who by fire [ch 3]
Title: Who By Fire (Ch3 - "Luck")
Characters: Ghirahim, Link, Impa, others
Rating: PG
Summary: Because wishes and hopes don't get you very far.
A/N: AU exploring the idea of Zelda being captured, too late for Link to save her - of Zelda, facing Ghirahim herself.
Previous chapter.
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“Good luck has its storms. “ - George Lucas.
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The pot shatters against the wall, shards of it scattering across the floor.
Groose huffs, staring at the broken pottery at his feet, face flushed.
Gritting his teeth, he turns to his punching bag. A drawing of Link is secured to it, smiling goofily at him. Groose pulls his hand into a tight fist. Yelling, he punches the bag until his knuckles ache.
The bag swings helplessly. The drawing is still smiling.
With a mighty grunt, Groose sends his fist into the punching bag, then again, and again, until his arms are burning and his head aches with exertion. He could punch holes through every wall in Skyloft and not be satiated.
Panting, he plops heavily onto his bed, glaring at the still swinging punching bag.
“I hate this,” he grouses, slamming his fists onto his thighs, “I can't stand the thought of poor Zelda, all alone down there, while we're up here relying on that wimp to save her.”
He props his chin up in one broad palm, mouth drawn in a tight line. He thinks of her pretty smile and long golden hair, the way she laughs in the sunlight. He doesn't understand what she sees in someone like Link, lazy, scrawny Link, when he, Groose, can do so much more for her.
Groose sighs dejectedly.
His eyes wander to the framed Loftwing feather hung on his wall, one Zelda's own bird had shed shortly before her disappearance. The blue reminds him of her eyes.
Groose stares at it, brows furrowing with concentration.
“That's it!” He bellows, springing to his feet. Smiling, he takes the frame down, gently prying the feather out to hold it before his face.
He tucks it into his tunic, and exits the room.
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There it is again, that feeling like spiders squirming up her back.
The old woman shivers, hands clasped tightly in her lap, splintered with varicose veins and purple-brown liver spots. Her bones ache from sitting for so long, joints wanting to stretch, to move, do anything but lie still.
She purses her thin little mouth, deepening the wrinkles gouged into her skin from time.
Dark magic sizzles in the air, like a pot of oil on a fire, crackling in her eardrums. Although she rests in the Sealed Grounds, far away from where the boy is now, she can't mistake it, this aluminum twang of evil. It's been following him for a while now, stealing behind his footsteps.
She makes a noise of worry, gripping her hands so tightly the knotted knuckles turn pale.
There it is again, the feeling like spiders squirming up her back.
It's different. It's not the stink of darkness or the taste of evil, but something else, stuck somewhere between the lines. It's the feeling of wrongness, she decides, as if something that was supposed to happen didn't, and everything is out of focus now, time taking a wayward path.
With great difficulty, she rises from the stone floor, cold against her bare feet. Even the floor feels different to her, although she's memorized every crack, counted each stone in her many years guarding this place.
She stands before the main doors, both palms pressed flat against them, not to open, but to feel.
In her mind's eye, she reaches through the forests, the caves, the mountains, past rivers and ponds, swirling green and blue. She treks the entire desert without stepping a foot outside, over the swirling dunes, down through the ancient mines.
There he is, groping blindly through a tunnel, weary but well. The sword spirit slips along ahead of him, guiding him through the tunnel dug deep beneath the ground.
He looks up, like an animal caught in the bush, looking over one shoulder, as if sensing her watching him. The old woman grins a little, before traveling onward, past the boy, deeper still. She breathes in and hurdles her consciousness farther ahead, past the mines and to the Gate of Time just beyond.
Something horrible blooms in her heart. There's a high-pitched kneeing sound, like metal on a grist, vibrating into her skull. The spell is broken, and her mind slams back into its rightful place.
Her fingertips scrape against the stone as her hands fall.
She breathes in a long and shallow gasp.
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He's bleeding.
Link has been doing a lot of that lately; he's bled more in the past few weeks than any other time in his life. It sticks to his hair and tunic, dribbling down from a cut above his eye, a few wayward drops sprinkling his cheek.
He sits inside the mines, alone. He's defeated the great scorpion, but barely, just enough to escape still living. Link knows there's no time for rest, no matter how worn he is.
His whole body aches, an all over throb nesting in his joints, but Link thinks himself fortunate, more than fortunate, to have survived this long.
Is it luck, or is it skill?
Link considers this.
Neither?
He sighs.
The Goddess would surely laugh at his foolishness, if she weren't doing so already. Link doesn't doubt she is; he laughs with her.
“Who are you, mortal,” he imagines her saying, “to take on such a task?” And her laughter is like thunderclouds, horrible in its beauty.
Link shudders. For all her mercy in saving them, for all her holiness, Hylia was a Goddess, a deity not of their world, though she walked in it for a time. He thanks the stars that he was not alive when she existed on their earth.
Fi would scold him for such blasphemous thoughts.
He reaches up to graze his fingers against the hilt of his sword, and finds, with relief, that her spirit is still within.
“Fi?”
She appears, rather, leaps from the sword at his back to float before him. He's still not used to her, the way she springs from nothingness and exhales air from another world, glowing with magic. Magic so old he can smell it, feel it buzz along his skin, bleeding through the cracks of his eyelids.
Magic he wields, magic he commands. The thought disturbs him.
“You said the Temple of Time was just beyond here.”
She nods.
“Lead me to it.”
Her clothing ruffles, just a little, as if she's somehow offended by his lack of manners. If she is, she displays none of it.
“Yes, Master Link. Follow me.”
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Impa waits.
She sits, straight-backed and solid, with the Gate of Time whirling behind her. It osculates with every turn, nephrite runes glowing within it. Behind it, the sun hangs low, cautiously, burning yellow and orange. The desert beyond the Temple of Time is frightfully quiet.
She knows the risk of waiting here when that man roams free, yet it hardly matters, not as much as telling the boy of Zelda's fate.
Impa would rather face anything in the cosmos than this.
She cares not for the boy, her only mission in life to protect the Goddess Reborn. She fears how well he'll handle the news - he's the Hero chosen by Hylia herself, but he is still human, still a boy. A vulnerable boy, unbreakable though he is. A boy in love.
Impa huffs a little, more a grunt than a laugh.
As if the gods themselves were reading her thoughts, he appears beyond, standing across the fissure and gazing, startled and a little wary, over at her.
She's up and motioning him to come near, to her relief (and despair) he does so without thought.
How trustful this boy is, she thinks in dismay, how soft. She should have chosen better.
Up close, he's at least two or three heads shorter than herself, but it's an unfair comparison, because he's yet fully grown and her people are unusually tall. Up close, his eyes are bluer than anything in the world, and fiercer than his appearance initially let on.
Up close, he reeks of holy magic, so green as to be flooded neon, and she can barely see him within it. A Sheikah's gift, the ability to see, taste and smell magic, has never been so damning as now.
He knows something is wrong.
She lifts one hand as if to place it upon his shoulder, hesitates, before letting it drop back down. He looks at her expectantly.
She closes her eyes so as not to look at him.
“Boy, we haven't much time to dawdle here, you most especially not - I won't spare pleasantries. Zelda is gone. I don't know where she is, and I have no other information for you, other than she's been taken by that man. There's no one else.”
Impa turns to regard the Gate of Time, glowing now that the sun is setting. She waits tensely for his response.
His voice is soft, and more melodious than any mortal voice has a right to be, when he says, “What can I do?”
She's unsurprised by this willingness of him, unable to decide if he's very stupid, or very selfless, so she settles on a little of both. She wants to laugh, but can't.
Impa gazes at him from over one shoulder, her eyes red like firewater.
“I wish to the gods that you didn't have to hear this, Link, not from me, nor from anyone, but as a servant, I must obey orders. My task was to guide Zelda throughout the realm to help complete her own destiny. I was, under oath, to never allow her to stray from it, or to allow her capture by those who seek to do her harm.”
Link nods, hands fisting at his sides.
Impa smirks, sadly. “You have a right to be angry with me. I would be worried if you weren't. I ask that you put it away for now, and use that anger to better aid her.”
He bows his head, looking less like a Hero and more like a boy, and Impa wishes he wouldn't, because that's not how a Hero should look.
“I have only one piece of assurance for you, Link.”
He looks up with so much hope he glows with it, and how much she wishes he didn't, because hope has never helped anyone.
Impa motions him closer to the Gate, she looking into it, he gazing at her, still and anxious. Then, she snaps her fingers, and with a zzt of magic, materializes a beautiful golden lyre - Zelda's lyre. Impa passes it to him with reverence.
Link cradles it in his palms, the metal still warm with magic, as if gripping to hard or too carelessly will sap its power. He cradles it because it was in Zelda's hands not so long ago.
“This is all I found of her at the Earth Temple. You probably assumed she was gone because someone rescued her, am I right?”
Link secures the harp in his belt. “Yes. I had no reason to believe otherwise. Not even Fi thought she'd been captured.”
Something passes over her face, a little like remorse. “There's no time for my apologies, Link. Listen to me. That lyre is the very same the Goddess herself held, and it's imbued with properties that will aid you in your quest. I imagine Zelda left it for you herself.”
Her voice grows weaker.
Link steps forward, golden brows lowering, eyes glowing fierce again. The softness in his words is gone. “And? What aren't you telling me?”
Impa raises her head to the darkening sky, a star-struck giant above them.
“The Demon Lord wants to sacrifice her. I have no time to explain the details. This is the piece of assurance I can give you - I botched his magic, just a little, just enough to hinder him. It won't buy you much time. I'd say three months, at the very best.”
She turns her fiery gaze back to him, expecting a downtrodden little boy. Instead, he stands straight, with a determination in his young face that startles even her.
His lips part to speak, but it's strangled by the loudest noise she's ever heard. For a moment, the world blooms golden-white, earth and sky slamming into one another above her head.
Impa spins down into darkness.
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She doesn't have time to think about what happened or why, only act.
Impa lurches to the side, just as a dagger hiss-whistles by and imbeds itself in the stone where her head was. She jumps to her feet and swears.
And knows what had happened.
And wishes she didn't.
It feels like there's a cluster of storm clouds in her head, rumbling with every movement, lightning burning up in her limbs. She has to ignore it.
Because wishes and hopes don't get you very far, Sheikah.
Link and the Demon Lord himself are battling just steps away, on the bridge of stone across the fissure.
Impa breathes in all the way to her belly, arms held out, shimmering with blue electricity.
“Boy!”
He stops just long enough to look at her, then to wildly fling himself away as she hurls her magic forward, striking the demon square in the torso.
She doesn't have time to gloat.
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Link winces as Ghirahim loosens a soul-churning scream of fury.
His clothing smokes thin little streams of black, a charred patch of cloth and skin still glowing with Impa's magic. He presses one hand to his wounded chest, the other gripping his blade so tightly Link can see it quiver.
His eyes are two blazing stars of melanoid madness in the dark.
Link braces his legs, standing between the demon and Impa, sword and shield out. The blade still glows with a Skyward Strike he'd charged moments before.
Then Ghirahim is right up against him, blades ringing, glowing embers flying with the impact. Link feels his arms give out under the pressure, knees buckling just slightly, but it's enough for Ghirahim to take the chance and kick him in the gut.
Link stumbles back before righting himself, just in time to leap away from a decapitating swing, the ebony blade grazing the top of Link's head.
Ghirahim cackles, thrusting forward, catching the edge of Link's shield. He bashes it into Ghirahim's blade, knocking him off balance. Link flings the edge of his sword down, aiming for Ghirahim's neck - only to pass through empty space.
He's seen this before - without thought, he twists around and swings as hard as he can, blade aglow, firing a Skyward Strike straight into Ghirahim just as he appears behind him.
Now, his instincts cry.
His blade nearly sings in elation as it slices Ghirahim's shoulder, all the way down to his hip, a chaotic arc of blood and rendered flesh.
But it's not enough, it's never enough, and Ghirahim smiles before cracking the butt of his sword into Link's face.
Stars blitz black and white and horrible red, a cacophony of color and confusion as Link stumbles back in pain. The taste of his own blood fills his mouth, choking him, spurting from his broken nose.
He can open his eyes just enough to see Ghirahim, still smiling, standing above him - when did I fall? Link wonders, vacantly.
He doesn't even have time to think of it, before Ghirahim lands a solid kick straight into his belly. All at once the air leaves him, and Link tries to gasp in pain, curling up on instinct. Another blow slams between his shoulders, then another, until Link can't think right beyond the pain.
Then, he hears another scream, but it isn't his own.
Link drags himself onto his hands and knees, spitting blood, craning his head just enough to look beyond him. Ghirahim lies quite a bit before him, still glowing with Sheikah magic.
“Link,” Impa says, helping him up, “no time, you must destroy the Gate, that's what he's after.”
He spits more blood, “you?”
Impa smiles sadly. “I'll have to return to the past. I'll go into the Gate, and you must destroy it the instant I do so, understand?”
Link groans, fumbling to retrieve his sword, before tipping his head in weak agreement.
Impa wastes no time, sprinting toward the Gate.
It takes everything, and a little more, for him to raise the Goddess Blade high above his head, willing holy magic into it. Impa looks at him for a single, still moment, before entering the Gate and disappearing, dropping a globe of electricity behind her.
Link fires a Skyward Strike, and The Gate of Time is destroyed utterly, with only rubble remaining.
He wobbles on weak legs, but finds enough strength to turn as he senses Ghirahim rise behind him.
The demon's face is so full of rage he bleeds it, pointed teeth rattling, nostrils flaring. He yells so loud Link can hear the thunder in his voice.
“I will make you regret that, child! I should have done away with you the moment I laid eyes on you - be careful where you tread now. I'm the one with your precious friend, and I hold all the pieces. Don't think this is your victory!”
He laughs, blood wetting his entire front. He raises the point of his sword toward Link.
“Pray to that filthy Goddess of yours that I still find use in her when that Sheikah's spell wears off. Count your blessings, boy. The next we meet, I'll be sure to make you wish you never breathed air!”
Link watches as Ghirahim circles himself with his own sword, and vanishes altogether.
He's alone, again.
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Next chapter.