Chapter Text
The statue stood tall over the spring.
It had begun to weather in places with age, and moss cloaked it wherever it could withstand the sun and rain. The size of the stone, along with the triplet waterfalls that crashed in tandem behind it, made the features carved in it impressive, even imposing. The full moon above the waterfalls cast the world in an ethereal hue.
The statue's stone eyes were closed. Of course. Just like those of any such statue—but it seemed stark, now, like a message she had pretended not to see.
Unseeing emptiness washed down relentlessly on her. Like the thorns that wreathed so many paths and rocky cliffs here in the wilderness, a briar vine seemed to wrap around inside her chest, caging her well-protected heart that was buried deep with thorns, yet numb to the pain.
The statue was unseeing, the spirits were unhearing, and she was unfeeling. Something was wrong—and far was it from her to believe that the fault lay in ancient forces that once spoke to so many.
That just left her.
Zelda tried not to tear up, tried not to let her voice grow thin and reedy. That went the same way that everything did these days, it seemed. She failed.
“Just, tell me, please,” she whispered, fists clenched in the cool water and eyes shut tightly. She wasn’t certain anymore if she was still speaking to the goddess, or to Link, or merely to herself—but her voice rose and grew more fragile all the same. “What’s wrong with me?!”
The waterfalls crashed the same as they had when she’d prayed. Now, they drowned out her hitching breaths, veiling her from the world in their mist.
Zelda clenched her jaw and ducked her head, tears finally leaking from behind scrunched eyelids and tracking down through the dampness that clung to her cheeks. Despite her best efforts, her shoulders shook once, and a pitiful sob escaped her.
Why, why? Why must she be doomed to receive no answer? Why must she endure pain and then shame as well, when she truly was doing all she knew how?
More tears slipped out, faster now on the trails of the first. Her shoulders shook again, and to her embarrassment, more sobs tumbled out, sorry and choked. The stones cast their shadows over her, deaf to her cries.
Absently, she thought she heard the noise of shuffling from back where Link stood guard.
There came an odd, soft splashing behind her, then the rippling of water in a way that washed her own waves into a churn.
A presence was beside her—and then she was only faintly aware that Link was there, standing so that his shoulder was only the smallest gap from hers.
For a moment, she wondered if it wasn't blasphemous for him to be in the spring too—but no, how could it be? Improprietous for him to be in the water when she was, maybe, but he was the goddess' chosen hero. If someone as disconnected from her as she was was permitted here, certainly Link was more than welcome by comparison.
Her breath hitched, then hiccupped. Her clenched hands shook in the water—though she only noticed because the water stirred and lapped back against her wrists.
Please, something deep enough in her to be her spirit begged. No one else—struggles as I do. Why? What's wrong with me?
The water was cool in Akkala's eternal autumn, and the night air was beginning to chill. Cold sweat clung to her arms and damp hair. The air beside her smelled of grass and cedarwood, and it was warm.
She numbly wound her forearm around Link's, grasping awkwardly at his wrist. She almost didn't register when she bowed her head and slumped her shoulder against his, leaning just slightly, then more heavily, desperate for any support at all.
Link didn't falter. He didn't move away from her. If he was surprised, he showed no sign of it.
Should she be ashamed of that too—that on top of every pressure he already bore, he was shouldering her burden as well?
When she glanced sideways at him through a blurry haze of night and tears, she could just faintly see his eyes closed, eyebrows creased together just slightly, face forward but downcast somehow, and his lips moving.
Was he praying? For her?
She didn't know if she could bear it if he were. Perhaps that was another immature notion, to not want intercession or others to mingle in her issues—but the thought stung deep. Was it that she was desperate to do this herself, to prove herself worthy on her own? Surely it wouldn't count if it was anyone's devotion but her own that pled for her.
Or was it the kindness of it that hurt so deeply?
“I just—“ she began in a whisper, though her voice curled and peeled and broke. “—want to understand.”
His shoulders shifted as he glanced at her, as if he were drawing a deep breath to speak. His lips parted again, but nothing came out but a hoarse breath, and she looked away.
She could feel him looking at her, searching for her gaze.
She was juvenile. No wonder the spirits wouldn't speak to her. She kept her head down and eyes closed, finding it easier than looking at him to see what he was trying to say with his eyes.
Link's arm twisted beside her, and his hand found hers.
His fingers laced with hers with more ease than seemed thinkable; a gentleness to their touch that she couldn't fully comprehend. Even through his leather bracers, everywhere her forearm touched his felt warm. Their fingertips mingling together seemed almost electric.
Perhaps it was mostly the distraction, the fact that he was holding her hand, so gently, and though her face had been hot with tears, her ears too were now warm—but some of the thorns in her chest slipped out without pain. The current ebbed around them, like cool balm to her throbbing heart.
They stood that way, hand in hand in the cold water of the spring, for a long while.