It's funny, originally I was going to skip Echoes of Wisdom at launch because I'd blitzed through the remainder of Tears of the Kingdom just a few weeks before release. Then one of my friends got so obsessed with the game that she gifted it to me so I would be forced to put it at the front of my backlog.
And I can't complain! The game was very good! Would recommend.
I don't have quite as many fic-related takeaways for this game as I do the BOTW/TOTK duology (Which I promise I will return to... Whenever I can find the time and motivations to hit everything I'm behind on). However, one particular side quest in Gerudo Town really got the gears in my brain a-turning. Thus... We have this little one-shot, hopefully not too late to capitalize on new Zelda game hype. Please enjoy~
Zelda feels her stomach lurch in time with the flickering flames of nearby braziers, each a stalwart pillar of shimmering gold and gemstones.
As the fire stretches high, sprays of gastric acid prickle her throat.
As the fire feigns intent to sink into its coals and escape as wisps of smoke, her innards seem to melt into void, dense as a black hole.
As the fire curls crescent-wise in the evening breeze, a pang twists her stomach, and it punches her spleen aside.
The princess fails to focus on anything that could take her mind off this feeling. She watches embers dance dangerously close to casting Gerudo history aflame across ornate tapestries of bleeding mango in every corner of the grand bedroom. She traces the powerful, wavy pattern of the palace's spade-shaped mashrabiya with her eyes, waggles this way and that to see every possible configuration of starry constellations shining through those gaps. She wonders what she might ask the well-loved sand seal plushie, discolored and dusty atop a bookshelf of haphazard scrolls and training manuals — perhaps, does everything feel better once that always itchy stuffing spills out?
Like her stomach, a Siamese stretches its lithe figure to the point of breakage on the nearby jewelry boutique's sandstone rooftop, visible through the lattice window.
So far as she can tell, this queasiness isn't an adverse reaction to an earlier feast shared with Gerudo Town's royal court: buttery, golden rice, soft-skinned chickpea balls, and crispy cuckoo, the meal topped off with a slim, gooey sweet cheese pie drenched in rose water. Zelda regrets not asking after each dish; she was too busy stuffing her face.
No, her distress must be coming from elsewhere.
Nerves are the most likely culprit, she reasons. But she hasn't felt anywhere near this breathlessly on-edge since stepping into the putrid guts of Null, a literal planetoid garbage dump that electrified goosebumps across her arms and legs in what she only later realized was layers of skin boiling away into nothingness.
How is it possible to feel anything but completely and utterly relaxed right now? Draped in silky smooth, pearlescent fabric jammies that are perfectly attuned to the desert chill which rides moonlight into the chamber, Zelda should be ready to pass out and sink into the depths of a quilted cairn. Instead, she sits tensely cross-legged, Impa's golden nails wrecking their manicured edges as the princess incessantly picks and prods at the hem of her nightgown.
Until the creaking bedroom door bursts her bubble of tension.
Zelda's heart nearly bursts from her chest as she rolls onto her hip and stretches back toward that tall silhouette in the pristine, shell-topped doorway of faded cerulean.
"Told ya we had a matching set."
The esteemed captain of the Gerudo guard sets forth, doing battle with a freshly laundered towel to ensure it stays wrapped around her head, so no more hair can fall loose alongside her shock of scarlet brows. Like Zelda, Dohna is bare of all clothing and accessories but her silken nightgown whose semi-sheer fabric, glowing brighter white than the towel wrap, exposes a great deal more ultisol skin than the Hylian's own porcelain shade.
Hyrule's young heir whittled away untold hours of her childhood in the castle's Hall of Heroes, a then-endless stretch of ancestral portraits and artefacts preserved by her forebears, many of whom shared eerie similarities to the girl Zelda saw in her mirror every morning. Her favorite pieces, though, were undoubtedly the grandiose marble effigies strewn about, including a glorious hero riding into battle with Rupee-encrusted plate mail and a vicious wolf companion, or a terrifyingly bombastic witch commanding an army of animated armored suits from on-high.
She never stopped being entranced by the ways in which stone could be rendered as soft as fabric, visually sheer enough to expose the harder texture of skin beneath. The skill of these artisanal sculptors was a frequent topic of discussion with her caregivers. However, she never truly understood why anyone could be driven to spend their entire lifetimes in pursuit of capturing such beauty in impassible stone until she saw Dohna step out wearing that garb, strips of beige threatening to tear through milky white whenever her thick quads scrape together.
It's also hard for Zelda not to fixate on how her pajamaed twin skipped the matching courtesy of wearing a brassier beneath that gown.
"Oh. Yeah!" Zelda's words dribble from a numb lower lip. "It looks much better on you though, Dohna…"
Her Gerudo friend snorts voraciously, loud enough to carry around every corner of the sedimentary canyons to the north. Zelda imagines artists might struggle to capture her perfectly chiseled, slender nose.
"Nonsense."
Dohna leaves it at that, and Zelda's mind races with a dozen different interpretations jockeying for attention.
This soon becomes an untenable arrangement as Dohna sits on the edge of the bed beside her, forcing Zelda to split her attention further so she doesn't slide into the quicksand depression that's been displaced. She preens the back of her hand as an attempt to relax.
"Have you ever worn a Gerudo braid?" Dohna's non-sequitur leaves the princess staring blank for a few seconds of agonizing eternity.
"Um." She clears her throat and sinks into the quicksand pit. Fittingly mango-scented shampoo emanates from its center. "That scientist in the oasis put my hair up when I wore that… What was it… Bedlah?"
"Ha!" That laugh rocks Zelda's foundation. Her core feels blended, like a delicious twisty smoothie. "No, don't be silly. That was just a dancer's ponytail. Gerudo braids are for sleeping, they help keep your hair from splaying all over and getting unruly in the morning."
"Oh… I see."
"Come then, I'll do your 'do just right, princess."
Dohna shifts Zelda's center of gravity when she scoots further onto the bed, and then turns to face the Hylian cross-legged. She pats her tree trunk thighs invitingly.
Zelda watches the quilted blanket fold into little dunes as Dohna's sage green toes and calloused heels conduct rhythmically to-and-fro. Reluctantly, she turns her back to the Gerudo and scoots her way across the blasted fabric hills.
Where she stops clearly isn't to Dohna's liking. The guard captain takes Zelda by the hips and drags her further, the princess briefly howling like her kitten whenever those three unfortunate soldiers who drew lots must bring the animal in for a bath.
Zelda buries her face in shame but finds no escape in the plush prison of her friend's lap. Dohna doesn't seem to mind any more than a chuckle conveys.
She gets to work pulling apart strands of woven-gold hair.
"I still can't believe we've never done anything like this before, Zelda."
"Mm."
"My mother keeps us so closed off here in the desert — The fact I didn't even know you were the Princess of Hyrule!" Dohna scoffs, and Zelda can feel her whole body shimmy. "Just think of all the trouble we could've gotten into if we knew each other growing up."
"I do wish I could have known more girls like me," Zelda mutters. "Princess-y and all. Chieftain hierarchies notwithstanding." A smile breaks through her Rupee-red cheeks. "Though I think my father would have sent us both to study together. We would've had no time to play."
Dohna lets loose another boisterous, snorting laugh, the proximity sending a shiver up Zelda's spine. Can Dohna feel her goosebumps rising again? "They do feel like kindred spirits, in that sense. I mean did you see how awkward they were over dinner tonight?"
"Oh. Yes, of course."
"Like we need all that pomp and circumstance just to organize a sleepover."
"You know how dads are…" Zelda starts to wishy-washy wave her head, but Dohna stops that with a firmer grip on her follicles. "He just wants to make sure I'm going to a safe place."
The Gerudo scoffs. "You really think he's concerned about your safety? You, the great Princess of Hyrule. Slayer of Null. Savoir of the Sleeping. World-Renown Stamp Collector."
With each moniker, Zelda blooms brighter than the fire-lit walls.
"S-Shut up."
Zelda's hands knead at shedding spools of fluff that are sweating through the quilt's rough membrane. Her fingers clumsily follow the same motions as Dohna's.
Then, Dohna pulls a bit too hard in one direction. Zelda mewls.
Her pain is quickly soothed by a warm palm pressed into the crook of her neck.
"Sorry, sorry. I'll be gentler, Zelda."
Dohna just as quickly gets back to work, but Zelda finds herself completely absorbed in this statement. Her thoughts spiral, every other word uttered by the Gerudo girl falls into a ringing din of tinnitus.
She's completely out of sorts until Dohna draws hands back to her hips, sitting statuesque so she can admire her work: a fine rope of golden silk that, at some point, she slipped a few loose wildflowers from her bedside table into.
"There. How does that feel? Lighter?"
Zelda absentmindedly paws the pulling tightness at the back of her head, a strain that all-but mimicking the feeling in her chest. "Mm."
"Well, go see it then!" Dohna pushes Zelda off with a roguish glint in her bedrock eyes. "Tell me what you think."
The princess crawls out of her position on autopilot, finds she's meandered through a maze of pottery pedestals in the hall to reach Dohna's bathroom before she knows it. She immediately splashes a basinful of cold water on her face, going over and over and over until the flush in her cheeks begins to subside and her gown is speckled with translucent rorschachs. The room's sparse layout begins to coalesce through the fog of her overactive mind, everything visible at once through a wall-to-wall mirror over the sink. A standing bathtub is hoisted atop a two-step ziggurat across the back wall behind her, its chassis almost comically speckled with jewels. Zelda can't help but wonder how much of a nightmare it would be to clean all the nooks and crannies in between, cursed with the knowledge of just how easily Tri could spawn indefinite Echoes of that appliance whenever necessary.
Zelda's heart aches a deep, agonizing ache. She misses Tri. She misses them far more than she could hope to express.
At least they might understand this feeling that Zelda can't escape.
It's the same winded exhaustion of stepping into a Stilled Realm. Of resorting to desperate, gulping breaths just to feel some internal equilibrium when everything around is stale and topsy-turvy. Of adrenaline coursing through every muscle, pushing you ever closer to the goal, that one and only thing you can do to make things right.
The princess splashes her face once more, dries herself with the most luxurious papyrus-printed towel she's ever felt, and then does a double-take before leaving after she realizes she never actually looked at Dohna's braid.
It's about the most she's ever liked her hair.
Zelda creeps back to the bedroom, casting a barrage of shadows in a dozen instances of torchlight. It feels almost like summoning a horde of crows again.
She finds her Gerudo friend exactly where she left her, sitting cross-legged right up against the place that quilt rolls up like a hilly dune over a set of pillows. Dohna doesn't notice Zelda immediately; her attention is currently being paid toward that damp towel. Dohna pulls the towel free, and a shower of frizzy, stringy hair falls all around her head like one universal line of bangs. The towel drops down to her lap, past the fake marbled fabric over that buxom, unsupported chest. Dohna then drives both hands into the hair over her nose, parting the red sea so she can tuck those locks behind both ears.
At that moment, she notices Zelda in the doorway. Her smile burns brighter than Death Mountain's crater.
Zelda suddenly realizes that, perhaps, her father shouldn't expect a continuation of the family bloodline.
Shout outs to the folks at one of my current zines, Silent Princess, for giving me the extra push I needed to actually write this piece. Y'all are the best, hope you enjoy a bit of extra love for our favorite gal!