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"Do you really remember me?" she asked, her eyes twinkling with a hopeful familiarity. It really was just as the Great Deku Tree had said—her smile was like the sun.
His body ached beyond description. Did he remember her? In that very moment it was as if "remember" was not a strong enough word for how far his knowledge of the princess stretched. He felt as if he'd always known her, across the very fabric of time and space. She'd always been more than just a princess, to him. He knew every name she'd ever gone by. He knew her every story. He saw her many faces in a matter of seconds, memories that had no ground in his own reality. But as quickly as they came to him, these strange glimmers dissipated like bad ideas.
Now there was only silence, and her golden locks gleaming in the morning sun. Did he really remember her?
The spotless Bow of Light still in-hand, he shuffled towards her wearily. He wasn't sure what expression he was making, but he noticed she was beginning to look confused.
Was she a ghost like the others? He had to know, lest he discover yet another one of his allies from all those years ago was nothing but a spirit. His hands itched to graze her skin, to see if she was even real. But he hesitated. If she turned out to be dead, how would he handle the truth?
No, she couldn't be. She'd been with him all along, and she was right there before him in this moment. She had to be.
Her quizzical gaze softened when his fingertips just barely met the blonde hair on her forearm.
His body plunged into a deep relief. She was real. He didn't doubt it for a second longer. His princess wasn't just a voice in his head, she was alive!
His legs folded and his knees met lush green grass. A gust of wind turned the surrounding field into ocean waves. He found himself clutching the fabric of her dress in both hands, silk meeting calloused fingers. Its soft feel was the same as it had been those hundred years ago—when he held her in his arms after the castle was lost. The skirt didn't carry the wreak of monster. There was no scent of seared wood or rust, or hot stone. The sour, pungent malice had been washed away in light.
He found himself sobbing then. These were no tears of joy, but they were not tears of sadness, either. The feeling was akin to weightlessness, yet it was strangely painful. It was as if he had spent his entire journey crushed beneath a boulder—his body had gone numb to the pressure, and parts of him surely died. But the sudden lack of this weight of the world was unfamiliar to him. His mind buzzed with confusion and fear.
It was all behind him. Every wound, every scar—every restless night and double-back over his shoulder. Every near-death second, every shrieking bone and muscle. Every life depending on his actions. Every blood moon and every arrow and rock and fire and bolt of lightning and gust of wind and beam of light piercing his skin. Every tree, every river—shooting stars, dragons swirling through the sky, every bounding deer and galloping horse and blooming flower and every sunset he had spent alone with no one to listen, no one to understand, no one to share this legendary burden that would haunt his best dreams and worst nightmares until his last breath.
"Link..." Her voice broke the relentless dance of memories. He heard her sink to the ground in front of him. He buried his face in the white fabric, ashamed of his emotional outburst. This was hardly appropriate behavior for a royal knight.
He felt her arms across his back. Shuddering, he couldn't help but think that this was all wrong. He wasn't the one who had spent one hundred years containing the Calamity. Yet, he couldn't help but feel his blood run cold at the thought of having regained consciousness even a day too late… would Ganon have consumed the nurturing and unforgiving land he'd grown to know so well?
"I suppose it was very unfair," she whispered, a certain lightheartedness in her voice, "All that pressure put on two people. We were too young for it, far too young. I'm over a hundred years old, now, and I still don't feel that I can handle everything that happened."
Link gingerly let go of the dress and placed his hands on her back. He reluctantly rested his forehead where her shoulder met her chest. Her warmth was devastatingly wonderful, such that he hadn't felt in a very long time. It made him tremble.
He rubbed the corners of his eyes with his thumb. She was letting him carry on this hug far beyond what should be a proper amount of time. But then again, what was considered proper after what the two had seen?
Finally, his tears had run out. His mind went blank, drained of every ounce of energy he might have had left. He pulled away, unable to look her in the eyes or muster the strength to stand. Instead he felt his body being swayed in the wind like a tree branch, his bones weak with shock.
She laid her palms on his shoulders. He could see a smile on her face out of his peripheral. She took a moment just to look at him, before she spoke almost too quietly to be heard.
"You were very brave, Hero of Hyrule."
He sighed through his nostrils. "Brave". He must have been called "brave" a thousand times throughout his travels. He never once felt it was true. In fact, he hadn't gone a day since waking up without at least a sliver of fear inside him, telling him to give up—because Calamity Ganon would devour everything and there was nothing he could do to stop it.
What had kept him going couldn't be called bravery, no. It was a feeling unexplainable: the voices of those he'd met along the way. From the littlest of children to the mightiest of leaders. Memories of his friends, old and new. Their voices always resided in him, her voice most of all.
So, did he remember her? He remembered them all.
But when it came to Zelda, Link knew no one better.