Chapter Six: Kakariko
Title: LoZ: The Time Keeper
Chapter: 6
Author: Hikari no Vikki
Genre: Romance
Parings: Link x Zelda / OC x Shadow
Disclaimer: I own a kite and a figurine that's missing a shield. The actual franchise? Not so much.
Description: Previously known as Divine Impurity. Following the events of Ocarina of Time, a girl with a legacy she knows nothing about joins the fight against Ganon. She falls in love with the Hero's shadow, and finds herself caught up in a war that seems impossible to win.
Author's Notes-
Don't you worry; they'll get to the Shadow Temple. In the next chapter, I promise. I just need some character development and some loving. Maybe a little lime. No lemon yet, not until they're married. XD
On with the fic!
Victoria, being the early riser she was, was the first to awake on the monster-less shore of Lake Hylia.
Her red hair was mussed, and stuck out at various angles from all her tossing and turning that night, but still somehow looked beautiful. She began to remember the events that had occurred yesterday and wondered if they had happened at all, but found the energy of her staff burning brightly in her magical core, and the warm presence of a body lying next to hers.
To her relief, it was Shadow.
He was still asleep, and looking years younger than he was (and quite possibly a decade or so younger than he felt) with his mouth open and drooling. Victoria couldn't help but giggle.
The sound, reaching his ears, caused it to twitch, and gradually but quickly he began to awaken.
At first, he simply blinked as she stared, trying to cover up her dimpled cheeks and silent laughter, but then realized exactly what she was staring and laughing at, and wiped it away with a jolt.
"Good morning, Shadow," she said, the laughter still lingering in her voice.
He scoffed, very lightly and almost like a laugh, and shook his head. "You weren't supposed to see that." Then the blush crept into his cheeks that started to show even through his dark complexion.
"I don't mind," she said, moving in closer, their noses almost touching, "I think it looks cute." Shadow blinked, suddenly aware of how close she was. He could smell her breath – hardly like morning breath at all – blasting sweetly in his face, and the remnants of the perfume she'd put on days ago (probably the day he'd first kissed her, which, when he thought about it, was only just two days ago, if he wasn't mistaken) still lingering. It complimented the faint mint of the air with its faint lilac and lemons, and of course, the ashy smell of her fiery hair.
It was completely intoxicating.
He moved in for a kiss, first just because it was the first thing that came to mind, but then he felt he needed more.
The kiss was long and heated, and they only broke apart for air, only to start again. This went on until he found himself reaching for the clasp of her tunic, but he stopped and moved away, breathing heavily. Victoria seemed confused at why he'd stopped.
"Something wrong?" she asked him. He shook his head.
"Hardly. It's all too perfect. I would keep on, but I can't do that to you." He sighed. "You know what I mean don't you?" She was surprised; he'd actually remembered that part of her still had the mentality of a ten-year-old.
But she did know what he meant.
"Yes," she replied breathlessly, "I'm not that dull. I knew I had to, ah educate myself on certain things." Finally catching her breath, she frowned and murmured, "Especially before that time of the month." A wry smile graced her lips. "If you know what I mean."
Shadow scoffed nodding. "But I can't do that to you. One it would be your first, and two, I believe taking that first belongs to whoever chooses to marry you. Even if it is me, I'd still…"
She nodded. "I get it. But it doesn't mean I can't please you."
Mentally, she wondered at the limits of her audacity. Did she know what she was saying? Of course she did, or she wouldn't have said it.
A seductive, sexy grin widened from ear to ear that sent shivers down his spine. "B-But please, not here," he stuttered, surprised to see her like this, "not with Link so close to waking."
She turned to look. He showed no signs of doing so.
"I doubt anything except cursing at him and a good dose of sunlight in his eyes would do anything for him. He'd sleep through a earthquake for Din's sake, don't you know?" Shadow smiled fondly, his initial feelings forgotten. "Perhaps, but I meant what I said. Not here, not now. Later, perhaps."
The smile dimmed to a wry smirk as he sifted his fingers through her feather-light hair.
She was slightly disappointed, but she knew what he was getting at. Her innocence was a one time only sort of thing, and if her father knew she was so close to him now… she shuddered to think of the things he'd say. But she knew they were right. Was this love, or whatever it was at the moment, was it really going to last? She did indeed feel something for him, but hadn't anything to really back up that claim.
"I wish I could prove it," she whispered, the words soft and barely a thought on her lips. Shadow heard her and asked her what she said. She jumped slightly, shaking her head and insisting it was nothing.
By now the sun had fully risen, and Link was awake.
"Can't that dammed sun get up later? Ugh." Link sat up, still sleepy and tired, but had gotten a good bit of sleep as far as she could tell.
"Afraid not. We have to get moving anyway. Gannondorf will not stop for anything, especially not to let us rest. The next temple is actually behind Kakariko's graveyard, so if we want to get moving, we need to do it soon." Shadow was serious, Link could tell. But there didn't seem to be any pain on his face; perhaps it was because he had left Gannondorf behind.
"I think we should get something to eat first. Fainting from nothing to eat is sure to be a bad thing, especially in a temple. And, I do not want to be felled by such a small thing as hunger!" Link's lips turned upwards into a grin, a laugh threatening to fly past them.
Shadow shook his head, but saw his point.
"Let's go to Kakariko's bar," Victoria piped, "It's my week off, but I can still get us a discount."
So they all packed their things (stuffing most of it in Link's hat, the bottomless pit that it was) and kept only the belongings that really mattered on them. Victoria's staff was stored safely away in the magical space-between-spaces where her core resided, but she was given Link's former slingshot, very small on his adult hands, but just big enough for hers, adult or not. She always had rather small hands.
"I'd rather have a bow, though," she said as they traveled across Hyrule Field, "this slingshot feels to much like a child's toy in my hands now. Hopefully there's one in my father's house."
Shadow had his master sword copy, and the Hookshot, for he'd returned the Longshot to Link. The Hookshot was tethered loosely to a loop in his belt for easy access, but strong enough to not fall during battle. Link had only his green clothing, sword, and hat, in which he kept everything else.
Traveling light was crucial if they were to stay on the run from Gannondorf's forces.
But by the time they'd made it to Lon Lon Ranch, Victoria's new, sharp magical senses picked up on a dark force beyond the river. Focusing on its location, she found it to be near Kakariko, or rather, deep below it. It was a powerful force. It tasted dark, evil, and ancient. And it was being let loose.
"We have to hurry," she said simply, urgency behind her voice, "something's wrong." She shook her head, her eyes beginning to cloud over as she searched the power further. "Kakariko's in trouble."
"What, already?" Shadow asked incredulously, "It can't be…"
But Link could sense it too, his very faint magical core picking up on it now. He looked back at Victoria as her eyes snapped back into focus, recoiling in pain. She had delved too much, and the ancient force and pushed her back into herself. There were remnants of an ancient magic lingering on the creature (that's what she felt it was just before her mind had returned to her) a magic she felt burning deep inside herself. Sheikah magic.
Link broke into a run, and Shadow followed, but Victoria, now smelling and seeing smoke rising from over the cliffs of the gorge Kakariko rested in, ran faster, ahead of them, ignoring their calls.
Memories of the flames that had taken her life from her came rushing back, fueling her desperate need to run. She couldn't stand by and let it burn; not this time. She flew past the gate and the townspeople fleeing and calling after her. She didn't listen to them. Her instinct was to help seal the monster that was about to break free. She had no choice.
Stop! A voice called. You must stop! This is beyond you!
And she did; violently and suddenly she dug her boots' heels into the earth.
There stood Sheik whom she had remembered from the day earlier. "What is happening?" She asked anxiously, finding that her voice had not been lost to the memories that were still plaguing her head, pulling back her fears and suddenly making her feel every bit of the child she still was.
"The monster sealed in the well is breaking free, Princess," he said, "Impa tried to stop it, but it's no use."
"Then why are you here?" Silence. "Because I have to be. The Hero approaches." He said this calmly, but then stood back, a feeling of panic seizing him. He spun around and shouted, "Come no closer! Princess, get back!" Shadow and Link stopped in their tracks, but Victoria couldn't move. The vile creature blew the off the well's top, the planks burying themselves into the burning wreckages that blazed around them.
It came out, slowly, and immobilizing everything it saw as food. She could feel its primitive creature mind seek her out, but sensing her magical core, saw her as an enemy, not as prey. So it attacked her.
Almost a second too late, she summoned her staff and groped for a last minute shield. The creature, seemingly visible to only her eyes, slammed into it, knocking her down, but not harming her. Immediately she lost control of the shield and most of her consciousness. The last thing she saw was Sheik being picked up and thrown past her field of vision. Then she blacked out.
Shadow dove to catch Sheik, but managed to simply cushion his fall with his own body, while Link unsheathed his sword, searching for the enemy. He could feel it moving, thinking, hunting him, and then, at the last second, pouncing. It picked him up and threw him in the direction of the well before it decided to head for the graveyard. Shadow, unable to doing anything but watch, looked on as Sheik slowly crawled off of him.
"Forgive me," the Sheikah murmured, still slightly winded. Shadow sat up and coughed the stiffness from his lungs. "No problem. I wouldn't like to do that again though." Sheik nodded. "Likewise."
Shadow didn't trust his legs to carry him over to Victoria, so he crawled over to her, expecting the worst. He sighed once he saw her, reassured there was nothing wrong. Sheik, however, had trusted his legs to stand, and was behind him. "She summoned a shield just in time. It was fairly weak, but it kept her from sustaining damage. The hero, on the other hand…"
Sheik ran toward the place where Link lay. Shadow frowned, having detected a hint of fear in the Sheikah's voice, and was puzzled by it. What did the disappearing trained assassin have on his friend? He shook his head. For the first time, he began to suspect that Sheik was not who he said he was, but he would have to hold his tongue. He picked up Victoria, who was lighter than he expected, in his arms, and hurried to Link and Sheik.
Sheik was crouching by Link, who was just now coming to.
"Ugh. What was that? Came out of nowhere…"
"An evil shadow spirit," the Sheikah answered, "it has broken free of the bindings that kept it here for so long." Victoria had awoken and Shadow helped her back down on her feet.
"It's very old from what I felt earlier. And isn't really evil, just… possessed." She smirked, obviously knowing what she was talking about. "Ironic that a spirit is possessed by another." She shook her head. "It's been that way for a while. Perhaps the other spirit could've been saved, once, but they're too far bound to one another."
Link stood up now, setting his head in his right hand, leaning on a brick wall for support. "But I couldn't see it… why? I could definitely tell what it was thinking, though." At this, Victoria frowned. "I think only Sheikah can, because we're illusionists. And what are spirits but living, or rather, former living illusions?" Shadow was silent. He had been able to see it too. Was he of Sheikah lineage? It was entirely possible, since he knew neither of his birth parents.
"You're right," Sheik confirmed, "but there is a more pressing matter at hand. Impa has gone to the temple to try and seal it up again, but this time the monster's power will be too great." Sheik seemed to be holding in something, an emotion. Impa was a Sheikah too, she reasoned. Perhaps he felt connected to Impa, and was very close to her.
"Even as a sage, she will no longer have the chance she once had against it, when she sealed it the first time. I think one of you knows the way there, to the Temple, but you will need a method of getting there. Hero, can you stand?"
Link groaned and mumbled something about hating being called that. Victoria could sense a wry smile forming beneath the Sheikah's cowl, and a similar smile formed on her own face.
"Yes. I assume this is another melody?" Sheik nodded. "Yes, Hero. This is the melody that will draw you into infinite darkness that absorbs even time…" Victoria thought of her mother then, for a reason she could not comprehend. Time was inferior to the shadow… and as she was lost in her thoughts, Sheik pulled out a harp and spoke again.
"Listen to this, the Nocturne of Shadow."
Sheik played it to him once, a cascading of beautiful colors, and Link played it back in flawless perfection. Then the music took them away, Link playing the melody and Sheik harmonizing. The music brought Victoria back to reality, though it had an opposite effect on Shadow.
He remembered playing those notes to the shadows, once, on the violin that he'd been given on his eighth birthday. How happy they were. It was because of this song. Only when it ended did the memory end. Shadow touched his face gently and found a few tears trailing down his face. He brushed them away, but Victoria saw them. She took his wrist, and looked into his eyes, asking the silent question.
Silently, he replied back, caressing her cheek with his other hand.
And, to top it off, as the song began to wind down, rain began to fall. Shadow looked down at Victoria, eyebrows raised.
"Your doing?" he asked, curious. She shook her head. "No. But I'm thankful for it though." Shadow thought for a moment and remembered her fire. His limited magical knowledge told him that it was possible to use all of the elements (except shadow if it wasn't the first one you practiced) but it was often difficult and could even cause discomfort.
"Could you have done it anyway? The rain, I mean." She looked around for a moment, her eyes spotting her staff. She picked it up and set it again inside her magical core.
"Perhaps. But because my specialty is fire, it wouldn't have been very strong." The words left her lips absentmindedly, as if she were listening to someone speaking and relaying the message back to him. All he could do was turn around to Link as Sheik spoke a little more.
"Let me take care of the village. You go on to the Shadow Temple and defeat the monster within!" And with that and the snap of a Deku Nut he was gone.
They stood there for a moment in silence, the rain beating down the flames to little more than simmers. Looking around, Victoria could see that no real damage had been done, and felt relieved. Roofs were a little charred, and grasses were obviously very burnt, but nothing major. Link turned to them after some moments.
"As much as I'd like to play the Nocturne now and get it over with, I feel that I'm not prepared. The fact that I can't see illusions also unnerves me." He paused, the question she was sure he wanted to ask poised silently in the air.
"There is a way," Victoria said, remembering a story her father told her once, "beneath the well. I don't think you could reach it now, though. Perhaps," she drawled, trailing off, "perhaps in the past?" Link looked around for his sword, finding it embedded in what used to be the top of the well. "Sheik said the sword has the power to take me back. But if I do go back, what is it I'm looking for?"
"It's called the Eye of Truth. It reveals the truth behind the illusions people other than Sheikah cannot see. Though if you choose to go…" she eyed the Master Sword warily, "you will be on your own. You're all right with that?" He nodded. "I have to be. I need that Eye if I'm going to make it out of the Temple alive, even with your help. Don't want to be falling into some pit that will be the death of me, you know. That would kind of be bad."
She nodded seeing his point. "Shadow and I will help the townspeople get settled again. You go on and get the Eye. Oh, and you have to lower the level of water in the well, if it hasn't been already. You won't be able to get in otherwise." Link nodded, pulled out his sword, and left, headed for the Temple of Time.
Shadow and Victoria spent the majority of their day doing just that, cleaning up roofs and sweeping the dead grasses into the wheat shearer's boxes, which he'd later cut and wrap up the pieces long enough to be used as horse feed, and bag up the smaller grasses for the cows. After they were practically ordered to stop and go eat by the kind woman who occupied the village leader's home (Victoria later learned her name was Anju) the pair found themselves being served hot glazed ham and biscuits by Victoria's boss.
"Free of charge, the both of yeh, one being you two helped out so much an' all and two cause yer such a loyal worker an' all." Victoria smiled and nodded, saying a quick thank you before attacking her meal. It was dinnertime by now, and they hadn't eaten anything in quite some time.
Shadow took his time with his meal, savoring the taste and the texture of the meat on his tongue and between his teeth as he chewed. He'd only eaten fish ever since he'd run away from Gannondorf's castle, and so the ham was a welcome luxury. The biscuits, too, were savored, though more so the honey that he watched Victoria drench hers in, a childlike gleam in her eye.
"Part of you still a child, huh?" He said this softly, but with a hint of laughter in his voice. Victoria just smiled and laughed, the sound muffled by the biscuits stuffed in her cheeks. Shadow leaned in closer and licked a bit of honey she'd missed, sitting poised in the crook of her mouth, surprising her.
She swallowed quickly, shivering from the feelings the action had sent down her spine.
"Perhaps we should go elsewhere?" she asked breathlessly, staring into his strange color-shifting eyes. Shadow, remembering what she'd asked him earlier, nodded, and called for the bartender. "I think we're done," he said, "and we'd like to retire for the night." Her boss smiled and picked up the plates, the two of them walking slowly up to her father's house.
She'd spent part of the day doing so dusting inside, to make it a bit livable if they ever needed a place to recover, so her parents' bedroom was virtually dust free.
"I'd take us to my room, but the bed in there's fitted for a child. Interesting as that might be, I'd prefer something a little more accommodating."
He didn't even have to be surprised at her expression, and since he knew they'd be alone, he didn't bother closing the door.
He kissed her with a passion as they made their way to the four-poster cotton-sheeted bed. By the time they'd fallen into its welcome softness, their boots were off, and equipment had thudded to the floor. Shadow's hat and shirt had disappeared, though Victoria was still in most of her Zora's tunic.
"I told you," he whispered huskily, lust undeniable in his voice now, "I will not take you. Not tonight, not until we marry. If we marry." She nodded, breathing rapid and needy. She brought him down into a fiery kiss, their magics running hot in their veins. "I know. Tonight is about you." She let her hands travel down his chest, well toned from years in the desert sun and well muscled from combat training. She traced the lines of the scars on his back, becoming sad for a few moments before he took her wrists and brought her hand back to his chest.
"Forget them. That part of my life is gone. Until we face him again, worry about me not." Her resolve set aflame once more, she began to kiss up and down his jaw line, turning him so that he was beneath her and easier to reach.
The hot, searing kisses and her hands as they traveled, ghosting his nipples, making them taut and sensitive were making Shadow writhe and wonder how she even knew how to make him feel like this.
"Goddesses," he whispered, "how do you know to do all this? Please tell me you haven't done this before."
She smirked. "Of course not, but I did experiment a few times on myself. After I educated myself, I was curious. So, well, you know what happened. You've probably done it before." To tell the truth, he had. As hormones had taken him during the early stages of puberty, there were times when the discomfort he was feeling was too much.
"A few times. I can see why you'd be so curious." Another smirk. She pulled away from his kiss-bruised face and moved to his right nipple, the saliva sending his nerves into a skyrocket of stars. By now his pants were getting far too tight, but at least Victoria had noticed.
"Excited already? I was hoping to draw this out more."
"I'll walk you through it," he said, gasping, "Unless you'd rather just use your hands?" She stopped for a moment. Obviously she hadn't thought this far. "We can stop. I can go to the bathroom and–" "Shh!"
She held a finger to his lips. "No. I will see this through."
Shadow never could remember ever feeling what she'd made him feel that night. And as they lay in new, clean sheets, and he clad in a new pair of pants, he didn't think he'd ever forget that particular night, either.
I said lime didn't I? Yes. Nothing really graphic, but it was implied, I suppose. Does that make it an, 'M' rating? You decide, because I'm having difficulty discerning the line between 'T' and 'M' with such subtlety involved.
I do hope you liked it, though. And though she's still a child in many ways, her mentality is fast changing. So perhaps her need for him can be justified under a similar rule. I hoped to balance her need with Shadow's reluctance to take her innocence and his value of it, not taking it before marriage (he's very old fashioned, Shadow is, because you know, Ganon did love him at one point and taught him good foundations, and I guess they stuck) and all that good stuff. He also cares about how others might see her if they did have relations with one another before marriage and that, I think is something else that balances it, even if it's more implied than outright said.
With all that covered, I would appreciate a review or so. You don't have to, it would just you know, be nice to get one. :)