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It had been two minutes.
A full one hundred and twenty seconds since Link had heard a suspicious noise from within the princess’ bedroom. An entire ninety seconds since the first time he knocked on the door, hesitantly concerned by the loud thud followed by silence. Of course, there was always silence. But there wasn’t always a thud.
He’d called out quietly, waited another fifteen seconds, and knocked again.
There had been nothing but silence.
Link cast a look around the dark hallway. It had been a normal night, except for the princess dismissing her maids before they could even undress her (if their mutterings were to be believed.) He was the only one on duty. It was supposed to be an honor—bestowed shortly after the Champions’ Ceremony at the Sacred Grounds. Watching over the princess as the late hours blossomed into early morning.
It had been made abundantly clear that this was only for the sake of convenience, so that he could escort her to midnight and morning prayers. He was never to actually enter the princess’s chambers.
Not that he wanted to. Or would. Not without the princess’s express permission. The King had been very clear on that, and both he and Link were well aware of how likely it was that Princess Zelda would invite him in for tea or cakes, as she sometimes did with Master Impa or her scientist sister, Purah.
As Link cast the fifth anxious look at the door and back down the hall, his hands began to shake at his sides, and sweat dripped down the back of his neck, reminding him—as if he could ever forget—that it was now nearly three minutes since he’d heard the noise.
Three minutes since he’d had any evidence of the princess’s existence.
Three minutes of silence.
Maybe he was overreacting. Maybe he’d imagined the noise. If he busted the door down now, and the princess was only asleep… He imagined rushing in, sword drawn, and oh, how she would lay into him. Sitting up quickly in her plush bed, her cheeks slightly rosy from sleep, her hair softly mussed from the pillows. Her eyes would burn brightly, and her soft pink mouth would turn angry, and…
Link slapped his face.
He shook his head and stepped closer to the door, moving softly so as not to overtake any sounds he strained to hear from beyond the wood. Link pressed his ear to the door and willed his heartbeat the slow. He prayed for a noise. A thunk of a textbook. A sigh or the scratching of a quill pen. And although he hated to hear them, he’d even take a sniffle. Something. Anything to prove to him that she was alive and well on the other side of the wood.
But he heard nothing.
Another fifteen seconds and his hand shook more rythmically by his side. Another seventeen, and the Master Sword was unsheathed, held ready by his side. Link closed his eyes. For twenty-two seconds more, he held his breath and strained to listen. If he snuck in a short prayer to Hylia that the princess was alright and that he wouldn’t be beheaded for what he was about to do, that was no one's business but his own.
It was with firm resolve then that Link knocked smartly on the door with his left hand and called out one final time.
“Princess, are you alright?”
He shook his head when he again heard nothing, and he lowered himself into a crouch, his hand fisted tightly around the grip of the Master Sword. With his left hand, he turned the princess’s door knob and pushed it open, letting it swing with a quiet woosh. If someone was waiting for him, he didn’t want to give them a chance to hamstring him before he could even see them.
Link peered into the princess’ dark entryway and frowned.
“Princess Zelda?” he whispered, trying to enunciate his words so they floated across the room.
The room was quiet and cold. What should have been a roaring fire had been extinguished. Link took two steps forward, staying in his crouch and peering behind the door for good measure. When he was sure no one could creep up behind him, he walked over to the bed, still crouched, his eyes flitting to every dark corner.
“Princess Zelda?” he whispered again. “It’s me, Link. Your appointed knight.” He tried not to cringe. As if she didn’t know who he was, and didn’t regularly spend a good number of hours each day working hard to avoid him. Link bent his head and looked under the bed before righting himself with a huff and frown.
Where in Hyrule was she?
Link stood and made a loop around the room. He opened each wardrobe and looked behind all the furniture. Everything was put away, clean and tidy, except for her desk, which was as it ought to be—cluttered and filled with books, journals, and half-discarded notes.
Link closed an open inkwell and frowned, looking around the room with his sword by his side. It was clear the princess wasn’t in danger in her room. But she wasn’t even here! What was the protocol now? He tried to calm his skyrocketing heartbeat when the sight of her study caught his eye.
Of course! Am I always so thick? Or is it just the princess that clouds my brain?
Link sheathed the Master Sword and trotted over to the doors to the bridge, opening them with a smile. She had probably just woken up, paced around her room for a bit, tossed a book on her desk, and then went to work in her study. Nothing odd or unusual. He would sneak over, ensure that she was busy working, and then creep back to his post, and none would be the wiser.
No one would know of his panicked slip-up but him.
Link slowed when he got to the study door. It wouldn't do for the princess to catch him. He pressed his ear to the door and waited for seven seconds before frowning. Not a single noise was made that would give his frantic mind any semblance of peace.
He sighed and gave up any hope that he’d exit this situation with his reputation with the princess unscathed. He knocked shortly once.
“Princess Zelda?” he said, willing his voice to stay steady and unemotional. “I apologize for interrupting your evening. I heard a noise and got worried. Could Her Highness please confirm to me that she is alright?”
Link pressed his ear back to the wood, pushing so hard that the soft flesh protested, but he ignored it as he strained for a single noise. It must have been nearly ten minutes now. Ten minutes without a sign of the princess or a noise. And it was enough for Link.
He pulled his sword, turned the knob, and pushed her study door open. Link found his feet coming to a leaden stop.
Nothing could have prepared him for the sight that awaited.
The princess’s clothes were…everywhere. Link felt his mouth fall open as he looked around. Princess Zelda was still nowhere to be found, but her clothes were lying all over the floor. Three layers of white petticoats were thrown haphazardly over her desk. The blue silk of her outer dress was pooled not far from Link’s feet, where he stood at the entrance of the door. Link carefully stepped over the skirt and ran a hand through his hair.
What in Hylia’s name? he thought, his mind working frantically to put the pieces together as his eyes bounced from each piece of clothing to the next, hoping that any of them held a clue as to the princess’s location.
Dark, spiny hands clawed into Link’s chest and wrapped around his heart, squeezing when he spied her corset. The princess’s powder blue silk corset which had been clearly thrown into the corner of the room and left to land in a heap.
Link crossed the space in two long strides and grasped the piece of fabric, pulling it to his face and inspecting it carefully to be sure. No. There was no mistake.
Someone had cut the laces of the princess’s corset in an effort to remove it from her.
The fabric fell from Link’s fingers as he whirled around the room, searching for an answer—any explanation as to what he was seeing. That’s when he heard it. The first noise from this side of the castle that hadn’t come from him in nearly twelve minutes.
The softest, faintest “oof.”
Link scrambled to the study window and flung the shutters open, completely abandoning any attempts to be cautious. He crawled onto the sill, shoved his head out, and looked down. His eyebrows shot to the top of his forehead as he saw a dark, shadowy figure picking themselves up from the ground at the base of the tower that held Zelda’s study.
“Hey!” Link called before he could think, launching himself out of the window, fingers scrambling for and barely finding purchase. The figure froze for half a second, looking up before turning and taking off, running at the sight above him, likely fearing the unmistakable Champion blue of his uniform.
Good, Link thought, digging his hands into the wall of the tower as he scaled down the side. They should be afraid. If any harm has come to the princess, they’ll regret the very day they thought about hurting the Hyrulean monarchy.
His fingers ached as he scurried down the wall, his brain screaming at him to move faster and more assuredly before the man got away. Fuck it, Link thought as he twisted his body away from the wall and jumped the final ten or so feet. His eyes swam, and he felt lightheaded as the jolting pain flashed up the sides of his legs and into his stomach.
“Stop!” Link yelled hoarsely, urging himself to move . He stumbled forward for a couple of steps before breaking out into a proper run, following the figure as they ducked into the stables. He saved his breath to muster a serious sprint, narrowly catching up to the figure and deftly grabbing them by the waist and swinging them into the hard wood of Epona’s stall. As sawdust rained around them, Link pulled a knife from his side and held it to their throat.
“Where is the princess?” Link gritted his teeth.
Glowering green eyes stared down at him under unimpressed eyebrows, and Link swallowed, fighting to keep any amount of moisture in his mouth as he dried up under her gaze. And Link was sure it was a her.
Despite his initial thoughts, the loose Sheikah robes she wore around her chest, and the deep blue mask covering the lower half of her face, two things gave her away: the form-fitting tights around her hips and the way Link’s heart fluttered under her scowl, making him simultaneously want to prostrate himself to show his deference and grab her properly and press his lips to hers until he was sure she knew how she made him feel.
Link was sure to keep his body away from this mysterious female as he pressed his knife into her collarbone. He caught his eyes trailing the messy blonde tendrils curling around her jaw and cheeks, and anger flared in his chest.
“Answer,” he demanded, pressing his forearm against her chest and digging the knife into her soft flesh until two small beads of red formed. He was shocked by how guilty he felt when she hissed and whined before raising her arms and pushing him back.
He was, of course, unmoved. Until the woman opened her small, soft pink lips and spoke.
“Are you always so foolish, Sir Link?” she hissed, and Link’s jaw would have fallen and landed somewhere in the hay if his bones had allowed it. “Or do you make it a habit to only do so in my presence?”
“P-princess?” Link stuttered and took a step backward.
“Yes?” Zelda sounded bored and crossed her arms across her chest, wincing as the movement caused a few more droplets of blood to boil to the surface.
“Is that really you, Your Highness?” Link couldn’t help but ask.
If he wasn’t sure before, he surely was when the princess huffed at him and pulled her mask down. “Convinced?” she asked with a haughty glare as she ran a hand down the back of her head and pulled her long blonde braid over her shoulder, absentmindedly pulling and twisting at the end.
Link nodded and sheathed his blade at his side, taking an additional couple of steps back.
“Yes, of course, Your Highness.” He said, falling to his knee and back on his reliable protocol as his mind frantically worked to make sense of the last half hour. “I apologize. I heard a noise while I was on guard. I called, and you didn’t answer,” he stumbled over himself.
Have I ever spoken this much in front of the princess?
“So I went into your room,” he continued. “It was without permission, but I feared for your safety, and then you weren’t in your room, so I went to the study, and I saw clothes everywhere in your study, and then your corset was um…”
Link trailed off, his cheeks blooming pink as he bowed his head. “I assumed the worst, and I apologize.” He frowned.
Why am I apologizing for doing my job? What should I have done differently? She still hasn’t explained why she is sneaking out! And in Sheikah gear, no less. Link huffed softly. She always made it hard to think. Speaking was even harder, and speaking without regret in her presence seemed like an impossible, fanciful dream.
“Oh, right,” the princess said softly. If Link didn’t know better, he would have thought that she sounded surprised by his reaction. “Well,” she continued. “No problem, Sir Link. Just report back to your post, and all is forgiven.”
Link looked up as she began to pass him, soft footsteps in the hay. “Your Highness?”
Zelda sighed. “Yes?”
“I’m uh…” Link trailed off. How am I supposed to say it? He grimaced and braced himself. “Your Highness, I’m still not…technically allowed to let you leave…the castle...”
Zelda groaned, closing her eyes and pinching her nose before looking down at her kneeling knight. “Do you ever get tired of it?” she asked incredulously.
“Tired of…what?” Link repeated back slowly before hastily adding, “Your Highness?”
“Mindlessly following directions!” Zelda threw a hand out, her green eyes glaring hatefully down at him.
Link swallowed. All the time.
“Never mind.” she huffed and turned away from him, pretending to dust some dirt from her pants. “You wouldn’t understand. Just…do me this one favor?” She turned to him, fiddling with her braid, and Link rose from his place on the floor, standing across from her. Behind him, Epona whinnied in warning.
“We are supposed to be partners in destiny,” Zelda began before turning the full force of her forest gaze on Link. He didn’t stand a chance. “Let me go. I’ll be back in four hours. Far before the sunrise, alright? I promise.”
She held out a hand.
Link looked down at it before looking up at her, his mouth slightly parted and his brain short-circuiting. Slowly, he shook his head, and Zelda pulled her hand back like it was burned, her lips curling back in distaste.
“Fine,” she said, turning to stride out the stable door. Link stood quickly, his hand shooting out and wrapping around her shoulder, stopping her before he even knew what happened. When she turned an accusatory look on him, it was Link’s turn to pull his hand away like it had been burned.
“I-I’m sorry, Your Highness,” he stammered. “It’s just–” Link sighed. “I’m really not allowed to let you leave…unattended.”
Zelda leveled him with an angry look, a frustrated noise leaving the corner of her mouth as her lips twisted into an adorable pout. “That, Sir Link, sounds like it is your problem.” Her words were cutting. “Not mine.”
And without another look, she turned on her heel and walked out of the door. Behind him, Epona whinnied, and he turned, giving her nose a gentle pet as he frowned. Am I really going to let her go? I am not supposed to let her leave unattended. The king has been very, very clear about that.
“What do you think, girl?” He turned to his chestnut mare and pressed his forehead to the tip of her snout, as they often did in quiet moments. A way to convey their unyielding support for each other.
Epona whinnied and smeared her wet nose across Link’s forehead, her tongue lapping at his nose.
“Euugh!” Link grimaced and pulled back, wiping his face with his sleeve. “What in Hylia’s name was that for?”
Epona huffed, and Link rolled his eyes.
“Yeah, yeah,” he muttered, already heading out the door to follow the princess. “I know. I’ll bring back some carrots for you later.”
Epona’s answering whinny was the final noise Link heard before he disappeared into the darkness, following the princess as she dove from shadow to shadow on her way out of the castle and into the town.
~*~
Link waited until they were past the fortress walls outside of East Castle Town and halfway to Hylia River before he showed himself, sidling up to Zelda with a cheery ask.
“So where are we going?”
He threw an arm out when the princess stumbled in the dirt and clutched her chest like she thought something had grabbed her.
“Hylia!” she swore, which made Link smile. He always liked it when she expressed herself more genuinely, and less like how she thought everyone expected her to act. When she looked over at him with a glare, he was sure to be quick to drop the grin and schooled his face into something more casual.
“I thought I lost you back in the castle.”
Link thought she was awful accusatory for someone with an appointed knight. He shrugged, and Zelda grumbled something about how she supposed it didn’t matter what she thought as the evidence stood before her. She turned from him and groaned into the night air before turning back.
“I can’t convince you to leave, I expect?”
Link shook his head.
“You can’t stop me,” she warned.
Link nodded. I understand.
“I’m going,” she said, again in that tone that reminded him there was danger ahead. She took a couple of steps backward into the night, her eyes remaining on him.
Link followed for a few steps before Zelda stopped and stood in front of him, her arms crossed. Her eyes searched his face, his body, seemingly his entire essence. Link wondered if she found what she was looking for because she softened.
“Fine,” she sighed. “You can come with me, but you are forbidden from ever speaking about this night, alright?”
“Yes, Your Highness,” Link fought to keep the joy out of his tone. Yes, he was terrified of what the morning may bring, but at this moment, his princess had allowed him to stay. For now, that was enough.
Princess Zelda missed Link’s dreamy smile as she turned on her heel with a huff and began walking at a punishing pace toward the riverbank. Link followed along, finding himself in the usual three paces behind her. She interrupted his musings about protocol— Yes, I am always meant to be behind her in the castle and on official diplomatic outings, but this is neither, and I’ve been yet to be given a protocol that matched this particular engagement, so what exactly am I to do? —with an irritated noise.
“What are you doing?” Zelda glared back at him.
“Huh?” was Link’s very intellectual reply.
“Get up here,” she hissed. “We aren’t going to the cathedral.”
Link nodded and trotted forward until he fell in line beside her. His appreciation for clarity was quickly overshadowed by his confusion and discomfort with their proximity. Deciding that he probably wasn’t allowed to ask for clarity on this point, he went with a safer option.
“So where are we going?” he asked, adding a quick “Your Highness” when she looked at him.
Zelda frowned. “You don’t need to do that.”
“Do what, Your Highness?” Link was nervous now.
“Say ‘Your Highness’ and all that stuff,” she muttered, turning forward once more. “When we’re out here in the wilds, you can just…call me Zelda.”
Link stumbled and righted himself, shaking his head. Surely I didn’t just hear…? But no, she had said… He stopped, feeling his face pale when she turned and looked at him.
“Understood?” she asked quietly. “Zelda.”
He nodded. “As you wish, Pr- Zelda.” He murmured before following her once more, allowing himself a half-step space behind her and to the side as they walked in silence. In the distance, Hyrule Cathedral towered behind the pair, watching them as they snuck past the road and down to the bank of the Hylia River.
Link could feel its presence as continually as the sword strapped to his back had been from the moment he pulled it from the pedestal five years ago.
At the end of the bank, before it sloped down to the water’s edge, the princess suddenly pulled up short, turning to look at him, her braid whipping around her shoulder.
“Stay here,” she commanded, waiting for confirmation with a stern look.
Link felt his mouth fall open. He looked up and down the road. It was deserted as far as he could see. He bent to the side and peered around her, the river bank seemingly empty below. He could not think of one logical reason not to obey her orders—other than the fact that they shouldn’t have been out here in the first place.
Even so, he could not think of one logical reason to obey her orders, everything in him screaming to keep her close, keep her safe. Although he hadn’t made a noise, she must have recognized the panic in his eyes because she reluctantly huffed.
“Fine,” she muttered, briefly fascinated by digging her toe into the mud before her eyes snapped up to Link, the green flashing dangerously. “I don’t think I need to tell you that if you tell anyone about this, they’ll have your head. Champion or not.” She turned and ducked, disappearing into the brush.
Link gulped and followed her dark form as she made her way to the water line. Something told him he’d been demoted again, and it was better to hold back, so he made sure to stay at least five paces behind her. Close enough to see her and anything that might come her way, but far enough to also give her some semblance of the space she clearly always craved.
And so he sat.
Sat and watched as the princess dove in the mud for frogs, dirting her knees and smearing clay along her thighs. He reclined when she started looking for bugs, her eyes intent on every shuddering leaf. Rolled his neck and shook out his legs when she began gathering flowers and frowned when she sighed, fell to her knees in the dirt, rolled back, and sat cross-legged before sadly weaving the blooms together.
Link wanted to again ask why they were there, but he suspected she would just tell him to hush. Thirty seconds trickled by, then forty-two, and Link’s hand began to shake at his side. Another forty-nine seconds and Link pushed up and sat on his knees, rustling the grass. She must have noticed because she half-glanced back at his form before huffing and returning once more to her task.
Link worried his lip between his teeth. He didn’t mean to bother her. Or upset her. He rarely meant to upset people, but he seemed to have a penchant for doing so. Never smiling quite the right way or fixing his face in an appropriate manner for the situation. His tone sometimes so mismatched his words that people would stare at him in shock, as if he had just slapped them.
Even though he knew the princess would prefer him to speak—had overheard her say as much to Master Impa in quiet complaint after a particularly harsh dressing-down from her father—he could never quite gather his words around her. No, around the princess, it was far better to stay silent.
And yet, as he watched his princess silently weave strands of plants, he had never felt so wrong in a decision.
One sniffle from her, and it was all over.
Link was by her side before he was hardly aware he intended to move. She looked up from her work, eyes likely wide in shock. Link could hardly see but a faint outline of her lips in the soft moonlight.
He swallowed. The lips frowned.
“What?” they hissed.
Link swallowed again. My collar feels so tight around my neck. Had I had a plan? I was sure I had. Oh right. “Why are we here?” he stammered. Link cursed himself when the princess huffed and turned back to her work. Stupid question.
“Oh, hush, Sir Link,” she chided. “We’ll be done soon. And if it rests your mind, know that we are here in the service of the goddess, alright?”
Link frowned. The service of the goddess? He looked around at the reeds, the bubbling of the river rushed behind them. Here?
“I can feel your judgment, Sir Link,” Zelda groused. “And it is not helpful to my work, so please take the energy back to the castle. Or at least fifteen yards back,” she amended, likely when she saw the stubborn look cross Link’s face that conveyed there was no way, not in one hundred years, would he be leaving without her.
Link started to dutifully move to where she had directed him, when a little bug began to dig into his mind. Not literally. But that’s how he had described it once to his father when he was young, and the apt description had stuck in their family ever since. A shorthand way to indicate a particular thought that burrowed in Link’s mind and wouldn’t be released until he either went on a very, very long run or spoke it.
Link looked up and down the bank and the roadside. He couldn’t leave. Link’s hand began shaking by his side. He worried his lip. He shook his thigh. Zelda turned to him, and it was all over.
“What are you–?”
“I’m not judging you.”
A sharp intake of breath from the princess, and Link spoke again, bolder this time. He half wondered where it came from.
“I’m not judging you,” he said again, slowly, carefully, like he was talking to Epona after she came across a serpent. He cleared his throat when his voice broke. “I wouldn’t do that,” he clarified.
“Oh,” Zelda said carefully. She shook her head. “You probably should, anyhow. What I’m doing is quite…foolish. Quite worth judgment.”
Link looked around the riverbank, adjusting his boots as they slid in the mud. He shrugged. “I don’t see anything to be judgemental of,” Link said simply.
Zelda looked over at him, and oh, had he said something wrong? The way her eyes bore into his—so intently and yet, so different this time. No trace of anger or frustration. Sure, there was still a layer of confusion that wasn’t uncommon when Link spoke to others, but there was something… more.
“You really mean that, don’t you?” Zelda murmured, so softly Link might have missed it if he wasn’t focused on staying very still and not making a single noise, except the slight rise and fall in his chest he couldn’t help.
Link silently nodded.
The tension broke with Zelda’s gaze as she looked down at her dirt-streaked fingers and half-woven flowers on her lap. “It’s stupid,” she said, as if in warning. As if there was anything she could say, any disclaimer she would give that would deter Link from listening to each syllable that dropped from her lips, precious falling stars for him to catch.
And so he waited, under the blanket of a midnight sky filled with starry pinpricks of light and a bright, full moon, for her to speak. He sat in silence and forced stillness, practicing his soldier’s training to focus on the rushing of the water near him, listen for any danger, and sit still. The temptation to flap his hands was growing to a fever pitch when he was rewarded.
“I think everyone in Hyrule probably knows I’m incapable of connecting with the goddess,” Zelda said quietly, her fingers slowly returning to their task of threading impossibly fine designs together out of mere plant material.
Link wanted to speak, but something sharp in him held his tongue. Perhaps it was his inability to come up with words to say that he could trust to actually convey his emotions—or some older, wiser force that reached up inside him and stilled his tongue, knowing that the princess needed to get these words out of her. Either way, he was just pleased she was talking to him.
Even if he didn’t like the topic of conversation, she was talking to him. A vast departure from their usual stilted silence or his respectful ignoring of her harsher turns of phrase.
“I know it’s me,” Zelda continued. “Although there isn’t much variety in the instruction, it is consistent. I diligently pray. I offer a sacrifice of my time, giving up the things I love most in exchange for more prayer at the feet of the goddess. I spend half of my hours in the cathedral or on sacred ground, and I–”
Zelda shook her head, her arm coming to wipe her eyes. Link hadn’t realized she started crying again, and he felt like the worst appointed knight in the history of Hyrule. His hands started shaking by his side again. He wished his hands weren’t so dirty, so he could hand her a handkerchief without mortification.
He was pulled from his distraction when Zelda turned on him once more. “I’m going to say something. Just once. Just here,” she said quietly. “Only you need know, anyway. It’s only fair as you’re my partner in all of this.” She steadied herself.
“I don’t know how to connect to the goddess,” Zelda whispered.
Link waited. For thirty-two seconds, they sat in silence, unmoving. Then, Zelda put her head in her hands. For sixteen seconds, Link stared at her hunched shoulders and her long braid that stretched along her back. He started to reach a hand forward, then frowned and scrunched his nose when he saw how muddy he was. He couldn’t comfort the princess in this state.
He stood and walked to the riverbank.
“What are you doing?” Zelda sounded confused.
Link froze and turned. He held up his hands slowly. When she nodded her head, clearly expecting a verbal answer, he swallowed thickly.
“Dirty,” he explained quietly.
Link could not have been more surprised when Zelda’s puckered face softened, and she began giggling. He could feel the heat spread across his cheeks and nose and thanked Hylia that it was night and his princess probably couldn’t tell. He quickly turned around and crouched, expediently washing his hands in the frigid water.
After a few seconds, when Zelda’s laughter died, Link found himself wishing he’d figured out a way to prolong it. The sigh she exhaled when she was finished was tinged with melancholy and Link hated it. Why hadn’t he let her tease him longer?
Just when he was getting ready to stand and dry his hands on his pants—having come to the unfortunate conclusion that it was his only option—Zelda spoke once more.
“This was the closest I came,” she murmured.
Link slowly pulled his hands from the water but froze in place. They dripped on his boots, but he didn’t dare make a further movement. He wanted her to keep speaking, craved her voice. He feared turning around would break the spell.
“I was…a child.” Her voice shook, and Link wanted to turn and pull her into his arms. His hands started flapping, and he pretended it was to remove the cold droplets from his fingers. He tried to forget the treasonous thoughts that poked and prodded at his brain.
“Maybe…six?” Her voice was contemplative. “Seven?” He imagined her turning her face towards the sky, her pale skin illuminated under the moon.
His hands flapped faster.
“It doesn’t matter,” she sighed. “I was…young. My mother was still alive, and we had gone for a long walk. Ended up here, in this…dirty riverbank.” Link could hear the smile in her voice. “We spent the entire day catching frogs and picking flowers to make crowns, our skirts in the dirt. Oh, how they wanted to yell at us when we got back, but…they couldn’t.”
Link couldn’t help but turn, sharing a half-smile with the princess when she looked up.
“Can’t yell at the queen, you know,” Zelda smirked before sighing, putting her elbow on her knee and resting her gentle cheek on her hand. Her other fingers twisted in the dirt, either writing or drawing some shape Link couldn’t see.
“I have such a clear memory of it,” she murmured. “I had fallen asleep in the reeds, and my mother woke me up, gently brushing her fingers against my face. If I–” She closed her eyes tightly for four seconds before shaking her head in defeat, returning to looking at Link. “Sometimes, if I try hard enough, I can almost imagine the way she felt, but it’s never quite…enough.”
She sighed. Link, still in a crouch, crept two steps forward. Zelda didn’t seem to notice.
“But I can remember so clearly. I woke up, and the sun was behind her, and she was the most…radiant thing I’d ever seen,” Zelda’s words were choked and soft. “I remember thinking she must have been the goddess, and I reached for her, and my mother pulled me out of the reeds and into her arms. She covered me in kisses and then held my hand as we walked past the cathedral, all the way back home.”
Link crept forward another step. “She loved you so much,” he said softly. “It isn’t my place, Your– Zelda, but…she would have been so proud of you.”
“Would she?” Zelda’s eyes flashed dangerously. “I’m supposed to be Hylia’s descendent and yet I have no evidence that I’ll ever be able to protect my people. You carry your sword. We know you’ve been blessed, but where is my token?” Her eyes were swimming with tears, and Link wished he could give her an answer. If she’d have it, he’d throw himself at her feet in offering.
It’s me. I am your token. Evidence that you are blessed by the goddess because I would follow you everywhere and do anything you asked if only you would tell me you wanted it.
But he knew she didn’t, so he stayed quiet and let her yell at him.
“Where is my evidence that she will provide and protect us?” she cried. “Every day, I spend hours on my knees, begging a stone to listen to me and fill me with her power. And yet, every day, we ignore the very real possibility that the problem is me! That I am the broken vessel, unable to feel connected to Hylia in any real capacity because the one time I came closest? It wasn’t in a shrine. It wasn’t in a temple. It was here.”
Zelda grabbed her dirty, half-woven flower crown and threw it as hard as she could. Link gulped when it landed in the river.
“Here,” Zelda spat. “In this dirty, stupid riverbank catching bugs with my mother.”
The tears were pouring freely now, and Link was entirely unprepared when her voice changed from one of raging grief to quiet desperation.
“What is wrong with me?” Her voice cracked and broke. “Why can't I find a connection to the temple?”
Link suspected that his princess did not expect an answer as she closed off then, gathering her knees to her chest and suppressing tearful sobs into her arms. He moved forward two more steps and sat quietly next to her, their shoulders occasionally bumping as she cried. Link reached into the bag on his hip and pulled out a clean handkerchief, laying it softly over her knee.
Zelda perked up at the pressure and looked at him questioningly. He nodded toward the handkerchief. It, like all of his possessions and even him, was hers for the taking—she need only decide she wanted it.
After she picked it up and started dabbing at her eyes, Link began counting again. He stared up at the stars. One…two…three…four…five… Twenty-eight stars, and he spoke.
“Maybe that’s not where Hylia is.”
“Hmm?” Zelda looked over at him, pulled away from whatever musings were rolling around in her head. “What do you mean?”
Link cleared his throat but kept staring at the stars. “I mean, maybe the temple is where man has said Hylia should be, but maybe that’s not where she is. Maybe she is here with us. In the dirt. The mud. Maybe she likes us catching her bugs and fish.” He shrugged and turned to catch her eyes, but Zelda looked down at her lap.
“It… It is a nice thought, but that is the exact opposite of what everyone has always told me about Hylia and how to connect with her,” Zelda murmured. “I just wish…” she sighed. “I guess it doesn’t matter.”
“It does matter,” Link said, before he could stop himself.
Zelda looked surprised.
“It does matter,” he repeated, just in case she wasn’t sure. When her eyes got too intense to look at, he turned back to the stars. “And if it doesn’t, then just say it. I’m sworn to secrecy, and the frogs can’t speak anyways.”
His cheeks burned when Zelda laughed. His lips dripped into a frown when she sighed.
“I just wish I knew what I needed to do to be good enough,” she sighed. “It feels like something is wrong with me, and I–” she trailed off and shook her head. “I don’t even know why I came out here. It was stupid. I was just looking for answers, and all I have are more questions and a lost night of rest before early devotionals.”
“It’s not stupid,” Link said firmly. He decided he wanted to argue with her. “And respectfully, Your Highness, of course, you only have more questions.”
“Excuse me?” Zelda sounded offended, and Link had to hold back a laugh. He turned an incredulous look on her.
“Are you not a scientist? A researcher? You gain new bits of knowledge all the time, and all it does is help you expand on your hypothesis, right?” Link said. “Even bit is to learn more about the world and expand your understanding, right?” he quoted Purah. If she’d said that once in the tech lab, she’d said it a hundred times.
Zelda frowned and looked at her hands. Link worried his lip between his teeth. Perhaps he’d gone too far. He cleared his throat.
“Sorry,” he said brusquely. “I-I was being dumb. I don't really know anything about being a scientist.”
Zelda looked up. “No, don't be sorry. You do. You clearly do.” She looked at him wonderingly, and it made Link anxious. “You’ve been listening to Purah and I? When we are in the lab?” she clarified.
Link nodded. “Is that not ok?”
Zelda gasped and giggled, shaking her head. “No, no! It's fine. I just would never have guessed. I would have thought you hated those times. The way you were silent and– Never mind.” She shook her head, and gave him a small smile. “It doesn’t matter what I thought because I know now.”
Link smiled and nodded. “I always listen to what you say, you know?”
Zelda visibly cringed. “I wish you wouldn't. I can be quite flippant and rude sometimes, and I know I’ve been unfairly harsh to you.”
Link shrugged. She may have been harsh to him, but it didn’t take long for him to see that it was a harsh world she’d grown up in, with high expectations and no margin for error. She was doing her best in impossible circumstances and if she took it out on him from time to time, he considered it part of his role as the carrier of the sword.
“It’s okay.”
“It is not okay!” Zelda admonished him, and Link looked at her in surprise. “You have been…kind to me. And I have repaid your–” She shook her head, tears beginning to fill her eyes and her voice. “–incredible skill and ability to carry your role with jealousy. I...owe you an apology. A million apologies.”
Link put a hand over hers and silenced her. It surprised both of them. She looked up in shock. “It’s okay,” he said.
“But surely you thought I hated you-?”
“It doesn’t matter what I thought.” Link smiled and squeezed her hand. “Because I know now.”
Zelda’s tears that had been building up started to fall, and she clasped his handkerchief in her hand, wiping her eyes absentmindedly. After twenty-seven seconds of tear gathering, she made a curious noise and unfolded the handkerchief, investigating the embroidered swift violets with a careful eye.
“From one of your fans?” She asked, likely imagining any number of fawning women who could have made and given this to the chosen hero.
Link snorted. “Sure, you can say that.” He noticed Zelda frowning and looking at the handkerchief more intently. “My sister,” he said, clearing his throat.
“What?”
“My sister, Aryll,” He explained, a sad smile on his face as he thought about his tiny home in Hateno and those eagerly waiting for his return. “She isn’t exactly a fan—of me or embroidery—but mom makes her from time to time. Says it's good practice, but I think she’s nearly given up. Aryll’s just like a boy, through and through,” he chuckled. “Mom just needs to come to terms with it.”
“Oh,” Zelda muses carefully. She flattens the handkerchief over her knee, folds it gently, and then whispers. “Thank you.”
“Oh, it’s no problem,” he shrugged. “Keep it. I have plenty of others. Aryll likes to make me lots of pink ones—thinks the guys will give me shit in the barracks.”
“Do they?”
“Yeah,” he blushed and laughed. “But I don’t mind. I like the reminder of her.”
“That’s sweet.” she smiled. “I meant to thank you for coming, however. Or for…letting me go.”
“Technically, the rule is that you can’t leave unaccompanied,” Link said matter-of-factly, an immediate feeling of unease in his stomach following after.
Zelda released it with a teasing reply. “You’re a bit of a rule stickler, aren’t you, Sir Link?”
Link chuckled and blushed.
“Well, I am grateful,” she said seriously, nudging his shoulder with hers. “Even if I didn’t get what I was exactly looking for, I still think I found something.”
Link looked over at her, a small smile on his lips. “Then we succeeded.” His eyes fell to her lips, and his mouth went dry.
“It seems we did,” the princess replied, but her tone felt far away—muted somehow, as if she were lost in thought. When Link finally pulled his eyes from her lips and met her gaze, she looked away and stood quickly. “It’s nearly morning,” she explained.
Link nodded and stood, dutifully offering her an arm to assist up the riverbank. He followed her back to the castle in stealthy silence, moving quickly before the morning merchants could arrive and see them. They were almost secure, nearly to the gate of Caste Town, when Zelda turned and looked back at him, a request he knew he’d never be able to deny, posed on her lips.
As he waited patiently, his princess stepped forward into his space, reached up to wrap her arms around his neck, and softly pressed her lips to his.
For six whole seconds.
Link fluttered under her attention, eyelashes blinking open when she stepped back. He waited for her to yell at him. For guards to jump out of the bush and accuse him of the highest of treason and march him to the dungeons. For the king to round the corner and excommunicate him on the spot.
“Perhaps we can come out for another night?” Zelda’s cheeks were a pale pink, and her eyes were soft, dreamy. “To look for Hylia?” she added quickly.
Link’s heart soared, and he couldn’t help but tease her. “Weren’t you going to find Hylia inside the cathedral? Isn’t that what you thought?” Link smiled, the right side of his face turning up higher like it did when he was genuinely happy.
“Perhaps it doesn’t matter what I thought.” Zelda met his gaze with a radiant grin. “Because I know now.”