move again for Amrick, Mera was nowhere to be seen.

"Over here!" she called from across the grass. He looked, and saw her waving from a distance. Grinning, he took off after her.

It would take him a while to reach her, even with the speed and stealth of a Shiekah. Chuckling to herself, she readied another Deku nut and glanced around at her surroundings. There was a tree with some low-hanging branches nearby; that could be useful. Predictable, but useful nonetheless. And a large area of charred earth nearby that caught her eye. Had something burned down here? Another farmhouse, perhaps?

Her interest in the game suddenly lost, Mera palmed the Deku nut back into its hidden pouch within her sleeve, and walked toward the burnt earth. There was some rubble, but the fire must have been a long time ago, for there was little but slightly blackened earth left now. She paused at the edge of the area, looking out over it.

"Mera?" Amrick had caught up with her. She gestured out at the burnt remains of whatever had been here.

"A fire, do you think?" she asked.

"Probably. I did wonder why that farmhouse looked so new. Maybe it was built to replace this one."

Mera stepped forward, crunching a small piece of brittle wood beneath her soft but durable boots.

"Mera, we shouldn't be trespassing like this. We haven't been invited back here anyway, and walking around on the remains of this building… It's bad form, especially for a Sheikah."

Mera waved him off. "Something about this place," she said slowly, "feels odd. Like I know it. But it's not familiar. Not really."

"…Mera, we're in a country that was only recently discovered. You couldn't know this place."

"I know that," Mera shot back, "but maybe it's similar to a place I know back in Hyrule? Anyway, I want to figure out why I feel like I know this place." She glanced around. Half-recognized visions danced just beyond her grasp. Walls…? Yes, she could visualize them in place. She was walking down a short hallway, at the end of which… A door, leading to the backyard. But if she took a right… here… she'd find a staircase, up to… what?

She stared up the phantom staircase in her mind, wondering what she would find if she wandered up it. For a single, crazy moment, she thought she remembered bedrooms. Two of them. One of them—the one on the right—created such a rush of emotion in her that, without thinking, she lifted her foot and put it on the first step…and through it. Thrown off balance, she tumbled through the invisible staircase, which dissipated like steam in a harsh wind. She cursed and tried to correct her clumsy mistake with a roll, but a chunk of rock dug briefly into her shoulder and she yelped, contorting to avoid it, and subsequently falling flat on her back. She stared up at the sky, and sighed.

"You do have a talent," Amrick called from where she'd left him, "though for your sake, you might want to refrain from practicing it too much. Another accident like that, and no amount of time with a Disai healer will help you."

"Oh, shut up," Mera called, and started to sit up. As she reached an upright position, though, something directly in front of her caught her eye. Half-buried in the dirt and crumbled coals, a small metallic object glinted dully. She reached forward and plucked it out of the dirt.

It was a spoon. Once, it had been elegantly carved, but now it was so tarnished and worn that the original design on the handle was barely visible. But it was visible enough to set off a spark in Mera's mind. That spark hit a haystack, and the haystack went up in an instant.

"No!" the little girl shouted. "I don't want to go! I don't like Uncle A——, and I won't go!"

"Please, Mera, we don't want to send you away either. But it's only for a season, don't you see? When the winter is over, you can come back, and everything will be like before. Isn't that okay?"

"No!" she persisted, tears running down her face. "I won't go with him!" She snatched a spoon off of the nearby dinner table and hurled it at the floor. It rebounded off of the hard wood, hit the wall, leaving a deep mark, and clattered to a halt at her mother's feet. The woman knelt, picked up the spoon, and sighed.

"We don't have a choice, Mera… I'm sorry, but I know you'll understand eventually. It's just for a season."

"…No!…"

"Mera…? Mera!"

The spoon in her hands receded from Mera as if it were floating away, though she could feel the warming metal in her hands.

And on the subject of feeling… She felt like she was drifting.

Oh, no.

A distant and rapidly fading "Mera!" was the last thing she heard before she hit the dirt.

El apunte de escritor

"The Note of the Writer!" (Dun dun dunnnnnnnnn, dramatic reverrrrrrrb!)

They said it wouldn't happen. They said it was impossible. They said it couldn't be done. Unfortunately, "they" were a series of Flash-animated Magic-8 Balls, and ZEY VER ROANG, BEETCH! Chapter mother-fubaring four is up, and with any luck, the story will continue to breathe! COME ON, TWILIT EYE, BRING ME ANOTHER BUCKET OF WATER, SHE'S ALMOST AWAKE!