Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

There’s a splatter of red. It oozes through her fingers as she pants for breath, desperately clutching her side as she runs up the never-ending stairwell. Hot polluted air fills her lungs. Burning like the pain radiating from her side.

No matter how fast she runs, she still hears his hollow, echoing footsteps behind her. His taunting, acidic words. The words the schoolgirls echo when they circle and corner her like sharks. Trapping her in like a pack of wolves with a rabbit.

She clutches the doorknob to the roof with a slick red hand, struggling for grip.

The drunken footsteps follow. Slow and sedate. He knows she’s trapped. He doesn’t need to run, despite her fast pace.

In spite of this, his words only get angrier.

The door opens with her weight, and she stumbles against it. The bang it makes is nails against her throbbing skin.

She doesn’t have time to breathe, but the pain has her legs shaking.

It hurts too much to get a proper breath, but she hisses one through her teeth anyway. Blinking away drifting sparkling dots from her vision like nonexistent fairies.

She doesn’t have time.

On wobbly legs, she drags herself forward. Drops of red splatter at her feet.

There’s nothing up here. An empty, flat roof with a railing taking up half the space. But the railing goes around behind the stairwell she just exited. Leaving a small ledge just on the other side, that’s unreachable unless you hold on from the outside and shuffle.

She’s hidden here before. Spent cold and rainy nights hidden in the space as her limbs go numb, too afraid to move.

She stumbles to the edge of the roof, her breaths fast and shallow, climbing over the barrier with shaking limbs.

She can hide. She can—

the door slams open.

Too late. No time.

A man with black hair, so unlike her own auburn— like her mothers, stands there for a moment, before equally dark eyes lock on her.

A knife stained the same red as her side is in one of his hands; there’s a bottle in his other hand. Even as he walks, he takes a long swig, stumbling forwards. “There you are.” He rasps.

In the span of one breath and the next, their eyes still locked, one with terror, the other with a dark promise… her foot slips.

Her hands are too wet with sweat and blood to catch herself on the metal she was clinging to— Slipping through her fingers like water.

She falls, but already her vision is starting to black out.

She screams.

She wishes…

She wishes the same thing she wished so long ago.

Her heavy eyes catch on a bird flying high overhead.

A seagull.

They aren’t anywhere near the sea.

She wishes she could be a bird after this.

To fly far, far away.

Maybe, just maybe, be with him again.

Like that long ago dream…

XxxX

Someplace vastly different, over Hyrule field, the sky parts with a beautiful golden glow, and something unseen by nearly all, falls.

A young man with golden hair that fades to a petal pink at the bottom of a single strand, scowls, nose crinkling in annoyance.

The beautiful scene has the goddesses' hands all over it.

He flicks his deep red and pink wings, absently smoothing out ruffled feathers and runs his hands over his layered tunic of red and green, assured by the magic humming against his skin from the many enchantments both on the clothes, the many rings on his fingers, and the bracelets on his wrists. His hand then trails absently to his sword and magic bag holding many of his numerous items.

It’s habit, even if he despises the idea of another ‘adventure’— at least he won’t be without his items this time.

He learned his lesson the last time he left home without his things.

The thought makes his face darken further.

Never again.

He’s still just staring at the golden rays of light. It almost looks like a natural phenomenon, if not for the waves of magic radiating strong enough that he can just barely feel it all the way from where he stands— no doubt miles away.

He should really go check it out.

Who knows what will happen if he doesn’t….

Weird things don’t just happen around him. Not without a cart load of trouble following.

Zelda will probably end up kidnapped again or something if he doesn’t.

She might end up kidnapped again even if he does go investigate…

“You gonna pay for all that, or just stare at the sky?”

Taking in a sharp breath through his nose, Link turns back to the shop stall and it’s not-so patiently waiting owner, quickly finishing up paying for his purchases for his and Ravio’s dinner.

They’re attempting stew tonight, though he might just bail and go to the pub or something. Let Ravio fend for himself.

Briefly, he glances at the sky again.

He’ll go investigate. But no one ever said he has to do it in a hurry.

XxxX

She, her name is Marin— wakes someplace very different from where she fell.

And she did fall.

She briefly remembers fluttering her eyes open to harsh winds and sprawling land far, far, too far, below her.

And then she closed her eyes again, unable to catch her breath.

…And then she was on the ground.

She isn’t dead— which she should be.

She isn’t in a hospital.

She isn’t in a city; laid out on the hot summer pavement, drowning on blood and the heat of that muggy summer's day— the hottest they’d seen in a long while, if the news reporter she’d watched from a store window on her way home was to be believed.

No, she’s in a green field, next to a stream and an apple tree. The air light and cool, filled with the combined symphony of birds, bugs, and the burble of water. A soft breeze has grass tickling her face, cooling the pleasant warmth of sunshine gently kissing her skin. Causing the greenery to rustle harmoniously around her in a soothing lullaby.

She feels at her side and it’s still painfully sore, still coated with drying blood, but it’s not actively bleeding, and the wound itself feels smaller.

Maybe she is dead after all.

Maybe this is a hallucination her brain is giving her, seconds before death. She read about that happening somewhere.

With that thought in mind, she crawls tiredly out of the direct sunlight of a late afternoon, and into the shade of the apple tree’s leaves. She sinks back down into the grass as she lets her eyes fall closed again.

It feels like only minutes later that her back begins to throb.

Waking her well into the night; it starts as just an itch deep under her skin, then a tingling, a barely-there ache, and slowly but surely grows.

Two spots right below her shoulder blades.

Soon though, she’s sobbing. The pain unbearable— she tries to scratch, or at least press, on the spots on her back, but when she contorts and reaches for them, she finds two uncomfortably large growths.

The skin feels too stretched. Far too sensitive— or more specifically whatever is underneath the skin is. The skin itself feels all but numb to touch. Just pulsing in pain.

And it hurts.

It hurts it hurts it hurts—

She isn’t sure how long she lays there, trembling and sweaty. Head starting to throb with the same resounding, all-consuming pain as she clenches her jaw tight. Skin far too hot, but also discordantly clammy and shivering.

Whatever happens, it comes several agonizing hours later. Just as the sun peaks from over the distant hills.

In that exhausted delirium, writhing in the dew-covered grass, the skin on her back rips, her shirt tears, and just like when she fell off the apartment roof, Marin screams.

No one comes.

No one hears.

There’s no one to help.

There never is.

Only in dreams.

Warm blood oozes into her clothes and down her back.

Something limp and warm and wet presses tightly against where there should be unmarred skin and fabric.

Tears slide from her eyes, wetting the dirt and grass she has her face pressed against. She heaves a wrenching sob that leaves her clenched muscles shivering with aching spasms.

She lets out a broken whimper. Utterly spent.

More tears slide down to pool in her ear as she curls in on herself between the roots of the apple tree. The comforting smell of apples and nature now only the sickening scent of overripe fruit and blood to her nose. Cloying in her lungs and leaving her stomach in sick knots.

If she is dead…

…Then surely this is hell.

Chapter Text

Despite the fact that the food turned out horribly burnt—Ravio’s attempt— and unbearably bland— Link’s attempt—and the two of them go to the pub anyway… Link did not, in fact, bale on his freeloading mirror-world shopkeep of a counterpart.

“Mr.Hero, did you see that light earlier? Do you think you’ll be going on another adventure soon?” Ravio asks that night on their way home, a grin taking over his face, and purple wings twitching happily with his mood, his cheeks flushed from the alcohol he’d drank. “I’ll be happy to supply you with any items you might be needing.”

“Screw you and your extortion!” Link immediately drawls back, wings flicking in dismissal, much more sober than his companion. “I’ll check it out tomorrow and see what’s up. If it is another adventure than you can hold down the fort. Just don’t sell off my items.” He glares, “N’ don’t touch the goddess damned cursed stuff.”

“Roger that Mr.Hero!” Ravio agrees with a snicker and sloppy salute. “I’ve already got an idea for a brand-new sales campaign!”

Link sighs, wings slumping, already used to his companion’s antics and the fact he can’t actually stop him.

Just like he hadn’t been able to stop their marriage— despite the fact their relationship is completely platonic and mostly revolves around tormenting each other.

Technically it’s just papers for the merchant’s convenience, so the other boy can get around the visa and citizenship process along with the fees involved.

To put it bluntly, it’s fraud. And maybe some tax evasion. But they are still technically married too.

Knowing the nobles his sister has to deal with, he can’t really bring himself to care about all the fees Ravio is avoiding all that much.

“Just don’t get arrested or anything.” Link eventually settles on. Which makes Ravio laugh.

So that’s how he ends up dragging his feet down a dirt path away from home and out into Hyrule Field early the next morning, eventually following Hylia River downstream, since he doesn’t really have a destination in mind, other than ‘somewhere sort of south-eastern’.

He doesn’t really feel like flying today. Travel by road can be interesting, and he’s an adventurer by heart. A good half the population can’t fly, so it would limit the people he might run into.

Of course, it’s just his luck that he’s the one who ends up roped into this kind of thing, being the hero and all.

No one else is going to go out and do it, but they all expect him to.

His twin sister’s good-for-nothing Royal guards certainly don’t try to help, or you know, investigate anything— and he can say that without any guilt now that his uncle’s dead— the only decent one in the whole bunch, in Link’s not-so-humble opinion.

And since he spent his first adventure running and hiding from the brainwashed men, he likes to think it’s a pretty valid opinion.

Ever since that first adventure, the goddesses have forced one thing or another on his shoulders. Hell, he tried to retire after his fourth adventure took him to Koholint, and look how well that turned out? Even when he tried to insist he was retired after all that— Nope. He ends up getting roped into going on two more besides.

Scowling, Link kicks a stone, watching as it bounces and sends up a small plume of dust before disappearing off the road and into the grass.

…It’d be faster to fly. He wouldn’t even have to worry about most monsters.

Instead, he grumbles and curses his way down the path.

Out of spite. He’s not doing the goddess’s bidding fast if they’re going to send him on another damned adventure.

If the ‘Powers That Be’ want him to hurry, then Din damnit he’s going to go as slow as Hylianly possible.

Of course, that changes when he rounds a hill to the sound of whimpers.

Not the crying-child kind— the ‘I can’t help it because I’m in excruciating pain’ kind— and he’s experienced enough of that to know the sound personally and intimately.

It’s not something he wants anyone to go through if he can help it.

He picks up his speed. Spreading crimson and pink wings. A few quick strides, a jump, and a few flaps have the ground falling away beneath him so he can search the area from a higher vantage point.

It takes a moment of searching to find the figure curled up at the base of an apple tree. But when he does, his heart freezes.

He knows that hair. He knows it. He has that exact shade of auburn memorized and burned into his brain. Marin. Marin. Marin.

He shakes himself, landing heavier than he intends and sending needles of pain through his bones and joints.

—No. She’s a dream. She isn’t real. She can’t be—

Another whimper, and he notices the blood. He notices the twitch of blood-soaked feathers curled tight on her back. What the f— not just feathers. New feathers. Tiny wings that won’t support her. The kind avians grow when they turn five.

The kind no one on Koholint has.

He didn’t even have wings, and he only really realized the problem and oddity of that once he woke up in an ocean shipwreck clinging to a piece of wood. Having to once again get used to a new and familiar weight at his back that he hadn’t realized he’d missed for an unspecified time that felt like years.

An unspecified number of years that weren’t actually years at all, but hardly a day.

His legs—they aren’t wobbling, they aren’t— bring him a few feet away from the girl— Not-Marin— and he nearly curses again at all the blood.

He knows what it’s like, getting wings.

It’s not pleasant.

Of course, getting the wings themselves is a… well, not exactly quick ordeal. It’s called Wing Birth for a reason. Because like childbirth, it can take hours of agonizing pain before the wings actually breach the skin. But after that, it’s around two hellish weeks of fever, pain, and overly sensitive wings, aching bones, and sore muscles— the over-sensitivity doesn’t even really go away for the first year or two.

It’s not something anyone should do outside.

It’s a goddess damned miracle that this girl, who’s most definitely not Marin— not his Marin— hasn’t been killed by monsters, or just sheer damn blood loss.

Hand rummaging through his bag, he curses, because he didn’t think to bring a fairy or potion with him. There’re at least three healing potions back at the house— he can picture them on the top shelf next to the ring box— and Ravio usually keeps a fairy on hand for emergencies— how could he be so stupid.

Striding over on legs that are still most definitely not wobbling, Link reaches out for the girl’s arm, his own most definitely not shaking.

Not at all.

“Hey.”

He scowls when she flinches, glazed delirious eyes fluttering for half a second.

His expression only grows more pronounced at the state she’s in, bony and too thin; skin clammy and feverish.

“You okay?” He knows she isn’t. It’s a dumbass question, but it’ll hopefully get her talking.

“M’ back.”

Well, no, duh. He bites his tongue. She’s injured. He can snark when there isn’t someone actively bleeding out in front of him.

At least she’s conscious, though she barely moves her head, still curled in a ball on her side. Her eyes stare blankly, empty with pain. Tears seep out of the corners to slide in wet rivulets across her face and drip slowly from her nose. The iris is a unique mix of green, gold and blue, amber near the center, greens and blues near the middle, and becoming a lighter blue along the edge. It makes them look like they shift colors in the light— something he can only tell because he’s so close.

They’re the exact same shade and pattern as Marin’s. He’s stared into those eyes a thousand times before.

So so so much like Marin…

And so much not—

 “It hurts.” She whimpers and it’s Marin’s voice, strained and broken, yes, but it’s her voice.

He sucks in a breath. It’s the same one he remembers.

Looking at her makes his chest hurt. Hearing her is worse. So, so much worse.

But…

Her eyes are too full of pain, too knowing, too old and world-weary.

Too much like his own.

He wants to run away.

He almost wants to go on another adventure just to forget. To stop the pain stabbing at his heart.

He steels himself. This is no time for that. “We need to wash the blood off. We don’t want anything to get infected. It okay if I move you?” His voice is detached. No nonsense. Impartial. How he likes it. Keep people away. 

He always ends up caring. He just doesn’t make it easy. They all leave at some point anyway.

She gives a barely perceptible nod, further curling in on herself. Letting out a suppressed trill of pain.

Avian.

She’s avian.

Marin was not. No one on Koholint was. They’re gone. Dead.

Her hair shifts and his eyes lock on the rounded tips of her ears.

He grits his teeth.

Not. Right. Now.

Shuffling, he picks her up as gently as he can. Careful of her overly sensitive brand-new wings.

She still flinches as they’re lightly jostled, and he winces, “Sorry.”

He’s pretty sure that’s the only ‘sorry’ he’s said any time recently.

Kicking off his Pegasus Boots, Link steps into the river and starts to wade in; unbelievably thankful he’s got a half-decent grip on the mermaid curse now and doesn’t turn and lose his legs at a moment’s notice. Otherwise, this wouldn’t be possible.

The tingling threat is still there at the edge of his senses, but it’s dormant for the time being.

Really, he wishes Maple could do more than just make the transformation voluntary— he’d like it off entirely. Where He can chuck the damn thing in the back of the ‘cursed’ box with all the other junk and never look at it again.

The swimming flippers he got on Koholint were better. He doesn’t understand why he got to keep all those things, including the siren’s instruments, when it was all a dream. Why keep those things— prove it was, in some way, real, just to kill off all those people?

He has all of that stuff locked in the furthest corner of the attic.

Has since he got home from that adventure.

Five years now.

Five years, three months, seven days—

No. Not now.

He takes a deep breath.

In for five, hold for four, out for seven.

He can do this. There’s a life relying on him. He’s the hero. It’s not the time for a mental breakdown.

It’s never the time.

The water sloshing at his legs as he wades in deeper is cold but not frigid. The day is warm enough too, that he isn’t too worried about the girl getting hypothermia, but he plans to take her back home after this. They’ll either dry in the sun on the way, or he can start a fire in the fireplace if really necessary.

It’ll be fine as long as her body isn’t going into shock.

It’ll be fine. She won’t disappear. This isn’t a dream. She isn’t going to die. This is wing-birth, every avian goes through this—

Still, when the water touches the feathers caked in blood, the girl recoils with a strangled cry, clutching onto him and away from the water. Her feathers that aren’t glued and caked together try to bristle.

He makes a soft hum at the back of his throat until the girl relaxes. “We need to get the blood off,” He repeats patiently. Like his uncle did for him all those years ago.

He’s never seen another avian go through this.

It’s private.

A family matter kept behind closed doors.

Non-Avians don’t know unless they have an Avian in the family, and even then, it’s kept quiet. To the point most laugh when they hear someone longingly proclaim they wish they had wings too.

He knows even seeing this much is crossing a line, but there’s no other choice. If anything, just leaving her vulnerable and exposed here in this state would be dereliction of duty.

His uncle wasn’t Avian, didn’t have the instincts or extra vocalizations Link has. Uncle did this for Link. Link can do this too. 

This girl doesn’t have the luxury he was thankfully provided, as unfortunate as that is— as angry as it makes him, because who the hell just abandons someone on the edge of Hyrule Field in the middle of wing-birth???

“You hear me?” He asks, squeezing ever so gently where he’s cradling her in his arms, “We need to get the blood off, okay?”

Slowly, she nods, like it takes every ounce of her energy. Her cheeks are flushed with fever and her eyes hazy… and she’s clutching at her side… which is…stained in a damning dark circle he knows too well.

“Are you hurt anywhere else?” He asks sharply as his brain fires off a litany of curses in a litany of languages, “—Besides your back, I mean.” He adds.

His own wings bristle when she nods.

He hopes she just says it’s her bones. He remembers the throbbing ache as his bone density shifted to allow flight.

Hope never did get him very far in life.

“M’ side.” She gets out between uneven breaths, eyes blinking slowly as her eyelids droop further and further.

He knew it.

He pats her cheek, “Hey, I need you to stay awake.” If she’s lost too much blood, things could get tricky. Especially without a fairy. She murmurs something incomprehensible, and Link takes the opportunity to shift her enough that he can lift the top of her strange shirt and get a look at the injury, and he curses.

A stab wound. Of course.

He knew it.

It’s something clearly intentional, too.

He frowns. It’s not something any of the low-level monsters in the area would do— and even if it was, they don’t have sharp enough weapons to manage a cut this clean.

A person did this to her.

Link would very much like a word with whoever dumped her here out in the middle of nowhere.

Link is going to kill them, bring them back, and send them to the goddess-damned dark world is what he’s going to do—

The girl makes a distressed warble— probably from instinct, seeing as her eyes are closed and she’s going limp. It must hurt like hell. He knows his throat burned those first few days as his vocal cords adjusted.

Without thinking, he answers it with his own soothing croon, and then curses himself. He unintentionally treated her, a stranger, a girl, not Marin— not Ravio— not Uncle, like flock.

Still, the way she practically melts helps to ease his own misgivings. Even more so when her sweat soaked face finally softens, long lashed eyelids sliding shut as her muscles relax. The tight grip of her fingers in his tunic falling loose.

For a moment after, his heart lurches, trying to rouse her, listening to shallow breaths and finding a sluggish but steady heart beat, one that beats in twos instead of the Hylian three beat rhythm. 

Again, it feels like a punch to the gut to look down at her face. To see Marin. To feel that same heartbeat he only knew on Koholint. She looks so much like his Marin.

Like the time they stayed out late to watch the stars and she fell asleep curled into his side— No. he can’t do this.

He washes away the blood, careful not to touch the still-fresh scabs, and temporarily patches her up with the meager supplies he has— just enough to get her back home and have a fairy heal her.

He avoids looking at her face.

Instead watching as the blood slowly washes from small brand-new grey down feathers, watches until the water runs clear.

Briefly, he glances up at the clear blue sky. Nose twitching as he scowls at the bright sun that doesn’t at all match his mood. It’d make more sense for there to be a storm. Like the night he found his Uncle killed.

His wings tense and flex briefly for flight, before he dismisses the idea and starts walking again, knowing he won’t be able to carry the girl and fly. Maybe if her bones have adjusted themselves to flight in a few weeks' time, but certainly not right now.

It’s a long walk back to his house and adjoining apple orchard, but not as long as it would’ve taken to get to Castle Town.

By the time he’s there, his feet are sore, and he’s panting from the fast pace he set for himself. Mind constantly on the slow drops of blood falling from the girl’s back and onto the ground. Slowly watching as her skin grows paler and paler, even as the trickle slows and stops.

Link picks up his pace when the first few apple trees come into view, quickly striding past them, kicking open the warn wooden gate painted a flaking white, through the overgrown back garden and to the house beyond. Opening a well-worn wooden back door that leads into the kitchen.

“Rav, can ya get me a fairy?” Link calls before he’s even fully inside the house.

“I’ve got one,” Ravio calls back from upstairs, and Link can hear his damn smug smirk, the cheap bastard. If Link can talk, he probably doesn’t think it’s an emergency. “But it’ll cost you, Mr.H—“ he rounds the corner and flinches with an ‘Eep!’

Link glares.

“Fairy. Right.” Ravio squeaks turning and running back to the storage room. “I’ll go and get that fairy!”

Link rolls his eyes. Scammer. That fairy is one Link caught himself.

With Not-Marin still in his arms, Link grabs an old spare sheet and the box of medical supplies he keeps in one of the cupboards.

Using a wing to shut the door behind him, he heads for his own room, since Ravio’s taken over the guest bed—

He says that, but the other boy’s been firmly moved into his room like flock for months now— and he keeps Uncle’s locked.

Adjusting his grip, Link spreads an old sheet on the bed with one hand and a few quick flaps of his wings to get it spread correctly without jostling the girl in his arms, quickly folding the cloth in half for a double layer, thankfully still big enough to cover everything that could be stained by blood.

He’s just placing the injured girl down on her stomach when Ravio bangs in and trips on his own two feet, landing flat on the floor with a groan; the fairy bottle held carefully above his head.

“Damn it, would you be quiet!” Link hisses.

 “Right. Yeah. Sorry—I got the fairy for you.” Ravio manages with an eye roll, scrambling up and rubbing his red nose, smiling sheepishly, ruffled feathers sticking out every which way.

With a scoff, Link takes the bottle and quickly uncorks it, gently sliding the fairy out over the girl’s back. “Can you help us? The girl’s side’s been hurt, and she just had wing-birth too.” He tells the softly glowing pink fairy.

She nods with a flutter of small transparent wings. Spiraling around the injured girl in a shower of fairy dust, before hovering at the stab wound, then up to the new wings poking out of ripped fabric. The blood slowly disappears as the fairy works her magic. Wounds stitching together until there’s nothing left but unblemished skin.

It won’t quicken the recovery time or take away the pain her bones are going to be in for the next two or so weeks, but it does slowly bring a bit of color back into her cheeks.

The two boys thank the fairy, offering a spoonful of sugar water, before opening the window to let her return to her fairy fountain.

Then, satisfied that the girl won’t bleed out, Link leaves to get a bucket and heat some water with a quick “Watch her.” to Ravio, whose eyes widen in panic. Expressive purple-black feathers ruffling up around him, sputtering objections as Link leaves. Objections that the hero ignores.

Link doesn’t even make it all the way down the stairs before Ravio’s calling from the door, “Uuuh. She’s chirping for flock, what do I do???”

Link rolls his eyes, “Chirp back you keese-brain! It’s what I’ve been doing.” And really, he wouldn’t admit that to anyone besides Ravio. Even then, he can feel his face and ears heat up in the short moments pause.

 “…But we aren’t!” Ravio squeaks, “Mr. Hero!!” The other whines. “We can’t just— do that!”

Setting down the kettle a little harder than strictly necessary, cheeks and ears a little too warm, he calls back, “Look, it puts her at ease, and I think that’s all that really matters right now. Implications be damned.” He pushes magic into the runes of the stovetop, and it flares with a bright plume of fire half a second later, “She’s someplace safe and she needs to know that, even if it’s just her instincts active through the fever!”

She’s not Marin. She’s not flock—

The answer shuts Ravio up, and Link hears his hesitant trill a second later. It has Link rolling his eyes again. For someone who practically forced flock care and preening onto Link, he’s being surprisingly squeamish about this.

When Link returns with the warm water, Ravio has already pulled a chair to the side of the bed and has one hand holding the girl’s, the other gently running through her sweat-damp hair.

He glances up when Link enters, “What happened?” He asks softly, gears turning behind green eyes as the holder of Lorule’s Wisdom takes in the information in front of him, and likely comes to the same conclusion Link has.

With a weighted look, Link pulls over his own chair with a foot. Keeping himself balanced by sheer force of will, the help of his out-splayed wings, and a lot of experience.

Humming absently, Link sets the warm water down on his chair, dunking one of the two cloths he has laid on the edge into the water. Wringing it out as he thinks, “I found her like that under a tree by the river.” He says with a nod at the girl, meeting Ravio’s horrified gaze and watching as his counterpart flinches, feathers fluffing, as he hisses in a sharp breath and lets a rare curse slip out in Lorulian.

Sharp amethyst eyes lower to their unexpected guest again, Link dabs at the dirt clinging to the girl’s cheek, carefully wiping away sweat and tears with his cloth. Letting his brain run empty and not think about how similar it is to the girl he used to know, not allowing himself to catalogue her freckles, or how those cheeks aren’t round with baby fat like they were on the island. “Beyond that I’m as clueless as you.”

“You think… someone just left her there?” Ravio’s wings hike up defensively at the mere thought. Link knows the feeling. If, and it is an if— someone did leave her there, then Link and that Ganon-spawn are going to be having more than just words.

Link tilts his head in a so-so motion, starting to gently wipe down delicate feathers, and clean off the dried blood that the river water missed or accumulated on the trek home, and what the fairy magic didn’t dissolve for extra power in the healing process. “Don’t know. She might just be a traveler.”

Not likely though.

Ravio gives him a look that says he has the same thought. With a huff, he takes the other cloth Link brought and starts dabbing at the girl’s flushed face. “Link. I’m a merchant. I know travelers. She’s not dressed like a traveler. And knowing you, if she had a travel bag, you would have grabbed that too.”

That’s true. Link nods, not looking up from the delicate grey feathers he’s carding his fingers through.

Ravio pauses to coo when the girl leans into the cool touch of his cloth and lets out a tiny, pained warble, returning the sound with his own meant to soothe and reassure that flock is near.

Link raises an eyebrow. Apparently the stupid Bunny forgot all his worries over this girl not being flock.

Same stupid too-big-hearted Ravio.

Shifting some of the girl’s auburn hair, Ravio freezes, ears and wings twitching up. “…Mr.Hero?” He starts in an octave or two higher than normal.

“…Yeah?” Link squints suspiciously at him. Preparing for the worst.

“…She has round ears.” Ravio states looking at him with wide green eyes.

Oh.

He blinks.

That.

It’s not unheard of in other countries, even if it’s still fairly uncommon, but Link knows all Lorulian’s have pointed ears, just like Hyrule, where those rounded tips are practically unheard of— or even thought to be a curse from the goddesses as a loss of favor to be able to hear their voices.

God, Link wishes he had round ears and that was actually how it worked.

He always loved Marin’s round ears, they were cute and her giggle when he’d run a delicate fingertip along the edge in fascination was like music—

“Yeah.” Link huffs out a breath, wings slumping from where he’d mimicked Ravio’s tension. “I know.”

There’s a groan, and the girl curls in on herself, trying to roll over.

“Hey hey! Don’t do that!” Immediately both jump up.

“You’re okay. You’re safe.” The boys fluster, their wings fluffing and flapping in agitation,

“Stay still.” Gently but firmly, they push her back into position before she can injure herself.

“M’ I… dead...?” She rasps weakly, hazel eyes cracked open, hazy and unfocused as they scan the room, what she can see of it from her position. Link notes how they stay on the door and window a second longer than anything else. Something he himself does. Marking all the exits, even when she’s incapacitated.

“No, you’re not dead.” Link manages with a snort and a small barely used quirk of a smile. Earning a mildly bewildered look from Ravio. 

She blinks slowly, “Have to be. Only speak this in dreams.” She breathes in slow, precise Hylian, but it sounds stiff in her mouth.

His heart lurches at the words and the smile falls away entirely. He’s sure he’s gone white as a sheet.

Throat suddenly dry, Link swallows hard. “Can you understand this?” He asks In Kohaleese— or whatever its real name is. Marin would never tell him, the tease. And it’d have been cheating to ask anyone else—

The words are just as stiff in his own mouth as Hylian is in hers. Accented too. He and Marin made fun of and laughed over their accents countless times during those years—

She huffs a laugh and then winces, damp grey down-feathers bristling, “Course’ I can.” She says, in a language he thought he’d never hear again. “You’ve got a strong accent.”

“Haven’t practiced in a while.” He distantly hears himself say in that long unused tongue.

“What’s your name?” Ravio asks, looking between the two and frowning at being left out— and at how pale Link’s face has become.

The girl closes her eyes, not bothering to change back to Hylian for the question. “Marin. M’ name’s Marin.”

Link’s breath catches in his throat.

He can’t breathe. He can’t breathe.

A hand lands on his shoulder and he flinches. Ready to run. To hide. But he meets concerned green eyes— darker than Marin’s not the shifting sea she keeps there— the face is framed by fluffy black hair on a face that’s the mirror image of his—if he had horrendous style consisting of a purple robe, a bunny hood, and a blue striped scarf.

Ravio’s saying something but it takes a moment for Link to hear over the ringing in his ears. “Breathe, Link. You can do it. Copy me.”

He can’t at first, but he keeps trying.

A little at a time.

 It feels like he’s drowning again. Lost at sea in that goddess forsaken storm.

But slowly, agonizingly slowly, he matches his breaths with Ravio’s, until he can do it on his own again, and reclaims control of his body.

Ravio waits, sitting on the floor with him. His dark wings form a tent around them as the merchant runs his hand along Link’s spine.

“…Should we find somewhere else for her to stay….?” Ravio asks eventually. “If she’s a trigger…”

“No.” The answer is out of Link’s mouth before he can even think.

Ravio pauses, “You know her.”

It isn’t a question.

Link nods anyway.

“But you were surprised it was actually her?”

Another nod.

“Should I be worried, Mr. Hero?” Ravio uses that damned nickname, and phrases it like a joke, but Link can feel the same hidden tension the other’s hiding. Feels the tremble of adrenaline in the merchant’s hands.

“She can’t be here.” He rasps, and Ravio’s hand stills between Link’s shoulder-blades, a steadying pressure.

“Why not?”

“Because,” He grits his teeth, his wings curling closer around himself. Covering his face with his hands when his voice breaks. His ears lower in shame. His face crumples.

“I killed her. Her, and everyone else on that goddess damned island.”

Chapter Text

The next two weeks are spent in shifts, one boy always watching Marin, and the other either sleeping or getting supplies.

Link explains his fourth adventure a little at a time. Sharing an experience he’s refused to talk about even to his sister.

Link doesn’t trust it.

That it’s really her.

That she’s really real.

But it slowly sinks in over the days. When she doesn’t disappear.

When Ravio sees and takes care of her too.

When that hazy too-clear-too-blurry everything-feels-slightly-off sensation doesn’t come.

When he can feel the grass and dirt without feeling that there’s something inherently wrong with it.

The way everything on Koholint always felt.

A few times, Marin is coherent enough to speak. When they aren’t forcing food, water, and pain medicine—Thank you Maple and Syrup— down her throat— or walking her to the bathroom before she can drift off again. Her words hold no meaning. Always questioning if she’s awake or alive.

The worst is the half lucid apologies and crying; sometimes to him, apologizing for not telling him. That she couldn’t because of the Wind-Fish.

Other times,  it was to people she never named, pleading with them to stop. Apologizing for a wrong she hasn’t committed.

But on the fourteenth day, Ravio and Link both feel comfortable enough to leave Marin to sleep. Her fever finally broken.

The two take the time that night to preen each other’s wings after two long weeks. Burying their hands in disheveled feathers and plucking out the loose or crumpled ones. Slowly letting the tension slide from their shoulders as the other massages and gently combs through their wings.

The two fall asleep that night in a nest of blankets and pillows, as has become their small flock of two’s habit before Marin crashed into their lives.

They aren’t entirely surprised when the next morning, while the two avians are in the kitchen, Link nursing his third cup of tea, and Ravio trying— and failing— to make breakfast… Each settling for an apple when the toast burns, a window left open to air the place out—they hear the sound of light footsteps upstairs, both boy’s ears flicking up in interest as they share a look.

A door closes, a click of the latch, and then, after a long moment, the sound of water from their shower. Something the two boys spent a good long while setting up themselves. Getting the fire and water runes perfectly balanced had been harder than they originally expected.

“Oh, we should get her something new to change into.” Ravio realizes after a long moment of listening to the muffled sounds of water running.

Link hums, throwing back the rest of his still steaming tea and letting it burn down his throat. “She can use my blue tunic.” He decides, “I’ll go get it.”

He’s halfway up the stairs when a song drifts down through the walls.

‘Sleepers wake… dreams will fade… although we cling fast...’

His breath hitches, a shiver runs up his spine. A sudden panic rising in him that he’s about to wake up.

‘Was it real, what we saw...? I believe…’

He doesn’t wake up. Though Ravio makes an appreciative hum somewhere behind him, even if he can’t understand the lyrics. He’ll probably want to learn, using the excuse that a merchant should know such things.

A selfish part of Link hopes Ravio doesn’t learn.

With a shaky breath, Link steels himself and marches up the stairs, blindly searching his dresser for the blue tunic. Feeling out its defensive magics. His ears angled back to better catch the echoing, haunting notes drifting down the hall and into his open doorway.

‘Lost in dreams… we sleep on… tossing and turning…’

She’s gotten better. He absently notes. Her voice is richer than it was as a twelve-year-old.

‘Stay with me… by my side… never leave…”

Finally, he finds what he’s looking for. With trembling hands, he takes the blue fabric, and a soft white undershirt. Adding in a red sash he has lying about. Then adds a spare towel, and a pair of white leggings he never uses to the ensemble. The shorts he uses give him more maneuverability.

The music continues on. Each note both a balm and a knife to Link’s heart.

‘What if the worst comes...? If someday this sweet reverie ends…’

He forces his feet to move down the hallway.

‘We too… our memories, for real…fade us by…’

He bites his lip hard. Threatening to draw blood.

‘Dream with me… by the sea…we watch the waves crash...’

He knocks on the wooden door and the song cuts off abruptly, but it doesn’t stop his mind from finishing the final verse.

Hold my hand, Think of me, And I’ll fly…

“I got you some clothes. I’m leaving them by the door.” He calls in Hylian. A little sharper than he intends. He’s surprised his voice doesn’t crack with how tight his throat feels.

His eyes burn, but he blinks until the feeling goes away.

“Alright. Thank you.” Comes the reply back. A little awkward. A little stiff. A little accented…

But it’s her voice. And he knows that now.

The simple words repeat over and over and over in his head in an uneven rhythm as he goes back downstairs.  ‘Alright.’ ‘Alright. Thank you.’ ‘Thank you.’ ‘Alright.’ ‘Alright. Thank you.’ His wings tingle with electricity and his heart is beating too fast in his chest, echoing the rhythm of the spectral words.

—He makes himself a fourth cup of tea. Heaving a heavy sigh when he sits back down. Mug warming his hands until they’re unpleasantly hot and almost threatening a burn. He keeps his grip tight and white knuckled.

Marin doesn’t start singing again.

Link isn’t sure if that is better or worse for his heart and fraying psyche.

“So...?” Ravio asks, just watching him from his spot leaning at the counter, nibbling on some bread that hasn’t been burnt to a crisp, and sparing a brief glance at the cheese Link bought yesterday.

Apples, bread from the baker’s and cheese from the market are about the only things the two can be trusted with.

Letting out a low groan, Link lets his forehead hit the table, his wings going boneless to trail their tips on the floor. “I have no clue how to talk to her.”

Humming, Ravio takes another bite of his breakfast, “Sounded to me like you did just fine?” His wings perk up, and Link gets only half a second of dread before Ravio’s speaking again, “—Oh, hey!” He holds out his free hand, “Gimme some rupees. About… say, 300?”

“Hell no.” Link snaps, not even thinking. Taking a sip of his near scalding tea, Link glares over the lip of his mug, “Why in the name of all the realms would I give you that much money?” He wrinkles his nose, ears pressing back as his Wings aggressively rise around him, “and you’d better have a good reason, or I’m kicking you out again.”

They both know Link won’t. They both know Ravio doesn’t have a place in Lorule anymore. Not after he damned himself as a scapegoat for his queen.

Stupid, really. Banishing the keeper of Wisdom while Courage rules. Link would tell the whole damn country exactly that, and more besides, if Ravio hadn’t made him promise not to.

“Aww, c’mon Mr.Hero..!” Ravio cajoles, flopping on the wooden table and scooting forward on his tip toes so he can poke Link’s arm.

“Don’t call me that. And don’t touch me. Bastard.” Link sniffs without any real heat, taking another swig and setting the hot mug down on Ravio’s fingers. Making the other boy yelp and pull away.

Link’s lips twitch up just a little bit.

It’s not actually that hot and they both know it.

Blowing on his ‘injured’ hand. Ravio puffs out his cheeks in a pout, teary puppy eyes included. “I just thought Miss-Marin would need some clothes of her own along with some other supplies.” The boy whines, “But if you want to be stingy…”

Ah. Alright. That makes some sense. Heaving a very put upon sigh that neither of them believe, Link fishes out his wallet and counts out the tiny colored gemstones.

“That’ll be 600 rupees!” Ravio chirps holding out a hand and waving it right in Link’s face.

Link scowls, “You said three.” He accuses, pushing the grabby hand aside.

“Don’t you want to make sure Miss-Marin has everything she needs?” The other asks oh-so innocently, fluttering dark lashes over big dopey green eyes.

Link’s nose twitches, and his wings prickle, “Stop that. You look ridiculous.”

It isn’t a no. Ravio knows this. Smelling rupees like a shark smelling blood in the water.

Ravio just keeps holding out an expectant hand. Fake customer service smile plastered on his face even as his eyes gleam like a Dark World-forsaken crow.

“By the goddess, Rabbit. You’d bleed me dry and sell my corpse to Ganon himself if he paid you.” Link grumbles, starting to count again. Using the smaller green and blue rupee’s instead of the slightly larger colors out of pure spite.

Obviously, he could just use one thumb-sized gold Rupee and be done. But might as well make Ravio work for each nail-sized chip.

“Eh.” Ravio shrugs, a sharp grin spreading, not at all put off by Link’s obvious —and repeated— pettiness. The money is still worth the same amount no matter how small the units of measurement are, and he can track down a fairy, or Sheerow to merge the magic currency into their larger colors. “I don’t think he’d have quite enough money for that.”

“Extortionist.” Link drawls, holding out the rupees, which cling and chime with their inherent magic as he drops them into the other’s hand.

“Excuse you, Mr.Hero! I prefer the term ‘merchant’ thank you very much.” Said merchant-extortionist chirps, snatching the handful of fingernail-sized gems and quickly counting them himself before putting on his brightest I-just-robbed-you-blind-and-you-can’t-even-argue-because-you-agreed-to-it smile on his face, “And thank you very much for the business Mr.Hero! I’ll be sure to get some good deals out of the other merchants for you! —With a small commission fee, of course.”

Link rolls his eyes, scoffing, “And I’ll just start charging you rent…of course.” He shoots back, which just makes the damn bastard giggle.

It stops abruptly though when they hear a click upstairs, a door creaking just the slightest bit, “Umm…” a hesitant voice calls, “I need some…” The last part is said too quiet to catch. Link’s eyes widen as he connects the dots.

“Right.” He calls back, voice practically squeaking at the end. “Be right there!” He turns on his housemate, pointing a threatening finger. “Shut up, Rabbit.” He can feel his whole face burning.

“Didn’t say a thing.” The other snickers, holding up his hands and bringing his wings in behind his back as he stands. “Not a word! Be back in a bit— byeee!” Ravio chirps, dashing for the door with a practiced skip and flap of wings that sends stray feathers scattering in a way he knows Link hates.

“Jeez. That guy.” Link grumbles, glaring at the closed door before he turns and makes his own way out of the kitchen from the opposite doorway. “Didn’t even offer to help.”

Of course, the second he’s around the corner, his brain takes a dive back to the subject.

Idiot. He berates himself, stomping up the stairs and running a hand through his pink-tinged hair. Of course she needs help. She didn’t have wings two weeks ago. Uncle helped him with it until the day he died.

Well, after Link resurrected everyone with his wish on the Triforce, for what little time that lasted before he got sick and died all over again.

It took him over two hours to get his tunic on by himself the first time alone. That time isn’t something he particularly wants to relive even in memory… since it involved a lot of flapping, contorted positions, jumping up and down, going in circles, and at one instance, rolling around on the floor, all while using every curse he knew at the time.

Stopping at the closed bathroom door, Link takes a moment to bolster his courage, taking a deep breath before he squares his shoulders and gives a firm two-beat knock.

“It’s open, you can come in.” Marin’s voice calls from the other side.

Holding the air in his lungs, he opens the door and is greeted by a cloud of steam. Marin is sitting on a stool Ravio keeps in there, her back facing him, hair pulled over her shoulder, and both it, and her wings damp and still dripping water.

The white leggings are on, but noticeably loose. The undershirt is half on. Enough to keep her decent, but it’s bunched up above her wings in a way Link knows to be painful on new and sensitive limbs from personal experience.

And… his face heats up as he notices, before he looks away, she’s managed to make a makeshift binding from the bandages he keeps in here. The actual piece of underwear hanging up to drip dry.

The other thing that catches his eye are all the scars marking her body.

He bites his tongue.

She turns her head just slightly, but doesn’t meet his eyes. Her eyes a gray-blue, like the sea on a stormy day. Cheeks flushed from the shower. “I need help… with the shirt, please?” She asks quietly, unsure.

She shifts, hands hidden but no doubt fidgeting. Her wings likewise curl a little closer to her back. “I tried on my own…but I don’t know what I’m doing.”

“Yeah…” he agrees, looking anywhere but at her as he reluctantly walks over. “It’s painful right? They still sore?” Of course, they’re still sore you bokoblin. What kind of question even is that? “It fine for me to touch your back and wings? I won’t be any help otherwise.”

“That’s fine.” She nods, though her wings stiffen just slightly, “And yeah, still a little sore, but it’s a lot better now—Thank you for looking after me during… whatever this is.” She finishes lamely with a shrug, and Link blinks.

…Wait.

‘Whatever this is’?

She doesn’t even know what wing-birth is? She’s never even heard of it?

She’s in Hyrule. She has to have. Avians make up just about half the population.

“Well,” He starts, lightly and briefly putting a hand to her shoulder so she knows where he is. Link gently starts to untie cords and loosen the already loose fabric with deft fingers. The tunic is designed for Avians, a tie at the nape of the neck, an open upper back, and plenty of crossing strings to synch the fabric tight so nothing becomes a hassle while flying. After loosening the fabric more than he normally would, he pulls it away and over the small protrusions. The shirt’s made for his frame, so it’s big all around regardless.

In this case, that works out, since that means there’s more than enough room for her own small and sensitive wings.

“Wing-birth’s pretty normal, though you usually only have that happen when you’re five. You must be some miracle of a late bloomer.”  As he speaks, he begins tightening and retying. Always careful to not pull too hard or too tight. It’s not only her wings that will be sore, even if the worst has passed. Bones and muscles are also affected, much like their change in vocal cords, and nerve sensitivity to sense the minute shifts in air currents.

In front of him, Marin’s shoulders slump and her wings follow, if only slightly. “‘Some miracle.’ Huh? That’s one way to put it.” 

That makes him pause, and he replays what he just said— did he trip over a sore subject?

“Here, I’ll help you dry your wings off.” He says stiffly instead of commenting on that.

Ravio calls it social ineptitude and emotional suppression.

Link calls it tact.

Carefully, Link does as he said he would, and soon her wings are mostly dry, and the blue tunic follows the white. That finished, he drops the towel on her unsuspecting head, ignoring her squeak. “There.” He says, “I’m done. Dry off your hair before you catch cold.”

That taken care of, he runs.

He doesn’t stop at the stairs, he doesn’t stop at the hallway, living room, or kitchen. He doesn’t stop at the yard, or the surrounding orchard. He doesn’t stop when he’s in the air, thunder rumbling and clouds threatening a downpour.

He stops at the Apple tree far from home, on the edge of Hylia River.

He stops when the sky opens up and drenches him with rain and deafens him with thunder.

And then he screams at the world.

He screams at Hylia.

He screams at that damned Wind-Fish who couldn’t even grant one small, stinking, rotted wish of a twelve-year-old boy.

Chapter Text

On the long, wet trudge through the mud and rain home, chest hollow and empty, Link thinks. He thinks about a lot of things. The differences between the Marin he remembers and the Marin waiting at his house.

He thinks about wing-birth, how her small grey fluff of wings will draw unwanted attention.

He thinks about the song she sang. How stilted their conversation has been.

He thinks about the injuries she’s suffered and the life she might have been living.

He decides he’d rather have her stay with him then go back wherever she was before.

He wishes she had been with him the whole time—

Halfway back, the rain stops, clouds parting in places to reveal beams of sunlight. Bright swaths of light painting the dreary hills and planes of Hyrule Field and everything else in sight.

He wants to go to the castle and talk with Zel. Zelly will know what to do. She always knows what to do and the right words to say.

His feet lead him through his orchard, and Link pauses outside the white gate leading to his house, his late aunt’s once pristine garden now a tangled mess of overgrown herb brush and wildflowers.

He misses her.

He misses Uncle too.

“Link? Link! You’re soaking!!” Link turns at Ravio’s voice, splashing, gravel-crunching footsteps run up to him over the muddy dirt path. “Were you out in that nasty storm?? What were you thinking!!! Idiot!!”

Link doesn’t answer, drops of water pearling on the tips of his bangs before plip-plopping to the muddy path below, just the same as so many drops are doing all around him as they fall from leaves and ripening fruit.

The water’s slowly penetrating into his wings too, chilling him, more drops falling from the tips of sensitive feathers in little bursts of sensation.

It’ll be a pain later, to dry and straighten the whole mess, and it really is a shame, after all the bother Ravio’d gone to the night before… He’d used the good oils. Scented expensive things Link never buys for himself, and hadn’t even realized Ravio owned, let alone been willing to share.

But for now, he can hardly bring himself to care. just watching as his friend— can he call him that?— Joins him and starts fussing, or as much as he can with his arms full of bags.

“What’s all that?” His voice sounds as empty and rung out as his chest feels.

“What?” Ravio cracks a grin, but there’s a familiar worry in his green eyes. “Don’t tell me you forgot already Mr. Hero? It’s the things for Miss-Marin.” The grin widens and his wings flap once, even as his eyes keep that wary sharpness. “I got a lot of good deals! —Oh. But I probably shouldn’t go into your Castle Town for a while. Like, at least a week or two?”

“Oh great.” Link rolls his eyes, mustering up some of his usual sass, if only to ease his friend. He moves to take some of the heavier looking bags, “I should’ve expected that. Can’t leave you alone for a single second.”

“Eh he he…” Ravio scratches at his cheek, an unrepentant smile spread dopily across his face. His shoulders relaxing at the familiar banter.

They’ll probably be talking about this later while preening their wings.

“Let’s just go in and get something dry on.” Link huffs.

Instead of their usual entrance through the kitchen, the two make their way up the front path, Ravio telling Link all that happened in the time he took while out shopping.

“We’re baaaack!!” Ravio calls as they enter, kicking off his shoes haphazardly, “I got a bunch of stuff for you Miss-Marin! I’m gonna go put them upstairs!” With a happy trill he skips up, wings matching the movements with little excited flaps.

Link snorts at his counterpart’s actions, he must’ve really gotten some good deals today. Otherwise, he’d be moping for the next week or so.

Link follows the excitable merchant at a slower pace, his nose twitching when he smells food— like, actual good, real food.

Starting to drool, he swallows hard and hurries in to go get dry. Someone made toast, bacon and eggs. Hopefully there’s enough for him— and Ravio— though if Link gets done first and there is food, Link’s not leaving any for the merchant.

“Welcome back…!” Comes a faint reply from further in the house. It’s not something Link entirely expects, but it makes his chest warm, despite the chill from being soaked to the bone.

“…Glad to be back.” He replies with a little smile. Too quiet to be heard, as he takes off his shoes and places them by Ravio’s.

Uncle and Auntie always hated it when he didn’t take them off, and it’s something he still does in remembrance of them. It’s ironic, really. His younger self forgot half the time, and always got chewed out for it, but now that Link’s parental figures are gone, he never once forgets.

When Link gets upstairs, Ravio is already changing out of his merchant robe and into a casual purple tunic, “We aren’t going to get many customers with temperamental weather like we’re having today.” He grins, before wrinkling his nose, “Your wings need preening again.”

Link makes a face back, starting to strip out of his own wet tunic, “They’re just wet. It isn’t that bad.”

“Honestly,” Ravio laments with a shake of his head, “no self care instincts at all, Mr. Hero. It’s a wonder you’ve made it this far in life.”

“Keep talking like that, and I really will kick you out of my house.” Link threatens without any real bite, and Ravio knows it too.

“You keep saying that, and you keep not kicking me out Mr. Hero. Keep this up and I might actually think you enjoy my wonderful company.” Ravio grins, flicking his wings as he gets them through the slits on the back of his shirt and tunic.

“You? As if.” Link banters back with a scoff.

“Um, neither of you were here to ask…but I made breakfast if you’d like it?” Marin calls from downstairs, and both boys make eye contact before Link quickly wriggles into his green tunic. He jumps over the pile of wet clothes and dashes for the door.

“Hey wait—” There’s a squawk behind Link as Ravio tries to follow but trips instead. A hard thump marking his downfall as Link dashes down the stairs and into the kitchen, Ravio just a few steps behind him and yelling threats for if Link eats everything.

As he enters, Marin turns from the sink with a wet plate in hand, “The foods on the ta— oh.” She freezes, breath hitching when she catches sight of him, wings hiking up and pulling closer than before. Her eyes first lock on his face, tracing the features, then drift to his pointed ears, and finally trail down to his wings, hanging loose and relaxed at his back but quickly hiking up in nerves. Does she recognize him? He’s grown… it’s been five years…

“Hey, what’s the holdup?” Ravio asks unintentionally pushing Link forward.

Marin stiffens further, holding up the dripping plate like a shield to her chest, breaths picking up speed. Wings pressed tight against her back in the same way they were when he found her. Like a kid curling up to look smaller.

“Oh.” Link blinks, glancing between Marin and follows her line of sight to Ravio’s purple-black wings and back… Huh. Usually, it’s seeing two people with identical faces that weirds people out.

Link unfurls his own wing and watching as her eyes immediately jump to the movement. “Guess you were too out of it to realize we both have wings, huh? …Surprise?” He admits sheepishly, a hand coming up to self-consciously rub at the back of his head with a wince.

The plate Marin was holding drops from her fingers and crashes to the ground. Her face crumpling as she shakes her head. “No.”

Link’s smile fades as he stiffens, wings starting to bristle, hurt. “Hey, it’s not that bad—”

She can’t hear him. Clutching at her hair. “Nononono. I have to wake up.” It’s a stab to Link’s chest he isn’t expecting.

She slaps her cheek. Hard. Waiting for a moment, gasping shallow breaths and eyes unfocused. When that doesn’t ‘wake her up.’ She shakily crouches down. Picking up a large shard of broken glass.

She meets his eyes and shakes her head, her voice breaks, tears fall. “You were the best dream I ever had— but I can’t stay.”

Link’s blood runs cold. Watching frozen as the glass digs into the palms of her trembling hands. “No…Wait...!” He can barely get the words out in a broken whisper through trembling lips. His limbs feel like lead.

He’s going to lose her again.

 “I—I have to wake up.” She tells him desperately, trying to convince him. Trying to convince herself. “I can’t— I can’t be here. I have to get away. I have to—to hide. I need to move...!” The tears keep coming. Dripping. As she shakily moves the sharp wedge up—

Ravio pushes Link aside, quickly grabbing both of the girl’s wrists and squeezing until the sharp shard slips out of her fingers and onto the ground with a clatter of crimson stained glass. He wastes no time in kicking it away.

Marin thrashes, “No!! You don’t understand— He’s— he’s going to kill me! I need to wake up! Let me go!!”

 “Snap out of it! You’re not asleep!” Ravio barks— harsher than Link’s ever heard the other boy speak. “Are you trying to kill yourself?? Because I’m not going to sit back and let that happen!!” He sounds like the hero he doesn’t think he is, and Link has never been more grateful for it.

She freezes. Eyes going blank and dull as she stares unseeingly in front of her. Muscles going lax in his grip. “Right…”

She falls limp in the other’s arms, like a doll with her strings cut. Sitting heavily on the ground. “I’m dead, aren’t I?” She asks the open air in a blank murmur. “I fell. He stabbed me and then I fell.”

Both boys suck in a breath.

She smiles a broken dead thing as she looks over her shoulders. Ravio releasing her at the disturbing change in behavior.

Link swallows hard.

“Didn’t even get my wish. Not really.” She laughs and it’s bitter. Hollow. “And instead, I get wings that can’t even fly.”

It’s not a laugh Link ever wants to hear from anyone, let alone Marin. Sweet innocent Marin, who loves to sing and who used to be an inch taller than him.

But here he is. Standing frozen on the other side of the room. Unable to do or say anything.

Like a coward.

She covers her eyes with her arms. “What a joke.” Her mouth contorts and more tears drip off her chin. “How stupid am I?”

Link steps forward, until he’s right in front of Marin. Uncaring of the glass, or the few twinges of pain it causes.

She drops her arms when she senses his presence, and looks up at him with blank eyes, but they fill with life as she looks at him in slowly dawning recognition. The light returning a little at a time. Her face crumples and the light swirls and multiplies as her eyes fill with tears all over again. “I’m really not dreaming? Link… you’re really here…? It really is you?”

His own face crumples at his name on her lips after so long, and he moves. Slowly, mechanically. Wrapping her in a tight hug that’s oh so careful of her wings.

“You’re not dreaming.” His voice is rough. Cracking in places, but he keeps going. “I’m here, Marin, and you are too.”

Her breath hitches and she clings a little tighter. Burying her face in his tunic.

She isn’t loud, and neither is he.

The only thing giving either away is the occasional hiccup or gasp of air, their shoulders shaking.

They aren’t crying for attention. Just simply because they can’t stop.

Because they can’t hold it in any longer. They are each other’s comfort after so so long.

Because he can let himself go if she’s here and not dead on a dream island— he has both her and Ravio and they’re both here— injured, but safe.

Arms wrap around Link and by extension, Marin. Ravio’s purple-black wings joining and overlapping with his own pink-crimson. “Don’t scare me like that!!” Ravio sobs.

…His own crying is a bit louder. A bit more open and uncontrolled.

Link isn’t even sure why the crybaby is crying.

Regardless, he shifts to include his friend— brother— flock-mate, and Marin does the same.

“I’m sorry. I’m really sorry.” She murmurs into their clothes. “I won’t do it again. I’m sorry. I thought I was asleep.” And the two boys simply shush her, offering assurances and heartfelt pleas for her not to do anything like that again, before dissolving into warbles and clicks and purrs as flock instinct drives them both to comfort further than words will allow.

“We need to treat your hands.” Link murmurs once they’ve settled into a warm pile, gently taking Marin’s hands in his own, as the three slowly pull away. “Does it hurt?”

She shakes her head, “I can’t feel it at all.” Her head is lolling a little and her eyes look hazy. “Everything feels far away. Like when I was about to wake up from a Koholint dream.”

“Koholint dream?” Link asks, because that sounds like she’s woken up from multiple and not just the one-time thing it was for Link, and despite the situation, he can’t help himself and his curious nature.

“I had them every night for a year… I’d go weeks in the dream and wake up to no time having passed. Just the next morning.” Marin answers in a daze. “Didn’t ever tell you because if you say it while you’re in a dream, you’ll wake up, and I never wanted to wake up from those dreams.” The words make Link wince. That’s exactly what he did. Woke them up.

“We can talk that over later—” He shakes his head.

Koholint: never— Injury care: now.

“You could be going into shock.” Link murmurs instead, forcing himself to stay on target, “Alright, we need a red potion. Rav. Help me out?”

“Right on it, Mr. Hero.” Ravio hurries out, and Marin lowers her gaze.

“…Sorry for the trouble.”

“Trust me,” He sighs, voice soft and movements gentle as he cups the back of her head, lightly pressing until her forehead is resting on his chest and his lips are nearly pressed to her hair, “If you were bothering me, I’d tell you loud and clear.”

She can never bother him enough to make him say it.

“Yeah, he definitely would.” Ravio chirps, bustling back into the room, shoes now on and a red potion in each hand, “Now I know these things taste pretty nasty—and mine are better tasting than most, I’ll have you know— But! It’ll heal you right up, so make sure you drink it all. That way those cuts won’t leave any scarring.” Ravio shoots Link a look, and sniffs in faux agitation, “That goes double for you, Mr.Hero.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Link agrees, pulling himself and Marin up, despite the pain that puts on the new cuts on his feet, going so far as to scoop up Marin and deposit her on a nearby chair. Receiving ruffled down and a squeak of surprise for his effort.

“And Ravio here’s a sucker for pretty women, so you’re in luck. Otherwise, he’d rob you dry.” Link flops into the chair next to the redhead, holding out his hand in a silent demand, “Hell, s’ probably the only reason he isn’t asking me to pay up before he hands me mine too, so I owe ya one for being here.”

“Hey! Mr. Hero, that’s not very nice!” Ravio pouts but hands over a bottle containing a viscous red liquid to Link, who pops the cork, and hands it over to a very dubious Marin before taking his own.

“But you don’t deny it.” Link retorts, popping the second cork just as easily and chugging the contents. Feeling the shards of glass slip out of healing wounds and clatter harmlessly to the ground.

“I’m a merchant!” Ravio huffs indignantly back, crossing his arms and puffing up his wings, “I’ll take any deal I see… if it piques my interest. That does not include stealing from a defenseless and injured girl.”

Marin goes about her own potion a bit more hesitantly, sniffing the stuff and recoiling, before taking a small sip and then gagging. Wings flaring minutely. The down standing on end. “It’s like cough syrup, but worse.” She whimpers, sticking her tongue out like that’ll actually help.

Snickering, Ravio goes for the broom and mop to start on cleanup, but not before he devours all the food on one of the two plates left forgotten on the table. Moaning that it’s the best home-cooked meal he’s had in months, and it wasn’t even warm.

Not that Link and Marin pay the drama king any mind.

Taking pity on the potion-newbie who hasn’t had her tastebuds all killed off yet, Link takes his mug and pours a cup of now over-steeped lukewarm tea, Marin had probably made it earlier. He slides it over to her after dropping in a spoonful of sugar and stirring.

“Best get it all down in one go.” Link advises, “N’ try not to breathe through your nose while you do it.”

With a deep breath, she does just that, tipping the bottle back with her eyes scrunched closed, twitching and clutching at the table, wings puffing up with a violent shiver, before she finally manages to swallow.

“There,” Link congratulates, his voice laced with laughter, as she lunges for the tea and starts chugging it. “You did it.”

It really is one of the better tasting ones he’s had.

But now that the potion is down, Marin is busy watching her hands heal right before her eyes.

Leaning over, Link watches too, “Oh right, Koholint only had fairies and magic medicine… Your… home… not have any potions? Or did you just never need to use them?”

Or were you prevented from using them. Because all those scars say you needed them.

“No potions, stuff like this… magic… it’s something for dreams and fairy tales… children’s stories.” Marin shakes her head, still looking at the new skin, even after it’s been completely healed, along with a few other hidden scars no doubt, though it’d take a few more bottles, or even a fairy fountain visit to alleviate more damage.

“Wait— no magic?!” Ravio spluttering, “You’re kidding, right?” Link has to agree, but he just frowns and listens.

Marin shakes her head again, finally lowering her hands with a tired smile that makes Link remember she’s only just passed wing-birth, “No magic, no wings, and no monsters, except for ourselves.”

“What do you mean, ‘ourselves’?” Link asks, getting a bad feeling… Not that he hasn’t experienced that himself. Not all of his enemies were monsters, after all.

It’s only confirmed when she touches her side with a bitter, empty smile.

With a hum— something to break the silence— he doesn’t know if it’s meant to be understanding, or consoling or pitying— not that he’d ever pity her— he just doesn’t know what to say.

So Link goes for the now cold food. It’s still good, like Ravio said. Far better than anything either of them can whip up… and he wishes he could enjoy it, but his mind is too full for that.

Ravio keeps asking questions, and Marin answers, whether from shock, or still being half convinced that this is all a dream.

Her answers, however, paint a rather bleak picture.

No magic.

No wings.

Fairies? Myth.

Zora or Mer-people? Also myth.

Link is suddenly glad Sheerow’s been off visiting Hilda with a letter Ravio sent. Marin might just decide Hyrule really is a dream if she sees the bird- spirit, whatever the heck Sheerow is.

Any of the other tribes Hyrulian’s all lump under ‘human’ are all met with confusion. She’s never even heard of them. Even going so far as to tilt her head and say, “Those don’t sound like humans?”

Interesting. So, it’s her race. Not the blanket term Hyrule and the surrounding countries use for people who are sentient and capable of higher brain function.

The next question is where she’s from: and she answers this one easily enough, if a little haltingly as she tries to remember words, and Ravio tries to help by offering a stream of synonyms. She moved from where she lived in a place called Scott-land— to someplace called Lon-den. What she describes is nothing like anything he or Ravio have ever heard of before; tall buildings that scrape the sky, more people than he’s ever heard about in one place. ‘caars’ and ‘plaines’.

And then Ravio asks about her family, and Marin’s face falls. She won’t say anything about her dad, her lips pressing flat and her wings pressing tight to her back.

“Mum… died a bit after Koholint.” Her eyes go distant, dark, and she hugs herself a little tighter, makes herself a little smaller. It’s not a look Link wants to see. It’s quickly becoming his least favorite look on her. “There— it was— an accident. She uh, she fell.”

Link looks at her. Really looks. She’s supposed to be the naïve, happy, Island girl— who’s dream of a life didn’t have any worries or concerns.

That was an idealization. A dream— quite literally. A memory polished smooth by time and clutching heartbroken fingers.

She isn’t that.

Maybe she never was that.

He’d assumed so much. Too much.

Didn’t even know her sweet smile hid shadows, just as his stories skipped over any pain or heartache.

They’d both lied, even if it was just by omission.

He hadn’t even thought about why she was with her ‘uncle’ Tarin on the island— just thought she was the same as him, only his uncle was dead.

His parents were dead too, not that he remembers them. She clearly remembers hers. Her father isn’t dead, as much as Link is starting to suspect he might wish him to be…

Maybe he can ask Nayru to lend him her gift for the Harp of Ages again. Get it to an exact time— so he and his younger self can beat each other to a pulp. Never mind that it doesn’t work like that. The idea is still a satisfying thought. He’d punt himself so far…

Link really didn’t think, did he? God, his younger self was such an idiot.

His present self isn’t much better.

There’s a clatter as Link pushes his plate away, making Ravio and Marin jump. “I’m going to go see my sister.” He meets surprised blue-green eyes, “You wanna come?”

There’s a moment of hesitation before Marin nods.

“Great,” Link gets up, glancing over at Ravio in a silent question.

Wings flick dismissively, “You two go on without me.” The dark-haired boy waves off with a small smile, shooting Marin a sad glance, “I’ll stay here in case any customers come by.”

“Alright then.” Link stretches, his shoulders and hip popping loudly, before turning to Marin and giving her a look over, “First thing’s first, let’s get you something to cover your wings.”

She glances back over her shoulder, letting one flick out slightly, as she frowns, “Why? Do they look that weird?” She worries at her lip.

“No. They look fine.” Link quickly dismisses.

“Yeah! They’re really cute!” Ravio chips in, and Link sends him a deadpan look. Laying it on a little thick, aren’t you?

Ravio just grins unrepentantly.

“It’s just, having small wings like that at your age isn’t very common.” Link explains, “Better to keep them hidden than get all sorts of unwanted attention in Castle Town.” Saying that, he motions for the stairs, “Here, I think I still have something that’ll work.”

“Alright... Thank you.” Marin says as she follows him up the stairs.

“No worries. Least I can do.” He waves off as he leads the way. A few of the wooden floorboards creak under their feet as they move, “It should be back here…” Link holds the door open for them to enter what once was his uncle’s office and now functions as a third storage room for all of Link's items. The downstairs sitting room being the second, and the outdoor tool shed being the first, though the whole house has really devolved into one large storage room at this point. He likes traveling, and he likes collecting souvenirs.

The air is stale, and Link hurriedly moves for the shuttered window, letting out a nervous laugh as he hurriedly moves several piles of magical-dungeon junk, haphazardly placing them on sheet-covered furniture. “Should probably air this place out more often… let’s get us some light.”

A second later, he trips on a chest he hadn’t seen, grumbling as he sets that aside too, and finally makes it to the window

Everything sticks, from the latch to the wooden frame, and it takes him longer than he’d like to finally push the damn thing open, not helped by the coughs brought on by the dust cloud he just raised to reach the stubborn window, and he catches himself biting back several curses.

Marin’s not much better behind him, as she lets out a series of sneezes, that, when he glances back at her, have her feathers all standing on end in an adorable jumble of fluff.

“This… is more of a mess than I remember it being…” He murmurs to himself, going to the other window and repeating his first struggle, before turning with his hands on his hips and surveying the chaos and set up a plan.

Something of a strategy mapped out, he starts to rummage where he thinks he remembers stuffing his uncle’s old clothes and other wearable odds and ends.

Another poof of dust rises, and Link scrunches his nose as it starts to tickle.

“Here, let me help.” Marin volunteers as she kneels beside him, hands out. Stifling a cough by clearing her throat.

“Uh, sure.” Link agrees, starting to pass her different items, she doesn’t comment when he sets others away with a flustered explanation of their various curses and that he didn’t think he’d left them out like this.

The tickle in his nose grows as he stirs up more dust, until he can’t force back the sneeze, which turns into two, and then three.

Likewise, Marin’s snort at his ‘bunny sneezes’ as Ravio puts it, quickly devolves into a short coughing fit followed by her own sneeze.

“Ugh! All this dust.” He complains, rubbing his face with his sleeve, “I think you thanked me too soon.”

Standing, he uses a hand to uselessly wave at the air, not willing to tempt the disaster that flapping his wings in this deathtrap would cause.

When did this room get filled up? No wait, he came in briefly with his Hytopia outfits— but then it was too full and he put them in the big wardrobe in the guest room… Ravio only really cleaned and reorganized the main living spaces.

“No, it’s fine.” Marin waves off with a sniffle, eyes watery. “The breeze from the window’s clearing away the worst of it.”

“Why don’t you go wait downstairs with Rav?” Link suggests, “Or there’s always the hallway. Or even by the window?”

“No. I’ll be fine—” Marin waves off around another cough, “Just, let’s wait a moment for things to settle maybe? It’s okay to take it slower.”

“Uh, right.” Link feels his whole face heat up. He turns away, taking a few steps to another shelf to pretend to look busy. “The— I think—the rest of that shelf is ordinary stuff, so you don’t need to worry about it being cursed.”

Now his movements are very carefully measured and slow to keep the dust from rising any further as he blindly picks up and sets down various items. He hadn’t realized he was doing that. It’s just, being here— alone with her— and with this mess. It made him jittery, even if it was his own damn mouth that invited her to join him up here.

Going to the window, Link leans halfway out it and takes a deep breath of fresh floral-scented air and lets himself calm, and his tense muscles relax.

This is Marin. Just Marin. He knows Marin— well, apparently not as well as he thought, but he knows her. She’s a good person— the best. She’s not gonna judge him. She never has before. There’s no reason for his hands to be shaking like he’s having his first audience with a royal.

Another deep breath, and he heads back around the four bookshelves and three large trunks he’d crammed in the middle of the room to hold more things. Finding Marin on her knees going through one of those chests. Carefully folding each item of clothing after taking it out with a straightening shake and a quick once over before moving on to the next.

As he comes over and crouches on the other side of the chest, she looks up, a flash of a smile crossing her face as she meets eyes with him, and the electricity filling his heart both calms and jumps at the action. “I’ve been looking through the clothes in this trunk, but I’m not really sure what we’re looking for…?”

“Ah— you didn’t need to fold them!” He starts, the dust apparently destroying whatever connection his brain had with his mouth. “I mean, thanks, but also, I was the one who stuffed em in there— it’s not like anyone’s gonna be wearing them again—” he clamps his mouth shut.

“It’s fine. I think it’s kind of sad to just leave them like that.” She says as she picks up another piece of clothing, this time one of his aunt’s dresses. It’s not one he ever saw her in, and based on the outdated but dainty cut, probably from when she was around Link’s age or just slightly older.

Marin holds it up and makes an appreciative hum.

It’d look good on her, it wouldn’t take much tailoring even— hell, Link could probably do it. But he wouldn’t mind paying a proper tailor… Just make it more avian friendly. Or Rav could do it and add some extra protective enchantments. They could modernize it too, so she could go out to Castle Town and not get any weird looks, make it fashionable, even, so maybe—

Right. She asked a question.

He should answer that.

“We’re looking for a cloak,” He hums, tacking on in a mumble, “It’s pretty noticeable though...”

digging through the pile of clothes he’d stuffed inside this chest years ago and never expected to look through again, he lets out a sigh, “Nope. Don’t see it here…” with a twitch of his nose, he quirks his mouth, eyes drifting around the unchecked shelves, baskets, and various trunks.

Nothing stands out in particular.

“Maybe the shelf in the closet…?”

Saying such, he pushes himself up, knees and ankles clicking like they usually do as he stands. He drifts over, pushing another box with his foot to use as a stool. balancing one foot in that, and getting his other on the back of the sheet covered couch by the closet door, wings stretching out to keep him balanced as he reaches for one of the bags on the top shelf.

 “Ah ha!” he declares as his fingers just manage to snag a handle. He turns and his wings hit something— Whipping around he finds Marin close behind him and spluttering.

“Oh jeez, are you alright?” He yelps as he jumps down, wings flaring in his worry and causing something behind him to clatter in a fall that has him wincing.

“Nope. Yeah.” She blinks rapidly, “I was worried you’d fall— guess you didn’t need that. Just— was not expecting the face full of feathers.”

It starts as barely a breath, bubbling up, light and airy. More of a snort really, and then descends into giggles, and then full out laughter, his sides aching as he clutches the bag to his stomach.

Her own laughter joins his, and it’s like the tension never existed, even if it and all they haven’t spoken hangs like an anvil-head thundering on the horizon.

“I’m— I’m so sorry!” He gasps once he has the breath to do so, “It’s just— your face— I’m not laughing at you, I swear— I didn’t mean to—”

She’s laughing too, and he wishes for a moment that he could keep it in a bottle like so many other things he has, yet it’s so much more precious.

“I wasn’t expecting you to turn! And your poor couch!”

“I can’t believe I hit you with my wings!” Link cries around his hands now covering his face, trying to groan but just laughing harder.

They laugh until they’re both on the floor, tears in their eyes and heaving for breath, without a care for how grungy the room is. The sun comes out from behind the clouds just long enough to catch them in a sunbeam. Sparkling dust-motes drift like fairies before it fades again and the cloud cover returns. A breeze still laced with the scent of petrichor from the storm gently blows at the laced net curtains that he and his uncle couldn’t bare changing after his aunt passed.

Finally, they calm, breaths heavy and even and satisfied.

Marin lets out a sigh, “Man I really needed that.” She rubs at her sides and gesturing to her back with a weak sheepish laugh, “It hurt, but I couldn’t stop if I tried.”

That makes Link sober up. “Does it still hurt? I think I’ve got some pain medicine somewhere— Zel will definitely have some… or I can run and get some from Maple—”

“No— it’s… manageable.” Marin waves off, once again distancing herself as she calms, “I don’t want to cause any trouble.”

“Cause all the trouble.” He tells her seriously, not letting her break eye contact when she tries, a hand gently hovering near her face, and when she leans into the touch, holds her there with a soft brush of his thumb, “And I mean that. All the trouble. Trouble is me taking on Ganon again— and I highly doubt you can cause that much trouble. And even if you do, I’ve managed several times now. I’ll do it again. I take care of trouble, okay? That’s like, my whole job.”

She offers a faint smile, finally breaking eye contact, and he reluctantly removes his hand, the warmth of her cheek lingering at his fingertips. “Okay.” She shakes her head, “It really isn’t that bad. I’m sore, but I don’t need anything right now.” She shrugs and then makes a face that says she regrets the movement, “Just— need not to do that again.”

“Right,” he smiles something closer to a grimace in apology for her pain, “Tell me if it gets worse, and I’ll work to fix it.”

She nods, eyes finally catching on what’s now in his lap, “Did you find what you were looking for?”

“Hopefully.” He makes a so-so gesture and undoes the clasp holding it closed. “We’ll see.”

Looking inside, he perks up, “Ah ha! I was right!” He pulls out a crimson cape, holding it up to show Marin. “Here, let’s see if this works.”

“…Okay.” Marin agrees, and he grins, both of them working to pat off dusty clothes and wings before he’s helping to pull the red fabric over her head and cover her wings with it.

Stepping back after he’s fastened the cloak with one of his aunt’s brooches, he admires his handy work. “There. It suits you better than it ever did me.” He tells her with a decisive nod.

“You think?” She asks, looking down at herself to see the fabric trail behind, and Link is quick to pin the excess into the clasp. “You don’t think… it makes me look funny? Wearing a cape?” She questions, as he continues to fuss and make sure it isn’t pulling or hindering or dragging anywhere. the sun is out again, and when she looks up at him, her eyes appear almost a reddish brown mixed with gold in the warm light of the window.

She wrinkles her nose, “Doesn’t the red clash with my hair?” She gives him a look. It’s a face he’s made plenty of times, but he thinks it’s a lot more endearing on her, “I bet it makes my freckles stand out too.” The light fades once more and her eyes are back to looking mostly blue grey in the colder light of the overcast.

…It does make her freckles stand out a little. Just a bit? Not really? And anyway, he likes them, so it’s not a problem?

“Nah,” he shrugs, wings giving a dismissive flick, “Plenty of merchants and travelers wear them. Some townsfolk too. It’ll help ya blend in better, if anything.

“Link. Redheads don’t usually wear red for a reason.” She deadpans.

“I think it looks just fine.” He doesn’t pout. And his ears definitely don’t lower in disappointment. She doesn’t have to like it. It’s for necessity only, anyway. “But if you want something else, I probably have one in another color somewhere…”

She gives an unconvinced hum but makes no move to take off the cape. “If you say it’s fine, then I’ll trust you. Just don’t let me outside if it looks awful.”

“Of course not.” He scoffs. He wouldn’t do that to her. “Plus,” he adds nonchalantly as they head back downstairs and out the door. The sky is still overcast, but there are streaks of blue shining through in places now, and it looks like it’ll be entirely clear soon. “Zelda says it supposedly belonged to our ancestor— the First Hero, so there’s that too.”

“Wait…” Marin freezes, before quickly hurrying to catch up with the slow pace Link’s set. A few drops of water landing on him from the apple trees.

He sends her a mischievous smirk, even as he ushers her away from a puddle that he knows is deeper than it looks. “Careful, there, wouldn’t wanna get all muddy.”

“Then should I really be wearing this?” She asked, almost panicked, “If this is special, then—”

“Nah. It’s fine.” Link waves off, crossing his arms behind his head, “It was given to me, and I’m letting you borrow it. Not like I wear it anyway.” He shrugs, “And it’s definitely seen worse wear than a stroll into town. If they didn’t want it ruined, they shouldn’t have given it to a kid.”

The King had hated that. Especially because it was him.

Link had spent several vindictive years toting the damn cape around to use as a bedroll, and on one specific occasion, a sail cloth for a raft…

Zel had put a stop to it when some particular gossip about that, and some of his other… ingenuitive uses… of the First Hero’s cloak came to light.

What can he say? The protective magics on the thing were damn strong! He wasn’t not going to use that to his advantage when the cloth was nigh on indestructible!

Ok, he can admit that he probably shouldn’t have used a one of a kind priceless historical relic to tie up a Darknut and then bomb the un-living hell outta it.

So he didn’t put up too much of a fight when Zelly politely told him to cease and desist immediately.

Plus it’s bulky and clashes with his sense of style, otherwise he’d probably still cart it around now and then.

“Oh, that’s right,” Marin says, tapping her chin, “You said something about being a hero on the island, right…?”

“Well, yeah.” Link shrugs, “After going on six adventures, I’ve picked up a bunch of different titles, but Zel’s set on calling me ‘the Hero of Legend.’” He rolls his eyes with a scoff, “Pretty pretentious, right?”

Marin giggles, covering her mouth, and something in Link’s chest eases at the sound, “I’m sorry, it really isn’t that funny. It’s just, you act so normal.” She smiles up at him, “Sure, you’re very kind, and you’re amazing with a sword— even taught me a bit way back when, but…” She laughs again, “I guess I’m just not used to anyone throwing around the word hero outside of wars or local do-gooders.”

That piques Link’s interest, “What, no prophecies or old legends of a hero who appears only when darkness rises?” He asks jokingly, “Seems like that’s at least half Hyrule’s history just right there.”

“Yeah, we don’t really have anything like that back home, outside of legends thousands of years old, or fiction.” Marin admits, taking in their surroundings, the sun finally appearing with a breeze that’s quickly driving the clouds away. It blows Marin’s hair into her face, and she quickly tucks a strand behind a rounded ear, “People aren’t born heroes or have any destiny or legend. They act or react to circumstances, and people name them accordingly.” She explains after a moment of thought, then smiles, “If you’re willing, I’d love to hear about your adventures, and the past heroes too.”

“Course.” His nose twitches, and he rubs at it. Hoping his warm cheeks and ears aren’t showing too badly. “Don’t mind sharing.”

“Thank you.” She looks away, “I don’t… know how long I’ll be here, but I’d like to know more about this world.” She smiles then, “Plus, I’ve only heard three of your adventures, so if Koholint is another, that means you’ve been on two more besides.”

“You remember those stories…?” He asks, mind racing and trying to remember everything he’s ever told her. Hylia River and the stone wall surrounding Castle Town coming into view as the road winds it’s way along downhill.

“Let’s see…” She lifts her hands, counting off on her fingers, “So, there were the brainwashed guards and kidnapping? Then there was the one going into the past, using a harp? And another that had to do with changing seasons.” She lists off, “Not to mention all the trouble we got into on Koholint in order to get the siren’s instrument’s and wake the Wind-fish.” She shoots him a look, “Not that you ever let me anywhere near the actual dungeons.”

Ah. He forgot about telling her all those stories…. Damn his past self and his idiotic big head. “Man, and you listened to me drone on about that stuff…” he laughs self-consciously.

Only Zel really knows more than Marin, if he really thinks about it— Ravio probably comes in a close third, if not a tie. Between nightmares, preening, and just plain stubborn nagging.

Though part of the reason he’s taking Marin to meet Zel is to get them to be friends— both of them no doubt need it. And for once, Link has a friend who’s a girl that he can trust to be friends with his sister…

 …Though that also means Zelly will probably be sharing some facts about him. Such as the Dark World, and the whole rabbit debacle, getting split with two doppel’s, and the whole mermaid curse thing.

He knows she and Ravio already share stories about him— and conspire together to force him into self-care. He doubts Marin will be any different.

Though… Zelda might actually be the one conspiring with him on caring for Marin in all honesty. That’s a thought.

He kinda likes that thought.

Still, having people know about him, about what he’s been through, makes something—probably the rabbit in him— wriggle uncomfortably.

“Link, you’re a good storyteller, so I don’t mind listening to those ones again too.” She looks down, fiddling with her hands, and he sees the minute shift of wings closing tighter. The sight makes Link frown.

She doesn’t really show any of the body language common for avians… those instincts should be starting to show themselves… and the one she does show is to make her look smaller. Less noticeable.

“Of course, if you don’t want to say anything, that’s fine too—” She continues, unaware of his mental detour.

“No. It’s fine.” He quickly decides. “If you want to listen, I’m fine sharing, just know… not all of it is pleasant.” What are a few secrets in the face of a friend he thought was dead? Especially when that friend is one who’s lost everything.

And like he was thinking earlier, Zel’s probably gonna spill on him if he doesn’t tell Marin himself. But knowing, the holder of Wisdom’ll at least give him a chance to do it himself first.

“I’m…” Marin smiles up at him, but it’s sad and a little broken as she reaches out and carefully pinches the corner of his sleeve. “I’m used to unpleasant things. They don’t scare me.”

A fond smile slowly spreads, and Link just as intentionally takes those pinching fingers in his hands, so he can hold that delicate too-thin hand instead, squeezing once before keeping it in a loose grip.

 Memories flood his mind of the two running all over an island together, taking turns with his sword as he teaches her how to defend herself against monsters. Laughing and carefree. Hand in hand, so similar but so different from how they are right now.

“It really wouldn’t scare you, would it?” He murmurs, moving to keep himself between Marin and the closer of the two soldiers guarding the gate of the outer wall as they start to cross the drawbridge leading to it. His wing moving to hover just behind her back.

Oblivious, Marin gasps as they pass through the large stone arch, and leave the portcullis and drawbridge behind, looking all over, at the bright colored banners, the various shops, and the town’s folk— though he doesn’t think she’s noticed the ones above in the air just yet.

He snorts in amusement. Just like a tourist.

Still, it has him looking around with new eyes too, trying to put himself in her shoes and see what she’s seeing instead of what he knows.

Walking further into Castle Town, Link tries to ignore the stares and whispers Marin is unaware of— perhaps even deaf to, given what he knows of her more limited hearing.

Some of the voices are awed, some guilty, and some straight up hostile, despite the pardon Zelda placed after her rescue. But more often than not… they’re just plain curious.

‘The Hero of Legend.’ The lying child. The kidnapper of the princess. … The lost prince. The nephew of the Captain of the Royal Guard, descendant of the Fallen Hero, and last of the True Hyrulian Knights. The rumors and titles are endless. Less then half of them are even true, which is why he checks off each truthful one he overhears, a sort of morbid game he plays whenever in town.

It’s more habit than anything now— even if listening to rumors and tracking people’s moods, especially in relation to him, once, and sometimes still, means the difference between life and death.

More than anything though, Link watches as Marin brightens with every step.

Her wings don’t twitch or flap in any of the normal avian habits…and the Hylian gestures of ear movements are out too…

But her eyes are sparkling. There’s a slight smile present that has been missing, and her steps have taken on a familiar bounce and sway that makes her almost seem as if she’s dancing as she walks and twirls to keep sight of some new interest.

“There are a lot more people than I was expecting, and they’re all dressed so colorfully.” She stops, tugging at his hand as she looks up, “Link, oh Link, look at them!” She breathes in wonder, “They’re flying…!”

He laughs, bright and heartfelt and carefree. He thinks this might be a record, or at least one he hasn’t reached since Kohalint.

A few towns folk who knew him openly stare, but he ignores them all. “What?” He teases, lifting the wing not currently hovering behind her back to spread out and behind his open hand in gesture, “Don’t tell me you thought these were just for show?”

“No, it’s just—” Her cheeks flush a pretty red, and when he starts laughing again, she puffs them up in a pout, purposefully shoving his side, “Oh shut up. I’ve never seen it before, okay?” She says that, but she’s laughing now too. Which sets Link off again. The both of them giggling together as they walk.

“…I don’t think about it too often, but it is pretty amazing.” He admits in a murmur after a moment, eyes tracing the sky to watch as a couple dances through the air… three kids clumsily flying by in a game of tag…

Avians just going about their lives. Some ducking low above rooftops or landing gracefully on balconies or in front of shop stalls…

Others diving through the alleyways and bystreets, laughing for friends to try and follow. calling apologies and gain shouts of alarm from passersby as they test their skill and agility.

and others still, merchants or travelers or just free spirits catch updrafts that send them far far above to soar and circle before they travel off to wherever the wind takes them next.

“Yeah, it really is amazing.” Marin agrees, and he looks back down at his dream-island girl holding his hand as they weave through the busy Castle Town square, her eyes fixed on the sky, just like she used to watch the seagulls at their secret place.

“Y’know,” he looks away when she looks over at him, his cheeks and ears going warm, “I’d—if— I wouldn’t mind teach— helping you learn— to fly that is. Once your wings grow out a bit more.” He stutters. The words catching in his throat and getting garbled. Damn it, this never happens when he’s talking to royalty— or anyone really, so why now?? “I mean, it’s mostly instinct, so you’ll probably get it fast but—”

A soft laugh sounds, and then he’s meeting eyes like the beach on a warm sunny day, a matching sweet smile to accompany them, and his heart jumps, “I’d like that very much. Thank you, Link.”

“Yeah, well.” He splutters, messing with his fringe. “Don’t thank me just yet. We saw how well that went earlier… and anyway! We have to wait for them to grow out first.”

Marin hums in agreement, eyes straying back to the sky as she squeezes Link’s hand. “I guess I’ll just have to wait then.”