Story Title: Our Wind Will Shake the Earth and Stars
Disclaimer: Still don't own The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, yeah?
Author's Notes: More thanks go out to mysticalgems, Kit, Tapix, Tavi, deadaleta, Anon256, and Rei Uchiha339 for reviewing.
In the games, Link generally picks up new skills very easily. Well, unless I'm controlling him. At least, the first play. Anyway, I wanted our Mr. Perfect Hero to be a little more believable, so it takes him a few more tries to figure things out. Though he still learns quicker than most people realistically would. Necessity and all.
Thanks for reading.
-o-
Chapter Five: The Light Spirits' Delivery
-o-
The Oocca are truly fascinating. Truly, Shad thought as he paused in his translation after jotting down a note in his father's journal. What wondrous creatures, they are.
Leaning back into his seat, Shad removed his spectacles and rubbed his eyes. He was not quite positive on how long he had been working, though if he had to estimate it would have been a few hours, but one thing was clear to Shad—he was learning much. It was a slow but steady progress and vastly rewarding with every completed sentence. The Oocca, after all, were truly fascinating.
And there were so many other very interesting things still to learn. Especially when it came to the history of the Oocca. Shad had flipped through the other yet-unread book and of what he had already translated in this book combined with his fleeting glances through the other, neither one really touched on the history of the sky beings. In fact, the books seemed to skirt around the subject. Shad was of the mindset that perhaps these hardly important to downright irrelevant passages he came across were an elaborate scheme to hide or avoid ever mentioning the Oocca's collective history.
Tired of sitting and specifically of the dull ache in his legs, Shad rose from his seat and paced about the Messenger's Library. The watching Oocca, who had yet to move or stare anywhere else but on Shad, followed his every step. Shad tried his best to not be disturbed by its ever-constant gaze, but he figured it would be easier to convince the Postman to pause in his delivery than for him to finally adjust to the Oocca's stare.
As he stepped about and sorted through and categorized in his head the new bits of newly acquired information, Shad noticed his stare angle and focus to the left. The swell of magic pressed into the library and, seconds later, Link came spinning into the room.
Shad hardly had time to blink before Link was pulling him toward Ooccoo Jr. "Shad! You have to see!"
Shad dug in his boot heels to slow the swordsman's eager haste. "Please, old boy, do provide some variety of an explanation first."
"I found a path," Link said, paused but still holding Shad's wrists. "I don't know where it leads or how dangerous it is but it's new. I want you to explore it with me."
A new path? Shad stood astonished as his mind delved into the prospects and wonders of an uncharted section. "In that case, let us hasten!" Shad said, his anticipation matching Link's.
Ooccoo Jr. teleported Shad first. As he waited for Link, the scholar stood in the revealed hallway and focused on it as his bearings steadied. I surmise I will never get accustomed to Ooccoo Jr.'s means of transport, Shad thought as the last of his blurry-whirly dizziness subsided. It is a wonder to me as to how Link manages so without any show of effect. Stronger constitution, I suppose.
Ooccoo Jr. brought Link and then sighed and fluttered down to the floor. A protective mother, Ooccoo raced to her son's side and held the sweating young Oocca in a winged embrace.
Feeling miraculously expressed through emotionless eyes, Ooccoo peered up to Link and said, "I am sorry, adventurer, but we cannot follow you. My son is much too exhausted. He is a brave boy but his magic does have its limits. Perhaps after he is rested, we will join you."
"Of course, Ooccoo," Link nodded. "Thanks for your help."
"He will be all right, will he?" Shad asked. "I would feel simply awful if all our traveling caused the poor boy any harm."
"Gracious, no, young scholar! You did him no harm," Ooccoo said, fanning her son with one wing. "He'll up and fluttering about soon enough. Rest is all he needs."
"As you say then," Shad said, concern still on his face as he watched Ooccoo Jr, flushed and panting, be tended by his mother. "We are ever so grateful for your assistance. You were the ones who made this possible."
Ooccoo smiled and gave a nod of appreciation accepted before returning to looking after her exhausted son. Shad set aside his worry only at the touch of Link's hand on his shoulder. He turned to him.
"Ready?" Link said, "It's just down this hall."
Shad supposed he was and headed with Link down the rest of the revealed hallway, muttering a short prayer to the Goddesses to speed Ooccoo Jr.'s recovery along the way.
Following Link's warning that he stay inside the hall, Shad stepped back a tile or two, just in case, while Link approached the door to trigger its self-opening mechanisms. When the door opened itself, he saw blue skies and no pathway.
"Pardon me, old boy," Shad said while Link put on the iron boots, "but where is this new path? If you are proposing we dive off this balcony and whistle for a large bird to come by and catch us, I will assure you of your madness."
"There's a string of peahats leading into the sky," Link explained as he adjusted the hold of the apparent pair of clawed devices on his arms. At last satisfied, Link dropped his arms to his sides and faced toward Shad. "Hop onto my back and hold on."
"Are you s-serious?" Shad asked, mouth parted open in disbelief.
"Yea," Link said frankly and evidently unbothered by the situation. "Not really any other way. I can't hold you, so you have to hold onto me. …Unless you'd prefer staying behind."
"Heavens no, old boy! I will not be left behind!" Shad said. And then much more timidly, "So…um…how will we go about this?"
"I don't know," Link said, shrugging his shoulders as he turned around to face the door, his back to Shad. "Whatever feels comfortable with you. Make sure you're secure."
Shad approached Link shyly. Perhaps Link was accustomed to such forwardness but Shad was raised differently. A gentleman's personal space always remained at a proper, respectful distance to another's. One did not simply hop on another's back and away they went. Even among the most intimate of friends did not share such closeness.
Circumstances do decree some flouting of decorum, I suppose, Shad reminded himself. After all, when it comes to exploring the City in the Sky, such societal rules do not apply. …Forgive me, Mother, for my transgressions but I am my father's son.
"Then I suppose…" Shad said as he wrapped his arms and secured a hold around Link's chest. "…this shall suffice."
Link nodded and, once outside, aimed for the first peahat. The claws made contact and sent Link and Shad flying. As the chain met its end, the recoil jerked through Shad and almost cost him his grip. From then on, Shad had his arms and legs wrapped around Link's torso and clung against him, as they rose higher and higher with every peahat.
"You're mad, you know that?" Shad shouted, uncertain if his voice would carry in the blustery wind otherwise. "Absolutely, positively barking mad!
Shad could have sworn Link was laughing.
-o-
Unable to see any more peahats in the thick, misty clouds, Link lowered the chain on a hunch and found a solid surface amid the rolling white vapor. He told Shad, still pressed against him for dear life, that they were here—though where that was, Link had no idea—and disengaged the clawshot from the final peahat.
"Astounding as it is for something to be up so high here," Shad said as he looked around and eased his nerves from their risky climb. "It is quite impossible to observe anything. I say, the visibility here is about as well as it is on Snowpeak during a blizzard, at least according to Ashei's accounts."
Worse actually, Link judged. And at least on Snowpeak, I could see around with a wolf's sense of smell.
"There has to be something here," Link said, iron boots and clawshots put away as he gave his tired muscles a much-needed break. The climb had been more strenuous than Link thought it would. Shad was heavier than he looked, though Link guessed most of his weight came from his rucksack. "And we'll find it. Watch your step."
"Quite so, " Shad agreed as he peered over his shoulder and down an assumed edge. "I shudder to imagine the terror of a fall from this elevation."
Shad followed a few steps behind Link as they made their way blindly up the apparent stairway. A thought hit Link as he surveyed their shrouded surroundings that even if there were something to find up here, they probably wouldn't be able to see it.
"Bizarre feeling, isn't it?" Shad said, whether toward him or simply aloud, Link wasn't sure. "It is as if we are traveling through a cloud. I suppose, we technically are."
Link was about to toss Shad an agreeing nod when his left hand started burning. He bit down a curse and managed to mostly stifle his gasp of pain as he grabbed his left wrist, his hand searing with a white-hot ache, reminiscent to Link like that of a heated branding iron on his skin and was a pain that was not all that unfamiliar to him.
Making a quick check of it, sure enough he saw the mark of the Triforce reacting with a slow, pulsing glow. Shad hurried to Link's side and stared in open-mouthed awe and bewilderment at Link's active Triforce. Holding his arm out at shoulder-height, Link followed the guiding pulse of the Triforce through the clouds.
Shad and Link were led toward a shrouded silhouette of a building of vast height and length that Link would have most likely found and investigated anyway without the Triforce's insistence. But either the Goddesses were assuring they came here or simply wished to get the pumpkin rolling, so to speak, Link wasn't sure which but he knew could have done without the divine prodding.
Standing before the presumed entrance, the pulsing ceased and the glow of Link's Triforce steadied. A second larger Triforce then appeared out of the mists, its glow burning away the haze and revealing an intricately sealed door.
Compelled by the Triforce, Link lined up the twin marks of divine power. Their glows harmonized briefly before both Triforces disappeared, taking the door's seal along with it.
"This is certainly something, now isn't it?" Shad said, all smiles and bright-eyed excitement.
With some strain, Link pushed the heavy stone doors open. The chamber was surprisingly lit, by what Link could not tell. There was no discernable source of ordinary light anywhere in the room. The ovoid-shaped chamber's dimensions were immense and had high, vast vaulted ceilings. Link stood in place while Shad stepped about, his light footsteps reverberating throughout.
The walls were covered wholly in small mosaic pieces of sky blue crystal. The matching color floor tiles lay in an uneven pattern with varying-sized spacing gaps between one another. The chamber was quartered into four sections and in each corner of sorts there was a pool of water contained and bordered in by large water-smoothed stones.
He heard Shad taking notes and muttering indistinctly to himself. Link started wandering around the mysterious chamber as well, his own curiosity peaked and memories stirred. The construction of the room all seemed vaguely familiar to Link. There was an undercurrent in the air that spoke to Link and welcomed him as an old acquaintance. From where and how he recognized it, however, he couldn't recall.
The central focal point of the room was an altar within a fountain located in the exact spot where the four quarters met. The altar was simple. It was just a stone base and four pillars holding up a vaulted ceiling. A gold rod stood atop the altar's ceiling. Its stand was molded and forged to look like talons. Water inexplicably flowed from the talons and down the grooved pillars and into the surrounding pool.
Link made his way up the short set of stairs to the altar and searched. On a waist-height slab of stone stood a carving of an open book and, as he somewhat expected, there were words etched onto the immovable pages. Link tried to discern the writing but he had no clue what it said or even what language it was supposed to be.
"Shad!" Link called. "Come look at this."
The scholar hurried over. "Yes, Link, what have you discovered?" Link pointed at the engraved carving. "Appears to be Ancient Hylian, if I am not mistaken and I highly doubt that I am," Shad said as he adjusted his slipped spectacles.
"Can you read it?" Link asked.
Shad flashed a proud smile, "My picture books as a baby were written in Ancient Hylian, old boy. Shall I?"
Link sidestepped to allow Shad full view over the message. After a momentary pause to work out a few translation issues, Shad believed he knew what the message read.
"It is a spell, no, an invocation," he explained. "Perhaps we should grant it a try and observe its effects?"
Link nodded and Shad read the invocation aloud. At first, nothing happened and Shad was stricken with despair and began muttering over the text in frantic search of any possible mispronunciation. Feeling the change in the air, Link raised his head and eyed about the chamber intently.
First, the water flowing from the talons glowed with a bright blue light. Then, the pool surrounding the altar filled with the glowing water. Openings appeared in the barrier and the glowing water poured into the gaps between the tiles. Curving and wavy bright blue patterns marked all across the floor.
"Brilliant," Shad whispered in awe as the water flowed upward and illuminated the crystal mosaic. "Do you feel that, old boy? We are in the presence of great magic. …Outstanding."
The entire chamber was aglow. Link now recognized the undercurrent of magic in the air. The sounds of water dripping only served to confirm his memory. The four pools of water shined with a gold and white-gold light, its radiance blinding the room. A great wind blew through the chamber carrying in its breeze the smell of dry, dusty clay dirt, of fresh hay and newly-cut grass, of the cool, wet riverbanks, and the loamy, green forests. With a final burst of blinding light, the four Light Spirits appeared.
"Oh, brave youth, you have summoned us to the physical world to this forgotten Messenger's Chamber," the Light Spirits said in unison. "The balance between the light and dark has been restored and the dark king has perished from our world. You know this well, hero chosen by the Goddesses, and yet here we four guardians of the Light stand. Speak now your request so that we may return to our duties decreed by the Goddesses."
"I and my friend…" Link said, "We seek your help. The Oocca have lost their true forms and their memories. We ask that you restore them."
"We cannot fulfill such a request," the Light Spirits replied.
Their response took Link aback at first. He hadn't expected it be that difficult of a task for the Light Spirits. After all, they had brought back and broken the curse on Midna, but then again Link could not be certain any of that happened as it had. He actually hadn't seen it for himself, only assumed.
And the more he considered, the more he realized it would require great magic, quantity and power, to return the Oocca as they were. Magic far greater than even the Light Spirits possessed.
"Then tell us if there is a way to restore the Oocca and if so, how?"
The golden liquid light bodies of the four spirits rippled and shimmered as the Light Spirits considered in silence.
"The knowledge of how to restore the Oocca to their true forms, is that the information you seek?"
"Yes," Link said, nodding firmly.
"And once you have obtained said information, will you pursue your goal of restoring the Oocca to the very end? Will nothing persuade you from your objective?"
"Nothing will," Link said, confident he would prove to the Light Spirits his depth of determination. "We will stop at nothing until the Oocca are themselves again."
As the Light Spirits' stares focused on Shad, Link gave the wonderstruck scholar a mild push forward.
"Y-Yes…t-that is so," Shad agreed.
"So it be then," the Light Spirits replied. Link and Shad looked at one another and beamed with hope and anticipation.
And then rays of light charged and arched into a swirling, spiral sphere before each Light Spirit and all Link's joy and hope crumbled to wide-eyed confusion and terror.
Link could tell the light was not the sort of delicate, warm, welcoming light of the morning sun but the concentrated, sharp, searing light like that of a beamos's laser. It was not a kind, comforting light. It was a blinding, burning light. A light meant to obliterate him and Shad from all existence.
"Goodbye, brave youth and friend."
Shad caught onto Link's fear and to the wrongness of the Spirits' behavior and clung to Link's arm. "We're going to perish, aren't we?" he asked, panic wavering his voice.
Link looked about the Messenger's Chamber, his eyes darting between the Light Spirits' charged light orbs and possible escape routes. Which there apparently were none. There was only one door, one entrance and exit, and the ornate seal had reappeared and denied them escape.
"Wait! What are you doing? Why?" he asked, pleading to the spirits to explain.
The Light Spirits did not respond. Their deep roars vibrated the room, shaking everything violently and heavily sloshing water about. Link struggled but managed to stay standing only by bracing his hands and arms against the altar. Shad had fallen to his knees and muttered to himself. Whether it was prayers or self-recriminations, Link could not tell.
Through the roars, there was a sharp, sudden crack, a sound that easily equated to the snap of a falling tree in Link's memory. He searched and rapidly found the four support pillars of the altar surrounding them riddled with breaks and crumbling as if they were made of soapstone in the quake. Alarmed by the popping and crackling noises from above, Link grabbed Shad and barely managed to dive out of the way as the altar collapsed, leaving only rubble and a puff cloud of dust when it was all over.
"Answer me!" Link demanded, panic giving way to anger. No, not merely anger, but fury.
And still the Light Spirits did not respond. The Light Spirits attacked, sending their four blazing suns spiraling toward Link and Shad. Delirious in the prospect of death, Shad rambled an apology to Link for involving him in this mess and held onto him, pressing his wet face into Link's shoulder. Futile as the gesture may have been but ever the protector, Link wrapped his arm around Shad and positioned himself in the path of first harm. And then he waited for his skin to start singeing.
The burning began but on his left hand, not his back. His strength waned, pouring out from top to bottom down out of him. He found himself unable to keep his grip, unable to hold Shad. His arms slid off the scholar's back and Link found himself leaning more against Shad, using him to keep himself propped. He had no other choice but, no longer able to keep himself up on his own.
Every bone ached. Every muscle urged to stretch. His blood ran hot. Every heartbeat was regular but every rhythmic pulse was felt deep and throughout his body. White-gold flames and starbursts of light danced before his eyes. A low, rumbling roar rang in his ears. Link thought he was mistaken at first but his first impressions were right after all—the roar was a song, ancient, primeval. A song sung with earthy resonance and otherworldly airiness. Earth and sky united.
Welcome, hero, sang the creatures of heaven and earth. Awaken and rise.
Link willed himself to rise. With everything he had, he forced his shaking self to lift from his mash against Shad and hold himself up on his hands as his bones broke, as fire embraced him, as light overtook his sight, as heat stole all the air from his lungs. Link withstood the pain, as his skin scorched and flaked away. There was one last act he was determined to carry out.
He raised his head high and returned the song.
-o-
…Never should have came here. Should have been satisfied in your findings. Should have let things be, stayed home, and had a cup of tea, Shad chastised himself as Link screamed. Never should have believed you could handle this—you are not Link. And even he cannot withstand this. This is your fault. Never summon spirits you cannot put down.
An impact and explosion. Shad had no time to think on it as the blast rocked him from his knees to the floor. He felt the heat of the flames but was not burned. Shad could not yet see for the bright light blinding him, but he felt the impression of what only could be described as great arms covered over him, shielding him.
As the light and heat died down, Shad heard a rumble. At first, he thought it was a minor aftershock from the explosion, but realized it sounded living, as if it came from a creature, that it was a growl.
"Link?" The heat had left Shad's voice dry and hoarse.
Shad received no answer.
He forced himself up and to sitting as soon as he could. Opening his eyes and finding a thick layer of dust from the altar's collapse coating his spectacles, Shad hastily cleaned them. He wanted to know if Link was okay. He had to be okay. He just wasn't responding. Didn't mean that he was dead, just unconscious. Maybe. Hopefully. Shad wasn't certain how divine fire could make a person unconscious, but it was better than thinking Link was nothing more than ash and bone.
His spectacles adequately clear, Shad slipped them back on and looked to where he last knew Link had been. But in his place sat a beast.
-o-
As the pain edged off and his bones ceased to shift and pop and realign, Link felt strong enough to stand and, in doing so, realized he was back to four legs again. The shift from two-feet to four-feet again, Link could adjust to with relative ease. That didn't bother him at all, what with his previous experience. What he was having trouble with was his size. He was much larger than himself. He was much larger than a wolf. If there was anything Link was certain about, it was that he was not a wolf.
He heard Shad call him and turned to face him, feeling strange doing so, not used to turning a longer neck or peering down a longer face. Shad stared back at him saucer-eyed, jaw unabashedly dropped with a mixed expression of confusion, disbelief, and terror. Clearly this form what not the Link the scholar expected to find.
Rusl's words of wisdom and battle experience told Link to never face away from his enemy for long and so he focused back on the Light Spirits.
The Light Spirits were quiet. If Link had to guess, he supposed they were thinking on his new form, what it meant, and how difficult it would make taking him down. There was an uncertainty in the air, Link sensed. Some coming from the Light Spirits, some from Shad, and Link indeed wasn't too confident in his new skin yet either.
"Chosen hero," the Light Spirits at last spoke, "though you have changed into that of a forgotten beast, our message shall not. We cannot allow you and your friend to leave this chamber alive. It is our responsibility decreed by the Goddesses to guard our lands, to uphold the Light and we shall."
The points of his claws clacking on the tiled floor, Link stepped forward and crouched down into a fighting stance. Well, if there was anything Link was entirely certain about, it was that neither he nor Shad was dying today. Not if he was able to fight. With a deep, low growl, Link challenged the Light Spirits.
Instead of charging their light into orb blasts again, the Light Spirits shot rays of light throughout the Messenger's Chamber. Link easily dodged the small blasts that came first for him and immediately made a quick check on Shad. He was up and evading the rays, albeit running around terrified out of his mind and just managing to miss bolts by pure luck.
Relying on himself and not just good fortune to keep Shad alive through this mess, Link hastened to reach him. Ordona, the Ordon goat spirit of Light, charged after him. The guardian of his home province was much faster than Link, mostly due to his inexperience managing his new, much longer tail while running keeping him from maintaining good speed. Ordona raced ahead and cut Link off. Link hurried to evade the Light Spirits' rays and tried a new direction. Again Ordona rushed in front of him and again Link had to avoid harm.
There had to be a way around Ordona. Outrunning the spirit wasn't an option. Neither was outmaneuvering—Ordona was fast enough to turn and charge back at Link if he tried running to Shad after Ordona passed by. But there had to be some way of reaching him.
Link had an idea but he wasn't sure if it would work. Really, it was his only idea and his only option. He guessed it was better than nothing and trying wouldn't hurt. Well, actually if his idea failed, it would hurt. A lot, he estimated. As long as it doesn't kill me, Link told himself.
Link raced alongside of Ordona and built up his speed. When he felt that he had gained all that he could, Link leaped into the air. Ordona immediately turned around and rushed him, head lowered and ready to ram Link. With an infinitesimal moment used to hope his idea worked, Link unfolded his wings.
Please! Work! He shouted in his head as he hastily fluttered his large wings to maintain air. Not getting much lift with the smaller beat, he tried a grand flap and wished for the best. Perhaps it was not quite the best effort by any stretch but it was well enough—Link flew over Ordona.
It was amazing. He had flew. He was flying. There was an indescribable, immeasurable joy and lightness in his heart rushing through him. But much as he liked to indulge in the thrill, now was not the time to celebrate.
Link landed, well, crashed onto the floor, got up quickly, and raced toward Shad. The scholar was still alive. Miraculously. It couldn't have been due to luck only. Shad had told Link at their first meet he lacked physical skills, but he obviously knew how to run, dodge, and duck and cover.
Shad saw Link coming. He clearly did not know the beast barreling toward him was Link by the flash of panic on his face as Link drew closer. Shad tried running from him but Link was faster. Link pushed his head between Shad's legs and tossed him onto his back.
Link rushed to regain speed and tried flying. His takeoff was awkward, wobbly, and his body rocked from side to side as he tried to stay aloft. He hadn't yet gotten used to balancing and steering with his tail. Well, to the general process of flying, but what better way to learn quickly than when your life depended on it?
The water serpent Lanayru struck. Link swiftly rose to dodge and Shad dangled from his neck, his hold around him unbreakable, as far as Link was assured. A short spiral to evade the monkey Faron and a happy accident with his steering letting him miss Ordona, Link swooped down and up and avoided their rays of light. The only Light Spirit to not physically assail Link yet, aside from light bursts, was Eldin. Link supposed that even with the Messenger's Chamber's large dimensions that the hawk spirit could not spread its massive wings and fly properly in the room. Up to his elongated neck in trouble as is, Link wasn't exactly missing the attack.
Not that Eldin was ineffectual in the fight. In the flurry of swoops, spirals, and dives to avoid the other Light Spirits, a warning sparked in Link's head and when he checked, he saw that Eldin was charging an orb of light. Link spiraled out of the curl of Faron's tail as the monkey tried to grab him and made a sharp turn out of the way of Lanayru's gaping jaws.
Link could dodge the Light Spirits all he could, but the fact remained that there was no way of escaping the Messenger's Chamber and, as much as Link refused to admit it, he did have his limits. The rush of flight could only bear him aloft for so long. He would eventually tire, though not anytime soon.
And he had to consider Shad's safety. The scholar would exhaust and his grip would fail far sooner than Link would give out. And all of Link's necessary, life-preserving aerial acrobatics had to be taxing on him. Link needed to find an escape. He needed to get away from the infinitely-powered Light Spirits.
Soaring past Ordona's string of light rays, Link searched the vaulted ceiling to the ovoid-shaped room and found no opening, no windows to crash through. The Messenger's Chamber was, absolutely just like an egg—impenetrable, unmarred, and whole. Only way of getting out was to make an exit. And if Link was going to make it out of here, it would not be using his own power.
Distracted as he bypassed another strike from Lanayru, Link roared in agony as a sudden ray of concentrated light from Ordona clipped his left wing, its heat and pain searing from muscle to bone. Faron wrapped its tail around Link, momentarily jarred by the pain, and pulled him down. Link wriggled, clawed, and snapped at Faron's tail trying to get free but the Light Spirit did not relent. Link heard Shad cry out as Faron constricted the pair of them. Link's efforts to free himself doubled.
Faron did unexpectedly release them. And then it was not so unexpectedly as Link noticed he and Shad had been tossed into the air and right into the path of Eldin's fired light orb. Body aching and one wing injured, Link soared ahead of the spiraling orb, its flames lashing at his tail. To his relief, Shad had managed to hang on and keep his grip around his neck.
Just a little longer. Hang on just a little longer, Link wished. Getting about as much distance between himself and the light orb as he expected he would, though wasn't much, Link waited, and at the right moment, rose up and out of the orb's path. The orb spiraled into the chamber wall, the explosion sending heat and fire back toward Link. He fluttered backwards out the way and then, seeing the shine of daylight through the swirling dark dust clouds, dove toward the wall.
As the other three Light Spirits gave shooting Link down with light rays one final try, Lanayru slithered itself between Link and the newly-created exit. Link avoided the water serpent's first strike and then its second. He flew about its head, missed strikes, and thoroughly frustrated the spirit. So desperate and determined to kill Link, Lanayru hardly noticed it wasn't effectively guarding the gap. Equally blind in their endeavor, neither did the other Light Spirits. With a sudden turn and Lanayru's gaping jaws trailing behind him, Link dove down and spiraled through the blasted hole in the chamber wall and into blue sky.
Never was Link so happy to see the sky. Even with the ache in his left wing, he delighted in the sensation of flight. After all, now was the time he could offer a moment to enjoy the thrill.
"…We made it. Somehow," Shad said aloud, half-delirious with laughter from fear and now overwhelming joy. "Thank you, you magnificent beast for saving me. I am terribly concerned about Link, however. I do hope he is alive and well. Where ever did the old boy vanish? I hope not in the flames."
Link's low, suppressed laugh came across as more as a deep rumble in his throat. So Shad wasn't aware that this new form and Link were the same yet. Oh well, he would soon enough, Link guessed.
Though not quite yet.
The air was shaking. Feeling the rumbling coming from the Messenger's Chamber before he heard it, Link turned and looked. Heavy cracks lined the ceiling of the egg-shaped building. With a final shock and a powerful blast, the ceiling crumbled. And soaring through the dust and falling rubble came Eldin.
Link rushed to escape but the hawk spirit with its mammoth wingspan caught up with him in a one and a half great flaps. Eldin soared into Link and tangled him in talons and trapped him in the strange air drafts the hawk's beating wings created. Link rolled along in their downward spiral, biting, clawing, and lashing his tail at the colossal hawk doing all he could to free himself while Eldin did everything to keep Link in his harmful grasp. They were an interlocked mess of pain and fury, and in the tumble of talons and wings, Eldin knocked Shad off Link.
Everything but his pumping heart seemed to slow as Link saw the scholar fall. All he could think about was how he had, roundabout or directly so, promised Rusl he would watch over Shad. But even without a promise to Rusl, Link had promised himself he would protect him. He knew Shad wasn't as skilled as himself in messy situations and he had gotten Shad into this madness. He was his friend and he was not about to fail his friend.
Protective rage coursing through him, Link struck out and sunk his jaws into the connection between Eldin's neck and right wing. He gnawed into whatever impossibly felt like bone, breaking it. He tore and ripped and jerked the mass of 'flesh' in his mouth, determined if all possible to pull every bit it from Eldin. Link wasn't positive how he was physically harming a spirit and he wasn't even certain if the Light Spirits had corporal bodies to harm, but he was doing just that, if Eldin's reared-back shriek of pain was any proof.
Struggling to stay aloft, Eldin writhed and kicked, throwing Link aside. Link quickly orientated himself from the toss and dove for Shad.
Link's new hypersensitive eyes saw more and deeper than he ever had before. He could pick up on the slightest minute movement so easily and at a much greater distance. It was nothing for him to catch the flutter of Shad's short purple jacket so very far below him.
Shad's stillness concerned Link. He wasn't panicking or flailing. He wasn't even screaming. He had to be unconscious. It was the only way the scholar would ever be so calm and motionless in the face of impending death.
Link plummeted but still it was not fast enough. There had to be a way. There had to be some way of speeding up and reaching Shad. Link would damn himself before he failed him.
Chalking it up to his worry for Shad and determination, Link shook. His body seemed overcome with waiting energy. Link hardly paid mind, his thoughts solely focused on saving Shad. Readying for a grand flap, Link brought his wings up and close together and when he did so, a ball of white-blue light appeared before his eyes. A little shift of his wings proved it wasn't a ball at all but an expanding ring as he completed his flap. No better way to know what it did otherwise, Link soared through the ring.
Link's wings pressed close to his body, aglow in white-blue light. The wind rushed past him as he dove faster, his surroundings completely unperceivable. Link felt an odd impression come over him, as he glowed brightly and burned with an inner fire. He felt like a comet, or at least like the description of a comet Rusl said flew over Ordon Village the night Link was born.
Though he couldn't see where he was going gliding so fast, Link still knew where he was. He could sense his position, Shad's position, and the quickly closing gap of distance separating them clearly in his mind's eye. He knew exactly where and when to open his wings and stall his descent.
As he reached his mark, Link spread his wings, the white-blue light dispersed in a grand flash, and with a little groan in his throat as he bore his sudden weight, Link caught Shad. The scholar had indeed passed out, as Link suspected. Making a quick check to see if Eldin was in pursuit and seeing nothing, Link soared off.