Chapter Text
He sliced off another corner of his apple under the spring blooms of the cherry blossom. With only a week to wait before his promotion, he'd taken the time to visit a place normally hidden from the world, in the valley between the rocky cut of a hill. Link wasn't a man of decadence, not when he could see the entirety of Hyrule and its beauty atop a mountain's cliff. There was only one way up these mountains, and that route was only paved with dirt underneath what was left of his bitten nails, and in between the grooves of his skin. It was days like this he knew he'd miss, as a Knight Commander, he'd no longer be able to wander off, to explore on his own time, not with a guard's battalion to keep watch over.
Only one week before he became the youngest in command at twenty, and the newest inductee to the exclusive club of men to attempt the Trial of the Sword. It was known to the whole of Hyrule, the impending return of Calamity Ganon, and the Princess' failure to summon the light to defeat him. It didn't help that the wielder of the Master Sword had yet to pull the infamous blade from its pedestal, but with every talented knight to be ranked up, was another chance for it to be freed. Not that it would be him, he thought, sure he was young, but that was a very different feat, something that hardly made him courageous enough to even touch the winged grip, let alone yank it from the goddess' strength.
He threw the apple core to the wind, before walking up to the edge. It took all of him not to let the wind take him too.
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Outwardly, the picture of divinity, the princess stood under the watchful eyes of Hylia. She sometimes wondered if it was the inability to take hold of her goddess given power that was infuriating, or the complacent smile drawn upon Hylia's carven face. There was something almost mocking about the way Zelda dedicated her life to a futile effort, only to remain unseen by her ancestor's unshifting expression. Her fingers burned with anticipation for dinner, and her chance to get away from prayer, to get time to herself. That was something she cherished, time to reflect on her Sheikah companions' research, be one with herself and the scholarly articles hidden in the castle library. Not like she received much of that, despite her desire to cease her devotions, the type her father demanded in the springs of statuettes littered across all of Hyrule.
'Hasn't he heard that seeing isn't always believing?' She thought.
"Zelda."
She pushed off her knees, standing from her stance of prayer at the sound of the King's personal guard's voice. All a part of the routine, she soaked the floor on her way back to her dressing room. On the vanity sat a single pot, with the seed of a silent princess never grown.