Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Evening crept slowly over the dusty Gerudo desert, stars appearing one by one to watch as the hot sand cooled and became frigid. Link had settled in for the night, spirits high. Mushrooms sizzled on a skewer over a small fire as he tapped away at his Sheikah Slate, stopping every now and then to take a bite from one of his last remaining rice balls. Absently, he raised a hand to check the bandaging on his arm. The gash he’d earned in the day’s battle had been thankfully shallow—an inch's difference and his night would have been very different—but he'd wrapped it up carefully anyway, downing his mildest elixir to speed up healing. By the time he woke up in the morning, there would barely be a scar.

"I do not recommend… running around carelessly… if you suspect there may be one in the area," Link muttered aloud, finishing up his entry on Molduga and flicking across the screen to examine his painfully pieced together map. He'd finally activated the last of the towers only a week ago, though every now and then the completed map still updated itself with new information as he traveled. Now the words "Arbiter's Grounds" hovered over his location, and Link chewed his meal thoughtfully. Arbiter—like a judge? If this place had been some sort of courthouse once, the few faded structures remaining gave no hint either way. Exploring the ruins themselves had been a waste of time, although the gem deposits he'd discovered had more than made up for any time lost.

Fishing through his pouches, Link withdrew one of the red gems he'd collected and examined it with satisfaction. Now he could finally commission one of those ruby circlets he'd been eyeing in town. No more nights trapped in the desert, confined to the warmth of his fire because his snowquill tunic had been too bulky to travel with.

Maybe he could consider storming the Yiga Clan's hideout by night now. The darkness would hide them as much as him, but it had to be better than approaching in broad daylight.

Silence blanketed the starlit desert, broken only by the crackling flames and the distant whine of cicadas, and Link's good mood dampened slightly. Solitude was nothing new—it had been his near constant companion since awakening in that pool of tepid liquid with nothing but a quickly vanishing voice in his head for direction—but some nights he thought it might be nice to have someone around to share in his good news, or his bad. He couldn't shake the thought that he was missing… somebody. Zelda maybe? From what little he remembered, they had rarely spent a moment apart, although the princess had acted more resigned to that fact than anything.

Link still couldn't remember how he'd felt about it.

At least finding the sword that sealed the darkness had helped, a bit. Maybe a blade was poor excuse for company, but it had chosen him… and legend said that somewhere in that forged steel, an ancient voice resonated. In the end, it was all he had, and Link kept it close as he finally pocketed the Sheikah Slate, pulling his skewer from the fire and blowing on his charred, golden mushrooms. Sunshrooms needed a more finessed preparation to unlock their full abilities, something he couldn't achieve with a simple campfire, but they would help to keep the worst of the chill away.

Yanking one off and juggling it in his hands a bit before popping it in his mouth, Link chewed carefully around its searing juices as his gaze strayed up to where three beams of red light pierced through the sky. Just one Divine Beast left. He hoped he'd be able to shake loose some memory of Urbosa before meeting her face to face. The other Champions had come in time—fragments of them, at least. Tiny pieces that formed an incomplete picture of who they were, and how he'd fit in among them.

Link had expected… more. There had to be more to him than than the man he remembered: the silent shadow who always observed, hiding every piece of himself away. His mind felt like the night sky above, each dim memory a tiny prick of light that did nothing to illuminate the enormous blackness containing it. Would he ever gather enough of those lights to form a clear picture of who he was, or—

Link froze, almost choking on his mushroom. His wandering gaze had fallen on the moon, rising unnoticed over the distant dunes.

Blood red.

All thoughts forgotten, Link clambered to his feet, counting back the days since the last blood moon and cursing his own inattentiveness. He should have seen this coming. The Molduga's carcass sat not far off, ripe enough from the desert sun now that he had to hold back a gag whenever the wind blew from that direction, but that wouldn't last for long. Soon it would be breathing again, parting the sand like water in search of new prey.

Link didn't intend to be that prey, tonight or ever, but a moonlit battle in the freezing desert made that scenario all too likely. Crossing the desert at night dressed as he was would bring equal disaster. He'd have to relocate to higher ground for now and face the beast in the morning.

Grimacing, Link pulled the remaining mushrooms from their skewer with his teeth before tossing it aside to pack up camp. Just the thought of fighting that battle again made his injured arm twinge. He knew better than to camp so close to fallen enemies.

Leaving the fire to burn out on its own, Link shivered as the first tendrils of cold air wrapped around his bare torso, the voe armor that cooled him so efficiently during the day providing no protection at all against the night’s chill. Maybe his warmest clothing had been too much to pack, but he could have at least thought to bring a real shirt, or even his hood.

Trudging through the sand was a joyless prospect, so instead he shrugged out of his shield and hopped on, surfing across the sandy dunes in search of a more secluded campsite outside of the Molduga's reach. A tall stone structure caught his eye, and he steered himself towards it, kicking his shield into the air as he arrived and catching it with a triumphant grin. He's gotten better at that.

Still, Link's smile faded quickly as his injured arm made climbing slow and uncomfortable, the frigid air biting at his fingers until he could barely feel the stone beneath them. By the time he reached the top, heaving himself up and perching momentarily on the edge to catch his breath, the full red moon had cleared the upper edge of the sand dunes, lighting what remained of the Arbiter's Grounds in an eerie glow. Link took it all in with a somber expression. The sight of those fallen columns bathed in red made him shiver without knowing why.

...Or maybe it was the cold. Rubbing his arms vigorously, Link retreated as far from the stone's edge as he could, kicking at the sand that coated everything here to clear a space. His habitual frugality with his dwindling wood supply meant he had just enough left for a second fire. A small one.

Whether he found a shrine nearby tomorrow or not, he'd have no choice but to warp elsewhere for supplies come nightfall—not the worst outcome, necessarily, if he could get that ruby circlet started, but it would be a pain to lose all the progress he'd made delving this far into the desert just because—

Unexpectedly, Link's foot met the ground with a hollow thump, and he stopped short. Kneeling to brush the sand aside with his hands, Link saw a square shape emerge with a metal ring attached—and realized with the familiar thrill of discovery that he'd uncovered a hidden doorway. Maybe some part of these ruins had survived, buried beneath the sand.

Glancing over his shoulder at the moon, Link considered his options. He had planned on sleeping out in the open tonight, but if there was even a chance at actual shelter… he would have to clear it out to be sure it was safe, but at least he'd sleep more soundly without the possibility of falling off. Nothing he found down there could compare to a Molduga.

Mind made up, Link grasped the metal ring and heaved. The old door inched open with a groan, stale air wafting up to meet him.

Another moment's investigation revealed a ladder that he descended cautiously, ears perked for the high-pitched squeak of Keese that liked to roost in dark places like this one. Maybe this place was too well hidden even for that, because no matter how he strained to hear, he heard nothing but himself. After a much longer climb than he'd expected, Link's feet finally met stone, and he wasted no time in whipping out his Sheikah Slate to illuminate the room with its soft glow, prepared to draw his sword on the instant if anything moved.

Nothing did. Link stalked slowly forward, scanning his tiny bubble of sight before nodding abruptly. If nothing had attacked him yet, he probably wouldn't be attacked anytime soon, and he needed that fire. Stacking his wood beneath the trap door so the smoke could escape upwards, Link struck his flint with numb hands, nursing the spark it made with small bits of tinder and sighing in relief as it slowly gained strength, his huddled muscles unclenching in the welcome warmth. Only once the flames flickered to his satisfaction did he look around and realize where he'd ended up.

The hidden door above had placed him in a passageway that stretched out of sight in both directions, but what made him grimace were the small rooms placed every few paces along the corridor, separated by bars. A prison, then. Link supposed a courthouse would need somewhere to hold its criminals before and after judging, though he could imagine many places he would rather spend the night. No chests or discarded weapons were readily apparent, either. The only thing nearby of any substance was a stack of rotting barrels, which Link rose reluctantly to examine. The odds of finding something useful stored away seemed slim, but he'd been pleasantly surprised before.

As it turned out, the barrels were useless, too far gone to salvage even as tinder, but fallen to the ground behind them was treasure of a different sort. Link's eyes lit up as he found an old, discarded torch, turning it thoughtfully in his hands as he considered the unexplored passageway. With a tool to keep him warm and light his way, he could clear out the corridor more thoroughly—which he should do now that he could, since he intended to stay the night—but beneath that practicality, he felt the familiar stirrings of curiosity.

That was all he'd had to drive him when he first woke up, before he'd remembered enough about duty and friends to spur him on—the thrill of discovery as the unknown became known. He might never unearth all the secrets of this land, or even all the secrets of his mind, but forgotten things deserved to be remembered... and out in this vacant desert, Link was the only one around to do it.

He lit the old torch with a single swipe, holding it close as he abandoned the warmth of his fire. It would not have burned out by the time he returned.

The first direction Link chose ended quickly in rubble, so he walked down the other, free hand hovering near the hilt of his sword just in case. After a few tense minutes of thrusting a torch into each tiny room, the cells eventually came to an end. The corridor itself continued for only a few paces beyond that before it, too, ended in piles of broken stone.

Link stopped, caught between relief and disappointment. Reassuring though it was to know that nothing would disturb him during the night, he'd still hoped for something a little more useful than rocks… or at the very least, more interesting.

Walking forward to examine the cave-in—Link thought it looked old, but it was best to know for certain whether the ceiling might come crashing down around him as he slept—he heard a familiar, hollow thump beneath his feet and froze. In an instant, Link was on the ground, sweeping back the grit to reveal yet another door, this one more cleverly hidden than the last. There was no metal rung built in for ease of access, and even the patterning across the top matched that of the surrounding corridor, as if whoever had built this entrance had hoped for it to go unnoticed.

Link didn't hesitate. Digging his fingers into the sides of the door to wrench it open, he followed the new ladder down, juggling the rungs and his torch with only a bit of difficulty. This had to lead to something better than rocks.

Sure enough, he found himself in a second passageway less rigidly built than the first, meandering its way even deeper into the earth. Link's excitement at his discovery ebbed a little as he remembered the caved-in corridors above and wondered whether a smaller tunnel like this would be more or less stable. If he got himself killed or buried beneath stone, the outside world would not survive his absence long. Zelda couldn't hold out against Ganon forever.

"Ten minutes," Link muttered, his words echoing faintly. "Then I'll turn back." He knew he shouldn't risk himself over so little, but there must be something important at the end of such an old tunnel. Why else would someone have gone to such lengths to hide it?

It took only a few minutes of wandering before the passageway stopped abruptly at an uncarved door so nondescript, Link almost mistook it for a dead end. Setting his torch aside carefully to ensure it stayed lit, he heaved against the stone with all his strength, injured arm throbbing with the effort. Gradually, the door slid upwards with a deep, grating sound, until an ancient mechanism finally activated with a 'click', holding it in place.

Retrieving the torch once more, Link thrust it forward, and bit back a gasp.

Diamond-patterned tiles spiraled across the floor of a room much more ornate than the tunnel leading up to it. Words in an unfamiliar language were painted in red across the mosaic's surface, heedless of the careful handiwork—but though he tucked it all away in the corner of his mind, none of that was what captured his attention. Thrust upright into the circular chamber's center, ropes branching from the hilt in all directions as if to contain it, there stood an enormous black sword about as long as he was tall, its serrated blade glinting dully in the firelight.

Fascinated, Link stepped forward, mounting his torch absently in a niche beside the door. Tiny slips of fabric fluttered from the ropes upon his entry, each one printed with a more familiar text than what was scrawled across the floor. Sheikah work, it looked like—or Yiga. The two were difficult to tell apart.

Link dismissed the strips of fabric for the moment in favor of examining the sword itself. He couldn't shake the familiar sensation that he knew this weapon, though he couldn't remember where or how. The small ruby just below the hilt glowed in the flickering fire, and something about the crossguard spreading out like wings around it tugged at his memory. Then his gaze traveled down to the three triangles emblazoned at the base of the blade, and realization hit. Drawing the darkness-sealing sword from his back, Link held it up to compare.

The gem on his own sword gleamed gold instead of red, and the wings on his hilt were less jagged, but the similarities between the swords still startled him. Even those three triangles on his blade were the same, though inverted from the sword in front of him. Had the two swords been forged together in the long distant past, or had one weapon served as a template for the other? Why did his sword have a place in the legends, while this other stood buried and forgotten?

More importantly, what was he going to do with it? He knew instinctively that this sword was different from the many weapons he'd scavenged in the past. If the Sheikah had been the ones to hide it here, then they'd probably had their reasons… but the Sheikah did not live in the desert. This was the Yiga’s domain.

Link thought he remembered those triangles on the blade as the mark of the ancient goddesses. As dark and foreboding as the sword looked, it still might have been forged with some holy purpose. Either way, Link decided, whatever the Yiga wanted, he should probably oppose. He wasn't even sure that he could drag this massive blade up the ladder with him, much less all the way to Gerudo Town, but Link set his sword against a rope anyway to cut it through—and almost dropped the weapon at the urgent sense of wrong flooding up his arm.

Inhaling sharply, Link looked down at his sword in confusion. Nothing about it seemed different now, but…

Experimentally, he held it to the rope again, and felt that same urgent feeling of wrong, don't, shouldn't as the blade fell from his hand entirely. Stunned, Link could only stare. Was there some sort of magic in those little scraps of cloth that prevented his interference, or was this, finally… the voice of the sword?

"Look who it is…"

Link fell backwards with a startled yell, fingers scrabbling for the hilt of his fallen weapon. Where the bound sword had been he now saw—but no. Link shook his head, confused. Why had he thought—

In an instant, it shifted again.

"That voice… I had almost forgotten…" Dry laughter echoed through the small room, then vanished abruptly. "Have you come to rescue me, hero?"

Link's eyes flickered, not sure where to focus as words failed him. Where one moment he saw a sword, the next he saw a kneeling man bound at the neck, his unkempt hair as pearly white as the moon should have been, his skin as black as the sword. The two images shifted back and forth in his mind, but before he could even think of how to react, the battle was over.

The man's head lifted slightly to meet Link's shocked gaze.

"Speechless as usual," he said, dark eyes dancing. "But then, you never were one for words… were you, Link?"

"Do I… know you?" Link asked warily, his hand finally finding its grip around his own sword's hilt, and the man's face brightened with anticipation. Unlike the rest of him, that face was pale, though marred along the edges by angular black cracks.

"Know me?" He laughed again softly, a too-long tongue slipping out to run across his white lips. Link watched it move in fascinated horror. "Intimately. In fact, I may know you better than anyone now living. Don't tell me you've forgotten?"

Irritation cracked through Link's surprise, and he gritted his teeth. Something in the man's mocking tone made it clear that he already knew the answer to his own question.

"I probably have," he said carefully. No matter how many people Link said it to, the admission still hurt… though for once, he wasn't sure that he wanted to remember this man. That feeling of wrong was stronger than ever now. "It’s not personal. I lost all of my memories from before the Calamity, though they've been coming back… slowly." The man said nothing, staring intently at him through cavernous eyes, and Link's gaze slid sideways to avoid his. "Since you seem to know my name, maybe you can tell me yours?"

"That's only fair," he mused, though for a moment Link thought he would refuse. "You may call me Ghirahim. In truth," he added, smiling as if at a private joke, "I very much prefer to be indulged with my full title, Lord Ghirahim… but I'm not fussy."

Link inclined his head.

"Lord Ghirahim," he murmured, and saw the other man's nonexistent brows lift a fraction as if he hadn't expected the concession. He supposed this Ghirahim might have been a noble in the king's court, although his strangely cut, form-fitting outfit looked more like something an entertainer would wear. Maybe that was the joke, and he was not a lord at all.

Then again, Link wasn’t convinced he was even human.

Either way, it didn't explain how Ghirahim had managed to survive so long, or who had trapped him here in the first place, or what had happened to the sword.

"How did you—" Link started to ask, but a sharp motion from Ghirahim cut him off.

"You have questions," he said, examining his own hands in a bored sort of way. "They are not nearly as interesting or relevant as my own, and I haven't the time to humor them. You do not know enough right now to know what should interest you."

Link frowned, more certain than ever that he didn't like this man.

"Tell me, then," he said shortly. "What interesting questions should I ask instead?"

"That is a good start," Ghirahim said approvingly, as if he hadn't caught Link's sarcasm. Those sharp black cracks had retreated from his face, hovering now around his collarbone. "I will tell you—but first," he added, eyes glittering as he flicked a wrist in Link's direction, "I would prefer that you sheath that sword of yours. You can hardly consider me a threat to you, bound as I am."

Eyeing the many ropes tied to his neck, Link had to admit that he had a point. He sheathed his blade reluctantly, and found as he released the hilt that a portion of his unease melted away.

"Much better," Ghirahim sighed. "I find that the only worthwhile discussions involve some level of trust, don't you? Don't be such a stranger, Link. Come closer." He crooked a finger, and Link's breath caught. "I can hardly see you over there."

Uncertainly, Link stepped forward until he stood within arm's reach, looking back to reassure himself of the open doorway behind him. The sword that sealed the darkness held no trust for Lord Ghirahim, which meant he shouldn't, either. Maybe he should just leave and forget this place ever existed... but not yet.

Even kneeling, the bound man was tall enough to meet Link's eyes.

"Warm in here, isn't it?" Ghirahim murmured, wiping nonexistent sweat from his smooth brow, and Link realized with a start that he was right. He hadn't noticed the temperature before as he'd entered, too distracted by the strangeness of the sword, but now sweat beaded across his forehead and slipped between his shoulders. Despite his cooling armor, he felt lightheaded. "Sweltering, even. No helping it, I suppose. Stand there and let me look at you."

Link stood, swaying slightly as Ghirahim's shining eyes raked him over, taking in the map of faded scars that had killed him once, overlaid with every scar he had gathered since.

"You are certainly a reckless child," he said at last, and Link flinched, first at his choice of words, then again as Ghirahim raised a black finger to his bare chest. Stomach clenching beneath his touch, Link watched breathlessly as he traced along the longest of his scars, too shocked to consider pulling free. "No companion this time, either. What a lonely little journey you must be leading… and no green tunic to mark you? That alone would make me doubt who you are, if I did not know you and that sword so well."

"Don't touch me," Link said, but Ghirahim ignored him. His words made no sense to Link. The Champion's tunic was blue.

"This clothing suits you better," Ghirahim decided with a grin. "You were always wild at heart, whatever thin veneer of culture the goddess managed to paint over you. Oh, if you insist," he added impatiently as Link opened his mouth to speak again, finally withdrawing his hand, and Link relaxed. That finger had felt sharp somehow, though a quick glance confirmed that it had left no mark. "Always so stuffy, you Hylians. Tell me, wild one, what do you remember of your past?"

"I…" Ghirahim's fingers moved constantly in strange, nonsensical patterns, and Link watched them distractedly. Thick indents encircled Ghirahim's black wrists as if something had bound them recently, and looking down, Link noticed a discarded scrap of rope. He wondered why that detail should stick out to him. "Not much. I remember the Champions… some of them. Revali and Mipha, and Daruk. Just… just a few conversations. And… it's the same with Zelda." He grimaced, remembering Zelda's disdain for him in his most recent memory of her. "Not much."

"Fascinating," Ghirahim said dryly, though Link was sure he didn't imagine the malice that flickered through his eyes at Zelda's name. "And you consider it such a tragedy to have lost the events of a single life, do you?"

Link stiffened at the realization that Ghirahim was amused by his loss.

"I never said it was," Link growled, glancing back at the doorway again. He didn't need to stand here and be mocked… but still he didn't leave.

"You wouldn't," Ghirahim said, rolling his eyes. "You were always the type to suffer in silence, biting your tongue to hide what you truly thought. People called you brave for that, but it always looked like hiding to me."

Link's eyes narrowed. It didn't help that he agreed.

"What would you consider tragic, then?" he asked irritably, wiping sweat from his brow, and Ghirahim's eyes glowed as if he'd anticipated the question.

"Forgetting a hundred lives," he said, his voice echoing faintly. "Living and fighting and dying, again and again and again, never knowing why you fight or that you have fought that battle before. When you defeat Ganon in this lifetime, do you think that will be the end? Was it the end for the last hero who defeated him? I remember him, you know." Ghirahim's lips split into a grin, revealing sharpened teeth. "The battle you fought with my master was not nearly as easy as I’m sure the legends would have you believe, though the stories written of your accomplishments do tend to leave the juicy bits out. You knew Ganon well in that lifetime, a fact that was never recorded, and you watched him become the monstrosity that you were always fated to defeat. The Guardians and Divine Beasts may have been on your side, but I assure you that you wept as you dealt the sealing blow.”

"I…" Link felt dazed. That was not the story Kass had always told. "That's not… that was somebody else."

Unbidden, Zelda's words from a hundred years back resurfaced. "Whether skyward bound, adrift in time, or steeped in the glowing embers of twilight…"

"Wolfling," Ghirahim said relentlessly. "Fairy boy. Sky child." That last name he spoke with particular relish. "You are all of these and more. You could think of them as different people, inasmuch as we are all formed by our memories and experiences… but that would make the 'you' standing before me a completely different person from the 'you' whose lost memories you mourn. Why should he seem like such a great loss, when your other lives do not?"

"Because…" Link licked his lips. It was almost too hot for thought now. "Because I can still do something to bring him back. The others… they're beyond my reach." He felt it now, though, the distant pang of forgotten knowledge. Who was he? Would he ever know the answer, with more of himself missing than he could have guessed?

"Beyond your reach? Perhaps." Ghirahim pinned him with an intense stare, his gesturing fingers coming suddenly to a halt as if pulling a thread tight. "Beyond my reach? Not at all."

He let the implication hover in the air as Link's eyes slowly widened.

"You would…" Link breathed. "You could…?"

"For a price, my wild one," he said, smirking. Link had thought his hair unkempt before, though now he couldn't imagine why. It hung to the side of his smoothly pale face in a shining curtain, sleek and strangely beautiful. "All things come at a price, though on a night like tonight…" He breathed in deeply, and the blackness that had faded to the tops of his arms retreated further, like ink withdrawing along angular cracks. "My master is restless… his power envelops us both. I think I could do anything on a night like tonight."

Link stared, a sliver of apprehension finally slipping through his hazy thoughts. He could feel it, too, that dark, unsettled energy that accompanied every blood moon, and he wondered suddenly how close that moon had come to its peak in the unseen sky above.

On instinct, Link reached for his sword—and inhaled sharply as his fingers touched the hilt. The air around him grew frigid, and he stepped back in horror.

"Ghirahim," he said, voice shaking as his mind became suddenly, painfully clear. "Who is your master?"

Ghirahim looked at him for a long moment, expressionless. Then his face split into a wide, malicious grin.

"Let go of your sword, Link," he said softly. "Do not touch it again."

He gestured, and Link gritted his teeth as, finger by finger, his hand peeled away from the hilt to fall uselessly beside him. His breath came too fast as Ghirahim straightened in his bonds, considering him thoughtfully.

"I had thought to do this gently, but I think I prefer you like this," he said, reaching out to brush a thumb along Link's cheek. Link considered biting it. "Uncertain and angry, like the first time we met. So many memories between us… oh, but perhaps you cannot relate." He laughed as Link growled low in his throat.

"What do you want?" Link asked roughly, anger tightening his voice, but Ghirahim hushed him.

"Enough," he said, running a finger across his throat, and Link felt his words dry up. "Focus only on my eyes and move quickly. Our time is running out, and I can no longer tolerate your peculiar brand of defiance, however amusing I might find it otherwise."

Link saw Ghirahim's hands moving again out of the corner of his eyes and felt his own hands move in response, but awareness of such things faded quickly. Ghirahim's dark eyes caught and held him, like twin caverns consuming him.

"I do not intend to hurt you," Ghirahim said, his voice strangely soothing. "Nor should you fear that I will run to my master's aid. He lost all need of my services when he abandoned hope and became that… abomination." Ghirahim scowled furiously at something Link didn't understand, though the expression softened as he heard something snap. "Yes, just like that. Quickly now, on to the next."

It was the blood moon, Link thought. That must be the source of his power, and the reason for his urgency, which meant this would all be over soon. Already, he could see the first red motes of light floating between them as the darkness stirred, and awakened.

Ghirahim hissed. He could see it, too.

"I should never have been imprisoned in the Arbiter's Grounds," he muttered. "A sword held captive for its master's crimes, can you imagine? Can a sword wield itself?" Another snap of rope, and he felt himself move on. "All those who once judged me are long since dead and incapable of providing release. How much longer should I be expected to rot here alone, even had I deserved my imprisonment? It stretches the bounds of justice, much less mercy."

Link glared, the only thing he was able to do. It sounded as if Ghirahim wanted Link's compassion, something he didn't feel much like granting at the moment. Anger boiled inside him as his movements continued, not his own.

A third rope rebounded with another snap, but the motes of light were coming faster now, the blood moon's peak mere moments away. Ghirahim held his gaze through narrowed eyes. He would not be free of his restraints in time.

"It seems that you are now the arbiter of my fate," Ghirahim said, bitterly amused. "And so I must appeal to you. I have not harmed you in all this, nor will I if you grant my freedom willingly. Surely you of all people can understand the desire to be free?"

Link felt his throat finally loosen, and laughed in Ghirahim's face.

"You should have asked for mercy before taking advantage," he snapped. The small voice in his head advising caution was lost in the strength of his fury. "It's not going to work now."

For a moment, Link thought Ghirahim might reach out and strangle him, but then the corners of his eyes crinkled.

"So be it."

The blood moon hit its zenith, every dark thing gaining power at once, and Ghirahim vanished in a flurry of diamonds with a single snap of his fingers. Startled, Link stumbled backwards—right into Ghirahim's waiting arms.

"Listen well, wild one," he whispered in Link's ear as the room glowed red around them. "We have fought each other many times, you and I, but I always tell the truth. What I promised you, what you want, I can give you that and more."

Link grunted, unable even to move as Ghirahim grasped his hand and lifted it to his lips, biting down carefully on his smallest finger until blood welled at the tip. Interlocking his own finger with Link's, the two of them watched as the blood dripped down them both.

"After all these years, that thread of fate still binds us," Ghirahim said, something dark in his voice. "You would not have stumbled down here otherwise. I call on the strength of it now. When the moon bleeds red, you will return to me once more."

"I won't," Link said, struggling, and Ghirahim's grip on him tightened.

"You will."

"I won't."

Sweat dripped down Link's face. Ghirahim's fingers moved back and forth, tying them together.

"You will."

"I WILL!"

Link's shout filled the room, crashing in around him until even its echoes faded away to nothing. Red motes vanished into the sudden silence.

Ghirahim was gone. In his place stood an enormous black sword, almost as long as Link was tall, its serrated blade glinting dully in the orange light. For a wild moment, Link thought it had all been a dream or hallucination, only…

Three of the ropes securing it had been sliced clean through, with another fraying tenuously. As Link watched, the cut ropes shriveled and faded away, their tiny slips of fabric vanishing into smoke.

"I won't—" Link looked down at his hands. One of them throbbed, a drop of blood falling from his smallest finger to splatter onto the tiled floor. His other hand clutched a black dagger he had never seen before, a tiny red ruby embedded just below the hilt. He dropped it, and watched it disappear in a soft flurry of diamonds.

"I won't be back here!" he yelled at the sword. "Are you listening? Keep your memories to yourself! I won't—"

Fumbling over his shoulder, Link drew his sword, holding it out in front of him, and felt nothing. No warning voice, no feeling of unease. The danger, as far as the sword knew, had passed.

Abruptly, Link shivered, every bead of sweat against his overheated skin freezing him at once.

"I won't be coming back here," Link promised, backing away from the room's center and grabbing the torch from its place in the wall, brandishing it along with his sword. "I'm serious. You can take your thread of fate and hang yourself with it, because I—won't—come!"

Link's back hit the wall, and with a start, he realized that he'd backed right out of the room into the tunnel outside. With a last, furious glare, Link ran, and didn't stop running until he reached the ladder. Only then did he sheathe his sword, though he climbed it just to start running once more.

His fire had burned down to coals by the time he returned, and Link stoked it to life with his torch, pacing and rubbing his hands in agitation, each heartbeat pulsing through his finger a reminder of what he had almost done. The Molduga rumbling around outside felt inconsequential in comparison.

He had to get out of the desert. He couldn't chance being here the next… the next time… Only he had nowhere else to go. Every Divine Beast was free now except Naboris. He needed to get the Thunder Helm back from the Yiga Clan so Riju could help him board it, and… and he wasn't going to run from this.

Link flushed, realizing he had literally just fled the buried room below, but his resolve stayed the same. He shouldn't have to distance himself from this place just to be safe. The next blood moon would meet him in the desert, and he just wouldn't go, and that was that. If he had his way, he would never return to the Arbiter's Grounds again.

Finger throbbing, Link curled up on the ground beside the fire, refusing to question his deep relief at deciding to remain. Tendrils of exhaustion enveloped him, and he found himself falling into sleep's embrace despite his racing mind. Who had he been in all those lifetimes Ghirahim claimed to have known him through? Who would he be now, if he could remember?

"I won't go," Link muttered again, before drifting off into dreams that he would forget upon waking.

In the darkness far beneath him, the fraying rope stretched and snapped, and soft laughter echoed, unheard.

Chapter Text

The vast expanse of the desert laid sprawled out and silent, its golden sand turned cool, dusty violet in the burnished light of the fading sun. Perched on the outstretched head of Vah Naboris, Link watched it all pass beneath him in slow, rhythmic arcs as the Divine Beast took one halting step after another, its enormous frame rumbling with each heavy impact. He had long since grown used to the constant, lurching motion, although at first those steps had thrown him off his balance. The precisely circular burn singed through his Sheikah chest guard was testament to that.

Vah Naboris had proven trickier than the other Divine Beasts to puzzle his way through, though Link nearly had it tamed now. All that remained was to activate the main control unit, a feat that previous experience suggested would be easier said than done. Link didn't think he wanted to fight whatever oozing beast had managed to kill Urbosa. The chiseled, confident woman had seemed indestructible in memory… but then, all of the Champions had felt that way. It stretched credulity to think that he had so far found success where each one of them had failed, and Link couldn't help but feel that surely his luck would run out any day now.

Urbosa's last, echoing words throughout the Divine Beast had warned him against overconfidence, but somehow, he didn't think that would be a problem. Not against this enemy, at least. He had already proven his tendency towards overconfidence against others.

None of that was the cause of his delay, though. Link couldn’t—wouldn't—say why he still refused to trigger that final fight. He thought he could sense Urbosa's growing impatience in the cooling air around him, even if only in his imagination… but still he sat, watching the desert darken beneath him. Off in the distance, he recognized a familiar grouping of broken columns buried in the sand. His finger hurt.

Scowling at that last thought, Link stuck the offending finger in his mouth to suck on irritably. The pain was small compared to what he'd long since grown used to, but intrusive. It shouldn't have hurt at all, considering that the small bite had healed over long since with only a fading scar to prove its existence, but as the day inched on towards night, it had steadily begun to throb once more.

Link feared that he knew all too well what that might mean.

Eyes straying again towards the columns, he found himself making the same absent calculations he'd made almost every night for the past week. If he leapt from Naboris now and glided his way over, Link could cover almost half the distance from here to the Arbiter's Grounds in the air. Running through sand would slow him down, but he thought he could make it to the underground room with plenty of time left before the blood moon hit its peak—assuming it even happened tonight. He still had time before the moon came peeking over the highlands to let him know for sure.

If the moon did rise red, then waiting for only a little longer would take him past the tipping point, proving once and for all that Ghirahim's parting command had been nothing more than wishful words. Then he could awaken the blighted beast inside Naboris without fearing that some outside power might draw him away, interrupting their battle and causing untold havoc.

If he was wrong and the moon rose white, so much the better. Maybe he could free Naboris and get out of the desert quickly enough that it wouldn't matter. For now, though, he intended to sit here and wait. Nothing could make him go where he didn't want to go if he simply didn't move.

His face a steel mask of determination, Link settled back. And shoved himself off the edge.

By the time his mind caught up with the rest of him, Link had already pulled out his paraglider, aiming it like an arrow towards the Arbiter's Grounds.

"No!" he yelped in frustration, craning his neck to look back at the Divine Beast he'd abandoned. His course didn't deviate by an inch, though, and he hit the ground running, cold sand kicking up behind him. The ruby bouncing against his forehead sparked to life the moment the freezing air turned painful, warming him like a small flame from the inside, but even that didn't melt away the icy fear gripping his heart—or the cold fury. He couldn't let this happen.

With an effort, Link forced his entire being to focus on a single command—STOP!—and slowly his traitorous legs came to a shuddering halt, ankle deep in the sand. Panting but triumphant, Link slumped against his knees to catch his breath, glancing up at the sky—and shot forward once more, groaning as he fought with the sand for momentum. In the sky above the distant highlands, barely visible but rising steadily, his eyes had picked out the smallest sliver of red.

Stalizalfos rose up to either side of Link as he ran, bones stacking atop each other to brandish their wickedly forked blades at him, and in trying to run forward and whirl back to face them, Link tripped. No sooner had he hit the ground with a grunt than the closest one was upon him, scuttling across the sand with frightening speed to slash its forked weapon at his thigh.

Even as Link cried out, his hand found his sword's hilt. The skeletal lizards fell easily, a vicious blow to the skull destroying each one, and as soon as they had fallen, Link was running again, this time with a limp. Blood flowed freely down his leg, soaking tights that were designed for stealth rather than armor, and Link gritted his teeth as his legs pumped silently through the night.

With each throbbing step, his fury grew stronger, slowly overwhelming his fear. Maybe Ghirahim could summon him back with little more than a word and a crooked finger, but this time he wouldn't catch Link by surprise. If he tried to wave his hands around again, Link would feel no remorse in chopping them off—and he would not let go of his sword.

The nauseating stench of rotting Molduga flesh did not improve his mood. Link gagged as he stumbled his way past the enormous corpse, approaching the familiar stone structure with dread.

Deciding that he had no interest in climbing tonight, Link instead reached into the hidden strength burning beneath his skin and felt the wind swirl up around him as the ghostly form of Revali appeared to carry him into the sky. Not for the first time, he wondered whether the Champions could see him in those brief moments when he called on their power. Did Revali know how hard and fast Link had just run to meet his own doom, or was the figure that appeared before him only the ghost of a ghost, offering the gift of flight but nothing more?

Maybe it was Link's imagination, but as the Rito Champion vanished into ghostly flames, he thought he saw a spark of pity in those fading green eyes.

Drifting down to land atop the stone, Link tugged at the hidden entrance. The blood moon had pulled free of the distant cliffs now, enormous and blazing as it started its slow ascent across the sky, but Link's view of it was cut off as he descended, his hands and burning legs lowering him rung by rung down the long ladder towards the man—was it only a man?—waiting patiently in the darkness below.

Then his feet hit the ground, and the force that had pulled him so relentlessly finally eased its grip, perhaps satisfied now that he would make it there with time to spare. Wiping sweat from his face with a shaky hand, Link limped down the dark row of cells carefully, his dimly lit Sheikah Slate not nearly enough to light his path. The remains of his old fire sat abandoned where he had left it, along with his discarded torch, but even if the wood hadn't burned beyond usefulness, he had no way of lighting a fire now and no time left to do so. It would be a dark journey down to the passageway's depths, the only upside being that he would not be able to see Ghirahim's smirking face at the end of it.

Link clung to his anger as he descended the second ladder, drawing his sword to grope his way blindly down the tunnel and feeling it tremble in his hand. This time, he wouldn't give Ghirahim the chance to control him. Once the compulsion left his limbs, he would be gone, and no force magical or physical could convince him to return. If the ancient Sheikah had felt it necessary to bind Ghirahim here forever, then he had no reason to disagree with their judgment and every reason not to.

His sword clinked unexpectedly against the stone doorway at the tunnel's end, and he stopped with a start, bending to wrench open the door that had fallen shut again in his absence. Once more, it held above him with a soft click, and Link stepped forward, his heart pounding with furious—and as much as he denied it, fearful—anticipation. For a long, breathless moment he waited in absolute darkness for something to happen, hoping against hope that nothing would.

Then the echoing sound of laughter washed over him, and Link gritted his teeth as a red gem burst into glowing life between them, barely illuminating Ghirahim's grinning face. So much for that.

"Ahhh, Link, welcome back!" The red light shone brighter, taking in the entire circular chamber, and Ghirahim sent it to hover over them with a sweeping gesture as Link squinted in discomfort. "Don't tell me you ran all the way here? If I had known you were so eager—"

He cut off as Link's sword whipped around to rest against his throat.

"Shut up," Link growled, wishing he could stop his voice from shaking, though the combination of nerves and exertion made that impossible. "If you thought that forcing me back here would do anything, you were wrong. I'm leaving, now, and if I even think you're about to twitch a finger on my way out, I'll cut it off!”

Link wrenched his jaw closed, panting hard behind clenched teeth. He hadn't meant to shout.

Ghirahim's dark eye considered him, glittering in the crimson light, though the hair that fell across his face masked his expression. His appearance had settled on pale skin and dark arms, with angular cracks forming the border between the two, and while it was a relief to see Ghirahim still and predictable for once rather than hovering constantly on the brink of change, it made him feel disconcertingly solid in a way that he hadn't before. At least the remaining ropes with their thin slips of fabric still held, fluttering with Ghirahim's slightest movements. Maybe the few Link had cut before wouldn't matter as long as these were left to bind him.

"I forget sometimes that you are almost half beast," Ghirahim muttered, before his voice took on a sickly sympathetic tone. "You sound upset. Don't tell me you were in the middle of something important when I pulled you away?"

"You—" Eyes widening, Link pressed his sword harder against Ghirahim's throat, though to Link's frustration, he didn't flinch. Fleetingly, he wondered whether a man who was also a sword could even be harmed by steel weapons. "You have no idea—"

The Guardian Scouts on Vah Naboris would return once the blood moon finished its path across the sky, as would the concentrated pools of Malice he'd cleared, all of which he'd need to laboriously clear again. This newest injury to his leg would require his strongest elixir to heal, which meant he'd need to prepare another before battling the blight of Naboris, which meant gathering up all the necessary ingredients. His tights needed mending, too, which meant a visit to the Great Fairy—and none of that was the point.

"I think I have some idea," Ghirahim said, his gaze sliding to Link's sluggishly bleeding leg. Link tensed further as Ghirahim's inhumanly long tongue snaked slowly across his lips. "Do you feel trapped, my wild beast? Contained? Coerced by forces neither just nor merciful?" His laughter was short and mocking. "In truth, my sympathy for your plight extends only so far. Misery loves company, as they say, and there is no person I would rather share it with than you, Link."

"That's too bad," Link said hoarsely, stepping back and feeling emboldened that he could. The compulsion to remain was gone now. "Because I'm leaving."

"So you've said." Ghirahim's eyes narrowed before he let out a deep, almost forlorn sigh. Shoulders hunched against the dim red light, he looked suddenly small. "Very well. It is almost unpardonably rude to leave so soon after arriving, but nobody ever accused you of having manners. Perhaps in another life we will…" His voice faded away, his gaze focusing sharply on something just over Link's shoulder, and Link was just jumpy enough to make a mistake he would kick himself over for weeks after.

He turned his head to look.

The stone door fell shut almost on Link's heels, and he stumbled forward with a yelp. His head whipped forward just in time to catch Ghirahim snapping his fingers, prompting an ominous click from the closed door.

"Announcing your plans is rarely conducive to achieving them," Ghirahim remarked casually, his moment of apparent weakness vanishing as he studied his own sharp fingernails. "You forced that lesson upon me once, so it is only fitting now that I do the same."

"What did you do?" Link demanded breathlessly, in disbelief that he'd been fooled so easily. He resisted the urge to scrabble his fingers along the door's edge, instead aiming his sword more urgently in Ghirahim's direction. "Open the door! Don't move another finger!"

"I can't do both." Ghirahim's obvious amusement needled Link further. "Now you control my freedom, and I control yours… although I may still allow you to leave in the end if I'm feeling particularly—"

"Wait." Link's shoulders shook as he fumbled for his Sheikah Slate one-handed, laughing at his own stupidity. Flicking through the screens until he found the map, Link looked triumphantly up at Ghirahim, still not lowering his sword by an inch. "I guess I'm not as easily trapped as you are. Have fun rotting here forever."

Freeing Naboris was out of the question now and Gerudo Town would never let him in dressed like this, so Link jabbed his thumb against the symbol inside Zora's Domain, eager to watch Ghirahim's stunned face as Link vanished before his eyes. If he could go anywhere else, then he might as well escape this dry air for the night… but instead, the fading red symbols painted on the floor beneath him shone a brief, brilliant white. Link's body twitched as pain shot through him, sending the Sheikah Slate flying from his tenuous grip to clatter across the floor.

Ghirahim sighed, clearly unimpressed.

"As I was saying," he drawled pointedly while Link stumbled forward to retrieve the slate, still blinking back stars, "I may allow you to leave if I'm feeling particularly merciful, though I'm starting to think I might rather—how did you put it?—have fun watching you rot here forever. Oh, come now," he added, his lips twisting maliciously as Link stared at him in dumb confusion. "Don't you think I would have escaped ages ago if it was as simple as that? You're stuck here until I say otherwise, so why not sit down, and we'll have a little chat?"

Link stiffened. The realization that he'd been tricked, coerced, and trapped hit him all at once, and he lashed out unthinkingly. With a roar, Link lunged forward with his sword, not caring if it met hands or neck or heart—and numbness gripped him as Ghirahim caught the blade between his fingers.

"Sit down," Ghirahim repeated softly, and Link's muscles locked up in panic, though there was nothing commanding about his words. "Tend to your wound. You look as if you might collapse at any moment."

"What are you?" Link muttered under his breath in horror, only realizing he had been heard when Ghirahim gave a soft, delighted laugh. Glaring furiously, Link wrenched his sword free, took a step back—and nearly stumbled onto his backside as his leg chose that moment to waver, all of his pain and exhaustion and slow blood loss catching up with him at once. Ghirahim was right again, the goddess curse him for it.

Link managed to wobble to the room's edge before his strength gave out, and he sank against the wall as far from Ghirahim as he could manage, leaning over his leg to examine it in the dim light. He couldn't make out much, but what he could see made him wince.

The crimson light grew brighter, and Link glanced up quickly, earning himself a raised eyebrow.

"Flighty little bird tonight, aren't you?" Ghirahim murmured.

Link's jaw tightened as he reached into his pack to pull out his saved elixir and a small bottle of water. Stiffly, he peeled out of his tights, hissing through his teeth as the fabric clung to his congealing wound and fresh blood began to leak through. Spikes of pain stabbed at him as he carefully picked out the wisps of blue fabric that his garment had left behind, washing it all with lukewarm water that he paused to take a deep swig out of. The slash had gathered too much dirt to heal now without cleaning it first, unless he wanted to deal with sand pushing its way through his skin for weeks to come… though with Ghirahim's gaze lingering so uncomfortably, a part of him thought it might be worth it.

"Have you considered my offer?" Ghirahim asked suddenly, and Link glanced at him sideways. Of course he had. It had been almost the only thing he thought about, when he wasn't occupied with infiltrating the Yiga Clan, or taming Naboris, or worrying over the next blood moon. Still, even if Ghirahim held all the power here, Link didn't have to make things easy on him.

His silence stretched on stubbornly, and Ghirahim's expression slowly darkened.

"I wonder how much air this room can hold?" he asked with a casual tone so false it grated. "Enough to last you through one night, certainly, but through two? What about seven? Until the next blood moon? Who can say?"

…Then again, maybe this wasn't the hill Link wanted to die on.

"I have," he grunted. Satisfied that he'd washed away as much sand as possible, Link popped the cork off his elixir, downing it with a grimace. The fire in his leg rose to an inferno before fading away abruptly, the flesh knitting itself back together to form a shiny red scar as Link stretched experimentally. His leg would be stiff for hours still, but by morning he would walk without a limp.

Ghirahim watched it all silently, his thoughts well hidden behind an enigmatic expression.

"Well?" he said at last when Link didn't elaborate, and Link finally met his gaze.

"No."

One second passed, and then another.

"No?" Ghirahim repeated. Link almost flinched at the dangerous tone, but remained firm.

"No." He thought he succeeded in sounding certain, though inside, that same old curiosity that had gotten him into this mess in the first place still lingered. Were those old heroes really him in any way that mattered?… Except even if they were, Link didn't want to find out like this. Not from Ghirahim. "The goddess gives us one life to live at a time for a reason, I think. I can accept what I've been given."

"Hmmm… ha!" To Link's surprise, Ghirahim laughed. He was starting to suspect that Ghirahim responded to most situations with laughter, its various tones indicating far more than mere amusement if only Link knew how to read them. "A wise choice, though I did not expect you to see it. Memories have weight, and to bear so many is a heavy, lonely thing. You have no idea how free you are, bearing none at all…" His strangely wistful expression vanished in an instant as he clapped his hands decisively, and Link jumped, though the action had no obvious effect. "But that is for you to discover on your own. I assume you at least wish for your most recent memories returned?"

"I…" The denial died in his throat. It was too great a lie to say otherwise.

The corners of Ghirahim's lips curled upwards.

"As I thought. I have two offers to extend to you, then. The first is by far the greater deal, though I don't think you're smart enough to take it." Link's eyes narrowed, but he nodded for Ghirahim to go on. Refusing to listen would only anger him further. "I will restore to you every missing memory you so desperately pine after, but in exchange you must cut through every rope restraining me."

"No." Link didn't even let himself consider it, pushing the possibility from his mind. The temptation to accept was too strong.

"Of course," Ghirahim sighed, strands of white hair fluttering around his lips. "Just what about my freedom is so repulsive to you?"

"Really?" Link demanded. "You think you can ask that after all… this?"

He wiggled his fingers in demonstration, and Ghirahim tossed his head dismissively.

"Have I tried this—" he wiggled his fingers right back, and Link twitched— "even once since you arrived here tonight?" Link scowled. He hadn't, but the fact that he'd forced Link here in the first place made his point less persuasive than it might have been. "That was uncomfortable for you, perhaps, but not harmful. In fact, only one of us has attempted to murder the other—but that might be how you treat everyone who inconveniences you."

"Or maybe my past lives remember you after all," Link snapped to hide his sudden unease. The threat of Ghirahim had felt so immediate when he swung his sword, but… was it? The bite on his finger was an annoyance at best, and Ghirahim had not controlled the Stalizalfos. Then again, if a fate worse than death existed, being reduced to a human puppet must be somewhere close.

"Oh Link," Ghirahim chortled, his gaze filled with such sudden heat that Link would have backed away further if he hadn't already been up against the wall. "You have no idea how some of your past lives must remember me."

His tongue flicked across his lips suggestively, and Link grasped blindly for his discarded tights, his face heating up.

"What was your other offer?" he asked, forcing himself to dress again slowly, though he knew it was too late for that. Surely there was no past life where he would have even considered… no, definitely not.

"My second offer grants you considerably more wiggle room, I think," Ghirahim said with a smirk, and Link's flush deepened as he tried to inch the rest of the way into his tights without moving his hips, wondering if Ghirahim could really make any word sound like that… but the man's next words swept such concerns from his mind. "A single memory for a single rope severed. There are plenty of them left, you see." His expansive gesture took in the handful of ropes that still held. "It looks like you could claim… oh, about five of them if you wished to take full advantage."

Link licked his lips nervously, almost lightheaded as he considered the prospect. Five memories. Five new points of light to illuminate who he was—except…

"Five would only leave one rope left," Link objected, counting them with a frown, and Ghirahim rolled his eyes.

"Four then, or three if you're feeling timid about it. It makes little difference to me in the end. I remain trapped either way."

"So why make the offer?" Link asked, his own eyes narrowing. "Why help me if you get nothing out of it?"

"Half of my obstacles removed are not 'nothing,'" Ghirahim retorted. "Three slices in the future are easier made than six. It is not a matter of if I am freed, but when, and I would hasten the process along if I could… none of which is any threat to you personally, so I don't see why it bothers you so. Then again," Ghirahim added with a sudden, sharp grin, "a thread of fate has always bound our souls. Who can say what else it has in store for us?"

"It has not," Link mumbled, realizing he sounded petulant but still certain that Ghirahim was wrong. He'd never heard anything like that from the stories, or Kass's songs, or from Impa, or… or anywhere. "Anyway, it doesn't matter. I reject that offer, too."

For one wild moment, Link thought Ghirahim might somehow manage to strike him despite the intervening distance, but the feeling passed as quickly as it came. Ghirahim threw back his head and laughed, the black diamond etched into his cheek visible for one brief second.

"Oh, of course!" he said, dark eyes shining in the dim red light. "Silly me! I might have known that you were afraid."

Link responded with a dry laugh of his own.

"Could you be any more obvious?" he demanded scornfully, but Ghirahim shook his head.

"You are that obvious, Link, just as you always have been. If you are not yet content with what memories you have, it is because you do not like what you see in them. You are oh-so certain that there must be something more… but the more of your past that you see, the greater the risk that there is nothing more. Perhaps you were only ever the man you saw: the same man you are now."

"You…" Link paused to lick his lips, his voice suddenly hoarse. For the first time, it occurred to him to wonder how Ghirahim would restore his memories. Had he been in Link's mind already? The thought made his skin crawl. "You don't know me."

"Neither do you," Ghirahim was quick to point out, his dark gaze as sharp as a blade. "You could, though, if you had the courage. Do you have the courage?"

Link felt his resolve starting to waver, his eyes flicking between the remaining ropes as he calculated how many it might take to hold him. Ghirahim's taunts were obvious for what they were, of course, but in a way it almost didn't matter. Not if he was right.

"You'll find a way to take advantage," he said weakly, because it was true. Link didn't believe for a second that Ghirahim would really be content to watch him leave without freeing himself if he could.

"Will I?" Ghirahim shrugged, and though it was impossible to appear truly at ease with his neck suspended between ropes as it was, he made a good impression of it. "Well, take your time deciding. I'm not in a hurry either way."

The strange assertion made Link pause. Shouldn't he be? Even unseen, the red moon would be advancing overhead. Their dwindling time pressed on Link, a constant reminder that he had only so much of it left to make his decision, so why shouldn't it press on him? Ghirahim had to know that once the moon hit its peak, Link would leave and never return… assuming he unlocked the door.

That was something else to consider, Link realized with an unpleasant swoop of his stomach. That smile Ghirahim wore so easily was a painted facade, and he knew it. If Link remained stubbornly unhelpful, would he still be allowed to leave?

"What would the deal be, exactly?" he asked at last, climbing cautiously to his feet and trying not to feel quite so eager. Trapping himself down here would save nobody, after all.

Ghirahim's smooth, sharp-toothed grin did nothing to ease his fears.

"A new rope cut through in exchange for each memory unlocked," he said as Link approached, sheathing his sword reluctantly. It wouldn't do him much good if he actually intended to go through with this. "You will cut the rope all the way through, mind. No skirting around the deal by slicing it halfway."

"Fine," he said shortly, his heart beating faster. At least he might get something out of it this way. "But the memory comes first. Then I cut the rope."

"That's your condition?" Ghirahim said in amusement, and Link froze. Was there something he'd forgotten? He thought maybe there was, but his mind only spun in useless, nervous circles. "I don't see how it matters, but I accept. This agreement will be binding through each exchange we make, so there's no chance of either of us backing out."

"Just one," Link said sharply, extending his hand with great reluctance. He could close up that loophole, at least, even if the rest came back to haunt him. "I only want one memory."

"Only one, hmm?" Ghirahim repeated in a murmur, his blackened hand encasing Link's like the bars of a cage. "Well… we shall see."

Link grimaced at the now-familiar feeling of wrongness that surged through him at the touch, binding him to their shared promise, but though the foreign presence retreated soon enough, it didn't vanish entirely. Instead, it consolidated, centering around his head with a shuffling sensation. He squirmed in Ghirahim's vicelike grip at the unwelcome feeling, already having second thoughts.

"What are you—"

"Interesting," Ghirahim said, ignoring him, and Link found to his horror that he couldn't tell whether the voice came from inside his mind or out. Just what sort of intrusion had he agreed to? "Your memories are all perfectly intact, but… disconnected. Ahh, but this one feels important. I think if I just—"

Link grunted more in shock than in pain as something in his head seemed to snap into place, and he felt himself go rigid, the small, crimson chamber dissolving around him. Though Link's missing memories had never come gently to him before, there had always been some sort of catalyst that triggered their arrival, be it statue or location or picture on his slate—something that hinted at what sort of vision was about to swallow him whole. This felt more like being thrown off a cliff blindfolded, with no way of knowing what awaited him at the bottom. His mouth gaped open soundlessly, eyes wide and unseeing as—

"Please, Link, I promise that the Sheikah keep a very effective watch. I suspect it is not in your nature, but I had hoped for just one night that you might take the chance to… relax?"

Link blinked in surprise to find the princess earnestly watching him from over the top of her ever-present book of notes, and let his hand fall slowly away from the hilt of his sword where it had wandered. The flames of a campfire crackled between them, licking around the skewers of gourmet meat Link had set expertly over the coals and lighting Zelda's face dimly from below as she nodded in satisfaction, turning back to her notes with her tongue stuck out just past the edge of her lips. Other campfires burned nearby with Zelda's small retinue of Sheikah and royal guards occupying them, and their tents had been built in a circle to surround the princess's larger pavilion. Even if some enemy did manage to sneak past the watch, they would have a circle of armed opponents to contend with before reaching the princess, not to mention Link himself… but the recent attack by the Yiga Clan still had him on edge. It was probably in the princess's best interests that he not relax, whatever she wanted, though the motivation behind her sudden interest in his comfort was a mystery in itself. Zelda could rarely be described as predictable, her moods shifting quickly depending on the success of her research, the frustration of her prayers, and her proximity to the castle and her father, but since they'd returned from their most recent survey of Vah Naboris, she'd been acting… different. Not in a bad way, exactly—she snapped at him less now, even if she stared at him more—but still. Different.

"Well now," she said, finishing her sentence with a satisfied flourish and blowing on the ink as it dried. "That really was quite successful. I can hardly believe how quickly Mipha has learned to control her Divine Beast! It's almost as if they've… bonded." Her lips pursed together thoughtfully—maybe even enviously?—but after a moment's pause she waved her hand. "A difficult thing to quantify, but still worth looking into. I wonder if Revali would describe it in similar—Link, please!"

Link didn't quite jump at the princess's exclamation, though he did quickly uncrane his neck, straightening under her admonitory expression. It had just occurred to him how unprecedented it was that they'd gone undisturbed for so long. There should have been some Sheikah researcher or another clamoring for Zelda's attention, but instead they'd been left in relative peace.

Sighing, Zelda snapped her small book shut, reaching for the satchel by her feet.

"Maybe this will help," she muttered, pulling out two tightly wrapped bowls of… food? Link couldn't help it. His interest perked. "I know it's a bit unorthodox, but since we're waiting on dinner anyway, I thought it might be fun to start with dessert tonight? Mipha told me that you were once fond of the sweet rice pudding the Zora make on special occasions, and I managed to procure some before we left. If you would like to…?"

She gestured hesitantly at the seat beside her, and Link nodded slowly, rising. Mipha had been right, though Link didn't think anyone other than the princess of Hyrule herself could have convinced a Zora to prepare the dish outside of a festival. The Zora were strict in their observance of spiritual holidays, with traditions set practically in stone for millennia—but the spiced aroma that wafted towards him as she peeled the waxed fabric from the first shallow bowl matched that of his memories.

His stomach growled loudly and a small smile lit Zelda's face, though she graciously didn't mention it.

"Sit with me," she insisted, pressing the bowl into his hands with a wooden spoon. "That meat still has a few minutes left on the fire, I think."

He sat a bit awkwardly, not quite meeting her gaze. It couldn't be more clear that she'd set this moment up with some sort of purpose in mind, though he hadn't a clue as to what. Then the first bite passed his lips, and for a moment he really did relax. It had been years since he last visited Zora's Domain during a festival, but he was surprised by how well he remembered the sweet, almost smoky flavor bursting across his tongue, carried by sweet, creamy grains of rice.

"Mipha says that you ate five bowls of this the first time she met you," Zelda said, opening her own portion and dipping in her spoon in a much more restrained manner. Too late, Link realized that he was already on his third bite. "She also told me that you were a lively, talkative child then. It's remarkable how much can change with the years, isn't it?"

Link's next bite slowed on its way to his mouth, and he eyed her askance. Was that what she and Mipha had discussed for so long together on Vah Ruta? Him? …What else had Mipha told her? The possibilities ranged from mundane to mortifying, but luckily the warm light of the flames hid the faint blush that rose in his cheeks as he considered it.

"Link, I… I feel I owe you an apology," Zelda admitted softly, fiddling with her spoon. "We ought to be partners in this fight, don't you think? Even if I cannot yet carry my end of—" She cut off, and took a deep breath. "We ought to be partners, yet instead I have treated you as an undeserved outlet for my frustrations, and I'm sorry. I know I have done nothing to earn your confidence in me and perhaps never will… but if you'll allow me to, I can at least try to make amends."

Link's brow furrowed as he set aside the empty bowl, unsure how to respond. Was that why she thought he didn't speak to her? The last thing he'd wanted to convey with his silence was a lack of confidence. Nobody needed the burden of his thoughts and worries weighing them down now, the princess least of all… but then, the very nature of silence made it difficult to clarify his intentions. Was his choice to not speak more damaging than he'd realized? If he tried to say something now, he knew the words would come out wrong—and he might not be able to stop.

"I don't expect a response from you tonight, if at all," she assured him as if she'd somehow read his thoughts, and Link took a moment to steady his breathing, staring into the fire. "I just wanted you to know that I—oh!"

She blinked in surprise as Link jumped to his feet, then smiled ruefully as she saw what had distracted him. Their dinner was on the point of burning.

"Forgive me," she laughed as he hurriedly pulled the skewers out of the fire, waving them gently to encourage the meat to cool. "How foolish it would be if my attempt at an apology spoiled your supper."

Link shrugged, handing the princess her portion, which she took thoughtfully.

"I wonder," she murmured, "if perhaps… I don't intend to pressure you, of course! I just thought that, if we wish to become better acquainted, perhaps we should start somewhere simple? For instance," she said with a smile, "my favorite food is the fruitcake prepared in the castle's kitchens. What—if I may ask—is yours?"

Link hesitated, blowing on his food as he glanced surreptitiously around them. Nobody appeared to be watching—or at least, nobody was close enough to listen in. Zelda's eyes on his face were shining and uncertain, ready to take the simple question back at his first sign of discomfort—and it was a simple question, something even Link and his fumbling words couldn't mess up.

His hands shook, but he opened his mouth, his decision made. He could do this much, for her.

The vision began to fade. Link watched it go in silent protest, trying desperately to retain the rest of the memory even as it slipped through his grip like grains of sand, until—

"One memory, as promised," Ghirahim pronounced, sounding unbearably smug as Link gasped and opened his eyes, the red-tinted chamber falling back into place around him.

"You cheated," he said blankly, tearing his hand free and wiping it against his leg as if he'd dipped it in something filthy. He only wished he could so easily cleanse his mind of that dirty feeling, as well. "You—that wasn't—"

He stopped, his thoughts whirling in an attempt to slot what he'd just seen along with everything else. Those smoky spices still rested on his tongue, and he wondered absently if Sidon could get him some, if asked. More importantly, he had spoken—or so it seemed—and Zelda had maybe not altogether hated him. It was more than he'd had before, though he still fixed Ghirahim with a glare.

"That doesn't count," he growled. "You knew you were stopping it before the most important part." Just one word, spoken from his own lips. Was that too much to ask?

"Oh my little wild one, how could I have possibly known that?" Ghirahim demurred, though his eye glinted shrewdly. “And of course it counts." He snapped his fingers, and a jeweled black dagger appeared suddenly in Link's hand. "You're fortunate that I showed you a memory so pertinent to your desires at all, much less that it lasted as long as it did. Think twice next time you make a deal—or at the very least, think once.”

His black finger beckoned, and Link gritted his teeth as he stepped sullenly forward, raising the dagger to one of the six remaining ropes. It didn't help his pride to realize that Ghirahim had a point, and he had thoroughly failed to protect himself from what now felt like obvious pitfalls. The only real mystery was why Ghirahim had not taken advantage more than he had.

"Show me the rest of it, then," Link demanded, flicking his eyes towards the remaining ropes as the one he was cutting snapped and the black dagger vanished into diamond flecks. There were five of them left—more than enough to risk losing another. This was his last chance. "One rope for the rest of that conversation, but you have to show me all of it. No tricks, or… or anything."

"Hmm…" Ghirahim made a show of considering it, rolling his neck languorously as if testing his constraints. Finally, he fixed Link with a grin. "No."

Link blinked, feeling suckerpunched.

"...What?"

"I said, 'no.'" Ghirahim enunciated each word clearly, as if speaking to a child. "And for future reference, I greatly dislike being told what to do."

"But I—will you—please?" Link stammered, angry and flustered all at once. Why wasn't Ghirahim jumping at this?

"Oh, how delightful! You thought I wanted you to beg!" Ghirahim laughed, leaning back as far as the ropes would allow. "But no. We've grown rather short on time, I'm afraid… and even if we hadn't, it's just too much fun watching you squirm."

With a start, Link saw the first red motes floating through the air between them, and realized with sinking regret that Ghirahim was right. Time was hard to gauge down here, and the retrieved memory had thrown him off further, but he'd still thought they had more time left than that.

"You're disappointed," Ghirahim noted, sounding far too satisfied for Link's liking. "Consider this a teaser, then. You've had a taste of what I have to offer now, enough to know that I can fulfill my end of the bargain." His grin had the air of a trap slamming shut. "I might even be feeling more generous the next time you come around."

Link could have sworn he felt the air freeze around him as he stared at Ghirahim, processing what he'd said. Then the spell broke, and his sword whirled from its sheath to point straight at Ghirahim's chest, not caring how ineffective steel weapons had already proven against him. He would find a way to fight Ghirahim off, if necessary.

"Don't touch me," he said coldly. "Don't you dare touch me. I won't be back after tonight, and you will not touch me."

Ghirahim eyed the sword with a pitying sort of expression, then sighed.

"Link," he said, the red motes flying more quickly between them. "You wild, stupid child. It's already been done." Link shook his head in horrified denial, but Ghirahim continued on, his dark eyes almost glowing with anticipation. "When the moon bleeds red, you will return to me once more. That is not a singular event, Link. The blood moon will rise again… and again… and again, and for as long as it does, you will return. If I am not free, then neither are you."

Link wanted to keep denying—but could he? This was a pointless thing for Ghirahim to lie about, he realized with fluttering dread. If Link was not still bound to the curse, then he would not show up on the next blood moon and that would be that. It was a waste of Ghirahim's breath to insist otherwise—but if Link was still bound...

His finger ached in silent confirmation as the blood moon hit its height once more, and the tip of Link's sword fell dully against the ground. He couldn't bring himself to raise it again, not even when Ghirahim vanished from his restraints as he had the last time, reappearing to lean over Link so closely that their foreheads touched.

"It's not so terrible a fate," he said softly as Link shifted, refusing to meet his dark eyes. "A curse easily remedied, when you think about it. I don't intend to harm you, but I will be free, one way or another."

"And when you are?" Link asked, his voice fainter than he would have liked. "Will I be free of you then?"

Ghirahim's only response was a slow grin, his long tongue slithering out to flick at Link's ear, and Link recoiled from the touch on instinct, clenching his eyes shut. When he opened them again, Ghirahim was gone, the black sword visible in its restraints for only an instant before the red light overhead went out, dropping them both into darkness.

Link couldn't have said how long he stood there, staring stiffly at a sword he couldn't see. Then he threw his own sword against the ground with a wordless shout, the metallic clatter echoing like bells through the small chamber. The click of the stone door's lock releasing behind him was small and mocking in comparison. He could leave for now, it said, but he'd be back.

The throb of his finger and the knot in his chest said that, like it or not, he would be back.

Chapter Text

Finding a bowl of rice pudding outside of a Zora festival was exactly as difficult as Link's memory had predicted, and might have been altogether impossible for anyone else. Luckily, while Link wasn’t royalty himself, befriending the Zora prince came with its own advantages.

Sidon’s golden eyes had widened in surprise when Link mumbled out his strange request, but in surprisingly little time he had a steaming bowl of rice in Link’s hands, kneeling beside him in demonstration as he showed Link how to hold just the curved base beneath the river’s cool flow until it reached the perfect temperature for eating. Even one hundred years later, the smoky-sweet dish was exactly as Link remembered it, and the combined familiarity of food and company hit him with such force that he closed his eyes expectantly. Something so clearly a part of his past had to shake loose… something.

Still, though Link forced himself to eat slowly, rolling the last, creamy grains of rice over his tongue for almost a minute before swallowing, in the end, it was nothing more than a filling meal. No conclusion to the memory of that night with Zelda came rushing from the depths of his mind to overtake him, and though he knew that he must have eaten this with Mipha as a child, the details of that long ago day were as elusive as the moon—distant and foreign no matter how he tried to grasp them.

“You look disappointed,” Sidon said, frowning as Link finally admitted defeat, handing him his empty bowl with quiet thanks. “Was the dish not to your liking? You practically licked it clean.”

“It was delicious,” Link assured him, smiling weakly and trying not to feel too crushed. “It’s just… I guess I’d just hoped it would help me remember…”

Sidon’s sympathetic look said that he understood, which he didn’t, really.

Neither of them mentioned the newest beam of red light piercing out of the desert towards Hyrule Castle, though they both knew what it meant—what Link was supposed to be doing now that the last Divine Beast was free. Zelda couldn’t hold back Ganon forever, he knew, though at the dawn of each new day he wondered uneasily… maybe one day more?

Link spent the week after Thunderblight Ganon’s defeat jumping from place to place across Hyrule, seeking out the memories hinted at by pictures on his slate with a selfish determination that he hadn’t dared give into with his fellow Champions imprisoned. He managed to track down most of them using the now-familiar shapes of mountains and lakes in the background to mark their location, and as he delved into the contents of his own mind, an increasingly clear portrait began to emerge—of Zelda.

Despairingly, Link realized that it made sense. If the princess had taken those pictures, then it stood to reason that the memories they held must include her somehow—and as he’d long since discovered, very little of his life as the princess’s appointed knight had revolved around himself. In some ways, they provided Link with much needed assurance. At least he no longer wondered whether he’d been sent on a journey across Hyrule by someone who couldn’t stand the sight of him.

That still didn’t stop him from staring with wistful curiosity whenever a group of children came bursting out in front of him at a stable, laughing as they chased each other through the stalls, or when he watched a family seated together around a cookfire to share the evening meal. Link must have known something like that once. Even he couldn’t have been born with legendary sword in hand—but memories from such a time wouldn’t come from his slate.

Instead, Link grew creative. And desperate.

“That certainly is an… interesting proposition,” the horned statue outside of Hateno said dryly once Link had finished explaining what he wanted. Its dark, resonant voice in Link’s mind was as sinister as always, though today it sounded sinisterly bored. “However, I think I explained the nature of our arrangement quite clearly the first time we met. I am a dealer in life and power, not memories… or have you forgotten?”

“Could you do it, though?” Link asked through gritted teeth, already regretting his decision to come here. This couldn’t be much better than what he wanted to avoid, but he was running out of options. The slate hadn’t helped, and neither had the Zora. He’d even braved Purah’s lab, feeling uncomfortably like an experiment beneath her analytical stare as he always did, and still he’d left with no solutions. “I have rupees. That’s what you want, right?”

The horned statue said nothing, and Link tried not to fidget under its silent consideration.

“You’re not the only one in Hyrule who makes deals, you know,” he added, as if that might tip the scale in his favor. Still nothing. “I would just… prefer to work with you.”

“I believe that you think I should be flattered,” the statue said at last, sounding unimpressed. “Better the evil you know, is that it? Or maybe you find my price less onerous than what others demand. Rupees are a simple thing to give up, for all their value.”

“I…” Link shrugged uncomfortably, unable to dispute any of it. “I just… thought we could help each other. Was I wrong?”

“Maybe you were. Maybe you weren’t.” Link stiffened, shuddering, as he felt a familiar darkness coil around his chest, gripping as if to tear out his beating heart. “Maybe I can touch your head as easily as your heart, though I can promise it wouldn’t be… pleasant. If I demanded a price greater than rupees, would you pay it?”

Link licked his lips nervously. “What price?”

The grip on his chest tightened, and Link tried not to think about the first time he’d knelt curiously before this odd statue, when it had stolen a portion of his life unexpectedly from his chest. He could still remember that swaying sensation of weakness… of loss. How much could he afford to give up with his battle against Ganon still looming over him? As had been the case since an old man became the ghost of a king before his eyes and told him the story of his death, Link had more important people to worry about than just himself.

“...Heh.” The pressure building in Link’s chest vanished, and he blinked in surprise. “There is no deal between us. If you wish to increase your power, then come to me. For the rest, you must go to Ghirahim and pay his price. I know better than to take what is not mine.”

“What?” Link said raggedly, realizing as he stumbled back that this was his first time hearing that name outside of its desert prison. “How did you—what makes you think—I don’t belong to him!”

But the horned statue had gone silent, refusing to respond no matter how Link argued or pleaded. Kicking it earned him nothing more than a bruised toe, and eventually Link stormed off, defeated. The next morning, he woke up to his finger throbbing along with his foot and knew with dreadful certainty that his time had run out.

The Molduga was dead by noon, the desert sun beating down on Link as he packed up its usable parts. Distractedly, he thought that if nothing else, he might have a lucrative career as a Molduga hunter once all this was over—they really weren’t that hard to kill now that he knew the trick of it—but for the most part, the massive beast he’d slain took up only a tiny portion of his thoughts.

Tonight, things were going to be different. Maybe he couldn't avoid the coming confrontation (maybe, a poisonous voice in his head whispered, he didn't want to), but at the very least he could walk there by himself without compulsion dragging him every step of the way.

Well before his limbs felt even a twitch towards Ghirahim's prison, Link was already traversing the underground tunnels, feverishly muttering the prepared terms of his bargain under his breath and barely aware of how his footsteps dragged along one moment only to dart forward eagerly the next. He just needed to be smart about this. Link knew how the game was played now. If nothing else, he would prove this time that he couldn’t be taken advantage of so easily.

Heat from a fresh torch licked at his fingers, the flickering light and echoing footsteps condensing the world so strangely within the long, wavering passageway that Link felt lost within a memory already.

Raising up the heavy door at the tunnel’s end, the sight of the diamond-tiled room and the sword within was what brought Link at last to an abrupt, shuddering halt, his foot frozen in the air just on the point of entering. Despite the nervous energy thrumming through him, he’d felt emboldened by the fact that he had never made this approach so well prepared, with both his clothing and his skin intact. Now, faced with the reality of that room and that sword, he felt almost naked, his dull attempts at preparation offering all the flimsy protection of a paper shield.

He was out of his depth here, wasn’t he? He should turn back now, figure out a better plan, and—

—And a tug felt just behind Link’s ribcage brought home the depths of his self-deception as he remembered that he wasn’t exactly here of his own accord to begin with. Helpless, he stumbled forward, gritting his teeth when the door slammed shut behind him. He’d wanted to do that himself this time, to rob Ghirahim at the very least of the satisfied sense of shutting him in.

“I'm not cutting the final rope today,” Link announced instead, jaw jutting forward along with his torch as his own words came crashing back over him in the enclosed space. In the back of his mind, he couldn't help but notice that the sharp click of a lock remained absent. Ghirahim didn't expect him to try to run tonight—and as much as he would have loved to prove Ghirahim wrong… “That's my first condition.”

“Not terribly adept at starting conversations, are you?” Ghirahim said idly. “I should have expected as much.” Legs propped out beside him, he might have been just caught in the act of lounging, though Link knew for a fact that a sword had sat in his place mere seconds before. A cursory sweep of dark eyes took Link in, the whole of him, and Ghirahim grinned. “You are a man obsessed.”

The high flush of Link's cheeks deepened uncertainly, but he shook his head, refusing to be derailed. “My second condition–”

“I take it that you’ve decided to accept my offer, then?” Ghirahim interrupted, his words as nonchalant as his pose as Link cut off in frustration. He should have known that his own urgency would be all the incentive Ghirahim needed to take things tortuously slow. “My second offer, from the sound of it, though I’ll remind you again of the abundant generosity of the first: every precious memory in your mind restored to its rightful place, for the negligible cost of snipping a few strings. Surely even your moth-eaten mind can see the value…”

But Link was already shaking his head in rote denial.

“One rope for one memory,” he said. “Just like before.”

“Your opportunity to choose otherwise is dwindling,” Ghirahim warned lightly, twirling a finger around his chin in a thoughtful sort of way. “How many memories could you regain now without freeing me? Four, if you were feeling bold? Three, if not. Three fleeting moments in time held in balance with the entirety of your human life… and inexplicably, you tip the scales towards the three! You choose to wander by candlelight when you could walk by the light of the sun.”

Link hesitated despite himself. He hadn't let himself consider it before, even for a moment. If he thought about it for too long, his traitorous thoughts would start to justify it, and– and then he might actually consider– but he couldn’t, right?

“My second condition…”

“My freedom is inevitable, Link, but nothing to be afraid of,” Ghirahim murmured, and even that soft redirection was enough to cut off Link’s weak attempt at speech. “I’m no more eager to be your enemy than you are to have me as one. Why not gain what you can while you can, and we’ll both emerge all the better for it? If it's going to happen either way…”

It made a certain kind of sense, Link agreed hazily, nodding now. Still, he couldn't shake his vague unease at how easily Ghirahim seemed able to follow his thoughts.

Following them… maybe guiding them?

As fast as the realization hit him, the sword that sealed the darkness was in Link’s hands. Shadows jumped across the room as his discarded torch fell, clattering, to the floor.

“Don’t,” Link growled, leveling his sword towards Ghirahim’s face—a pointless act, he knew by now, but it made him feel better. “Don’t do that.”

The hilt in his hands was a cool, if voiceless, presence, clearing the haze from his mind—but not quite the fever. It could only erase Ghirahim’s influence, after all, not the heated maelstrom that was Link’s alone.

“Is that your second condition?” Ghirahim asked idly. If he was disappointed that Link had caught on so quickly, he didn’t show it, meeting Link's glare with a wisp of a grin.

“No,” Link muttered. Should it be? Shaking his head did nothing to clear it. “I mean—”

“Because if you’ve drawn up a list, I think I’m entitled to a few of my own—the first of which is that I will not be treated as some magical trifle that you can con out of wishes. If you insist on seeing me as such, then I’m afraid I will be forced to treat you as one in kind.” A single, raised finger made the warning clear despite his pleasant smile, shriveling the retort on the tip of Link’s tongue. “In this lifetime or another, I will be free, though you do your future self no favors by denying me now. Why, leave me hanging on the edge for too long, and I might even be… cross… when next our threads intertwine.”

Then again, maybe that upturn of lips did have a cruel cast to it.

“That’s my future self's problem, then,” Link said shortly. “Not mine.”

“Your most recent self did you no favors, either,” Ghirahim informed him, his dark gaze fixing Link in place. “How does the saying go again? Those who don’t learn from the past are bound to repeat it?”

He didn’t elaborate beyond that, arching his arms elaborately in a shivering stretch above his head. It couldn't have been more clear that Link was supposed to ask—so Link didn't, smothering his curiosity and stooping to retrieve the fallen torch, slamming it too forcefully in the niche by the doorway. His past self hadn't done him many favors in general, as far as Link could tell. Nothing that hadn’t already backfired horribly.

Behind him, Ghirahim settled more comfortably across the ground, arranging the points of his cloak across diamond tiles in perfect, radiating lines. He had ample space to do so now with so many ropes missing, even if the ones that remained still kept him from standing at his full height. Something about the image struck Link as odd, though he couldn't put a finger on what.

“You will not cut the final rope,” Ghirahim announced suddenly, and Link cursed himself for jumping. “A failsafe, no doubt, in case things don’t go according to your plans… but if I may be the one to say it, a rather flimsy one. You must know how easy it would be for me to coax a single slice out of you upon our next meeting.”

Link said nothing. As much as he hated to think he’d learned anything from Ghirahim, keeping his plans to himself this time struck him as simply good advice.

Unfortunately, it appeared that Ghirahim was capable of pulling the entirety of his intentions out of thin air anyway.

“You don’t expect to see me again after tonight,” Ghirahim said, delighted amusement creasing the one eye visible from beneath his pale sweep of hair. “Once my master is gone, the blood moons will presumably end, releasing you from your somewhat inconvenient… situation. Your plan is to gain all you can from me now, offer up as little in payment as possible, and then leave me to my dreadfully lonely fate. You do want what I have to offer, though. Desperately.” Ghirahim relished the word with a hiss. “Of course, judging by the state of you, I think we will meet at least once more. You are not yet ready to defeat my master.”

The air vacated Link’s lungs in a startled huff, his worst fear spoken aloud striking him with almost physical force.

“What makes you say that?” he snapped, hoping it didn’t show in his voice.

“Just look at yourself.” Ghirahim’s voice had turned pitying, gaze flicking across Link’s face as if to read his every thought, and his next words didn't help. “I'm sure you know how to swing that so-called sword, but that's only half the battle, isn’t it? The rest is in your mind… and speaking as someone who’s recently been poking around, it's a mess up there. As if that wasn't enough,” he continued with smug satisfaction, overriding Link's attempts to interrupt him, “you're wearing red.”

“What?”

Link looked down at his outfit, feeling ragged as the conversation took yet another unexpected turn. He’d spent more time than he would ever admit deciding what to wear that night, the memory of Ghirahim’s heated gaze and suggestive words still fresh in his mind. The worn burgundy of his plain Hylian tunic had felt nondescript enough to avoid drawing comment, but of course Ghirahim had somehow managed to pull meaning from it anyway.

“What does that have to do with–”

“It is sometimes the most insignificant details that remain nevertheless the most consistent over time,” Ghirahim said cryptically, leaning back as if the matter was settled. “If you do not yet know what I mean, then you are not yet ready. It’s as simple as that. Will you risk the world as you know it on the off-chance that I’m wrong?”

Link’s knuckles were white against the hilt of his sword, which made the vague sense of unease gnawing at the back of his mind now Link’s alone. He had defeated every Blight and freed every Champion. He had the sword that seals the darkness. Zelda thought he was ready, her voice echoing through his mind for the first time in months as the final red beam from Vah Naboris raced across the sky. Ghirahim was just trying to worm his way under Link's skin—to buy himself more time to escape. He had to be.

Wearing red…

“Where did you get that cloak?” Link asked abruptly, finally noticing what had changed.

Ghirahim glanced up at him over the edge of the strange crimson garment adorning his shoulders, a light smile curving his lips.

“What, this old thing?” A flick of his finger set the golden chain clasp jingling faintly, and Link fought back a flinch. “It's not much, but it is… familiar. Why, I almost feel like my old self again. Almost.” That same finger dug pointedly beneath the collar around his neck where the remaining ropes still bound him. “You mentioned having conditions…?”

Breathing in deeply, Link resolved to worry about it later, if at all—though something about the appearance of that cloak unnerved him. Harmless though it was on the surface, Ghirahim still seemed to get some part of himself back with every bond broken. The jagged, angular line where pale skin clashed with dark hovered further down Ghirahim’s arms now, approaching slim, articulate wrists as if to push blackened skin out through his fingers, and even that felt somehow precarious—not shifting before Link's eyes, exactly, but shimmering on the cusp of movement. Would two ropes be enough?

“You are staring,” Ghirahim hummed in satisfaction. Link's gaze jerked back to Ghirahim’s face, his own cheeks reddening.

“One rope per memory, just like before,” he repeated roughly. He had never struggled to stay focused in battle, so why did his mind insist on wandering here, where he needed it most? “But it has to be a whole memory! Don’t cut it short on purpose or anything. And it should be something important, not just… I don’t know… eating breakfast.”

“Ahhh.” Ghirahim shrugged, an elaborate gesture. “I’m afraid that you’ve stumbled into the realm of subjectivity, though I can certainly do my best. Now, if you're asking me not to sabotage the process—”

“I’m not just asking,” Link said, squaring his shoulders. If Ghirahim had the chance to pick apart every aspect of their bargain, he’d almost certainly pick it to pieces. “It’s a condition, not a request.”

“And if I refuse?” Though he didn't shift a muscle, Ghirahim’s single-eyed gaze intensified to the point that Link struggled to hold it.

“No ropes.”

The tension stretched. Link resisted the urge to bounce on his heels.

“Any other… conditions?” Ghirahim asked.

“Just one,” Link said carefully. “Any memories you unlock have to be mine, from this life, unaltered. Not yours, not… changed somehow by you… and not from any of the previous heroes.”

The heavy tension pricked like a noxious bubble with Ghirahim’s delighted laugh.

“Oh, you rascal!” he said, warm and… almost proud? Link felt a confused flush warm his cheeks. “You've put some effort into this, haven't you? Forethought was never your goddess-given strength by any means, which makes it all the more a treat whenever it manifests.”

“I’m not…” He'd been right to specify, Link realized with the uneasy thrill of someone who had just watched an arrow graze past their face. Ghirahim wanted Link to make the connection that the captive man himself couldn’t seem to keep from making, looking fondly through Link as always towards some other long-dead hero. It was all he could do not to hunch in on himself in a futile attempt to hide. “Do you accept my terms or not?”

“I see nothing amiss,” Ghirahim agreed, almost suspiciously amenable. Link immediately started wracking his brain for what he might have missed. “Of course, this will not work at all unless you sheathe your sword.”

Link’s eyes narrowed incredulously, the tip of that sword scraping the ground as he adjusted his grip. “No.”

“Come now, Link.” Nothing about Ghirahim's amused expression changed that Link could put words to, but his own stance still shifted warily. “Surely you don't expect to cling to it through memory's grip?”

“I'll manage,” Link said stubbornly.

“So distrustful,” Ghirahim sighed, shaking his head so his sleek hair danced regretfully—as if he had not attempted such deceit only minutes before, Link thought, incensed. “Yet as I said before, this will not work otherwise! It is not a condition, but a necessity.”

Link bit his lip, determination wavering. If Ghirahim was lying, Link still had no way of proving it—and if he wasn't…

“No… tricks,” Link warned, swinging the sword over his shoulder slowly. “That is a condition.”

“Yes, fine. I’ll add it to the list,” Ghirahim said impatiently. “The exchange is well worth it if I am spared the displeasure of looking at her.”

Despite his professed distaste, Ghirahim’s hard gaze followed the sword all the way into its sheath. Her?

“Now, if that's everything…” Ghirahim’s fingers unfurled in a ripple towards Link, one right after the other. “Do we finally have a deal?”

Link froze, all else slipping from his mind on a wave of eager trepidation as he realized that days of frenzied searching had abruptly reached their culminating moment. All he had to do now was let Ghirahim into his mind once more.

“Deal,” Link said, the word creaking on its way out—not loud, but it still filled the too-small space of the room around them as the agreement was sealed. If he hadn’t thought of everything, Link still hoped he’d thought of enough.

“Oh, where has all that heroic resolve flown off to?” Ghirahim’s laugh was a throaty sound, and where only the moment before he’d been splayed across the ground, now a single step forward carried him into Link’s space. His outstretched hand flipped at the wrist, pressing against Link’s chest. “Your fretful heart is fluttering like a bird.”

Whether those last uttered words came from outside Link's head or within it, he couldn’t tell, a feeling made all the more disconcerting by its familiarity. That horrific shuffling sensation as Ghirahim slipped inside to card through the contents of Link’s mind struck him with the same dreadful sense of recognition. It made Link wish he could back away to where Ghirahim, bound by his ropes, couldn’t reach him—but that had never been an option, had it? Time was passing him by, with no way of knowing whether too much remained or too little.

“Any requests?” Ghirahim asked, looming over Link despite the hunch his bonds forced on him. “Something particular you have in mind?”

Link's eyes squinted warily, part surprise, part trepidation. “You can do that?”

“Nothing too specific,” Ghirahim warned him, putting to rest both the worst of Link’s fears and his wildest hopes. “Still, if you have a general sense of what you desire…”

“I…” Link averted his gaze. Focusing on anything with Ghirahim invading his mind like this felt like swimming through a bog, but he'd had plenty of opportunity to think about it over the last few, fevered days. He just hated having to admit to it out loud, especially in front of him. “Something from before… something that has nothing to do with being a hero.”

“Yes,” Ghirahim mused after a moment, the soft word still thrumming beneath Link's skull. “You are rife with heroic memories already, aren’t you? With your utter lack in every other area, Hylia has perhaps never had such a complete hero.”

Something almost like pity flickered across Ghirahim’s face—though with the next words out of his mouth, Link decided he must have imagined it.

“Unfortunate for you, then, that it was merely a request and not one of your conditions.”

Realization struck Link a full second too late for him to actually do anything about it, though his eyes had time enough to widen.

“Wait, don't—”

And he was in dark freefall, a resounding ‘crack’ echoing through the confines of his mind as something unseen snapped brusquely into place, and then…

Link was going to be in trouble.

He knew it, even as he followed whatever the strange thing was that guided him—the wooden, imp-like creature that had laughed at him from the periphery of his vision ever since arriving here that nobody else could see.

Of course, it didn’t take much to get Link in trouble now, though his father had warned him ahead of time that this might be the case. The captain of the military training camp had made it his personal mission to demonstrate to Link that he would get no special treatment despite his skill and family connections, and the growing list of minor “infractions” Link had committed that other trainees got away with easily had Link occupied from sunup to sundown with extra training and chores. That was what had Link out chopping wood before dawn in the first place when the little imp popped out from the treetops, chirping for him to follow.

In Link’s defense, he hadn’t realized where the creature was leading him until he was already knee-deep in fog, but he knew by now how little that would matter. What he didn’t know was what his ultimate punishment might be if he got caught. This was no minor infraction. Everyone knew that the strange, misty forest north of camp had been declared off-limits to trainees and soldiers alike: unmapped, unexplored, and potentially dangerous.

Link followed anyway, curiosity stronger than any vague fear of repercussions. Who knew what might lay at the end of a path such as this?

“Wait!” he called out to where the mist swirled ahead of him with laughter, dodging doggedly after it. Link had seen these little forest imps before, many times, though this was the first time he’d heard one speak. They’d always liked to hide in the woods outside the village, laughing in delight whenever Link found one before vanishing in a burst of leaves and sweet smoke. Nobody aside from Link had ever seen them then, either, and Aryll had accused him of playing tricks. If this was his chance to unravel the mystery of these creatures…

“Come and find me!” came the cry in response, and childlike giggles echoed in all directions, the mist rising as if to overtake Link before ebbing away. Was it one mischievous imp he chased or a chain of them, laughing and vanishing in turns, leading him along?

Leading him… where?

Anxiety stirred in Link’s chest at last, and he wished he hadn’t dropped his axe. The wind rushing past his ears seemed almost to push him along, always at his back no matter which direction he ran, and if he stared at any of the trees for too long, they started to look concerningly like gaping mouths. The creature—creatures?—guiding him had always seemed more childlike than malicious when he'd found them before, but if their mischief left him stranded in the middle of a forest with no weapon and no clear way to wander…

His high-pitched panting rang loud in his own ears.

Then something in the air shifted, the wind and mist fading away together as the path widened beneath his feet, and Link’s pounding steps slowed. His mouth fell open slowly.

The first rays of dawn fell across an overgrown clearing that felt warm and green after all that blue, otherworldly mist. Softly pink fairies flitted past twirling vines and enormous seed pods heavy with verdant growth, and in the branches of trees laden with leaves and blossoms…

“You found us!” the little forest creatures cheered from all around Link, hopping up and down with glee. Craning his neck with a dazed expression, Link thought he must have found all of them. Gathered in the treetops, hovering on little, leafy propellers, and stumbling along with Link’s footsteps were more of those wooden imps than Link would ever have guessed existed, chattering and laughing together in an indistinct hum that so completely captured the spirit of childlike joy that Link couldn't have stopped the laughter that burst out of him if he wanted to.

Then something caught his eye, shining, sticking up out of the stone, and the laughter vanished from his heart as if pulled from it, replaced by… wonder? Recognition?

Purpose?

Not until his hands were wrapped around the hilt did Link consciously recognize it as a sword, its winged crossguard flaring out from his two-handed grip. Sized for someone slightly larger than he was, Link struggled a bit to stand tall enough to pull it out, though it still slid from the stone more easily than he would have expected. Examining the blade in awe—he’d never seen its like, even on the royal guards, even in the hands of his father—Link felt something slot into place in his heart, deep, where he could just barely sense it… and the whisper of a voice he couldn’t make out, similarly out of reach. Light gleamed along its edges as if it recognized him in turn.

“Hero chosen by the goddess…”

In all his preoccupation with the sword, Link had failed to notice the giant tree. The tip of the blade brushed the ground as his head whipped up in alarm, and before his eyes, the aging bark creaked and snapped in sheets to form a withered, kindly face that chuckled at his gaping expression.

“I thought it must be you,” the tree rumbled in an impossibly deep voice that he heard almost more through his legs than his ears. “I apologize for the antics of my little korok children. They do love to play, and so few have the sight to see them anymore.”

Link nodded weakly, feeling like he should say something, but not at all certain under these circumstances what he should say. His eyes darted from the tree, to the koroks, to the sword in his hand—a question that maybe didn’t require words as levity faded from the tree’s expression.

“I have felt it for some time now… the first rumblings of malice, deep within the earth.” The great tree sighed, and the sound of it was a soft gust of wind rustling hundreds of leaves. “You must have felt it, too, to awaken so early to your calling.”

Calling? For the first time since drawing the sword, unease flickered across Link’s heart, and he held the blade up to examine it again. True to the tree’s words, he had felt… something. Something that left him twisting in his covers late at night.

“Yes, Link—” Link started at hearing his own name, which he hadn’t given. “—It is your destiny to carry that sword and, alongside the princess of light, seal the darkness away once more. You are young still to bear it… but there have been younger.”

The pit of Link’s unease grew wider, his blue eyes shifting uncertainly back to the tree’s face. The crease of its wooden brow was regretful—and unyielding. This was something to be mourned, with nothing to be done.

“Yes. Oh, yes… there have been younger.”

His face withered further, fading, falling away until…

“One memory in exchange for one bond cut, as promised.”

By the time Link became fully conscious of his surroundings, the burnished red of firelit tiles all the more jarring after the forest’s greens and blues, the familiar dark knife was already in Link's hands. A few swift strokes cut the rope, and pressure eased from Link's chest as Ghirahim’s touch withdrew, standing perhaps another inch taller now with one more bond's removal.

“A full and complete memory, mind you, pertinent to your present life and unaltered by myself.” Ghirahim reminded him of his own conditions with an all-too-knowing grin, as if well aware of the objections clamped behind Link's lips. At the same time, the dagger vanished in diamond-shaped wisps from Link’s hand. Maybe he also knew exactly where Link wanted to throw it. “Are you not satisfied?”

Link swallowed. “You…”

His voice shook, but not entirely out of anger, or even due to Ghirahim at all. Though he had agreed not to, the temptation to draw his sword and examine it again was strong. How old could he have been during that memory? Fourteen, maybe? Twelve? Still mostly a child, whatever his age—though never a child again after that night.

At least he finally had that single word out of his own mouth, Link thought with bitter lack of mirth.

“If you were just going to ignore what I wanted, then why did you pretend to let me choose?” Link finally managed to ask. He couldn't complain, really—or he wouldn’t have if he hadn't thought he had a choice in what he saw—it was an important memory returned to him, and one he’d wondered about many times—but Ghirahim had asked.

“Such a dour expression,” Ghirahim tutted with gratingly false sympathy, one hand raised as if to brush the hair from Link's eyes. Link very nearly fell over backwards in his haste to get away. “Frowns all around, as one might say… not that I can blame you. That particular memory was practically drenched in her presence.”

One dark, venomous eye slid past Link's face to where the hilt of Link’s sword jutted out.

“Why did you ask?” Link demanded this time, glaring now.

“Was the moment you claimed her as dramatic as you might have hoped?” Ghirahim persisted, something dark tightening his smile. “Filled with the proper gravitas, I assume? It always is. The beings that control your fate have a flair for the dramatic.”

Link's hands became fists. “Why—”

“Don't take it so personally,” Ghirahim sighed, venom vanishing all at once as he shook his head in apparent exasperation. “You are attempting to play the short game, Link, while I intend to play the long. It is only natural for you to desire immediate satisfaction, while, with four ropes left to slice, it's in my interest to leave you… wanting.” His lips curled upward. “Of course, if I withhold what you want too thoroughly, I risk losing you altogether—so you can be assured that this time, I’ll play nice.”

The hand Ghirahim extended towards him with a wink was an obvious invitation, and Link glared at that, too.

“Maybe you've lost me already,” he snapped. “If I can't trust you to do what you say you will, then what's the point—”

Ghirahim's hand was in Link's hair, pulling back painfully, and Link's startled jerk of surprise did nothing to loosen his grip. He hadn't realized that Ghirahim could even reach him where he stood.

“I held to my end of the deal with exactness,” Ghirahim hissed, grip tightening on that last word, and Link couldn't quite bite back a grunt of pain. “You simply failed to extract any further agreement before plunging recklessly on, unthinking, as you always do. The fact that you play the game poorly has no bearing on my honesty—and as I've told you once before, Link, I always tell the truth where you're concerned.”

“And what makes me so special?” Link rasped, his neck starting to ache in earnest now—and blinked in surprise as the pain eased somewhat, Ghirahim's grip on his hair loosening. The angle of his head moved a fraction, offering Link a rare glimpse into both cavernous eyes, and without lessening in the slightest, the heat in Ghirahim's voice shifted to become… something else.

“What, indeed?”

Taken aback, Link licked his lips unthinkingly, and watched in stunned disquiet as Ghirahim mirrored the gesture in a more… elaborate… manner. Heat flooded his face as he remembered unwillingly what Ghirahim had said before about some of his past incarnations. Lies, surely—though Ghirahim had just told him that with Link, he never…

“Promise me, then,” Link said, grateful that his voice, at least, was steady. “I want to hear you say that you'll give me what I asked for.”

“To the best of my knowledge and ability, the next memory I retrieve for you will be everything you want and more,” Ghirahim almost crooned, and Link wondered if it was possible to get whiplash from his lightning-quick shift in emotions. “Do you trust me now?”

“No,” Link said, even as he closed his eyes in reluctant surrender—and anticipation. Three ropes… that would be enough, right?

Behind closed eyes, Link could still feel Ghirahim’s grin, slipping inside Link's skull, rifling through his past, voice echoing both in and outside of Link's head.

“Smart boy.”

A snap, a drop, and then…

“So, you think you have what it takes to join the Big Bad Bazz Brigade?”

Link grinned to himself quietly, creeping over one of Zora's Domain's many platforms to peer down at the scene playing out below. Bright sunlight glinted off the domain's many pools, making the finer details difficult to pick out, but Link could still make out its broader strokes: Bazz, standing alone atop blue stone steps, while a handful of Zora children looked up at him from the water. From the slow way he paced, Link thought Bazz was going for an air of solemnity, though the excited waggle of the overlarge fin atop his head gave the game away.

“You already said I could join,” a girl called up to Bazz, unimpressed. A new recruit, then. “Why are you being so weird about this?”

“Gaddison!” Bazz stopped pacing, clearly frustrated. “I told you, this is serious. You need to take this seriously.”

A chorus of “yeah!” from the other children was enough to quell her annoyance, it seemed, because she offered no further objections.

“Besides, you’re not really a member until you know the secret password!” Bazz said, spurred on by his support to gesture dramatically. Link tensed, readying himself to spring. “Are you ready to learn it? It’s fluffy white clouds, clear blue—”

“ZORA!” Link cried as loud as he could, leaping down from above and gathering his limbs into a ball. The gathered children had only a startled second to look up in alarm before he'd landed in their midst, water splashing over them in waves.

The ensuing chaos more than made up for the sharp sting of his landing.

“What was that?!”

“Is that a Hylian?”

“Link!” Bazz said. Shaking wet hair from his eyes and treading water, Link could see Bazz looking down at him in shock, his expression torn hilariously between excitement and outrage. “It's not a secret password if you go yelling it out like that for everyone to hear!”

“That was the password?” Gaddison said, nose scrunched in disapproval. “It should have been clear blue skies, or water. Clear blue Zora doesn't make any sense.”

“That's what makes it so perfect,” Rivan insisted earnestly from beside her. “If it doesn't make sense, then nobody will ever guess what it is.”

“He guessed it,” Gaddison said, pointing at Link. Pulling himself out of the water, Link grinned back at her, wishing his teeth were half as sharp.

“I came up with it,” he said proudly, throwing an arm around Bazz's neck.

Bazz returned the gesture, leaning in towards Link while the other kids began debating the merits of that and alternative passwords.

“I didn’t know you were coming!” Bazz said excitedly. “How long is your father stationed here?”

“Just a couple weeks,” Link said, only halfway regretful. His mother had still not quite recovered from Aryll’s birth, sick in some way that he didn’t understand but that she assured him was nothing, and his father had negotiated a shorter term of duty because of it. As eager as Link had been to get back here, he had to admit that he kind of missed Aryll's babbling hugs. “He says we might be back again later this summer.”

Bazz slumped forward in disappointment, then brightened. “At least you’ll be here for the festival this weekend!”

Link’s grip on Bazz’s shoulder tightened suddenly, an unholy fire burning behind his eyes.

“You’ll give me your share of rice pudding?” Link said seriously, and Bazz nodded.

“As long as you train me every day in the sword,” he promised, his voice just as solemn.

“Then our pact is sealed.”

The two stared at each other, lips writhing, until Link was the first to break, leaning forward with peals of laughter that Bazz joined him in seconds later. Eventually managing to catch his breath, Link looked up at the waterfalls surrounding the Domain and smiled. It was good to be back.

“You could have broken an arm falling down from there, you know,” Bazz said, craning his own head back to look up to where Link had jumped from. “What were you thinking?”

“That Mipha would heal me,” Link shrugged, finally pulling back from Bazz to inspect himself for damage. Nothing seemed too badly hurt, though his reddened skin still stung where he’d struck the water.

Bazz sighed at him, still grinning. “She always does.”

Link blinked himself out of the memory, not dragged or dropped but hazily aware of the diamond-tiled room swimming into focus around him. Maybe he was finally getting the hang of this… or maybe for the first time, he'd retrieved a memory that didn't end in such a way that he felt wrong-footed.

Ghirahim’s face swam into existence alongside it all, and even that was less objectionable than it might have been. At some point, Ghirahim's grip had slipped from Link's hair to hold his hand with surprising care, and Link thought that the strangely soft smile on Ghirahim's thin lips might reflect his own.

“Better?” Ghirahim asked knowingly, and Link nodded, though it took him a few more seconds to find his voice.

“Yeah,” Link said at last. “That was…”

It was exactly what he’d needed, he realized. Hearing the stories about his old self from others was one thing, but actually seeing it… the depth of Link’s relief surprised even himself. Memories or not, he really was who he had always been… was maybe even more himself now than that silent knight from more recent memories. The potential for that man still lived inside Link, of course, but he was not the whole of him, and surely not an inevitability. How could Link ever have reached that point in the first place?

There was more that he wanted, of course—especially now, with the new mysteries his mind had presented him. Aryll had felt important in both memories, though Link still couldn’t put a face to the name. His own father was similarly nothing but a vague presence in his mind, with his mother almost absent entirely… but this could be enough. Remembering anything that came before his heroic calling was enough to maintain his hope in whatever came next.

“That much better?” Ghirahim laughed, a soft sound of amusement, and his thumb circled once around Link's palm. “I can be generous when I’m in the mood. Are we ready for the next one?”

Sharp awareness doused Link’s haze of contentment like icy water on a flame, his eyes snapping open as he remembered too late (how had he forgotten?) just who held his hand. True to his word, Ghirahim had shown him exactly the sort of memory he had promised—once Link had pinned Ghirahim so far down that even he couldn't wriggle free. He had also dragged Link back here over and over, pushed him one way and pulled him another, and laughed at him all the while. Though he claimed to no longer serve the beast, he still gained his strength from Ganon and called him “master”—

And he might not take no for an answer.

Link’s eyes flicked across the remaining bonds, each in quick succession. Four of them remained—no, three. A black knife had shimmered into existence in Link's free hand, moving to slice the agreed upon rope. When it vanished, he was left shaky and sweaty-palmed, his connection to Ghirahim through the other hand still unbroken.

Ghirahim’s head tilted to the side in clear, unspoken question.

Three bonds held him now, and that… that felt safe. The thought of two bonds felt too much like something teetering, and one… under other circumstances, Link might be tempted, but he couldn't take selfish risks with his battle against Ganon so close at hand. Three felt right.

Except he'd timed it all wrong. The blood moon was not yet approaching its peak, the air still free of any hints of malice, and unless Link found a way to sneak a peek at the Sheikah Slate, he had no way of knowing how long they had left until it rose. Would Ghirahim retaliate if Link refused another deal? Could Link stall him for long enough to make such a deal impossible?

“Maybe,” Link hedged weakly. “Just give me a minute to…”

It wasn't going to work. It might never have worked, but certainly not when Ghirahim had just watched the truth of his intentions play out across his face like a story.

“Of course,” Ghirahim breathed. “I see that I have left you too soon satisfied, after all.” His grip on Link’s hand didn't tense, exactly, or even tighten. “It is not your fault, Link. This is what comes of me being… soft.”

“I…” Subtly, Link tried to pull free, and found that he couldn’t withdraw by even an inch. “I think I might be… done. For the night.”

Link had never heard a silence that dripped before, like honey rolling slowly down a hive. Praying for the first motes of malice to appear—wondering if the goddess could even grant such a prayer—he prepared to draw his sword wrong-handed in the more likely scenario without divine intervention.

“Three binds left restraining me,” Ghirahim mused, so quietly that the words might have been for himself. “A rather timid number. Have you so little faith in the magic that contained me for millennia?”

“I can't…” Link hadn't expected to feel guilty. After all, what might Ghirahim do, if free, to tip the scales in Ganon’s favor? What might Ghirahim do, if free, to Link himself?

It still didn’t change the image of the bound man in front of him, or the knowledge that Link would leave him there, again.

“No… on the eve of your life's greatest battle, the last thing you need is some loose thread pulled taut for you to trip on,” Ghirahim said shrewdly. Unnerved again by how closely the observation mirrored his own thoughts, Link tried and failed once more to pull away. “It is simply my misfortune that our paths should cross when you are at your most duty-bound… and your most boring.”

“I'm sorry,” Link said helplessly, not sure what else to say—and could have sworn he felt the temperature plunge despite the ruby on his forehead.

“Well,” Ghirahim said. “As long as you are… sorry.”

Link had one black moment to wonder if he'd said something wrong. Then the world dissolved into darkness, the ground falling out beneath him. An ominous ‘crack’ echoed through his mind, and…

Link stared at his own reflection, adjusting again the blue cap that kept trying to fall too far down his head. He hadn't needed the seamstress's exasperated tutting to guess that he was the smallest by far to ever wear the armor of the royal guard, but while she'd managed to alter the tunic itself and even procured the proper boots, the uniform's cap was still a smidge too big. His first action in a fight would probably be to toss the thing altogether.

The same ribbon-wrapped hilt as always jutted up above Link’s shoulder. At least the sword fit him better than it once had.

“My son… the princess’s own appointed knight.”

Link glanced in the mirror at where his father stood behind him in his own regalia, spoiled only by the wooden cane that he leaned on heavily now. He'd gone the entirety of Link’s initiation ceremony stubbornly without it, which Link knew his father would pay for over the coming weeks with crippling pain. He had caught his father staring more than once that day, his expression less decipherable the more time passed… but he could hear the pride in his father’s voice and clung to that, at least.

“Looks like you're all settled in now,” his father continued gruffly. “Don't suppose there's reason for us to linger any further.”

“You could,” Link said, hating how high his voice sounded. “Aryll… would probably like to see…”

Leaning forward, Link's father laid a heavy hand on his shoulder, and the suggestion faded into nothing. He'd known they couldn't really stay longer, anyway—not with the farm at home for them to care for. Still, showing Aryll around Castle Town had been by far the highlight of this whole experience. She so rarely ever got to leave Hateno Village, and had quite nearly dragged Link down the streets in her excitement to see everything.

“You have worries in your head, son,” his father said, and Link bit his lip. “Anyone can see it, and nobody would blame you for having them. Still, while you’re here…” He leaned over Link's ear, voice lowering. “Keep them to yourself.”

Link blinked up at him uncertainly. “Father?”

“The girl who it is your duty to guard has the fate of the kingdom on her shoulders,” his father said solemnly. “The last thing she needs is for you to add your burden to hers. In fact…” His hand clapped against Link's shoulder again as he straightened, voice rising back to normal. “If you're not sure what to say, for now it might be best to say nothing at all. It'll take some time for you to get a handle on how things work in court, and the easiest way to not misstep is sometimes not to step at all, right?”

A blonde tornado launched herself from Link's bed to wrap tight arms around his neck, knocking his hat once more askew.

“You'll write to us every week, right?” Aryll said, her voice muffled against his chest. “Every day, if you can! I'm sure the postman won't mind.”

“He's going to be busy, Aryll,” their father chided her, but gently, and Link cracked his first smile of the day as he hugged his sister tightly. “Your brother is going to make Hyrule and his family proud.”

Aryll huffed to show exactly what she thought of all that, and Link’s smile deepened—but even as he held her, his mind was somewhere else. Say nothing at all… He thought he just might take that advice to heart. It was easy enough to follow—cut and dry, something he couldn't possibly mess up. Maybe nobody would notice his youth too much if they couldn’t hear it on his voice.

He’d just have to let his sword do the talking for him from now on. Unlike Link's words, his weapon had never failed him yet.

“You were wise, in the end, to set a limit.” Ghirahim’s voice rang above the swirl of Link confusion, piercing through both ears and mind. “If my continued captivity is your design, you have assured that much, at least. You will not cut the final rope… but the deal made beyond that was one rope for one memory, with no need for your continued assent.”

The dagger was in Link’s hand and out of it before he had the presence of mind to notice, another rope snapping and rebounding into nothing, blackened fingers catching up his wrists again like shackles. Struggling did nothing to loosen that grip.

“Far be it from me to understand why you would wish to remember what you have lost, but if that's truly your heart's desire, who am I to deny you the deepest of pain?”

“Don’t—”

But it was already dark. He was already falling.

“I don't know why you even bothered coming home to begin with,” Aryll snapped, bucket of feed slung over one arm as she glared back at him. “We're getting by just fine without your help. It's not like you have any fun stories to tell these days, anyway.”

Link followed his sister silently, ducking into the coop after her with a pitchfork held up against his own shoulder. Aryll looked older than he remembered, which maybe shouldn't have surprised him as much as it did. Then again, maybe it was the worried creases lining her eyes that felt so out of place on his sister's young face. He remembered those same lines on his mother, dimly, and more clearly now on the princess herself. Link had never seen them before on vibrant, carefree Aryll.

“You only talk to the princess now, is that it?” Aryll said, whirling suddenly to face him. “Are you too good for all of us in Hateno? I never expected you of all people to come home putting on airs like some kind of lord, but maybe that tunic's gone to your head.”

“Aryll,” a rough voice said reproachfully behind them. Turning, Link found his father leaning against the door to the coop, weight kept carefully on his good leg. Link tried not to think about how much older he looked, too. “I've told you already to leave your brother in peace. He came all this way to help us.”

Link shrugged a shoulder to say he didn't mind either way, but Aryll flared up.

“Fine! If Link wants to help out so bad, then he can feed the girls.” Shoving the bucket of feed against a startled Link’s chest, Aryll stormed out the doorway past him, careful even in her anger not to brush up against their father's old injury. “It's really the least he could do.”

Watching her go, Link thought he should feel sorry, or annoyed, or even resentful. Somehow, the only feeling he could summon up was tired.

“She loves feeding her girls,” Link's father said, shaking his head in exasperation. “Better leave that bucket right where you are, Link. She'll never forgive you otherwise, whatever she says.”

Nodding, Link lowered the bucket to the ground, hefting the pitchfork instead to turn over the cuccos’ bedding—and stopped when his father limped forward.

“You've been hard at work already, haven't you?” he said, looking Link up and down. His eyes lingered disapprovingly where hay stuck out of Link's tunic, evidence of the work he'd done already with the cows. “You shouldn't do all that in your Champion’s tunic. It disgraces the royal blue.”

Link's first instinct was indignation—his family's livelihood couldn't possibly disgrace any outfit he chose to wear—but his father's raised hand forestalled any further reaction he might have had.

“Your tunic and sword are symbols, Link. They're something for people to look towards and feel hope. What hope can they possibly have in a tunic stained by manure and covered in hay—or a hero who wears such things?” He snorted. “Might as well use that sword to chop our firewood while you’re at it.”

Resentment fading, Link picked a bit of straw from a seam self consciously. He hadn't actually been working in the manure yet, but still… maybe before he did, he could change into something else.

“My boy,” his father sighed, clapping a hand on Link's shoulder. “I know you worry about us out here, but your duty lies elsewhere, and I fear that your concern is becoming a distraction. I think…” He hesitated for just a moment, then carried on. “It might be better if you… didn't come home. Not until all this is over.”

Link stiffened beneath his father’s hand, heart pounding suddenly.

“We're doing just fine,” his father assured him softly. “Even Aryll is, trust me. We have the whole village looking out for us, along with what you send each week from the castle. Much as it comforts me to see your face… letters will do for now.” He cracked a half-hearted grin. “Do your duty to Hyrule like I raised you to do, and all of Hateno will give you a welcome home the likes of which you'll never forget, I'm sure. In the meantime, Princess Zelda’s side is where you belong.”

Link chewed his lip, helpless dread turning his stomach into knots. He'd looked forward to these rare visits home as a brief chance at relief from the pressures of the castle… but maybe his father was right. He couldn’t afford anything that might distract him from his duty.

Unable to even rasp out his assent, Link finally nodded—and heard a sob in the doorway behind him. Turning, he caught a flash of blonde hair as Aryll ran back up the pathway, the hem of a green dress kicking up behind her, and felt a pang of sharp remorse.

I'm sorry, he wanted to call out after her, but couldn't make the words come. He wanted to explain that he didn't know how to do this halfway—how to speak here and nowhere else. If he unburdened himself to her now, then how long until he was spilling his fearful heart out to the princess herself? She didn't need that from him. Nobody did.

“Don’t…”

Words felt heavy in his mouth, the memory lingering too long. Only as he blinked did Link discover that tears had gathered in the corners of his eyes, the motion setting them free to fall across his cheeks.

“You didn’t like that one, did you?” Ghirahim cooed, tracing the path the tear had taken with a gloved finger. Had he worn those before? “I am so very sorry. Don’t tell me that unraveling the tedious mysteries of your mind isn’t every bit as satisfying as you always dreamed it would be.”

“You…” Link tried and failed again, still thick-tongued. One rope remained now, stretching from Ghirahim’s throat to the room’s far end—far less than Link had ever hoped to leave him with, but maybe it would hold. More relieving were the first malicious specks heralding the blood moon's peak, finally stirring in the corners of his vision. This was almost over…

Except Ghirahim seemed not to notice or care about either the dwindled number of ropes or the blood moon's rising.

“Could you possibly still want more?” he laughed instead in mock incredulity, hair draping to brush across Link’s face as their foreheads touched. His dark eyes burned at the edges like festering wounds, capturing Link’s vision. “I suppose no part of our agreement forbids me from unlocking one of your precious memories with no rope cut in return. What further miseries can your mind supply?”

Too many sharp teeth in a thin-lipped grin struck Link with breathless foreboding, and every part of him tensed. Mute, protesting, with no way to reach out for help, Link reached within—and found in the depths of his anger that a newly obtained piece of a soul knew fury all too well.

The small hairs on the back of his arms stood on end.

“What—”

Power thundered through Link, and Ghirahim stepped back quickly, gloved hands leaping back from the electricity that danced beneath his skin. Energy in potential crackled through the air, collecting in Link’s fingertips where it would take only their snap to ignite, and green flame burned in wisps around him. Link could feel Urbosa there in all of this, fierce and furious, and the grimace on his face echoed her own.

“Stay away from me,” Link snarled, finding his voice at last—or was that Urbosa, too? Stay away from him, Link had almost said.

“Oh, you are a wild thing, aren’t you?” Ghirahim murmured, voice thick with bitter hunger. Green and orange firelight clashed across his pale face in eerie contrast as he stared down at Link. “I might have known that you carried a companion with you after all. Loneliness was never the fate of your heroic journey—it is merely the fact of what comes after.”

Link’s fingers twitched with the desire to unleash all of that gathered energy to rain down on Ghirahim’s head. If those hands could stop Link’s sword, then let them try to catch the lightning—except even in the depths of his and Urbosa’s anger, the strips of spelled fabric fluttering wildly from the final rope made him stop, a thin, reluctant thread of caution winding through him. If Urbosa’s Fury wasn’t enough to kill Ghirahim, then it would almost certainly free him.

Still, Link kept it held there, electric energy poised in uneasy balance as the malice flew up faster and the blood moon neared its highest point.

“If you are sated with memories of the past, then perhaps I will leave you instead with a vision of the future.” Ghirahim’s voice came out resonant, his dark eyes devoid of light despite how the small room danced with illumination. “I have seen it all often enough to know how these things play out. On the heels of your victory over my master, that sword you have clung to through the ages will abandon you, her truest loyalty belonging to the battle she was forged for and not the one who wields her. Any companions that have aided you on your journey will scatter to the winds, and in the ennui that follows fulfilling your goddess-given purpose, your fierce spirit will begin to fade, as well… and then you will return to me. That is not a curse or a compulsion, but a promise,” Ghirahim added, smiling grimly when Link’s head jerked side to side in protest, his smallest finger aching once more as the blood moon hit its peak. “That is the truth of our thread of fate.”

“I don't believe you,” Link said hoarsely. “It can't have happened that way every time.”

“All but the last.” Prevented from approaching Link by the sparks still crackling across his skin, Ghirahim blew him a kiss that emerged as a flurry of sharp diamonds, blinding Link's vision, stinging his cheeks. “Look how well that has worked out for us both.”

And then there was nothing but a tall, black sword thrust point first into the ground, a single rope with fluttering strips of fabric stretching from its hilt as the final motes of malice faded away. Slowly, Link let the energy clenched inside him dissipate into nothing, Urbosa and her thunder and all his righteous fury fading until Link slumped forward, empty, the air dead and dull around him.

So he’d had a sister.

Chapter Text

It was only a couple days later in the northern reaches of Akkala that Link, crouched beside his small fire, reached within himself in search of Daruk's Protection—not to use, as he had hours earlier in his battle with the Lynel who had claimed this place before him, but simply to hold. 

Link had often imagined that the Champions who gave him their gifts could sense their use—that they were maybe even present in some form as he used them—but had always chalked any flickers of expression he thought he saw up to wishful thinking, brought on by his own solitary journey and the heightened emotion usually present when Link called upon their powers. Only after that night when Urbosa's presence rose up so strongly inside him had Link actually started to wonder…

And there it was, clear as day now that Link knew what to search for: a heavy, supportive presence that could only be Daruk. It spread out from Link with a wariness that shifted to confusion, flickers of green flame rising from the earth as the barest reflection of a diamond shield encased him, and Link knew Daruk must be searching for the threat that had brought Link to call on his gift in the first place.

“I'm fine,” Link mumbled under his breath, not knowing if Daruk could hear him. He didn't even know whether this was Daruk himself or not, or just some echo of the Goron Champion lodged within his heart. “No danger. I just… wondered whether you were…”

Understanding bloomed suddenly, and with it, an emanating warmth so deep and steady that it might have come from the heart of Death Mountain itself. Biting his lip against the strange, choked feeling welling up inside him, Link stayed there, crouched beside his fire, relaxing unsteadily into the warmth both inside and out as he held Daruk’s gift suspended… until eventually, Daruk’s presence started to dwindle, and Link discovered ruefully that even this weak use of Daruk’s Protection had its limits.

“We’re here for you, buddy.” The whisper rumbled up from inside Link like a hand clapped against his back, Daruk’s Protection coiling inside his chest to recharge as the final vestiges of green fire faded away—and whether what he felt was the whole of Daruk or not, Link decided it was enough. Maybe he’d never been quite as alone on his journey as he thought he was, after all.

A shame that the realization should come so close to the end of it, but Link would take what he could get. He’d already wasted enough of himself mourning over lost time.

If someone could have watched the whole of Hyrule from above, they would have seen a wave of orange lights succumbing one by one to blue as Link prepared for his battle with Ganon in the only remaining way he knew how: tackling the shrines placed across the land for his use in search of the treasure within. Physically, Link had never been stronger—or at least, not since before the day he’d lifted himself shakily from his resting place in the Great Plateau. Kneeling before the statue of the goddess with mumbled prayers spilling from his lips, he could feel her answer come in the gift of life flowing through him: clear, distinct, and holy.

Still, as the spirit orb rippled through Link’s chest at the completion of each shrine, he thought he’d never felt weaker. Maybe he could point his body to any purpose and expect it to follow through, but his mind was another matter entirely, lingering where it shouldn't no matter how he attempted to force it towards their greater goal.

Link had thought he was ready to face Ganon before. He knew he wasn’t ready now.

Only once did Link give in to his longing, stepping across the threshold of the place he’d so thoroughly avoided since his last night with Ghirahim: his own Hateno home.

If nothing else, Link realized with odd detachment, he could now track the outrage he’d felt all those months before when he’d seen this house being demolished back to an emotional source. He hadn’t known what exactly drove him to stop that destruction at all costs—to do whatever he could to save this house, even if it was really the last thing that should have worried him. Now… well, the coop must have fallen apart years since (or maybe they’d demolished that first?) but he’d still seen this house as Aryll ran up the path towards it and recognized the place as home.

Antsy, Link sat at the table and wondered how many meals he’d shared at a table just like this. Had he known how to cook then, or was it always his father, or Aryll? They must have left something in this house—trinkets or letters that Bolson might have discovered and, more than likely, tossed aside, assuming they’d survived the ravages of time. Where had his family gone when Calamity struck?

“The old owner apparently went off to the castle to report for service,” Karson had told Link when he’d asked, his pick-axe leaned up against his shoulder while he spoke rather than dismantling the foundation, and Link had wanted to keep him speaking. “Never came back, never wrote.”

The old owner… himself or his father? With a shiver of foreboding, Link remembered an injured leg, a limp, and a heavy cane. However accomplished a soldier he’d been in the past, the man in his memories had not belonged on the battlefield. Still, in the face of Calamity, with the kingdom he’d pledged to defend burning in the distance and Fort Hateno under attack, would he have seen any other option but to go and fight?

Aryll, though. He wouldn’t have left her all alone… would he? Or would he?

The sun set slowly, the home’s dark interior dimming further as Link failed to light a lamp. Ghosts pressed in on his skin, whispering stories that he could almost make out, and Link closed his eyes, ready… but no new memories came. Why could he never manage to remember anything on his own without pictures on a slate and the heroic mandate to remember? Was that old, silent soldier Link had thought he’d left in the past holding such reminiscence at bay, all too aware of how it might occupy his mind with their task still incomplete?

Maybe it was for the best that he didn’t remember. Maybe his father had been right a century past, and coming home was a distraction Link still could not afford. After all, what good had the memories he’d gathered already done for him in the end?

Then again, Link thought, pulling his slate out abruptly as night settled in and picking a destination at random—somewhere, anywhere that wasn't here—then again, what good had his father's words done him all those years before? They were spoken with the best of intentions, Link knew, and yet…

Maybe it shouldn't have surprised him when the world reformed on glowing strands of light to reveal the luminescent blue walls and moonlit pools of Zora's Domain.

The memory Link had regained of his childhood here hadn't been a bad one—not at all—but he still considered choosing another destination as he stepped slowly away from the shrine, footsteps splashing despite his best efforts. None of those memories had quite slotted into his identity enough for him to know how to act on them yet, and his skin itched with not knowing where to settle… but a darkened silhouette at the top of the stairs called his name, taking the choice out of his hands.

“Master Link! That is you, isn’t it?”

It was Bazz calling out to him, because of course it was. Link half raised a hand in greeting, feeling strangely shy as he remembered just how easily they had once slung arms around each other. Bazz had always taken his flighty memories in stride, never holding it against him… but knowing it wasn’t his fault that he’d forgotten, Link still couldn’t help the curling of shame inside him.

“You’ve picked a fine time to visit,” Bazz continued, not put off by Link’s quiet approach. He had the look of someone on patrol, his silverscale spear held upright in one hand with the other on his hip. “The weather tonight is lovely. I believe the inn has plenty of open beds if you wish to stay the night.”

Watching Bazz resume his ready stance, standing firmly in the center of the steps Link had just ascended, it occurred to Link suddenly to wonder what he was guarding. He supposed the captain of the Zora guard might occasionally watch over the Domain in general, but Link could have sworn that Bazz was facing in towards the shrine when he'd arrived.

In fact, now that Link thought about it, he didn't think he'd ever walked up these steps without some member of the Zora guard standing in that exact space, calling out to him.

“Are you… guarding the shrine?” he asked, looking back down the steps. Sheltered in the heart of Zora’s Domain, that shrine was hardly the sort of place where trouble might break out.

“Of course!” Bazz’s grin, though not quite as dazzling as Prince Sidon’s, still gave the impression of easy warmth. “The prince has informed me of how this shrine serves as a traveling point. All entrances to our home must be guarded, of course—but beyond that, it is a treat to be able to greet you on your arrival to Zora's Domain.”

Link found himself again at a loss for words—something that might have hit with awful familiarity if not for the lightness that infused him, and a budding sense of relief at the growing conviction that his father's words, however well meant, were wrong. There was no shame in returning home, whatever that meant for him now, and no greater good gained by avoiding it.

“You’ve been keeping up with the sword forms I taught you, of course,” Link said abruptly, looking up at Bazz with his best impression of stern sharpness despite standing at little more than half his height. “Practicing every day?”

To his delight, Bazz actually straightened his shoulders, looking mildly panicked.

“I—well, perhaps not every day, but—” He stopped, laughing ruefully as he shook his head. “How is it that you can still make me feel like a new recruit? No, I suppose I’ve grown rusty over the years.” He hefted his spear, spinning it through the air in flashy demonstration. “My expertise lies elsewhere now, I’m afraid.”

“Wellll…” Link dragged the word out, looking him up and down. “I suppose I can forgive you for that. Still, if you ever want to train with me again, I assume you remember the price of payment.”

“Vividly,” Bazz said, eyes sparkling. “I heard you were here the other week seeking out that very thing, in fact. Are you still not satisfied?”

Link forced a sudden shiver down. Forced his grin not to waver.

“Never.”

“Wellll…” It was Bazz’s turn to drawl, considering the sky above. “The next festival is still two new moons out, but if you can manage to wait that long, I could certainly use a refresher course.” His grin flashed again, wide and affectionate and so unlike the last sharp-toothed smile Link had seen. “Fluffy white clouds, clear blue…”

“Zora,” Link said firmly, his gaze following Bazz’s upward to the sliver of a pale moon above. Two new moons… Calamity Ganon should be dead by then.

—

It wasn't much later that Link found it, stashed inside an unassuming chest beneath the enormous statue of the goddess deep within the Forgotten Temple.

Link still didn't know how he'd missed that chest all those weeks before when he first knelt at the statue to pray. He didn’t even entirely know what had drawn him back now, aside from maybe a vague notion of collecting materials for Robbie to turn into weapons for his final battle. The gauntlet of Guardians within had dissuaded Link from delving this temple's depths too frequently, though he'd always felt pulled to these ancient places. Maybe that was all that had brought him back here in the first place: the lure of something forgotten—

Or maybe, Link thought with hitched breath, withdrawing the hidden green tunic from inside the chest, that instinct to return had come from somewhere else entirely.

The shirt was old—ancient, even—though somehow preserved well beyond its time. Running a careful hand over sturdy fabric and simple stitching, Link held it up to his chest, already suspecting a perfect fit. It was like nothing he’d ever worn before, he was sure—and yet…

No green tunic to mark you?

You are wearing red.

It is sometimes the most insignificant details that remain nevertheless the most consistent over time…

Closing his eyes, Link felt clearly for the first time that thread pulling back through the ages, tying him to every previous hero whose life had followed this same, strange pattern, fighting the same battle against evil in the same shade of green. Ghirahim had tried to tempt him with knowledge of those past lives, once… and while curiosity still lingered despite himself, Link knew enough now to dread such knowledge. Where had that thread begun, and when would it end? How had the terribly predictable shape of his existence ever formed in the first place… and what must it be like for the only person living who remembered it all?

With tunic in hand, Link felt the tip of his smallest finger start to ache, and acknowledged with bitter humor that his time had run out again. He was ready to defeat Ganon now, he knew with grim certainty, just as all those heroes had before… but too late. With the blood moon close to rising, Ghirahim would call him back—and if this encounter went like all the rest, by the end of the night, Ghirahim would walk free.

Link bit his lip, green fabric twisting through his hands as he thought. His muddled conscience could no longer believe with any conviction that Ghirahim should remain trapped in his desert prison forever, but neither could he consider freeing him at this exact moment in time. Ghirahim still called Ganon “master” too casually for Link to trust him not to tip the scales in the upcoming battle… and who could say what resentment he harbored after centuries of imprisonment, towards the goddess, the Sheikah, and Link himself?

Of course, the greater question remained of whether Link even had the power to stop it. After all, he was smart enough to recognize their deals for what they always were—little diversions tolerated by a man who knew he held the ultimate advantage—and with just one rope remaining and the final blood moon at hand, such games must be at an end. Ghirahim would take what he wanted from Link as he had on their first meeting, and at the blood moon's peak, even the sword that sealed the darkness wouldn't be enough to stop him.

Link drew his sword on frustrated instinct then, not quite daring to believe he might hear its voice after all this time, but still hoping he might feel something… and saw the lights of the nearby shrine reflect off the silent blade in a way that made him pause.

It was a puzzle, Link decided after a moment. Words had never been his greatest strength, after all, even if they came to him now when they hadn't before. The sword was his greatest strength, but had already proven ineffective against a man who seemed to be at least half sword himself—but maybe neither of those things were the answer now. If he put all that aside and turned the problem on its head…

With the goddess looming over him and the shadow of a grin on his face, Link started to form his plan. Who could have guessed that those shrines might have prepared him for something after all?

—

The next day, Link spared the Molduga.

Avoiding the beast took almost as much effort as defeating it had in the first place, surfing and gliding from pillar to sunken pillar and sometimes only narrowly dodging its ire, with none of the tangible rewards that came from killing it. He almost couldn't say why he bothered—or maybe didn't want to admit to it? It was such a small thing, really—but if his entire existence was a cycle he had no way of breaking, then at least he could disrupt this loop in unexpected ways.

Besides, Link thought, there was something almost peaceful about watching the Molduga's powerful form cut through sand, the sun setting behind it in an explosion of hues he'd only ever seen in this desert—though as he paused to take in the sight of it, Link considered the likely possibility that his sense of such things had long since gone irredeemably skewed.

Still, that tranquil feeling stayed with Link as he descended the now-familiar ladder, building his small fire on blackened stone and arranging the items he needed at hand carefully within his pouches. He’d done everything he could to prepare for this encounter, and if it wasn’t enough… well, Link would cross that bridge if he came to it.

As his final preparation, Link touched the souls of his fellow Champions one by one, taking maybe a little longer than strictly necessary to ensure that all four were at the ready. He only expected to need one of them tonight, and that one only as a last resort, but it felt… nice… to tap into the variations of focused support that all of them, even Revali, had to offer in the brief few seconds that he could hold their gifts without draining them.

At last, with everything at the ready, Link indulged the itch in his feet that led him further down the tunnel, lighting his torch for both light and warmth this time as he left. Dubiously, he’d exchanged the ruby at his forehead for the hat that had come with his tunic, half expecting it to fall off his head at any moment, though the fact that it had survived a Molduga chase already meant it must have fit him better than he’d realized. The so-called trousers he’d found alongside them were shoved into the bottom of his pack, and only a lingering sense of obligation had kept Link from abandoning them in the chest where he found them, dryly certain that he could imagine Ghirahim’s reaction if he ever wore the complete outfit.

The tunic fit with eerie perfection, exactly as Link had known it would, and after all of Ghirahim's thinly veiled hints towards its existence, he knew exactly what sort of message wearing it would portray. Of course, expecting Ghirahim to acknowledge Link's readiness to defeat Ganon tonight was maybe expecting too much—more likely, he'd have some other tactic prepared to throw Link off balance—but some things didn't need verbal acknowledgment. At the very least, the green tunic meant a wrapping up of loose ends—and loose threads.

Even the sight of Ghirahim's sword at the end of the tunnel wasn't enough to shake Link’s nerve. Walking through the stone door and finally closing it before Ghirahim could, he settled the torch in its familiar niche, feeling wrapped up in steady determination. Then he turned to face the tiled room—and found Ghirahim staring at him like a walking ghost.

Stepping back quickly, Link tried to swallow and realized that his throat had gone as dry as the desert above, the calm before the storm faltering beneath the first sprinkling of rain. That final rope still held, he noticed with distant relief. He had halfway feared it wouldn’t… but with just one rope left as an anchor point, Link was all too aware of how small a sliver of space remained outside of Ghirahim’s reach. This room had always seemed to grow or shrink with the strength of Ghirahim’s presence—a trick of the mind, he thought—and it felt about as small as a tomb just then, with Ghirahim's wide eye pinning him to the wall.

“This is the last night,” Link finally heard himself rasp beneath that blank scrutiny. There was no threat to that gaze, exactly, though when flowing words were expected, simple silence on Ghirahim’s end became deafening… but Link’s voice broke the trance.

Ghirahim stirred, mirroring his step backward as if Link presented some sort of threat. Did he?

“So it is,” Ghirahim said without argument, tossing his cloak as if to shake off whatever troubled him. His dark eye traveled slowly down Link’s outfit, flicking back up to the hat again with annoyance. “Your choice of attire held so much promise until now. I had halfway hoped that perhaps you of all the heroes I’ve met might finally disdain the hat.”

“Sorry to disappoint,” Link said, secretly glad that he’d kept it if it got him this kind of reaction. Ghirahim’s hand rose slowly as if to tear the offending garment off his head… but instead his wrist twisted in a beckoning gesture.

“Should we get this over with now?” he asked briskly, fully recovered from the mood that had gripped him earlier—or was he? His gaze kept wandering from Link’s face downward. “I think we both know that this night only ends one way.”

With the last bond sliced through. That was the most likely end to things, however Link hoped to prevent it.

“What, no small talk?” he joked weakly, to no effect. Unsurprisingly, Ghirahim wasn’t in the mood. “You’re probably right, but… I did have a bit of an offer. There’s time left for something else first… if you want.”

“Oh?” Ghirahim’s voice sharpened with amusement—and familiar heat. This time when he looked Link up and down, it had a very different feel to it. “What exactly did a wild thing like you have in mind?”

“Not…” Link decided his blushes were a good thing if they made him look like less of a threat, though he couldn’t have stopped them either way. “Not that.”

“A pity,” Ghirahim murmured, his gaze lingering like a touch… but while the heat fell mercifully from his voice, amusement did not. “You are not yet sated with memories, then? You had your chance, little hero!” He sighed incredulously, gesturing towards the heavens as if for help, or possibly commiseration. “I shared all that you would allow me to, and then some! My previous offer was indeed generous, but I'm afraid that we no longer have the time—”

“Not that, either,” Link interrupted him, and Ghirahim cut off, a curious tilt to his head. “Or… not exactly.” He took a deep breath, steeling himself. Maybe he'd come to regret this, but he’d thought it all through and could see no other way. “I think there are… things you wish I could remember. Parts of my past lives that you want me to see.” Another deep breath. “I wouldn’t let you show them to me before, but… I’ll let you do it tonight. If you want.”

Ghirahim stared, the heat sucked so quickly from the room that Link nearly shivered.

“The night’s still young, isn’t it?” he offered when Ghirahim still said nothing. It was still young. Link hadn’t wanted Ghirahim to feel rushed. “There’s probably enough time left for three memories—two, if you’re feeling timid,” he couldn’t help but add, lips quirking despite himself

“I think…” The word scraped over Ghirahim’s sharp teeth, his eyes narrowed, “that you are attempting to be devious.” He tossed his hair, surveying Link over the edge of his cloak. “You believe that I care one way or another what old memories are rattling around inside your head?”

Link shrugged, not even trying to hide the helpless guilt on his face. Maybe Ghirahim didn't care at all, though the way he’d reacted to Link’s tunic just now made him slightly more sure of himself. Of course, Ghirahim would recognize anything he suggested now as the attempt at delay it was—so it had to come off as desperate. If Ghirahim was tempted, he might just allow it anyway, confident that he could withstand whatever last-ditch attempts at escape Link threw at him.

There was almost something fun about it, in a reckless sort of way. Inexplicably, it felt like fighting the Molduga.

“I have been trapped here,” Ghirahim said slowly, some barely-contained tension burning through him as his fingers clenched, “for uncounted centuries… and you expect me to delay my freedom for something as fleeting as a mortal’s memories?”

“If you want,” Link repeated, his amusement withering guiltily into something more sober. “I just thought that the only thing worse than not remembering… is maybe being the only one who remembers.”

A strained hiss of laughter escaped Ghirahim’s lips, though Link wasn't entirely sure that he noticed.

“You and your thoughts,” Ghirahim muttered. He was looking through Link again, as he so often did, and Link had to remind himself that this was what he needed for his plan to work—for Ghirahim to see some other hero through his eyes. “I don't know that anyone else ever realized just how much you… think.”

A long pause while Link tried to breathe evenly, smothering nervous laughter as he remembered all those times he'd suspected Ghirahim of reading his thoughts. Surely that was nothing but his own fear speaking… right?

Then Ghirahim's voice brightened, taking on a showman’s lilt.

“So, you wish to remember what you should not,” he proclaimed with his arms flung wide, the reverberation of his words swallowing up a room that felt once again too small to contain him. His hair tossed aside for a moment, and both eyes gleamed. “Or perhaps it is that you will tolerate such memories if doing so keeps me contained for that much longer. The entirety of your soul's existence at my fingertips…” His laughter rippled down Link's spine. “Oh, Link, have you really thought this through?”

Even as Link leaned back in vague alarm, the thought came with fleeting relief that he had guessed right. Ghirahim really did want this, whether he was willing to admit it or not. Was this dazzling performance meant to distract Link from that fact, or himself?

Was Ghirahim always so easy to pick apart if you only held the keys?

“Well, far be it from me to waste precious time dissuading you,” Ghirahim very nearly purred, measuring Link so thoroughly with his eyes that he felt almost sliced to pieces, his various parts weighed and packed in paper for consumption. “You have stumbled upon the rather inconvenient truth that this is the only night remaining wherein I could restore such events to your mind, if the blood moons are to come to their end. In fact, it is by my master's power alone that each precious memory has returned to you thus far—so be sure to show proper gratitude when next you destroy him.”

Link's blood ran cold at the thought, remembering the skin-crawling sensations that had accompanied each of Ghirahim’s intrusions. The idea of letting Ghirahim into his head was always bad enough, but to think that any part of Calamity Ganon could have touched him so intimately… but what else could he do?

Ghirahim had begun to pace, back and forth across the room's center as the rope restraining him allowed, the air churning in his wake to rustle the tips of his cloak and set the flame of Link’s torch dancing. If his power rose and fell with Ganon’s, then that was reason enough for Ghirahim to interfere with their final battle whether Ganon could wield his sword or not—and reason enough for Link to attempt to keep him here, at least until that threat had passed.

“Another word of warning, since the last proved insufficient,” Ghirahim went on, turning abruptly from his pacing. “These… memories, for lack of a better word, are not strictly speaking yours at all, but ours, preserved by virtue of the fact that I remember them. As you once said, the goddess gives us one life to live at a time for a reason.” He laughed, a light sound. “What a delight to see you disregard her reasoning.”

Link frowned.

“But they’re real, right?” he said cautiously, ignoring the jab. “The memories, or whatever they are… they actually happened?”

“Oh, they’re real,” Ghirahim confirmed, grinning to match Link’s frown. “They happened. I only warn you because you might find that they come with a shift in… perspective.” His tongue dipped between thin lips, out and in again. “It might hurt.”

A warning too vague to mean anything, Link thought helplessly, or to change anything—not if Ghirahim was willing to take the bait. Taking a deep breath, he nodded.

“Fine.”

“Still so determined,” Ghirahim said, his soft voice failing to cover something that felt nearly manic. “Such determination deserves its own reward, doesn't it? Very well.”

In diamond-shaped wisps, Ghirahim's long gloves peeled away and vanished, revealing pale arms that he moved in gestural demonstration. Only the very tips of his fingers were blackened now.

“Don't think for a second that I don't know what you're really after,” he added dryly, holding one hand out. “Still, when you're presented so pretty on a platter, how can I not indulge?”

Link knew what he was supposed to do, or he thought he did. Not giving himself time to second guess, he walked forward reluctantly, his own hand outstretched—and was caught off guard when Ghirahim wrapped his arm around Link's to entwine only their smallest fingers, as he had on the fateful night of their first meeting.

“Any requests?” Ghirahim asked, laughing throatily at the flat glare Link gave in return. “Ah, never mind. As is too often the case, what you want will have very little bearing on what happens next.”

With a lurch made worse from knowing what it was, Link felt the cold power that seeped from Ghirahim's fingers climb up his arm, goosebumps pushing in its wake as it spread toward his head… or his heart… or maybe all of him?

It was almost enough to make Link pull away. Instead, he gritted his teeth, bearing it.

“On any other night, I would take my time preparing you… but with time so short, I’m afraid we have no choice but to plunge right in.” Ghirahim's teasing voice reverberated through Link, like a string plucked across his chest. “You have never believed in our thread of fate, stubborn child that you are, but perhaps following it through the ages will shed new light.”

No, not his chest—his throat, his lungs. It was his voice speaking, his lips curling in a grin as the two of them fell together, and in the crawling darkness encasing them, Link could no longer tell where he ended and Ghirahim began.

“I believe you may have heard of this hero,” he whispered as they fell. “The age of twilight was well recorded, after all…”

Those echoing words chased Link down the winding thread of his past, falling in tandem until…

—

Swirling his goblet of wine with easy poise, Ghirahim thought he had never felt quite so at home in any era of Hyrule’s history as he did this one.

Though no more technologically advanced than most ages he had lived through now, there was still something about this time that grabbed him… a nod towards culture, maybe? For the first time in memory, the fashion of Hyrule held enough intrigue that he had actually purchased a new item of clothing: a trailing blue-violet cloak that he liked despite the primitive fabric. No doubt it would not last the centuries, but his existence held so few novelties now that he supposed he would have to take them where he could.

It helped, too, that his service rendered to his master had been so satisfactory this time around. Grin deepening, Ghirahim took a sip of the regrettably weak drink in his hands, remembering. Captured by the sages all those centuries ago, Ganondorf had still amassed enough strength by the end to nearly rival Demise, the ages he spent trapped within twilight more than enough time to allow his master’s resentful power to fester and grow. He had forced Hyrule beneath his heel, puppeteered that useless avatar of the goddess—and on that final battlefield, he had wielded Ghirahim's sword with all the force and finesse he could ever have hoped for.

His tongue slipped from between his teeth without thought, lost in pleasant reminiscence.

If his master had still not managed to subdue the hero in green… well, that failure was not unique to him. While his loss regrettably meant another slow fading away before Ghirahim was called back to battle once more, at least it opened up an opportunity of a different sort.

The door to the tavern opened, sunlight piercing the room's dim haze, and the object of his musings walked in, his eyes drawn magnetically to Ghirahim sitting in the corner before jerking away stubbornly. Even the hero's signature green tunic bore embroidery in this age, the garment put together with something approaching structure, though Ghirahim despised the familiar outfit no less because of it. The goddess must have had a truly twisted sense of humor… or perhaps this was just her form of petty revenge?

Ghirahim half raised a bare eyebrow, but made no other move to show that he had noticed Link’s arrival, once more contemplating the contents of his cup. No doubt it was simply the balance of life that in a time when so much else was to Ghirahim's liking, this hero should prove the most resistant to his advances yet. Ghirahim had seen enough of Link now both in and out of battle to get a read on him—strong for his size, sturdily built, and stubborn, though not without his breaking point. Quiet, but not incapable of speech. Nauseatingly helpful, like every hero Ghirahim had ever met, though he appeared to prefer the company of animals over any human companionship.

Fitting, as this hero was a beast himself, the veil over his natural ferocity pulled thinner than any before. Ghirahim hoped Link came around to him soon—hoped the red thread that had bound them thus far had not become some thin, faded thing with the passage of time. He had even considered a little nudge in the right direction… but no.

No, it would ruin it all if Link did not accept him on his own.

“Anything else I can get for you?” the tavern's owner said loudly, wandering from another table to bodily block Ghirahim’s view of Link with a warning frown, braids swaying ominously atop her head. Telma tolerated his presence here, usually—something in Ghirahim's eyes had the power to quell even the most hotheaded patrons before a fight could break out, a skill that any barkeep could appreciate—but she didn't trust his intentions with Link.

A smart woman. Ghirahim rather liked her.

“I am quite content as I am, thank you,” Ghirahim said politely, gesturing with his mostly full beverage. The stuff unfortunately did nothing for him that a demonic brew would have done, but it was surprisingly palatable.

Frown deepening, Telma leaned in.

“I'll let you nurse that for now, but when this place gets busy, your table goes to paying customers,” she warned. “Whether you're finished with that or not—”

“He's here with me,” a rough voice said quietly behind her, and the two looked up in surprise. Neither of them had noticed his soft approach. “I'll have whatever you’re cooking that smells so good.”

Link slid into the chair across from Ghirahim, giving Telma a reassuring smile, though Ghirahim recognized the familiar, stubborn set of Link’s jaw. A silent battle raged between them, until Telma eventually straightened, lips twisting.

“I'll have that right up for you, honey,” she said, though her hard eyes strayed back to Ghirahim as she added, “Won't take more than a minute.”

She left, and Ghirahim wondered idly if she hid some desert ancestry as he took another slow sip, surveying Link over his goblet. Of all the human races, the Gerudo had come the closest so far to crafting anything worth drinking.

Link frowned at his silent scrutiny, glancing back at the door as if already regretting whatever impulse had drawn him here in the first place, and Ghirahim relented. Wolves were only tamed with great care, after all.

“To what do I owe the unexpected pleasure of your company?” he asked, running a gloved finger around the rim of his cup. Beneath those gloves, he knew his fingers had already begun to blacken. “The last time I sought you out, you objected to my offer. Strenuously.”

A mild way of putting it. Ghirahim had learned that night that Link's newly absent companion was a touchy subject, at best.

Link's eyes narrowed, though he didn't speak at once, drumming his fingers against the table. More than accustomed to such silences, Ghirahim waited patiently.

“I’m leaving Hyrule,” he announced at last, looking startled by the words that had just burst out of him. Knowing Link, it was his first time speaking the idea out loud. “Not… not forever, and maybe not even for that long. I just want to see… well, I’m looking for…”

Ghirahim was unsurprised. This hero would not be the first to wander beyond the borders of Hyrule once life within failed to provide the proper stimulation, although every incarnation regarded the prospect with great gravity. None strayed for too long, either, that very same gravity pulling them back. The spirit of the hero was closely knit with Hyrule, after all.

“That's a long journey.” Ghirahim cut across his stumbling explanation, leaning back. “Has… Her Majesty anything to say on the matter?”

Ghirahim only just managed to smooth back the grin that wanted to spread across his face at Link’s questioning look of confusion. Likely, it hadn’t even occurred to him to ask. While they had battled his master together in easy tandem, the princess and her hero were mere acquaintances in this age—a rare eventuality that he always took great pleasure in when it occurred.

No, he rather thought this hero’s heart stolen by another princess altogether.

“Never mind that,” Ghirahim murmured, waving a hand to dismiss the idea. “Will you be taking it alone?”

Link hesitated. “That's… what I wanted to talk to you about.”

This time, Ghirahim had no hope of suppressing his anticipatory grin.

Telma interrupted them then, swinging back around as quickly as she'd promised with a bowl of the stew Link must have smelled upon entering—a dish of meat and vegetables, though Ghirahim could tell at a glance that Link’s serving leaned heavily towards the meat. Anyone who had ever shared a meal with the boy knew where his preferences ran in that regard.

Link thanked her for the meal distractedly, but ignored the food as she left.

“You know about… magic,” he said awkwardly once Telma was out of earshot again, pulled reluctantly away by a cluster of soldiers, though her head still angled their way.

“That I do,” Ghirahim agreed, preening. His ability to perform any great feats with it waned by the day, but the knowledge remained.

“And you're a… sword.”

“The finest you will ever wield,” Ghirahim promised, overlooking the flicker of doubt in Link's eye. He might not have been formed for Link's hands in exactly the same way as his old sword—exactly the opposite, in fact—but at least he would not need to be put to rest in some forest before Link’s life was through.

“You…” Link bit his lip. “You know what’s in the Arbiter’s Grounds?”

Ghirahim eyed Link thoughtfully. “Better, perhaps, than you do.” Far be it from him to dissuade the boy from a hopeless cause, and yet… “There is no repairing that mirror, Link.”

Link’s hands clenched into fists, and Ghirahim wondered if he was even aware of the snarl curling his lips.

“Nobody knows that for sure,” he said stubbornly. “Somebody must have built it in the first place, right?” So, Link had found his purpose—for better or for worse. Either way, the hero's soul never lasted long without one.

“Should I interpret this round of questioning as an invitation?” 

Ghirahim knew the answer already, of course. He should have put more faith in a connection already lifetimes in the forging. It was only a matter of time before—

Link looked up at him, blue eyes catching him off guard with their openness.

“Why do you want to come with me?” he asked, something surprisingly earnest breaking through the suspicion that had dogged all their interactions until now. “I know what you said earlier, but tell me honestly: why?”

“You…” The hero almost always had blue eyes, Ghirahim had found, as if the sky he had loved so much so long ago could be contained inside. As much as Ghirahim adored a deft twist of words, saying one thing to obscure another… sometimes with Link, unadorned honesty really was the only way forward. “You remind me of someone I traveled with… a long time ago.”

For only a moment to Ghirahim's eyes, the Link in front of him shifted, a messy fringe of hair framing rounder cheeks and a warm, carefree expression. Shaking his head to dismiss the vision, Ghirahim drained the cup in front of him, wondering grimly if Telma would bring him ten more glasses of the same. Twenty. If he drained this whole bar, would Ghirahim finally forget?

“Your cause will be my cause for as long as we travel together,” he said, grimacing. “I promised as much already, and the why of it doesn’t matter.”

Calloused fingers brushed against his own tentatively, and he looked up in surprise to find Link giving him a somber look of understanding.

“I get it,” he said wearily. “You're a lot like someone I used to know, too.”

—

Link felt his mind pull free as the scene surrounding them unraveled, though only just. He was still falling towards the next memory—still tangled too tightly both body and soul with the man whose voice rang through his chest, shaking his teeth.

“The little wolf… reminded me of you, in some ways.” Laughter burned his throat like bile. “Less so in others. There are always similarities, of course—but the differences…”

Questions piled atop each other in the back of Link’s mind, none of which he’d have the chance to ask. Already, he could feel the next memory approaching, swallowing his weak sense of self, until…

—

The hero frowned down at the sword in his hands, heedless of the rain that poured from above to drench his garish green tunic, and Ghirahim knew that he'd made a mistake.

From the start, nothing about his awakening into this strange era had settled right with Ghirahim. Ganondorf, the avatar of his master’s vengeance in this time, was as much a sorcerer as a swordsman, though when Ghirahim had felt him awaken to his master’s power, he still answered that irresistible call. From the desert they rode like a scourge, capturing with honeyed tongue the ear of the king. His master’s displeasure had fallen in sinister form upon all who withheld the spiritual stones that barred him from entering the Sacred Realm where the Triforce slept…

…And then the hero had emerged from the forest, not to fight any final battle, but to claim that such battles were already fought. While Ghirahim had called the hero from the sky “child” often enough, this boy was a child in truth—but effective still at turning first the princess, then the sages, and finally the entirety of the royal family against his master, imprisoning him in the Arbiter’s Grounds for crimes he had yet to commit.

It all left a bad taste in Ghirahim's mouth. Time was ever a malleable thing where the goddess was concerned, and Ghirahim couldn't shake the sense that he'd been robbed of something rightfully his… or the memory of it, at least: that moment of great finality when his master faced the hero down with Ghirahim’s sword in hand.

To top it all off, the child hero himself had vanished soon after, reappearing intermittently across Hyrule over the years but never easy to track down—not that Ghirahim was even convinced at first that he wanted to. He had followed this strange hero often enough to recognize Link’s spirit inside, though his reserved nature had developed to such an extreme this time that he sometimes went days without speaking… but Ghirahim didn't know him, much less know how to approach him.

The first time around, Link had come to him all on his own. This one didn't know to do so. They had nothing.

Whatever thread had bound their fates in a previous life must have long since lost its strength. Even if Ghirahim somehow convinced Link to take him as his companion, their partnership couldn’t possibly replace what he’d shared with the hero of the sky—with Link as he was meant to be. It might be best for both of them if Ghirahim simply moved on, finding some other way to fill a century or two of slow decline before his master’s waning power pulled him into sleep once more—and yet…

And yet.

Link’s sword decided it for him at last, its gilded diamond pattern calling to Ghirahim like a sign from fate itself. Whatever else he might be, this hero was a gifted swordsman, possibly even surpassing the previous hero’s skill—and so Ghirahim had decided that if fate intended to rob him of that final battle in his master’s hands, then he would at least have this boy wield him now, whether he ever knew it or not.

It had even worked, for a time. It was no difficult feat to change his shape, and Ghirahim had imitated that gilded sword without flaw, slipping seamlessly into the hero’s life… but in their last battle, an exciting dance of rain and blood, Ghirahim had let too much of his excitement slip through—and Link, finally, had noticed.

Still, Ghirahim tried to convince himself, even if Link had felt something, he couldn't possibly understand just what it was he felt. Indeed, as Link reluctantly sheathed his sword after examining every inch of it, mounting the horse that was his only constant companion and riding a short distance to the mountains where an outcropping of rock offered barely passable shelter, Ghirahim decided with satisfaction that Link must have brushed the strangeness off as an anomaly—something brought on by the heat of battle. The truth of the matter was no doubt too foreign for Link to even suspect, much less know what to do about it.

Gathering what kindling he could find beneath the rocky overhang, Link managed to light a decent fire even from damp wood with a quickly cast spell—another startling oddity to this particular hero. The Link of old never had the gift for magic, much less the head. Leaving the horse to graze nearby, Link seated himself on a stone by the fire, sighing at the warmth. Unsheathing Ghirahim’s sword, he laid it across his lap—and sat there in silent contemplation, eyes closed.

Then he pulled out a blue ocarina and began to play.

Ghirahim recognized the power behind the notes immediately, as well as the intent. A song of healing, it was meant to soothe the listener of any old pains or regrets, to the point of putting to rest the souls of those who lingered too long over unfinished business.

It grated like a rasp against Ghirahim’s core, and he wanted—no, needed it to stop.

“Enough,” Ghirahim hissed, emerging from the sword to glare balefully at Link. “Would you cease with that infernal whistle?”

The song stopped, the ocarina lowering slightly from lips hung open. Only as the blistering haze of music faded did Ghirahim finally see Link’s shocked face and realize the extent of what he'd inadvertently revealed.

His first impulse was to retreat back within the sword, though he knew already that it was too late for that. His second was to straighten to his full, impressive height, but the shallow overhang prevented that—so instead, he knelt, tossing back his cloak as well as he could and thinking quickly.

“Forgive me,” he murmured. “I suppose we are not yet formally introduced. I am called Ghirahim, and I am… the spirit of your sword.” With a wry twist to his lips, he added, “Do not try that again. I am not some wandering soul to be serenaded to sleep.”

Link’s wide blue eyes moved from the sword back to Ghirahim again in clear, unspoken question, the wet fringe of hair that the fire had yet to dry still plastered across his face, and Ghirahim… hesitated. It was as clear an opportunity as he would ever have to insinuate himself into this hero’s good graces, particularly if he was less than forthcoming about certain aspects of his nature—but the prospect sat poorly with him.

No, Link had accepted him once before despite his past. He would not twist himself out of shape now just to become more palatable.

“I have not always been such,” he admitted, watching Link thoughtfully. “In fact, if my suspicions are correct, you should be intimately familiar with my true form.”

Though his heroic exploits were not widely known, those who knew of Link's true nature in this era called him the hero of time. If he had really fought his master in the future as he once claimed…

With a snap of Ghirahim's fingers, the sword in Link's lap transformed into something much larger: the chosen blade of the desert king. Link froze as if facing a viper, his gaze flicking between the sword and its inhabitant again in sharp understanding.

“As I thought,” Ghirahim said bitterly. “You have been at the end of it.” Shaking his head, his voice nevertheless took on a tone of grandiosity. “Yes, Link. I am not the hand who wields it, but I am that sword.”

Link’s eyes had narrowed, staring at the sword in his hands now in furious contemplation, and Ghirahim prepared for him to cast it aside. He would have to find some other way to occupy his time now… a rather dull prospect.

Then Link looked up at him, his lips writhing with labored speech.

“You… remember?”

The raw longing in those words took Ghirahim by surprise, so like the sky child that for a moment, he was left almost breathless. That yearning for some acknowledgment of the twists and turns of his heroic journey—the desperation for shared memories once the companion who had shared in it all had departed—it must have run deep in his soul if yet another hero sought such comfort from the very sword he'd crossed blades with.

Ghirahim had not quite understood it before, too caught up in the bitter differences to notice, but this was the hero’s spirit. He could see it in the eyes now: that restless wandering in search of purpose that had brought the Link from another time so unexpectedly into his arms.

He did not remember the battle, of course—not in the way Link wanted him to—but neither did Link remember what Ghirahim wished he could, so in that way, they were evenly matched. Still, he thought he remembered enough.

To prove it, Ghirahim snapped his fingers again, and his sword shifted shape once more to mimic a blade that only the two of them in this age had ever seen, sealed away in the Temple of Time: the Master Sword.

Link stood with a startled yell, the sword clattering from his lap to the ground as he stumbled back.

“Don't,” he said sharply. “You shouldn't—”

“I should not,” Ghirahim agreed, and the blade was once again the gilded sword it had been before. The tension in Link’s shoulders eased slightly, and the breath fell out of him in a rush. “Yours still, if you want it.”

Ghirahim gestured, and the sword floated through the air, hovering before Link at just the right height for him to grasp… but Link ignored it, regarding Ghirahim instead with wary wonder. His retreat had brought him back into the rain, which ran in rivulets down his face.

There would be questions, of course, once Link could get his mouth and mind around them, and Ghirahim would need to provide answers—though again, the thought came that the closer he adhered to the truth, the better. If Link caught him in a lie, he would have no second chances… but Link was going to accept.

He could see it in the longing that weakened Link’s limbs, and the way he looked to Ghirahim like he held the keys to… well, relief, at least, if not quite salvation. Ghirahim thought he might appear as such, backlit by the fire while Link watched him from the rain.

Link's fingers twitched, then grasped for the sword, and Ghirahim couldn't have possibly helped the grin that split his face. So the two of them had more than nothing, after all. If their thread of fate still persisted beyond all reason… well, who was Ghirahim not to follow where it led?

–

“It's almost over.” The voice that rasped up through him might have been soothing, if acid could soothe. Link didn't have to know the boundaries of his own body and soul to know that all of him was cold. “My master's power was not made for you, but neither was I, and to bear one means bearing us both. You did offer me as much as we had time for, remember? And there is time for one more.”

The two of them had already fallen impossibly far down that thread–so far down, Link wondered how they would ever climb their way back up.

“The start of it all,” he murmured, a painful vibration—but there was something almost uncertain winding beneath those words, sharp with discomfort. Link squirmed to escape it, or thought he did, and wondered why they still hesitated when they were so far down—

And then all sensation swept mercifully away as Ghirahim opened his eyes…

–

If Ghirahim didn't know better, he would have said that the chosen one of the goddess, the hero who vanquished Demise, was lost.

Of course, that wasn't quite it, Ghirahim mused to himself, tracking Link languidly from a distance with nearly the same ease he always had before. “Lost” would imply some desired destination or, at the very least, a lack of familiarity with his surroundings. Considering that Ghirahim had found Link wandering this same forest when he first fell from the sky, he could assume this wasn't the case… though from the newfound diligence Link paid his surroundings, he might still have lost something—or if Ghirahim's suspicions were correct, perhaps some one.

There was one loose end he'd yet to wrap up from his adventure, after all… or rather, one loose thread.

Then again, if he was seeking out someone specific, Link clearly hadn't even the faintest idea of where to look. His wandering of late had carried him all across the surface… and with nothing better to occupy his time, Ghirahim had followed, wondering at the grim set to his face that hardly seemed to suit a victorious hero. 

Ghirahim himself had spent weeks after his frantic flight through the Gate of Time recovering from that shattering loss, and weeks more coming to terms with the fact that he would not recover fully—not when he drew his greatest strength from a master whose power waned further with each passing week. One day, like the swelling of a malicious tide, Demise would gain strength and form once more, and maybe then Ghirahim would gain back that spark of his former self… but until then, all he could do was watch black fissures crawl across his skin—marks that had once been a show of strength, of his true form, now signaling nothing but weakness with his inability to control them—and wonder with dull lethargy how long it would take before his waning strength pulled him once again to sleep within his sword.

When the goddess first sealed his master away, he had lasted for scant few centuries after. With his strength already depleted, Ghirahim could only hope to last half that long this time around.

Link stopped on the path below, pivoting, and Ghirahim just had the presence of mind to slip sideways out of view. This, too, was a new habit of his that had almost caught Ghirahim off guard the first time it happened, and further confirmed his suspicions. He still couldn't say for certain that Link hadn't seen the last, lingering diamonds of his departure earlier that day… but he thought that this time, at least, he'd avoided—

“Hello?” Link called out, turning towards Ghirahim’s hiding spot to peer suspiciously through the leaves. His hand inched towards his hilt. “Who’s there?”

Or maybe not, Ghirahim acknowledged ruefully.

The sword Link drew, while certainly the best handiwork his people could provide him, still fell laughably short of the living steel he had wielded with such grace on their last encounter, and Ghirahim wanted nothing more than to twist that unsightly scrap of metal in his hands. How the mighty had fallen.

How all the mighty had fallen.

“I know you’re there,” Link said more softly, his shaking voice betraying his uncertainty.

Ghirahim had spent weeks already musing over where and when and whether to make his presence known to this boy, all the while watching Link’s stumbling, solitary trek across the surface in search of… something… and while Ghirahim could not abide the notion that Link might think him in hiding, neither was this open forest grove where even the tiniest Kikwi might stumble across them the place for them to meet.

Fortunately, while his days of summoning tornados were behind him for now, Ghirahim’s smallest tricks had always unnerved Link the most. Snapping his fingers with the wisp of a grin, Ghirahim appeared behind Link for just long enough to whisper:

“Come and find me.”

…And was gone again before Link could even finish whirling around, leaving nothing but the echoes of diamonds and laughter for Link to grasp at. That laughter stayed with Ghirahim long after he'd left Link's earshot, leaning up against the temple's entrance to wait. It was gratifying to discover that if nothing else, the shattering chimes of his appearance could still make a hero flinch.

Ghirahim had left Link without naming a destination, certain that none was required, and Link did not disappoint. In fact, the hero arrived so quickly that Ghirahim more than half-suspected him of sprinting the whole way. He stopped short upon discovering Ghirahim outside the temple, perhaps expecting to find him ensconced within as he had so long ago, and his flushed face formed a picturesque mess of thoughts and emotions that Ghirahim—and maybe even Link himself—had no hope of deciphering.

At no point had Link sheathed his sword since drawing it, holding it out between them now warily, and Ghirahim eyed the dull blade with dry resignation. It was like that, then.

“So, you’ve found me at last!” Ghirahim intoned dramatically, as was expected, acknowledging the boy’s presence by gesturing towards himself. “After all this time… It’s not too much to presume that I am the one you’ve been searching for, is it? The last little mar on your heroic record for you to wipe clean...” He waved a wrist as if to flick something away, eyes glittering with condescension as Link approached.

Link had been searching these woods for most of the day now, the warm air and deepening shadows speaking of late afternoon. Aside from the melting away of Demise’s lesser minions, little had changed about this temple since Ghirahim last stood before it, although the humans had already begun to spread across the rest of the land like some self-righteous plague. Their short-lived focus had fixated so far on the new and the progressing, paying no heed to the crumbling remnants of their long-forgotten past.

“How long have you been following me?” Link asked, as blunt and graceless with his words as always. Ghirahim hummed in pretend thought, tapping one cheek.

“Do you mean how many hours today, or how many weeks before now?” he asked in retort, indulging a self-satisfied smirk when Link looked taken aback. Ghirahim's carelessness today was the exception, not the rule. “The number is roughly the same, I think. You’ve been at this quest of yours for quite some time, haven’t you?” He paused, giving Link space to respond. When the boy said nothing, he continued. “I would commend you on your diligence in seeking me out, yet I can’t help but notice that if you’d been even half this inept at tracking the spirit maiden, I would have swept her away quite easily. How disappointing that your skills have begun to rust in your old age.”

Still, Link stared at him in silence, almost unblinking, until Ghirahim began to wonder slowly whether the levers to Link’s reactions that he had gleefully pulled in the past might have started to break down in the months since their final battle. His mention of the spirit maiden had brought the expected flash of anger to Link’s eyes, of course, but otherwise…

“You’ll have to give me more to work with than that, I’m afraid,” Ghirahim said dryly. “If you’ve something to say to me now that you’ve found me, then say it now. However, if you’re here to finish what you started months ago, as that sword implies—” Link jerked, staring at his own weapon as if he’d forgotten that he held it. “—then I’m sorry to say that I’m in no mood to indulge you. In fact, if that's the case, then I think I might just—”

“Wait,” Link said quickly. “I'm not trying to… look, see?” And to Ghirahim’s amazement, Link hurriedly sheathed his sword, even going so far as to hold up his hands in a placating gesture. “Please don't go.”

Taken aback, Ghirahim examined Link shrewdly, taking in the hero anew. From a distance, he had thought Link grim; up close, he looked worn, or perhaps even haggard. Ghirahim had seen enough of the human settlements, and even the spirit maiden herself, to know that both prospered… yet in the aftermath of his victory, Link did not.

“Zelda was easier to find,” Link offered after a moment, with a nonsensical, half-hearted grin. “I… had a different sword then, and…” He paused to swallow, grimacing. Oh, he felt his own lack keenly. “I didn't know whether you were alive, or where to start looking for you… or until earlier today, whether you wanted to be found.”

“I see.” So Link had seen him earlier, though he seemed to be under the impression that Ghirahim had allowed himself to be seen on purpose. Quietly, Ghirahim decided not to correct the misconception. “And the reason for seeking me out, if not to finish me off…?”

Any reason strong enough to prompt weeks of lonely searching should have sat easily on the tip of Link's tongue. Instead, he clammed up, his comparative chattiness vanishing as mysteriously as it had arrived.

Still, Ghirahim could be a patient man when given the right incentive, and the curiosity he felt at this wilting hero was almost enough to remind him of why he had always considered sparing Link his guilty little pleasure. How a mere human could have so thoroughly caught his fascination in the first place…

His patience was rewarded as Link chewed first on his cheek, then on his lip, and at last, opened his mouth to ask:

“Do you still want to kill me?”

Link winced as soon as he spoke, disappointed with how the words had come out. Still, for all its bluntness, Ghirahim understood the ins and outs of what he wished to know. There was an inherent hope hidden on one side of the question, and on the other, a lurking fear: what were Ghirahim’s intentions now—for Link, the surface, and beyond?

“An intriguing thing to ask,” Ghirahim murmured. “Let’s find out together.”

And before Link could do more than blink, Ghirahim had surged forward, a dark saber appearing in his hands just in time to press against Link’s neck.

Link spasmed in shock, attempting to step backward, and was prevented by Ghirahim’s hand gripping the hair beneath his horrid excuse for a hat. Arms half-flailing to keep his balance, Link glared up at him with wild, stormy eyes, his heart galloping in alarm as he strained to pull away from where a red drop of blood wandered along the curve of his throat… and then he stopped. His eyes darted across Ghirahim's face, a sharp crease forming between them as his brows drew down in confusion. Then his lips parted, comprehension pouring out like the sun through breaking clouds.

Each expression told a story, though not one that Ghirahim could hope to make sense of. What about this position could Link possibly find enlightening?

Link's pulse slowed from its frantic pace to something steady and certain—a repeating rush of blood that thrummed through him with such strength, Ghirahim could hear the rhythmic tremble in his breath.

“You don't,” Link said wonderingly, with what really was reckless confidence considering the sword pressed against his throat. 

What was more, Ghirahim himself had not yet reached that same conclusion. Snarling with an anger that fed on Link’s calm, Ghirahim pressed in harder, his rage all the more invigorating after its long absence. This boy—this worm —was the very reason Ghirahim existed in this sorry state to begin with, instead of drunk on blood and power at his master’s side. He had emerged from battle victorious, and dared to be dissatisfied! He—he…

He was smiling now, pushing the saber gently from his neck—and Ghirahim, to his own numb surprise, was allowing it. The storm of his eyes had cleared to a calm, brilliant blue, and whatever Link had been searching for before, Ghirahim had the sudden, fleeting impression that he'd found it.

“It's okay,” Link said. “I don't want to kill you, either.”

–

“That’s enough.”

Link was thrust up from the depths of Ghirahim's mind so quickly, he staggered. The scent of stone and burning oil from the torch was the first thing to hit his awareness, and he coughed reflexively.

“Enough,” he echoed in a blank rasp. The afterburn of pain lingered like a gnawing chill in his heart, but in the aftermath of memory, Link barely noticed. Blue eyes still looked up at him from an ancient past, some unknown emotion stuck at the base of his throat… though swallowing dislodged the feeling. A bit.

Whether skyward bound, adrift in time, or steeped in the glowing embers of twilight…

“You said I could show you what I want you to see.” Ghirahim's voice came out quiet, even detached, and he disentwined their fingers with none of the usual flair he might have given such a motion. “I have done so now, and then some. It is enough.”

Link watched Ghirahim retreat—there was no other word for it—long gloves shimmering back into place along Ghirahim's arms as if to form one more barrier between them, but the strange disquiet of the action barely managed to sink in to a mind still whirling with—with…

Ghirahim had actually cared about all of those heroes—though on second thought, maybe “cared” was the wrong word. Still, beneath his callous superiority, and the manipulations, and all that stomach-twisting bloodlust, there had been… something. Something soft.

Except all of that had led them here. With those earlier heroes, Ghirahim had been reluctant to nudge them in any direction. With Link, he’d done it without a second thought.

“What was the point of this?” Ghirahim whispered in a voice that Link could barely make out, though they stood mere paces away. “Even seeing it all wouldn't make you… You share this sparse handful of memories now, still not knowing their weight—and soon you will die and join those men in memory. Meanwhile, I…”

The murmured words faded off as if Ghirahim had forgotten he was speaking, staring at the patterns of tiles below without seeing them at all, and Link slowly awakened to the realization that something was… not right. Whatever Ghirahim had expected to gain from this, Link thought he’d come out with something else entirely.

Licking his lips, Link had the distinct sense that he should choose his next words carefully.

“What happened?” he asked, and saw Ghirahim's eyes snap back towards him. “Something changed between then and now. How did it all go… wrong?”

Ghirahim’s eyes narrowed slightly, staring at Link sideways for so long that Link almost thought he wouldn't answer.

“The last hero,” he said at last, almost wistfully. “Things ended poorly between us that time, as you can imagine… though I suppose I can admit now that we both made our mistakes. Yours was thinking the two of us could make a fool of fate.” His lips curled, their derision directed inward. “Mine was believing you.”

Link's brows furrowed as he realized that Ghirahim had said all that he intended to on the matter, and he looked down to hide his dissatisfaction. In Ghirahim's current strange mood, Link didn't dare press, but still… why couldn’t he have chosen to share that memory instead?

“There really is no helping your hopeless curiosity, is there?” Looking up again, Link found Ghirahim still staring at him, his expression a blend of fond incredulity. “This was all ostensibly to tempt me, wasn’t it? Yet now I could almost believe you've been caught in your own trap.”

Caught in his own…?

A single speck of malice floated through the air between them, and Link instantly understood. The entirety of his focus narrowed in on that speck, tracing its erratic path upward with all the intensity of a Guardian narrowing its sights. Then it vanished, leaving Link staring into Ghirahim’s smug grin.

“Time's up, little hero.”

“Another deal,” Link said, taking a bracing step back to disguise the movement of his left hand reaching into one of his prepared pouches. Ghirahim always placed the knife in his right hand. “I want to make another—”

“Stay where you are, please.” Ghirahim said it almost kindly despite the reproving wag of his finger that stopped Link in his tracks. “This will only take a moment.”

Knowing he was trapped there, Link still tried to move, and found his legs rooted to the ground… but that was fine. Link wouldn’t need to use his legs.

“I’ll cut the rope myself,” he said quickly, another spot of malice floating up between them. This time, Ghirahim did pause. Briefly.

“Oh?”

“After I fight Calamity Ganon,” Link admitted reluctantly. “Once that's done, I promise I'll come back and set you free. In return…”

He hesitated. He had nothing left to give.

“I have everything else I want from you, I'm afraid,” Ghirahim hummed, and Link felt a familiar weight fall into his hand. Looking down, he saw his fingers clench the hilt of a black dagger. “Everything but this.”

“You can come with me after you're free,” Link offered desperately. There was still every chance in the world that this wouldn't work—though squeezing the hand still hidden in his pouch lightly, he felt reassured by the warm prickle against his skin. “Like all those other heroes. If that’s what you want, I won’t try to stop you.”

Ghirahim scoffed.

“Do you still not understand how replaceable you are?” he asked scornfully. The malice flew up steadily now as Link felt himself walk forward, knife outstretched. “How insignificant? It is entirely possible that you will seek me out either way—and if not…” Close enough now to loom over him, Ghirahim's grin had a manic edge as he tilted his head, offering Link better access to the rope at his neck. “There will be other chances. Other heroes.”

Gritting his teeth, Link tensed with reluctant anticipation. This was it, then. 

Drawing the time out as much as he could, he waited until the last possible second before clenching his left fist shut.

Inches from the rope, the knife slipped from between Link's abruptly rigid fingers, his rapidly clenching muscles obeying no will but that of the shock jolting through his body. Breath hitched in his throat for a moment before hissing through clenched teeth, and as the crackling current finally dissipated and Link felt himself slump forward, he dared give Ghirahim a level look.

Inside, though, a thrill sparked through him. It had worked.

Frozen in place with a different kind of shock, Ghirahim's single eye looked wide and, for the first time, uncertain. The malice was coming faster now. Thicker.

“What sort of trick is this?” he hissed under his breath. “Your companion…?”

Another quick snap had Link armed again, and Ghirahim growled.

“Cut it now!” he urged with a sharp gesture, and this time, Link surged forward—but focused too narrowly on the dagger, Ghirahim missed Link’s other hand delving once more into his pouch.

Again, the dark knife fell from uselessly clenching fingers, a short grunt of pain pushed out unwillingly through cracking lips. Link's heart beat strangely asynchronous as the electric energy dissipated, a slight tremor shivering through his hands… but it was almost over now. He just had to push through the blood moon’s peak—and the moment of Ghirahim's greatest power.

Gloved fingers raked through Ghirahim's hair, clawed and wrung at the air as if they desired Link’s neck.

“Again!” he rasped, and Link felt the knife return to his hand—his left hand, he realized with a start. Flustered, he dove awkwardly for the pouch with his right… and this time, Ghirahim saw.

“What's that?” he asked sharply, hooking a finger through the air in a quick arc, and Link’s hand jerked from inside his pouch. A handful of electric chu jellies that he'd barely managed to snag pulsed precariously between his fingers.

Ghirahim went absolutely rigid. Their eyes met for less than a second, nearly obscured from each other by flurries of malice, and Link bared his teeth.

“Time's up,” he said, lurching forward to slam his chest against his hand. The fragile jellies burst, unleashing all of their electric energy directly into Link's heart.

The world went white. Vaguely, Link felt himself convulse, flung backward as if some giant hammer had lodged against his chest, shattering him and sticking there, a heavy, immovable weight. Tasting metal, he thought maybe he’d bit through his tongue—but it was all a faded thing. The ringing in his ears, the pale face screeching obscene threats above him, the world gone red in the blood moon’s wake… all of it a distant, faded thing.

Mipha stirred inside him, waiting and ready, and Link smiled at the thought of her healing touch. Little though he tried to use her gift—dying was a sensation Link hoped never to grow used to—it had always left him feeling fully refreshed, with even his smallest aches and pains washed away.

He fell out of consciousness with a contented sigh, knowing he had won, looking forward to the moment when he would wake up to Mipha.

He did not wake up to Mipha.

Pain layered atop pain as Link returned to the world with a start, his ribs creaking dangerously against some heavy, rhythmic force that rocked mercilessly against his chest. Eyes blown open, Link tried to flail, and managed only a weak twitch of limbs. His thoughts scattered in all directions, his wide eyes darting wildly, seeing nothing. There was something he needed to remember. Some one. A presence other than himself that he needed to watch out for.

The pounding on his chest finally ceased, and that force—that presence— Ghirahim leaned over him, white lips locking against his own, and nothing in this world made sense.

Ghirahim was kissing him… or, no.

No, Link realized as his nose was pinched shut and air blown forcefully through aching lungs. No, Ghirahim was saving him. Ghirahim hadn’t known about Mipha, and he was…

Link coughed, convulsing violently, and Ghirahim drew back at once, leaving Link space to hack and retch beneath him. Eventually, the spasming of his chest eased enough for Link to lay back again, looking up weakly into Ghirahim’s contorted face. The other man’s breathing sounded harsh, rasping through lips curved into a rictus snarl.

“You wild…” Ghirahim growled, glittering eyes darting over Link—looking at him, at last. “You stupid…”

He leaned over Link again, and this… this was a kiss. Harsh, grasping, and Link’s mouth still tasted like blood, but Ghirahim’s tongue didn’t mind, coiling around his as if to draw more of it out of him. Moving on strange instinct, Link tried to lean in and moaned at the effort, the sound spurring Ghirahim to grip his shoulders tightly—except the blood moon had passed its peak, malice dissipating into nothing, and Ghirahim was slipping away.

Pulling back with a harsh, despairing laugh, Ghirahim looked down at Link, something indecipherable passing between them.

“One of these lifetimes,” he whispered as he vanished, “I will learn not to underestimate you.”

Then there was nothing but a black sword thrust point first into the ground, a single rope with faded fabric charms stretching out from its hilt—and one last, fading whisper:

“And one of these lifetimes, you will learn not to underestimate me. ”

Shapeless terror grasped Link. Scrambling backward, knowing he needed to move without yet knowing why, Link lurched towards the stone door on his knees, desperate to wedge even just his fingers beneath its edge—

And heard the sharp, unmistakable click of a lock trapping him inside.