For one blessed moment, Link thought he'd found Yvalo, safe and sound.
The flute's music had been floating through the clearing, gentle notes full of light. Several small animals had been gathered, seemingly hypnotized, around the source: Yvalo, sitting on the stump near the center of the clearing, playing on his flute.
Link's heart had leapt in his chest at the sight, and he'd started running towards the kid, grinning and waving and calling his name. It had scared off the animals, but Link had known they'd be fine and that if Yvalo's music had that effect on them, it still would the next time he played.
But as Link had gotten closer to the stump, the music had faded and so had Yvalo, the apparition becoming increasingly transparent and quiet until it had faded to nothing.
The happiness, the relief, the exaltation at finding a missing child, had vanished from Link's heart, replaced by bitter disappointment. Yvalo wasn't here.
Link was left staring at the empty stump, both puzzled and furious at the space for not containing Yvalo after all.
He walked over and examined the stump and the area immediately around it thoroughly, resisting the urge to kick and stomp lest he destroy something that could explain what was going on and where Faer's son might be.
He scratched his head.
He was at least sure that the apparition had NOT been a ghost. For one thing, there was no trace of the tell-tale ethereal blue-green flames. Also, the animals had liked it, and animals never liked ghosts – they either got scared or didn't perceive them. And finally, the way the apparition, both the sights and sounds of it, had faded out while Yvalo seemingly continued to play unbothered, was not at all how ghosts disappeared.
Link couldn't even talk himself into thinking he was jumping to the conclusion he wanted. This looked no more like a ghost than steam from a kettle did.
But then, what HAD it been? Where was the real Yvalo? Was the apparition showing something that was happening right now but somewhere else? Or was it more like some kind of memory?
Link sighed and sat on the grass, leaving the stump in case the little show should start over and he could gather some clues from it.
This was intolerable. Yvalo was a little kid, he shouldn't be missing! And the fact that he didn't have an actual ghost hanging out here didn't mean he was well! But he had to be. Because he was just a little kid, and because if he was gone, Faer would be devastated.
Except this wasn't the sort of "had to" that came from logic. Link knew he had no way to know whether Faer's son was okay or not, so he had absolutely no news to bring to the kid's father, and Yvalo was no closer to being found. No closer to being safe.
And Link couldn't afford to actually search for him properly: betraying the Princess' trust was unthinkable, but beyond even that, he couldn't prioritize Yvalo: if Link failed to get the Master Sword in time and Agahnim found the Princess, ALL of Hyrule was lost, including Yvalo, wherever he was.
Link clenched his jaw, fished the map Vario had given him out of his pocket and unfolded it. He was pleasantly surprised to see that it unfolded into quite a large, detailed map: even the clearing where he was now was visible on it.
He soon spotted a red mark in the Eastern Hills, not too far from the Eastern Palace. All he had to do was to go North from the main entrance to the area. He committed the location to memory and folded the map away again.
"Princess Zelda?" he called out with his mind. "Good news! I know where he is."
"Excellent!" came the immediate reply.
Princess Zelda sounded so happy that Link immediately pictured her smiling and clasping her hands together in delight. His heart suddenly beat harder and he smiled too.
"You must not tell me where he is," Zelda continued. "Stay well, Link."
The Princess cut the contact then, leaving Link still smiling back in a daze for a few seconds.
Link's thoughts did eventually wander back to the apparition that had greeted him. He would really have liked to know that Yvalo was okay, and even though he was still very much certain that he had not seen a ghost but something altogether different, he was not all that reassured. At best, something weird was going on.
Maybe it had something to do with the darkness in the air that Ezifa had mentioned. He'd have to ask Gramps about that, it seemed like invisible darkness floating around could be related to Agahnim and Ganon.
He sighed. For someone who was trying to help the Princess save the day, he sure felt powerless. He shook his head, pushing the feeling away, and started gathering kindle and branches. He didn't have time to let his mind wander pointlessly.
He got a fire started a few steps away from the creek, with sticks around it forming rudimentary drying poles. He then stripped his clothes and dunked them in the water, scrubbing them as well as he could with no soap. The stream's swift current promptly carried the worst of the grime away. Once his clothes were as clean as they were going to get, he hung them around the fire and used his hands and more water to scrub himself down.
He sat next to the fire after that and occupied his mind trying to form a plan to escape the guards when he came out of the woods.
The sun was low in the sky by now, it would set within the hour. Logically, using the cover of darkness to evade the guards would make sense.
Link yawned. The little nap he'd had at the Sanctuary was feeling like it had been days earlier. Maybe if he just lied down for a minute while he waited for the sun to set...
An owl's hoot woke Link up with a start. His fire was down to ambers glowing faintly, and no other light, safe from the stars, could be seen.
He jumped to his feet, horrified. How long had he been sleeping? He looked up at the stars, trying to remember enough of his astrology lessons to gain some information on what the hour was, but he quickly gave up: all he could remember was that the position of the stars changed through the year as well as through the night. How, exactly? He had absolutely no idea.
He shuddered: he'd been sleeping in nothing but his underwear, and the night wasn't particularly cold, but it wasn't hot, either. He went to check on his clothes: they were pretty much dry, which was great for his comfort as he slipped them back on, but terrible on his nerves because it meant he HAD been asleep for a long time.
At least he'd managed to get the worst of the smell out of his clothes: they still reeked pretty bad if he stuck his nose in them and sniffed, but the smell wouldn't be straight up awful for other people unless Link literally smothered them.
He needed to hurry to Gramps' hiding place. Between the rest and the meal at the Sanctuary, the time he'd spent in Kakariko, and now this unplanned nap, he'd wasted WAY too much time since he'd helped the Princess escape. Agahnim would eventually find Zelda if he was allowed too much time to do it. Link was NOT going to let that happen.
He used his hands to carry water back and forth to finish cooling off his fire, then buried it by kicking soil and dirt on it until he was satisfied the flames wouldn't come back to life and burn down the woods. He then squared off his shoulders and set for the path that would take him out of the Minshi Woods and straight into a bunch of bespelled guards instructed to attack him.
Link had flattened himself against the wall of trees that edged the path out of the woods and was craning his neck to observe the guards.
There were three of them still, and each of them was carrying a lantern, making them clearly visible. Unfortunately, it also meant that the area just outside of the woods was not nearly as dark as Link would have liked.
However, the better part of the glow of the lanterns was limited. If Link managed to stay quiet and out of the oval of light each guard produced, he might just manage to slip by undetected.
As was the case in the castle, the guards' patrol pattern was also abysmal: they were just walking randomly around, with no organization whatsoever, and so they kept leaving large chunks of terrain out of all their sights.
Link waited for a time where the lamps were all pointing away from where he was and ran for it, turning left and running towards his house. The ground was grassy here, muffling his steps, and for a few glorious seconds, he really did think he was free and clear. A quick glance back revealed the guards weren't looking his way at all, but when he looked forward again, the illusion of temporary safety was chattered.
He'd expected his house would be guarded, and he would have avoided it altogether if he'd been able to figure out another way to get to the Eastern Hills. He still hadn't expected the area around the house would be crawling with a solid dozen guards.
He dove behind some nearby bushes. He then peeked around and breathed a sigh of relief: he was well out of the line of sight of the guards he'd dodged by Minshi Woods, and the ones by his house were still ambling around and showed no sign of having seen or heard him.
The only problem left was how to get around them all. Link figured he could walk north to the castle's moat, but he'd have to come back down towards his house again because of the river.
The Hylia River ran North to South between Link's house and the castle, and Link had to cross it to get to the Eastern Hills. There was a bridge by the castle, but Link had no doubt that going back to the actual castle, or anywhere near it, would be a terrible idea. So, that bridge was not a good option. The only bridge that was really accessible to him was the one down here, just east of his house. Link briefly considered jumping in the river in a more convenient spot, but quickly dismissed the idea: the river was deep, with a swift current, and was well known to be dangerous even for good swimmers… something Link definitely wasn't.
Circling around from the north to end up on the other side of his house might still be the best option, however: the guards seemed to be concentrated in the front of the house, so barreling through that way was out of the question.
If he could sneak by from the north, however, Link would only have a short way to run before he could dive under the bridge leading to the Eastern Hills: that bridge had very generous banks on both sides of the river, so much so that one of the Kakariko villagers, a twenty something man named Makh, had a camping hideaway set up on the north bank.
Link sighed. He was only just starting this quest and he was already sick to death of running and hiding. It still beat the alternative of hurting the bespelled guards, of course, but it was just really, really annoying. And the figuring out, and hiding, and running, was exhausting.
His upper lip curled as his eyes narrowed: having to run and hide didn't matter much in the grand scheme of things, Agahnim was responsible for far worse and ultimately wanted to allow for all of Hyrule to suffer under Ganon. If hiding and running was what Link needed to do to stop the wizard, well, he could do that.
He waited until none of the guards' lanterns were pointing in his general direction and took off running north, towards the castle's moat.
Link turned east well before the moat, keen not to be seen from the castle's walls. He made his way to the banks of the Hylia River and carefully, from tree to bush to tree, started approaching his house again.
It was still very dark out, although a small crescent moon had risen. The river gurgled to Link's left, the water's song louder than from his bedroom but still familiar and somehow comforting.
Link reached the back of the hill his house was on without seeing any of the guards: clearly, they were only patrolling the front and sides. He peeked around and looked for the telltale light of the lanterns, but they never quite seemed to get all the way to the eastern side of the house.
Link pressed his tongue to the roof of his mouth, thinking. Guards had been summoned in Kakariko, and although he really didn't know how that spell worked, it was possible Agahnim knew Link had been in the village. Maybe the guards near Minshi Woods had also communicated seeing him to their master, somehow. Link himself was able to talk to the Princess, after all, and Agahnim might be able to use similar magic.
If Agahnim knew Link had been in Kakariko, or that he had passed by the guards near the woods, the wizard would have expected him to arrive from that direction if Link ended up going to his house. And if the wizard could communicate instructions to his guards at a distance, he would have told them to watch the west approach to the house.
That was a lot of ifs, but it sure did look like the area east of the house wasn't being watched very well.
Link dropped to his belly and crawled forward, eyes scanning ahead for the glow of the guards' torches.
His house sat on a bit of elevated ground, with the terrain dropping abruptly on all sides except for a more gentle slope leading to the door. He stopped when he reached the south-eastern corner of the little cliffside surrounding that elevated area.
He risked a peak around the corner. The closest guard was just east of the natural ramp that led to his house's door. As Link watched, that guard turned back towards the west and walked away. Link ducked back out of sight, counted to twenty, and peeked again: a different guard was walking eastward, but just like the previous one, stopped just past the ramp and turned around. Link couldn't make out the faces so he had no idea who they were: somehow, that made the fact they were after him a bit easier to bear.
He ducked out of sight again. It really did look like the guards were only watching the west side of the house.
He positioned himself to be able to see whether the glow of a lamp got near and waited for a count of one hundred and fifty. He could see the very outer edges of the lamps' lights regularly, but never more.
He waited for a time where he couldn't see any such glow at all, signifying the guards were all looking the other way, and took off running east, towards the bridge over the Hylia River. It was a wide open road from his house to the bridge, with basically no cover, so even with the guards not paying attention to the east side of the house, the chances he'd be spotted by the next one who happened to at least look east were unfortunately high.
Sure enough, he was maybe halfway to the bridge when the shouts started and boots started thundering his way. At least he'd gotten a head start... he started running faster.
Judging by the sound, the guards were catching up quick, which was definitely a change from how they'd all been relatively slow in the castle and in Kakariko. Link wondered whether Agahnim knew they had been outrunned before and was using magic to make them faster.
The point of a spear brushed his leg just as he was approaching the bridge.
He surprised himself by managing to accelerate again for the last bit of distance he had to cover, and then, as planned, he jumped for distance right before setting foot on the bridge, seemingly throwing himself in the river but actually aiming for the generous north bank tucked under the bridge.
He got close enough, landing at a roll just a hand's width from dry land, getting wet again but in no danger of drowning. He threw himself in the tent Makh never bothered to take down.
He landed on something lumpy. The something in question yelled and shot up, revealing itself to be Makh, who'd been sleeping peacefully until being woken up by a dripping wet teenager throwing himself on him.
Link pushed him back down and gagged him with his hand. "Shh! Danger!" he whispered urgently.
Makh nodded, eyes wide.
Link let go and stood perfectly still listening.
He couldn't hear anything: no shouting guards, no splashes, no sounds of boots. He counted to fifty and when he still hadn't heard a thing, he sighed and sat down next to Makh.
"Ok," he said. "We're good. Sorry about this."
Makh scratched his head and yawned. "What's going on?" he asked. "Who you hiding from? Your uncle catch you doing something bad?"
His uncle being mentioned was like a stab in Link's heart. He swallowed but his eyes filled up and overflowed anyway. He wiped at them irritably.
"Long story," he said. He still believed Kaygee was right in saying it was best not to tell people Agahnim had betrayed and killed the King – it could only serve to get them in trouble.
He got up and turned towards the tent's opening. "Sorry I woke you up like that," he said. "I gotta go."
"Sure," Makh said through another yawn. He lied back down and as far as Link could tell, was asleep again instantly.
Zelda woke from a doze for what must have been the tenth time of the night. She sat up on her camping bed and stared at the only source of light left in the hidden shelter under the Sanctuary at this hour: the Sheikah lamp that lit the room during the day, dimmed to nearly nothing by a heavy blanket placed over it.
The reason she couldn't sleep was simple: she hadn't heard from Link in hours. She was hoping he was asleep, but she wasn't sure he'd give himself permission to rest.
She had meant to tell him he should sleep once it got dark, but that plan had had a big flaw: she couldn't tell when it got dark outside from where she was, underground in a closed off room. By the time she'd realized it was late, it was late enough that Link might have already been sleeping, and she was afraid that if she talked to him and woke him up, he would refuse to go BACK to sleep, or be unable to.
But what if he was awake because he didn't think he should 'waste time' sleeping? She should definitely talk to him then. But that wasn't likely, was it? The training for the guards probably included classes on staying healthy.
She tilted her head: she wasn't sure it did. She really didn't know what guards in training learned.
She clenched her fists. She couldn't keep on like this, she was just looking for an excuse to talk to Link. He was almost certainly asleep, else he would have been calling HER.
Unless he was afraid to wake HER up, of course. Maybe she SHOULD check in. Order him to sleep. And eat. And shower? Rauner had brought her a wash basin and some fresh clothes earlier, and she felt a lot better now that she didn't stink of sewers and sweat anymore.
She shook her head irritably. Link didn't need her to tell him to WASH. She was being ridiculous.
She wondered where he was. He knew where Sahasrahla was, now, but she didn't, so she didn't even know which direction he might have gone from Kakariko.
"Idle thoughts," she reprimanded herself under her breath. "Think of something useful at least, if you cannot sleep."
She cast her mind again to what the trial of courage might be. She knew that the Eastern Palace had once included the trial and some training grounds, but she hadn't been there in years, she had no idea whether they had been restored when Agahnim had cleansed the palace from the evil that had infested it years earlier.
Her eyes widened at the sudden realization that neither her Father nor herself had been at the palace since Aghanim had supposedly restored it. For all she knew, the wizard had actually done no such thing.
She shook the thought off for now: she had no idea where the trial was located now and ultimately, her ignorance on this didn't matter. If she could just remember any information she might have ever gleaned about WHAT the trial was, however…
She spent the rest of the night thinking back to old stories, ones she'd read and ones she'd been told.