Link dropped to his knees, tearing free from his rucksack at his side the flint and tinder stored therein. Scurrying it into a small hole dug into the ground, his arm quaked violently as he attempted to light the bunch of wooden sticks, his shivers keeping him from properly striking the stone. A series of shallow breaths echoed around him as he desperately tried to start a fire, finally achieving his goal with a light sigh of relief.
Spinning on his knees, he crawled to the entrance of the small cave, pulling Mipha closer to the fire, she having collapsed just upon entering, leaving the two only barely sheltered from the roaring blizzard outside. Link's eyes caught the raging snowstorm outside, not having the time or energy to be thankful for their ultimate luck. He simply pulled Mipha closer, feeling her more rough hewn scales crackle against the ground, leaving her fireside as he threw off his gloves, soaked as they were from the snow accumulating upon them now melted.
He breathed hot air into his palms, placing them upon Mipha's face before lowering his head, face an inch from hers, heating her with his own breath. He followed those steps again, and then again. Link reached up to grasp his wet coat, tearing it free along his chest, doing the same for the equally drenched shirt beneath it until only his bare chest remained. He cuddled Mipha's head in his arms, pulling her up to bury her face into his chest, curling his neck to place as much of his skin against her scales as possible, still pulling away to breath hot air against her.
"Come on," he begged, struggling to understand how her torpor could have come to pass so quickly.
His answer didn't come from her words. Preoccupied as he was, he only noticed Mipha's awakened state as her hand pressed against his stomach as though to signal her presence, not wanting to leave the warmth present just a scale's breadth away within his chest.
He gave a brief sigh of relief, only now recognizing his own body's continued shivering, now with his chest exposed to the frigid air and Mipha's chilled scales. Lowering back toward the fire, Link struggled back toward his rucksack, beginning to dig through it as Mipha watched him with listless eyes.
"We made it," she managed weakly.
Link shook his head, knowing he was the one in most danger now. He yanked out a set of thick woven flannel pajamas and his sleeping pack, forcing himself to his feet and removing his coat before sliding off his shirt, shaking violently the entire time.
Mipha's expressed screwed in terror, "What are you doing?!"
"My clothes are wet," he explained, much to her horror, "I need to get into something dry, or else."
The simple explanation quelled Mipha's worry only slightly as she recognized Link's thought process wasn't one of crazed thinking. She watched him throw on his thick shirt before removing his trousers, socks, baring his bottom half entirely before rushing to slide on his dry pair of bottoms and a pair of socks. He unraveled his sleeping pack, hurrying inside before zipping it closed, sighing with relief, not so much that he was only now safe, but that he'd largely done all that he could. He watched Mipha's weak stare, not daring to curse that fact that his head remained exposed to the environment; he wouldn't have dared left Mipha there without his own eyes.
The two lie there still, Link in his sleeping pack, and Mipha beside the fire as the wind outside whipped at the cavernous entrance, a constant reminder of their impending danger should the blizzard continue.
"It's cold," Mipha complained quietly.
Link nodded, "It is."
"Sorry," Mipha hazarded an exhaustive word, "for collapsing."
"You haven't a thing to apologize for. You did great," Link smiled, "We'll make it out of this; don't worry."
Mipha's eyes winced, "I do worry."
She blinked with a strenuously slow speed, "I was so scared. Scared to pass out, to wake up to find out you'd died."
Shaking her head weakly, she confirmed, "Considering all you've done… I wouldn't be strong enough to do the same for you."
"You mean watch me die?" Link chuckled, "Trust me, that's the absolute last thing I'm hoping for you to reciprocate."
He watched her eyes, peering into their ever-deepening beauty, "When I said to remember Death Mountain, I wasn't meaning that."
"I know," answered Mipha, her lips managing something of a smile, "I just- Maybe it's just the situation."
Link ran his hands along either arm, trying to warm himself up further, "You'd probably be in for much more of a trip were you to wake up with a body like mine. I feel like that fire; trying desperately to keep a weakening flame alight."
He grinned at the thought, "It's so weird trying to explain it to somebody with such a different body."
"No, I think I understand," Mipha confirmed quietly, "At least after this long of knowing you."
She thought for a moment before correcting, "-this long of being so close to you."
Link smiled.
"My body feels like when you sit a pot of water over the fire for one of our meals. Like you know its proper state needs to be at a rolling boil, but you're sitting there waiting. and the more you watch, the longer it feels like it takes."
Her eyes deepened, "When we bask in the sun to warm ourselves, it feels like a simmer, like when you first add your vegetables. Not like when I'm with you."
Mipha felt her skin crawl underneath her scales, "The wait is so excruciating. but I can't get enough of it. Such expectation to it- because I know you won't leave. Even more than the sun's simmer, my body reaches a boil. I feel so incredible; my mind races, my heart beats faster. I feel like I can do anything."
"But also," she clarified, her voice lowering into a temptress whisper, "like I never want to leave you either. Like I never want to reacquaint myself with that pot of still water, even if I were to boil, I'd soon evaporate."
She curled her lips inward, "It's all I dream about some nights, with or without you. Dreaming about evaporating beside you, entering your body, becoming one with you in those magnificent ways I think about with you. Thinking of you taking a sip of that water, so tinged with flavor, and feeling every bit satisfied."
"It's a chore," she concluded of her own physiology, "But you truly make it amazing, Link."
Link's smiles had dissipated as she spoke, having taken a pensive stare while listening intently, "This isn't one of your 'keep me warm' games, is it?"
She grinned, "No. I often think of these things; when I hear of others being sun drunk while we bask, silently knowing that they haven't a clue. Not at all."
"It makes you want to jump out of the pot like those more fierce droplets, huh?" Link inquired.
Nodding, Mipha scooted weakly toward the fire that had begun to weaken, "And then I think of hibernation- like a frozen slab. When we don't even dream. Even when I sleep, normally, I can dream and make that period of inactivity a time worth experiencing. I miss so much when that torpor has me in its clutches."
"Like Yuletide," Link noted with a sad tone.
She shook her head, "I mean- I'm not trying to say-"
"I know you're not," Link clarified, "I know how important it is to you. How much you wanted to experience something of mine."
Mipha's eyes wandered off as if in avoidance.
Link dropped his head toward his chest to think for a moment, face twisting in thought before he spoke up once again, "When I was a child -a child of soldiers- we didn't celebrate Yuletide much. Defense of a Kingdom rarely allows for down time, after all; I would often stay home and work on whatever curriculum was expected of me at the time while my parents worked. Once, I left the house -it must have been a few days before Yuletide- and strode through the streets, being entranced by all the things that took you, also, for such a beauteous shock. The evergreen branches contrasting against the pale white snow, the lights of so many colors, the smiles on people's faces, their excitement at receiving gifts."
"I often imagined what it would be like to be a family- one that wasn't constantly being left behind as an afterthought, anyway," he explained, "Once, I found a gift for my father and mother; we didn't have a tree, so I simply left it on our table- a kind old lady down the street had helped me wrap it, actually."
He smirked, grim and dark, "I remember that more than my parents the next day. They nary noticed what I'd done."
"I know I seem jaded and apathetic about the holiday," Link admitted, voice lined with regret, "but I do so look forward to sharing it with you. Getting to experience old traditions for the first time, getting to begin new ones with you… "
Mipha eyed the wilting fire with longing in her eyes. Trailing along her sight to whatever had caused her such a dour expression, Link could understand why she had suddenly grown so despondent. He thought for a moment before loosening his expression.
Her senses perking up at the sound of a buttons being undone, Mipha glanced toward Link's sleeping sack to find him opening up himself to the cold, much to her surprise.
"Link!" she cried weakly, "What are you-"
"How am I to enjoy Yuletide without you there? We need to keep you from the cold, too, right?"
Mipha had no further reply. Like one lost in a desert encountering water, she felt her body shutting down any complaint, despite knowing that what he was asking her to do was harm himself for her sake. Still, she felt her body awaken through a spell of lethargy, crawling closer to her beloved as Link took her by the arm to help her close in. Mipha fell into a daze at the sensation of heat that surrounded her as it escaped from the open sleeping bag, almost losing her balance entirely, leaving Link to guide her further. He wrapped an arm around her waist, pulling the two of them stomach to stomach before pulling in her legs with his own.
Even as Link worked the bag back to fully enclosed, he could feel the chill that hadn't been a part of this thick bag of wool a moment ago, losing much of his sense of security. But then again, he thought, he was secure in a much more meaningful way. He supposed this as he buttoned the sleep sack fully this time, no longer offering the frigid air their skin to lash out upon, leaving the two within the darkness therein.
Mipha stared forward, right into Link's chest, with a mesmerizing series of breaths. His body radiated heat against her, swelling her heart in a peculiar joy while she basked in the darkness; a sensation she had grown accustomed to only upon joining with this man before her. It had felt odd at first, but had grown comfortable, safe: as though she had found her home simply in Link's arms.
"See?" Link spoke, trying his hardest to keep his chilled shivering from affecting his voice, "Nothing t- to worry about."
It was only then that Mipha fell from her stupor, recognizing that Link's fiery body, to her, was actually chilled to the bone by her presence. A regretful shuffling pushed her further from him within the sleeping sack, but Link's arm pulled her back into his body.
"I shouldn't be in here," she reported with a tremor that both recognized her sadness at having to leave as well as her regret in causing distress to her lover.
"Why not?"
"I'm freezing you."
She scooted away. Again, Link pulled her into him.
"No, you're n- not."
Mipha retorted with a light anger, "You're shivering to death!"
"I'd rather die beside you than in the comfort of anything else," Link explained with a boyish naivety.
His lover frowned, "Your romantic streak is going to get you killed one day…"
"We d- do this all the time. My heat will become yours, and nothing will feel out of sorts soon enough," Link noted in recall, "I feel it appropriate to bring up that Zelda would remind you that 'cold' doesn't exist, and in actuality, you're simply less heated than I am on occasion."
"But even then," he offered in a heavy tone, "I'm not going to watch you fall asleep and miss Yuletide."
He pulled his hand up to find Mipha's shoulder, finding it slithering along her arm until coming to her arm, grabbing hold and pulling it against his chest, thumbing at her finger.
"I'm hurting you…"
"This isn't hurt," Link muttered, "I'm against the woman I love. Keeping you safe couldn't ever hurt me."
He felt Mipha's hand tug against his chest.
She whispered, a longing pang hiding behind her breath, "You're fire. I'm ice."
"And I'm skin, you're scale. I'm hair and you're beautiful crests of fins."
He pulled his hand from his chest, finding Mipha's remaining against him as he reached over to tuck her temple fin away from her face.
"My eyes are pools, and yours are oceans."
She ran her hand up his chest before reaching up to hold his cheek.
"There are so many things that should keep us apart. But there are so many other things that keep us together."
Mipha murmured under her breath, "We love one another."
"We do," Link smiled, "You cool me down on a hot summer day, and I warm you on winter's eve. My skin is so tense and fun for you to play with and tease, and your scales are an unending adventure in smooth runnings of my hand along your body. Your redness excites my eyes every chance I get to see you, and-"
He thought for a moment, attempting to recall something similar from Mipha's point of view.
"...your hair reminds me of fields of wheat," Mipha finished, her voice finally taking on something of a timbre of happiness, "And it's so soft and warm against my face."
Link grinned, continuing on, "Your chin is-"
"And I count them when I can't fall asleep and I'm holding you in my arms," Mipha interrupted, as though lost in her line of thought, "Every strand of hair, wondering silently to myself how somebody so different might love me the same way that I've loved them for so long."
Link looked into her eyes, having now adjusted to the darkness, noticing that they had closed. Mipha's hand remained on his chin, her thumb stroking his skin as she lost herself in some memory from long ago and far away; some night when they could be together without the fear of incompatibility- those nights when it was just them in love.
He slid his hand to match hers, caressing her cheek before leaning closer, his hot breath passing across her face in what felt like sweet exhalation to Mipha. Her eyes opened in slight reverie, allowing her a moment's sight before Link kissed her, taking her lips into his and pulling away just enough to speak.
"And you taste so good," he breathed, "How could we be so impossibly incompatible?"
Mipha's hand took hold of his thick shirt, pulling his collar closer as though in a daze of sexual ferocity. Having grown accustomed to her quick bouts of mindless taking from his body what she wanted, and rather unable to protest, he simply acquiesced with little to nothing in the way of resistance, instead almost goading her own with his own touch. His hand slid along her back, collecting every electric sensation that trailed along atop her scales; they were so pleasantly textured, so soft and slick all at once, Link's mind couldn't help but find pleasure merely in every inch of her body.
He began to pull away for a breath, only for Mipha to take his head in her hands and pull him closer, forcing Link to strike a breath through his nose while the Zora beside him threw her tongue into his mouth, sultry moans following as she found his sweet-lined tongue and found it tasty. As if coveting his ever-heated saliva, she tenaciously darted her tongue along his, even as Link pulled away to tease her; a series of whining, panting breaths and moans quickly warned him to simply allow himself to be tasted, lest Mipha grew even more restless.
Not that Link wasn't willing in his own participation, instead choosing to warm up the rest of her body while she fixated so wildly on his lips and mouth. His arms trailed down the small of her back, grasping hold of the haunch at her backside and pulling her groin against his before running his hand along her delicately soft skin, her scales so small and fine where his hand now massaged, stroking ever so tenderly beneath her midfins.
Mipha's tongue retreated, now that her insides had reached a crescendo in heat between their impassioned kisses and where Link and she were joined at the hip. Pulling away from her lover's lips, her tongue swathed hungrily along her tongue where saliva had dribbled down, finding in to remain delicious even apart from this man's body. She slyly peered up at him before burying her face against his chest, allowing Link to wrap his arms around her, holding her close now that their body heat had equaled.
Sated, it was Mipha's turn to tremble beneath the weight of heat upon her body. Link only smiled, recognizing her worries having now quelled, as he reached down to kiss the crest of her forehead.
"See? What's mine is yours. Heat included."
His arm slung around her head, pulling her tenderly against his chest. Knowing this to be her unique equivalent of reaching a rolling boil of a climax, Link kept her close, kissing her scalp, rubbing her gently, and gently cooing to her.
"I love you," he reminded in between kisses.
Unable to speak, Mipha nearly tugged at him as though she was capable of getting even closer to his heart. Just a scale's breadth away, she thought.
"I've loved you since the first day I saw you," recalled Link, "It might have simply been infatuation then. but I thought it was love. Following you around like a puppy dog, teasing you in ways I don't think you even understood."
Another kiss.
"I just knew that I wanted to be with you. at all times. Not exactly like this, but-" he paused, allowing a thought to cross his mind, "I just love you, Mipha. Whatever happens, I-"
A gentle nuzzle against his stomach forced a pause, Mipha's voice reverberating like a wispy dream, "I love you."
He smiled, nary even a thought of the blizzard just outside or the Zora's skin that ought to be chilling him to the bone.