Rain pelted him with heavy splotches, weighing down his garb and hair. It blinded him half as much as it deafened him. The cold tendrils of heaven's tears sploshing atop the tips of his long ears, then soaking through to the soles of his boots. It wouldn't be hard to look at him and believe he was thrown from the bow of a ship.
It didn't stop his sword from cutting the air before him.
He watched the silver steel split the air, fast enough to cut the rain that was unfortunate to be in its path. Boots slid on wet ground, heels dug, arms flexed and he swung again. It cut once more. Different drops of rain were sliced, others splashing against the metal. They were the only victims to his dance.
Air left him in cold spurts, chest heaving from fatigue and cold. The sores of his hands ached as they were twisted about the hilt of his blade. Water constantly slipped into his eyes and blinded him. Arms were tightening with a refusal to continue. He didn't let himself feel any of it.
His blade cut again. Forward and back to saw through an enemy's defense. A retreat in his posture before raising in defense. A twist of his boot, momentary sacrifice of his posture, to let him put his full weight into the next swing. It carved through the rain like a stick in water. It almost sang.
It... almost spoke.
But he heard nothing.
Nothing but rain pelting on the steel in his hands. His teeth gnashed at sight of the silent blade.
His voice left in a bark, slamming the sword down. He saw an enemy slinking beneath his grasp, taking their arm. He jumped over, body double in weight from rain and sweat, but still landed with a splash in his boots. The sword came over his head, arcing through the air like guillotine. It cut could have cut the heavens with the power he put into it.
But for that to be possible, he had to hear the sword.
And he still heard nothing. Not even the ring of its swing.
"You reported to the guard you found the blade from its calling to you. Tell me, how do you both claim to have heard the blade to draw it, yet cannot hear it now?"
The question came with his head bowed, the impossibility of speaking for a spirit lain on him. The king did not utter a word after, letting his question hang before the court. Before the Champions. Before his daughter. All of them waiting for an answer. One they knew he could not give.
"Am I to assume that you did not hear the blade? That you perhaps found it by chance, seeking it to draw merit?" He shook his head in denial. He did not. "Then perhaps you can hear it and my daughter misspoke to me. Did she tell a lie, or did you confess you are unable to hear the sword?"
It was a twisted question for his honest one. But he could not twist his own words. He had to be a sword for the king. Honed, sturdy, straight and honest.
He denied that the princess lied. He refused to look up to see her.
He knew she was smiling. He knew she was proud, to not be the one bowed.
"Then you must tell me, supposed hero. Why do you not hear the blade?" He still had no answer. "How can we trust the safety of this kingdom to a lad who has nothing to his name but a sword he can only swear to have pulled?"
His foot reached out, sliding across mud and dirt. Grass was pulled for his effort, but he snarled through the torrent that assaulted him. The rain of war was like fog, and he had to blaze through it. He stabbed upwards, twisting his body as his sword hung, using the non-existent target as a leverage to swing himself. The sword pulled through, ripped by his two hands, before running up to cleave another.
The grip changed, from two-handed to reverse grasp. He put the palm of his hand on the pommel, using it the main force behind the fulcrom of his hand. It turned the blade from a sword to a cleaver, ripping the rain water faster than before. It didn't just slice. It tore. The storm cried above him for his efforts, a wave of water splashing against the ground far away.
The blade itself didn't so much as hum. He stared at it, panting, tired, but far from done.
"Frankly, the idea of someone like you holding that blade now is even more asinine then I initially imagined. I mean really, even the youngest of Rito are able to hear the winds we use to fly. How can you not hear the song of your own supposedly great metal?"
The comments came from the Rito Champion as he passed the practice hall. His talons clicked on the tiling as Link held the sword up. Eyes shut, he put his head to the flat, trying to drive his soul into it, looking for any sound at all. It worried him that it could be speaking, and he only could not hear it from the jeers of the champion.
Jeers that were met with snickers and laughs from the rest of the men.
"Would you believe me if I told you my bow speaks to me? Oh yes, every plug of it strings is met with the thunk of my targets, and the two of us can make a veritable song out of practice. So much so that no one dares to hold it." He demonstrated, but he didn't see.
He only heard, distinctly with his ears so focused, the triple release of the bow, the twang of it nestling in air. Then, as he said, the dull thunk of nine arrows hitting targets. The cheers from the men showed he had not only made his mark, but did so with flourish. They loved and act. They loved displays.
He had nothing to show. Nothing but the silent blade in his hands.
"Come off it and admit that the blade was taken from another, or perhaps given to you as messenger. Never meant to use it in combat, only meant to deliver it to a more capable soul." The men snorted in agreement.
He heard them draw closer.
"I wonder who that soul could be?"
He didn't need to look up to know Revali was grinning.
His boots started to spin as much as his body. From the heels being support to the edges of his toes. Water collected at the edges, making it feel like he was standing deep in a river's basin. It didn't stop him from moving, from twisting, and swinging.
The blade cut as he danced in a circle, angling the sword with full body rotations. The rain went on and off with the ferocity of his strikes, each heavy swing creating a vacuum of liquid for moments, breaks in the downpour of the sky. But they were downpours that always continued, no matter how hard he swung. Until the water began to collect yards from him, puddles on the tops of his carved from the twst of his boots and jutting of the blade.
He stopped his fifth rotation with his heel sideways, bearing his weight on it. He let out a heavy cry, screaming as he drove it forward. The collective of his effort sent the water up against his strike. It bade his command.
Then, the moment that followed, it rained down on him again.
The sword bathed in the rain. It bathed in his misery.
"Little guy, that sword is yours, right?" The question from the Goron Champion came with a coolness that compared to mountains. "You're father was a brother to me, so I'm not gonna question you're a good guy. But I've seen good guys to desperate things. And you ain't one of 'em, right?"
The question came as he was cornered in the hall. Between the barracks and the training ground. He looked up at the Goron, the stone grey beard of the man pulled down with a frown, behind a mouth that he knew could swallow him whole. He still didn't let go of the blade.
"See, your father wasn't just a good guy, he was a great one. First time I saw you, I couldn't help but call you a little guy. Small as my nail, but your pops was smitten with you. Day he passed, I swore I'd look out for you. Might be my fault you ended up in the domain. Ending up there couldn't have done you any good."
He stared up at the eyes of the Champion, not taking his gaze away from the critical eyes of the Goron. The blade was in his hand he wasn't going to let it go. No matter how many bruises he had or the ferocity with which they stung. He held his position. Just as he was taught to.
Just as he had to.
"You were outta my view for so long, I'm afraid ya got a bad idea 'bout bein' worth somethin'. And let me tell you something. If ya really did snag that blade from someone, you gotta be straight about it." His voice was stern as his body. "And if not, you gotta tell me what the swords sayin'. You said it talks, so ask it somethin'."
He had. For hours a day and for days on end. He asked it as he was swinging it, sleeping with it, practicing with it, holding it against the assault of fellow soldiers, against the scrutiny of the Shiekah, against the condemnation of the Princess.
He never let go.
Daruk only sighed at his silence.
"Kid... its gettin' harder and harder ta believe ya. Turning yourself into ash."
He lumbered away, leaving him alone. It was silent as a grave. No one spoke to him. Spirit or otherwise.
He dragged it down now, letting the tip slice the mud. It cut clean as it had the straw targets of the testing grounds, making a slice so fine it could only have been said to have been committed by a master. The rain hid the evidence of the cut, in water and mud. He stepped over it, blade already spinning like a saw.
A step to his right, the blade dug in a circle to his left. He switched his weight, and the blade flung over his head, slicing through the other side. No specks of mud ran up with the efforts, cut too cleanly from the ground. The sword was cleaned in the water it battered as it ascended. His walk continued, tearing through the air above and ground below, the dedication of a narrow field of combat.
His vision blurred more with the rain, hair falling over his gaze. He didn't have the time to adjust it. The sword needed his attention. He needed to focus on it as he carried it through heavy arcs. The weight of its steel, the rain, and its momentum needing him to focus. His hands rolled over one another from hilt to pommel, carefully grasping it without sacrificing its strength.
He only stopped when both hands were at the hilt, and the blade was at a point behind him. Behind him, like it was on his back. It didn't hum. It didn't vibrate. It refused to sing.
"My little bird needs to sing, and you've put her in much grief with your acts. Parading around a sword you claimed to have heard, but now say won't utter a whisper? There is a saying in the desert for voe who speak for another's tongue. Do you want to know it?"
The Gerudo Chieftan, twice his height and match for weight, leaned over him as he sat for a meal. He looked up at her, unable to stomach the food before him. Rotten apples and uncooked meat. Scraps of fat thrown together with hard cartilage and bone. The scraps he saw the cooks steal from the pigs and give to him chuckling of a fitting feast.
It gave him a wide birth in the garden he ate at. It didn't stop the Champion of the Desert from bearing down on him.
"I was under the impression you had been chosen by fate and effort. Her mother would dream of the boy who would pull the blade and aid her. And now all I see is a pretender making excuses to keep a position too high for himself. To rest behind walls and never without soldiers at the ready to keep you safe."
Her hands fell opposite his plate. Lightning crackled from the edges. He looked down at them, seeing them boil the already spoiled food he was made to eat. Turning inedible into poisonous. He continued to stare, until one of her dark hands reached up and grabbed his chin, pulling him to her gaze.
"By the way, we call those voe 'Varush'a'. Do you know what it means?" He did not. He did not care. "Liars of fortune. Do you know what we do with Varush'a?" He did not know. He did not care to know. "We let them to the desert, to see if their words can spay the winds. None have so far."
Urbosa stood to her fullest as she left, the grass crackling beneath her. Link looked at his food, wasted, worthless. His stomach begged for food.
He bit into poison, desperate to hear something cry.
His hand worked now. Shoulder running forth to break a shield, the pommel of the blade coming up to dent armor. The fulcrom of his stance swung it like a mace, switching the blade from left to right, putting his body up and repositioning her feet. The mud almost made him fall, but grit teeth and flexed muscles kept him up. He refused to fall.
The blade was trying to pull him down, so it came out towards the rain. It split and splintered under the ferocity of the stab, and it dragged him to a better position. One he pulled away from, dancing from one spot. The position of defender, to single out the enemy. His eyes took to drops of water that fell from the sky, cleaving them with jerks of his blade. The blade that came out, twisted, and then ripped back above his head.
His foot rose to kick out, the weight greater than that of his leg alone with water dredged in it. It made a wet slap as it landed, doubtlessly ruining what little of it wasn't worn from practice. He made to swing the blade down, but stopped, a painful cry coming from him. The cry of something he didn't care to hear. His back was furious with him, but he refused to drop the blade.
Not until he heard it.
"It's alright if you don't hear the blade Link. I believe the sword is yours. You just... have been under more stress than others will give credit for. Everyone has eyes on the princess, so they don't see what you have had to bear."
The Zora Princess slowly brushed his back with her webbed hand. It was bare, stripped with painful slowness. Cuts and bruises were forming along it, deep enough that he knew there was going to be little feeling in the future. He thought the relief of her magic would start soon.
It never did.
"Maybe... this is a good thing. This is a sign you should stop." Her kinds words came without her magic. Kindness with a heaviness he couldn't lift. "Maybe you should stop and return to the domain. Father would be thrilled for your return and... and you wouldn't have to worry about the sword anymore."
The feeling of her hand, smooth with scales and slick with a membrane, was like water rushing down his back. What should be easing, but filled with pain. Fresh wounds found water to clean them, not to heal them. Her powers were meant to heal, but he felt nothing. None of the efforts she had done when they were younger.
"It's okay if the sword doesn't talk to you. You don't have to be a hero for it. You can just be a hero for me. That's all you need." Her voice was filled with empathy and kinds.
All for who she believed he was. Not for what he had endured.
Mipha's words echoed as she continued to rub painful circles along his tattered back.
He did not cry. Not before the blade.
Muscles screamed at him as he continued to slash at the air. Each stance he took was made from memory. Foot slid before the other, weight on the heel. Bent forward with sword upon the ground, leg twisted for a strike. Two hands along the pommel, leaning back as he swung, using the weight of the sword to hold him up.
The moves became more intense, wilder, almost more random. The third swing in and Link knew his form was failing. His feet didn't extend far enough out. His hand grasped the guard too far down the side. The flat angled towards him, rather than towards the ground. His head leaned forward, making his balance sway.
Each moment he caught himself. Each moment he pushed on. The muscles continued to berate him.
Tendons he had spent hours in training to strengthen began to wear. The bones he'd stressed to a point of high durability were starting to shiver. The mind began to fall. Link held onto his blade to keep him strong. Strength failed faster for it.
The rain continues to pelt him, and he continues to defy it. The heavens continue to cry out for his fall, but he did not give them answer. His ears search for only one voice, and until he hears it, he cannot allow his body to stop. To stop moving is to fail. To fail is to admit he is not enough. He has to be more. He has to be.
The blade did call to him. It had. He lifts it above his head, where it weighs heavier than the first moment he had dragged it from the Lost Woods, before the sight of the Great Deku Tree. Hanging above him with silver daring the sky to strike, he stares up at hit, water trying to blind his blue eyes. He doesn't look away. He doesn't remove his focus. He has to listen. Because somewhere, in his hand, was the spirit.
It called to him once before, and he needed to hear it again.
Hear it, at the edge of his being, looking to pull him in. It had to be. Link sees and feels nothing but rain, wind, and days of training. He still does not let go. He continues to stand in defiance of nature, waiting for the same force to come to his aid.
The blade called to him. It asked for him. He followed it in his dreams.
Now he hears nothing. Now, he feels his lips pull in a snarl. He does not have the energy to hide it anymore.
The blade shifts in his hand as a knee splashes against the soiled ground. He flexes his hardest and lets everything, everything, drive itself into the dirt.
"False Hero of Hyrule, you disrespect not only the sovereignty of the crown, but that of the history of the land. We Shiekah have watched the Hylians since before the first age, and you are not the first to attempt to upset this order."
He stands without effort. Chains are bound to his wrist, holding up up from the ceiling. His boots barely scrape at the ground, his arms having to endure a painful angle. He maintains it, because the pain of having to hold his body up by the wrist alone is worse. It would be worse if that was it alone.
But he stands with a trio of the white garbed Shiekah before him. Their hats of straw hide most of their faces, but the marks of the Eye of Truth are well known to all Hylian soldiers. Each holds a series of knives or needles, nestled between flexed fingers. They jut out from fists so much like exposed swords. They each appear like this, except for the one who leads them.
"You have a tongue to speak. Won't you use it?" He does not. He had been taught that words under duress were never in the favor of the captor. He did not believe he would be in this state. But to ignore the shackles around him would be avoiding reality. Reality must be confronted as an enemy.
Reality is Impa, the Shiekah Guardian of her Highness Princess Zelda, bearing down on him with red eyes bright enough to be mistaken for torches. The sheen of cool steel in her grasp kept away notions of her being filled with warmth. Her words did the deed well.
"If you do not use words, then use sense. Drop the blade you hold. Release the Master Sword." He did not.
Even now, bound in a dungeon where he's sure the rest of the castle sleeps, he holds the blade tight. It shivers with the strength he grips it with, but he doesn't release it. The moment he drops it, he admits defeat to the enemy. A knight, no matter how lowly, is not allowed to admit to such things before they are true.
One of the Shiekah, faster than most but slower than Link, drives one his knives into his leg. It gives a convincing argument to release the sword. His body fights him with a scream, but is held back with a grimace instead.
He does not release the Sword.
The other strikes him now. The opposite leg, but dragging up his hip. Blood flows and stains his trousers. His boot are going to be dampened and ruined. Link believes he will pass out before he can tell they are filled. That said, he remains unconvinced to drop the blade.
It is his. It is his. He pulled it, but they only want it.
No words are spoken then on. Instead, one by one, the pair of Shiekah under the command of Impa continue to strike him. Knives enter and leave his muscular portions. The tips digging into arms and leg, pulling in painful arcs. Each arc leaves behind a swath of red. He can only just see them, unwilling to remove his blue gaze from the red stare of Impa.
She is not impressed with his silence. It doesn't take long until he is stained a red darker than the guardian's eyes. She wears nothing to reflect the blue of his own. The haze in the cell, however, begins to match the gray of his vision. It was slowly leaving him, and he holds on with all that he has.
"Your strength is leaving you, for you are a thief." She speaks as the pair of Shiekah lull their assault against him. "We have looked long for what the craft is that allowed you to pull the blade, and were unaware of it. It's safe for us to presume that it is something you fashioned with the help of Calamity or Yiga."
The name only makes him grip the blade tighter. One of evil, one of traitors, both an enemy to him. They are comparing him to Hyrule's worst. But he knows that is not what makes him snarl.
They believe he is among their number.
"Your father died in Akkala against them." The callous words continue. "It stands to reason to us who watch the Royal Family that you may have used this point to contact them. A deal may have been made in order for you to obtain the blade. They would know of curses to lift it, and keep it, from others."
White boots step forward until she is leaning towards him. She still does not reach out to him. Far enough away to keep even a jerk from hitting her. Link knows better than to show aggression. It is useless while one is bound.
"It is a mockery to our name that you have gotten this far, but it is a problem you can assuage. All you need to do is drop the sword."
He breaths deep and strengthens his will. The blade is silent.
Needles now. Needles begin to push into his limbs and hold themselves in place. Link is able to hold back his cries as they stay still. A knife would do too much, stuck in to be irremovable. A needle does not have that problem. It can cause far more pain. These are Masters of the Shadows. They are versed in torture.
Link endures it with grit teeth, a ruined body, and a still silent blade.
"Drop the sword." The sole speaker in the cell continues on. "Your curses may have rendered you its only wielder, but if you forgo it, another may grasp it. So you must drop it."
Finally, Link lets his head hang. He cannot continue to stare at her. He has to focus on the pain that is blooming in him. It takes him a moment of though, feeling steel make jelly of his limbs, to realize there may be poison on those blades. If there is, it is not a poison to take his life.
It is a poison to give him pain. It is meant to make him scream.
"Drop the blade, False hero! Drop it!" Knives in his thighs, needles in his arm. He refused. "DROP IT!"
"HIAGH!" He plunges the blade into the ground.
For one glorious second, the storm stops. Mud turns to dry dirt, and his clothes are loose on his body. For one brilliant second, he is in silence, staring at a blade cleansed in rain and effort. A moment he has the breath to believe would be it. The chance, the moment he would hear the words coming forth.
But the rain fell again and, with it, took the only chance he thought to hear the sword. Blue eyes stared down at it, at the lavender hilt that mocked him with its perfect curves. Metal that didn't dull in dirt or rain, that cut through steel as hot butter and wood with more strength than an axe. A blade that had heralded the coming of great heroes, in shows of light and power.
Now, in his hands, spoke nothing.
"Why..." The question left him. So breathless he could barely hear himself in the rain. "Why won't you speak?"
The rain mocked him with its cacophony. It weighted him down with the guilt of his inability. All the strength of the greatest of knights, all the skill honed from trying to honor his father's name, his family's history, and it was lost because he couldn't repeat what was done.
"You spoke to me through the forest. You guided me to you. You told me... You told me to raise you up. I did. I DID!" He put his weight onto the blade.
It sunk deeper into the ground, like a post to hold his fragile body up. Or a monument to the truth he'd never be able to bear. The blade and steel were his, but the rain took the noise. The spirit belonged to others. The Spirit of the Sword wasn't his.
The Master Sword was his. It's spirit should be!
"So why... why don't you answer me..."
His head dug into the pommel.
"Why don't you speak? Why?" Just rain. "WHY?" Just lightning. "ANSWER ME!" Just thunder.
"Link?"
Hope for one terrifying moment, filled him. He sucked in air, water, and hair, dragging it into him as he stared open mouthed at the blade. Awe at hearing a voice not his own, in this rain. He heard it! He did!
Then he looked past the blade.
There, he saw her.
"Tell me hero, do you hear it? Do you hear the voice of the sword?"
It was a question he paid no mind to. Another question to wonder on the voices she wished to hear and he could not. A sign of his success and her failure. He never spoke of it as a success, for he knew he had yet to succeed. But that was not what the Princess saw.
He knew she saw her lows, and only imagined his highs. He was what she wished for. Seeing successes he dug for, and strove to keep. Hers was a perilous journey to reach success. He had obtained the key to his, and now strove to prove his worth.
He knew, from time and patience, that she needed to know she was not alone.
"No, I've never heard it."
That was not what she told the others when he offered his answer.
"Never? You have never heard the sword?"
His admittance was not taken as an offering of peace. She did not see it as proof to show they both were working. She took it as him being a fraud.
"You... are a liar."
Joy lit upon her features.
It became an outlet for her.
An outlet to tell all.
Link, the Great Hero of Hyrule, could not hear the Sacred Blade.
She wasn't alone.
Impa stood beside her, a curtain of leather above her head to hide the princess from the rain. Both were staring at him, with emerald and red eyes so vivid, not even the darkness of the storm could conceal it. Eyes on him, judging him, watching him, staring at him. The princess, hands at her mouth, disgusted by his display.
The Shiekah guardian with a mouth drawn, eyes furrowed in vivid disappointment. A disappointment, a failure. She was ready to torture him again, prepared to drag the blade from his hands in another attempt of scaring him. She would be cheered, and she would only find honor in taking it from him.
And the princess would watch. Eyes so wide, so still, focused on him. She had done all of this. She had ensured everyone knew he could do nothing.
She was only too happy to make sure everyone knew the truth.
"Lying for position."
"A better holder."
"Dishonest kid."
"You liar."
"You should give up."
"Release the blade!"
"I've never heard it."
"I've never heard it." He still couldn't.
The rain rumbled like thunder over him, forcing him to tremble. He kept his body rigid as the steel he held. Steel he couldn't hear. A voice he couldn't understand. Nothing but clean silver, and a void of noise. The heavens tried to mute out the world.
He wondered why. There was already nothing to hear. Therefore, nothing to hold onto.
Link let go.
He stood up, the rain continuing to pelt him, drain him to hold him still. It would have, if he had any more weight to him. But he didn't anymore. The weight that he didn't deserve was stuck in the ground, held to the mud. It lacked any shine. The rain kept the sun from dancing on it.
Still eyes looked to the princess and her guardian. Neither had moved. They didn't have to.
He did. He turned, soaked through skin and bone, and began to walk away.
"Link?" A voice called. He did not turn. It was not the voice of the blade.
"Link!" He did not stop for her calls. She didn't need to call anymore.
The blade was silent.
"Link!"
He was no hero.
Not anymore.
She didn't know what was happening.
That wasn't entirely true. She knew exactly what was occurring.
She could list each word and reaction with perfect recall, able to understand each effect and the subsequent cause. What was happening was obvious.
Why it was happening, she was still working on that.
She tried to piece it together as she stood beside Impa, facing her father, looking over his desk with a look of calm disbelief.
"He's gone?" The question had to be asked, even after the report. "Speak sense. That boy wouldn't just turn tail and leave."
"That is what he did sir," Impa replied regardless, position firm from bow. "Princess Zelda and I both observed him practicing with the stolen blade, unable to make it recognize him. After he performed an admirable display of execution, he left the blade embedded in soil and walked into the storm."
King Rhoam put a hand to his brow and rubbed it, creasing the already old skin.
"Boy really was a fraud. How stupid of me to think his word was good enough."
The words stung her. Pained her.
"Father he may-"
"Not now, Zelda." He silenced her with a wave of his hand. "Whatever your concerns are, they're secondary until we find out what this means." He settled his quill on the table. "His drawing of the blade was meant to sign that the Calamity was coming. And now, we find that it was a fraudulent act."
'No, I've never heard it.' The quiet voice offering up something so delicate so easily to her.
"It... may not have been."
"It was your highness. You don't need to offer him your sympathies." Impa did not scold her, but she gave a light chastisement with her tone. "All the champions have affirmed that he is unable to hear the voice in the blade, casting serious doubt on his authenticity for possessing the sword in the first place."
"He was able to possess it in some manner." Her father offered. "Though it could also be a ploy of our enemies to scare us into the approach of Calamity. If the sword is not drawn, then the fate of Hyrule is delayed."
Zelda loathed the relief that gave. The idea that Link leaving was her peace. That should have been exactly what she wanted. The perfect knight was gone.
'Perfect knights do not cry in the rain for their failures.'
"What if... our words made him feel unworthy?" Zelda offered. Both her father and Impa stared at her. "I mean that Link has no other family. He was housed here because of the Master Sword. And I have heard since... since I reported what he said." Bile rose in her. "He has not been adequately treated."
"He has not adequately showed us his abilities." Her father pushed back. "There are many men who are skilled with the blade, so feats alone mean little. If he cannot have the blade talk, it doesn't matter."
"Don't concern yourself for his well-being anymore, Zelda." Impa tried to offer her a smile. "You did well to tell us what he said. He may otherwise have led the nation to ruin in fear."
"She is right. This means good things for you." Her father's words almost hurt. "Now that Calamity Ganon is no more an immediate threat, you can focus on assisting the other Shiekah with the ancient technologies. Though I would like for you to commit to your acts of penance and shows of piety, I cannot proclaim them so much higher a priority now."
It truly stung her to hear her father offer that. Everything she had asked for and wanted, offered because she sold out a boy who struggled.
"I've never heard it."
"My lord, should I send out a party for the boy?"
"No, that won't be necessary. There may not be an immediate risk of Calamity Ganon, but there are still parties seeking to usurp the land." He drew up a parchment. "Have it be known that a reward will be offered to the information leading to the capture or killing of former Sir-"
"Killing!?" Zelda couldn't help but yell.
"Of course!" Her father was a fronted. "He committed fraud before the crown, absconded with goods and privacy nobles dream of. He offered a threat no different than treason." Her jaw worked uselessly.
The boy staring at her from across the rain, fury and sorrow in his eyes. Desperation unrewarded. Efforts put to vain. Strengths taken as flaws. Flaws taken as totality of worth.
The same look she saw in the mirror after every failed prayer. Every failed test. Every failed conversation.
The hatred of one's self.
"But... capture is enough. Then we can know how he obtained the sword!" Zelda tried, she did.
"We have it now, and there is little to be gained about the manner he used." The king pushed back. "Further, thanks to your clever thoughts, we know of a new test to be able to measure anyone able to lift the sword. If no voice rings, they are not chosen to lead."
She bit her lip in rage.
"But... I can tell this is upsetting to you." Rhoam rose and crossed the threshold of his desk. He approached his daughter, hand on her shoulder and rubbing over her skin. "I have been too harsh with you, my child. The fear of the Calamity made me a fool, and I have no true way to make up for my sins against you."
Everything her father was saying, for her, everything she ever wanted to hear.
It hurt. It truly hurt.
"Just know, I am aware of my sins. Putting too much trust in one who I didn't raise. I can not undo what has been done. But I can do more moving forward. I only ask you allow me that." His face was gentle. Just like when mother was alive.
Zelda wasn't sure how that brought her more pain.
"Zelda?"
"I... I will." She forced out. "M-May I go? This is t-too much."
"Of course. Take your time. It can't be easy having the horror of Calamity raised over heads, only to drop it like a curtain." He didn't understand. "Let Impa know if you need anything. Her or I." She shook her head. "Goodbye Zelda. I love you."
She was out the door before she could offer a response. Her legs were heavy, making her nearly stomp out of the room. The weakness in her mind made it a swift drift, almost ghost like through the halls. Heels clicked as she ascended the steps, servants bowing as she passed, looks of sympathy being offered. Sympathy for her, for her.
When the princess entered her room, she latched the bolt on instinct. The moment it clicked, a bubble rose and popped in her throat. Her hand slapped to her mouth to cover it.
It threatened the damn within.
"Do you hear the sword? The spirit that lays within the blade?" She had asked the question so desperately, sure that the perfect knight had been having conversations nightly with it. Speaking to it about the princesses before her, that rose to face Calamity.
"No, I've never heard it." And the joy she felt at it had to be shared.
Shared with her father, the Champions, her guardians. She wasn't the only one who couldn't hear the powers to be their kingdom's safety.
But she was the only one that was being cared for despite it.
She fell against her desk before she found her way to the chair. Her body was limp as she grabbed the edges, holding herself up with fingers and elbow. Across the desk the vanity stared back at her, the same glass she'd stare in every night she failed, every morning she had no success. Here was where she saw those eyes each night.
The same eyes Link wore. The same gaze he had screaming into the rain for a voice to speak to him.
The same way he did for night after night... ever since she shattered the little trust he placed in her.
"I've never heard it."
"And no one else knew." She realized with slow breaths.
Her failures, the testaments to her work, the efforts she put in, piling up to nothing. The faces of scorn that followed her, sighs of resentment, empty platitudes fill with false hope. They were all she received from those around her. All but him.
Link understood. Link tried to help her.
And she threw it into a sacrificial pyre.
The love, the understanding, all of it... Because of him.
Because of what she did to him.
"I-I'm sorry." The breathless whimper left her. She couldn't hold back the tears. "I-I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm s-sorry..." She could get no further.
She wept alone in her room. No one was watching over her now.