The Legend Of Zelda;

The Voice Of Madness

As Told By "Petra"

Chapter 1

We hurried, hurried, hurried through the dense thickets of the Forest of Time, in complete and utter terror, the voices of dozens of those maddened mugs behind us. "Off with their heads!" cried one; "Feed them to the hounds!" howled another; "Treason!" blurted out yet another. My brother Devyn eventually threw me to the ground under a bush and held his hand over my mouth several minutes...several bloody long minutes...until the wankers left, their blood lust dissatisfied.

"Little Swallow..." he began to whisper to me, "I don't think I have much time left. We may have eluded those mug soldiers for now...but that wretched Voice will pull them back in our direction at any moment. We must hurry and get you somewhere safe...I cannot afford to lose my last sister to The Voice..."

"I can't afford to lose another damn brother to that plague...Devyn, please, there must be a way for BOTH of us to live on..." He looked bloody dismayed.

"Little Swallow...as lush as that idea is...the odds of both of us evading those creeps are miserably low. Your life means more than mine...that power that flows through the birds of our family...I cannot afford to let those minging creeps snuff your light out. If anything happens...run to safety without me. My sacrifice will be the best thing I have ever done for Hyrule..."

"C'mon, brother, surely you can do better than THAT!"

"KILL THEM!" hollered out a nearby soldier. Suddenly we were surrounded by several dozen of those deranged foot soldiers.

"LITTLE SWALLOW, LEG IT NOW!" Devyn drew his knight's broadsword and engaged the maddened creeps like a rabid animal, quickly opening an escape route for me to flee. Moments later...Devyn screamed in agony; I could not see what had happened, but I did not need to be told. Devyn...had died violently, as a martyr for my sake, to keep me onstage for the elaborate, ever repeating play of Hyrule's self preservation...a pair of mouldy shoes I had no bloody desire to fill.

I hustled east towards the Proxim Bridge and crossed it before entering some woodlands. Before I could get too far...

"OFF WITH HER HEAD!"

Back west I ran, trying to preserve my life, to show at least a little gratitude for Devyn's sacrifice, even if I did not believe in the cause he had tried to recruit me for. I reached Proxim...and was cornered; soldiers on the east end, soldiers on the west, like the jaws of a massive rabid dog.

Am I going out like this? NO, I am not going out like this! I am not about to let my brother's death be for nowt!

I hurled myself off the Proxim right before two of the infected soldiers could seize me and soon found myself being driven along by the Hylia River...an angry, ANGRY river around Proxim, and I cannot swim to (literally) save my life. I struggled and gasped and flailed, having little luck keeping my head above the raging waters...I was terrified, every breath now feeling like a luxury. Eventually, just when I thought it was over...I hit a waterfall. Struck a large stone at the bottom of that fall HARD, felt like I broke a few bones, felt a heap of pain...but at least I was no longer in the death dealing drink, and those daft soldiers did not think to look for me there. Not wanting to think about how I was going to get off that boulder...I passed out.

I spent several miserly days on that rock...I could not swim off, especially with several broken bones, and what little food I had packed had been ruined by my "ride" in the Hylia. I really thought that I had bloody blown it...that Devyn's sacrifice really had been for nowt. When I woke up day three, however...I was astonished to see what looked like Devyn standing over me. Short blonde hair, little over one and a half meters tall, commoner's clothes...I hurried to my feet and embraced "Devyn" without a word. He looked really confused...when I let go – surprise! - not Devyn; in fact, I had never met this bloke before...

"Who the damn are you?!" I blurted out in shock. He told me his name was Link Schwert, and that he had been fishing on Lake Hylia when he happened to notice this unconscious bird near the falls. He then asked my name...I did not dare tell him my real name, so out came a corny pseudonym.

"Petra! I'm Petra, and I am quite fine thank you very much!" He was quick to ask me what I was doing sleeping on a rock in the middle of nowhere...

"I was (ow...my ribs...) resting after going fishing!" He did not look convinced by that porky...he offered to take me back to his town, Little Lorule, for medical attention.

Don't kick a gift horse in the mouth, "Petra"...I reluctantly got onto his boat and followed him...

Link rowed the boat to a dock below the south side of the Bridge of Hylia, easily Hyrule's largest bridge. We climbed a relatively gentle hill (about all I could take with how I was feeling) before moving to cross the bridge...seemed like a mental move to me.

"Link!" I coarsely whispered, "This bridge is crawling with those Voice maddened creeps! How do you think we're supposed to cross this death trap?!" Link told me to stand back while he barged onto the bridge alone...I watched in abject horror as he whistled at the top of his lungs, causing thirty or so soldiers to come running after him...I thought he had just committed suicide...

But nope; I had not given the bloke nearly enough credit. Link fought like no one I had ever seen...he was almost impossibly fast, leaping away from deathblows, rushing back to counter those blows with his knight's broadsword, disarming those cretins with his shield. Within maybe half an hour all the soldiers were out cold, lucky not to be dead, and Link whistled for me to follow him. I moved as quickly as I could for the shape I was in (ow...) and followed him across the bridge.

After crossing the bridge we continued north until we hit a fork in the road, then continued west, first passing the Outpost Settlement and then spending the night in the Gatepost Town, a quaint little hamlet not far from where I had lost Devyn...it was bloody hard on me, being so close to where my only remaining sibling had died, the reminder that I was now very very VERY alone in the world. Link paid 60 rupees for us to each get a bed in a local inn before we tucked in for the night...before we hit the hay he wanted to know what in Hyrule I was doing sprawled out on a rock in deep water without a boat. I was wary of answering him...but he was very insistent. I eventually concluded that he deserved to know and spat it out to him.

"My brother and I...we...we were being pursued by the Plague Witches...we...we tried to hide in that Forest of Time to the east, and...and...they found us...brother..." I couldn't vomit out anything more and started balling. Link just came forward and knelt next to my bed for fifteen minutes...I was surprised to see that he cared about my feelings.

"Thank you, Link...this...this isn't how most...how most blokes have reacted when I get all mental like this..." Link said it was normal to feel like this in my shoes...I noticed he was tearing up a bit himself. I smiled at him and went to sleep without waffling about anything else...

The next morning I woke up to Link having already prepared me breakfast...roasted bird drumsticks (not sure precisely which bird) and tea. I was shocked...

"Aw, Link...you didn't bloody have to..." He was quick to say he felt like I needed the pampering after what I had been through; besides, he said, cooking is his hobby. I ravenously tucked into the drumsticks (before meeting up with Link the day before I had not eaten in three days!) and then tried to drink the tea...the bird was ledge; the tea...MINGING. I quickly spat out the tea the moment it hit my tongue.

"What the damn is in that tea, Link?!" I yelled at him, surprising him. He said rushrooms...he's addicted to the stuff and uses it to wake up in the morning. Not my cuppa tea...

We soon left the inn and (painfully) continued west for a while, eventually veering south at another fork in the road. We soon thereafter reached the Digdogg Suspension "Bridge", really a series of bridges attached to several stone pillars and situated over a river. That last bit...after almost drowning in a river a few days before, I was/am PETRIFIED of water and poor Link had to guide me across the bridge by hand while my eyes were slammed shut. Probably the worst part of that damn trip...

Not long after crossing the Digdogg we entered Little Lorule. The town, situated in the arid Gerudo Wastelands, had little for buildings...just lots and lots of tents, a veritable sea of them. Link led me to a large tent in the center of the village, where we met a tall, balding old man with a gray beard, a long, twirlable mustache, and iron armor (must be unbearable in that heat) sitting at a wooden desk.

"Lieutenant Link, you return with a lady friend in tow! What's this there lady's name?!"

"Petra! And I am not his damn girlfriend! We just bloody met!" The old man laughed.

"Feisty one this! I ought to introduce meself! Name's Peggle! Commander Peggle, da' big kahuna of Little Lorule! Nice to meet ya, Petra!" He had not yet noticed me grimacing in pain from my broken bones...Link went on to tell him that I needed medical attention.

"Ah, that we can provide! We have a spare medical tent just a few tents down from mine! Get it ready for her, Lieutenant!" So it was that I got my first "home" in Little Lorule...

Chapter 2

I spent several weeks in that medical tent...the first ten days the doctors and nurses (most of whom were male...not a lot of birds in Little Lorule) insisted on me spending virtually all my damn time inside, resting to let my bones heal; after that they let me spend more time walking around Little Lorule. I remember "fondly" an incident on day three of tent life...a young bloke with black hair came to "check on" me.

"How are you today, Ms. Petra?"

"Fine," I spat out unenthusiastically.

"How's your...your chest feeling?" He struggled to hold back a laugh...I wasn't impressed at his minging, less than professional interest in me.

"Cut it out, kid...you came here to help me, not gawk over me!" He did not get the point.

"What an attractive specimen you are!"

"SHUT UP..."

"I've seldom met a woman as shapely as you are!"

"SOD OFF ALREADY, CREEP!"

"What nice, ginger hair you have!" THAT word...I lunged upward and seized his throat.

"SCRAM!" I yelled out as I shook him, ignoring how much that hurt me. The creep took off and never set foot in my tent again...not one of my doctors and nurses made any comments about my physique after that.

Eventually my bones all healed up and I was released from the medical tent. Link was quick to meet me...we'd been keeping in touch after he rescued me from Lake Hylia. He's not my type...but he was my best friend regardless.

"What's up, Linky?" I asked him. He found that nickname very embarrassing when I first used it but eventually got used to it...anyhow, he asked me what I wanted to do now that I was in good health.

"...I...I have no clue, Link. I can't cook...I have no bloody clue how to clean..." He then asked if I had any idea how to fight.

"No..." He suggested that I learn...he said he saw a heap of pent up energy in me that would probably translate into a competent fighter who could defend Little Lorule from monsters. I felt conflicted.

Would I even be a good scrapper? Would this...would this allow me to find another, more effective way of fulfilling my destiny? I pondered such thoughts for several long minutes before answering Link...

"Alright, Link..." He smiled and offered to teach me...I agreed to it. For weeks we trained intensely from sunrise to noon, with sword, shield, bow...I was okay with a sword, rocked a shield, but my skills with a bow were simply divine. It felt like my bow was part of my body; I became better with a bow than Link himself. He was bloody proud.

About a month after my training started, my skills were put to the test...one morning I awoke in my tent to a series of loud THUDS that drew closer and closer to Little Lorule. I quickly got dressed and hurried out of my tent to see – to my horror – a black hinox rampaging around Little Lorule. The giant, obese, cycloptic wanker was uprooting tents, stealing food, and trying to seize and devour innocent people...I rushed with Link to the front line to confront the beast. As we approached, Link told me to pelt its eye with arrows while he and the other foot soldiers attacked its body...the problem? Unlike most hinox, this one had a brain...it held one of its massive hands over its gargantuan eye, making it near impossible for me to shoot it; meanwhile, if Link or any other foot soldier got close to the beast, it would try to crush them with its massive trotters. The resulting stalemate lasted a half hour...

How are we going to fell this minging...thing?! Suddenly an idea rushed to my mind and I ran ahead of the pack to the foul beast, to Link's horror, stopping just out of range of its feet. The hinox responded by trying to crush me to goo with its free hand...I leaped out of the way and quickly climbed up its arm, to everyone's alarm. The hinox vainly tried to shake me off, and when it tired of doing so I pulled out my soldier's broadsword and stabbed its upper arm, causing it to roar in pain.

"Ya want a piece of me, creep?!" Just as I had hoped, the hinox took the other hand off its eye and tried to pound me to goo with it...I leaped off the beast, it missed, AND I got a clean shot at its eye (time seems to slow down when you draw a bow in midair...Link taught me that). The hinox crashed to the ground and, before it could recover, was punted into the thereafter by the foot soldiers; meanwhile Link caught me before I could hit terra firma and break more bones. He was horrified by my stunt...I didn't really have an answer for his concerns.

You're kicking a gift horse in the mouth, bloke! So thought I as Link got on my case about my "heroism". Before Link could finish Peggle showed up, astonished.

"That...was INCREDIBLE, Ms. Petra! You just saved Little Lorule! That there stunt deserves a promotion!" He was quick to summon the higher ups in Little Lorule for a simple ceremony...

"From this day forward, this here Petra shall be LIEUTENANT Petra and shall be respected as such! Cheers to the young lady!" The audience burst into applause, and it was more than I could take...I hurried away and tried to hide, but people kept following me everywhere. Eventually Link managed to convince everyone to give me some space...everyone else backed off at that point.

"Link...thank you. I hate all this damn praise I don't deserve..." Linky said he thought I deserved it. That felt better than hearing it from strangers...but I sill disagreed inside.

"Thanks, Link." He then went on to apologize for getting on my case earlier...

"No need, Link...I did act mental back there." He held my shoulder and returned with me to Little Lorule, talking as we went...but no matter how close I was to Link that day, I did not dare to tell him who I really was; if I dared, that would just make my life more difficult...would make him try to shoehorn me into fulfilling my unwanted destiny...into repeating that naff cycle Hyrule has been trapped in for centuries...so thought I on that "heroic" day...