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To love; what a profoundly horrible thing.
They always say it's the most beautiful, the purest thing in the world… But is it?
Love is like a fire. It's a spark, at first, nothing more. So many sparks never turn into anything at all. But with the right conditions, the right environment, the right timing, maybe, just maybe, that spark can become something more. Suddenly, it catches. That spark becomes a flame, and that flame grows, and grows, until it's a roaring blaze, and then, perhaps, they're right. Maybe that is the most beautiful thing in the world.
And then that fire dies. Sometimes, it's slow, sometimes all at once. Sometimes, it isn't anything wrong with the fire at all that does it. Sometimes, things just get in the way. How cruel to let those flames burn when they were always destined to falter. How cruel to let those flames leave so much destruction in their wake.
It's not as if it doesn't hurt when the sparks die out. It does, it always does. You just notice the loss of warmth a whole lot more when the fires that overtook your whole world turn to ashes right before your eyes, and all you can do is watch, helplessly, selfishly hoping that it might catch again, knowing, helplessly, that it won't. And yet, you hope just the same, even if it kills you all over again.
Revali watched. He couldn't help himself. It wasn't his fault that things ended the way they did, nor was it Link's. Sure, he'd blamed everyone he could find to blame, but when all is said and done, what could anyone have done?
Revali watched long after the ashes settled. Too long, really. He watched, and watched for a hundred years, because what else could he ever do, and watched, and watched, and watched. He watched, and saw as Link met someone new. Someone who made him laugh, and smile, who brought warmth to the stone-cold knight inside his stone-cold shell, and who brought him out of that shell, little by little, until it was discarded like an afterthought.
Revali watched, even though he knew he shouldn't, even though he knew it hurt him. He saw Link giggle like he used to make him do, he saw Link kiss Sidon just like he used to kiss him, he saw them go up to the top of Satori Mountain together and wish upon a star as they led in the grass in the pale moonlight. That was our place, why would you take him there?
Revali watched, and listened as Link called Sidon the same tooth-rottingly sick nickname he once called him, as he held him impossibly close in the same way he once felt, as he slowly adopted tiny little new mannerisms to mirror his new love just as he lost the old, as he worried as his new love hurt like he once worried for him, as he whispered those three words into his new love’s ear so gently, so softly. The same three words that once lit his heart ablaze. The same three words that must never have meant anything at all, because how could Link ever move onto someone new, when everything he ever saw of Link, every time he heard his name, every little detail in the world that reminded him of a day they spent together hurt him a thousand times more than Calamity Ganon ever did?
It was never the day he died that was the worst. That, he could handle. He was always bad with processing emotions, anyway. No, the worst came later. When it all sunk in. What he lost. What he could never, ever reclaim.
They called it a miracle, when the Champions were resurrected after the scourge of the Calamity was slewn, but weren't miracles meant to be happy?
Revali wasn't happy. The only small mercy he was afforded in all this was that he could no longer watch every second of Link's life, every little step he took away from him, forgetting him. He knew it was happening, he still felt it, but he couldn't watch anymore, and that was something.
He had reconnected with Link. That was nice. Being able to see him and talk to him, really talk to him, and know that he was seen back. Just being in his presence felt like flying. And then he opened his mouth.
“Sidon.”
“Sidon.”
“Sidon.”
Revali hated him. Hated him, because he was everything he would never be. Sidon was more attractive, sweeter, stronger, smarter. Where he was cynical, Sidon was optimistic; where he was sarcastic, Sidon was earnest; where he was closed-off, Sidon was open. Where he was a flawed man, Sidon was someone else, someone good.
Revali didn't hate him. He hated the idea of him, because he was perfection incarnate, and Revali could never be that. He hated himself - how could he ever compete with that? With someone like that in Link's life, he wondered if he was ever more than a flicker in his head. It was cruel, really. Desperately, horribly cruel. That Link could be so happy and content while Revali was reduced to this mess. How dare he move on?
I worshipped at your altar; I still do. I worship a God that doesn't even see me.
They talked, still, but it was never quite the same. Revali still felt the same rush when their eyes met or when Link said something sweet, the same joy when he saw the other smile, the same euphoria when he heard Link speak and it was like a song that all the musicians in the world could never capture. And yet, new feelings too. A new pain when he saw the happiness in Link's eyes, a new sorrow every time Link talked about his new love so animatedly, a new agony at every beautiful thing he did as it reminded him that Link was his no longer and never would be. He was addicted to the joy. Or the pain. Or perhaps even both.
Link was his lifeblood and the knife that spilt it, and Revali just led in the pool that welled from the wound, hoping, helplessly, that Link would stitch him back together again. That they could be together again.
What a stupid sentiment.
Revali had been a ghost for a hundred years, and yet all the same it was Link that haunted him. He was alive now, and yet the specter of love lost chased him forever and ever more. No place to run, no place to escape, no place to hide.
No place to go where he could no longer see that new flame burning, and yet no place to go where he could feel the old warmth.
No, I don’t think I will ever get over you.