Chapter Text
It began with what they eventually called the gloom.
The priorities of the current excavations of the castle were about recovering lost knowledge, artifacts, and materials rather than any sense of restoration, although Zelda had hopes for the future. But now, this strange substance, seeping out from different, seemingly random areas around the castle’s foundations, has made more than a few of their hard-working volunteers fall ill.
And that wouldn’t do at all.
Zelda put out orders that no one was to go near the castle until further notice and called for a meeting - which meant that she, Link, and Purah met at the ruins of the sacred grounds, where, over a hundred years ago, she had officially and solemnly appointed Link as a Champion. Surrounding them were a motley assortment of tents, with various Hylians that had volunteered to help excavate the castle wandering around. In her periphery, she could see the skeleton of what Purah called a skyview tower, one of fifteen that were being established around the kingdom.
Link had been brave enough to get close to the oozing, vile substance and collect a sample before Zelda even considered asking, and it was this he now held. The vivid pink hue interspersed between the blackness of the gloom set Zelda on edge, reminding her of the nightmares that still plagued her from time to time, particularly when she was feeling strained and anxious.
“Sunlight appears to be the best medicine for anyone that gets sick,” Purah said, taking the vial from Link to examine its contents more closely through her eyepiece. “But it is leaking out in greater volume, so to speak.”
Leaking out not only from foundations of the castle, but from the passage that had suddenly revealed itself. The passage underneath the castle that Zelda herself had never known existed.
No one must ever venture beneath the castle, her father had told her when she had asked as a child. Not even one of us. To speak of the matter was forbidden, much less exploring down there.
And yet it was the only next step that could be considered.
“If we are to stop this for good,” she said, “we must find it at its source.”
“I’m sure we can get some volunteers,” Purah offered. “Or perhaps the some of the Zonai Survey Team-”
“No,” Zelda said quickly. “We do not want to risk so many people when all we currently know about it is the damage it can cause. Not to mention that we have no means of treating the sickness if we are underground. No, we must keep this to as few people as possible.”
She met Link’s gaze, and she could tell from the set of his jaw that he already knew what she was thinking.
“Oh, no, not just you two!” Purah protested immediately as she clocked their silent exchange. “Princess, you can hand-pick whatever team goes down there. And - and Link, you can go with them, but both of you?”
Zelda held up her hand to forestall further protests. “I am the one who can best navigate the castle at its foundations, and Link is more than capable of protecting me.”
Purah turned her pleading look at Link. “Linky, help me out here!”
In her periphery, Zelda saw Link shrug in response, which was about what she had expected. Even if he thought differently, Link never disagreed with her in front of others, a show of unity that had withstood a hundred years.
“You have my word, Purah,” she promised, “that we will only observe, and we will return with notes so that we can decide on next steps. And should we encounter it in greater volume that it prevents us from moving forward, we will return promptly. Does that help?”
Purah pouted. “Not particularly. I don’t like the idea of you guys down there all alone, especially without any real plan to reach you if things go wrong.”
Zelda looked around at the campground, mulling over an idea that she had been forming in the back of her mind for some time. “You know, there was an escape tunnel from the castle for the royal family.” She tapped her foot on the stone and said, “This is where it’s supposed to let out.”
She looked at Purah. “I have been thinking that it is past time that we establish some sort of outpost in central Hyrule. If we do so here, we can observe the gloom from a safe distance, and the tunnel would allow entrance into the castle. It might even make it easier on the excavation efforts.” She gestured at what would be the tower. “And your tower would be right here too.”
She raised her eyebrows at Purah pleadingly. “Would that help more?”
Purah groaned, loud and long. “Not really. But I know when I’m beat.”
Another thought occurred to Zelda as her eyes found the gloom on the table once more. “It would be prudent, I think,” she said, catching Link’s eye, “to bring the Master Sword along with us on this expedition.”
Link nodded, unsurprised; she imagined that the thought had likely already occurred to him. “If we leave now, we can make it to Woodland Stable by sundown,” he said.
“Then it’s settled,” Zelda finished. “Link and I will go now and retrieve the Master Sword. Purah, you begin designs for the outpost. When we return, we will descend under the castle’s foundations and find the source of this gloom.” She stood up straighter and nodded at Link. “Prepare the supplies, and I’ll prepare the horses.”
She heard Purah grumbling as they left, but generously elected to ignore it.
Zelda’s white stallion, hitched to a post near her tent, greeted her loudly when she approached, and she surreptitiously fed him an apple before preparing him for the journey ahead. He was a feisty creature, but he always behaved for her and Link, who had been the one to tame him and present him as a gift to Zelda five years ago.
“I remembered your old horse,” he said cautiously, grasping the reins of the handsome horse with white knuckles. “Supposedly this one’s descended from him, so I thought you might like him.”
“He’s beautiful,” Zelda replied, taking the reins and stroking the nose of the horse, who nosed at her hair in interest. She had missed the freedom that came with riding her horse. “Where did you find him?”
“Sanidan Park?”
“Ah, yes. Did you know that the royal family’s white horses supposedly came from there?” She giggled as the horse nudged her insistently. “I’m not surprised.”
“We used to go there too, didn’t we?”
At the hesitant tone in his voice, Zelda turned and looked at Link, who suddenly looked apprehensive. She nodded, an unconscious realization washing over her, and said reassuringly, “We did. You helped me improve my horsemanship. I always cherished it.”
Link grinned happily - a rare sight over a hundred years ago.
Zelda promised herself that she would endeavor to see it, and hopefully cause it, as much as possible in this new life.
By the time Link was ready, Zelda had prepared both her own horse and Link’s brown mare, a more gentle creature that was deceptively fast. He threw the saddlebag with their supplies over his mount before handing Zelda her cloak. She fastened it over her shoulders while he fastened the bags, and soon they were mounted and riding away from the campground as the sun began its descent into the sky.
As they rode, they passed various supply stations. “People must be using the materials,” she said happily as she observed the lack of supplies at certain stations. “Hudson Construction has truly been a more than valuable ally in the rebuilding efforts.”
She turned pointedly to Link. “And we all have you to thank for that, Link.”
Link’s smile was small and bashful. “You would have done it if I didn’t.”
“But I wasn’t there to do it. You were.”
It was an old and private argument that had been circulating between them for some years now and was unlikely to be resolved any time soon.
The sun had just breached the horizon when they arrived at the stable. They were greeted warmly by the stablehands, who took their horses away to be housed for the night. Zelda set about procuring their beds while Link prepared dinner.
By the time she returned, Link was sitting beside the communal cooking pot, stirring something intently. Zelda sat down next to him, settling her notes on the gloom in her lap and gazing into the pot. “Tomato stew?”
Link nodded. “And I added those truffles you like.”
“Oh, thank you.”
They sat in comfortable silence - she reviewed her notes and Link finished the stew, occasionally taking sips of the broth before tossing in various herbs and spices until it tasted to his satisfaction. By the time he was done, the savory aroma was turning more than a few heads around them. He ladled out a bowl for her first, and then he offered one to anyone nearby. The pot was nearly empty, and Zelda was nearly finished, when he finally served himself.
“What’re you thinking?” he asked before spooning some into his mouth.
“I’m wondering,” she said, flipping back through her notes, “if the gloom may be a residual effect of Calamity Ganon. The resemblance to his power is too uncanny.” She tapped her pencil against her chin. “But that begs the question of why it would emerge now, and why we haven’t seen it earlier, even during the Calamity.”
Link hummed around his mouthful of stew.
“Questions that will be answered eventually, I hope.” Zelda sighed and closed her notebook. “Thank you for the stew - I quite enjoyed the truffles.”
“Mm, me too,” he mumbled, and Zelda had to smile at how pleased he looked with himself.
As Link finished his stew, Zelda sat back and basked in the warm evening air. Around them, the stable was quieting down for the night - just as the goats were herded into their pen, the children were herded yawning into the stable. It was an enduring comfort to her to see the people of Hyrule living their lives in peace and comfort. It had been heartening to see that the Stable Association, established before the Calamity, had managed to prosper in the hundred years that she had been gone. There is more to protecting our people, her father had said, than simply fighting.
The moon rose into the sky, and Zelda could see little stars twinkling down. As a sight she thought she might never see again, she cherished it every time.
When Link had slurped down the rest of his stew - he never wasted food - she stood and stretched. “Come on, let’s go to bed. The sooner we’re back to the castle, the sooner we can find what’s causing the gloom.”
“The sooner you can answer your questions, you mean,” Link said wryly as he stood and followed her.
“Yes, that too.”
“It’s the Princess! And Mister Hero!”
Zelda could not keep the smile from her face as she and Link emerged from the damp cold of the forest into the home of Koroks. Several of the cheerful creatures were already moving to greet them, trotting up on little legs or floating down from the surrounding verdure. Here, the air seemed fresher, almost revitalizing.
Ahead of them, she could see the gleam of the Master Sword, gleaming in its humble pedestal. Towering above the clearing, the Great Deku Tree shifted in awareness at their presence, blinking heavily. “Ah, it is good to see you, Princess Zelda of Hyrule,” he greeted, his voice rolling across the clearing like summer sunlight, intense and warm and welcoming. “And Link, Keeper of the Master Sword - your blade has been fully restored. Go on then, Link. Draw it once more.”
Link stepped up the pedestal. He had told Zelda of the first time he had come here after a hundred years, of how trying to pull the sword had nearly killed him, of how that new failure had nearly broken the burgeoning resolve that had carried him forward until then.
But now, there was no hesitation or doubt in his step. Somehow both relaxed and respectful, he grasped the hilt of the Master Sword in one hand and pulled it up from the ground with a gentle shink.
“Great Deku Tree,” she said formally, “thank you so much.”
The tree laughed heartily. “There is no need for thanks - I merely watched over its renewal.”
Zelda watched as Link weighed the sword in his hand, and she could almost see the familiarity and the relief in his stance. “It is amazing that a sword can heal itself,” she said, “no matter how badly damaged it becomes.”
“It can do more than heal,” the tree added. “If bathed in sacred power, the sword will continue to gain strength. The stronger that power, the more powerful the sword becomes.” Although his gaze was hard to follow, Zelda thought that, like her and Link, the tree was gazing at the sword. “The potential of this fabled blade may well be limitless. Truly the work of a goddess.”
“A sword that grows ever stronger,” Zelda murmured to herself, watching Link, who seemed to accept this new knowledge with a sense of pride as he slid the sword into its sheath on his back. “It is extraordinary.”
She raised her voice so that the tree could hear her. “I thank you anyway, for watching over it. I hope we do not need its strength, but I trust that it will not fail us if we do.”
“May the Goddess smile upon you both, wherever you may go,” the tree bid them in farewell, and Link followed Zelda as she turned and led them away from the forest, both of them smiling and waving at the many Koroks that shouted buh-bye!
May the Goddess smile upon you. As common as it was across the kingdom, Zelda herself never used that particular blessing. It had left a bitter taste in her mouth for over a hundred years, as she couldn’t help but wonder if the Goddess had been smiling down on them as Calamity Ganon had ravaged the kingdom.
While most others found peace and comfort in Hylia, she was not one of them.
“Zelda,” Link said, twitching her elbow, and Zelda realized that he had been saying her name for some time.
She blinked and turned back to him. “Sorry, I was just…” She shook her head. “How is the sword? How does it feel?”
Link raised his eyebrows but didn’t press her on the issue. “It feels right. I know it’s so much older than me,” he smiled as he admitted, “but it always felt like my sword. It feels strange when I don’t have it. Like a piece of me is missing.”
“Well, it is your sword,” Zelda said pointedly, but not unkindly. “You are the hero. It was meant for you.”
The Zelda of over a hundred years ago would have spent the rest of the day in a haze of bitterness and shame at such a fact.
But Link smiled and Zelda knew it was his way of thanking her, and she felt nothing but pride.
They returned to the campground in the late afternoon, where a surprising amount of progress had already been made. Or, given Purah’s one-track mind, perhaps it was not that surprising. A perimeter for what appeared to be a comfortable fort had been established, and logs were already being carted in to serve as the wall.
Purah was in her element, supervising and directing workers on where materials needed to go. “Ah, you’re back!” she exclaimed when she saw them. “How was it?”
Link twitched his head at the sword in response. “Splendid,” Zelda replied. “And things here appear to be progressing smoothly.”
Purah looked around, pleased. “I’d say so. Wanna help?”
“Actually, we mean to head to the castle now.”
There was a moment of silence, and then, Purah groaned “...now?! Princess, please give it a moment. A long moment. Maybe several long moments?”
Zelda dismounted her horse. “Purah, I do not want to wait while this gloom accumulates. Link and I are ready now. The outpost is being established. I see no reason to wait any more.”
It was clear from Purah’s expression, as she followed Zelda in hitching her horse, that she did, but this was not the first time she had lost an argument to Zelda, and it would likely not be the last. “Just, be careful, will you?” she asked. “I mean it. I don’t have a good feeling about this.”
“I understand. But we are the possible options for this. And I said that we would only observe.”
“Yes, you did say that, but what you say you’ll do and what you end up doing are sometimes two different things,” Purah said pointedly. “I know you’re curious, but I need you to be more cautious than curious right now.”
“Understood, Purah,” Zelda said, a little tightly as she retrieved her belongings from her horse.
The slight strain in her voice must have been audible, because Purah leaned over where Zelda was repacking her satchel and caught her eye. “Hey, c’mon. I’m lookin’ out for you, huh? Cut me some slack.”
Whatever irritation Zelda felt at the comment melted away, and she smiled at one of her oldest friends. “I know. I will do my best. Besides, I’m sure Link will keep me on track if I begin to stray.”
Purah snorted. “I don’t think Link has ever refused you anything, ever. Oh, and I was thinking, as long as you’re observing,” and she passed Zelda a small tablet, “you should take this with you.”
“You finished it?” Zelda said brightly, looking the device over and weighing it in her hands. “Oh, it reminds me of my Sheikah Slate.”
“Ah ah ah, this is a Purah Pad. Much better. And cooler, if I do say so myself. Here, let me show you how the camera works.”
“Please do.”
When both Zelda and Purah had finished - later than Zelda had planned, but the Purah Pad was just so interesting - Link was already waiting for her, the Master Sword still fastened to his back. “It may be some time,” Zelda warned Purah as she adjusted her satchel. “But we’ll try to be back within three days.”
Purah raised her eyebrows. “You think it’s that deep?”
“To be honest, I’m not quite sure what to think. There is something underneath the castle, but to speak of it was forbidden even among the royal family.” Zelda sighed before catching Link’s eye. He nodded encouragingly at her, and the sight reassured her. “But I have faith that we will be alright.”
Purah waved them off, and they began the trek up to Hyrule Castle.
The passage had been bricked up in a nondescript hallway, and had been uncovered a few days prior, and from this passage in particular, gloom flowed out like the mouth of a river - a sluggish, polluted river, that is. Zelda wondered how many times she had wandered past it with no knowledge of what lay behind.
Link approached it first, stepping carefully onto the untainted floor. “Only step where it isn’t,” he said firmly. “If there isn’t a clear, sturdy path, don’t go at all.”
“Understood,” Zelda said, as her torch breathed in life and breathed out light around them. “Are you ready?”
He nodded and delved into the passage, Zelda following close behind.
By the time they discovered the ruins, they had been descending for hours.
Their surroundings moved between ancient Hyrulean architecture and rocky caves, lit only by the bioluminescent flora that seemed to thrive in this climate. Gloom drifted about them, and patches of it pulsed along the ground and walls. They had paused a few times to nibble on rations and rest, but never for very long.
At this point, Zelda’s main observation about the gloom was its ability to change its form of matter - here it was a gaseous mist rather than the slimy substance that was plaguing the castle grounds. She was wondering whether there were certain circumstances in the environment that triggered such a shift when she noticed a structure that emerged from the darkness.
Structures that were distinctly not Hylian, but, at the same time, not unfamiliar to Zelda - a structure that ushered them into a narrow hallway.
“These carvings,” she murmured as she waved the torch around, dragging the light across every detail, “I’m sure they’re Zonai in origin.”
Link hummed, having been on the receiving end of many such bursts of information before. “You think so?”
She nodded, dropping to her knees to observe an inscription. “I’ve seen designs like these in my studies. The Zonai are said to have lived long ago, in the time of earliest legend. They possessed godlike powers, and had a prosperous civilization in the sky. Many history books tell us about the Zonai, but none gives us the full picture.” She grumbled to herself as she looked over the hieroglyphics. “I wish I had a translation guide with me.”
“Next time,” Link promised, looking ahead to where a pair of tall statues flanked an archway.
Zelda followed in his wake, gazing up at the strangely-proportioned statue. “Is this what the Zonai looked like? They seem so different from us.”
“Big ears,” Link murmured.
Zelda felt her brow furrow in confusion as they continued. “How did the ruins from a civilization in the sky end up here beneath the castle?”
“Maybe it fell a long-” Link’s head snapped up, clearly listening for something. Zelda stopped dead as he pulled the Master Sword from its sheath, and she only noticed now how it glowed and hummed with power.
He gestured at her to stay put as he stepped into the next room, and Zelda heard the telltale squeak of keese that must have been roosting in the ceiling, before she heard the song of the Master Sword as Link swung it and dispatched them cleanly.
“All clear,” he called a moment later.
Zelda stepped into the room. “The Master Sword,” she said, watching as Link slid it back into its sheath, where she could still see it faintly glowing. “I knew we had reason for concern.” She paused. “You’re not hurt, are you?”
Link smiled. “Takes more than keese to do that nowadays.”
She rolled her eyes affectionately before taking a moment to take in the room, which was wide and semicircular. Her attention was immediately caught on a series of murals that adorned the back wall.
“Look at these,” she murmured, moving closer as she thought back to countless lessons and readings. “The written histories of the royal family include stories of a great war long ago. It was a conflict between allied tribes and someone only ever referred to as the Demon King.”
“You think these are supposed to be the same story?” Link asked, staying a bit behind her as if he knew what she would do next.
Indeed, Zelda moved quickly from one mural to the next, her thoughts coming together like puzzle pieces even as Link’s question was ignored. “This is similar to the statues we saw earlier - a Zonai. And these figures look like Hylians!” Excitement crept into her tone. “This certainly suggests that the Zonai descended from the heavens.”
The next mural stopped her breathless for a moment, the depiction of a Zonai and a Hylian together in equal harmony. “It is said that my ancestors - the first of Hyrule’s royal family,” she said aloud, “were born from a union with gods who had descended from the heavens.”
She stopped for a moment to consider. “If these murals are accurate, then the gods mentioned were the Zonai. They must have forged a relationship with the Hylians of that time, working together to establish the kingdom of Hyrule!”
The implications were nothing less than astounding, and a part of Zelda felt vindicated in her investment into the Zonai Survey Team. The history of the Zonai was the history of Hyrule itself!
Zelda’s smile was wide enough to hurt her face until she turned her attention to the next mural, one that radiated menace. “This figure - he seems to be stealing something of incredible power. This all aligns with what I’ve read in my studies.” She shivered as she took in the struggling body of the Hylian woman from the previous mural.
She moved along, sensing Link moving along with her. “And then this - if the creature depicted really does represent the Demon King, and the battle against him, then…”
The feeling was building up inside her, the pride and joy of discovery and understanding. “Incredible! This mural must be the great war recorded in the royal histories!”
Zelda stepped back to take in the murals as a whole. “This is the Imprisoning War, and the events that led up to it!”
Her feelings of elation overflowed and she did the next thing she could think of.
She whirled around and cried, “Link, this is a huge discovery!”
Link was grinning as she continued. “These murals support so much of what histories have written about - oh.” She paused, taking in the end of the room, where a rockslide obscured the remaining murals.
She narrowed her eyes, wondering if they might be able to remove some of the wreckage when Link took the torch from her. “Next time, remember?” he said somewhat pointedly.
“Yes, next time,” she nodded determinedly as she pulled out the Purah Pad. “In the meantime, I’ll record these for further study.”
Clicks filled the room as Zelda took pictures of the murals, Link waiting patiently. “How did this area come to be so forgotten?” she wondered aloud. “Why was our history left hidden here? Did the royal family in those ancient times want this place and these murals to remain secret and out of sight?”
She thought of her father, a bittersweet exercise. They had only ever had one conversation about the depths of the castle, in which he had only warned her of its prohibition. She liked to think that her mother would have known more, but maybe not - no one in the royal family had ever had any reason, it seemed, to wonder about what might lay underneath the castle.
Until now.
Her task finished, Zelda lowered the Purah Pad. “I can’t shake the feeling that I'm missing something here,” she admitted to Link as she put the pad away.
“You’ll figure it out,” he said easily, giving her the torch.
“It’s just…” She shook her head as they moved away from the murals. “Why would anyone want to keep this whole area a secret? It can’t be because of what’s shown in those murals.”
She turned to Link. “Could it?”
He pursed his lips, unable to answer this question confidently, and they both looked toward the singular exit that remained in the room, which seemed to stare back at them.
Link shifted beside her. “Only one way to find out. Unless we want to turn back now.”
Purah’s many warnings rose unbidden into Zelda’s mind, and she sighed. “As exciting as this is,” and she gestured at the murals, “it only raises more questions. And we still haven’t discovered the source of the gloom.”
She turned towards the exit. “So no, no turning back yet. I only hope,” she said, “we’ll find more answers farther below.”
Link stepped ahead of her, taking the lead as they left the murals behind to reach the longest singular set of stairs they had encountered so far.
The climb down seemed to stretch into an eternity, and the air seemed to grow heavy and stale around them. Zelda wondered how far down they must be now, finally feeling the weight of the earth above pressing down on them. The tunnel of stairs seemed to grow narrower and narrower, and soon it was all she could do to keep her eyes on the suppressed glow of the Master Sword at Link’s back to reassure herself.
She was beginning to doubt whether or not they shouldn’t turn back, but eventually the stairs evened out, and Link was inching his way into the next room. Zelda heard him breathe in, sharp and quick, and hold it at whatever he saw there.
She moved to join him, but he thrust his arm out, telling her to wait. After a long moment, he gestured her forward, but turned and put his finger to his lips, his face drawn in concentration and apprehension.
Zelda did not like that look.
Still, she crept down and joined him at what seemed to be a ledge that looked out over an enormous cavern.
She felt her breath stop at the sight they beheld, and she suddenly understood the look on Link’s face. “What is this place?” she whispered, afraid to disturb the stale air.
A thick ribbon of light lazily spiraled down from a ceiling that Zelda could not see in the darkness, interspersed with various hieroglyphics that she could not identify. The light shifted between deep green and vibrant blue before settling on a burning white where it ended in the middle of the cavern, where Zelda could faintly make out the silhouette of something stiff and motionless on a circular dais, surrounded by gloom.
This was it. This had to be it.
And yet, she could discern no possible solution to the gloom without further investigation, no reason for its behavior, no explanation for why all of this was beneath the castle hidden behind Zonai ruins. She surveyed the room for anything else notable, and found nothing. Climbing on the dais would be out of the question, but perhaps they could still get close enough for observation.
And then they would turn back.
Zelda turned to Link. “We must be extremely careful,” she whispered.
She could see the apprehension written clearly across his face, and his jaw worked as if he wanted to argue. But he swallowed it down and nodded in assent before moving forward.
As silently as they could manage, they crept down from the ledge and closer to the dais. The gloom still did nothing to arrest their path, but every step felt as heavy as it was deliberate. As they approached, Zelda felt her breath catch in her throat at the horrific nature of the figures on the dais.
It was a man, or what was left of a man. He had clearly been large in life, and even in death, his stature was intimidating. His skin was dried and warped, stretching grotesquely over his body, from which gloom drifted. Long red hair hung limply from his head. His garments were familiar, somehow, but at that moment Zelda could not place exactly what they reminded her of. His skeletal expressions was twisted in anger and agony, and his eyeless gaze was fixed on…
…on an arm.
A singular clawed arm stretched down from nothing, holding the man in place. The white light from above flowed into where its elbow would be. It glowed with greenish-white light, and Zelda could see ornamentation still closed around it.
Her mind churned with possibilities and explanations. This man, or his remains, was the source of the gloom! But how? And the arm - whose arm was it? And what, and how, was it doing whatever it was doing?
She unconsciously stepped closer and the arm shuddered. Zelda’s thoughts came to an abrupt stop as it shivered, its pale glow receding into itself, and fell to the ground with a dead thud that seemed to fill the previously silent space.
A small shining stone that Zelda had not noticed fell away from its ornamentation, hitting the ground with a ringing sound that seemed to echo as it rolled across the ground to lay at her feet.
She crouched down to look at it and, sensing no malice emanating from it, plucked it from the ground. It was strangely warm, and it seemed to grow warmer in her hand as she turned it over, glowing with a familiar golden light.
For a long moment, she could feel the warmth spread through her, like a calm shaft of sunlight deep in the darkness. There was power in this stone, a familiar and sacred power-
And then there was a pulse - a wave of force that pushed through the cavern like an ancient heartbeat. Zelda felt it move through her and push her back and she looked up to where the corpse still hung on the dais.
The corpse that was now crackling as it moved.
Zelda felt her heart skip a beat, and she knew, deeply and instantly, that this had all been a mistake.
The corpse rose at the waist as if it were trying to stand up, its body creaking and snapping as joints and muscles that hadn’t moved for who knows how long finally roused from their stiffness. After several long moments, it fell backward as if its spine had been broken.
Whatever it was trying to do, perhaps it had failed. Zelda allowed herself a moment of hope.
And then its head turned to stare directly at them, with new eyes that glowed with ember-like hatred, and her hope died away.
The gloom that had been flowing slowly from the corpse’s body now exploded in release, churning upward like a fountain of malice. What had been a passive sludge on the surface now twisted and writhed as if it had its own limbs - limbs that were now bearing down on her. Zelda did not even have a moment to flinch backward before they were upon her.
In her gasp between seconds, Link had appeared between her and the gloom, the Master Sword outstretched before him. The gloom was repelled, but only for a moment before it swarmed up the sword, as fast as rushing water, and grasped and pulled at Link’s arm.
Zelda considered herself to be very good at reading Link, who, even in their new life together, still tended to mask his emotions to a certain degree. Maybe it was
So when his face contorted, and he winced as he attempted to pull away from the gloom, she knew that he was in deep pain. She had not felt the effects of the gloom herself, but those she had spoken to described it as a burning feeling, one that drove through your skin and into your bones and pulled your life away from you.
This was so much worse than anything else she had seen.
When the gloom finally retreated, the devastation of Link’s arm made Zelda nauseous. The fabric of his sleeve had been burned away, and the skin was burnt black, crackling with malice, almost all the way up to his shoulder, which he was holding in pain - Zelda had no idea how he managed to hang on to the sword, which, to her rapidly growing horror, had not escaped damage either. Like Link’s arm, gloom seemed to have seeped into the blade itself, and its foul coating dulled the sword’s natural shine.
In less than a minute - in less than half of a minute - everything had gone horribly wrong.
The gloom reared back again, like a serpent ready to bite, and Link grimaced and braced himself, raised the sword to strike as it whipped at them again and Link swung and-
The sword shattered.
Glowing shards exploded around the gloom like little pieces of stars. Zelda watched as what had been the tip of the sword flew forward as if it still carried its purpose, and sliced the face of the corpse, its torn skin sizzling and bubbling with malice.
Link only had eyes for the corpse, but Zelda only had eyes for Link. Agony and turmoil twisted his face in a way that made her heart ache.
“That was the sword that seals the darkness?”
The new voice, raspy and cruel, arose before them, and Zelda’s eyes widened to see the jaw of the corpse working to grin mockingly at Link. “To know that this was how that fragile blade was broken gives me no small amount of pleasure, Link.”
Link made a sound of disbelief.
“And you must be Zelda, the Princess of Hyrule,” the corpse continued condescendingly, as the cavern around them seemed to groan to life just as he did. The ground and walls began to shudder.
In spite of the heavy warmth of the gloom surrounding them, Zelda felt a chill cut her to her core. He knew them, but they did not know him.
“Rauru placed his faith in you,” the corpse taunted as he rose upward, fingers flexing as he gathered gloom to his body, “and that was all you could do?”
The name was familiar to Zelda, but she could only manage, in weak disbelief, “How do you know our names?”
The corpse did not grace her with a response, and Zelda watched as he channeled the gloom in his hands, the force building and growing, until he thrust his hands upwards and the gloom rushed like an unholy fountain towards the ceiling of the cavern. Zelda had never actually seen Death Mountain erupt, but she imagined that it would look something like this. The cavern shook with force, rocks and pebbles sliding and scattering around them, and she and Link both adjusted their footing to avoid falling to the ground.
The force of the gloom collapsed the dais, and the corpse, surrounded by broken pieces of rock, fell calmly into an endless darkness.
A darkness that would swallow them up if they didn’t get out.
Link staggered, falling to one knee as the effort of holding up the damaged sword became too much for his injured arm. Zelda looked frantically around the cavern to see if their exit had been buried under the falling rubble.
“Zelda!” It was only by the startled gasp that Link let out that she turned to look back at him, and saw him sliding away under the crumbling floor. Whatever plan she had been forming about their escape fled in a panic as she dropped the torch and leaped forward to grab him. Link had leapt at the same time, and she grasped his good hand, the one not still clinging to the grip of the Master Sword. But his leap was not enough to clear the edge, and his weight dragged her forwards until she slammed into the ground, and he was swinging over the edge of the abyss.
She hadn’t realized it before, but she was still clinging to the stone that had fallen from the arm before everything had gone so wrong. Now it was pressed between their hands, growing warm, as she used all of her weight to keep him from falling and her from following him.
Link’s face was set in a grimace of pain and determination as he tried to raise himself up on his one good arm. But it was clear that the gloom had ravaged more than just his arm.
The only thought in her head, the first clear thought since all of this had happened, was, I must save him.
“Zelda,” he mumbled hoarsely as Zelda pulled back as hard as she could, their hands growing warm with the strain, “you have to go.”
“What? No!” she shouted. He had saved her countless times, and she had already lost him once. She could - no, she had to save him now, when it mattered most. “No, we are getting out of here together!”
As she spoke, she realized that the heat between their hands was not coming from them, but from the stone, which was now glowing brightly with golden light, swirled with blue and green, as they held a fragment of the sky. For an impossible moment, as the glow encompassed them, everything seemed to still, and anything seemed possible. Zelda felt a strange feeling grow through her, one that was both somewhat familiar and strangely new.
I will save him, she thought, leaning into the feeling as Link looked frantically between her and the stone, his face twisted with fear and wonder. It was the last thing she saw before his face was drowned out by the light, and Zelda had to close her own to avoid being blinded.
Then the floor began to crumble away beneath Zelda, glittering shards of the Master Sword falling all around, and she felt her stomach drop as she and Link both dropped. She only had a single sickening moment to realize that they were falling, before someone gripped her wrist.
The force of her sudden suspension in the air ripped Link’s hand from her own, and with it, the stone. Zelda screamed, “No!” as, surrounded by the multicolored glow, Link, still holding the Master Sword, fell away from her into the darkness, looking at her in desperation before the light drowned him out.
Then, in a rush of rich blue and green and gold, as if a strange wind had emerged from nowhere, the light seemed to funnel into itself and was gone - and Link with it.
Staring into the emptiness where Link had been, as the cavern collapsed around her, Zelda did not look to see who had grabbed her before they pulled her up and into another darkness.