Archive of Our Own ^beta

It was a beautiful day in Hyrule, a couple months after the fall of Calamity Ganon. Link and Zelda officially moved into their small house in Hateno Village a month or two prior. Things were going great for them. As of now, they were on a walk, picking apples and fruits for dinner later that night. Well, mostly Link. Zelda was excited to try out more photography and take some pictures of nature. But she still helped out quite a bit.

“Link! Look over there! There’s a restless cricket!” Zelda approached the rock to which a restless cricket sat upon. She crouched down to take a photo. It had been 100 years since she last got to be up close with nature. She was very fascinated with how much they’ve changed and evolved over time.

However, as she focused on the cricket, she didn’t realize the Black Moblin in the distance, rapidly approaching them. 

Link was quick to drop the basket of apples, the fruit tumbling to the ground. He drew the master sword with one hand while he ran over to Zelda and yanked her up. She was confused and a bit upset because the sudden movement had scared the cricket.

“Link, what-” Zelda quickly shut her mouth when Link put himself in between her and the moblin. She realized now what was going on and took a step back. She drew her bow and readied an arrow. Although Link wasn’t a huge fan over letting her fight, she managed to convince him to teach her how to shoot.

Two blue bokoblins suddenly appeared from the woods, seemingly to be with the Moblin. They started to surround the two, but Zelda quickly shot one of them in the head with a fire arrow, killing it. 

The Moblin raised its claymore and swung at Link. The 19 (well, technically 119) year old dodged and slashed his sword on the beast’s torso, however, he appeared to not have done much damage. The Moblin kept swinging, making Link’s movements turn sloppy as he started to run out of stamina. Eventually, he ran out, unable to move as he breathed heavily.

The Moblin took this opening to its advantage and picked Link up. Zelda unfortunately was preoccupied with the other Bokoblin that she didn’t notice. The Moblin held Link with a tight grasp, causing the young adult’s breathing to become strained. Suddenly, he threw Link into the air before using the blunt side of its claymore to blast him across the forest. 

“Link!” Zelda just killed the last bokoblin as she saw her knight yell in pain as he was thrown across the forest. Quickly, she readied an ancient arrow and shot the Moblin. The moblin’s body disappeared in the flash of the light orb. 

With the enemies now dealt with, Zelda ran towards Link and knelt down in front of him. She looked over his body and saw his left leg was askew and he was slightly holding his side. She lifted up his tunic, revealing a giant bruise on the side of his torso. Then she decided to check his leg. She barely touched his shin when he let out a pained yelp.

“Sorry, sorry! I’ll wait until we get home to check on it,” She assured him. He whimpered but nodded.

Carefully, Zelda helped him sit up before telling him to brace himself. Then she threw his arm over her shoulder and helped him stand on his other leg. He let out another small whimper. This was very concerning for Zelda. She had never seen her knight this vulnerable and weak other than when he died. A pang of guilt settled into her chest as was reminded of that time. She still blamed herself for what happened. 

Zelda pushed those bad memories down as she pulled out her sheikah slate. She sent Purah a quick message, telling her to come down to her and Link’s house. Although Purah specialized in engineering, she and Symon knew a little more about medical practices than she did.

It was a slow trek back to the house. They had to stop many times to let Link rest, despite his assurance that he would be alright. Zelda could tell how badly he was trying to tough it out, or that his adrenaline had finally kicked in.

When they stepped into Hateno, many villagers stared at them with concerned expressions. Link felt utterly humiliated. As the hero of Hyrule, he wasn’t supposed to show weakness like this. He hated the pity on the people’s faces as they watched him struggle to even limp without Zelda’s help.

Purah and Symon were waiting at the house with medical supplies. They helped Zelda carry Link into bed and got started on examining his wounds. Zelda gave them a run down of what his major injuries seemed to be and they got started. 

First, Zelda needed to take off his boot in order for Purah to get a closer look at his injury. That proved to be harder than she thought. She barely put her hands on the shoe before Link suddenly hissed in pain, trying to use his strength to move further away from her, but being unable to.

“You’re okay, Link, I just need to take off your boot,” Zelda told him. He reached down and grabbed her hand, squeezing it in pain. This made things more complicated. Link was actively searching for comfort, something he almost NEVER did, but Zelda couldn’t give him it, because she needed to help Purah.

“Why don’t you comfort him while I work on his leg?” Purah suggested. 

“Shouldn’t I be helping though?” She asked.

“You are, by keeping him calm and still,” She explained. 

“Well… alright,” Zelda moved over closer to Link’s head and held his hand.

While Purah pulled off his boot, Link yelped, biting his tongue as he thrashed in pain. Zelda held him and kept him still as she worked. She did the best she could to comfort him.

“You’re doing great, It’s alright, Link,” Zelda assured him. Link squeezed her hand tightly, hiding his face in her arms.

Purah worked quickly to wrap his ankle and shin in bandages before using a couple sticks to tie to his leg to keep it stable. While she worked on that, Symon fed Link a pain killer potion. Luckily, the potion worked almost instantly and the pain started to subside. 

When Purah had finished wrapping his leg, she propped it up on a pillow before tending to his ribs. She lifted his shirt up and gently felt the bruised area. He seemed to just have bruised them, maybe even fractured one or two ribs, but everything seemed to be fine. She rubbed an ointment on the skin before wrapping his ribs lightly in bandages.

As Link watched her, he couldn’t help but remember a time when he used to have these bandages wrapped around his chest on a daily basis. The barely visible scars underneath his pecs are a reminder that he no longer has to use those horrid bandages to keep his chest flat. But now he had them wrapped around just underneath his chest for a different reason.

Before long, the intensity died down and it was all calm. Purah had given Zelda instructions on how to care for Link’s injuries. Most of it required lots of bedrest which Zelda knew Link would not be a big fan of. He hated sitting around and doing nothing. But she figured she could somehow find a way to get him to stay in bed. 

Eventually, Purah and Symon left, leaving Zelda and Link in their house. Zelda sighed and scratched Link’s scalp. She looked at the makeshift cast on his leg and frowned. She felt like this was all her fault. It could’ve been prevented if she had been paying more attention to him. 

“I’m so sorry, Link,” She whispered, “This is all my fault”

“‘S not your fault…” Link mumbled quietly. As a mostly non-verbal individual, this was usually very big for him. He almost never talked. Zelda couldn’t imagine how much energy he must be using right now.

“I appreciate your kindness, but you got hurt because of me,” She countered. Link shook his head.

“Nu-unh. It was the Moblin’s fault,” Link said, before grimacing a little. The talking had caused quite a bit of pain to erupt from his ribs.

“Just…get some rest, okay? We can talk about this later,” Zelda told him, noticing the pained expression he made as he talked.

“Only if you admit ‘s not your fault,” Link said. The former princess sighed. She hated it when Link did this. He always cared so much about others. He really didn’t want her feeling guilty.

“Fine. It’s not my fault. Now get some rest. You need it,” Zelda leaned over and kissed his lips. He smiled and looked back up at her. She gave him a pitiful smile before standing up and walking downstairs to get started on supper.