The next morning, the two were awake at the crack of dawn and out of the castle before most of the staff were moving about.

Link had stayed up late in order to finish the papers he couldn't during the day, effectively freeing up his entire schedule for the next day and appointing himself her sole guard for the day. Despite the castle still being on lockdown, he used the excuse that, because it was Zelda's birthday in two days, he would need enough time today to figure out what he could buy her as an early gift.

His true goal was to mostly spoil her.

Well, that and to get her checked out at a doctor's since they couldn't do so at the castle.

When Zelda had told him yesterday the reason why they hadn't gone to the resident doctor or nurses, Link found himself quickly agreeing with their deductions. No matter how much they seemed to be on her side, they did still answer to Rhoam, meaning if he asked, they would almost certainly say something and their secret would be out.

To avoid anyone following or recognising them, Link managed to acquire Zelda a regular commoner's dress, consisting of a simple cotton shirt, a light summer petticoat and cotton skirt.

By the end of it, she was somewhat unrecognisable as the Princess of Hyrule, but the golden hair was a pretty dead giveaway if someone was looking for her. He didn't know too many people with such a rare shade of blonde, but he guessed it'd be fine for a day.

Him on the other hand? He got lost in crowds every day, he apparently looked like any other guy save for his stature and the bright blue tunic. While the tunic was an easy fix, the rest wasn't. His short stature was usually something that made some people look over since he stood at 5'2", a full three inches below the ladies' average for Hylians, to say nothing about the mens'.

Ever since the day Arn told him and even backed it up with the official statistics, he hadn't been able to forget about it. He'd been mad ever since.

Now he couldn't wait for the short jokes that were going to come when people started finding out about the pregnancy. He was expecting people to tell him not to pass on those specific genes or that his own kids were going to be taller, but he gave up and accepted the inevitability of the jokes and teasing.

"You're not going to grow any taller standing on your tippy toes in front of my mirror," Zelda looked at him expectantly. "I want to get out of here before everyone starts moving around."

"One day it'll work!"

"No it won't."

Getting out of the castle was a breeze. They made their way through the least travelled paths and past the knights guarding the entrance. At the first sight of Link, they didn't bother asking him what he was doing in regular civilian attire but rather, they let him and the princess go without a care in the world.

Once they reached the entrance of Castle Town, they set off to their first destination: the local doctor's office to get Zelda checked properly rather than the half-assed guess they were running on.

It wasn't that Link didn't trust Zelda, no he trusted her intuition entirely, but the way she'd explained her symptoms and the conversation she had with Impa gave him a very unclear picture of what was going on. She was all over the place and it barely made any sense to him.

She jumped from topic to topic and he struggled to get her back to the original subject once she'd departed it. First she started with a missed cycle, then he was lost when she started talking about trying a new really good treat she discovered. He had to remind her numerous times to get back on track but it was useless, so a doctor's visit was rather necessary for both of their sakes right now.

And she led him right to the place they needed with little to no assistance, which amazed him.

He made sure they weren't being followed by any guards, Sheikah or castle staff, looking back and around them so many times he was sure he seemed suspicious. Since they'd left castle grounds, he didn't smell or sense anyone he knew following them, thankfully, but his guard remained up until they entered the establishment.

The first thing he noted was the intense smell of cleaning products and rubbing alcohol.

From the first step in, he felt like everyone looked at him and Zelda and he immediately wanted to leave. They were in no way malicious, but the dozens of eyes just staring at him was making him uncomfortable.

"Can I wait outside?" He whispered.

Zelda just gave him a look.

Right. Stupid bullshit.

Despite it being Zelda who stepped up to the counter, the nurses handed him the papers, something she noticed immediately. He wasted no time in giving the papers to Zelda, along with the pencil.

He didn't miss the scowl on the nurse's face when they walked away, but why she was like this, he had no clue.

Zelda was busy muttering her own special curses so low he could barely make them out, but he didn't need to know the specifics. He found it cute, which was his little secret for the day.

It would take less than a few seconds of zoning out before Zelda voiced her first complaint.

"Why are the first questions about you?!" she whispered incredulously.

"Maybe it's medical history?"

"Not one of these questions pertains to medical history of any kind."

And she was right, of course. It took a quick glance for Link to realise that most of the first page were indeed asking questions about him, though it was mostly basic information. Name, age, race, sex, designation, address, occupation, but not one asked about anything medical in nature.

Zelda passed him the pencil and the page, letting him scribble down the necessary information, but he left occupation and name blank.

"We can't put our real names," he said quietly.

"What do we do?"

Link looked around. "Enter one of your maids' names. I'll put Arn's down."

She nodded as he scribbled down the wrong name and entered the Royal Guard as an occupation. He couldn't put his legitimate position or it'd be too easy to tell he was lying.

"What address is that?" Zelda pointed to the line he'd written. He didn't put down the castle, but rather, he put down the apartment he owned but never used. He couldn't even remember the last time he'd gone there, but it had been a long time and he only ever went on his days off when the castle was too hectic.

"I own a little place in Castle Town."

"You never told me that."

"It's a little hard to go when you live at your job," he muttered. "I only really use the place when I want to be alone or it's my rut. People leave me alone."

It's probably really dusty in there… I don't want to clean that… I wonder if they'd let me burn it down and rebuild it so long as the fire didn't spread…? He shook away the thoughts of the dusty, probably in desperate need of a deep clean, apartment and went back to the paper.

"Oh." She sat back while he finished entering the smaller, less specific details.

"Alright, name?"

"Adina." She smiled.

Years of filling out paperwork took a hold of him as he just fell into his habits, filling out the next page, then the next, and then the next after that until he didn't know what to put anymore. He filled out five entire pages, strangely enough, and had only stopped when he reached the questions pertaining to her parents' medical history.

Once he finished, Link passed back the pencil and let Zelda read over the page. He wasn't as laid back as she was when she started writing, glancing constantly at her neat handwriting as she entered information.

He raised his brow at her when she wrote Bond Spouse Neglect under health conditions for her mother. It surprised him even more when she wrote between parentheses that it resulted in death.

That doesn't cause death… does it? He was going to ask her about that later, but now didn't seem like a good time considering they were sitting in the lobby of the nurse's office. He heard it could cause illness but he had never heard of it being so bad.

He remembered what his father had told him about the bond. His dad had refused to tell him who the Queen's bonded was, stating orders, followed by throwing him into the water for pushing. There was no way Link was going to pull that out of him.

He wondered if Zelda may be able to pull that information out of him though, seeing as she was the princess.

It was a small chance, but still a chance.

Regardless, Link swore to himself he wouldn't let the same thing happen to Zelda. He owed it to her, he was her partner and the one responsible for this whole situation, it was the least he could do. If it wasn't for him, she wouldn't be with child and struggling to figure out what to do, she wouldn't have to worry about an extra thing on her plate. He promised himself that he would do the most he could and more.

"Lift your sleeve please?"

Zelda did as she was told, lifting her sleeve to the shoulder as far as she could. A strange strip of cloth was looped around her bicep and tightened before starting to inflate.

"Why do you think you're pregnant, dear?" The nurse pulled out a paper and began noting down her results.

"Morning sickness."

The nurse stopped writing and glanced up from her page. "That's it?" Sensing no more coming from Zelda, she looked at Link. "Sir?"

"Sudden nesting, morning sickness, missed cycles." The nurse nodded and scribbled down the symptoms.

"How many cycles?"

"Two, and I didn't get my post-heat bleed." Zelda interjected.

"Why didn't you come in earlier?"

"Her father didn't really teach her anything about this stuff," Link answered in Zelda's stead.

"Why didn't you notice?" She turned her attention to him. "You should know when your omega is on her cycle."

Well that's a bit crude. "I've been absent on assignments with work."

"So you've left her alone for what, almost three months? How will she support herself if you're not there?"

"What? No, no, she's staying with her father. I was ordered to Akkala for the last month to assist with training," he lied. He didn't enjoy how quickly the conversation had turned into a sort of blame game against him. "We had recruits and I had to go."

Long ago he'd made it a personal choice not to ask about anyone's cycles, finding the topic to be too personal to ask about so he actively ignored it unless someone brought it up first, and he only ever knew about Zelda whenever she's slip him requests from under the door for some tea or a hot water bottle.

His mother had advised him as such and he took that particular advice to heart.

"Right, it was a last minute thing too," Zelda added onto the lie. "It's fine, really. My father has been taking care of me."

The nurse shot a glance between them and wrote down more details on her paper before reaching under her desk and pulling out a scale.

"Step on the scale for me." The nurse helped Zelda stand on the scale, sliding the weight along a bar until it evened out.

Link noticed how few bars she had to push for it to even out, noting that Zelda was pretty light for a woman of her stature. She was two inches taller than he was, fairly muscular but even then she barely broke the fifty-five kilo mark. He silently hoped that wasn't her regular weight and this number was just a result of her recent, rather rough, bout of morning sickness.

I haven't weighed that much since I was eleven… The more he thought about her current weight and her circumstances, the more it seemed terrible.

She was so much lighter than he'd imagined. It wasn't like he was lifting her like a weight every day, but he assumed she was still in the healthy range for her age and height. She did ample horseback riding, she was quite muscular, more so than most women he knew. And she was far more underweight than he thought.

She wasn't eating enough and he should have seen it. She drank more than enough fluids in one day; tea and water was by her side at all times of the day.

He clenched his fist by his side at the thought that something so obvious slipped by his attention. I have to stay by her side. I can't let them change my schedule like that again. Muscle was far denser than body fat, so he couldn't begin to think of her weight if she wasn't as strong as she was.

The nurse frowned and looked at the two for a moment before writing down her weight. "You need to eat more, dear. You're underweight."

Link was trying to figure out how to make that work. Hiding a pregnancy and purposely gaining weight didn't go hand-in-hand very well, but she absolutely had to gain more. They served her small dinner portions so he figured she'd have to sneak a few extra things throughout the day, but he was determined nevertheless to help her, even if it meant raiding the kitchen at two in the morning.

"And you." Link nearly jumped out of his chair as the nurse levelled an accusatory finger at him. "Are you providing for her properly as you should be?"

"Yes ma'am."

"Do better. She's one of the most underweight ladies I've ever met, you need to up her portions, am I understood?" He nodded, not daring to say anything back to her. "And try not to stress too much, your blood pressure is through the roof."

There was nothing that said stress like being princess to a country, assassins to the left, corrupt councilmen and lawmakers to the right, her irritating father next to them and the sudden addition of a baby on her shoulders.

"You need to make sure she doesn't do any unnecessary housework, start helping around the house, make dinner for her or something, but don't let her do everything."

Link saw as Zelda tried not to laugh at the mirth and affront that was no doubt showing on his face as he muttered an ok under his breath, just loud enough for the nurse to hear. It was a good thing that the nurse wasn't looking at him directly or else Link might not be leaving in one piece for not taking this seriously.

"What is it you do again sir?"

"I am a royal guard." Link said simply, trying to conceal his disdain at essentially being called lazy.

"Ahh, I see." Why the nurse was about to start laughing, he didn't want to know. Was she calling him lazy again? His first thought was of the sleeping guards who leaned against the castle walls with their weapons. "Ask for time off, she could use the additional assistance." She proceeded to smack another sheet of paper on her desk and wrote furiously on it. "Ginger tea if you feel nauseous, if you feel the need to nest, do so for as long as you want. Eat whatever you'd like in whatever quantity your heart wishes, but stay away from fish, voltfruit and mighty thistle. That should wrap things up." The nurse slapped the paper into Link's hands as he was standing up out of his chair.

Just as the two made their way to the door to leave, the nurse nudged Zelda on the arm and whispered quietly into her ear, but Link heard it quite clearly.

"Oh and dear? Make sure he spoils you, I hear guards make a lot."

First she blames me for her weight, then she makes fun of me and calls me lazy, and now she wants my wallet drained… Link couldn't wait to get out of the clinic before he could add more to the list.

After they left the clinic, Zelda grabbed Link's hand and dragged him through the streets, jabbering about tea and biscuits.

He kept up just fine with her, but he couldn't help but smile at the absolute glee on the Princess' face.

It took only a single glance for Link to try to conceal his amusement.

She brought him to the shop he's always grabbing something from.

"Go grab a seat, I'll come back with your tea." He shooed her off and walked up to the counter to make their order, along with their table placement. It was convenient that he knew this place so well, he was certain he knew exactly what she wanted to order.

He returned a few minutes later with a tray of small tea sweets, a bowl of sugar cubes, a small cream pitcher and the two cups, leaving it atop the table for her to serve herself.

Conversation naturally flowed until she learned he knew most of the menu by heart when he mentioned knowing she would like the home-baked chocolate chip cookies.

"You come here as well? Impa and I came here a few days back, this is actually where I found out I was pregnant!"

Link choked on his cup of coffee. "Aha, maybe say that a bit quieter?" He mumbled. "They do know me here…" It wasn't a secret to the cafe staff that he frequented this place, he was here often with Barnabus, grabbing a piece of cake or two, a muffin or another piece of baked good for a quick lunch.

This is exactly how rumours start. The wrong person who knows him could hear her say those words, pass it on, and it wouldn't take a genius to figure out his golden-haired date was the Princess of Hyrule. And if someone heard the Princess of Hyrule say the words "I'm pregnant"...

Disaster, that was all.

"I was wondering something." He took a short sip of the coffee in the dainty cup. "Who was the guard with you that day?"

"Oh it was one of the girls," She thought for a moment. "Oh it's been slipping my mind…"

"Mara? Or Caya?" He prayed it wasn't the first one. Can't be her, the castle isn't gossiping about it yet.

"I think it's Caya."

Oh Sweet Hylia… It was a nightmare to think that one of his guards knew he was sleeping with the princess, but it was a migraine and a half to think the brunette knew he got the Heir to the Throne pregnant… Please don't say anything, please don't say anything…

"It's only her…right?"

She nodded, picking up a cookie from the tray. "She's very trustworthy, I haven't heard a single thing through gossip at all."

He let out a sigh of relief. "Thank goodness, I was worried she might have told Dame Mara…"

"What would be bad about that?"

"Well she's a bit of a gossip, you see…" Sensing curiosity, he continued. "I found out two of my guards were hooking up in broom closets thanks to her. I found out about the Court Poet and a maid-"

"Razan?! And a maid? " Zelda gasped loudly. "Oh screw the maids, I want my gossip from you!" She sat back and readied herself to listen. "Go on, tell me more."

"Uh…" What more could he tell her? As far as he knew, Mara was essentially a bokoblin with a brain, stealing and breaking into the storehouse, pillaging the kitchen after hours, and hiding in the most obvious places to hear the best news. "She found out Captain Randy got a divorce before he was even handed the papers."

"He's divorced?! "

"He hides it pretty well. Now that I think about it, I probably wasn't supposed to tell you that."

She ordered three more cups while Link limited himself to one more. She had long since finished most of the treats and felt satisfied with herself when Link passed her the final biscuit from the tray.

The one thing she noticed was how laid back he was. He was tense when she told him one of the guards knew, but that quickly replaced itself with his laid-back yet professional air.

He wasn't even that tense when she told him about her pregnancy.

"Link? Why don't you seem more nervous about this?" She brought a small biscuit to her lips.

"Well I am nervous about this," he admitted. "But you know me, I hide it well."

That he did. He hid his nerves and stress behind a cold immovable façade. One very few people could see through, but what she didn't understand was how she couldn't see the stress right now. She'd learned quickly enough when he was stressed about something, but now he seemed as if he didn't have a care in the world.

"You don't seem very nervous." She said, feeling a bit envious at how quickly he had brushed off his worries.

"It's less the baby and more your dad." He took a sip from the tea cup. "I'm happy about the baby, I really am, but I'm worried about what your dad might do."

"My father would never do anything that might harm me or my baby… he'll say something maybe, but he wouldn't do anything." She didn't think he'd do something anyway.

"I hope you're right about that, I'd like to avoid a confrontation as much as possible."

"Mhm, I'm sure." She wasn't sure. "Wait, did you say you were happy about the baby?" She glanced at Link with a closer look, seeing his hand freeze in the air with the cup to his lips.

He tried to look away, but she could see the pink dust on his cheeks and ears.

"You're happy about this?" It wasn't accusatory, but she was quite surprised.

She wasn't expecting him to be happy about the pregnancy, considering a baby constituted a rather significant commitment to both her and the life of politics which was known to break even those born to it, but this side of Link rather intrigued her.

"A-a bit, yes," he answered into his mug. "Babies are adorable, you know? They're fun."

"Babies are hard work."

Link let out a loud laugh before going back to his coffee. "You don't say? I got woken up at least three times every night, and that was just the start of it."

She swore she could see it in his eyes, the sleepless nights and the memories of what she assumed to be of crying and having to soothe a crying baby.

"But they're also the cutest little things ever!" He smiled into his cup. "If we're ever in Hateno, I'll show you my niece, she's the absolute cutest!"

"I'm sure," Zelda said with a smile.

"She giggles so loudly if you poke her belly, and she falls right asleep whenever I hold her, it's just too cute!" Zelda didn't quite hear the rest of what he was saying, but his entire mood switched and now he was talking and going off with more pride than she's ever heard come out of his mouth. "Oh! There was this one time, she stopped crying when she was playing with my hair and Sota absolutely hated me for it because he couldn't get her to stop but I could."

Oh my goddess, Purah was right. She could see the pride and happiness return to his face the moment he started talking about his niece. She heard what Purah had said about him and the supposed baby fever, but she hadn't realised how obvious he was about it.

What have I gotten myself into…

He didn't take her back to the castle immediately after, rather he decided to take her on a proper tour of the city for the first time.

He took her to the fashion district of the city where he pointed out the local seamstresses and tailors, even showed her the place he'd been dragged to for his suit he was going to wear for her birthday and the Nayru's Day celebration.

He recounted the dozens of times he was poked with a pin and how he had struggled to stand still for two full hours when it definitely shouldn't have taken that long. Zelda laughed and commented that it shouldn't have taken more than one and he responded by turning away with a blush and moving on quickly to their next stop.

He showed her the food district where she bought small snacks left and right, staying particularly long at one of the Rito snack places where she found a sudden new love for dehydrated fruits coaxed in sugar syrup.

"Z-Zelda? Are you good?" he hesitated to interrupt her enjoyment of the sweets.

She ignored him and instead snacked on the crunchy delicacy; the sugar syrup was crystallised around the fruit, giving it a satisfying crunch, and Zelda seemed to be enjoying it more than anyone else.

"You're going to be bringing me more of these when the cravings start, I'm warning you now," Zelda managed between bites.

"Thanks for the… head's up."

Link looked around and noted the food stalls being set up around the area, and he guessed that they might be celebrating Zelda's birthday that was coming up in two days.

An entire week of celebrating… wow. Link thought, in one week it'd be Nayru's Day, and in two, it'd be Zelda's birthday. Why take stuff down when you could keep it up all week? They'll take any reason to party. Lucky them.

It would take another ten minutes before he would be able to drag her away from the stalls, partly out of fear of his wallet but mostly because he didn't want to spend the entire day in the same place.

When they finally returned to the castle, they went straight for Zelda's personal study to hide the things she had bought. She stashed away any blank journals she purchased way in the back of her bookshelf, she hid her dried fruits and nuts in a nearby jar and small knick-knacks Link had surprised her with in a box she would later move to her chambers after nightfall.

It was late into the afternoon when they finally settled down properly in her study, a book in her hands, a small rope that Link was playing around with in his hands.

Eventually, he stopped fidgeting with the rope when he began thinking back to earlier in the day when they were at the clinic.

Zelda had filled out her parents' medical records truthfully, save for the names and birthdays. He assumed the history itself remained truthful, Zelda knew the importance of family records when it came to her own, he was certain of that.

Before he left for home, he remembered that they were uncertain about her mother's real designation, having shown herself as a beta for the world to see, but he found out very quickly that it wasn't the case from his father.

Zelda entered Bond Spouse Neglect into her mother's history. No way she knew about that three months ago.

He knew she knew nothing about bonds, he introduced her himself to the concept of it. There was no way she'd have found that in a book and connected it back to her mother without some prior knowledge of it, not to mention, as a beta, she'd ever have suffered its unfortunate side effects.

Zelda definitely knew her mother's biological identity.

"Zel?"

"Hmm?" She leaned her head his way but kept her eyes on the book as she flipped the page.

"Did you find out anything while I was gone?" he asked nonchalantly, hoping she would say yes.

"I did," she took a bookmark from the desk and placed it in her book before standing up and moving to the bookshelf where she moved a few novels and grabbed a leatherbound notebook hidden behind. "I wrote down everything in here, have at it if you'd like."

He took the notebook and lazily flicked through the few pages of neat handwriting without really reading it closely. He was glad for how organised her notes were, each section was subtitled with a different name such as 'pregnancy', 'sbn', 'death' and 'bond', so if he wanted a more thorough look, he wouldn't have a problem doing so.

"Did you?" He looked up to see her peering at him curiously. "Discover anything, that is."

"I did." He feared telling her about the bond. He feared her anger when he would tell her of the magic, he didn't want to witness what might happen.

"Really?" She scooted her chair closer, an excited smile on her lips. "You must tell me!"

"I-I need you to listen to what I'm going to say and not freak out." Link cautioned Zelda at first. "It's a wild story, believe me."

"Why would I freak out?" She crossed her arms and cocked her head to the side.

Link took a deep breath. "It concerns your magic, that thing we found in the Sealed Temple and the bond."

"Well, this should be interesting, I make no promises." She sat back, ready to listen, but Link could feel her scent shift in the air to one of mild irritation.

Sweet Hylia, spare my life please, he silently prayed before allowing himself to leave his fate in Zelda's hands.

He started with the journal and the statuette and how he wasn't cursed but rather possessed. Zelda waved him through it, having assumed most of it already it seemed. The conversation with the first hero Sky had followed, in which Link conveniently left out the threat of bodily re-possession if he used the Master Sword as a pickaxe again.

The princess listened to this story attentively, trying to see if she could connect it to anything, but found she wasn't pulling from very much apart from the fact that this supposed person pre-dated Hyrule's founding.

"He said I was only able to communicate with him because you bonded with me. He didn't seem confident when I asked if I could do it with someone else, but he did say it's something you should be able to also do. Talking to your ancestors, I mean, but I'm not sure if it's all of them."

Zelda was baffled by the end of that particular story.

She was speechless, trying to make sense of it all. He could see a hundred questions in her eyes, he was sure there were even more in her mind, but she was likely debating which to ask first.

It was a lot of information to take in one go, he understood the confusion.

"So this bond…would let me talk with my ancestors?"

"Very likely, yes, but only some."

He could sense she really meant her mother when she said ancestors, but he didn't want to give her false hope. He didn't want to see the hurt that could come from discovering you could talk to ancestors except the one you really wanted.

He knew just how much she wanted to see her mother again, and to falsely lead her into the idea that she could even communicate with her wasn't something he ever wanted to do.

"Is there anything else this bond can do?"

Loads… too much actually… he had an inkling she could sense him faintly based on their conversations prior to his trip home, but he had yet to confirm any of it.

"There is…" he drifted off quietly. "And it's big ."

" Big ?" she repeated, confused. "Just how big?"

Great goddesses I'm really doing this. "Huge, for you anyway."

She remained quiet in her seat, as if she was trying to guess what this thing could be. "Does it have to do with my powers?" She hesitated to ask.

"It… It does."

"Tell me now." She pulled an inkwell from a shelf and a long page of parchment, setting it readily at her desk.

He took a deep breath before going into it. He explained how his father had told about the reciprocity of the bond and the reserve of magic that could potentially be accessed by him if he knew how to. He made sure to mention the monogamous nature of her bond specifically and how if they bonded together, there'd be a low chance of separation, something that didn't surprise Zelda one bit, it seemed.

She clung to every word. She wrote down as fast as she could in her notes, and he could see that she really did write most, if not all of his words.

"Did he tell you how to access it?"

Link shook his head. "I doubt he'd know the specifics. He was very tight-lipped about it, he wouldn't mention anything else."

"Wait, he shouldn't even know about it, why does your father know about all of this? Only the Royal Family itself should have known about that."

"Well, he was Captain of her guard for almost fifteen years. He spent most of that being her personal escort everyday. Arn and I know a fair bit of information we probably shouldn't, I'll be honest with you "

"Mhm, I do imagine he would know a fair bit about my mother's powers in that case. What was his name?"

"Sir Fredrick of Castle Town, it's 'of Hateno' now but that was before we moved." Link explained

Zelda's eyes widened instantly. "Eh?! No way! I remember Captain Fredrick."

"Wait you do?"

"Of course, he was in charge of my safety until I was six." She smiled, likely remembering the days of her childhood. "He retired shortly after and moved away. Haven't seen him since."

"You didn't have a separate guard when you were a child?"

"I should have, as per protocol, but I clung to my mother everywhere she went, so it was a given that he would ensure my safety as well. My father didn't bother assigning an extra guard, it would have probably been a crowd otherwise."

That makes sense. Four or five people as a group is quite the crowd if two are personal guards. The decision didn't feel out of place whatsoever if what her assumption was the truth.

"Fair point, I don't remember much from the time I lived in Castle Town, it's just one big blur."

"That's odd, I remember he used to bring his… kid… Link, you don't have any older siblings, do you?"

He really didn't remember his childhood very much from the time before he moved to Castle Town. He remembered waiting for his father to come home from the castle everyday with his mother, the memory of losing his friends were fragmented at best with the other kids' faces blurry as heck, he remembered earlier beach days with his little sister and teaching her how to swim after their move to Hateno.

But for Zelda to say that? Did his father really bring him to the castle that much?

"Uh, nope, I'm the oldest between Aryll and I." He shook his head, trying to resurface any memory from his childhood.

"If that's true, you were one of my friends when I was little," she started laughing. "They'd use you to distract me from my mother on some days. I remember now, you were so clumsy!" He frowned as her laughter grew in volume.

He stopped breathing for a moment when he suddenly felt embarrassment resurface. Falling in the mud. He did that a lot. He tried to pick up weapons too big for his tiny body, only to trip. He could feel his cheeks start burning and the desire to jump out of the tower and dive head-first into the moat.

While he didn't recall much, it seemed she did and she was right. He was incredibly clumsy but he was incredibly grateful to have outgrown it since he reached his early teen years.

"It's not funny," he muttered.

"Yes it is! You fell face first into the pond while looking at the fish!"

While he didn't enjoy being reminded of the times he fell into stuff, he did thank her distracted nature for pulling her attention away from the magic and divine powers topics.