Disclaimer: I don´t own Legend of Zelda Twilight Princess.
Can you imagine how happy I was when I found out that I got my first 4 reviews on the first chapter? I really dance in the street. But I might have awoken the whole neighborhood in my euphoria.
Thank you so very much: anon, marylizashrubs and LLink!
And special thanks to MisaChan89 for posting the first review on this story and giving me my first review ever!
So I´ll now begin with Chapter 2! (I even took notes in History Class for it!...Not that I missed anything important. My teacher has the tendency to rample on a topic for hours, while others would only need 5 minutes.)
Chapter 2 Oh! The Joys of Pregnancy!
The council members had taken it quite well, although it sounded quite unbelievable. I guess I wouldn't have believed myself, either. But with the whole crazy stuff going on, the council believed me and I was reinstated as the righful ruler of Twilight. And with that came the ceremony. O the joy, bless the dude who came up with this stupid traditions.
To let the nobles and commoners know that their princess is back. Kenad had argued.
Yeah. Now I sat here to supervise the preparations for the ceremony. To make sure I was pleased with the results. What goatshit! Why did I have to oversee the preparations for my celebration. I had better things to do, like... sitting in my room and brooding. Good one, Midna. Oh well might just do it right here. Who knew it could be slightly more interesting than sitting in my room alone.
Sighing I watched the buzzing activity in the throne room. My throne room. I reminded myself. It hadn't changed much since Zant ascended the throne. The same old blueish-grey walls with the same old turquoise shining runes. The same dusty old, dark cloths "adorning" the walls. Even the ancient huge useless fake-candelabrum hanging from the ceiling was still there. The same old lightstones were hidden in the ceiling to illuminate the room in the same old way it was done centuries ago. The floor shimmered as if someone poured oil onto black water. Obsidian. The Princess remarked. Obsidian refined with crystal-threats. One of... Anyway the obsidian floor was being polished beyond recognition. By now it could easily be used as a dinner plate for a noble family ... but nobles don´t eat on the floor. The Princess piped in. No not the usual noble but I had already eaten on the floor and not on such a spick and span obsidian floor, but on the dirty ground.
And I had enjoyed it, every single second of it. Even if i I hadn't admitted it. At first I thought it was kind of dirty to sit on the ground, but eating there had its charm. In coparism to eating flavourless food in fancy dining rooms with the company of silent Twil, eating crunchy bread with goat-cheese or grilled fish on the ground with Link was awesome! I stopped my train of thought and shook my head. You decided to forget him. You will never see him again. You will never talk to him again. You will never touch him again, never feel his rough skin rubbing against yours, never feel his soft, unruly hair. Never again will your lips meet, never... I felt unshed tears burning behind my eyelids and quickly supressed the longing.
Not here. Not in front of half the royal household. You know how fast their gossiping network is! You don't want to embarass youself. Concentrate Midna. You won't cry. I reprimanded myself. To ease the headarche I began rubbing my temples.
"Your highness? Is anything displeasing you?" A dwarfish, plump servant asked. "If there is anything we could to for you it would be our pleasure to honor your wishes."
Abruptly I stopped rubbing my temples and slowly rose from my seat. Something inside my head cracked and with wild gestures I screeched: "No! It´s alright! Everything is alright! The hell not! Let me begin with the room. This whole room is so something more... colourful hurt anyone? Some red here, some yellow there. Why not paint this whole grey cave orange? And what's with these dusty rags there on the wall? Who wants to even look at these, yet alone stare at them every single day! Why do they actually hang here?"
The Twili in front of me had already covered his head with his arms and shuddered heavily. Everyone was frozen on the spot whatever activity they had been doing. "I asked you a question!" I screamed in my rage.
"The-the-he-hese we-r-r-re pa-pa-passed down in the-he-he royal fam-ily fo-hor cen-tu-tu-turies. A hei-rloom fro-from your ance-cestors." He answered in stutters. How could it be so hard to just formulate a normal sentence?
"Sorry. I couldn't quite get that. Would you mind to repeat what you have just said?"
The dwarf took in some breath to calm himself and squeked: "These were passed down in the royal family for centuries. A heirloom from your ancestors."
"Interesting." I admitted. "May I enquire your name?"
"Zwrop" He risked a glance in my direction.
With a wide grin I brought my face towards his. "And why, dear Zworp, would I care? They are all dead! They won't die again, if these tatters were exchanged for something new, right?"
Everyone nodded. "Good. While we at it. Would anyone mind getting this useless candelabrum out of my sight? Thank you all very much! And who cleaned the floor so much that I'm blinded by it? If you want to make this room brighter you shouldn't polish the floor but rather let some light from the sols through the windows! We already have so little to begin with, why would be shut it out?"
Zworp raised a finger like a little child waiting for aprove to speak.
"Yes? What is it?"
"The light from the sols is already used for the crops. However, if you insist we could possibly let some of it in, so..."
Right. This wasn´t the Light World. This was the Twilight Realm and it was without sunlight. There were only the sols and everyone needed their light for food. I wanted to feel light again. Wanted to be in the Light World again. Wanted to be with Link again. I wanted my light back.
The pain came back and I felt the tears trying to escape my eyes again.
Not here.
You already made a fool of yourself. You are supposed to be a princess.
Stop.
"Please excuse me and my childish behavior from before. Do continue, everything is fine. Forget what I just said, I'm not myself today. I'll leave in your able hands since I have some unfinished business to attend to." With that I stroaded out of the room to find a spot, where I could cry alone.
The throne room was after my mental breakdown in-recognisable. The servants did a great job, even though I told them to ignore my wishes. Perhaps they had also thought the room needed a new touch. The rags had been replaced by lighter coloured new banners. The candelabrum was finally removed and the room didn't seem as depressing as it was before.
Zworp stood fidgeting in a corner and nervously awaited my reaction.
Smiling brightly I commended: "This is very good. Bye bye, depressing atmosphere! Hello new throne room! Everyone of you did a great job. Thank you, all!"
Zworp seemed a bit taken aback by my gratitude. It was not common that higher ups thanked the servants for something they ordered them to do. This was habit I picked up in the light world. People preferred serving someone who was nice to them than serving someone that wouldn't even want to breath the same air as a commoner.
"Right. Sir Kenad informed me that dinner shall be served in ten minutes in the second dining room. It would be a great honor for me to escort you there." Zworp offered while twirling his fingers behind his back.
Second dining room? Where was that again? With its thousands of rooms and ten dining rooms the palace was hard to navigate in especially if one hadn't been here for more than six month. And I wouldn't mind the company.
"That would be very nice. I don't mind company. So shall we go?" I asked and turned to the exit.
Nodding Zworp opened the door for me and we went to dining room number two.
The second dining room did not really differ from the former throne room. The same spectrum of colours, the same depressing atmosphere. Of course it didn't look similar. This was a dining room, not the throne room, so there were some differences, like the long, sleek table that was in the centre of the room. About thirty chairs stood around the table, most were already occupied with elected nobles. I knew few, all of them knew me. Therefore everyone went silent when I entered the room. Not until I sat down in the fanciest chair, the talks were resumed.
The seat next to me was already occupied. The Twili was a tall, slender woman I recognised: Lady Dima. I knew her from several encounters on exquisite parties. She wasn't a friend of mine, but I got along with her. And that was quite rare, since in my earlier days as princess I wasn't the easiest person to get along with. She had a similar sense of humor and on these parties we used to laugh about the most ridiculous garments. Usually to the richest had the most ridiculous fashion sense.
"Good evening Princess. It has been a long time, hasn't it?" Lady Dima started the conversation and turned toward me with an interested look.
"Yes indeed, Lady Dima. Since Zant's reign I have had my hands full. It's a shame we haven't even heard of each other." I said while leaning back into my chair.
"It would have made my day brighter if I had heard from you Princess."
Sure. And what's with everyone calling me princess? I have a name. I thought.
"Just Midna, please." I corrected her.
"As you wish, Lady Midna. So how are you?" she asked me in a friendly tone.
"I've been better. Fighing against Zant and Ganondorf and rebuilding the Twilight Realm has really taken its toll on me. I wish I got a hiatus or something like that. It's been ages since I've relaxed. Lately I have been feeling more and more exhausted. But enough of me, how are you?"
"Everyone is feeling slightly uneasy, but otherwise everything is fine. Recently, my husband bought a leisure residence near the west shore of Lake Twilia. It's not very pompous, but comfortable and cute. We thought that it might relieve some stress to go there for some time. Perhaps you should go to Lake Twilia, too. They say it's the most relaxing place there is in Twilight! I heard that the royal family already has a residence there. I think you should go, if you are feeling so stressed." I could see it was a honest suggestion.
"That´s a wonderful idea, but the kingdom needs me right now. I can take a break, when everything has calmed down."
For the next minutes we continued our chat, while the dining room was slowly filled with nobles. The other seat next to me was taken by Kenad. He was discussing the costs of rebuilding the mountain passages with the head of the leading building company of the whole Twilight Realm.
Then the servants carried viands and placed them before the nobles: exquisite fish extremely hard to fish out of lake Twilia, various small birds and little fruits from the planes, a traditional soup of the mountain tribes. There even was whine. For a meal in the Twilight Realm this was a gigantic feast. Because of the lack of sunlight crops didn't grow as fast, big and delicious as in Hyrule. And whine was rare. Grapes needed so much sunlight, that it was nearly impossible to grow them. But a famous scientist found out, that a special kind of magic had the same effect on plants as sunlight. Because of this discovery the agricultre had boomed. The speed and growth had increased by 50% and finally grapes could be used for whine. A small percentage that is.
But an exquisite meal in the Twilight Realm wouldn't even be good enough for commoners in Hyule. Crops here didn't seem to have any taste if you were used to rich flavours. The first time I ate a simple piece of bread there, I was overwhelmed. If you ate something in Hyrule you didn't eat it because otherwise you would starve, but because you could enjoy eating. A mindset that would never exist in the Twilight Realm. Here you either ate or you would starve. Good food was far too expensive to eat everyday, even the royal family couldn't afford something like this everyday. To cut to the chase: Food from Hyrule was heaven for any Twili. For nearly half of the last year I ate this food and I got used to the full taste. So I didn't really look forward to eating this stuff, while everyone else in the room was staring hungrily at the food. Why me?
But I found myself quite hungry the whole day and something inside me told me I needed to eat much. To eat? Or not to eat? What a troblesome question...
This entire time I was so much in thought that I didn't notice the expectant looks of the nobles until Lady Dima nudged me. I was expected to inauguate the meal.
Quickly I rose... "Oh. Thank you all for turning up... eh coming here. You can begin to eat." ... and quickly sat down again.
The most promise showed the fish. So it was the first thing I took. As exspected it tasted like nothing at all, but at least it was eatable. Lady Dima and Kenad seemed thrilled about it, so it had to be really good... for a Twili´s toungue- a Twili´s toungue that never ever tasted light food before. Ergo everyone except poor me.
I pretended I was eating some really awesome fish from Hyule like the famous and rare Hylian Loach. With enough imagination I should have been able to boost up the taste enormously. But the positive effect didn't come, and on top of that I now wanted some Hylian Loach. I craved for a soft bread filled with Hylian Loach, or a slice of goat cheese, or carrot salad with strawberries and milk... wait where did that come from? Carrot salad with strawberries and milk? The longer I pondered this thought the more appealing it became to me. Carrot salad with strawberries and milk, why hadn't anyone tied this, yet?
Lost in my thoughts I didn't notice I finished the fish, ate another piece of it, two birds and three plates of the soup.
The next morning I found myself kneeling over the toilet.
When I had woken up I felt suddenly as if I had eaten tons of spoiled fruits. Every wave of nausea brought another wave of undigested food about. In the end was was exhausted, the toilet looked as if it hadn't been cleaned for years. Finally, I laughed, the food had found its righful place: the toiled! But the feelings of triumph against the nasty food were short-lived. My limbs felt like jelly-go and my whole body felt very cold.
Exhausted I leaned against the wall. Why did this happen? I certainly hadn't eaten spoiled food, because food was thoroughly checked before it was served to nobles and the royal family.
Maybe I got ill? But Twili usually didn't get sick and the chance was even more slim with Twili that used magic as much as I did. Me being sick was simply not possible. Was it because part in me had light magic? Was this a side effect of Twili magic merging with magic of the light? Not once had there been anyone with both types combined inside them. But if this was really a side effect of being partly light, why hadn't I felt this sick when Zelda gave me part of her life?
Question and questions and no answer was in sight. My head calculated different possibilities only to come up with another bunch of questions. I won't solve it now. I'd better clean this mess up, before someone sees this and worries. I thought while I began channeling magic to get the whole puke into the toilet to flush it away.
Thoughtful I regarded the grayish mud swirling and being compressed by the flush mechanism and then finally disappearing.
There is it.
Midna´s showing the first signs of pregnancy!
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