The Waters of Nayru
Chapter 15: Nayru's Chalice
By, Frank Hunter

For a moment, it was all the kids could do to stand there with their mouths wide open. It was a veritable sea of gold and light, and it was theirs to take. It was wealth and prosperity and success. It was Rigo's kingship, his crown, in all its splendor, and the promise that everything would be alright.

"I don't know what I was expecting," Amili said. "But it wasn't anything like this."

Rigo smiled. "I don't think we'll be able to get it all on the camel."

Amili laughed a nervous laugh.

They took small steps into the vault. Neither of them had any idea where to start. What would be the most valuable items to base their rebuilt religion on? How to even choose? Eventually, they both just began pulling together small, ornate pieces that would be somewhat manageable on their ride home. Deep on one of the shelves, Rigo found a violet sack made of plush, soft velvet, and lined with the delicate fur of some creature he had never before seen or even imagined. The only animals they kept at the pueblo were those adapted to the harsh desert climate, and such fur would be impractical in the desert.

They decided that they would fill this sack with as much treasure as it could comfortably hold, and while it was still movable, they would call it quits. They set it down beside the lift and began to add to it.

Amili had a great deal of fun with the task. She went about the room selecting the pieces she wanted to contribute with a particularly discriminating eye. She came back with a silver candelabra inset with large, perfectly shaped diamonds. She came back with sleak gems and jewelry. There was a ring that was more emerald than gold. She marveled at each piece before dropping it in the sack. Rigo would have thought she was shopping the marketplace for herself.

He, on the other hand, became distracted with something he wanted for himself: a sword and shield that put his old gear to shame. The sword was of fine gold and brown leather, wrapped smartly around the handle. The flawless steel blade curved sharply into the shape of a "C" and was engraved with gold and silver filigree, as was the more intricately decorated crossguard. The shield was hard as stone but light as air, made of mythril, or so Rigo suspected. It was adorned with the orange emblem of a setting sun that he did not recognize.

When he showed these pieces to Amili, she responded skeptically. "I'm not sure we should be keeping any of this for ourselves."

"It's just this practical stuff!" Rigo protested. "It's better than the old ones, easier to use too. We could still run into trouble out here. It'd be good to have stronger gear!"

Amili wasn't convinced, but she didn't press the issue, and instead continued looking for new pieces to serve their original purpose. Rigo was like a child who had just gotten a new toy. He pulled his sword, swinging and flourishing around the room. It was balanced so precisely, so comfortably, that he wished there would be more skeletons to try it on.

Having fun, are we? Nabooru asked.

Oh, heck yeah! Rigo answered earnestly, and even the impatient spirit seemed somewhat bemused by his childish giddiness.

You'll want to tighten your grip at the thumb and forefinger. Control there will allow you to twist your wrist as you want to. It's good for showing off, which seems to be your only strong suit anyway.

Rigo took her advice, and soon was making windmills and figure-8's across his body. He laughed out loud. After a few moments, Amili peeked in on him from around a corner.

"Think you can get back to work, or am I the only one taking this seriously?" she asked with her hands on her hips.

He gave the sword a few more arcs for good measure before returning it to its scabbard and fastening it to his belt. "Yeah yeah," he said as he did. "Just having a little bit of…"

The word "fun" got stuck in Rigo's throat as he looked up from the scabbard and saw something else that entirely took his breath away.

Sitting atop one of the shelves before him, in a pile of relatively unremarkable pieces of tableware and jewelry, was a single cup. This cup, this chalice, was a piece completely unlike any of the others. All of the treasure was beautiful, make no mistake, but this piece…this piece was attractive. It called to Rigo in a way nothing, not even his new sword, could have done. It was supernatural.

The chalice was crafted from something akin to silver, but it was shinier, more lustrous than any metal Rigo had ever seen at the pueblo. It seemed to generate its own light instead of merely reflecting, glowing from where it stood. The metal was carved with scenery and artwork that seemed to be taken from the Hylian legends of creation. Rigo recognized the three Hylian goddesses, and the legendary triangles set in as part of the design. But he didn't let these symbols offend him. He couldn't, it wasn't possible in light of the chalice's magnificence.

Inset into opposite sides of the body was a decorative emblem comprised of three pentagonal sapphires inset into a golden crest. The sapphires were the color of water and the light inside seemed to ripple and sway, as though the gems were in fact made of liquid. The cup appeared to be alive, moving and singing, and Rigo could only marvel.

"Amili!" he called, and his voice got caught in his throat. "Ami, come look at this!"

She strolled back around the corner a moment later with somesort of golden chain in hand. "What is it?" she asked, and followed his eyes to the shelf. Then, she saw it. "Oh…" she said, before becoming entranced as well.

"It's…it's gorgeous," Amili said.

"We need it," Rigo said.

"Huh?" asked Amili, distracted.

"That's the piece we need to start our new temple. There's something about it. You can hear the Sand Goddess in it. Can't you?"

Amili nodded slowly. "Uh huh." She took one step forward, reached up, and lifted the chalice from its shelf with all the reverence she could muster. She turned it over in her hand, admiring the artwork and adornments with her full, rapt attention. "It's…warm," she said.

Rigo stepped up to her. "Is there anything inside it?"

Amili shook her head. "No."

"I love it," Rigo said simply.

"I think…you're supposed to," Amili answered, without really knowing what she meant. But she took the chalice, went back to the lift, and placed it in the sack.

The kids finished gathering a few more pieces for their collection, but their interest in the chore had waned. Nothing else in the room matched the chalice in its splendor, and each of them made a point, each time they went to place something else in the bag, to open it wide enough so they could have another look. The only thing that brought them slightly back to reality was when Amili found a length of thick, tensile rope on the ground beside a pile of loot. The rope, made of white and gold threads woven together into a magnificent ivory pattern, was a godsend.

"We can use this to climb back down to the main floor. And we can lower the bag down too," Amili said, with visible relief.

"Oh, that's great," Rigo agreed. "To tell you the truth, I didn't know how we were doing that. I figured we were just gonna throw all this stuff over the side."

The kids both laughed about it, grateful that a solution to their problem had presented itself. It wasn't long before they decided the sack had reached its maximum weight, and that they were tired and ready to make for camp. They had spent several hours in the temple at this point, exerting energy and not taking any water. It was time to call it quits.

The lift functioned to return them to the higher floors. They then trudged along, back to where they had come from, Rigo taking responsibility for the heavy sack.

They tied off the rope on the spiral rail, and were able to make it close enough to the bottom that they could untie the bag, dropping it the rest of the way, and jump off themselves. Amili had a bit of a hard time with this, her wounded arm still causing some pain, but she managed and before long both were on their way back to the entrance over the makeshift bridges they had built earlier.

"We're gonna have to find that river tomorrow morning," Amili said. "Refill our water skins before we start back. I think we might still have enough meat for the trip though, if we ration it out."

"I am so sick and tired of pork," Rigo whined.

"Yeah, well, if you see a chicken or a goat or something along the way, will you let me know?"

They climbed the stairwell out into the waning daylight in good spirits, the return journey clear in their minds. They both thought of the success and happiness they would get upon returning home, and the cozy, starlit nights they would share on the way there. All in all, this adventure had turned out better than either of them could have hoped.

But as they crested that final staircase, it suddenly became clear that their streak of good luck had finally, and tragically, worn out.

They stepped out into the sunset, and the sight they expected would greet them, that of their camel and their simple campsite and the abandoned ruins beyond, wasn't there. What they saw instead was an army of thirty Gerudo warriors lined up around the entryway. Most of them had longbows trained on them the instant they stumbled out into the light.

Rigo and Amili stopped, shocked and disbelieving. They'd been followed? How was it possible? They'd been so careful, at least, Rigo thought they had. He'd lit no fires before finding the oasis, made sure they'd followed Pureet's instructions to the letter.

He saw her then, standing behind the archers. Pureet stood tall over the archers, the expression on her face torn and devastated. Beside her, stood another, smaller woman, the one who must have been responsible.

The other figure was dressed in a tunic of ceremonial white. Her hair was decorated with matching white silk, and her eyes and forehead adorned by a delicate and intricate golden tiara and facemask, inset with lines of red rubies and garnets. Behind the mask, the eyes burned a hole through Rigo, lit by the fire of their amusement and arrogance and general air of superiority. Though the tiara hid the other details of her face, Rigo knew who she was. The mask and garb were, after all, the mantle of the Stewardess of Gerudo. There could therefore only be one person underneath.

"Sooru," he growled.