The penultimate chapter...

The Legend of Link:

The Bastard Prince

19. Zelda

It had been nothing a few days ago; a fantasy world of no importance to her own. A world she could escape to when her life was too hard, too heavy a burden; a purely fictitious thing she believed not to be real.

Now she was screaming into her bloodied, fluid covered hands; a hand that had held half the spirit of the Triforce of Wisdom. Now she was crying as a pool of blood crept ever closer to her broken invisible box; blood that belonged to someone she had considered a close friend.

Now she was shivering as reality set in.

This was reality, a reality more real than that she had lived in back home.

This was what her life had been building towards. All her studying, all her exams, all her sleepless nights that she had cried over before saying 'fuck it' and playing her Legends; they all meant nothing.

Everytime she had sat down with her parents as a child, her dad as a teenager, and booted up a console to play a new Legend; they mattered.

They had taught her how to fight evil, where his weak spot was and how to hit it. They had taught her Courage, a small girl overcoming her fear of Stalfos and Blizzeta to take them down and cure their evil – in her mind at least. They had given her Wisdom, a first-hand knowledge in the Legends to rival that of the Legends' royal family. They had given her the Power to learn how to fight effectively, for self-defence, her mother had always told her: how right she was, as she thought back on the fights with the monsters she'd encountered so far.

But none of it, none of the Legends or the lessons they taught her, could prepare her for this.

Nothing could prepare her for the complete and utter fear, the immediate and heart-wrenching loss that came when you saw someone you love murdered.

Nothing felt worse than not telling someone you loved them before you lost them.

"Mum's going out for the week with Auntie Impax, Sweetheart. Could I get a kiss before I go?"

"Muum!" Zelda had moaned, not looking up from her DS screen. "You're talking over the cutscenes!"

"Zelda, sweetie, you've played this before," Zelda Sr. said in response, leaning down to hug her from behind as she looked over her shoulder at the screen. "You only finished it a few days ago, why are you starting it again?"

"I want to know how you know what's going to happen before it does!" Zelda exclaimed as she turned back to look at her mother. "Spirit Tracks has only been out for two weeks and you already knew exactly what was going to happen when! How do you do it?!"

"That's a secret, sweetheart," Zelda Sr. booped her nose gently. "Perhaps I'll show you, but only when you're older."

"No fair!" Zelda stropped, stamping her feet, looking a lot younger than ten in that instant.

"I know, but life's like that." She mussed her daughter's hair and stood up, her arms held wide expectantly. "Now, can I kiss before I go?"

Zelda humphed and hugged her mum, her DS still in her hand as she embraced her somewhat reluctantly. As she pulled back, her mother looked deep into her eyes, seeing the hero she would one day become, seeing that she would one day know more about the Legends than she ever could. Smiling gently down on her, the elder Zelda kissed the younger on the cheek.

"Blegh!" The girl exclaimed, rubbing her cheek with the back of her hand. "Muuum!"

And Zelda Sr. laughed and picked up her bag, turning away from her daughter and out of the house, no idea what would befall her when she came back from Hyrule in just a week.

Neither knew this would be the last time they saw one another.

"Love you too, sweetheart!" Zelda Sr. called over her shoulder. "Take care!"

"Take care!"

It echoed around her as she shivered again, hugging her skinned and bloodied knees to her chest.

Tears continued to roll silently down her face as she looked out into nothing, oblivious to the puddle of blood that was getting ever closer to her feet. Unseeingly watching the fight between the Princess, Link and Ganondorf as they swore at each other, shooting light arrows every which way to try to knock him down, or at least away from the hovering assembled Triforce.

Her mother had been stolen from her by that man, that evil incarnate. But, she had known her daughter loved her; she had known her daughter would mourn her for everyday of the rest of her life.

She had known the time would come for her daughter to avenge her, in the name of love.

What she didn't know, what she couldn't have known, was that her daughter would be incapacitated when the time came for her to be a hero.

While her mother had died in peace, knowing her daughter loved her; Alarink had died in excruciating pain, thinking Zoelda didn't care for him. Thinking she wasn't heartbroken when she'd had to break his.

She choked a rattling sob as she saw his face only an hour or so before, so sad and defeated, but willing to give everything up for her.

A face that knew death was only a handful of breaths away.

And she could have so easily made his death less painful by telling him there and then that she loved him.

Instead she'd told him to stop.

Instead she'd let him die without hope.

She buried her face in her hands again, tears streaming once again as she whimpered.

The juxtaposition between the one who had known she'd loved her despite being away for a week, despite not knowing she would be dead by the end of it and that of the one who hadn't known she loved him despite being with her for a week and knowing he would be dead by the end of it was almost too much for Zoelda to bear.

They had both died because they knew she could save their world, their real world.

And there she was, crying into her hands, just trying not to scream again.

Then the blood reached her boot.

Looking up from her hands, Zoelda saw the small stream of blood following one of the fissures in the floor that her foot was now blocking. Slowly, deliberately as she hiccupped and willed her eyes to stop watering, she followed the stream of blood back to its source. She looked at him.

A mangled mess of a man she had come to know, a caved in skull covered in a sticky red and black blood darker than the ginger hair it matted; a jet black right hand limp in the pool of blood by his head; his spotless armour and robe now dripping red and black; his legs splayed unnaturally behind him; his short sword bent in his chest equally unnaturally. And his beautiful silver circlet still at his brow, a trail of blood working its way down the slender frame before dripping off the gem – a ruby crying for its owner.

Seeing him face down in a pool of his own blood, still recognisable but mangled, Zoelda forced down a wail yet again.

For a man who had known he was going to die, he had been the most full of life person she had ever met.

Every step was one closer to his last, every one nightstand would bring a reminder of his fate to him as they asked what was the matter with his chest; every smile forced and every laugh a mockery. But dammit if he wasn't enjoying himself as he swore, fought, laughed and fucked his way through Hyrule.

And Zoelda couldn't let that be in vain.

She couldn't let either of them have died for nothing.

If this was going to go down as another Legend, she wanted it to be named after him:

'The Legend of Alarink Link: The Bastard Prince.'

And this time, it was Zelda's turn to be the hero.

"Now, this is normally when I tell the monster who's boss using a series of swears."

Zelda stood up and wiped her face, smearing tears everywhere against the blood and fluid that had dripped down onto it out of her hair.

"I'm coming for you, Motherfucker."

They both hid the tears in their eyes and put on fake smiles.

Putting on her best sardonic smile, Zelda put one foot forward, leaving a bloodied footstep behind her.

"Keep an eye on him for me, would you?"

She looked over at his body once more as she moved slowly forwards, not seeing him as a crumpled heap of black clothes or blood, but as she had the night they'd come back from Twilight.

What she remembered clearest about him in that moment was that final resolution to the question that had clearly plagued him all day.

Her question had been answered too; both Link and her mother had to die. They were what would give her the strength to see this through, to end Physical Ganondorf once and for all.

"Mistress. Steel your broken heart and move wisely against the Evil, for this is all part of Hylia's plan."

Her bloodied boot hit something then, something solid. Looking down, she saw the Master Sword at her feet, untouched by blood and shining in the late evening light flooding in through the windows.

"I thought you'd know that those pathetic little swords of yours are not what will kill me."

Bending down slowly, Zelda took the Master Sword hilt in both hands.

"Mistress." It flashed at her, beginning to glow in a pale, unearthly light.

"I'm not the one to use the Sword in this battle, the spirit practically confirmed that when she called you Mistress instead of calling me Master."

It was only then, as she took up the Sword and stared forwards, a determined and sardonic smile on her face as she looked at where Ganondorf was giving 'Link' a pounding as the Princess tried to get a hit in on him with the Bow of Light, the Triforce hovering all unaware a few feet away from them, closer to her than to them, that she knew what she had to do.

"Oh, I'm coming for you, fucker." Zelda grated between her teeth, starting a slow and deliberate walk, the Sword in her hand a she walked through the pool of blood at Alarink's feet, not looking down at him as she passed, not trusting herself to not start crying yet again.

Soon she was jogging, her feet making a pattering sound on the hard floor that caused the others to turn and watch her as she ran towards them, Sword outstretched, trail of bloody footprints behind her.

Then she jumped, her left hand high above her head as she reached up to about seven feet in the air.

"NOOOO!" Ganondorf screamed and came running towards her, knocking both 'Link' and the Princess out of the way as he did.

"Goddesses!" Zelda shouted as she gripped the gap between the Triforces of Courage and Wisdom, holding herself suspended in the air and onto the Golden Triangles that could apparently grant her wishes. "Separate Ganondorf from Demise! Let there nevermore be a human form of evil incarnate! Scratch that, get rid of Demise once and for all! And if You can't do that, then limit his resurrection to once every few millennia, let Your people be ready for him when he comes!

"Just," she sighed as Ganondorf stared at her, a few feet away as he realised he couldn't stop her any more. As she looked over at the battered and bruised 'hero' and Princess, and the dead form of her closest friend. "Just stop this insanity."

There was a huge golden flash, one that temporarily blinded everyone in the room as Zoelda fell from her place in the air and kicked Ganondorf down as she did, landing in a crouch with the glowing Master Sword still in hand.

The flash imploded and faded into nothing, leaving little trace that the Triforce had ever been there in the first place and little evidence that anything had changed.

But she saw it, on the back of her birthmarked hand, three golden triangles as clear as day. She felt the buzz of the Goddesses in her veins, a golden glow emitting from her gently as she stared at the form of Ganondorf standing back aways, looking down at his hand in shock.

His eyes flashed in anger and sorrow, his hand clenched and unclenched at his side while the other continued to grip his sword. As he looked up at her, she could see the fear and vulnerability in his gold Gerudo eyes.

There, before her, was Ganondorf, the Gerudo Chief.

Demise was gone, whether gone for good or for millennia, Zelda didn't know. But he was gone for now.

And the man that stood before her was only that, a man.

One who had killed many, who had destroyed lives, families.

Who had killed two people she loved.

She didn't hold back as he ran towards her, screaming that she had taken away all that he was, had destroyed all that he lived for as he attacked her foolishly, leaving obvious gaps in his defence that she exploited enormously with the Sword of Evil's Bane. Soon he was the one bleeding, the gems on his forehead and chest ripped off in frustration and revealing no trace of the spike that sealed Demise nor the stab that had killed Ganon twenty years ago.

And soon she was the one swearing at him with gritted teeth as she parried, dodged and flicked away his sword, using her own to stab at him, never fatally yet, but always damaging, always drawing blood.

"You! You fucker!" Zelda swore at him loud enough for him to hear, but not too loud to lessen the harshness of her words. "You utter shithead! You, you have killed my mother! You killed so many innocents with that Pestilence of yours!"

"That wasn't me, that was-"

"Shut fuck, you twat," Zelda interrupted him before he could say it was Demise controlling him, before he could say he hadn't enjoyed the power that came with being evil's puppet. "It was you. You let it control you, you let power rule you. And you fucking enjoyed it, didn't you?"

Zelda was grinning like a maniac as she held the Master Sword at his throat, her hand gripping his wrist and forcing him to drop his own weapon.

"I, I-"

"You liked watching the life drain out of people, you got a kick from killing, asserting your dominance. Don't say you didn't, we all do. I certainly am right now."

"Zelda, I-"

"Oh, please don't beg for mercy." She cut him off again, her eyes flashing and the golden glow growing within her. "You don't think I've been giving you mercy, toying with you until we got to this point because I want you to savour the moment?"

"What?"

"Look at this face, Ganondorf." Zelda grinned at him, walking back from him a foot or so so he could get a better look, sure he was beaten enough not to try and attack her again. "Look at the face of your killer.

"I'm not blonde, nor am I obviously blue-eyed; I'm not native nor am I foreign; I'm tall and my ears are short, I'm pale and not even properly dressed.

"And I'm a woman."

Zelda rather negligently thrust the Sword into the cut that Link made into his stomach with his short sword as he died, angling the Sword up before she thrust again, hitting an organ that could have been the heart or a lung. Whatever it was, it was vital enough to cause him to spit up blood immediately.

Deliberately pulling the sword out roughly and slowly, wriggling it back and forth as she did, opening more wounds on his insides and causing him intense pain as blood continued to froth from his lips.

Finally, with cold hearted detachment, she let him fall twitching to the floor, watching as his blood pooled at her feet and the life drained out of him. He'd live for a few more minutes, but the shock would knock him out cold in just a few moments.

So, she bent down to his face and looked him in the eye, a sardonic grin on her own blood splattered face and her hair wild as the golden glow of the Goddesses left her.

"Remember that, Ganon. Remember that it was a woman who finally killed you, you fuck. A woman of Hylia's blood."

"Ga… Ganon… Dorf." The dying man corrected pedantically with his last few breaths as she stood up again.

"Whatever," she said as she plunged the Master Sword into his open wound, causing him to scream in pain and look up at her one last time before he fainted. "That, was for Link."

As he lost consciousness, a few moments left until the blood loss would draw his life away from him, Zelda walked away, wiping the blood from her face with the backs of her bloodier hands.

"Take that, you fucking monster. Think you can attack someone on my watch? Not likely, fucker." Zelda repeated the first words she'd ever heard Link say a week ago under her breath as she walked over to his body, slumping down next to the column his head had cracked against. Behind her, behind the body of Ganondorf, the other two were staring at her in horror and awe, surprised that one they assumed was incapacitated at Link's death could be so ruthless, so utterly detached from her own bloody violence.

"Why don't I go tell my friends what it's like to attack them while I'm around? Oh wait, I can't," Zelda gasped, tears filling her eyes again as she continued to paraphrase Link's words, looking down at his body, grateful she couldn't see the cut across his chest. "'Cause he's dead."

Then she was crying into her bloody hands again, next to the body of her friend and sat in a pool of his blood.

"Bitch…"

AN:

Before I get into this, I just want to apologise for the mess that was last week's chapter. By the look of it, Fanfic was down so no one could access it and I was feeling so rough that I barely mentioned just how much I loved writing that chapter. Things are back to normal with the website now, as far as I can tell, and the chapter definitely is up and available to be read.

Just quick thing about last week's chapter that I didn't mention, I absolutely loved writing in multiple POVs. 'Link's' section of the courage battle was really fun to write, as was getting into the mind of someone other than Alarink and Zoelda.

But anyway, onto the notes about this chapter.

I love it. It's my second favourite chapter, to write and to read, after 12. As I said back in 12, I'm not sure if it tops Alarink's confession, I'm not sure if it's as good or whatever, but I do know I loved writing it. I know I loved the raw emotions that Zelda shows in this. (Little note in case it wasn't clear, from here on out in the story, Zoelda is Zelda again and Alarink is Link.)

As mentioned many times, I do take inspiration from my situations to influence what I write. Obviously, I've never been in this kind of situation before, but it was very cathartic to write that level of raw emotional pain and loss at the start. And using that pain to fuel Zelda's fight with Ganondorf felt natural, as natural as using my own pain to inspire my writing. I think it was Zelda's swears at Ganondorf as they fought that felt the most real to me, they make no sense, they're harsh and foolish - they're how anyone as befuddled as she was in that moment would act.

I went way off plan with this, as I did with many of my chapters, but the one thing that I had planned from the moments I came up with Alarink's first words (which was before I even had any plan in place, his first words were his character before he even had an appearance, before I even decided he was half Twili) was Zoelda using them against Ganondorf at the very end. And it fits perfectly.

I must have written this chapter only two or three days before I started posting this up back in November, and now we're on the last week before it's finished. And I can honestly say, that this was the chapter when I truly began to understand Zoelda. Perhaps that's bad to say, perhaps I should have gotten to know her long ago. But in the beginning, this was a story about Alarink told from her perspective, she was in it for the ride. This was when she made it her own. And I'd obviously gone back to edit the older chapters after I finally understood who she was, but the original story looked rather different before this chapter was written.

Anyway, I think that's enough here. Next week, being the last chapter, will have a much longer note, I imagine. But I just wanted to express how much I loved this chapter and what it helped me achieve with Zoelda's character. Also, I really liked expanding on Alarink's death over the course of these three chapters rather than having it limited to one, he was the main character in this for me and I couldn't let him go down without showing how much his death impacted Zoelda.

But, that's enough for this note. I hope to see you all next week for the final chapter! In the meantime, have a nice week. See you one last time next one!

~WWQ