Chapter Text
He wakes from a dead sleep thinking about a teapot.
Grandma’s teapot, cool thick earthenware with a funny handle. Stout. Poured a mean cup of tea — better than most, even — despite the crack running top to base on both sides. He would eye it as she poured, anticipating its catastrophic split. It will cleave in two like a supple fruit, he always thought, it will take me with it.
So it wasn’t so hard to comprehend when the earth did just that. It would’ve been a relief, even, if it hadn’t felt like his fault; as if all the time he had spent imagining the boiling water flooding the table and scalding his thighs made it come true.
He swallows thick and scrubs sunken eyes of restless sleep. He sits up in the dirt and every notch in his spine cracks. His breath comes out a cough. Hylia’s Champion, he thinks.
“Mornin’ Link!” Banji sings, trudging past with an armful of roughage for the goats and Ena at her heels.
Link digs up a bleary smile, a half-voiced mornin’ all caked in sleep. He recovers from the trauma of waking up with a few (5) omelets, and soon he’s awake enough to process this whole thing about a teapot. Why, of all things, a teapot? Surely there were far more epic events to recall. For instance, the apocalypse.
Nonetheless, the pot shines clear as day in his barren memory, kept company by the stoic ghost of his former self. He scratches the edges of his mind wondering why it never came apart. Maybe one day it did and he just hadn’t been around to see it. Still, that’s a long life for a broken vessel. Whatever the case, he chalks it up to a strong foundation. Yeah, a strong foundation, he muses, bare back borne to the rising sun.
These days he’s kind of a staple around the stable scene, usually at one or another as he plugs away at his quest to clear Hyrule of its remaining threats in the wake of the Calamity’s demise. Taluses, Lynels, the like. It’s slow-going, though, what with all the sleeping and cooking and horse-tending he’s taken to. One might get the idea that he doesn’t actually intend to finish the job. One might even think he’s afraid to, lest he be left without purpose. A full-on conversation with the kid (rare) yields more concrete conclusions, such as:
- He is completely lost.
- Floundering.
- Listless.
- Deeply traumatized.
And, surprise, has no idea what to do once he’s done. Has no idea who to be, even.
So he fills his solitude with people and things; stories from all corners of the kingdom, chicken chatter, children laughing, horses braying. When his bones start to itch he goes out and finds something to kill. Sometimes it’s just dinner, and those are the nights he feels worst.
This morning is alright if not a bit strange. His shadow feels heavier. But he can hear Beedle jingling around the bend, and soon he will set up shop over by the horses, and he’ll say something like, Yaya! or Hiiiiiiiiii! and Link will purchase whatever arrows he’s got and add them to the stockpile amassing in his quiver. At least that’s something.
Around noon he packs up and hauls ass towards Hebra. He finds some amber in the broken down wagon just past the bridge, uncovers a korok, beats the shit out of a stone talus (Gesane will be happy to hear), and clears a Lizalfos camp near Kolami bridge that was giving travelers trouble. By then the sun is hanging low over the mountains. Link wedges an axe in a nearby pine with a grunt.
Chop. Chop. Chop. Creak. Chop. Chop. Chop.
Woosh.
He whips around towards the sound, axe at his ear and ready to swing.
“Now, is that any way to greet a friend?” Revali scoffs, wings folded at his back.
Link relaxes, releases a tight breath, smiles halfway. He lets the axe head fall heavy by his feet and leans on the handle. “Same goes for you.” The Rito clicks his beak in response. He always preferred a dramatic entrance. Link levels a gaze. “How long?”
Revali looks properly abashed. “I beg your pardon?”
Link’s smile fills out. “Never known you to beg for anything,” and he turns around, heaving another whack at the trunk. “You’ve been following me, right?” Whack. His axe sticks and he peers over his shoulder.
Revali’s eyes narrow. “You knew?”
Link nods, once.
“Well, then I assume you must know why.”
Creak. Whack. “Not really.”
Revali’s almost forgotten, too, watching Link’s back muscles work over each other. He thinks of a potter at a wheel, he thinks of sweat. “You’re not even curious?”
Link chops off a smaller piece of the trunk and positions it on a stump. He drives the axe down and shrugs as the wood splinters. “I like it out here.”
Revali squints. Surely this cannot be the same sullen dog that trailed Zelda’s every move, that waited patiently for scraps, longing lick the royal chin. They had not seen much of each other outside of the pomp and cirumstance of their glorious return, the festivals in Kakariko and Hateno, the promenade in Zora’s Domain. They always had a hollow tone. Something that Link accentuated as he hung at the sidelines, reluctant to recieve praise. He spent most of the time talking to farmers and shopkeeps about their wares and what they needed for the coming winter. At least, that’s all the Rito overheard. He even caught snippets of a conversation regarding a construction company. What have you been up to, little dog? He’d thought. Where have you been?
Chopping wood, apparently. Tending horses. Sleeping in the dirt. Zelda had asked each of the champions to keep an eye on nearby stables, as Link had been rumored to be hopping from one to the next. He hadn’t intended to humor the request (he’s no courier pigeon) but found himself curious in his own right. It was sheer luck that the morning he showed up in Tabantha, Link happened to be sunning himself by the fire.
“So if I told you that Zelda was planning a ribbon-cutting ceremony, you wouldn’t care?” He tries, though he’s certain he already knows the answer.
Link furrows his brows. “For what?”
“She’s repaired the town center. She’d like you to come see it,” he repeats, almost verbatim, Zelda’s exact phrasing. Link, of all things, winces. He tosses the logs off to the side and starts on a new one, splitting it easily in two.
“I care,” he grunts, “I’m glad it’s working out. But I can’t…” Revali waits expectantly.
“Can’t…what? Use a pair of scissors?” he gives Link’s digits a cursory glance — all present and accounted for. “Surely you’re capable of cutting a ribbon. It’s hardly different from a Bokoblin.”
The Hylian laughs, and it’s a sad, empty sound. “No, Revali, I can’t…”
He finally puts two and two together. “Ah, go back. I see.”
Link turns to meet his eyes, utterly unguarded and dark beyond their open blue. The sun is singing behind him like it only started shining when he came to town — so ripe like an unbitten fruit. Like mango juice dripping down your elbows. Like you couldn’t wait ‘til you got home, like your mother tuts her tongue and tells you you’ve always been so eager. Like she says you’ll make a mess of yourself if you’re not careful.
“Yeah,” he says, and it’s so quiet Revali almost up and leaves; so vulnerable it makes him feel inside out. “It’s hard. To see it.”
Revali nods. His vision glazes over hot red, inky black. The smell of rot. Of vinegar. Malice. His heart makes a sound like Medoh’s low thrum. “I understand.” He’s never seen Link so soft so close, and he almost hates him for it. He wears mortality like a shroud.
“Thank you,” Link says, and he says it with his eyes too. He’s always doing that. He got good at it.
He lets the silence hang deep, for a moment. Then, “She’ll expect some news of your whereabouts, you know.”
The Hylian slumps, and Revali is sure he only imagines Link roll his eyes. He tosses another set of logs on the growing pile. “I don’t know, can’t you just say I’m busy?”
“My, you’ve grown insolent in your old age, Chosen One.” Link tenses and Revali snaps his beak shut. That’s no way to begin a (tentative) friendship, is it? And isn’t that what Mipha had urged him towards, in the barest whisper? Had he hallucinated her direct eye contact, her murmured, you have more in common than you think? Surely not. Revali looks away. “She’ll be expecting something far more robust than just busy. Do you want me to make a fool of myself?”
Link loosens the reins on a warming smile. “The truth is sort of long-winded.”
“Wind is my specialty,” Revali smirks, and he tamps down the triumph of eliciting a sun-bright laugh from the Hylian. He has heard that sound maybe never. Emboldened, he offers, “You know, Urbosa sent us all home with a bottle of Gerudo’s finest after the last Champion’s meeting. It’s quite unbecoming to make a habit of drinking alone, and I’d hate to see it go to waste.” He searches Link’s face for a reaction and finds himself nigh blinded by a sleepy, subdued grin.
“Are you inviting me over?” he asks, voice high. “To hang out?”
Revali rolls his eyes and makes to leave. “Well, if you’re going to be a child about it—”
“No! No,” Link cuts in, and the Rito lets his wings fall. “I accept.”