Work Text:
King Daphnes Nohansen Hyrule woke up and wished he didn't.
At first he thought he was still dreaming; the castle was silent, empty and its rich tones had desaturated into whites, blacks and greys. He moved through its many halls, now a sole representative of red and golds and life, and trembled. No echo answered when he yelled for someone, anyone, to show up. No response came from the royal chambers, or the kitchens, or the dungeons. He knew why that was, of course, remembered well what had happened in the last minutes of Hyrule, but he still clinged to hope that maybe, just maybe someone else... but the Castle turned out to be empty. The few foul creatures, a scattering of moblins and darknuts in the main hall, where they had been surprised into eternal stillness, were hardly any company.
A long time ago, just before he had fallen asleep, Daphnes had been told by a calming ethereal voice that he would be woken up when the Hero of Time came back to fight the dreaded. This moment had to already come, certainly, if he was awake. He made sure he still had a part of golden Wisdom hidden on his chest under the robes, and that the Wind Waker was still safely tucked in his sleeve. But as he waited nobody came for the Master Sword, or for him for that matter, and there was no way to get out of the Castle; a magic barrier stretched a mile wide and a hundred miles tall around it.
Maybe he woke up too soon. It was a frightening possibility when he didn't know what this too soon meant exactly. He decided to avoid thinking about it too much and try to get by until the Gods spoke to him once again or a portal to the surface of the great water above him opened, or something else happened, anything that would please tell him what he should do now.
He wasn't sure if the normal day and night cycle still functioned in this forever paused world until the first evening, when the darkness fell heavy upon the castle and seemed to creep upon him like a predator waiting to pounce. He lit a candle to ward it off. The flame was dark and unwavering even in his shuddering breath, but it still emitted white light that tore through the night. He lit every single candle he found and spread them all throughout his bedroom, and spent the night hidden in this single bastion of light in the midst of despair. He didn't get a lot of sleep.
The next day he realized that he should probably wear his mourning robes and even set out to find them. But soon a part of him that was calm and rational, that seemed to respond to the golden Wisdom on his chest, told him to stop. He had no right to mourn, it said, if it was him who had effectively asked for the flood. And even if he prayed for a single soul a day, it would still take centuries to cry for them all. He stayed in his reds and golds. At least the vivid colours differed from the bleak environment; if he had worn black, he was sure there would come a time when he wouldn't be able to tell whether he himself was a living man or just another detailed setpiece of the giant castle. But was he still a living man? The more he realized he didn't feel hunger or thirst the more worried about this whole situation he became. But he could still sleep - only for a few hours at a time, but any escape was welcome.
After five days, when the reality finally started to sink in, Daphnes tried to distract himself by any measure available in order to forget about the silence and stillness of the world. He finished writing and signing many documents he'd been procrastinating over; cleaned up items that should in every other situation be a concern of the servants; talked at length with his daughter who couldn't answer from the portrait in the main hall; and in a bout of boredom even thought about swapping the frozen monsters' weapons and helmets around before reminding himself that he was not six anymore, but over ten times older.
He wandered into the castle library and picked a few favourite books, but soon discovered they only made him bitterly remember the other times he had read them; he turned to new titles but couldn't focus enough to understand the words. Frustrated he headed for the library door. But as he was passing the last shelf, something caught his eye: a black old tome sticking out from between its fellow books, like it had been pushed in there in hurry. It was a publication on chess strategies. He remembered it well. As a child he was forced to study it by an overly enthusiastic tutor, who considered the game the best way to train young minds in logic and tactics. When Daphnes opened the book something slipped out from inside: a piece of parchment in pristine condition, so big it had been folded in four. It bore no letters or marks whatsoever. Perhaps some poor soul had intended to annotate on it while relaxing his mind with the old masters' games, but his sunny afternoon plans were thrown away by the storm of invasion. Daphnes forced himself to not think too much about what could have happened to the poor man, tucked the parchment back in and – because it was getting dark - brought the book with him to the bedroom in hopes it would help him focus on anything else than the black nothingness of the night.
It turned out chess were, indeed, a good way to forget – the game analyses and collections of openings took him half the night to look through, and the problems required his full attention. After a few simple mate-in-twos he skipped to the hard examples. Soon he realized he'd have to help his not as sharp as it once was mind. Because he didn't have a chessboard anywhere near, he resolved to write his thought process down. At least the parchment he'd found would be of any use. With a quill he scribbled down a few symbols, underlined the solution and returned to the book. Maybe two minutes later he looked at the parchment again and blinked in surprise. There was nothing there. After a moment of confusion Daphnes decided to go to sleep; clearly it was so late as to have his brain playing tricks on him. He slept maybe not well, but much better than the earlier nights.
- - -
The next day he decided to keep busying himself with the book. He went as far as to find an old chessboard, probably remembering his youth, and cleaned papers and trinkets from the desk to make place for it. Masterfully carved pieces stood on full attention in their proper places. Even if he didn't actually intend to play against anyone, the steady rows just looked right. In fact, when he first stumbled on yet another tough problem, he couldn't get himself to break the formation and instead once again solved it on the piece of parchment. But just as he turned his sight away, with a corner of his eye he caught movement.
His notes looked just like he'd left them, but, he realized, that wasn't all that was written on the page; beneath them, in an unknown handwriting, was the following:
Chess notation with swapped letters? Is that some nonsensical new way of coding messages?
Daphnes's heart beat fast. Somebody answered. By pure accident, and probably with a lot of magic that the parchment had to be imbued with, he managed to get in contact with another human being. Overjoyed he didn't even think about what that other person responded with, just grabbed the quill almost knocking over the inkwell. It had to be someone from above the water, he thought; he could get in touch with people, with other Hylians, with – with his dearest daughter...!
“My name is Daphnes Nohansen Hyrule,” he wrote as fast as he could, “I'm the only one left in the Hyrule Castle. Where are you? Who are you? I'm glad someone else survived. Please answer!”
For a long time there was no response.
I should have guessed you were not my spy, appeared eventually. And here I thought they would be reasonable enough to hide their page. Alas. Next time I'll send a bokoblin.
Daphnes felt as if all his blood had first turned into red-hot molten lead, then congealed and weighted at his every limb, alloyed with wrath and terror.
“It's you.”
Yes.
“How dare you speak to me, demon?” he wrote, trying to still his hand shaking with rage, “How dare you be still alive and show yourself after what you've done?!”
And what is it that I have done?
Daphnes exhaled heavily through his nose, resisting a rising urge to tear the parchment apart. “You brought the flood, destroyed Hyrule and killed her people!”
Yes, it was obviously me who marched into your temple, along with your sages, and with your prayers asked your gods for help in thwarting my own plans. You can deny your guilt all you want, King of Hyrule. It won't change what you've done. What your gods have done.
“They did what they had to!”
Did they? Will you try to tell me waking us too soon had its reason as well?
“Yes!”
Then?
“The Hero had to be reborn. Why would I be awakened otherwise?”
By accident. Yet another mistake of the gods. When they realize what happened, they'll send us both to sleep again, and we will likely proceed without any memory of this awakening, like children that don't remember they woke up while their parents were carrying them to bed. And before Daphnes could think of a good answer to that, something else appeared, an inch lower. Pawn to f4.
Daphnes had to check three times to make sure he wasn't just seeing things. Their conversation was slowly starting to fade away, from the earliest words to the latest, as if everything written on the parchment was charmed to disappear after a certain time passed. It still wasn't the strangest thing right now.
“Are you trying to play chess with me?” Daphnes wrote.
Obviously.
“Why?”
I am bored, and I believe you are too, King of Hyrule. Let's play.
His mind yelled at him to not fall for it (whatever sinister plan 'it' meant), but the person writing with him was right about boredom, and besides, the sole thought about getting in contact with someone alive after over a week of wandering a dead castle was enough to get him to consider. He could afford one game. It would be alright as long as he didn't pay attention to just who he played with; for the sake of his sanity he decided to think of the person like of just a chess partner. He sat comfortably and moved a white pawn from f2 to f4, then considered his response.
“e5,” he wrote, and moved his pawn to rest diagonal from his partner's in a gambit aiming to weaken the white kingside. It wasn't the safest thing he could do, but he wanted to see what answer would follow. His partner could either go for the capture or focus on developing.
e4.
So he declined the gambit, probably thinking it some kind of a trap (it wasn't, not really, not that early in the game, but it said a lot about the man's suspiciousness). He came up with his own instead: uncovered the king in exchange for gaining control over the center. Daphnes had seen the King's Gambit often, but was many times advised against using it by his old tutor; it was an incredibly risky move, he was told, favoured by players aggresive and brash and short-term oriented who wished to play a dynamic, interesting game. (“It's for madmen,” the tutor had said, and asked by young Daphnes why was it so popular then, he added, “Well, that only shows how many madmen there are in this country.”)
Are you going to move?
Daphnes realized he had zoned out for a minute, thinking about whether to accept or decline the King's Gambit. Accepting would be generally better, but his partner probably expected it and had a response already in mind. Throwing him off by declining could help. Therefore the best decision may have been to defend; develop the bishop, threaten the weakened kingside and prevent a possible castling.
“Bc5.”
Daphnes felt a thrill at how quickly an answer appeared this time, and for a split second he was sure he had just marched right into a trap and lost; but then he actually read the message and it didn't even mention a move. All it said was, What is B?
Daphnes looked at the sentence incredously for a long time before slowly writing, “Bishop.” He shook himself out of the stupor and added, “You want to play chess when you don't even know the pieces?”
I know them. There are no bishops in chess. They're not fit for a war.
Daphnes wasn't sure if he wasn't being made fun of, but decided to play along for a second. “What kind of pieces do you know then?”
The proper ones. The King and his second-in-command, or the General, as the strategists. Two Messengers who scout the field. Two units of best Riders to force their horses between the enemy's men. Two Fortresses to guard the army and hide archers. The Pawns for numbers. Isn't it obvious?
“No,” Daphnes answered, “because they're properly called the King, the Queen, the Bishops, the Knights and the Rooks.”
A moment of silence. Of course. You Hylians would take something you haven't even invented and modify it as to present it as your own accomplishment. Do you expect me to use these ridiculous names?
Daphnes felt a weird unpleasant pang, like something poked him in the chest close to the hidden Wisdom. “We're in Hyrule,” he retorted, “and we either play by her rules or don't play at all.” He half-expected that the response would say that Hyrule was dead, that the land they got stuck in was now so broken and desolate it couldn't be called the same name anymore.
Very well, the words appeared. We play by her rules. And after a moment, Kf3.
“Knight is N not K.”
Of course. Why wouldn't it be. Nf3 then.
Daphnes only rolled his eyes and moved d6 (the chess tutor from the depths of his memory cried, “repeat after me: strong pawn structure!”). During the next few turns he developed his knights and bishops. As soon as he saw the opportunity for castling he performed it and noted, “0-0”.
The answer didn't took long, was very short and consisted in its entirety of ???
Daphnes had seen question marks in notation before, sometimes even two when a player commited an especially spectacular mistake, but he'd never seen three. He calculated the positions on the board frantically. Did he not notice putting the king in check, or something of the kind? But no matter how hard he looked for the fault, it wasn't there. Then it dawned on him: if his partner struggled even with the names of the pieces, he probably didn't know the more nuanced notation.
“Castling on the kingside,” he explained.
What?
Well, that made sense too: just like the pieces, castling probably had a different name to his partner. “Kg8 Rhf8”
A long pause. Are you trying to make a fool out of me, King of Hyrule?
Now it was Daphnes's turn to write a confused, “?”
Don't “?” me. The writing appeared fast, missing dots over „i”s and tightening with speed. Two pieces in one turn. Your king can now move two squares apparently. Your rook sprouted wings. What fool do you take me for King of Hyrule.
“I'm following the rules. If K and R haven't moved yet and there's no mate threat you can castle. K side 0-0 or Q side 0-0-0.”
Silence. Then, in writing much calmer, This rule is recent?
“Barely younger than my father.”
Then recent. A pause no shorter than ten full seconds. The king bravely advances his troops but he himself falls back to hide cowardly in the castle. I see why it's a Hylian rule. I see why you use it.
“The pot and the kettle.”
His partner ignored that comment and proceeded with, Is there any other rule you've been hiding to gain unfair advantage?
“I wasn't hiding it. I assumed you knew chess.”
I know proper chess. Not this. What else have changed?
Daphnes resigned himself to his fate and started to describe the rules shortly. While he was writing, almost no comment appeared from the other player, aside from a snide remark about capturing en passante and a note of approval on underpromotion. I bel. there are circum. when N/B's irreplacable. It was one of the only times he used contractions like this; Dapnes had already noticed that his partner seemed ill-bent on always using full words even if it wasted space on the parchment, perhaps becausehe wanted to show his words held meanings so important that they were allowed to take whatever surface he saw fit.
When Daphnes was done explaining they resumed the game, and a few turns later he had to admit he gained satisfaction from seeing a properly noted 0-0-0. But it still paled in comparison to the euphoria he felt when, in the middle of a careful exchange, his partner made a blunder so obvious, so terrible, that it opened a way to his doom. Daphnes smiled to himself, and much less mature part of him underlined the foe's Rf6, wrote (??) next to it for good measure, and then struck with a clean checkmate. He felt amazing, at least twenty years younger, grinning at the parchment while waiting.
A response didn't came for a long time, and when it did, all it said was, New game.
“It won't change the fact that you lost.”
New game, King of Hyrule.
Daphnes couldn't refuse; not after a victory so rich and sweet. “Very well. e5.”
And somehow, like it often happens in situations such as this, one game lead to another, and another, until they played the whole day through. Finally Daphnes decided it was getting too late. “We'll start another one tomorrow. I'm going to sleep.”
One more.
Like a child, Daphnes thought. An extremely dangerous child. “Tomorrow. I'm sure you're tired as well.”
I can afford a sleepless night.
“Chess is better with a well-rested mind. I'm going to sleep.”
Then I'll wait for you, King of Hyrule. I'll still be here when you wake up.
Daphnes hesitated, and finally wrote just, “Good night.”
It was surprisingly easy to fall asleep after that, as if there appeared a line between them both that, however intimidating, still connected today with tomorrow, and promised that tomorrow to happen.
- - -
His partner had been waiting indeed, the next day. It was obvious from how quickly he responded to a “Good morning.” The day after that he'd been quick as well; even the following days he would always answer when called. He had to wake up early – well, early for their standards; Daphnes soon discovered the games shifted his daily activities more to afternoon and night. He didn't even notice the days flying by.
His partner unsurprisingly turned out to be a very fast learner (and perhaps remembered more and more of his own chess playing days); at first Daphnes kept a winning streak, but it was soon broken and from there on he lost quite a few times, until the win ratio was only slightly leaning towards him. Daphnes learned a few things from these games; first, while he himself focused on positional play, his partner preferred quick-witted tactics; second, the other player almost always started with an aggresive f4. Asked about it he wrote, It's better to know a few openings deeply than a hundred superficially. Daphnes had to agree with the sentiment.
Many times his partner would make an innocous comment that would soon turn out to be provocative, but Daphnes didn't have any desire to dive into arguments and philosophical disputes and stubbornly refused to write back anything but his chess moves. It was, of course, a two-edged sword: his fellow player seemed blind to every sentence that didn't agree with his skewed beliefs. But maybe it was better this way; they couldn't afford to stop communicating, being the only two living things left in an empty world, with nobody else to turn to.
Daphnes often caught himself reading every response out loud, as if pretending there was someone else in the Castle with whom he could talk. He felt that the silence would deafen his heart otherwise.
- - -
After a week Daphnes got used to their games and now treated them as yet another part of the day – or rather, the only worthwile part of the day. That particular night they hadn't finished yet, and it was a few hours into the darkness already. Daphnes suspected it could be two or three in the morning; his mind was engufled in a weird mix of acute awareness, fatigue and lack of inhibition that one always feels long after midnight. He made his moves not really caring whether they were good or bad.
Are you tired?, asked his partner.
Daphnes sighed. Nothing could hide from this man, could it? “It is the middle of the night.”
It is not only that. What ails you?
What ailed him? He wasn't sure himself. Melancholy? Loneliness? A nagging sense that he shouldn't exist? The way his limbs felt dead even when he could move them with no trouble?
“Maybe I shouldn't have woken up,” he wrote before his tired brain could catch up with the fact that sharing his feelings wasn't the best idea. His chess tutor would surely annotate this move wih a “??”, he said to himself, but instead of making him feel better, this thought only worsened his emptiness.
Have you finally realized that? Do you see now that your gods are just as cruel as you?
“The gods aren't cruel,” he retorted, “and neither am I.”
His partner took so long to answer that Daphnes had to put the quill back in the inkwell so it wouldn't dry. Finally the reply appeared, being written steadily and calmly.
If a child dreams the sun in the midst of a storm, then to shake her awake is the foulest of sins.
Just like before Daphnes felt an impulse to read the sentence aloud, and discovered it held a surprisingly pleasant rhythm. “An epigram?” he inquired.
A poem.
Well, that was an interesting way to end the night. Daphnes leaned against the backrest and looked with curiosity as more words appeared; but with every new sentence sparks of sudden dread shuddered down his spine, and the curiosity turned morbid.
If a child dreams the sun in the midst of a storm,
Then to shake her awake is the foulest of sins.
For is breaking her sleep any good of a deed
If the storm will not end, if the sun will not rise?
I long wished they had slept without knowledge or fear,
Yet I fear that they knew and I know that they feared.
And if mothers know first when a storm comes upon,
Then what truths and what lies they bestow on their young,
When the roar of the rain breaks the dream of the sun.
When the mothers' hands shield little eyes, ears and mouths,
Yet they can't grasp the storm spraying down in their hair.
They tell children to sleep, for its only a rain
Which the king said he'd bring from the lands far away
Which the prayers had sent on the death-scorched sands
It will give dates and figs and full rivers and life
They make children asleep they take knives in wet hands
For to lie her to sleep is the greatest a grace
If a child dreams the sun in the midst of a storm.
No more lines came.
Daphnes discovered he couldn't quite understand what he was now feeling; he wasn't even sure if he felt anything. He looked at the writing without any emotions at all - behind a heavy veil of calm, through which something large and dark tried to get in from the outside, but couldn't. The ink in some of the words started to blur into little spots, and the first thought of Daphnes was that it had to start raining and the drops fell on the parchment. And that had to be the truth, because if it wasn't-
f4.
Daphnes stared.
f4, was written again, but he couldn't for his life remember what he was supposed to do now, what he was supposed to write. Every thought left him.
f4 f4 f4 f4 f4 f4 f4 f4 f4
The message continued rhytmically, and the more he read it the more the letters and numbers stopped making sense and instead melted together into unrecognizable wavy symbols, reminiscent of some foreign writing or decorative patterns. After four lines like such, there was a few seconds break, and then, What are you doing. I attack you. Move. I dare you to move. I dare you to answer to my attack. I dare you to answer by destroying every single piece until only the bare kings dance on the graves. It should be easy. You have already done it once. You have already killed them.
The calm veil broke. A monster of guilt torn its way through it with razor-sharp beak and claws, flew upon Daphnes and covered him with dark suffocating wings. Pain and nausea found their way into his guts, making him double over the board and grasp its sides, knocking a few pieces to the floor. He gathered the courage to glance at the parchment again only to see a blotty sentence sprawling across the whole page.
MAKE YOUR MOVE DAPHNES NOHANSEN HYRULE
Not taking his eyes from the message Daphnes took a few shaky steps back pushing the chair aside. He had a feeling that the parchment would jump at him would he move any faster, but that illusion soon broke and he ran. He swinged the bedroom door open and bolted out into the darkness, running somewhere, anywhere, pursued by something he well knew he couldn't fool or leave behind, but what he still desperately tried to outrun. Finally he found another door, took a deep breath and opened it. His feet had taken him to the main hall. The large room was dimly lit by a few candles he had lit here and there just in case he would ever have to walk through there at night. The door he had gone through was the one on the first floor on the stone Hero's left hand; in front of him were two sets of stairs combining in the middle into the top of the big carpeted steps leading to the Hero's statue. And on the wall above them were two portraits, and his heart quivered when he thought about one of them.
He wanted to see his daughter. He wanted to hold her and kiss her golden hair, and tell her it's alright because he's here, and the world wouldn't hurt her because he wouldn't allow it to. (Like he allowed with all the other children, a quiet part of his mind that seemed to be somehow speaking in cursive told him, like he allowed with everyone else.) He moved forward to better see her portrait, but stopped in the middle seeing it; a monster of guilt returned to stab at his heart and lungs with its massive beak. He was looking at his little daughter, forever frozen in her stiff pose between the servants, and the only thing running through his mind was the poem; this wretched message from a demon, this terrible admission of guilt. (But no, Wisdom told him, it couldn't be, because demons didn't feel guilt. Demons didn't feel at all, they could only show what seemed like emotions to manipulate. They could only manipulate. It was the only explanation why the demon had wanted to play chess with him: to lull him into a false sense of security and then drop a blade on his neck when he didn't expect it. And it succeeded. It all made sense now. The doesn't-know-the-rules play? It was to make him gain confidence. The first blunder? Intentional, to let him feel smarter. That's all there was to it. He solved the puzzle. Wisdom cheered.)
Once again this night he took a few steps back, until both his feet were on the edge of the carpeted stairs, not taking his eyes from his daughter. It was all going to be alright. He was going to find the Hero, kill the demon and revive Hyrule for her. He was going to fix the castle and the country. He was going to bring back everyone who had drowned. And...
...and he was going to let everything happen to them again, and again, and again, see them dying over and over countless times, see them pray through parched lips that never knew any prayer to give their thanks, but only to request help, see them in flames of despair in every waking moment until merciful sleep took them... merciful...
And something broke in Daphnes Nohansen Hyrule. Something had to, he thought; something was terribly wrong. Because he suddenly became terrifyingly sure that the best thing he could do for the people he wronged and sentenced to death, the right thing to do, was to...
…was to let Hyrule sleep.
He stumbled back on the dark carpet, almost falling off the stairs, until his back hit uneven stone. One of the four lion statues that decorated the stairs fell to the floor with a thud. Daphnes didn't even look after it; he stayed there frozen in shock, bracing himself against now empty pedestal for what seemed like hours. He moved his gaze to the side and fixed it on one of the other lions, in the opposite corner of the stairs, but could still feel the eyes of his daughter staring at him in disgust from the portrait on his right; could see the stone sillhouette of the Hero long passed turning his back to him on the left; and when he tried to look forward instead, all he could think of was that somewhere there behind the castle walls, behind the barrier, there stood a tower with yet another person that awaited his moves and despised his decisions. And every single of the sinister observers seemed to scream at him to stop, to think, to not blunder, to not fall into traps posing as solutions. But if it was a trap, why did it sound so obvious and rational? He should see right through any lie, he was Wisdom, he-
Daphnes tightened his fist around the golden Wisdom, when it had flown in fear. The most uncanny of possibilities unveiled before him: was he corrupted? Did the Triforce take a hold of him when he'd been sleeping, and now whispered destruction? His train of thoughts first halted, then lunged forward at breakneck speed. He couldn't be corrupted, he could not, but what if? But then again, if he was thinking about it, if he was aware, then it surely meant no corruption has settled in – but if it wanted him to think that way – but no, he knew he was too intelligent to think himself too intelligent to -
He clutched at his head pulsating with pain. No, he told himself firmly, there was no use in thinking like that. He didn't even have the full piece. He was fine. He knew he was. He just had to strap himself up and stop thinking about such foolish notions. He decided to go back to his bedroom to rest, but before that he turned to look at the poor statue knocked out of its pedestal. It was indeed one of the four Red Lions; the everlasting symbol of knighthood, honour and bravery in the face of darkness; of always protecting the motherland and its people from destruction. The dark shape of the proud maned head made Daphnes uneasy, so he moved his gaze up, over the pedestal, where it latched to something high on the wall; only after a few seconds did he realize that he was looking at his own portrait.
(maybe he was cursed to be both the King of Red Lions who wished to save, and the King of Hyrule who wished to destroy, something whispered)
He took one of the candles and through the pitch-black halls returned to his bedroom. He was startled to see there were still new words appearing on the parchment, now much slower and in irregular intervals. Had the de- his partner been writing all this time?
He covered the messages with his hand to not see them, just in case, and wrote in the empty space, “Let's go to sleep. We'll resume tomorrow. We should both,” he hesitated over words, “allow our minds to rest.”
I don't need to rest I am fine, I don't need sleep, if I go to sleep then I wake up find everyone's gone always everything. f4.
“When was the last time you slept?”
Hesitation. A while ago.
“A while is how long?” To that there came no clarification. Daphnes rubbed his tired eyes. “Let's retire. We both deserve to sleep.”
What is deserved is not given what is given is not deserved.
“Good night. And go to sleep,” Daphnes wrote, but before he could stand up, a desperately quick answer had already appeared.
Promise me you'll still be here when I wake up.
Daphnes stared at this sentence for a long time, not sure if his eyes are playing tricks on him.
“I will,” he finally wrote before going to bed.
No sleep came that night.
- - -
The next morning he found the parchment empty.
“Are you there?” he wrote.
Where else would I be? appeared almost instantly. Daphnes felt some inexplicable relief at that; he half expected his partner would never answer him again. Let us play. f4.
So he intended to just go about his business as usual. Daphnes hesitated. “About the poem you have written,” he started, but before he could finish the sentence there was already a response.
It was not me who wrote it.
“It had to be.”
No. The man who wrote it is gone. He has vanished along with the ink that held his burden. The way past is closed. I don't care for it anymore. The only road there is - is future. And she is the only future I have.
“She?”
Hyrule.
“Hyrule is dead.”
I will revive her. Only I can do it.
“Not only you. The Gods may have sealed Hyrule away, but they left behind her people who will be able to awaken her one day.” He thought of his daugther and pain stabbed through his chest with its slick blade.
Maybe. But it will be me who will revive and take rule over her.
“Why do you want Hyrule? You claim you don't care for the past. Then what for you want revenge?”
Revenge? I want justice.
“Justice has its roots in the past as well. Every choice you make is stemming from the past. You can never be free from it.”
Neither can you. Neither can anything.
Daphnes knew it was true. He also knew that maybe they both thought of Hyrule as their future, but that didn't change the fact it was still confined in the past; they had thought the last night the future a week earlier. So maybe the best solution was to erase it all. Destroy any trace of the past, and if the kingdom had to go down with it, then – let it.
There was a lot of times when Daphnes still hesitated over his choice, later, but this would be the day the seed of Hyrule's fate was planted.
- - -
For the next few days they didn't talk a lot, or at least not on sensitive topics. They came about even with their games' results, and Daphnes managed to once again put aside thoughts about what the future held for them and why exactly they shouldn't play with each other; he didn't manage, however, to get rid of the nagging feelings in his mind and chest. One day, that he suspected could be a Sunday, he woke up as usual and immediately made his way to the chessboard.
“Good morning,” he wrote and waited until a similar reply appeared. “I believe it's my turn to play white, is it?”
Indeed, answered his partner. Daphnes Nohansen Hyrule?
“Yes?”
Today I want you to play your best against me. No matter how long you take.
“Why?”
I will play my best as well.
That wasn't really an answer to his question, but he let it pass. “Very well. e4.”
They played for a long time. Daphnes contemplated every move and its possible outcomes carefully, which sometimes took him only a minute, sometimes a few, but he also had to take a long contemplative walk through the castle halls once before the best possibility unveiled itself in his mind. His partner took his time as well, once even excusing himself for ten whole minutes – allegedly to eat lunch, but that was probably just a stealthy way of saying he needed to think. They fought incredibly even through the majority of the midgame. Only nearing the ending, when the darkness had already fallen over the castle, did the balance wobble. His partner made a grave mistake that allowed a white knight to capture a few important pieces; from there he only fared worse. Any attempts to recover and retaliate fell flat. By sacrificing the last rook he was able to get his king – now the only member of his army – miraculously escape an ambush. But no matter how much he struggled, and how much he wanted to somehow get even, the lonely black king managed only to get himself cornered on a2 by the three remaining white pieces – the king, a bishop and a knight on c3, a4 and e2 respectively – and the game crept slowly to its end.
“You know it's hopeless,” Daphnes wrote. “You can't check. Give up.”
I fight until the end.
“Very well. Nc1.” The knight moved, putting the black king in check and forcing it to leave its square in the next turn. His partner thought long about the move, a minute at least, and Daphnes wrote a helpful, “We can call it my win and start anew.”
No. And after another minute, Ka3. The black king moved to the square next to the white bishop, able to capture it in the next turn if it didn't get out of the way. Daphnes reached for it to save it, but hesitated, always a wary tactician; and when he looked the positions over once again, cold realization hit him.
Of course he couldn't let the bishop be captured, as he would be left with just his king and knight and the rule of insufficient material would make any checkmate impossible; but if he saved the bishop, moved it in any way, the next turn the black king would not be allowed to move at all lest he put himself in check, and the game could not progress further. After hours of tiring play, they have reached a stalemate.
Well, King of Hyrule? What is your move?
Daphnes gritted his teeth and wrote, “Be8”.
Of course. Getting your bishop as far away from me as you could. I wish I could respond to it, but I'm afraid I cannot move. You lost.
“Clearly I didn't lose.”
But you didn't win. Neither of us can ever win.
“You're mistaken,” Daphnes wrote fast in anger, “I won, because you have just the bare king left, and I have material, a knight and a bishop, that have the potential to checkmate. I win.”
That's not a win. That's a stalemate. Just a wait for a new game to begin.
“I know better what is a win and what isn't.” Wisdom purred in approval. "One for me. Do you wish to play the white next?”
The parchment stayed empty for a long time. Then, slowly: I am going to sleep soon.
“The night is young. We have time to start another game.”
I have not.
That shook him out of the smug confidence. “What do you mean?” he hurried.
The Gods seem to have finally noticed their mistake. Tiredness chases me since morning. I'm growing weary by the minute, with sleep that will last for centuries. I'm not sure how long I have, maybe just a few minutes. I expect you'll follow suit soon.
“Why haven't you told me earlier?!”
You would rush the game. I wished to win against your best. A pause. It was a satisfying match.
“You didn't win.”
Does it matter if the board will always be set again? Daphnes wanted to write “what if it won't?”, but more words kept coming. We have won and lost and drawn our games, and the board stands still. Perhaps it is never to be conquered. Perhaps I am to lose against your best. But even as the pieces come and go, the board survives. It is a soothing thought.
Daphnes wanted to scream: but it wouldn't survive! It wouldn't because – because he would not let it, because it would be better sleeping forever under the sea, never to be played on again, never to host a war again.
Daphnes?
He waited for another sentence, but it didn't appear. “Yes?”
And the new sentences came, slowly and deliberately, as if the writer wanted to make sure they were fully legible, bore no mistakes, blots or stray lines.
Before I go to sleep, promise me that should I be the one to fall, you will take care of Hyrule in my place. Cherish her. Love her. Make her grow. Promise me that you will. Allow me this one comfort at least.
The monster of guilt returned with all its might, claws and beak ripping his limbs apart, breaking through his skull and ribcage. What was he to answer now?
Let him know! screamed Wisdom. To know is always better than to be oblivious! You don't have any interest in him not knowing! Let him know, let him be burdened with it – let it be his fault as well! It is all his fault! You know that, and if you know that, then obviously it must be true, because you know best, you are Wisdom!
But a part of him, a part that was not wise, that was terrifyingly Daphnes Nohansen but not Hyrule, that was a broken Red Lion, whispered: If a child dreams the sun.
And yet another part realized that among all of his emptiness he had one last thing other than destruction to offer, which he wasn't able to feel himself anymore, but could still gift as his last saving grace to the dying world and its children; and it was hope.
He wrote, “I will take care of her.”
For a few seconds Daphnes expected the rest of the page to remain empty, but a few words appeared. He had to strain his eyes to read them; they appeared very faint, probably from the quill running out of ink, or maybe the pressure being lifted after the hand that had been writing suddenly felt too weak.
Thank you. I sleep in peace.
And lower, in strokes even weaker:
f4
END