Chapter Text
“Run”. “Keep her safe”. “Find link”. The words circled her head like vultures. How did this happen? How did it happen?! The trees feel like they’re closing in on her. Boom. Another explosion. She runs faster, trying to get away. She needs to find link. Her older brother. He knows how to help. She just needs to find her. She needs to get her and aryll to safety- BOOM closer now. Their closer. Their coming. Trips. She trips at the worst time. What’s going on!? Blood rolls down her forehead. Getting up, she holds aryll close to her chest. Starts running again. She’s near his treehouse, she’s so close! Just a few more steps- BOOOOM. She falls forwards. Rolls at the last second like mama told her to. Checks aryll. No injury’s. she’s just about to stand up when a large shadow looks over her. Too big to be link. Too big to be her brother. Which means it’s someone else. Someone mean. “Found you pretty girl”. Frozen. She can’t move. He’s big. Too big to move around. He grabs the knife from his pocket. Come here pretty girl, I’ll make this quick.” She kicks him in the shin before the knife is to close. “Not without a fight” her voice is small, tiny. Like a child’s. “she is one” he realises. Just a kid. He shouldn’t kill her. She’s no threat. He pulls the knife closer to himself. “But she might become one” the larger voice in his mind echoes. The monster inside him. The part of him he wishes never existed. But he listens to it. Lifting the knife in the air. “Well then pretty girl, I guess we will make it slow and painful”. He aims for an organ, but she rolls away and it hits her shin. It’s deep, but not fatal. The girl bits her tongue so hard she tastes blood. She can’t show weakness. “Pathetic. Your pathetic. What? You think a 7 year old can’t fight? Well guess what? I’ve been training since I was able to walk.” She stands up, ignoring the stinging tears in her eyes. Did she do well? She said the line mama made her practice every day in case this happened.
She runs into the woods, jumping on any nearby surface like she was told so she wouldn’t leave footprints. “Don’t let them track you” papa taught her that. After running for what feels like ages, she feels tired. That’s weird. She’s run longer. The girl looks down at her numb leg and sees it’s worse than before. Stopping to catch her breath, she sits down behind a big tree. She hates the sight of blood, but that doesn’t matter. Not now. Now? She must find link. Snap. A twig. She turns around just in time to see the man. She tries to dodge, but he gets her arm. It’s deeper than the one in her shin. The girl can’t hold in the pain as she lets out an awful scream. “ your brother will find you pretty girl. And by then, the maggots would be all over your tiny little body.he walks away, not hearing the whimpering coming from her. The girl cannot let her see aryll. She holds her hand over her mouth with her remaining strength so he doesn’t hear her cries. She lets her sister go, with a stupid hope. “Find link aryll. Find him” she’s a kid though. Barely 2 years old. Aryll starts screaming like crazy. The man’s gone now luckily. “She won’t get caught for now” she lies there on the rocky ground with her conciseness slowly slipping away. for what feels like forever, when someone’s shadow looms over her tiny frame. “SPARK!” The boy yells. He jumps onto his knees in hopes to help her. “No no no no!” He’s crying now, “Spark! Ember! She wants to speak, but words just can’t form on her tongue. His words are becoming muffled now. “Must be the blood loss.” He hears snippets of his voice. “Sorry…fight…..say…something…..I’m…..need to……goodbye.” His words get harder to hear as she lets the darkness consume her. It’s not cold. Just empty. The girls made peace. Link found her. He can grab Aryll. He has more of a reason to kill ganondorf now. And- a small fast escapes her lips. It’s warm. She feels a slight breeze. She feels the rocks she fell onto. Then she feels like she’s floating. She opens her eyes to see herself floating above the ground. Golden light consuming her. She sees it combing from the boy. No link. Why did he forget his name. Why is she forgetting things. Why is she here again? What’s her name? “Goodbye little spark. I love you” she hears his voice one last time before she forgets to stay awake.
Ember wakes up in a cold sweat and reaches for her neck. “Good. It’s still there” she calms her breathing while feeling the cool touch of her pendent. The familiar feeling of the gemstones spelling out the letter “E” helps calm her nerves. After a bit, she stands up to get her clothes. A simple Cotten tunic with butterfly’s and flowers embroidered all over it. She pulls it over her head while trying to forget the nightmare. “Same one for 4 flipping years” she mumbles. Thinking about the nightmare, she wonders who the boy is. She always wanted to know, because he looks familiar. “It’s probably someone from my old life.” That’s what it is. An old life. Something not worth remembering. Not that she could if she wanted to. After grabbing the pants of the end of her bed, she goes to put her dark brown mid back long hair in a simple braid. Ember was hylian, her ears say such, but there was something about her that was off. She had dark brown hair with blood red and dark purple highlights at the tips of her hair. One of her eyes were blue, while the other is a violent purple. She had tanned skin from working on the ranch on the weekends “Ember! Breakfast!” Her adoptive mother’s voice rang through the house. “This place is my home. Nowhere else” she reminded herself. That nightmare always made her feel like she didn’t belong, but her adoptive mother always told her that this is her home and that she was always going to be part of their family, no mater what. “Coming ma!”and with that, she slipped on her socks and ran down stairs, where aryll, and her adoptive parents were sitting down for breakfast. “I’ll always belong here”, she thought to herself. Doesn’t matter what happened in the past. Only the present. And with that, she sat down to eat with her family.
Her adoptive father lonol, started asking about her weekend plans. Ember just smiled and said she was going to help on the ranch. Her adoptive parents looked at each other with a look. The kind of look that parents get when there is something they’re not telling you. “Honey”…. Her adoptive mother tillo started, we need to talk. “Yes we do” lonol agreed. “Your spending to much time on that ranch. It’s unhealthy” tillo continued “we understand that you like it, but why don’t you start trying to make friends at school? The royal family are doing their once a decade tour around hyrule! You might be able to get there attention, and even get scouted for a job at the castle! That won’t happen if you’re working at a filthy ranch”. Ember just sighed. It wasn’t the first time the brought up the ranch and the royal family. “I enjoy working at the ranch, it’s fun and hardworking. And I don’t really want to go the the castle. It’s far too stuffy.” Ember always put on this mask with them. A polite person who still has opinions. It’s easier than getting a lecture about manners. “Plus, maryrose lives there. We can hang out while doing work and get snacks.” They just nodded and tried change the subject. Aryll was happy to talk about her newest crush at school, it was currently a tie between two gross boys who picked their noses and ate the snot. Ember finished her breakfast and grabbed her lunch she made the night before. “See you tonight!” She shouted as she went out the door. It was peaceful, as she started walking down the familiar road to school, a poster caught her eye. It looked odd, and the letters looked like scribbles. When going to take a better look, she heard the school bells ring. “Shoot, I’m late” she tore the poster of the wall and put it inter her sack, before running off.