Archive of Our Own

“You are a hard man to pin down, Mister Wilde.”

Link’s heart jumped into his throat.

He was self-conscious of his appropriated tunic and gloves and boots that he’d ripped off the fence of some poor sunbathing shepherd. As was par for the course whenever he landed in a new place, the first thing he did was find a meal. This era’s meal consisted of a porridge with a meat best not examined too closely. He ate with relish. He was self-conscious of that too.

In contrast, the woman across from him was as fresh as a daisy. No-one spared her a second glance for all that she was wearing skin-tight clothing that in this era did not exist. Her skin was a sunny tone of light brown, her eyes were dark and he couldn’t tell if they were green or something else, and her ears were the longest he’d ever seen on a Hylian.

Link felt his throat close up. Oh dear.

She smiled. Don’t smile! Was she trying to kill him?! “Have you guessed who I am?”

He nodded.

Her smile fell. “Are you alright?”

His mouth opened. He cleared his throat. He gestured at himself.

She replied, “I’m going to have to ask you to trust me on two accounts, Mister Wilde. On the first, please wear this. This bracelet will temporarily inhibit your field of consciousness—that’s the immaterial extension of your mind that is capable of manipulating the space immediately around you. With it suppressed, you will not jump through time indiscriminately.”

Link accepted the bracelet. Immediately, something flighty in is chest and head settled. He winced.

“I know it is not a comfortable sensation,” the stranger continued. “I apologize: we’re fine tuning it. But I promise that it will not harm you and should you change your mind throughout the course of this conversation you are free to remove it. At the same time, I strongly advise against it.”

Link nodded and breathed through the abrupt nausea. The stranger touched his free wrist. He flinched. “You’re doing well, Mister Wilde. Thank you for the opportunity.”

He wanted her to stop touching him. He wanted her to keep touching him. Her smile was a little patronizing. He wondered what could make her belly laugh. He wondered what she liked to eat.

He looked away from her lips.

“Secondly, I have a device that will be able to transform your thoughts into legible words. It is not a perfect translator, and it is most certainly an invasive one, but through it I can be assured of your total consent and the depth of your understanding of the conversation to follow. May I employ it?”

To her relief he nodded. She drew from her hip a disk no more than two centimeters thick and glowing a swelling orange. At her gesture he touched it. In the next moment an immaterial screen appeared between them.

what the heck that is so cool wait are those my thoughts appeared on the screen a moment later.

The woman smiled. “Fantastic. It works.”

was it not GOING to work her smile is nice why is no one else in the pub noticing this wow this thing really has no censor let’s not think about anything weird DRAGONFRUIT nothing weird at all

She pressed her lips together as her cheeks lifted even more. “As I said it is not a perfect translator. I apologize.”

it’s fine I guess I can usually talk just not today

“Oh? Are you injured?”

a little tired but that’s not why I was treading water for three hours before I came here and I kinda don’t talk well sometimes and only my mom and sister can talk hands my dad and uncle try but they get words mixed up a lot

She smiled sadly. “Your family sounds lovely.”

they are are they okay is what happened to me going to happen to them

“As far as my intel goes, you are the only one in your immediate family to have spontaneously developed the ability to leap through time.”

do they know I’m gone?

“You will be allowed to visit them once you have full control of your power. The matter of gaining control of your power depends on your answer to my proposal.”

sure yes okay whatever you say

“No, you cannot consent yet. I haven’t told you what the proposal is.”

sure yes okay whatever you say

She bit her lip.

she’s smiling again STOP THINKING ABOUT HER MOUTH sorry it’s just you’re really pretty

“I will not judge you based on your impulsive thoughts, Mister Wilde. If anything, I am sorry that I cannot grant you better privacy. The device that you are using is still a prototype.”

it’s pretty cool though

“Robbie will be happy to hear you express as much. May I begin…?”

Sure yes

She smiled and nodded. “First of all, please pardon my poor manners. My name is Zelda Bosphoramous, and I am a Temporanaut.”

there was a princess from three hundred years ago named Zelda they say she killed a dragon and used its blood to water Hyrule Field and that’s why it has so much food now

“Yes. I am she.”

.

“Mister Wilde?”

that’s hot

She bit her lip.

WAIT NO I DIDN’T MEAN TO

She did not laugh. “That story is mostly conjecture. I will bore you with the truth another day.”

I’d love that

“I’m flattered to hear so. Shortly after my brief reign, I found myself in a completely new place. I’m sure you can guess what happened. I was later apprehended by my mentor, a woman named Impa, who made me aware of a society of time travellers. Every time traveller that there ever was and will be are made note of by this society and, if they chose, they may join it.”

what’s the catch?

“No catch as much as it is a mutually beneficial situation. The individual is afforded the education and resources that give them the most control over their situation, and the society requests in turn that they allow themselves to be tracked, should they choose to remain civilians, or that they join the group of agents such as myself.”

Link’s eyes briefly tracked over her outfit. Uniform, he thought.

“That’s right. I am an agent of the Temporanaut Society. My duties include wrangling wayward travellers such as yourself (whom we colloquially call Jumpers), observing undocumented periods of time, or escorting others through time.”

Are you going to take over the world?

She laughed. “I’ve played leader enough in my lifetime, thank you. And the Temporanaut Society is not interested in governance of any form. We are, primarily, a library. Our duty is to gain as much objective information about the world as we possibly can for posterity. The reason why is because the history of Hyrule has begun and ended severely several times in its very very long life. Constantly we have to start over from scratch. Documenting all of human history is our service to Hyrule.”

okay but like who are you gonna give all that knowledge to

“Everyone, when the time comes.” She smiled. “I will be happy to go into detail with you, but for the moment my proposal is this: you may join the Temporal Society. As a civilian, we will give you the training and knowledge enough that you do not leap through time unless you want to, albeit you will not be allowed to travel without permission.”

doesn’t that mess with the time stream

“Not as much as you may think. Our specialists have proven that even the most disruptive time travellers do not cause any more trouble than they would have if they were not equipped with the ability.”

Bootstrap Theory?

Her eyes lit up in interest. “Not quite, but adjacent. I’m excited that you know the term.”

Wow that’s a genuine smile huh STOP THINKING I wonder if she likes fried rice I make a mean pepper fry rice STOP

Zelda smiled, but glanced away from his private thoughts as soon as she recognized them as such. She said, “Your other option is to choose not to join the Temporanaut Society. In that case, I will return you to your time and remove your ability to travel forever.”

yeah not gonna happen

She smiled. She was bright and invested. Hylia be with him. “Oh? Then you wish to join us?”

I want to be with you LIKE YOU I like you NO I want to be LIKE you LIKE you

Her lips twitched. “An agent?”

please

“It is not impossible, but it is hard work. And you will need a sponsor: an experienced Temporanaut who is willing to help you transform your book knowledge to practical application.”

like you?

This smile was the widest yet. She sighed, “As it so happens, I have been in the market for a mentee.”

-

The Temporanaut Society HQ was a giant island that floated over a perennial sea. She said that it was affixed to the Era of Winds, a time where human populations were at an all-time low, and the likelihood of being discovered beneath the Sky Barrier was very rare.

Link had so many questions.

The giant island was outfitted with the things Link’s mind said were futuristic or old or weird. Magic did not exist in his pocket of time, and it was almost entirely dead in Zelda’s, but it made an appearance a few centuries later, and the Temporanaut Society hosted a technology that was founded at the intersection of magic and secular science.

Towers punched into the air. Aqueducts patterned the skies. Link had never seen a Goron or Rito before but here they were in spades, and there was architecture to suit them. He jumped the first time someone appeared out of thin air.

Zelda was his rock and guide. “Careful,” she led him away from a circular pattern on the ground. “That’s a teleportation pad. Some of them allow for speedy transport around the city, but some are portals through which Temporanuts visit this place from other places and times.”

but only agents right?

“For the most part. There are Temporanauts who support the Society outside of a military capacity, as administrators or historians. Sometimes their work requires them to jump.”

are there any time travellers that aren’t part of this society?

“Almost assuredly. Not including individuals who have mastered their powers in secrecy, there are many other organizations out there and across time.”

are they evil?

“Evil is relative. Rarely do their agendas interfere with ours, so there is no need to call each other enemies. However, I must warn you: it is of utmost importance to treat anyone who allies themselves with the Yiga with extreme caution and prejudice.

are THEY evil?

“Most assuredly, yes.”

Zelda was still holding his elbow, so he mindlessly bent it to keep her there. She noticed, but since he pretended not to notice she pretended not to notice too. Link carefully kept his thoughts away from how lovely it felt to have her shoulder occasionally brush on his.

Zelda said, “You have had a long few weeks. Today, what I will ask you to do is eat, rest, and be ready for me to receive you tomorrow at eight in the morning. You’ll be given a room with basic amenities and a construct to answer any basic questions—”

what’s a construct nevermind I guess I’ll find out

“—and tomorrow I will take you on a tour of the society beginning with our museum, where you will gather a better understanding of Hyrulean history, Temporanauts, and our mission. We’ll walk you through the various vocational avenues that are available to you, how you will be paid and where you will have access to subsidized services, any tax exemptions, and paths to marriage—”

Bzzt—MARRIAGE?—wrr

Zelda replied, “Oh yes, we are a society, Mister Wilde. People meet, fall in love, have children. There are even incentives to encourage marriage: the reasons for which we can get into later, if you’re interested.”

Sure

“Lovely.” She took him to a tower that ought to defy gravity and into a lift to a sun-washed corridor that wrapped around the hollow center of the building. Plants were growing on the railing. Everything looked like a utopia. The science-fiction movies from his time reminded him to be suspicious of utopias.

It was very hard to remember that when competent, glittery-eyed Zelda was snuggled up to his arm though.

She released him to open one nondescript door among dozens of nondescript doors. “This is your temporary home. Here is your construct: an automated attendant that will be able to answer day to day questions. Through it you can contact me if you desire.”

I desire. SHUT UP

Again her cheeks lifted and again she politely ignored him. “I’ll also inquire into alternative means of enabling you to communicate. For now, the construct will take care of you. Have you any questions for me?”

Food?

“The construct will provide.”

Can I leave the room if I want?

Her eyes widened. “Of course! All of the island is your oyster! Do as you like—erm, within reason, naturally. It reflects poorly on me if you were to, as a random example, climb a flagpole naked and hang your knickers from the very top.”

Link was deeply entertained. Has anyone done that?

“Yes.”

Link smiled.

“Do not do that.”

He was tempted.

“I’ll see you tomorrow at eight, then?”

How do I properly say good-bye to a princess? Do I kiss her hand or bow or something? So he took her hand and kissed it. He moved slowly and clumsily, but for whatever reason Zelda only watched him. He could not tell if she was flattered or morbidly curious by his bad form.

After a dread-soaked heartbeat, she smiled. “In the future a handshake will suffice. At the same time, I am honored by the courtesy.”

Am I red? I’m probably red. Let go of her hand. He let go of her hand. She smells nice QUIET DON’T THINK.

Finally finally, Zelda giggled. “Have a good rest, Mister Wilde.”

Link was alone before he allowed himself to melt into a puddle.

-

“Zelda!”

“Augh!?” Zelda startled out of her thoughts. “Purah! You menace!”

Purah cackled unrepentantly. “Where’s your report on your last mission? The computer keeps telling me the artifact isn’t processed.”

“It’s here. Beg pardon.” She submitted it, and Purah nodded when her own console, affixed to her glasses, pinged in confirmation.

“Excellent. I’ll authenticate it and hand it over to you to return it to its time.”

“How lovely. Once again ducking and twisting between arrows and poison darts.”

“You hadn’t left a temporal gate point?”

“Magics of all sorts were suppressed in the center of the temple.”

“Fascinating! Was that due to the material of the temple that interfered with your field of consciousness? Never mind, I’ll skim the report later. When are you coming to the lab? Robbie was expecting you half an hour ago.”

Zelda shot to her feet. “That was today!”

Purah finally recognized that she was out of it. She only needed to stare before Zelda removed her hastily donned composure.

She answered, “Pardon my absent-mindedness, Purah. I’m preoccupied with the pick-up I just conducted.”

“Didn’t go well?”

“It went splendidly. May I confide in you?”

“Let’s take the long way.” They walked past the fountain, the enclosure for boko-creatures, the doors to the library and the gates to the special residencies. “The pick-up was the one for level five clearance, right? The Ping Pong?”

“Right. He exhibits exceptional power. He was jumping through time in century-long increments, and this after a recovery period of only a few short days, sometimes mere hours.”

“Yeah, I heard that. Jumpers with that much raw talent are decently rare. Impa would love him to join her breeding program.”

“Your sister calls herself a matchmaker.”

“My sister needs to leave others’ love lives alone.”

“Are you referring to the time she suggested Robbie as a compatible partner—”

“Tell me more about your Ping Pong Jumper.”

Zelda obeyed. “It took a while to pin him down. And even when I did, I was almost too late. He’d almost drowned.”

“That’s what bothers you?”

“It’s made me pensive. I was chosen specifically for this mission and I almost failed.”

Purah was aggrieved. “Why are you getting twisted in a knot over an almost? He’s here, ain’t he?”

Zelda remained uncomfortable. Perhaps it was less that she had almost failed to rescue him and more that Link had been so willing to be rescued. His life and livelihood were in her hands.

“I suppose it’s because I feel responsible for him,” she admitted. “He expressed desire to be my mentee.”

Purah hummed. “You think he’ll make it through training?”

“It’s too early to say.”

She called her on her bullshit: “You have a nose for people. What’s your gut telling you?”

“My gut is telling me…that had he been a man I met while I was queen, I’d have done anything within my power to keep him at my side.”

Purah’s eyebrows lifted.

“I do not speak of him romantically.”

“No, I know. Why?”

“He was steady.” She tried to remember her first opinion of him flawlessly radiating his feigned inconsequential nature. “He had been yanked through seven centuries in the span of two weeks, and his instinct was to blend in, get a meal, and rest.”

“And as a queen you find that attractive?”

Zelda’s back straightened. “Yes. To have someone who can assess the situation and make a judgement call under what must be a highly stressful and disorienting situation? Yes. I can see him as a general, a commander, I can see him inspiring thousands to arms, or to lay down arms.”

Purah wondered what such a magnificent person looked like.

“Putting that aside, who do you know that can refer to me a thought-to-speak device?”

“Aside from Robbie?”

“His prototype was magnificent, but I recall that Cherry was his friendly rival and might have made some tweaks. Had any others in the lab stuck their fingers in the project?”

“Maybe Sonia in the prosthetics department?”

“Mh. She’s affiliated with the House. I don’t want word going back to my aunt…”

“It’ll go to your aunt anyway.”

“Mf.”

“Enough about politics. Robbie! I found her. Will you—put that down you narcissistic coelacanth!”

-

Link luxuriated in the pleasure of waking up and finding things familiar. With the relief came a fatigue he did not know he was suppressing.

“Temporal jumps infamously consume a great amount of energy,” the friendly construct, Link’s cohabitant, told him last night. “This is especially true for novices who have yet controlled their output. Please eat as much as you like.”

Link had always had a big appetite. Was it possible that he had always been utilizing this ability?

Perfectly at eight o’ clock the construct reported, “Agent Zelda has arrived. Shall I bid her entry?”

“I’ll get it,” he murmured. He opened the door and blinked, because Zelda looked exactly as she did yesterday.

“Good morning, Mister Wilde. Did you sleep well?”

she doesn’t look like she spent the night either not sleeping or sleeping. It’s like what was almost twelve hours for me was one for her.

She smiled guiltily. “It’s true I jumped through time to meet you now.”

she looks so tired.

“I’m not, but if it worries you, I promise I get between eight hours sleep every thirty-hour cycle, give or take.”

she looks hungry.

She laughed, “I could eat. Are you hungry?”

He nodded and produced his elbow. Zelda’s smile melted from polite to charmed and she held him there. “I sense that you and I might make good friends.”

Oh! So it wasn’t just my imagination that we get along.

“I’m happy to hear its mutual. I know of course that any relationship needs more to sustain it than a feeling, but friendships have been forged on less. May I be your friend?”

You’re kinda my lifeline in this place you’re basically my everything WAIT that sounds suggestive

Zelda’s smile was pained. “You are entirely correct. I hope to rectify that as soon as possible. Once you have your feet under you and training begins, your social circle will expand, and you will have the space to forge a whole myriad of relationships. As your mentor I will continue to hold some amount of power over you, but that needn’t invalidate a true friendship.” Her smile was a little lethal. “Therefore: don’t go thinking I will be easy on you, Mister Wilde. I stand for nothing less than excellence.”

Link’s posture straightened in response.

“Good answer.”

It was called the Museum of Time and Link was having much too much fun. There were moving dioramas and interactive lessons and a scavenger hunt, and he was eating candy and showing off his card of stickers to Zelda who was also eating candy and had her arm looped through his when his idiot brain thought: hey this is kinda like a date.

He closed his eyes against the abrupt shame.

Zelda smiled.

Ignore me.

“As you say. On the matter of your communicative style, would you like to prioritize a visit to our medical office? The construct would have notified us if you were in grievous health—it reported only that you were sunburnt and dehydrated—and you will visit the medical office anyway before training begins—should you still take the route of an agent, that is—but there is nothing dissuading us from going now.”

Link shook his head. It’s nothing that can be fixed. The thing connecting my throat to my brain just doesn’t work sometimes.

“I see. How did you communicate when you were home?”

Sign language. My friends and family knew sign, and my dad was based in the Zora Domain for a long time and they speak with their hands above water, and I worked there after I graduated, so not-speaking wasn’t an issue.

“I see! What was your occupation?”

I was a chef.

“Truly? I’d not have expected it.”

??? Why???

“Well, sometimes you hold yourself as a soldier.”

Oh! She can tell? I was a marine. Dishonorably discharged.

“What had you done?”

Kicked my corrupt superior off a boat.

“Is that all?”

Twice.

“Ha! Bravo.”

Link smiled at his little sticker chart.

“I do not know Zora Sign. I will do my best to learn.”

That’ll be easy for you.

“Oh? What makes you say so?”

He didn’t mean to think that. You seem really really smart. He didn’t mean to think that. It’s a little intimidating STOP THINKING.

She patted his elbow. “How do you feel about a device that translates your signed words to written words?”

He shrugged.

“I’ll put in a request then. I wonder how much a commission like that will cost?”

?! Cost?!

“Naturally, Mister Wilde. You didn’t think that all of this was free, did you?”

Altruistic society—wrr—utopia—money???

“We need money. And a great deal of it. Rupees is the safest currency, along with gold and gems, because they are untraceable and their worth does not vary greatly among timelines. Cycling these currencies through our coffers keeps the wheels turning. Of course, we cannot keep rupees and gems in our vaults—economies across the eons would suffer from spontaneously disappearing gems—so day to day we count money in the form of credits.”

Credits, Link thought vaguely. The universal currency of sci-fi movies and videogames.

She ignored him. “We pride ourselves in being a meritocracy, and our department of finance categorizes services to the Society in different tiers that are worth a certain amount of credits. Working overtime for three hours grants you twenty thousand credits, for example. Or pining down wayward time travellers may secure an agent eighty thousand credits.”

I’m pretty sure I’m worth more than eighty thousand credits.

She smiled at his subtle pout. “Being an agent is rarely lucrative. The majority of our earnings go straight back into our equipment and mentees’ education.”

Link jerked.

“Fret not: I can afford to sponsor you. And when you graduate, you will work with me for an agreed amount of time, effectively paying back your debt. Some agents choose to work under their mentor’s name for the rest of their lives. It increases profit, and means that we can rely on each other in difficult times. Those agents can even have mentees of their own while still recognizing their old mentor as a sponsor. If the cycle repeats itself enough, eventually what you end up with is a House: a group of agents with allegiance to each other.”

Sounds kinda political.

“You’re onto something,” she awarded him with a squeeze and a sticker on his forehead. “A House of considerable number of agents gains clout and esteem and influence for the amount of credits that they accrue through their acts of service.”

Are houses in charge?

“No. Or at least, not yet. Currently the Society is led by a triad of prophets who have seen more of the past and future than any other person in existence. But everyone here studies their history and knows that human governments never live to perpetuity.”

If the Houses are going to be in power one day, do the three old prophets know that?

“Yes.” She smiled sadly at him. “You’ve joined our ranks at an interesting time.”

Are you part of a house?

“I was, briefly. The House of Hylia. Its founder is said to be the first-time traveller ever. I don’t know if that’s the truth though.”

How can you not know??

She smiled sadly. “You’ll find, Mister Wilde, that objective truth is often a matter of perspective.”

Then it’s not objective anymore.

She replied—

“Already scooped him up, have you?”

They turned to face a young man who shared some of Zelda’s features. He was Daphnes, her cousin, and they did not get along. Link could tell by the sudden stiffness in her shoulders and politeness of her smile.

Daphnes was tall, slender and graceful. He had a Zelda-like spark in his eyes that implied intelligence. He said to Link: “Good day, Mister Wilde. Your reputation precedes you.”

Link artlessly replied, ???

“You created multiple Wakes. Has Zelda told you what those are? When we jump through time, we disturb the space time around it for a while. Like the ripples on the surface of a pond from a skipping stone. It’s by those Wakes that we can track Jumpers through time, how Zelda tracked you, sniffing like a bloodhound—”

Zelda’s hand on his elbow pulled because she felt Link tense.

“—but even so, your Wakes were so large that we didn’t know if she’d be able to find you. How broad were they, dear? Sixty years?”

“Fifty.”

“Fifty years. She had to hunt you down within a fifty-year span. Can you imagine how many jumps that is? How many resources she had to expend to find you? I lost a bet, y’know. I genuinely didn’t think you could.”

Zelda blinked.

“No offense.”

“I suppose that’s the difference between a level that is earned and a level that is inherited.”

He returned, “Or perhaps the difference between skill that is honed versus skill that is bred.”

Zelda did not reply.

Daphnes smiled bitterly. “Forgive my bloodhound analogy.”

“No. It was apt.”

Daphnes’ eyes flickered back to Link. “Have a good day, Mister Wilde.”

It took a moment. Then: asshole.

Zelda pressed her lips together. “He’s not that bad.”

I’m not very bright but I’m pretty sure he called you a talentless bitch?

“Two things. One: you are very bright, actually, that was obvious from day one. And two: that is more or less what he said, yes.”

Why?

“Daphnes’ father failed him.” She tugged and they continued walking. “He made him believe that his worth was tied directly to his ability as a leader. When I succeeded the throne instead of him, his sense of self-worth and identity was tied to being better than me. He is aware of this flawed ideology but leans into it: finds comfort in playing the role of villain. I’ve given up on trying to help him. He does not desire the help.”

So you let him talk down to you like that?

“Oh fret not, didn’t you hear that I got a word in? Besides: I am better than him.” She lifted her chin. “Don’t you agree?”

Absolutely.

She giggled. “You flatterer. Come: we need to take you before Impa soon. Let’s find the last of your stickers and go.”

Link went, but in the back of his mind he wondered about something else Daphnes implied. He said that Zelda expended a lot of time and resources to find him, that pinning him down was heinously difficult. He implied that going to such lengths was unusual.

His eyes flickered to Zelda’s profile curiously.

-

Impa was an old and tiny woman, so cute that Link wanted to pick her up, kiss her cheeks, and carry her home to show his sister.

“You’re pretty good looking yourself,” Impa replied with a toothless grin, and Link suffered in silent embarrassment as he remembered the stupid tool that made his thoughts plain.

Zelda was also laughing at him. She said, “Venerable Elder. May I introduce Link Wilde of the Tears Era. He is the fifth level disturbance that created Wakes between the twelfth and twenty-eight centuries.”

“How marvelous!” Impa hopped down from her throne of cushions. Link startled a little: she was sprightly! “Kneel down, young man. Let me get a look at you.”

Cute old lady, he thought as he obeyed. Ow. She pulled at his eye. Ow. She pulled at his cheek. Ow! She wrenched his neck to one side. He noticed Zelda pressed her lips together again. Her shoulders were shaking. She did not rescue him.

“You’d make beautiful babies,” Impa hummed. “What’s your sexual orientation, boy?”

“Impa.”

“I’d hope not,” she grinned, “it wouldn’t do for you to only have the hots for old women!”

Link laughed even as his cheeks were stretched taut.

Zelda chastised again, “Impa.”

“Alright, alright, I’m done. Spare me a little, hm? This is the first time I’ve heard wind of your sponsoring anyone, much less showing interest in anyone with good genes.”

Link touched his hot cheeks and looked at Zelda for an explanation.

She abided, “Impa has spent millennia studying the bloodlines of Temporanauts. Sometimes, if she is invited, she introduces potential lovers.”

Link was a little revolted. You breed people?

Impa waved her hands, “Calm down. What I do is put two people who have the hots for each other in the same room.” She tapped her own cheek speculatively. “Had I been a few decades younger I’d have been in such a room with you.”

Link tried not to smile.

Zelda wrangled the situation back into some semblance of professional consultation. “What is his starting level, Impa? Purah suggested he might be as good as me, and that’s untrained.”

“Hm, I’d say she’s about right.” Impa was solemn. “Unfortunately, that means that you cannot be his mentor, my dear. I’m sorry. I know your heart was set on this one.”

Link’s response was more heartbroken than Zelda’s. Why not?

“If something goes wrong in your training, I am not strong enough to stop you from hurting yourself or others,” Zelda explained softly.

Link’s disappointment was plain. So who will be my mentor?

“There are so few Temporanauts higher than level five…we may have to reactivate a retired one.”

“Can I recommend Mipha?” Zelda said quickly. “Link is comfortable in Zora culture.”

Her back was turned, so she missed the look of adoration Link sent her.

Impa smiled warmly at them. “I will take your advice into consideration.”

Link decided, Training won’t take long.

Impa laughed and slapped her thigh. “I like you.”

With Impa’s blessing, Zelda escorted Link across the city and talked a mile a minute about what to expect of the Zora Domain. “She is the Queen of the Domain of Lake Hylia during the Era of Twilight preceding the second Imprisoning War, that is, the civil war between the Hylian Empire and the other races, not the war between the Zonai Empire and the nations of the surface that resisted annexation.”

Link was stunned. There were two Imprisoning Wars?!

“History as you know it is incorrect, so do away from now anything that you think you know. At the same time, to take your teacher’s word as gospel is willful blindness. Always question.”

Link nodded.

“I’ve only known you for a day, but I’ve spent so long looking for you that I feel I’ve known you longer than that. I’m sorry that we could not deepen our acquaintance before you go.”

He smiled. As soon as I finish my training can I come back here to this time?

“Well, provided you receive the permission I see no issue, but that would hardly be fair to you.”

Fair?

“You’ll have spent upwards of a year growing apart from me.”

So if I spend six months training under Mipha I can only come visit you six months after we part company?

“Her Majesty Queen Mipha. And that is hardly gospel or necessarily recommended. I am being selfish: I don’t want to appear immature to you. You’ll be wiser and older when you return.”

Not that old.

Sweetly: “It’s going to take more than six months, Link.”

She called me Link! She called me Link! Ah, she’s reading this isn’t she.

Zelda tried very much not to laugh.

Link asked, Can I visit you after six months your time?

She rolled her eyes. “Visit me whenever. It will always be lovely to see you.”

He embraced her tightly. She laughed and patted his back and marveled how easy it was to like him.

The following day, two hours after Link was shipped off to the Twilight Era, a young man that she did not completely recognize seized her in the quadrangle in a bone crushing hug and lifted her off her feet. She screamed, even as she vaguely recognized his clothes as the water-resistant silk of the Zora…

Agent Link returned Zelda to terra firma. His hair was long, his skin was once more sunburnt, and he was fuller in body and more settled in spirit than he’d been before his training.

Zelda slapped his shoulder. “You haven’t even given me the chance to learn sign yet!”

“You don’t have to,” a device attached to his hip spoke in an unfamiliar if soothing voice. “Am I too late?”

“Too late for what?”

“Will you be my partner?”

Zelda’s expression opened in surprise and then crumpled in suppressed pleasure. “Don’t think I’ll go easy on you, Mister Wilde. I stand for nothing less than excellence.”

Link, pleased and smug, took one of her hands and pressed his lips to her knuckles.

-

Partners were encouraged.

Time jumping was difficult work in spite of their rigorous training. It served an agent well to have someone watch their back. At the same time, it was not uncommon for highly ranked Temporanauts, ranked from a competent five to a godly eight, to accept solitary missions. Doing so invited great risk, but compatible partners were few and far in between.

After he received Queen Mipha’s blessing, Agent Link was ranked at seven. His rank only promised to improve as he cultivated experience. He therefore had his pick of Houses, partners, friends and spouses.

Foolishly, he chose Zelda instead.

Zelda was honest about his choice. “I’m flattered, but I hate you.”

He looked up from his meal with a startled expression.

“Most Agents would kill to be invited to the House of Hylia. I don’t think you understand what an incredible boost it would have been to your career had you accepted.”

“There’s a reason you left them, right?”

“My reasons are mine. Not yours.”

“Well, they’re mine too.”

“They don’t apply to you!”

“Why don’t you have a partner?”

She allowed him to deflect. “My methods of travel are reckless. You are familiar with the technique of tethering, of course.”

He nodded. It was a fundamental technique that differentiated a Temporanaut from a Jumper. Leaping through time was like jumping from a cliff. You might be able to land at where you aimed for without the right tools affixed to your person, but if you didn’t it was very likely for a Temporanaut to end up hurt or lost or both. Affixing tethers in different points of time allowed the Temporanaut better control and safety, but tethers cost energy and time. A Temporanaut was always running short on time.

“I don’t tether. For my skill level it’s not unusual, especially not across increments of decades, but I don’t tether for centuries. Especially when I’m tracking Jumpers, I navigate by the cadence of their Wakes instead of with instruments.”

“But that’s impressive.”

“Maybe, but when one is in a team, their individual skills need to be used to the benefit of the collective. Team work doesn’t suit me.”

Link straightened at the scent of a challenge.

Zelda was touched by his response. “Good man.”

He ducked his head as he did whenever he was shy.

“So then: where do your skills lie? What had Her Majesty encouraged and discouraged over your training?”

“She said I expend too much energy.”

“Lots of precision and endurance training then, yes?”

Link nodded. Queen Mipha would tire him out until he was ready to collapse and then she’d smile with all her pointy teeth and tell him that the real training was about to begin. “I think she enjoyed torturing me.”

“I don’t blame her.”

Link blushed. He wasn’t opposed to the idea of Zelda torturing him. He was grateful she could no longer read his mind.

“What are your strengths?”

“I can jump three thousand years untethered with a two-century margin of error.”

Her eyes widened. “But that’s superb!”

He ducked his head shyly.

“I suddenly feel embarrassed that I had ever assumed I could be your teacher.”

He immediately corrected: “You have a lot to teach me.”

“There are other more established—”

“I want you.” He smiled because she looked a little touched and huffy.

“Her Majesty rated your combat ability highly as well.” She was trying to be aloof as she consulted his report.

He let her pretend. “I’ve always been good at Bullet Time and Flurry Rush.”

“Before your first jump, you mean?”

He nodded. “Sometimes the world turns a little slower and everything aligns for my arrow to strike true.”

“And he’s a poet. I think I’m in love.”

He blushed marvelously.

“Oops. Sorry. I don’t mean to tease.”

“Yes you do.” Shyly: “I don’t mind.”

She stood suddenly. “I want to see you in the field. I am on standby for a reconnaissance mission, so let’s get you registered as my partner posthaste. Shall we?”

He hesitantly stuck out his elbow for her. Thoughtlessly she took it. She asked, “How long had you trained beneath Mipha?”

His smile was self-deprecating. He stuck up five fingers.

“Five years!” She looked him over in a way that would make any man’s blood rush. “That’s shorter than I anticipated.”

He pointed at her.

“I had trained for four years.”

He pouted.

“Do not consider it a reflection of being a bad student, my friend. Queen Mipha is a legend in the temporal community. She has rescued ecosystems, salvaged civilizations, and travelled the farthest on Hylia’s Wake. Your education has outstripped mine in leagues. Congrats!”

He briefly knocked his head to hers. Their acquaintance was still very very new, but the idea of cultivating a physical language with her felt right. As he hoped, she responded positively. “You’re welcome, Mister Wilde.”

The clerk who processed their request at the registry did little to hide his skepticism. “Agent Link Wilde of the Era of Tears, level seven, seeks partnership with Agent Zelda Bosphoramous of the Era of the Wilds, level five?” He spoke her title with scorn.

In the waiting room, Zelda pressed her shoulder to his. He delighted in it and leaned towards her as she whispered. “I must warn you. I am not popular.”

Why? She was kind and passionate.

“You are very new to the social scene. What I’ve shown you of the Society is barely the tip of the iceberg, although you’ve guessed at some of the political machinations that are occurring between the Houses and the standing authority.”

He smarted at his ignorance and glowed under her praise.

“I was adopted into the House of Hylia by a distant aunt. She cultivated my powers and expanded my knowledge with travel. Had I stayed with the House, the efforts of the collective would have buoyed me such that I could have focused on my abilities and attained a rank of your equivalent. But I chose to leave.”

He blinked.

“It is by design that many powerful Temporanauts are members of the House of Hylia. This grants the House unique prestige. Their agenda disgusts me.”

“They want powerful Temporanauts? Like Mipha?

“Mipha’s allegiance is with her people. She will never interfere with the internal politicking of the Society.” She met his eye with an apologetic smile. “It’s very likely that the House of Hylia will target you.”

“But I don’t have any political clout.”

“You discredit yourself, my friend. Power and skill aside, you are in line to earn some serious money since a powerful Temporanaut is always in demand.”

He was pensive.

“Never mind that you are beautiful. Gents and ladies will be vying for your hand in short order, wait and see.”

Link’s grin was very silly.

“What’s that look about?”

“You think I’m beautiful?”

“Don’t flatter yourself.”

She was cold yet when Link rest his temple on her shoulder, she sweetly pressed her cheek to the top of his head.

-

Agents Link and Zeda descended on a quiet moment in Hyrule’s timeline creatively dubbed the Era of Snow.

Death Mountain had erupted. As temperatures around the globe cooled, humans congregated around warmer seas and monster populations fled underground, leaving the bitter inland uninhabited and beneath the sentinel of last era ruins.

“This is one of the sixteen major extinction events that we observe within Hylia’s Wake. It is widely believed that there was at least one before, instigated by the Demon King.”

The two of them hadn’t been able to speak until they made it out of the blizzard. They stood in the doorway of a massive stone structure now. In the future, Link would know it as the Lost Temple at the bottom of Tanagar Canyon. Before that, it was known as the Great Temple of Hylia, a popular pilgrimage site and the most comprehensive library in the world.

By their ability to sidestep matter by warping spacetime, they teleported into the temple just a little beyond its door. It was pitch black, dead silent, and the air so still Link’s throat tickled.

Zelda produced three orbs of light. One would float ahead, wandering ever further or higher until there was nowhere else to go. The other would stay at the entrance, and the last would follow Link and Zelda.

Link stomped his boots against the stone. Zelda shot him a look.

“What?”

“This is a sacred site, Mister Wilde. Please treat it with respect.”

“Aren’t we going to set up camp here?” Wasn’t that also disrespectful?

“After paying tribute to the goddess, yes. The statue should be ahead, should the schematics sourced from six thousand years ago hold true.”

Those schematics were sourced by a Temporanaut who so fell in love with the era he was tasked with overseeing that he spent his life as a monk in this very temple.

Link followed her lead. “I didn’t know you were a pious person. You seem really brainy.”

“Are you saying I can’t have faith and be cerebral?”

“Water and oil don’t mix, right?”

She looked up from the map she was consulting and took in the ripped plaster in the roof of the complex. They walked on a wide promenade. On each side were routes to other chambers. One of them supposedly was home to a sacred tree that bore fruit only once an epoch.

Zelda replied, “I was raised on the faith of Hylia. It was the source of my spiritual power during my tenure as queen. When I was adopted into the Society and learned that Hylia may have been a real person, the first time traveller, my faith was only reinforced by scientific discovery. Tell me: do you believe in the sky?”

He was confused. “The sky is there whether or not I believe in it.”

“What a pretty answer.”

He blushed beneath his scarf.

“I have known people were disappointed to learn that their god was mortal, like a child learning that the sky isn’t really there. But learning that Hylia was a woman just like me makes me even more excited to follow her. I might even be able to meet her one day.”

“People say you should never meet your heroes.”

“Well. Maybe at the end of the road I’ll be disappointed. But I’d rather know than not know.”

They were approaching an inner sanctum now. Zelda’s voice was growing quieter. “Do you want to see beyond the Boundary?”

The Wake of Hylia was the ten million years window available to time travellers. It began after the collapse of Skyloft and ended after the appearance of the Dragon of Darkness. The current standing theory was that a powerful time traveller, supposedly the Goddess Hylia, had punctured through spacetime. The result of this colossal jump was a Wake so huge that it made a permanent bubble that enabled time travellers to jump back and forth as much as they liked.

However, time travellers could not cross the boundaries of Hylia’s Wake. Those who tried failed to return.

Zelda paused at a mighty threshold. She nodded. “Yes. In many of my preordained fates, I am lost to it.”

“That doesn’t frighten you?”

“Yes.” She stepped forward.

Link and Zelda found themselves at the feet of a colossal goddess statue. This was Hylia, deified and weird, colossal and lonely. They each took to their knees. After that, they made camp on the promenade.

“This place was home to thousands of travellers in a single day,” Zelda told him in naked wonder. “They were bringing knowledge from all over the world. A good chunk of it were oral traditions, but some were ancient relics that lost their otherworldly power when magic ebbed from the world or regained it when magic returned.”

The Age of Snow was an era when magic was at its weakest, so travel to this time took great energy and was traditionally the purview of the strongest Temporanauts.

Link gave her a cup of soup.

“Oh, I couldn’t eat another bite.”

“You’ve barely had anything. Eat. You’re so skinny.”

“What’s wrong with being skinny?!”

He shot her a vexed look that made her giggle and tuck in.

They were both tired. Confirming that the pieces of the Mirror of Twilight were here, given as tribute from a Gerudo prince who joined the faith, would wait until morning. In the present, drowsy and full and lonely, Link sat beside Zelda and she thoughtlessly settled against him.

“Whose voice is it that speaks for you?”

“It’s my voice.”

“Is it!”

“You like it?”

He was teasing, but her response flustered him: “I do. It’s soothing.”

It was so quiet that they could hear the mild buzz of the floating orbs. Zelda was idly counting her heartbeat. A rustle of fabric landed like a thunderclap. Link’s throat moved in her peripheral vision. Then:

“Zelda.”

She was up like a shot.

Link’s voice did not suit the wide-eyed frozen creature that faced her now. It had been gentle but sure, masculine and rusty.

She smiled, hoping to encourage him to speak again. His voice was sweeter than a recording! Despite that his pretty neck bobbed twice more however, he ultimately pinked and ducked his head.

Zelda snuggled against his shoulder without fanfare. She watched his hands and knew most of the words before the speaker box chimed in:

“You should eat.”

She moaned, “No! Please! I’m bursting at the seams!”

“You’re undernourished.”

“I am not!” She watched for more signs, but he was peeling off his gloves. Why? It was cold! His fingers alighted on her cheek and it was warm warm and a little sweaty.

He pulled down one eyelid and then the other. He pulled at her bottom lip to look at her gums. She parted her teeth to bite him, but ended up messily sucking on his thumb instead.

Link flinched and Zelda recoiled. “Beg pardon. I went too far.” She covered her mouth. “If it’s any consolation I meant to bite you.”

Link permitted hastily, “You can bite me whenever you like.”

She glared at him despite her humiliation, despite her grin. “Don’t give me such an offer, Mister Wilde. I just might take it.”

Link ducked his head shyly but kept her eyes, and when his gaze grew to be too much she buried her face in the thick shoulder of his coat. She woke up in the same position. The only difference was that Link was examining her nails this time. She told him that it was too cold without her gloves, and Link responded by wrapping her fingers around his pretty pretty neck.

-

“Ah! The Lovebirds!”

Zelda immediately looked away from Link’s shoulders. Link turned and she noticed his pretty profile and long hair. Stop looking!

“Hm? Zelda? What’s the matter?”

Link glanced at her.

Zelda looked down from the ceiling. “The stucco is lovely.”

Both Impa and Link craned their heads up. Had Zelda looked that silly?

Impa clicked her tongue. “The goddess did well when she made you an agent in Her service than an architect.”

Link’s eyes glittered in amusement and Zelda flushed irritably. “Is there a reason you summoned us, Impa?”

“Yes. I need the two of you to launch an investigation into a Dark Epoch.”

Zelda’s eyes slid to Link again, but his expression was not blank. He knew that a Dark Epoch were the segments of time that were uncharted and undocumented by the Temporanaut Society. Ignorance was the greatest risk in travelling to such places. There were some Dark Epochs that were completely restricted because too many curious Jumpers or trained scouters were lost to it. There were others that were hard to chart because of the presence of acrimonious forces.

“My granddaughter has had a vision of the Era of Time. She has seen a people worshipping the serpent Volvagia.”

Link was swift. “That’s the dragon that was killed by the Goron Hero, revived by a reiteration of Demise, and killed again by the Hylian Hero.”

Impa smiled indulgently. “You know your history.”

Link’s eyes flickered to Zelda. She tried not to fidget: she had too much fun pulling his cheeks or ears if he performed poorly on her pop quizzes. She said, “Worshippers are hardly enough to lift the ban from the Era of Time.”

“They are the ones who built the Fire Temple, which survives within Death Mountain until the Boundary. I want to know who they were to be able to co-exist with a malevolent god.”

It made impeccable sense. Defending Impa’s cause to the council would have been easy because of the appearance of the Dragon of Darkness. The Society’s only goal was to create a comprehensive compendium for the people of the future. There was nothing known of the future. Did time travel exist? Did civilizations collapse anew? Would knowing about Volvagia make a difference to people facing down the stare of the world’s newest evil deity?

“Your mission,” Impa said, “will be to escort my granddaughter to a time just preceding the believed appearance of Volvagia for the first time. From there, Paya’s visions will gain clarity.”

Link finally looked confused.

“Paya is clairvoyant,” Zelda provided. “Her temporal ability manifests in visions of the future or past.”

Impa nodded. “I was a powerful Seer myself once: I thought I could see beyond the veil of the Boundary. The very attempt stripped me of my ability.”

Link asked, “When are we going?”

“I will send her to you tomorrow.”

So Link and Zelda did as they always did before a mission and went in pursuit of a meal, good tools, and a good night’s rest. Link was friendly with the merchants because he always brought them good information, the Society’s second currency. They got good deals on tools, all wink-wink-hush-hush, and Link entirely missed Zelda’s small adoring smile as he haggled with Beedle.

Air displaced behind her.

Zelda murmured sourly, “Why do they insist on sending the one person from the House I dislike?”

“Perhaps because most have no faith that you will return but need to make the attempt to appease auntie,” Daphnes replied. “Good morning, Your Majesty.”

She looked at him critically. She frowned: a bruise was on his jaw.

“I have no patience for your pity today.”

“I don’t pity you.” She had given up on telling him to leave. He feared isolation. “Do you want something?”

“You and your partner are invited to tonight’s dinner.”

“And we are grateful for the invitation but Link and I must prepare for—”

Daphnes added quietly, “You know it’s not a request.”

Zelda pressed her lips together. She would not accept out of filial piety. She would accept because the head of the House of Hylia possessed power, prestige and influence. The woman was a respected educator and devout follower of the Society’s cause. She did not have the power to prevent Zelda from taking the missions that enriched her lifestyle, but she had the power to make Link’s friends suddenly very uninterested in doing business with him.

Zelda took a bracing breath. “Time?”

“Six.”

“Dress code?”

“Formal. White.”

“White.”

“Auntie is renewing her vows.”

“This is hardly warning enough for me to get her an appropriate gift.”

“I’m sure that she would find the arrival of her estranged niece and her partner to be gift enough.”

Zelda did not respond to his bitterness.

Link returned and stared at Daphnes without greeting him. Daphnes smiled wanly, bid them a good day, and left them in peace. Link looked at Zelda next.

She replied, “How do you feel about eating out for dinner, Mister Wilde?”

Link was profoundly uncomfortable with the concept of entering the lions’ den, least of all when Zelda told him that his uniform was inappropriate attire.

“You look like you’re going to war,” she protested.

He protested, “We are going to war!”

“Stop it now, I’m getting cross.” He froze. “There should be a limit to how adorable you can be.”

True to fashion, Link blushed and sulked, and he allowed Zelda to bully him into clothing with far too much lace than he would have preferred. His one solace was that he and Zelda matched. He offered his elbow and thought, This is the first time I’ve seen her clavicle.

“My eyes are up here.”

And he immediately tried to defend himself—

“It’s quite alright, Mister Wilde.” She faced forward. “I was also admiring your posterior.”

And she ignored the broad broad smile that glimmered in her peripheral vision.

Link would be lying if he said he never wanted to visit the House of Hylia. It was a pivotal element to his dear friend’s motivations and its insignia appeared dozens of times across the city if one took an afternoon stroll. He wasn’t expecting a literal manor.

“And if you ask half the members inside, they’ll say that this is small,” Zelda rolled her eyes. “I myself spent many years at war sleeping on stone or dirt. The concept of a building with this much negative space for the function of making a statement turns my stomach.”

“You went to war?”

“It’s a dull story.”

Link smiled because he wanted to kiss her.

“Why are you smiling at me like that?”

He told her another truth. “I’m scared. Please don’t leave my side.”

She laughed. “I promise at worst is that a young woman will ask for your hand.”

“In marriage?”

“To dance, Mister Wilde.”

He blanched.

“What? Is that worse?”

And she laughed when he nodded.

Lavish decorations aside, the event was unremarkable. To Link’s eyes everything was decently lavish but tasteful. At his left, Zelda’s teeth gritted and found it all garish. Link spoke to her often, because she squinted less when reading his hands.

“That’s auntie,” she whispered to him when a mature woman, tall grey-haired and masculine, ascended the podium. Beside her was a younger gentleman who kissed her cheek with naked adoration. “She’s head of the House of Hylia. She’s the woman who taught me the basics of jumping through time.”

Link asked what her name was.

She hesitated. “Zelda.”

Link glanced around the hall. More than a few bore a striking resemblance to each other.

“Ours is one of the bloodlines Impa studies,” Zelda answered is unaired question. “The House of Hylia is half a clan half a breeding project: like royals scuttling to keep all the money within the family, so does the House of Hylia urgently control the so-called bloodline of the goddess.”

“So it’s true that you’re descended from Hylia?”

“It isn’t impossible, but I am of the belief that it is unlikely. There is credence to the theory that Hylia was a gifted time traveller the equal of whom have not been discovered—save perhaps for you, should you hone your prodigal strength—but to call her a goddess transforms this green-eyed family from a clan into a cult.”

She was so annoyed. He adored her.

“Ours isn’t the only family in which Temporanauts are reoccurring, of course. Actually, it’s cases like yours that are the outliers. After investigating your family, you are the first time traveller in nineteen generations.”

He stared.

“Yes, it’s very unusual. It’s not uncommon to skip a generation or for the inheritance to be indirect, but nineteen generations apart and it’s difficult to call you family at all.”

Link asked, “You investigated my family?”

She gauged his reaction. “I—”

“Zelda.”

Link felt Zelda shiver. She stood, so he stood with her. Her auntie was even more intimidating up close, more so for the respect she inspired in her niece.

“And this must be your partner, the famous level seven.” She smiled at Link. “Your appearance had been foretold but I never thought I would live in the era in which you were precedented.”

Link shot Zelda a confused look, but his arm was seized.

“Dance with me.”

And so, Link was stolen.

“You’re a terrible dancer,” Auntie Zelda laughed three steps later. “I had thought Zelda would have taught you.”

Link could not respond that aside from having no time, he had every intention of being only in Zelda’s arms tonight. Which sounded suggestive. Thank god his hands were full.

Auntie Zelda kept the steps simple. “You seemed confused when I mentioned that your appearance was heralded. Did she never explain to you that the Society has been expecting you?”

Link frowned, shook his head, and took everything that came to follow with a grain of salt.

“For all that we travel back and forth in time, we do not know the future. Spacetime is elastic and can spring back if energy is exerted on it. Wakes are one example of this phenomenon. All that to say that when you go on your little missions to observe the world, or even if you change something, you exert pressure with your jump, and more often than not time snaps back to the moment before you were there. The only evidence of your passing would be the reverberations.”

Link did not require the lesson. Queen Mipha had been thorough with the fundamentals. Auntie Zelda however seemed the type of person who liked to teach. She was good at it: already Link’s steps were surer.

“People like Impa and her granddaughter can see those reverberations, but its like looking at the surface of a disturbed pond. With each distortion, a different future is revealed. All of them are true. Parsing the future is a matter of figuring out the trajectory of the present. But I digress: all of that is to say that there have been a multitude of seers who saw a future where a time traveller the equivalent of the Goddess Hylia’s strength would appear within Her Wake.”

Link frowned. And they thought that was him?

“Zelda believed that you were them. She studied your family and your Wakes for years. She had trained to find and apprehend you. She is so very competent, isn't she?”

Link took her words with a grain of salt. Still, he nodded.

“I am glad that you are with the Society, Mister Wilde. There are many powers that be who believe that we shouldn’t exist, nor should we seek what is beyond the Boundary.” The dance ended. “But what do you believe?”

“Thank you for the dance.”

Auntie Zelda smiled and did not hold him back to answer her question.

Link popped next to Zelda’s elbow. She frowned, but allowed him to teleport them beyond the manor. It was blissfully silent at the edge of the floating city. The crash of the waves might have been soothing if he didn’t have nightmares of drowning still.

Zelda waited for him to tell her what was wrong.

“Your aunt told me that you trained for years to be able to find me. Is that true?”

Zelda went unreadable. “It’s true, though she had no business telling you.”

“Were you ever going to tell me?”

“Yes.”

He frowned. They’d been partners for months.

She held out her hand. “Since you are asking for my transparency, allow me to show you all of my research.”

He took her hand and they were in her room. It was a sterile space: she barely spent time there. Going on missions back-to-back was her lifestyle long before Link adopted himself into it. This was functionally Zelda’s waystation. Link was functionally homeless.

She showed him a projection. “I was freshly recruited when I was told that there were a series of Wakes in the Tears Era unlike anything else in the observable timelines save for the appearance of the Hero of Time and the incarnations of Demise. It was believed that it was caused by a being of equivalent power.”

“So you knew me for years.”

“Well, I never met you until I met you,” she replied abstractly. She winced, noticing how avoidant she sounded. “I have known about you for years, yes. You were an enigma. It was like an astronomer pouring over an understudied supernova.”

Link stared, arms crossed, unimpressed.

She continued, “The Seers gave us thousands of things to be seen in your Wake. Very few of them described you as even marginally human. More than fifty described you as an apocalyptic event. The Society had sent agents to investigate, but when twenty were lost, the Era of Tears was dubbed Dark, and visitations to the times that you jumped through heavily restricted.”

Link shook his head. “Did I kill people?”

“No, Link.” She frowned. “You may have put on a pyrotechnic display that attracted the moths, but you weren’t the bat that ate them. In our ignorance, we deemed your visitation points a danger.”

“Until you.”

“Well, yes. I had proven myself as a skilled Temporanaut with eighteen successful recoveries, and my ability to surf on Wakes are second to none. I may not be as powerful as half the travellers in the House of Hylia, but my technique is precise. And it was what led me to you, as preordained by only one Seer.”

“Who was that?”

“Paya,” Zelda smiled. “She won notoriety since.”

His eyes flickered. He was so busy with his hurt and confused by these new revelations that he’d forgotten that she was in a pretty dress. His own corset was aching.

“What are you thinking?”

“I’m thinking that the House of Hylia trained you to find me.”

“Yes. For their agenda to travel beyond Hylia’s Wake.”

“And then you left the House.”

“Yes.”

He watched her notes. “You’ve been studying me for years.”

“Specifically, I’ve been studying your Wakes for years.”

“And the verdict?”

She frowned. “You already know I find you beautiful.”

His smile was besotted.

“Will you forgive me for not laying all of this plain earlier?”

“Only if you tell me why you kept it secret.”

“It never seemed important since I cut ties with the House of Hylia so soundly. Without their influence you were free to make your own path.”

“Is that why you left?”

“Don’t make me out to be noble, Mister Wilde. I left because of my own selfishness. I didn’t want to be part of their divine right to lead us into salvation from ignorance.”

“That’s not selfish.”

“Anyway,” and she dismissed her notes, “I managed to diminish your Wakes by apprehending you. The Era of Tears is now open for inquisition, and we may have discovered why so many agents were lost to it: the Yiga Clan are active in that time.”

The Yiga Clan were a serious threat. “You’re not selfish, Zelda.”

“Please focus, love. Tomorrow we well be visiting a similarly dangerous era with a civilian in tow.”

He leaned off the table and crowded her space and while she was cast catatonic by his proximity, he pressed a kiss to her cheek. His “thank you” bubbled out of him unbidden, sharp and voiceless.

He saw goosebumps race over her skin.

He drew back enough to orient their noses and ask permission, but her lips were on his.

She broke the kiss rather violently. He grabbed her forearms in reflex.

“Forgive me.” Her eyes were screwed shut. “That was inappropriate.”

Link lifted his hands to her neck. He nudged his thumbs under her jaw, but her chin had already lifted. He kissed her cheek.

He could fly. Zelda leaned into his touch. He could fly!

She murmured, “Lovely as this is, we should stop.”

His grunt was unbidden.

“We have a long day tomorrow and…and…forgive me, but I have some thoughts to untangle.” She glared, “But we will be having a long chat over wine after the mission, understood? You will take me to dinner, and we’ll have crackers and cheese, and we’ll talk about what this meant to us.”

He nodded, but: “One more kiss?”

“Hmph. Yes.” She was flustered. “But after that we’re going to bed.”

His eyes lit up.

“To sleep! In separate beds! Oh hush, you—”

And he laughed as he kissed her, which was an awkward and marvelous way to be kissed.

-

Paya did everything right, but if she were not there then Zelda would not have been taken.

It wouldn’t be right to resent her. She was already sobbing, her arm all bloodied from the attack, and every other word she offered Link over her shoulder was an apology.

Link was tired of telling her it wasn’t her fault. It wasn’t her fault. How was she to know that the worshippers of Volvagia were the Yiga?

They were some sort of ancillary group, or a broken off family, or a group that were left stranded in time and only had each other and a hate for Hylia left. They were jumpers, but knowing the extent of the threat did not wholly prepare them for reality. Yiga themselves did not flex spacetime: their instruments and weapons did. Yiga were time travellers by virtue of devices on their person, not due to any natural ability.

Zelda told Link to flee with Paya. When he returned half a moment later, Zelda was gone, the Fire Temple was empty, and Volvagia was bearing down on him.

Time had snapped into place. Time had snapped into place!

So he went to Zelda’s home—his home now, technically, since in her absence he was entitled to her property as her partner—and he went a little mad. He studied her notes, he tried to understand how she analyzed him, he tried to find her Wakes in increments of time that spanned millennia. Paya tearfully introduced him to Purah and Robbie, and he made a small fortune doing the work that no-one else wanted to do, and he went broke spending that fortune, and when he looked up for air three years had passed and Robbie said, “Found her.”

Link was gone before Robbie could say more.

-

Zelda woke quietly.

She was not in the immediate company of her captors, that much was certain. The bed was soft, she was warm and healing, and the roof was unfamiliar and homely. Despite this cheerful place, she was nervous. It was all new.

Zelda crawled out of bed quietly. She was sore and she was alone. Her equipment was missing: there was nothing to tell her where she was in what timeline. She looked around the space that was a loft bedroom. Rather than risk a squeaky step, she teleported downstairs.

She was in instant pain. She fell to her knees quaking. She felt as though she were torn in two and half of her was still standing somewhere else. She could feel the grain of the wood beneath her feet and vividly as she could feel it under her cheek as she sobbed. Zelda sobbed quietly.

This was how Link found her.

Link rolled her onto her side and cleared away the table and chair that she might have hit in the depths of her seizure. When it was done she was tired, her nerves were buzzing, and she was very certain she’d wet herself.

Zelda cried.

“Sh-sh,” Link softly patted her head. “Sh.”

He left and returned with a quilt and wrapped her in it. He cleaned the mess on the floor and provided her with water and candy. As she absently watched him work he wondered how young he looked, how small-bodied in these soft clothes, and she wondered when he had cut her hair. He looked at her: he did not recognize her.

She stiffened. “Who are you?”

He opened his mouth to answer and the door opened. A young woman bearing a jarring resemblance paused as she took in the scene. “What happened? Are you alright?”

Zelda jerked back.

“Hey, hey,” she kneeled and softened her voice and pushed Link aside. “I am Aryll, and this is my brother Link. Your name is Zelda, right? Link, I mean, the other Link, brought you here to recover. He’ll be here soon.”

Zelda’s eyes flickered back and forth. She gathered a sense of the situation. “How old are you?”

Little Link tilted his head in thought. “Twenty-four,” he eventually signed.

Two years before his first jump, Zelda thought. She pulled the quilt around her and over her nose. “Thank you for taking care of me.”

“Of course,” Aryll grinned. “You’re family, alright? Remember that. Now then: daddy patched you up, but he left to grab a medic he knows from the village over. He’ll be here any minute, but in the meanwhile can you tell us if there’s anywhere we missed?”

Zelda shifted. Physically, everything was addressed. To the best of her knowledge, the Yiga hadn’t broken anything, they just hurt everything. Her nose might not be straight ever again and her stool might be a little black for a while, but physically she would recover.

“I could use some electric safflina if you have it.”

“Huh,” Aryll watched her speculatively. “Big Link’s already gone for it. Didn’t explain why though. Expecting to take a jaunt through a thunderstorm?”

“It will soothe my nerves that are oversensitive to the temporal jumps. I’ll continue having the seizures otherwise.”

“Huh.” Aryll bobbed her head. “That’s something.”

Little Link was staring at her. When Zelda looked at him, his eyes darted away.

“Do you need anything else?”

Zelda smelled of urine. “I would appreciate a bath.”

And she was allowed one, and Aryll stayed with her. The mention of seizures had her thinking it’s best Zelda’s not alone for a while, and Zelda was transparent about adoring the company. In part it was because Aryll was thoroughly agreeable, in part it was because she was having much too much fun acting as Link’s sister.

“And so he jumps into the lake, right?” Aryll said over their giggles. “But like, he’s nine. And he’s skinny as all hell and his underwear didn’t fit—woosh! Off they went!”

Zelda cried, “Oh no!”

“Oh yes! Flashed the entire Zora community. Hell of a cannonball though.”

Zelda was still laughing when someone shoved open the door. She hiccupped and ducked in the water.

“Out.”

Aryll sighed, “Oh come on, you’re not still embarrassed, are you?”

He stepped to the side and pointed. Aryll cackled, reminding Zelda everything of Purah whom she missed bitterly, and left them in peace. Link, her Link, closed the door behind his older—no, his younger sister. He spared the bath a pout.

Zelda, submerged to her chin, smiled shyly.

“Don’t listen to her.”

“Of course not, Mister Wilde.”

He sat at the edge of the bath and she took him in. He was older than she remembered. She was embarrassed to find him handsome for the long untidy hair and scruffy cheeks. His face had lost its youthful curves, and he had a scar on his chin she did not recognize.

“How old are you?”

He grinned at her—don’t grin! What he trying to kill her? “Thirty. Thirty-one in twenty days.”

“Oh.” She looked at his shoulders, so lovely in the Temporanaut’s uniform. “Happy birthday.” And then she cried.

Link wrapped his shoulders around her and dragged her to his neck and kissed her hair.

She cried, “I missed your birthdays!”

He smiled. Was that really what she was sad about? He sobered quickly: of course it wasn’t. The scars on her back were still pink. It must have ached terribly to get out of bed. He squeezed her tightly and kissed her hair. He permitted himself a sniffle.

She drew back. “I’m naked.”

He grinned and bobbed his eyebrows.

“Oh shush.” She sniffed. “You owe me dinner first, remember?”

“We have a reservation at Wilde Restaurant. How do you feel about spicy stir fry?”

She sniffed. “That sounds wonderful.”

He smiled sadly. “I missed you so much.”

“I’m sorry. But—did Paya?”

“She’s fine. She’s sorry.”

“She was impeccable.” Zelda sniffed. “If I were just faster—”

“You’re impeccable.” He wiped his thumb on her cheeks.

“Will you kiss me? Please?”

His mouth twisted. “I want to, but you’re hurt and just went through something really traumatic.”

She wilted. “I just wanted comfort.”

Link stiffened. He murmured, gently held her face, and pressed his lips to hers for three seconds. They were slow to part.

She sniffed. “Thank you.”

“No more than that for a while, okay?” He bobbed his eyebrows. “I want you to be healthy enough to bully me in bed.”

She scoffed even as she flushed. “You’re so sure you’ll get that far.”

“I’m willing to beg if you let me.”

“We’ll negotiate it.”

And they had a conversation that valiantly tried to substantiate the three years between them.

Link’s family was lovely. They were under the impression that she was his girlfriend, which Zelda went to no great lengths to correct. Link’s mother found her polite and stunning, Link’s father found her companionable and witty, and Link’s sister was happy to tease and gloat in turns. Every meal was boisterous and cheerful, and as much as Zelda was unaccustomed to it she was grateful to be so welcomed.

Little Link however avoided her. She was disappointed with his aversion: he was cute! She wanted to pinch his cheeks and tell him that he was going to grow into an incredible person, that he already was, but mostly she just wanted to make him blush.

Big Link scowled a little when she mentioned it.

“Are you jealous of yourself, Mister Wilde?”

“No.”

“You said that too quickly.”

“No I am not jealous of my younger self. My younger self doesn’t get to kiss you.”

“See, a man who was not jealous wouldn’t say that.”

He lightly bit her shoulder to aggravate her, but she only laughed.

“He just has a crush on you, that’s all,” Link said to her shoulder. “He’s thinking of a hundred things to say to you and doesn’t know where to begin.”

She was so touched. “You thought so highly of me, then? Bandaged and bruised as I am?”

“I think so highly of you now.” He was still speaking to her shoulder. “You smile and I don’t think.”

She touched his hair and then his hollow masculine cheek. He was handsome but he was so thin. Her smile faded. “Have you been eating, Link?”

It took him a moment. “Mommy’s been stuffing me.”

“As she should. You look terrible.”

Defiantly: “I am sexy.”

She blushed. “Well, you can be both.”

He met her eyes with a dangerous glint and she looked away, searching for anything in the shade of the apple tree that would veer them away from such dangerous topics of conversation. “Is this why you trusted me so readily when we first met? Or rather, when I first met you? Because you knew we would be lovers?”

“Mm. No.”

“No?”

“I told you. I don’t think when you smile.”

“Had I smiled when you and I first met?”

“All the time.” Link sounded pained. “I hated that mind reading machine so much.”

“Do you? I rather miss it.”

“Why?”

“It was cute seeing your unfiltered thoughts.”

“I didn’t know you were vain.”

“It does anyone’s ego good to learn that someone they find attractive finds them attractive in turn.”

He kissed her shoulder.

Tomorrow would make it a month since they stopped at his family home for Zelda’s convalescence. When the electric safflina controlled her seizures and her tentative command of jumping under Big Link’s scrutiny returned, she asked to be allowed to sleep in the loft of the abandoned barn on the property.

Link’s mother was aghast. “You’re a guest! You’re family! We can’t have you sleeping in some dusty hayloft!”

It was Link’s father who kicked her ankle under the dinner table and muttered, “Let them have their privacy, love.”

Then Link’s mother looked at her husband all moon-eyed, and Aryll was disgusted, then doubly disgusted because Big Link was wearing the same expression, and Little Link was visibly bitter. Aryll quarrelled, “What is wrong with this family.”

Zelda went to the hayloft and managed to overhear a snippet of the Links arguing:

“Why are you mad at me? Why are you mad at me? You are me! You’ll get to kiss her later!”

“Still.”

“Still what?”

Zelda forced her laughter down. She teleported to the hayloft. She settled, and the fear ebbed. She was in control of her body and strength again: they would be returning to HQ tomorrow.

Link appeared a heartbeat later. He frowned at her. “Okay?”

“Just tired.” She rolled her wrists. “Sometimes I can still feel the rope.”

Link kneeled in front of her. “How can I help?”

She plucked up some courage. “It would be nice if you touch the places they hurt me.”

He was grim but nodded and kissed her nose first. She smiled and closed her eyes. He kissed the jaw that had been purple, the lips that had been split, and the throat that had been red. He sat on their makeshift bed and pulled her into his lap and ran his hands over the back they had whipped. She wrapped her arms around him and whispered, “Is it alright if I don’t want sex? Is it okay that I just want to be touched?”

She was probably asking because he’d seated her pretty obviously on his erection. He lifted his hands to say, “Sorry. Different position?”

“Can I lie on you and we kiss?”

He kissed her cheek to say of course and they spent a little time like that with roaming hands and comforting petting, wordlessly wiping away the other’s tears without needing to be asked.

-

It had taken a moment for the Society to deem that she was back at her full strength, but it only took two months training.

Paya had sobbed in relief that her vision about Zelda returning to them came to pass, and Zelda grinned and aggressively adopted her as a little sister. Auntie Zelda tried once again to apprehend them, especially since they were obviously together, especially since they made public their intentions to find a tether beyond the boundary of Hylia’s Wake.

“Don’t look, Paya,” Zelda told her. “You are too gifted a Seer for us to risk losing you.”

She sobbed, “And aren’t you too talented for us to lose you?”

“You won’t lose me. We have dinner next weekend and Link is paying.”

Link grunted. This was the first he was hearing of that!

“But aren’t you scared?”

Zelda laughed and held Link’s hand. “Terrified!”

He kissed her temple, and they were off.