I am sorry I didn't post this earlier, I had other things that came up, but I got posted now though. Anyway, here is chapter nine.
As usual, I don't own Legend of Zelda or the Percy Jackson universe.
Chapter Nine
We've Been Discovered
Two months had passed since the blood moon, and nothing else out of the norm had happened. Well save for one thing that is, since the blood moon, silver monsters had been spotted. Just the month before, Zelda and I had celebrated our daughter's first birthday, and Zelda's twenty second birthday. Ilia was continuing to grow and develop. She had gotten her first teeth just a month ago and started crawling about three months prior. Fortunately, being so young, she was completely unaware of the disaster occurring outside the boundary of our home.
Monster attacks on the outposts had continued without any real change, the status of the situation as far as the mortal world was aware hadn't changed. Strangely however, the Yiga had all but disappeared, that was enough to ring alarm bells in the demigod world. They were undoubtedly plotting something. Just what were they up to now?
It turned out that we got an insight into our enemy from a source we never expected. Just a month after Ilia's first birthday, and a couple months away from our fifth anniversary, someone knocked on our door right as we were about to have lunch. My wife and I looked at each other, Ilia glanced at the door, then back at us with a befuddled look.
"I'll see who it is." I offered.
I walked to the door, opened it, and was met by the camp messenger.
"Oh, thank the gods! Someone has showed up demanding to speak with you! He says it's urgent!" The messenger says; leaving out important details like who they were, how they got here, etc. This served to express just how urgent the matter was.
I look back at Zelda, sitting in her seat next to Ilia's highchair, staring right back. I turn back to the messenger.
"Tell him to wait for me by the watchtower by the beach. I'll be just a few minutes." I reply, the messenger nods and dashes off.
Just a few minutes later, our daughter now fed, we start making our way to meet this stranger. I'm wearing my hero's garb and have my sword and shield strapped to my back. Ilia is held snugly in my arms as I walk alongside my wife, looking around with an interested expression. Soon our destination comes into view, and we see the silhouette of the man waiting for us. He's still too far away for us to see any more than that he's large and broad shouldered. When we get a little closer, I see what color his hair is. It's a deep red, a red that I have only ever seen in the Gerudo. I also at this moment see his skin is a dark olive. This man is Ganondorf, he's here.
He turns at the sound of our feet on the wooden steps saying, "Link! Thank the goddesses! I have to tell you…" he trails off when he notices Zelda.
"P-princess Zelda? Is that really you?" He says, sounding surprised.
"Yes Ganondorf, it's me. But I'll have you know that I'm not princess Zelda this time, I'm simply Zelda. There are no princesses or kings anymore." My wife replies with an edge to her voice, crossing her arms in front of her, her face hard and stern, aiming a fierce gaze at him.
"Forgive me, I am still used to the old times." Ganondorf apologizes.
My eyebrows go lopsided at this, Ganondorf apologizing?
"Now tell me, what is it you so urgently need to tell my husband?" Zelda continues, voice icy cold and her emerald eyes piercing.
At the word 'husband' his gaze tracks to me and Ilia, the moment it lands on my daughter I instinctively hold her a little closer to my chest protectively, while giving Ganondorf a wary, rather than angry, look. He winces slightly, but doesn't seem surprised though.
"Before I tell you, I just want to say that I'm not asking you to believe me. I suppose you have every reason not to, I can hardly blame you to be honest. All I've ever done is try to kill you and conquer the world, hear me for the sake of the world." He begs.
Mine and my wife's eyebrows raise at this point.
"What is it you have to tell me?" I ask firmly, but keeping any semblance of a threat or anger out of my tone so as not to scare my little girl in my arms.
He takes a deep breath, then says, "He's back, the one who started all this. Before you say anything, you need to know that until recently I didn't even know he was there. I always thought my cause was right and just, that you were meddling in my plans, but this time when I returned something was different. The little voice that was always in my head was gone, and I felt sick when I thought of the things I have done. That was when I realized it was never really me, it was always him!" His voice gets higher pitched.
Ilia begins to whimper, spooked by the rising tension in the air. My wife looks over at our daughter, rests a hand comfortingly on Ilia's head, and gives Ganondorf a dirty look.
"Sorry." He grimaces, pulling himself together.
"We already know by the way, we've known since the blood moon two months ago." I reply neutrally.
"He's back and he'll be coming for you!" Ganondorf says, keeping his tone calm but still worried.
Zelda freezes, face twisting into an expression of terror and disbelief.
"What?" She asks, voice strained.
"There's no way they can know about us!" I add.
"He found out, he knows you're here." Ganondorf insists.
"How much does he know?" I rasp, mouth suddenly dry.
"Luckily not much, just the locations of your two camps." He replies.
"When will they attack?" My wife nervously asks, "And where will they strike first?"
"I don't know, but we should be prepared." He says firmly.
"We?" I ask suddenly, does he mean…?
"Yes, we. I'm going to help you anyway I can. It's the least I can do to atone for what I've done." He says sounding very determined.
He…really meant what he was saying, he truly did regret. Zelda felt this as well, her next words confirmed this.
"There's nothing you need to atone for, what you did wasn't your fault. It was all the demon king's doing." She says firmly.
"I do need to, for myself at least." Ganondorf instantly insists.
Then he does something we never could have expected; he gets down one knee, an arm folded across his chest, and head bowed.
"Link, Zelda, I am your humble servant. I will serve you to the best of my ability, and provide whatever aid I can. If there's anything I can do to help, I would be honored to do it." He says, voice filled with resolve.
Zelda looks at me, I shrug slightly, completely mystified and at a loss for what to do in this situation. She nods and takes the lead.
"Rise, Ganondorf Dragmire." My wife says, but her voice is much kinder now, the words she spoke and the way she said them almost sounded like they were coming from a true queen.
"We do not have servants anymore, but we would appreciate your assistance in our efforts." She continues, voice strong and full of wisdom.
Ganondorf stands, head bowed a little as he speaks, "How can I be of use then?"
I speak up now, "Ganondorf, do you know anything about the Yiga clan as of recently, do you know any information that might help us."
He smiles at this, but not a malicious or sly smile, a true genuine smile.
"I can do one better than that, I can tell you what the demon's likely plan is. He was part of me for so long I can be almost certain about what he will do." He replies confidently.
"That will do just fine, Ganondorf." Zelda responds, voice filled with certainty.
Ganondorf then seems to falter, "Is there…I know it's a really long shot…but is there by any chance a goddess statue I could pray at to offer my thanks to Hylia for freeing me from the demon king's influence?"
My wife and I suppress chuckles, the one request he makes that we can easily grant. He notices and asks us what we're thinking is funny. I tell him we actually do have a goddess statue, it's in front of our house, that we had it made when we married. He thanks us and when we get back home, he kneels in front of the statue and stays there for some time. That evening, I ask my wife what she thinks about this. She says that she was initially skeptical, but now she believes him, he seems to truly believe what he says and also seems genuine.
Just a week later, we received a summons to a meeting of the council. My wife and I were a little puzzled, yes, we had monthly meetings, but this one wasn't one of them. This was an unforeseen meeting for sure. When we got there just ten minutes later, we found all the other council members waiting for us. Zelda and I sat down (next to each other obviously), me placing Ilia on my lap.
"What's this about?" I ask curiously.
Percy's face slightly tightens, then says, "Camp Jupiter was attacked just a few days ago, by the Yiga clan."
"What?" Zelda gasps, "Camp Jupiter is shielded, how did they find you?"
"We don't know, they just showed up and started attacking. Fortunately, we only suffered a few casualties, even though Camp Jupiter's forces nearly decimated theirs." Annabeth replied.
Everyone was silent for a minute as we all absorbed this. The Yiga attack on Camp Jupiter showed that they indeed knew about us.
"Where exactly did they appear? Was it within the camp or outside it? Did the shield keep them out?" I ask.
"They appeared right outside the barrier, though if that was because they couldn't teleport inside or simply chose not to, we don't know." Percy responded, face tight, like he hated not knowing, I knew the feeling.
It was a good point, for all we knew the Yiga clan could have done so but didn't just to make us underestimate them.
The meeting continued as normal, sort of. Then someone asked about the blood moon, which everyone had seen. Our monitoring of the media and other things of the outside world had revealed it had been seen all across this side of the world, and just hours later, the other side of the planet. Everyone had seen the blood moon, every person alive had been witness the terrible omen. The person who asked about the blood moon then asked about the return of evil. Until now we had declined to respond to this question as we hadn't been sure how to answer. Now though…
"There's something you visitors from Camp Jupiter should know." Zelda spoke up. "Just about a week ago, we had an unexpected arrival, Ganondorf."
All the people from the Roman side immediately gasped as they hadn't heard this yet.
"Strange as it sounds, he's not evil anymore!" I quickly interject. "Somehow in his return, he was separated from the original evil entity itself. Ganondorf has at last been freed from his uncountable eons of being under the control of the true king of evil."
"You mean…the demon king?" The head Hephaestus camper asked.
"Yes." I nod.
"What should we do?" Percy asked.
"Luckily, Ganondorf has been providing us information. Having been bonded with the demon for so long he knows what the demon king's likely actions will be." I respond.
Everyone nods, it makes sense after all. Having been part of him for so long, one would expect Ganondorf to know how the evil would think.
"He has not advised anything different from what we are currently doing, for now at least." Zelda adds.
I hand Ilia over to my wife, who places her on her own lap as I lean forward with my fingers laced together.
"He has proven himself to be a valuable source of information, and has shown nothing but every wish to assist us. I say we should trust him, I admit my wife and I were initially skeptical, but he has been very genuine and honest. Quite unlike he ever has before, I'll say." I inform everyone.
"Can you remind me of what happened last time the evil appeared for you two?" The head of Demeter cabin asked.
"Well last time we had the divine beasts, massive machines whose scale utterly dwarfed almost any machine currently. They were capable of immense offensive power, particularly in a massive beam they could fire." Zelda answered.
"When you say they were massive, what exactly do you mean?" The Demeter person asked.
"We're talking several hundred feet, minimum, kind of massive." I answer.
Before anyone can respond, something unexpected happened. There was a slight popping noise and everyone turned their heads to see what made the sound. Standing not twenty feet away, were the gods, like all of them.