CHAPTER 25
Removing his hat, he tenderly wrapped it around Ruto's small body and placed her in the shade of the nearest tree, then began the preservation process for the fish.
"Link?" Ruto chirped, snuggling into the supple fabric and inhaling the soothing scent.
"Don't worry, love. I'll keep the livers," he replied absently.
"How did you come by that mask, anyway? Did you buy it from the River Zora?"
Shit. He'd forgotten to tell her about the masks. "I used a similar mask to turn into the Fierce Deity," he began, keeping his hands busy. "They, um – they're no ordinary masks, see. They. . . . . . . . .how do I explain this?"
He unpacked the masks one-by-one and laid them out for Ruto to examine, telling her the tale that the soul inhabiting each mask had told him. She scowled apprehensively at the Zora Mask as he recounted the story of Mikau and by extension, Lulu – but common sense persuaded her that Link could feel nothing toward another Zora's mate, especially if (as she assumed) Mikau fathered Lulu's hatchlings.
But one question bothered her – a question that she'd forgotten to ask before.
"This Skull Kid. . . . . . . . .the one who stole Epona and the Ocarina of Time," she asked. "He – he couldn't have done so by his own power. Did he use one of these masks, too?"
"Not exactly," Link replied while scaling a fish. "He had a much more powerful mask – Majora's Mask, to be exact. I don't know much about it, but I do know that the spirit within was. . . . . . . . ."
He paused as he finished scaling the fish and set it aside – only to peep in Ruto's direction and see her mouth wide-open and her eyes bulging in alarm. " YOU FACED MAJORA?!" she screamed, gasping for breath in-between words.
"You know about him?" he replied, scooping her into his arms.
"Only what Rauru told me," she admitted. "Had he known anything about a mask, I'm – I'm sure that he would've brought it up. But he DID say that Majora arose when the Goddesses had just created the world, and that a certain human tribe worshiped him, and. . . . . . . . ."
Ruto paused, steadying her breath. "And that, were he ever to rise again, he could pose a far more dire threat than Ganondorf ever did."