Chapter 27: There Are No Innocents Only Tools
The only sound in his tent was the steady breathing of the unconscious prisoner. Ganondorf unfurled the map of Hyrule and laid it on his desk, smoothing it out until there was no crease or rumple over the parchment. The spell worked best when there were no such disturbances. Once satisfied he opened a small box of Deku wood, enchanted for protection from ages past, and took out the bone-white spinning top.
"That which I have marked, I call to you. Reveal yourself to me." He rolled the top across the parchment, first focusing on the Emerald.
The top spiraled about the page, until it found a position where it could stabilize. The top dipped a little, almost falling over before it righted itself. It spun, rigid, finding the perfect balance where it did not appear to move at all. Then it started, without the usual wobbling of a top, it formed a straight line across the map. Passing over Hyrule Castle and toward the Death Mountain. Then it stopped about three-fourths of the way to the mountain, the point just off the road.
The exact same spot it had laid for a month. Every time he cast the spell, without a fraction of a change. But then why hadn't he found the blasted thing? None of his scouts had seen anything when he sent them out. While they searched the lands he looked over what scrolls he had remaining to him for some word of a place of deep magic nearby. Nothing.
Did the Kokiri boy finally find an appropriate spot to keep it safe? Curse the Princess, it had to be her doing. He must have been going to the Temple of Time to deliver it there before she got involved. If it had been the Temple of Time he could pick it up when he had already won. Or if they found some other place of power, some sacred grove or a mighty castle, that would be nothing. All it would take is intelligence, power, and patience and he could take down any defense that was laid before him.
But how was he supposed to figure out how to get the Emerald if they had simply dumped it down a hole somewhere? Was it even some random hole? If it was, why here? Why trek this far away? In the same direction he had been heading?
How am I being outmaneuvered by children?
He picked the top up and again spun it. "Reveal yourself to me," he urged the top to move somewhere else. To figure out how it had been tricked and solve the riddle for him. But, it moved to the exact same spot and stopped.
His fist crashed down against the table. It made a satisfying smack of sound causing the top to fall, finally going somewhere new. Even if it was just rolling around on its side until it fell off the table. Ganondorf caught it before it hit the ground.
CRUSH IT
Ganondorf took a deep breath and put the top back onto the table. Behind him the pattern of the breathing changed. It appeared his captive had woken up. Took him long enough, after a few days Ganondorf had feared it would not wake up at all after the beating his warriors gave. But the captive did not groan or make any sudden movements. Still pretending to be asleep, then? Clever. He had to give it that.
Ganondorf straightened his back so even peering over the map he looked massive. It was time to become the Dark King. The man that made trained knights quiver in fear, and Hylian mothers tell horror stories to their children about to make them behave.
He rose form his chair, slow and steady. As if time itself moved on his whim. Rage can be scary, but control, complete dominance of the world around you. That was terrifying.
"Sav'otta," Ganondorf turned to look at the captive. The Lizalfos was wrapped in chains, both of its legs together and it's one remaining arm shackled to its ankles. It had it's eyes closed, still pretending to be asleep. Not that it did any good, he could see its shoulders trembling in fear. That's always a good sign. "You can stop pretending. I know you're awake. In fact, I think you'll find I'll always know when you're lying to me."
The Lizalfos' eyes opened only a sliver. It's tongue lashed out, flicking at the air. "Why," it hissed, it's elongated mouth struggling to form the words in Hylian "am I still alive?"
Ganondorf pulled his chair over, then sat down in front of the lizard. He still towered over it, but now he also looked comfortable as he did it. That was another trick of interrogation. Make yourself look powerful, and make it look effortless. Let your target feel that whatever horrors you will visit upon them is as nothing to you. Any conscience that you may have should be as shallow as an empty well. "My sisters really did a number on you. I thought perhaps you would die, that would delay me for a few days."
The Lizalfos' eyes swiveled about the room. This one was a thinker. It was somewhat hard to see the emotion in a lizard's eyes, was it calculating a way to get out? Or were his eyes wandering about trying to avoid looking at him? Impossible to know. "Why?" it asked again.
Ganondorf did not respond, he only glared at the lizard and reached out with his hand. The Lizalfos flinched away trying to pull its head out from under Ganondorf's hand. But there was nowhere to go. There was a part of Ganondorf that felt disdain as the creature tried so hard to slip it's head out from Ganondorf's hand. But he pushed those feelings away. Even to something as vile as this creature one must always fight. Even if it is against the inevitable. Wasn't that what he had been doing his entire life?
His fingers clenched the back of the lizard's skull. His captive froze and Ganondorf pushed his magic into it. When he lifted his hand a black mark of magic remained on the lizard's head. The creature hissed and spit as the image sunk deep beneath its scales and disappeared.
"What have you done?" It screeched.
Ganondorf pulled his hand back and simply sat across from the creature. Letting it worry about what had happened. "You are going to tell me why you came south to lay traps upon the road."
The lizard's eyes finally met Ganondorf's, and its tongue flickered to the air between them. "I raid. I run from the Gorons."
"And why would you do such a thing? I had an agreement with King Dodongo that he would stay to the high places. That he would keep his forces contained."
"Cannot fight Gorons," the creature hissed. "Their strength is too great. Cannot eat Gorons, their meat tough as stone. Nothing to take but rocks."
"Did I not promise your kind all the gems they had but one?"
"What gems? We find no gems. We find only rock and the dark powder."
"So did you and your -how many was it, forty? Did you and your forty men just leave all together then? Or were you ordered to break your word to me?"
The lizard stared with it's blank eyes at Ganondorf. Threatening the Lizalfos proved more difficult than Ganondorf would like. Among people there were always tells, little twitches of the eyes, breaking of eye contact, sweating. The lizard did none of those things. "Yes. We all leave together."
No way to tell if the creature was lying. Then he would have to fake it. "Well now, that's a pity. I suppose you will be of no use to me after all." He reached out once more toward the lizard's head.
"Wait," it tried to pull its head back. "Wait."
"Why?" Ganondorf said, but he let his hand stop. His fingers reaching out like a claw toward the Lizalfos' face. "I have no use for you. Unless you weren't being truthful."
The lizard did not respond. It just stared with those cold eyes, but now at his hand.
"Do you know what I can do with one hand?" Ganondorf asked.
"Yes," it hissed. "I was there, when you slew the Thrice-Cursed."
"Then you know exactly how much pain he was in at the end."
"Yes."
"Who sent forty men in a coordinated raid?"
"King Dodongo." There, finally the truth of the matter. "We were to disrupt the Goron's supplies, and reinforcements."
"That was not the agreement I had with him."
"I did not know. I only follow orders."
"Then you will have no problem following orders from me. You are to return to King Dodongo and tell him to stop with these raids. I want his entire force to prepare to assault the Crown of Death Mountain."
"The Crown?" the lizard said. "That is impreg-impre-" it's lips could not quite form the word. "Not possible."
"Yes."
"Why?"
Again with the questions. It made sense why this one was in command, he supposed. It had a brain, more than he could say for half the knights of Hyrule. "When you tell King Dodongo my orders, I wish for you to touch him. You still have one good arm, use it."
"You are releasing me?"
"Yes," he said. "But I have something to show you." He stood up, walked to his desk and picked it up. He brought it to the chained lizard. The captive's eyes roamed over the map.
"Here is Hyrule Castle," Ganondorf pointed to it. "And here, is Death Mountain." He ran his finger along the map until it reached the home of the Gorons. "And finally, here, is where we are." He tapped on the road. "And this," he held up the top. "Is a gift from my mothers. You know who they are, don't you?"
"The witches."
"Exactly. They told me it was carved from the very bones of a demon of the old world. Possibly from before the time the Goddesses departed these lands." Ganondorf shrugged. "I have never been able to verify that myself, but its power, that I cannot deny."
He pressed the top between his fingers and spun it. Letting it land on the map.
He took the top in his fingers and spun it, letting it land on the map. "That which I have marked, I call to you. Reveal yourself to me." The top spun around before it moved its way directly where Ganondorf had pointed. "It sees you." He said as he looked up to the lizard. "And it will always find you."
For the first time, he thought he saw a hint of fear in the way the lizard's tongue flickered.
"If you think I'm letting you go so you can run off, you're mistaken. You have betrayed me once, I am releasing you because you did not know. But if you betray me again I will hunt you down. Remember what I did to the Thrice-Cursed and think what horrors I will bring down upon you."
"I understand."
Ganondorf patted the creature on the side of its face. Not hard, not enough to hurt anything, but the Lizalfos flinched all the same. "From this day to your last, you are mine. If I tell you to run, you will run. I send you to deliver a message you will deliver it. If I tell you to fall on your sword, you will do so. Because if you displease me your death with be far worse than that."
"Yours," the creature nodded, trying to nudge Ganondorf's hand away. "Yours, whatever my king wants I do."
"Good, now, once I release you, what is it you are going to do?"
"I return to King Dodongo. I tell him no more raids south. I tell him to gather his forces and assault the Crown."
"And?"
"And I touch him." He clenched the fingers on his remaining arm. "I touch him."
"Good." He grabbed the chains that held the Lizard down. He could just unlock him, that would have been enough. But when being terrifying it paid to be a bit flamboyant, Nabs would have called it wasteful. But what was the point of playing the Dark King if he could not be a little wasteful from time to time? He let his witch-fire spread from his hand. The lizard hissed as the chains grew hot. Then its hissing turned to a shriek as the metal melted as the black magic worked through it.
The chain crumbled in his hands, by the time the ends hit the ground they had turned to an ashen dust. The Lizalfos pulled back, rubbing it's blistering wrist on its stomach.
"It is night," Ganondorf said. "Better run before the sun rises and things will be much more difficult for you."
It had been three days since he released the captive and neither Ganondorf nor his army had moved anywhere close to as much as he wanted. He lay on his bedroll, the scroll held over his head. It was nothing. One of the few the Kokiri thief left to him, and it was no wonder why. Nothing. He had read over the relevant passages twice that day, and the irrelevant ones he read the day before.
Nothing about a sanctuary in the middle of the road. His eyes hurt from reading, he laid the scroll over his face and sighed letting it block out the bit of sunlight he had in the tent. Perhaps if he had access to the Great Library of Hyrule he'd be able to find something more useful.
But all he had was a handful of useless scrolls and an army.
The tentflap opened, and Ganondorf heard steps enter.
"Sav'aaq, Nabs." Gnaondorf mumbled from under the scroll.
"How'd you know?" A hand grabbed the scroll and lifted it off him.
"Who else would enter my tent unannounced? Aren't you supposed to be in the vanguard? Who's leading my army?"
"Not you clearly," Nabooru sniffed. "It's usual to let things get a bit rank when out on the march, but this is a bit much don't you think?"
"Nabs, no jokes, who's leading my van?"
"I left it under Bethe's command until I return. Hopefully before nightfall."
"Hmmph," Ganondorf muttered. "She's dependable enough. What is going on? Why are you here?"
"We haven't moved in over a week, Gan. How much longer are we going to stay here?"
"We just fought a battle, it's expected that we lick our wounds for a few days."
"We barely had a skirmish. Some of the vai not in the know are asking questions. And that's not even getting into some of the camp followers we picked up."
"Are we in the habit of making our battle plans based off the whispers of petty warriors and tent chasers now?"
Nabooru sighed. "Obviously not. You don't need to condescend to me, high and mighty king."
Ganondorf swung his legs off the bed roll and stood up, stretching his arms above his head he felt the bones of his shoulder and back creak into place. "Then what's the problem?"
"It's not that they're whispering, it's what they're whispering that has me concerned. Some are saying you're delaying on purpose to let more Gorons die. Some retribution for their aid of the Hylians in the war."
"And?"
"And I stopped what I heard, of course. But if those words have reached me, your second in command, then I can only guess at how much worse the rumors are that people have been keeping from me. And it will leave the camp. Perhaps reaching the Gorons, maybe the King himself. This whole plan of yours only works if they all trust us, right?"
"Hmmph," she was right, of course. "It's here, Nabs. I know it's here."
"It may well be. But we can't delay an entire war to look for it."
"The scouts have found nothing?"
"Nothing except trees, grass, and rocks. We checked the closest villages as well. None of them heard tell of a boy with a fairy. And most of those were nowhere close to where your spell marked."
"Send them again."
"To what end, Gan?"
Ganondorf growled and stepped over to his desk to peer over his map once more. It could not be more than seven miles away.
"We started this war, Gan. It's on us. Every day we delay we are getting people hurt and killed."
"Don't you think I know that?"
"You told me, you promised you were not trying to set Hyrule ablaze and rule the ashes. Well we already ignited the spark. We need to smother the fire before it gets out of hand."
"We will, I've made sure that King Dodongo can't cause any more disruption than the kind we want. I just need more time."
"At least give me a timeline. When do we say we need to get on with our plans with the war?"
Ganondorf closed his eyes and tried to think. How much more could he delay? What excuse could he make to the Gorons for why he was so slowed? How long, exactly, could he push it? "Two days," he finally said. "Give me two days, and at first light on the third day you will lead the vanguard ahead, straight march all the way to the Gorons."
Nabooru nodded, "I can work with that." She made her way to the tent entrance then stopped. "You know, I could always just send a message ahead to Bethe. Do you want me to stay here and help you with this?"
"Hmm? No. No, go enjoy yourself. This is magic nonsense. No reason for both of us to be miserable."
"You're certain? It's no trouble-"
"Go!"
Nabooru shook her head. "Just get some sleep before we ride, alright?"
"Yes, Bulira. I'll be certain to go to bed on time."
Nabooru rolled her eyes before she grinned, "Fine, I deserved that. But no one wants to have to lift you onto your horse. Bethe is with me, remember. I doubt the other vai can do it." With a flutter of the tentflap she left Ganondorf alone with his map and his problems.
Several hours passed as Ganondorf mulled over the location of the Emerald. He reread his scrolls, laid back down on his bed rolls, even left his tent for a jog and clear his head. All the while he kept trying to think about what tools he had at his disposal. The scouts were not working. And they would be of no more use. They were only people. If they had not found the Emerald yet then they never would. He could try to walk about the road himself. But it could take weeks to personally trek over these hills, longer if the child had truly just dropped it in some hole.
That left him with only his spells.
It was already dark when he returned to his tent. He found the small bone and let it roll in his hand. What was he missing?
The top spun and dropped to the paper. He said the words of the spell and watched it move across the page to stay spinning at the same spot above the road.
In his mind he went through all his potential spells. Most of them were about combat in some way. Ways to defeat his enemy with force or fire, or sneak about to catch them unawares, or sending messages to his lieutenants to coordinate faster. But the one spell he had for this searching wasn't working.
Could he call his mothers? Would they help him? He grimaced as he thought about that prospect. The last time he called upon them he had almost lost control. Did he still have the strength to defeat whatever little game they played now, with Nabooru already returned to her position in the vanguard?
No. He could not risk it. Not now. Not when it was just staying put.
That just left the spell he'd been using. He picked the bone-top up from the page.
How did the spell work? The bone was magic, that much he knew. But what about the rest of it? The map was nothing. He'd stolen it from a trade caravan in the war years ago. And the spell worked with a map of Castle Town he bought when he first entered the city. So the map was not important. It was just paper with some markings on it.
How smart was the spell? How smart was the bone?
Ganondorf grabbed the parchment he had been reading before Nabooru entered his tent. He flipped it onto the back and grabbed a quill. He drew a rough compass and laid the parchment on the table. He rubbed it as flat as he possibly could.
"Please," he muttered into the air. He wasn't certain if it was a prayer to the Goddesses or whatever demon lost the bone to make the top. "That which I have marked, I call to you. Reveal yourself to me." He released the top. The point struck firm on the center of the compass. At first all it did was wobble until it steadied. Then it moved up the line of ink that went North, before it moved to the left. Then it stopped and continued to spin.
North-West then. He glanced back over at the map. It matched, by the Goddesses it matched! The point the top designated every time was north-west of where the army was camped.
He grinned as he picked the top back up. Cast the spell and released it again. It went straight to the North-West again. A burst of laughter escaped his lips as he picked the top up again and spun the parchment around so North was facing South. He cast the spell again, at first the top spun in a small circle. Almost as if it was getting its bearings. Then it found the line that read North and moved along it, turning at the very end and stopping in the North-West quadrant. He tried the spell again, and again. Changing the orientation of the compass every time. And no matter which direction it faced, the top headed to the same spot on the page.
He picked the top up, threw his head back and laughed as loud and wild as any he could remember.
The moon had already started to descend as Ganondorf found a particularly flat piece of land on these hills. He put down the page for the dozenth time, cast the spell and saw the top spin straight toward the South-East line. He had just passed where the Emerald had been hidden.
He smiled as he looked out on the mound of grass that had a healthy bright green even in the moonlight. There was something down there. There was no way that someone could dig up a pit to store the Emerald, cover it, turn it into a mound and then have grass grow along it with no sign of the earth being disturbed.
Magic dwelt in this place, it had to be. Ganondorf crouched into the grass and waited. If nothing came out, then he would need to go in blasting. Messy but not necessarily a bad idea. But hopefully he would be able to think of a more skillful solution.
It took hours, but something did draw close to the mound. A speck of pink light with two clear wings fluttering around it. It rose out of the grass and fluttered toward the trees. It seemed to just be enjoying itself dancing around the starlight.
Well, a fairy then. That would make this a fairy mound and perhaps one of the Great Fairies themselves lived beneath. He might best one in direct combat if he needed to. But, these beings were known for their powerful magic and their trickery. It would be better if he got the information of what he would face in person.
Ganondorf whispered old words of magic in a language long dead. Darkness of true night enveloped him like a cloak. A night where the twinkling light of stars and moon never touched him.
The fairy danced about, singing to herself as she headed toward the flowers to breath in their scent. It seemed to feel his presence. It stopped and turned around to look at Ganondorf. But it froze, trying to figure out what it was looking at perhaps? It's tiny mind not realizing the workings of the spell. Ganondorf bound the last few steps to the tiny creature.
Thrusting his hands forward, he let the night slip past his arm around envelop the fairy as well. His fingers formed a prison exactly the right size for the fairy.
It screamed, until that too was drowned in the darkness.
Together they stood, around them a whirling flow of blackness distorted the world, turning all light away from them. Only the fairy and him could see each other plain. It tried to pull at Ganondorf's fingers, then kicked, and bit. But through his gloves he barely felt a thing.
Ganondorf did not release the spell until they were well away from the Fairy Mound, and the fairy had seemingly given up trying to fight its way out.
He lifted his hand to his face, looking through his fingers at the little creature, the barest outline of a figure beneath the pink glow. "Hello," he said. "My sincere apologies for my poor manners. Please allow me to introduce myself. My name is Ganondorf Dragmire, and you are going to tell me everything I wish to know."