Chapter Five

Shad

Ever since he had been a young boy, Shad had been nothing short of fascinated by... Well, anything and everything. His father, a scholar of the ancient Oocca, had always encouraged his curious nature, though he knew most days it drove his mother mad. He had been more intrigued than terrified during the Twili invasion, excited to see what new experiences and laws of nature would come with a different realm. Though, he soon realized the grave danger the kingdom was in. When he had stumbled upon Telma's bar one rainy afternoon, he had never expected his life to change so dramatically. Telma had casually mentioned the Resistance to him. He had thanked her, but informed her he was not much of a fighter. She shook her head, told him it was all right, and that they could use brains like he had.

They had spent months planning a strike, and after months of planning had gotten no closer to a feasible plan than when they had begun. He had treated Link horribly the first time they had met. 'Well, what have we here, hm?' He had asked, a smirk on his face. 'That's quite an outfit you have on, old boy. That timeless design... You're sporting the legendary Hero look, aren't you?' Goddesses he had been such a pain to him. His words in of themselves had not been offensive, but the tone he had used... He wished he could apologize for his rudeness, but that could never happen, not after what had occurred. He had doubted Telma when she said the Ordonian would have been of use to their group. Ashei had fought it from the beginning. There was no possible way he could have known Link was the true Hero chosen by the Gods.

Of all of the situations they had imagined, they had never even considered a scenario in which Link would die at the hands of the Evil King. They had never entertained the possibility that Hyrule would actually fall.

And yet, it had been mere days since the defeat, and already the realm was in chaos. They had fled south, were making their way out of the kingdom with plans to find Rusl's family along the way, and already they saw the destruction the Demon King had brought with his newly found reign. During the day, when they slept, they feared ambushes from monster encampments. During the night as they traveled, they risked attack from Stal enemies, beings Shad had thought fairy tales parents told their children at night to scare them into behaving. He never imagined they would have been real, or that they would have posed as much of a threat as they did. He was relieved, at least, to see that the villages and towns along the path were still intact, unharmed, and had noticed Rusl shared the sentiment. If these villages were still standing, Shad had no doubt Ordon was as well.

He tried to keep Ashei company. Rusl and Auru had one another to lean on, to commiserate with. Shad had known no one when he had come to Castle Town, and Ashei had not even been brought up in the kingdom proper. He had tried to speak with her, to keep her mind off of things, but he had been dismissed each time. He could only begin to imagine how she must have felt. It had been her plan to strike the castle early, to keep the monster hoards off Link so the Hero could focus on Ganondorf and Ganondorf alone. By the time Link had made it to the throne room, they had run out of ammunition, and their weapons had been all but broken. Had they planned better, Link may have lived.

The sun was beginning to rise, and the group set up camp in a cave away from the road. Shad sighed and sat down, grateful for the relief of some rest, though still wary of ending their day's journey so soon. It had gotten riskier and riskier to travel closer to the daylight hours, though. Still, each day that passed brought a greater probability of walking into destruction, greater probability of walking to their deaths.

"He was always such a lively boy," he had overheard Rusl speaking to Auru. Days had passed, and it was the firs the had heard anyone speak openly of their fallen friend. "That always amazed me. He was a bastard, never knew his father, and his mother died of a horrific illness... And yet he seemed so happy as a boy."

"We were all happy as boys," Auru sighed and leaned against the cave wall. "When you're a boy, your biggest worry is not falling out of a tree, breaking your arm, and being scolded by your mother.. If you're lucky, you become a man and your biggest fear is falling out of a tree, breaking your arm, and being scolded by your wife."

Shad thought he saw the ghost of a smile on Rusl's face. He watched as Ashei sighed and sat across from the two men. It never ceased to amaze him how well she got along with them, how natural conversing with them seemed to come to her. And she was a woman. He was a man grown, and still struggled to connect, to form bonds with them. "He was a good guy, yeah?" she asked, looking into Rusl's eyes.

"Really was," Rusl sighed and stared up at the ceiling of the cave. "Hard-working, polite, a little reckless, but he was a teenager..." the man trailed off. It was cruel, Shad could not help but think, that the Goddesses always chose such young ones to be their chosen ones. If memory served, the Zelda and Link, long forgotten by most, who had been responsible for sealing Ganondorf into the Twilight Realm had been ten years of age at most.

"You lot get some rest," Auru said after a long moment of silence. Shad still had yet to figure out if he enjoyed the silence or not. Each time, it was heavy, filled with the things they wished to say, but no one dared to say. In those moments, their shared sorrow and mourning hung over them, crushing them with its weight until someone finally broke it. "I'll take first watch."

Shad sighed and lay on the stone floor, staring at the stone ceiling. He doubted any of them had slept well since the defeat. Ashei had been too preoccupied with blaming herself for their joint failure. Rusl had been mourning a lost son. Auru was no doubt worried for Zelda, who he had tutored and loved as if a family member, and Shad had been to busy worrying about everyone else. He sighed deeply and shut his eyes, sending a silent prayer to whatever Gods or Goddesses that may or may not have existed, that some glimmer of hope would be revealed to them.