Chapter I
Identity. ("Vocalise, Op. 34, No. 14" by Rachmaninoff)
February 17th, 2011 (222 HT) continued
She had reason to believe that these soldiers were being gentler and more respectful because they were higher ranked. Their crisp, clean uniforms were different from the ones worn by the soldiers guarding the cells. They even carried thin, short swords at their sides, unlike the others.
What were they doing to the castle, she wondered? She felt some pang of anger as she imagined them snooping or otherwise ruining it to bring it to their own standards. This place was so familiar to her: the way the light pattering sound of her feet echoed down the corridor, the slightly uneven gray, cobbled floor, the random statues she couldn't hope to identify decorating coves and crevices. Here was the place she had spilled her tea because Luke had decided to jump out and scare her. There was the place Link had found her crying and had comforted her until she was able to stand on her own again.
There was even a lingering smell of savory food, though she couldn't imagine the last time something had been cooked here. Where was everyone that had worked here? She felt concerned for them, for people she knew well, like Granice the cook, and the many guards. How were they getting paid? She couldn't understand.
It seemed they were heading to the throne room, or at least in that general direction. All the governmental parts of the castle were located along this hallway. Luke's office, Umom's office. Either was a goldmine of information about Hyrule and its secrets, and for these people to find such information would undoubtedly prove detrimental to the country. She harbored some hope, however, that Luke might have removed or otherwise expunged anything that could be used to hurt Hylians.
With the thought of Luke, her heart sank. Where was he? She hoped he finished doing what he needed to do soon, because affairs here were not quite going as planned. They turned a corner and she did indeed find herself near the throne room, one of its heavy doors propped open. The other was closed, though, transforming it into something more foreboding than what they had left it as.
They led her through the door. There was a man standing across the room there, looking down at a few papers laid out on a table. Dressed in a decorated uniform, he was saying something to a man standing across from him, who nodded. The first man signed the papers and handed them off to the other, who then walked by, glancing at her from the corner of his eye on the way.
The first man looked to her and smiled politely. "Good day, Your Majesty," he said, bowing slightly as he moved from behind the table. He was familiar, and she was certain he was one of the men she had met a few weeks ago, when they had first come to Hyrule.
Your Majesty? She wondered who had taught him to bow like so, since no one ever bowed to Zelda except when they were wishing to brown nose her (and that didn't ever succeed). Her thoughts swam to times when she was younger, when she might have wished to be treated this way, to really be a princess or a queen. But it hadn't been possible. Now that it was like this, she found her position to be complicated and draining.
She nodded in return to his greeting, not quite feeling it in her to smile, given that two men still held her cuffed arms.
"Ah, oh, sorry about this. You can free her," he said to the guys holding her. She stood taller, trying to act as regal as she knew how; she was emulating what she thought a queen would act like in his eyes. Perhaps she was attempting to scare or intimidate him a bit as they freed her arms.
He nodded again to everyone else, and the men with the frightening weapons seemingly all filed out, closing the giant door with a loud creak. She knew this room like it was her own home, because it had been part of her home for a long time. With these foreign people situated here, it was different. She briefly wondered what was so wrong with Hyrule that it kept getting taken over, in ways Zelda couldn't prevent or perhaps hadn't the ability to protect against.
It was a very long room and they were separated by a short distance. He walked a few steps to her, dragging a chair along and spinning it around to her. "Please have a seat," he said, gesturing to the wooden chair, leaning his body forward as he did so in another slight bow. It was one from the tables Zelda had filled the room with when she'd turned the throne room into more of a center for the government of Hyrule.
She sat gracefully (though part of her wished she was wearing nicer clothes that would fit her projected refined façade), watching him carefully. He turned his back to her as he went to get a chair for himself.
"I'm truly sorry for the restraints, Your Majesty. It is for your own protection more than anything, I can assure you."
She turned her head to the side, narrowing her eyes. Not believing him for a moment, because she couldn't imagine how that had been protecting her. In fact, imprisoning her sounded outright ridiculous by this reasoning.
Not responding to his preposterous excuses directly, she raised her voice. "Please, call me Zelda." It was something Zelda had spoken a thousand times to the most varied collection of men and women alike. It never failed to baffle and fluster them a tiny amount.
But this man, Andrew, he was unabashed. "Very well, then, Zelda." He did sound skeptical, though. "The reason why we have brought you here is actually complicated, but I intend to explain fully to you, because you certainly deserve that."
She nodded slightly.
"As you know, we arrived here about a month ago, yes? We intended only to learn about your culture. I was involved, in league with our armed forces, because the government knew we couldn't only send in scientists and expect complete peace for them. I was hoping that would be the case, but we weren't received well."
She shot him a glance, which probably came across as more irate than it needed to be. "That is not true."
"I was glad to have met you, that first time in the inn. I'm sure you have more important things to remember, but you did act kindly to me. However, I did expect this, since you are a very just queen and I've never heard an ill word spoken about you. It was evident, though, from the moment you stepped in with your companion that other Hylians weren't going to welcome us as much. Meghan Navi was her name, if I remember correctly,"
"You cannot base your judgment of the Hylian people on the behavior of one girl, just as you could not base it solely on my own. That girl in particular has gone through many things which cause her to question the actions of many. I brought her along because of her inability to be swayed by niceties and formalities. She sees the truth in people." She was, of course, fabricating all these details. As far as she knew, none of them were true. It sounded convincing, though, in her mind. The real reason why she'd been there…
"I see," he began, staring her straight into her eyes. She straightened again, staring right back. Link had once described her eyes as disconcerting, when she stared with them like this. With any luck, all these actions were actualizing her plan to daunt Andrew. "Your Majesty, Zelda, let me explain our reasons for being here. We are always curious about other cultures. We want to know everything, because there is always a chance that something we learn in other places could help us in our own country. Furthermore, there is always something that we can bring to others, to help them improve as well. Here, we've found promise on either side. We want to work together with you, Hyrule, to bring you to a more advanced age, where you can benefit from our more advanced technology and scientific knowledge."
"I would like to respectfully reject your aid. Our people are curious, inquisitive, and innovative, and frankly, we would like to figure things out for ourselves. I can only see destruction and ruin lying in the wake of hastened advancement."
"But would you deny healthcare advancement that would save the lives of your people? Would you reject the technology that would lower the cost of and time spent doing work you are currently toiling away at?"
The medical care bit slashed her in her weak spot—how could she reject that? She scrambled for something intelligent to say in quick return, not wanting to go back on her own words, but not wanting to sound cruel. Zelda wouldn't let unnecessary people die. "Then give us your medical knowledge and be done with it."
"That could be done, and in theory we wouldn't ask for anything in return. However, there is something we're interested in, and for this we may need to remain in Hyrule."
She raised an eyebrow. May need to? Why were they so arrogant? But she internally slapped herself. Told herself to stop with the judgment. Let him elaborate.
"There is something here that seems to give you a little edge over us. Some kind of power supply that allows you to heal, or create things. I've heard from the people that you, Zelda, are quite proficient with using this. The people here call it magic, spell casting. But as with everything, we know there is an explanation behind it, and you are the one who knows it. If we had the power to heal like they say you can, our country would be a hundred times better off. And energy is a problem in our country. If we could have limitless power, as the Hylian people say it is, we would…" He shook his head in wonder. "It would just be the answer to so many problems. I ask you to share this with us."
So now he was questioning magic. Magic, she had come to learn, was best not questioned. Magic was something that just was. So it sounded rather ridiculous to her that he wanted to harness such a thing.
"Do you believe in gods, Andrew?" she asked him.
For a moment, he thought she might be changing the subject, but he decided to indulge her, having the idea that a supposed wise and weathered queen like her would go off on tangents to round the conversation and drive her point home. "I am a god-fearing man," he responded with a blink.
"If you believe in gods, then you believe in magic," she said simply. "You cannot uncouple the two."
"But I have always learned that you must. Godly power is something that we lesser beings cannot ever duplicate. Godly power is not magic. Magic is not real."
"Well, if you want to understand Hyrule, you must understand this. Our magic is goddess-given. The power of the goddesses is the source of all our strength and they have chosen to give their magic to the people, to those who will use it. This is not a power source. It is not something you can harvest. It is something that, with privilege, one can learn to manipulate and control, but it cannot be used in the ways you describe."
His lips were tightly pressed together during her story, and she could only imagine that he was having the same disbelieving thoughts she'd had during some things he had said. It didn't seem as though the conversation was going well, in this aspect, since neither thought the other was speaking well-informed and honest words. She figured that while she was on this roll, she had better continue with the entire story before he stopped her.
Because he needed to realize what Hyrule really was.
"Have the Hylian people told you of our goddesses, they way they told you about our magic? Our ancient lore and legends?"
"I've only learned a little. The researchers know more than I do."
"Well, this is something you need to know, Andrew," she said, moving her hands to rest peacefully in her lap.
"If I must, please explain," he said, gesturing to her, still retaining his air of misgiving as they stared each other down. Perhaps her idea of disturbing him with her blue eyes wasn't working on him…
She took a deep breath, briefly contemplating how to start. Though she knew the stories well, she was not as proficient at narrating them as the Sheikah were.
"The three Golden Goddesses created Hyrule countless years ago. Nayru of Wisdom, Din of Power, and Farore of Courage all bestowed their greatness upon the land, creating us and all the creatures that now populate this terrain. They departed to the heavens, but they left one relic, one last bit of their godliness, to the inhabitants of Hyrule. We call this the Triforce."
Something lit up in his eyes. "Yes, I've heard about that."
"The Triforce represents that holy trinity of traits—wisdom, power, and courage. And the Triforce rested in a place where it was technically able to be accessed by our people, but would take a great deal of work to get to." Her wording was far from the glib speech she had hoped for, but it would get the point across. "More than ten years ago, an evil man decided he wanted the strength of the goddesses to fulfill his awful goal to take over this world. I will never understand why, but he was so bent on this goal that he was able to trick me into getting him into the resting place of the Triforce."
Andrew now stared with a blank look, because this was clearly where the story became decidedly absurd. It seemed he was just tolerating her storytelling, just letting her talk if it caused her to be satisfied with herself.
She started again with new vigor, putting much effort into her words to prevent herself from lapsing into ineloquent ramblings. "But the problem with possessing the Triforce is that in order to do so, you must have the three holy traits in balance, within yourself, or else you cannot obtain it and the Triforce will split in three. The evil man was far from wise, and in fact was rather impulsive and brash. He was also a coward, I would say, since when he had no power left, he picked on the weak just to…just to…get revenge…"
There were terrible images that flooded through her mind then, pictures of blood and death and pain and misery, and Andrew could see that she had visibly slowed down.
"Luckily," she continued after a deep and nearly shuddering breath, "We had a savior, who not once, but twice defeated this great evil. When the Triforce split, our Hero of Time received the Triforce of Courage. No one is like him. So this is why I say that you cannot harvest the power of the goddesses. You cannot use magic the way you want to, because that evil man already set a precedent against using magic in that way. Magic should be used to bring balance to the world—never to upset it."
"I'm willing to bet that the last part of your Triforce—wisdom, was it?—went to either you or the king."
Well, here was the dilemma. Tell him that she possessed the Triforce of Wisdom, and who knew what he would do with that information. Tell him that Luke possessed it, and that would bring on a whole slew of problems for both Link and Luke. Because she didn't find either answer to be a suitable one, she decided to go for neither.
"As much as I wish that one of us possessed it, neither of us do. It went to a young girl who uses her wisdom for a greater good."
Andrew gave a small, remorseful smile. "Zelda, I'm afraid this is where I might have caught you in a lie."
"What?" she asked sharply, barely refraining from snapping. "This is not a lie. Neither I nor my husband possess the Triforce of Wisdom."
"That I may believe, but I don't believe that in a world where someone has been given divine wisdom by…" he tilted his head as though the words were so appalling he couldn't say them, "goddesses, that person would not be the leader."
"You can't assume something like that. They are very modest people, knowing the consequences of vanity like the evil man had. Just as she declined a position of leadership—and believe me, I would have given it to her—our hero declined any sort of reward or recognition for his deeds. He only accepted such a thing after I'd nearly blackmailed him." Zelda had, indeed, needed to resort to desperate measures to get Link to accept his dukedom. He wouldn't even tolerate being called his proper title, Hero of Time. However, he hadn't been blackmailed (just subjected to a ton of begging). "And you misunderstand-the Triforce pieces do not grant magic. They merely augment existing traits and abilities."
"Well, all right," he said in a challenging way. He stood then, and she became scared and wanted to stand as well. She reminded herself, however, be an intimidating queen, and stayed sitting, maintaining her regal posture. He went to the table behind him and picked up a few papers. "As you will remember, you were found running from us, within our own country." He sat back down in his chair, the papers in his hands, but she couldn't see what was on them. Somewhere in the background, a clock ticked the seconds away as he observed the documents for a moment. She swallowed, waiting for him to continue. He finally looked up. "After we took custody over you, you were sleeping for a while."
"We were knocked out," she said accusingly, vaguely remembering some sort of needle poking her skin.
"Again, I must insist it was for your own protection, my queen. But, we were able to observe a few things about you and the king while you were transported back here." He held out a paper to her. "This is an artist's rendition of what was observed on your husband's, the king's, hand."
On the paper was a simply colored sketch of the back of a hand, with a Triforce lightly laid out upon it.
"Please forgive the crude evidence. We weren't able to capture it using other methods. It didn't seem to show up."
"So you admit it's real," she said, knowing she'd been caught in some sort of lie. No, this wasn't good. She couldn't start betraying Hyrule like this. This couldn't happen.
"So you admit that the king is the one who possesses the Triforce of Wisdom?" he countered.
"No, he does not. I don't know where you would have seen this."
"As I said, it was observed on the hand of your husband during transport."
She took a deep breath, not knowing what to say, or how to convince him otherwise. Because if it was clear that this was the Triforce to him, and if they had seen it, she couldn't refute them.
"The king's office—it's right down the hallway, isn't it? It's an interesting place."
Her stomach flipped, and her worst fears seemed to have been realized. They must have gotten all of Luke's information.
"It was empty, except a few items which I believe were purposefully left to be misleading."
It was all she could do to stop herself from sighing in relief. How could she have doubted Luke? Even if this castle was taken over, he would have been able to swoop in and reclaim everything, or otherwise destroy it. His lifelong training as a spy before he became king was not for naught.
"However, there were some things that even the most capable swindlers cannot feign. Tell me, Zelda, do you believe in science?"
She nearly guffawed, and it was obvious he was paralleling what she'd asked him before. "Science is not something one believes in. Science just exists."
"Well, then I'm glad. Sometimes religious folk are against it, for whatever reason." He looked down to his papers thoughtfully again. "My queen, are you aware that every single person in the world…has a distinct set of fingerprints? Even identical twins. So, as you could imagine, using fingerprints is a good starting point for identifying or distinguishing people."
"I certainly know how fingerprints are used. You mistake my country for something primitive."
He handed her a sheet of paper, two ink blots in the shape of finger prints, and her heart fell even farther into her stomach. Of course she knew what fingerprints were…but she'd never thought to tell Luke about them. She cursed herself. But how could she have known?
"On your left are King Lukas's prints from his office, and on your right, his prints taken during transport yesterday. It's detailed below, but as you can see from just looking, they are visibly different."
"Are you trying to prove that the man you captured with me is not Lukas? You do realize this isn't reliable, right? Many people are welcomed within Luke's office. Fingerprints are not a completely accurate means of identification, both because it's possible these aren't his, and because they are open to interpretation."
"That is true. I chose to explain this to you using fingerprints because I felt it would be easiest for you understand. We have other methods of identifying people which are accurate, I can assure you." She was absolutely offended by how simple he thought she was, but she hadn't the energy left to dwell on that. "And I will tell you this now, Zelda. That man in the dungeon is not King Lukas."
She still stared down at the prints, her eyes gliding over the words written on the page, but not comprehending any of it. Her breathing was shallow and quick, her heart beating quickly. She begged her brain to speed up, move faster, and find a way out of this, but she was running out of reasonable response time. Anything she said past that point would be easily identified as fictitious information.
"Of course, now, this begs the question, who is he? I've already showed you that we know he is in possession of a Triforce. This leaves the options of the already defeated evil man, which I figure is unlikely since he was defeated and, well, evil. So that leaves the hero of which you spoke."
All right, so maybe they figured out that Link was only pretending to be Luke to protect Zelda. Was that so bad? It might have been better, actually. They couldn't catch Luke before he carried out his plans, no matter how hard they tried. She was sure of it. So they were safe, at any rate. She and Link would just need to hold out until then.
"It does make sense. I believe that since you are so convinced that running away from us is the best thing for your country, you two, you and the king, would not only want to separate yourselves, you would need some protection, right?"
She didn't nod or answer in any way, still trying to find that perfect thing to say that would disprove everything he'd said. She was clinging to the hope that he'd consider some of her story, at least, but she wasn't sure whether she was a convincing liar.
"Though I'm confused. I won't pretend to understand royalty fully, or your country, for that matter, but it had seemed to me that marriage was held in the same regard here as it is in my own country. But, as it seems from reports I've gotten, there seems to be some sort of affection between you and the 'hero.' If we are correct, his name is Link Navi, and his wife is that lovely lady Meghan we met at the inn a month ago. Do you remember how you described her?"
When she merely stared at him, her facial muscles twitching to prevent a scowl from forming, he continued. "You said you regarded her as your sister. Quite a cruel thing to do to someone you are so close to, isn't it?"
At that point, she wished to the holy goddesses above that she could just reach forward and slap this man. Instead, her grip just tightened on the papers she still held in her hands, crumpling them around the corners, maybe making a slight tear at the edges. He plucked the papers from her hands, stood so he was far from her reach, placed the papers back on the table, and continued his awful story.
"I would understand if it was because you were trying to convince us that you really were the king and queen. It didn't seem that way, though. The small kisses to comfort one another, squeezing hands together. It wasn't an act, was it, Zelda? Would you tell me, right now, that this is normal for Hylians? To actively betray a spouse and desecrate not one, but two marriages in the process?"
He knew he was riling her up. He knew with his increasingly accusatory words, she was growing angrier by the second. But for what purpose? What was he trying to prove? She tried not to let this get to her, because even if he spoke true words, they were simultaneously not true.
"You don't know what you're dealing with in Hyrule," she said in a strained voice, one which struggled to keep emotion in check. Her fists were clutched tightly.
"Since King Lukas does have that holy wisdom, I'm sure he'll understand, won't he, Zelda? And that girl, Meghan…" He looked at her for a moment, carefully regarding her eyes. "Gosh, she couldn't have been a day older than twenty. In all her 'truth seeing' capability, she'll know that this is all right and good. All this adultery and infidelity. I'm sure it's what she wanted. Isn't it, Zelda?"
She stood then. He was still standing by the table. She had the urge to knock the chair between them out of the way. By some miracle, she didn't do that. He didn't look frightened by the menacing way she'd stood. "Don't worry, Your Majesty. I won't tell anyone," he said in a deceivingly soft voice. As though she could trust him. "Just have the king come to us. No one will ever know your secrets, unless you want them to."
"What do you want from Luke anyway?" she asked, again in her strained voice. "You initially admitted that I was the one with the magic. I am the one with the knowledge. You know this."
"I have mentioned that we want to investigate the Triforce power. I know you believe that goddesses granted this power, but let me tell you, there is science in everything. You've just given me all the information about it that I needed from you. I think your King Lukas may be the one who can help us understand, though. We would never do so violently, of course. Please don't fear for his safety."
"But you would blackmail us?"
"Regrettably, our country has seen better moments. But we've also gone to war over pettier and less promising things. By doing this to you now, I'm making sure that everything happens peacefully. Unfortunately, there always has to be some sort of incentive. And even more regrettably, I am acting under orders that I can't disobey, so I really am sorry for this."
She was shaking. Angry and shaking, and she knew that she was going to start making rash decisions. There was no other way out of this. "Luke isn't the one with the Triforce of Wisdom. I am."
He gave a sad smile. "I'm sorry, but you can't expect me to believe that. Your actions have been far from the level of wisdom I thought they were supposed to be. I've witnessed decisions made by the king. He isn't a fool, for sure," he said, his hand on the table behind him. "Your decisions, however…"
So? Who do you think these invaders are? Why are they accusing her of these things? :D
Yeah, so it took me a long time to figure out what was exactly right for this chapter. I spent literally the whole day on this. XD In the original version of this scene which I wrote in between my class notes in 2008, the conversation between her and Andrew was a lot angrier. They were yelling at each other a lot, and surprisingly I ended up using very little of that content. The rest should go next chapter, I guess. There were definitely more things I wanted to say about this but I can't remember any of them…haha. I'll probably make a blog post about this at some point.
I think I have just decided to flip this entire thing around. Some things aren't going as they had been planned for years—but that's ok, because I think it's better this way. :D
Thank you so much for reading! Any criticism is very welcome. This story is still in its "I'm-figuring-this-out" stage, so I do expect to revise it in a million ways before the story is even finished, but if you notice anything odd, feel free to let me know. :) Thank you!
