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The darkness was slowly closing in on his mind; he feared that he would not make it through the month.
“You can’t give in like that,” Navi would say. “You’re stronger than this.”
And he was stronger. But he couldn’t see that in himself. He only saw the pain of others, the pain that he felt he had caused the day he walked into that temple. Maybe if he hadn’t opened those doors, Ganondorf would never have been able to ruin so many lives, uproot so many families. Maybe if he had just continued on with his life and ignored Zelda’s concerns, everything would have been fine.
No; deep down, he knew that wouldn’t work. Ganondorf would have found a way in there, even if it didn’t involve the little fairy boy in the green tunic and the young princess with her ocarina. Zelda’s warnings were fair; she was right, after all. Link knew he could never have refused to help her.
Even if he did sometimes regret it.
Maybe if they hadn’t said anything, Ganondorf would never have known that they conspired against him. Maybe if they had refused to see Link, the doors to the Temple of Time would have remained sealed. Maybe they could have avoided watching their people die. Maybe their people would have known that Zelda was still out there, that they still cared for them.
But now they were Sheik, and Sheik knew that life was filled with countless “maybe’s” and “what-if’s.” Sheik knew that Zelda had to remain in hiding until the time was right, until Link awakened the sages. Until then, Sheik knew that they would aid the hero from the shadows but never stray too close.
Though they were no longer princess, Sheik had a duty to their people, even if they did sometimes regret it.
The lights of the houses grew dim as morning approached Kakariko Village. Link sat atop the chicken keeper’s roof, fiddling with the ocean-blue ocarina in his hands. His vantage point was the best in the town; he had a perfect view of the sunrise.
“It sure is beautiful,” Navi murmured. She rested on Link’s shoulder, twiddling her thumbs. “I know this town is mostly safe now, but don’t you think it’s ironic? That this same sun shines down on all of Hyrule?”
Link grunted, only half paying attention to her ramblings. She was always so introspective during the early hours.
“The sun will reach even the darkest corners of Ganondorf’s realm. So maybe there is hope, Link. If light can reach those people, why can’t we? Or you, at least. “
He didn’t quite understand the irony of it all, but he nodded. He was glad one of them was hopeful; his determination had been waning these past few weeks. The time travel was taking its toll; he was neither boy nor man. He was stuck in limbo, constantly floating between two opposite sides of the spectrum. Not to mention Ganondorf’s forces had taken it up a notch. No more fooling around – the soldiers of darkness were out to kill him. Being aware of your own mortality was never a fun thing.
Navi sighed before floating off Link’s shoulder and in front of his face.
“You can’t keep moping around like this! There are people who need to be saved, Link. They’ve lost all hope, but we haven’t!”
Link wrapped his arms around his legs. The sun was beginning to peak just above the rocky plateaus and mountains that surrounded the village.
“Don’t just sit there and ignore me. Besides…I know you’re worried about everyone here, but the Gorons have our back. They’ll watch over Kakariko. But what about the Zora, Link? They don’t have the Gorons to watch over them. They need our help. We can’t sit here lazing around.”
Link continued to stare beyond the horizon.
“And don’t worry about that Sheik, either. I know we haven’t seen ‘em in a while, but I know they’re fine. I mean, they made it seven years without us, right? They’re probably out their kicking Ganondorf’s butt right now, and we’re totally missing it! C’mon!” She pulled on the hair hanging in front of Link’s eyes before taking to pulling on his earring. He chuckled and shooed her away from his head. With a heavy sigh, he pushed himself off the roof and pulled his shield and sword sheath back over his head. He managed a lopsided smile at Navi before jumping off the roof. “Now that’s the spirit! Time to go save Hyrule!”
It was too bad that the hero of Hyrule felt that he needed saving himself.
Sheik looked down from their vantage point of a cave halfway up the side of a rocky cliff. This place had been home for nearing two weeks, but it was time to move on. These days, it wasn’t wise to stick around anywhere for too long. Besides, they were marked. Someone had spotted them last night. Who, Sheik did not know exactly, but they spotted a lantern moving through the forest during the wee hours of the morning.
They couldn’t afford to take chances, so Sheik packed up their belongings and move on to the next “home,” until Link needed their help again.
As they walked deeper into the cave and back outside through an interconnecting tunnel, they thought back to that day, deep inside the Goron mines. Link appeared strong-willed, and his face remained stern as Sheik had approached him. When they began speaking and after they had pulled out a harp and begun playing, Link’s face softened, and he mimicked the tune.
Inside the inferno of the mines, the two continued playing the Bolero of Fire until their fingers ached, and until he could no longer breathe. The fairy had taken to improvising lyrics, and despite the urgency and the danger of the situation and what would soon follow, the three were at momentary peace. Link had later recalled that everything about that meeting just felt right, that it was all familiar and comforting. Sheik felt the same, but they knew exactly why it felt that way.
No, Zelda knew why it was familiar. Sheik was just an acquaintance to Link and Navi. There was nothing connecting the three of them together besides a few random encounters. It wasn’t fair to any of them, but both Zelda and Sheik knew that that was just the way things had to be.
The road to the Zora’s Domain was long and winding and nearly unreachable if you didn’t know where to look or happen to have an ocarina on hand. Luckily, Link had an ocarina on hand, but unluckily, he didn’t know where to look. Navi wasn’t much help in the matter, and she had “accidentally” knocked the map out of Link’s hands and into the river.
He hadn’t been much of one for comedy these past few months, but today he found himself the butt of Navi’s endless jokes. Link considered it terrible; Navi considered it a welcome change.
After a few hours of wandering upstream, the two came to an engraved stone and waterfall. After a few moments of pondering the writing on the stone, Link pulled out the ocarina and played young Princess Zelda’s lullaby, the one she taught him so long ago.
A gust of frigid air chilled him to the bone and rattled his body. Undeterred by the cold, Navi pressed onward until she floated out of sight. With a glance back, Link turned to follow the fairy, all the while preparing himself for the horrors that most likely awaited him.
The only thing colder than the night was the people of Hyrule.
Sheik couldn’t blame them. They were starting to feel that chill that Ganondorf wrought too, after all. The only consolation they had was assurance that Link was progressing, that he was waking the sages.
It was a shame he was taking so long.
Sheik was frightened – yes, that was the right word. It was finally time to admit that. Fear wasn’t shameful, was it? Everyone experienced sleepless night every now and then. Everyone regretted things. Everyone did something wrong once. Everyone was afraid sometimes.
But lately, those sometimes had turned into all-the-times.
They could see it on the faces of the villagers.
The nights were growing longer, the days shorter. Fall was approaching, and the harvest season had arrived. If only there was something to harvest.
Ganondorf’s forces had ransacked the fields and destroyed the crops in early summer. Someone had apparently broken into a camp of some sort and stolen a bag of grain. A petty crime, that’s all it was. But an example had to be made.
Sheik could only stand and watch.
That was what hurt. There was nothing they could do; there were too many bokoblins and who knows what else for them to fend off. The villagers had tried, oh they had tried, but little could be done. The fires burned late into the night and smoldered for days.
That was the day the people had started to give in. Word had spread quickly through Hyrule. The remaining optimism was draining quickly. Fear had finally overtaken the people after seven long years.
Sheik was thankful the people had lasted this long, but they should have lasted a little longer. The sages were slowly being awakened, and soon they would all have a fighting chance. Ganondorf could be defeated.
This much was sure.
Stupid, stupid, stupid. How could he have allowed that?
“Not everyone’s perfect, Link. Even the great hero of Hyrule messes up sometimes.” Navi had said. Who cares if the Hero of Time makes a mistake? Link isn’t supposed to make mistakes, especially when it has to do with the lives of others. Of children.
If only we hadn’t spent so long listening to King Zora, he had complained. Maybe we would have known what was going on in this village!
“Link, we had no idea. How were we supposed to know? We couldn’t have, unless we had been there personally!”
Exactly. They should have been there personally. The village had been built just off the Zora River, near the basin. It was their next stop before they headed off to Lake Hylia. They had been about a mile away when the village was burnt to the ground, and the only reason they had realized was because of the acrid smell of the air.
They had arrived to a pile of soot and broken stone not even twenty minutes later. Families stood around in tears, parents dug through the rubble in search of something, anything. Children poked at the remains of their favorite toy or chair. The village elder stood near the river, staring, watching the current rush by. Link thought about joining her and letting the water wash his worries away, but he decided that the best thing he could do was to help with the clean-up.
When the purples and oranges of twilight encircled the land and the stars had begun to appear, Link joined in the preparation and eating of the village’s trademark soup. The townspeople had calmed considerably, and now sat around idly chatting about how they could overcome this or rebuild. Link was slightly shocked by their resolve and determination.
“Hey, Link. Listen, I don’t think that we could have prevented this. At all. And I don’t think we could have stopped it once it was started. But we can at least help with the clean-up. And we have. Take a look around.” Navi gestured at two children chasing each other around the fire that had been used to heat the soup cauldron. “These people are going to be okay. They’re strong. And so is the rest of Hyrule. And so are you. Don’t give up just yet.”
For the first time in months, Link felt a shred of hope. If these people could smile hours after having lost everything, then maybe the rest of Hyrule wasn’t as lost as he had thought. Maybe, with their help, he could do it. Maybe he could save Hyrule.
Maybe Sheik wasn’t right about their optimism anyway.