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What do you even put as a salutation in a letter to a princess? Is “Dear Princess Zelda” too generic? Is "dear" not appropriate? Do you need to say “your highness” or “your majesty” or something? Is there some special formal letter greeting just for royals?
… Did it matter at all when you weren’t even sure how to get a letter to the girl who you’d just saved? Maybe saved? Hopefully saved?
Link sighed and looked at the blank page of his notebook again. He’d been stuck in this rift for days after helping the princess. He’d spent the first day defeating every monster he could find, but although he’d definitely been in situations where defeating all monsters would open a door, that didn’t seem to lead to a way out this time. Then he’d spent the next day searching every nook and cranny trying to see if he could find a path that would take him to the next piece of the still world. And when paths didn’t seem to be the answer, he’d searched for puzzles. Then he’d spent another whole day just trying to see what he could interact with. He could swim in the water, cut the grass, but he couldn’t find any rocks that would move, and his attempt at moving a whole floating chunk of masonry had nearly resulted in him overbalancing and falling off the edge. He debated jumping off intentionally and hoping he’d find another chunk of rift in the gloom below but he wasn’t sure if that was a thing he’d survive. Then he remembered the notebook and pen in his pocket.
Lueburry had asked Link to document what he knew about the rifts, and Link had found a love of writing and sketching as a way to communicate and help him remember things he wanted to share. He liked the way writing things down in this notebook made him slow down and think, and drawing them made him notice details. He’d had to write a lot since losing his voice, but writing as a substitute for talking felt slow in a different, impatient kind of way. Writing in the notebook and having a whole bunch of observations he could share with Lueburry was just so much more enjoyable. Especially when Lueburry added his own annotations and questions for Link to answer.
This particular field notebook wasn’t quite full yet, so Link filled up a few pages with more detailed notes and sketches but after a while his mind had started to wander to the princess in the crystal.
He wasn’t really sure that he’d managed to break the crystal. Was the princess okay? Had she managed to get the rest of the way out? He hadn’t found her in the still world with him but if she’d fallen in afterwards there was no guarantee that they’d end up in the same spot. The still world was odd that way. He’d looked for her just in case but hadn’t found a trace.
What if she was lost? What if she was alone? What if she was searching for him? Was she as worried about him as he was about her?
What if he left a note for her, just in case?
Link sighed. He hadn’t even figured out how to start the letter!
Okay, surely the princess must get letters from school kids and they probably wrote “Dear Princess Zelda” so it was probably fine. But… what after that? He wanted to know if she was okay and if she’d gotten out of the crystal, but it wasn’t very likely that she’d be able to answer him. Still, he’d ask just in case. He’d appreciate it if someone asked if he was okay because it showed that the person cared, right? Wait, maybe he needed to tell her that he was okay? Oh, and that he apparently wasn’t getting hungry so he wasn’t going to starve. And maybe that he wasn’t frozen? The fact that he wasn’t frozen in the still world was probably pretty interesting. That was interesting too, right? He’d never seen anyone else able to move except monsters.
Wait, did that mean he was more like a monster than a person? That was kind of creepy to think about. Maybe he wouldn’t tell her that. But he might want to ask Lueburry about what might make him different and hope that it wasn’t something monstrous. Maybe it was a side effect of the weapons that Lueburry had made for him?
Hm, really he could probably be sending a letter to Lueburry instead of the princess. But… he already had a whole notebook of stuff for Lueburry. And he wanted to write to the princess for some reason. If only he could figure out what to say. This didn’t seem like a very long letter so far. He wished he had more paper so he could try writing out some drafts, but he didn’t have an infinite amount left and he didn’t know how long he’d be stuck here, so he’d just try to keep it in his head.
What else would she want to know? Oh! Maybe she’d be interested in learning more about the still world? Maybe he should write her a guide? She would probably be curious after having watched the rift open right in front of her. And maybe she’d know stuff he didn’t know, since she’d been trapped? Most people tried to run from the rifts but she’d watched him fall with an intensity that he admired. Maybe she’d seen something that would change what they know about the still world if they worked together?
Link shook his head at himself. Working together with the princess was probably a fantasy. But… she’d been out doing something when she got nabbed. She was at least a little adventurous? Maybe they had that in common? It would be amazing if he got to sit down with her and go over notes about the rift together once he got out.
So yeah, a field guide to the still world. He could write that for Princess Zelda. Maybe he’d do a short letter first telling her he was alive, not starving, and able to move but stuck in the rift at the moment. And tell her that he hoped she’d gotten free and that he could find a way to get messages to her. He could drop it off the edge and maybe if he was lucky it would get to her? And if not he was only out one sheet of paper.
And once he was done that, he could start putting together everything she’d need to survive the rifts, just in case. He sliced another section of grass to use as bookmarks and started marking pages he thought would be most useful. He daydreamed a bit about the princess reading his words. This was going to take a while, but he suspected he was going to have a lot of time.