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Zelda.
Meeting her is like waking from a dream. You're fifteen and standing in the middle of a crowded hallway in an age far from when you once began. You're alone and she's with friends, but blue eyes meet green and you're both frozen on spot. Her lips part in surprise, perhaps in recognition, perhaps to form the shape of your name. Because despite the fact that you've never met her before—not in this lifetime—she knows you, and you know her.
(And you know her lips. You've traced them before with the pad of your thumb; they were soft when they met the juncture between your neck and your shoulder. From them, she breathed your name, over and over, a mantra of hope and—)
Going through puberty and starting high school is bad enough, but now you're hit with an onslaught of memories and feelings that are not quite your own but will be. Your meeting with her has been written by the Goddesses, but that does not mean it was blessed by them. You're accustomed to this tune, hummed it before you were even conscious of what it was, and it's not worth it.
(She has died in your arms, you've died in hers. Even when you both lived, you did not share that life together. Not how you wanted to.)
So you break gaze with her and proceed past her, ignoring how her eyes widen just a fraction. You hear her friends ask if she's okay and you tell yourself you both will be better off apart in this life. Whatever demon you need to defeat, you'll figure it out when that time comes. Never mind that your souls are bound and you can't run away from her when she's your destiny.
(It's fate and pointless all the same.)
You are the lone wolf in the school and she is the Princess. Even without a monarchy, her presence exudes light and grace. She is like the sun, shining on others with her warmth and tenderness. In contrast, you are the moon that eases away the darkness, but simultaneously creates the shadows. You coexist, and while some may prefer night over day, no one will ever allow the moon to tarnish the brightness of the sun. A temporary eclipse, maybe, but nothing more and everything less.
This does not mean you don't have friends; you just like to keep them far and few. Daruk is a good buddy of yours and Mipha has been with you since you were children. They are also friends with Zelda and so you two eventually meet (officially). What either of you are supposed to do is introduce yourselves (unnecessary) and share a hug or shake hands (why when you've done so much more), but none of the above happens and instead, you both stand rather awkwardly in front of each other. Mipha laughs nervously and apologizes for your antisocial behavior but you know better and Zelda knows better so you don't bother correcting your childhood friend.
(And you can't touch her, won't touch her, lest you drag in more unbidden temptations.)
But being Zelda's sort-of friend allows you to be somewhat close to her and you can't decide if this is a good thing or not. On the one hand, it's counterproductive to what you originally intended but you can't deny you're drawn to her and every second you're near her makes your heart soar.
You begin to watch her because quite frankly, it's what you've been trained to do over and over again. She still likes fruitcakes and has picked violin as her instrument of choice this time around. She is also the libero on your school volleyball team and you are torn between being in awe every time she dives for the ball and wanting to surround her in bubble wrap to prevent any scrapes or bruises. Mostly though you enjoy hearing her laughter; the sound was a rarity in your past lives.
You're on the fencing and archery team and play club soccer. You're smaller than the rest of the guys but you're also faster with unbeatable reflexes (and stronger than they think, but like to keep this hidden for the most part; only Daruk knows. And Zelda, always Zelda). She likes to watch you too, between classes, at games. You try a little harder, play a little rougher when you know she's there. You pretend you don't feel her eyes follow you when you take your shirt off during practice.
It stays like this for the first year. At sixteen, you both start relationships with other people because you actually haven't spoken to her and she appears to be respecting your wishes. She dates Groose, the typical jock, and while it certainly annoys you, you take comfort in beating him in every sport he dares to challenge you in. You, in turn, start dating Mipha because it seems like the reasonable choice and she has loved you nearly this whole lifetime. And because there is no role in this life that will allow you to station yourself next to Zelda without question.
You try to give to Mipha what you can because she is kind and caring and deserves the best of you. She takes many of your firsts in this lifetime, as you do hers, and proves to be a very passionate lover. It doesn't take you long to realize she needs more than you can offer.
You imagine Zelda is in a similar position and it sometimes makes you feel as green as her eyes, but it's better than standing outside her chamber doors and hearing her pained gasps and whimpers. Her kings were gentle but they didn't know how to soothe her like you did, and fortunately it only lasted until an heir was produced. You've quickly learned, should the lifetime permit, to ease her into the process before another man ever lays hands on her. More than once you've ensured you were the last to touch her as well. There has been only one lifetime, the original reincarnations, where you were able to call yourself her husband and the father of her children; you suppose you're lucky to have any at all. Hyrule's safety and prosperity has always been the priority, and even with Courage and Wisdom, you two were, are, merely players on a board.
It's barely tolerable but you have more friends this year, as well as rivals that you respect. There's Revali, the vice captain of your archery team that is constantly trying to overthrow you. There's Midna who is too snarky for her own good and seems to be more aware of your feelings for the school's Princess than you're comfortable with. Urbosa is the school nurse and the coach of the wrestling team, and has been a secondary mother figure to you (and Zelda too). She warns you to think twice about the decision you've made, and though there is no context for this warning, you know she loves Zelda like a daughter and there is a misplaced hope that blossoms in your chest. Sometimes your friends remind you of people you've known Before, and maybe they are the same souls cycling through rebirth. It's hard to remember others when your beacon that is Zelda shines brighter than all else.
Another year goes by. You're seventeen and it's the Spring Equinox dance, and Zelda is absolutely breathtaking. Her dress is a sky blue (the color of your eyes) with sleeves draping off-shoulder. The bodice is form fitting but the skirt billows out and sweeps across the floor, and the matching gloves on her arms span from elbow to fingertips. She is every inch the princess she used to be, every bit the incarnation of Hylia she still is.
You're in a white suit that your mother forced you to get tailored and you're extremely grateful you did now. Somehow your tie almost matches Zelda's dress but then again, so does her date's and your date's attires. It's not significant, really, yet something tugs at you at the back of your mind.
The dance ends at midnight, but around ten, you wander into the courtyard. You're not a fan of crowds, never have been in any lifetime, and maybe it's this predictable behavior that lands you in her company. She's seated on a bench in a secluded corner, and catches your eye before yours can even adjust to her presence. Like the first day, you stare, unsure whether to move towards her or away. You should move away; for almost three years you've both done an excellent job at keeping distance. But something about tonight compels you to her, and you take the step forward before you even realize it.
You reach out to her, and she to you, but neither make contact. Years, centuries of experience tell you that now is not the time. The shadows are not dark enough and there are too many people around to risk it. Instead, she leans in, her breath on your ear, and tells you to come by her place later when the rest of the town sleeps. She slips a piece of paper into your coat pocket and brushes past you without touching you even once. Time does not move fast enough.
You're in a t-shirt and shorts when you scale to her second floor window without even considering the door. It's more familiar to you this way, and must be for her too as the window slides open without resistance. She's on her bed in a white slip, hair undone and in wavy cascades down her back. Your breath hitches in your throat and she laughs at you before patting the spot next to her. You're by her side in an instant, but still you hesitate to touch her because there's no going back once you do.
So you look at her and she swallows, then nods, her small hand coming to overlap yours. And in case you need a little more motivation, she says, No one's home.
The memories didn't do her, this, justice; your skin is set aflame at the feel of hers, body lurching to draw her closer, closer, closer. She meets you halfway in a desperate kiss, hands fumbling to claim purchase on your shirt and making a sharp tug upwards and over your head. You have one hand behind her neck and the other sliding up her thigh, fingers already hooking on the cotton band at her hips. Link, she breathes in that intimately familiar way that undoes you, and you forget about the world, about your doomed fate as you nudge her onto her back and sink into her arms.
Afterwards, you talk and you talk more than you have your entire life. You've been watching and observing one another for two to three years, appreciating and admiring from a distance, and there are so many words needed to fill that gap. You learn she likes it when you put your hair all the way up, like you do during fencing; even better when you use a pencil or a pen in the event you forget a hair tie. You tell her you think she's cute when she's mad, so you try hard to best her in your shared Ancient Hylian class just to get her flustered. She throws a pillow in your face for that and dissolves into unrestrained giggles. Her laughter is contagious and you find yourself chuckling as you pull her back into your arms.
As you settle down, you twirl her hair around your finger and ask if she remembers even though you know she does (why else would she suddenly invite you over?). She says nothing at first and instead traces an X with her index over your right pec, a large slash over your abdomen, a smaller one at the edge of your left rib cage. Her finger is warm but the trail she leaves is cold, and though you are scarless this lifetime, your previous wounds are still imprinted in you like it once did flesh.
Too much, she replies at last. You pull her closer and tell her you wouldn't change a thing as long as you can keep her safe. My Hero, she smiles, and you're lulled to sleep by the sound of her rhythmic breathing.
You're gone before the sun rises because your parents are expecting you to be home, but not before you take a moment to appreciate her bare, porcelain skin and almost regret that you blemished it in certain unseeable areas. She wakes too, pulling you into a searing kiss, and whispering I miss us onto your lips. Your whole world shifts (upside down or rightside up?) at these words and you end up leaving later than you originally intended to, but every sigh of your name makes any consequence worth it. There is none because no one knows (you've always, always made sure of it), but the next evening brings a hailstorm that cuts all power to the city. You know it's a warning from the Goddesses. She knows it's a warning from the Goddesses. You find yourself in her bed again anyway, embracing her and allowing the darkness to hide your tryst.
It'd be extremely wishful thinking to hope you could show up to school with her within your arms, but in this life, as it was in most lifetimes, you two are publicly bound to others.
But Mipha's touch barely sufficed before and it can't even scrape the surface now. Up until the Spring Equinox, you've only had Zelda in your dreams of distant pasts, but now she's real and yours and though forgetting had never been an option, distracting yourself is no longer possible.
You break up with Mipha before you can hurt her more than you probably already have, citing dreams of going abroad and being far, far away from Hyrule. It isn't a lie; staying where Zelda is when you can't have her will surely drive you insane. There's still another year before you graduate from school, but these goals are sudden and you need to make preparations and stave off the memories of her nails scraping against your shoulder blades.
You and Zelda don't meet or speak again for months. In theory, it should make your self-imposed separation easier; in reality, it makes it all the worse. Zelda doesn't break up with Groose until the summer holidays, and you'd be lying if you said you hadn't thought about whether you could've sped that along had you chanced a few more visits with her. It does you no good to think of her being touched by another.
You give in during the Fall Equinox, once again scaling into her bedroom window. It's more desperate this time; you're filled with the need to know that she's still yours even though she shouldn't be, will never be. She understands though, her fingers running through your hair as she settles on your lap. Always yours, she murmurs as she kisses you below the ear. There are no immediate repercussions but the winter is especially harsh that year.
She gives in when the Spring Equinox rolls back around and neither of you attend the dance this time. With everyone else celebrating, you find solace in each other, this time in your home. She wears your clothes because she wants to, and who are you to deny her? She looks good and you can't help but think that this is how it should be—the two of you, together.
You worship her that night. Your movements are slow and unhurried to draw out her pleasure. She's under your sheets but sometimes you catch glimpses of a campfire reflecting off her white ceremonial gown or a sliver of moonlight filtering through the canopy of a four poster bed. These are places you can't quite remember, yet know existed once upon a time. You've worshipped her through all your lifetimes, it seems.
When her head is resting next to your heart and your arms are curled around her waist, you tell of your plans to leave Hyrule. She grows stiff within your hold but doesn't pull away, so you grip onto her all the more. It's better this way, you reason to her, to yourself. You feel the friction of her cheek as she nods and don't comment on the wetness pooling on your chest. You curse the Goddesses for her sadness.
It snows the next day even though it's supposed to be spring. First, it's a flurry, then it's a full on blizzard, and school is consequently canceled for the week. You visit her once and while you're careful not to touch her this time, you tell her she's beautiful and feed her fruitcake instead of confessing that there is no place in existence you can go where you won't still be yearning for her.
On graduation day, you take advantage of the frenzy and pull her into a dark corner and kiss her. I love you, you say. Her response is a wordless kiss and a sob that breaks your heart.
The rain that pours nearly flushes out the ceremony.
You attend university in Termina because of its technological advancements and major in environmental engineering. You have always loved the wild and find a sense of purpose in protecting it. It keeps you busy and sometimes you don't sleep, but that's okay because it just means you dream of princesses less.
You're four years in and you debate whether you want to return to Hyrule. You visit your parents during the holidays but the last memory of Zelda you have is her tear stained face in her cap and gown. You wonder if she thinks of you from time to time. You wonder if she misses you.
There's a knock on your apartment door one evening. There is nothing special about that day; no ominous feelings or even a cloud in sight to forewarn you of anything cataclysmic. But when you swing your door open, Zelda stands before you and perhaps her light has depleted any blackness and obscurity from the town, and any condemnation that is sure to come after this will have to wait until she's gone.
She doesn't wait for a welcome before she grabs you by the collar and smashes her lips against yours. You feel more than you hear the muffled your room being demanded and you've been her soldier, her knight, her Hero for so long it's impossible for you to disobey, so you lead her accordingly. You tumble onto your bed with her in your arms and she's everything you've remembered from your past and everything you want for your future.
I love you, she whispers in your ear, your dreams, your heart, and you don't think you can withstand letting her go again.
You both brace for some kind of storm, hail, sleet, etcetera, but none comes; not that day, or the next, or the year after. You move back to Hyrule to be close to her again and you think maybe, just maybe, the Goddesses have given their blessings this time around.
Neither of you are so optimistic as to forget that your rebirth comes in three, and that eventually, you'll have to fend off Demise, or Calamity, or whatever epithet Ganon decides to adopt. You have no doubt you'll succeed, because that has been written by the Goddesses for years longer than you can recall.
But after that, you'd like to settle down. Not in the sense of staying in one place (Zelda also has a partiality for traveling), but an overture of commitment you can finally outwardly express. You'd like to bend on one knee for her, this time not as a soldier, or a knight, or even a Hero before his Princess or Queen, but as a man for the love of a woman (whom you have loved for lifetimes over, but that's a mere technicality).
And if she says yes (and you won't ask until you're sure she will), you may get married the next Spring Equinox and eventually have a daughter or a son or any and all variation of that. And then one day, when the next Zelda comes along, you hope she and the Link she meets will be allowed to have this happiness once more.
But for now, being with her is enough. Sometimes, not just in this lifetime, you both think you'd let the world burn if only for another minute together. But you're Courage and she's Wisdom and you're fated to save the world just as much as you are fated to meet. Like the sun and moon, you corroborate, and at times, one gives more while the other takes, but every now and then, they find an equal standing. Every now and then, your times align, and in this lifetime, you and Zelda are synchronous.