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It started as a quiet comfort. One that shouldn’t have been and shouldn’t be. She doesn’t know him. He doesn’t know her.
Yet—he does. He does know her.
The soul of the Hero knows her intimately.
So that might be why his eyes naturally find their way to her. That might be why he lingers within the castle grounds instead of heading back to Ordon. That comfort lingering in the space between them is coaxing after everything that’s happened—after going together to see Midna off.
As he stands within meetings playing the part of a guard he can’t help tuning out the nobles, and counsel men who speak with her. He can’t help allow his head to empty and find his way back to those moments on his journey where they made their way to each other.
The sad look in her eyes when she gazed upon him as a beast.
The gentle way she spoke with him that stirred him to keep her safe.
The feel of her hand as she placed it within his.
Her presence is the only thing keeping him grounded in this place he has no reason to be standing in. His role as the Hero of Twilight fulfilled. He is but a farm hand in truth. The flutter of his lashes come and with it understanding and recognition—how long will he be able to use this fulfilled role to linger by her side?
They’ve not had a single private conversation since he brought her back to the castle. He wonders if she notes his lingering. If she’s aware of how his eyes linger upon her. He wonders if she feels this same comfort and pull that keeps him from heading to his village. If he asked her would she tell him these comforts that shouldn’t be there but are present are things that she too feels?
—is this comfort he feels even truly his?
Or is this the Hero of Time’s dedication and feelings for their version of this woman?
He can feel it rising in his throat from deep within him. Startle. Panic. It’s thick in his throat and utterly beyond his own control as his eyes, wide and taken aback, slide from the floor and up to her. The ringing in his ears is loud. Deafening.
It takes everything in his being to not bolt from the room. It takes even more when those aquamarine notice and gaze back upon him. There’s no missing the slight up turn of her brows or the way her mouth parts just a small amount as if she might say his name—only to be ripped from him when a noble gets particularly loud.
It’s frustrating and vexing.
It bothers him more than it should because these feelings may not even be his.
He can only hope it’s not obvious when he leaves the minute the meeting is dismissed. He needs to go somewhere. Anywhere. Just not here. His feet carrying him far from her with heavy footsteps and a speed very obvious in their lack of casualness. He just needs to breathe to collect himself. To process these new questions. Are these feelings yet another thing that he doesn’t get a choice in? He wasn’t given a choice to be the Hero of Twilight. He was thrust into it and expected to fulfill it without complaint. The Goddess’s making it clear this was their expectation of him and that he would complete the mission they set out for him.
Had the Hero of Time been eager to play his role unlike him?
Had he already had a relationship with the Princess—No. she’s a Queen now.
Had he suffered and fought for her because that was what he had wanted or because that was what he was destined to do?
He hadn’t thought to ask such questions when he had stood before him. That look upon him though, skeletal or not, was unmissable at the mere mention of her name. That imposing figure of him softening. It was unquestionable, the Hero of Time felt things for her that went beyond simply dedication and loyalty.
There’s an uncomfortable ache within his chest at such a thought.
Her—but not his own.
His very own Zelda was not the one he had felt those things for.
She doesn’t know him. He doesn’t know her.
Yet, he already has begun to apply such terms of ‘his’, and ‘own’.
The soul of the Hero truly does know her so much more intimately than he does, and that pulls at him to change that. To know her so he can hold these thoughts at bay. These thoughts that he is just an imposter playing with another Hero’s heartfelt intentions.
He cannot look at her again today.
So he hides. He hides in the room she has given him while he stays here.
She does not come to check on him or ask why he had held such a look upon his face. So when he wakes up and he’s before her again going with her wherever she needs to be present he doesn’t look at her. He keeps his hands relaxed as he holds them behind him. He lets his mind go empty and tune out those around them.
—and he feels himself sinking further into uncertainty.
He should just go back to Ordon, and to simpler living.
This exhaustion he suddenly feels upon him would disappear if he wasn’t here. Those questions and uncertainty would never have painted themselves upon him had he not stayed after his role was fulfilled. His ears twitch just now catching the footsteps that pass him, and they move on to the next appointment she has.
Hours come and go and he doesn’t dare to look her in the eyes in fear of what new questions he’ll have. A day passes. Then two. By the third day that pull is heavy on him. It’s magnetic and he can’t stop himself as he stares her down as she speaks with someone. He’s sure this behavior from him is inappropriate by court rules, but he can’t stop himself—he’s drowning.
So what if he is letting himself be swept up in the Hero of Time’s longing for her?
Is it truly an issue if he allows the soul of the Hero to make yet another decision for him?
Would it truly be so bad?
It wasn’t the Hero of Time she had introduced herself to. It was him she had gazed upon with that sad look as sat imprisoned. It was him she had bowed before when asking for his strength. It was him who she had placed her hand upon. His palm remembers the warmth it had when she had done so. It’s him who saw the way her eyes had held such gentleness when she stepped closer to him.
It hadn’t been the Hero of Time.
It had been him, the Hero of Twilight.
She was not the Zelda the Hero of Time knew. She was the Zelda he knows here in this moment—and he wants to know more. He wants to know her beyond her crown. He wants to know what her childhood had looked like. He wants to know the fears she had as she sat hoping, and praying locked away. He wants to know how she felt when she took his hand, and as she held onto him close as they made their way back to her home. Had he felt as warm to her as she had to him? Does she want to know him too?
His tongue presses against the roof of his mouth as he takes a particularly rough swallow. He’s meant to be the symbol of courage, and yet he feels cowardly in this moment and can’t stop his eyes from darting to the floor. It takes him a second before he even realizes they’re standing within the garden. He had just followed her with such single-minded focus without even realizing their surroundings. The movement of her skirts has him locked in place. She’s turning to him slowly with a touch of uncertainty. His eyes can’t help but make their way up only to feel his breath catch in his throat. There’s the smallest of tilts to her head as she looks at him. Those eyes of hers make him question if he could drown in them. Her lips part ever so slightly and that’s all it takes for his cowardice to kick in—he cannot step the small step back his foot makes.
That face she’s making changes so fast and yet so paradoxically slow before him. Whatever question she had is gone and locked away. Those aquamarine eyes of hers flutter closed as if tossing a thought around only to open and look away from him choosing the grass instead.
Panic and anxiety.
It floods his system and has him before he can really think about what he’s doing. She’s just started to turn back away from him when he’s grabbed her wrist. He says nothing but inside he is screaming. He is yelling. The panic filling his lungs. The anxiety making him nauseated.
—but she says nothing.
and she continues to say nothing as he becomes emboldened by her silence.
His hand slides itself from her wrist to hold her hand, and they stand there. They stand there in silence as he just holds her hand softly. His thumb rubbing soothing circles over her fingers and brushing against her knuckles.
The world has gone so incredibly quiet in this moment. That warmth within her eyes is silencing the panic and washing away the anxiety. The slight tilt of his mouth is subconscious. This small moment in time between them—this is his and hers alone.
They never exchange a word, and that’s okay. There’s time for words later. Right now he just wants to embrace this quiet comfort. He can’t remember how it ends as he makes his way back to his room. He can’t remember who let go of who’s hand first. All he knows is that the way her face blossomed at him as he held her hand is one he hopes he’ll see again. If she’d gaze up at him like that once again he’d hold her hand as often as she desires.
In the following days he notes how often they glance at each other in every space. He notes how her hand brushes against his ever so slightly on her way out the door. He notes how she suddenly adds the garden to her routine right before he’s to be dismissed. They don’t hold hands again, but they talk softly between each other. She asks him questions about his village. She asks him what it’s like working on the farm. She asks him if he longs for that life again—and he hesitates to answer because in these moments that are just them he’s not sure if he does.
In return as the days come and go he asks his own. He asks about the smallest of things. Her favorite color and foods. He asks her about the bigger things. Was she scared when he came before her more beast than man? Does she ever wish she was not the holder of the Triforce of Wisdom? She answers them with consideration. She answers them with brief hesitation. She answers them all.
No matter the occasion nor the guest count his eyes find hers. They follow her. They monitor those that linger near her. They take note when someone gets too close, and it takes everything in him to not place himself between them. It takes just as much of himself not jump when she places her hand upon his arm in front of everyone. It’s the softest of touches. Gentle and affectionate. The red that tints his ears and dusts his cheeks comes against his will.
It just coaxes him further. To be more daring.
To be more courageous.
So when they’re alone in the garden he finally breaks free from how restrained he’s tried to be with each passing moment and day. He doesn’t hesitate when he should. His fingers hold her face softly as he leans forward—his lips hovering over hers.
He feels his being buzz as her own hands hold upon his arms. It’s a second of silence between them. Her throat moves with a swallow.
“Link.”
He’s rough and he’s demanding as his mouth comes upon her own at the sound of his name so intimately upon her lips. He wants so desperately to be softer. To be more gentle, and yet he cannot in this moment. Her grip upon his arms tighten and that’s enough to coax a groan from him as his head tilts and his tongue finds its way within her mouth.
She’s so soft. She’s so warm.
and he’s drowning in her.
One of his hands slides from her face down to the crook of her neck letting his thumb rub soothing circles against her skin. Her own have moved from his arms to his green tunic gripping it rough and harsh. That’s all it takes to make him take a step forward in hopes to consumer her. To devour her. To completely drown in her.
—but then his mind halts and he pulls from her because those thoughts of his he’s tried so hard to pretend don’t exist come crashing back.
They’re breathing heavily. Panting. Trying to regain whatever oxygen they can as the hold each other firmly in place. That panic. That anxiety. It’s back. He wants to run from her in this moment.
Breathless though she voices the one question he assumed she didn’t have, “What upset you that day?”
She doesn’t have to elaborate.
She doesn’t have to specify it.
They both know what she’s talking about.
He desperately wants the ground to swallow him whole here and now. He knows that when he tells her whatever her response is it will either give him the sweetest of releases or it will undoubtedly crush him. He cannot even tell if his breathing is now shallow from their kiss or if from the panic has erupted through his being.
“Is whatever this is—us? No. Is this me or something determined by those before us?”
The slip of her grip upon his tunic sends him spiraling internally and is further pushed as she comes impossibly closer, “We are undoubtedly intertwined and bound to one another. . .” his heart is dropping and suddenly there such a loud sound within his ears, “but you are you, and I am me. We cannot be them, and they cannot be us.”
There is no room for further question. She has said it so definitively. There is no room for him to even try and press this fear because he has stopped breathing. The weight of that uncertainty no longer pressing against him. The world has melted in this moment and it’s back to that silence that he had basked within the day he had been so bold as to hold her hand.
He was him, and she was her.
The soul of the Hero doesn’t knows her intimately.
He does.