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Chapter Text

In this cold vault that was her bedroom, the arched windows still contained panels of stain glass. Shimmering and timeless, thanks to the wizard's spell.

The one that both imprisoned and preserved.

Locked within this endless sleep, Zelda Proserpina of Hyrule, daughter of a King, sister of a King, and niece of a King, could only recall hazy glimpses of a long dream.

Just one. Only one. Never truly beginning. Never truly ending as she lay upon her embroidered cushions, hands upon her stomach. Her shoulder-length hair had not grown an inch in her sleep; fresh and dark red as a never-bloomed rose.

Just a dream. And not a very clear one at that.

Behind her closed eyes, visions splashed against her mind like raindrops. Warping the landscape in a grim blur of death and malice. Over time it bloomed with colors. First there was only red, spilled in rivers across a dying land, painting the fires that consume it. The monsters that roamed it. The color of poisoned skies that spill acid rain upon crops.

Screaming people, desperate, hopeless.

The Sleeping Princess would weep, if she could.

Then, suddenly...almost inconsequentially...there is a speck of green amidst the destruction. Unfurling, growing, dispute the lack of sun, the lack of rain, the lack of help.

He is small at first, so small.

A green-shoot of stubborn life. Yet he grew. And all he touched grew green in his wake. Waking with hope, with faith, with endurance.

With courage.

Oh, he stumbled at times. He hurt and he bled red, oh so much red, until the cursed earth he walked on was sanctified with it. In her dreams, she gasped whenever his foes dealt him a wound, wanting to cower and hide her eyes as much as she wanted to reach out and bind the red flow, to stop it.

She can never get a good look at his face. She doesn’t know his name. Eventually though, the worse of the red, the cause and cancer of this land, yields to him at the end of his sword. The monster is sealed away within him, within his blood. It is the first time she tried to cheer within her dream, within the spell. Even outside the spell, her lips twitch in the faintest hint of a smile.

If that had been all, it would have been enough. She could’ve rested in peace, for the remainder of eternity.

Such was not her fate.

Four more seasons pass with feel of old friends. They are her only companions after-all, in her frozen cocoon of time. She knew them well, favoring spring and summer the most, but still fondly remembering the other two. These brief flashes of the changing years that swept her mind though the magic is painful in its unteachableness.

Her glimpses are tangled with her memories of how things once were. It was hard to separate what was from what she longed to be. She does not grow, does not age. A horrible, awe-filled thing. The only company are the Shiekah who make pilgrimage to her, bringing the currents heirs to the throne to remind them of the past. 

She is so lonely.

Each time the Door creaked open, that fragile, stubborn hope fluttered, only to have its wings cruelly pluck once again. She slumbers on within the sleeping death, a frost upon the gentlest flower.

But not everything is frozen in time.

Out in the world...things are changing, old magic is stirring. Whispering "Its time."

There was an old song from her era. It was once declared that time made one bolder…that children grew older. The Princess’s young green-shoot…he grew older, too.  Grew strong and daring. As giving as an apple tree in autumn.

What else could explain the decision he made? When he accepted the quest to wake her?

Had the Princess been able to stand, even in her dreams, she would have fallen to her knees.

She never realized hope could hurt so much.

So much that it was nearly dyed red in color, with every dropped spilled by moblins and achmans and every other unclean thing. She fretted. So terribly, terribly afraid. It seemed an unequal thing, that someone should risk his life when it truly wasn’t a pressing thing. Her sleeping or not was not a matter of saving the kingdom, or the world.

No.

He was doing this solely to save her. That was the only prize awaiting for him, should he survive the ordeal searching for the Triforce of Courage proved to be. It seemed like a meager thing, a Hero’s life for one girl out-of-time.

An unnecessary, unneeded, forgotten Princess.  

He had so much more to offer than her.

Don’t, she thought, pleaded, somewhere in the shifting murk of her mind, watching him. Watching him struggle, fight, bleed, die -honest to goodness die, dear Hylia. Die more than a few times, cheating Death only with spells and craftiness and strange little dolls.

Please don’t do this for me, it’s not worth it.

Of course, nobody can hear her. So deep is she within her dream, she doesn’t hear the footsteps echoing through the North Palace’s abandoned halls, their owner exhausted and filthy and dizzy with triumphant. Doesn’t hear the door -the one Which-Does-Not-Open- swing wide, letting in the Hero she had been watching for...waiting for.

*~*

She doesn't hear the short puffs of his breath, his lungs unable to get enough air, aching as they were against his bruised ribs.

That last battle with his own shadow was one he will not soon forget. It had been a growling, savage version of himself, all his fierce will to live warped and twisted into something so dark and selfish, it had struck him as much as his enemy's sword.  He hadn't said much as they exchanged blows. But what the shadow had said, he wouldn't ever forget.

"I won't let you wake her!" the dark image had spat. "She's mine!"

Link had to admit, there had been particular venom when he drove his sword home for the final time, satisfaction when he watched the shadows hissing, cursing form vanish. He doesn't see his steps grow softer, more reverent, as he approached the blood-colored stairs leading up to her altar. Gazing upon her figure, he was struck, once again, by the crashing wave of kinship he felt with this young maiden. Royalty or not, he knew something of the unfairness of being under a curse. Having it dominate your every hour.

Waking or asleep, he considered, before he straightened up determinedly.

He might be powerless to stop his own curse from chasing him for the remainder of his days, but such would not be her fate. Her fate he could change. He could give her life back to her. If she lived a good one, maybe she could live it for the both of them. It would be worth it, then. Every cut and bruise, every stab his shadow gave him. It would be worth it.

Setting his jaw, he squared his shoulders under their coverings of brown and green and leather and stood beside the Sleeping Princess, the precursor to the Legend of Zelda which bears her name.

Since he already knew a Zelda, he had taken to calling this royal maiden Aurora, after a fairy tale told among the campfires of his youth. It had been his favorite, fascinating him with the story of the Princess as beautiful as the morning, preserved in time.

The stories never described what the maiden looked like, saying only that she was fair, but this Princess is more than lovely enough to fill in the gaps. She’s so small, white-skinned and delicate seeming. Like the summer lilies that the other Zelda, Crown Princess of Hyrule, had managed to coax from the recovering soiling in the royal gardens.

Her rich hair was the dark red of certain woods he would find, deep in the heartbeat of the forest. The kind that made good homes. It tumbled to her shoulders, matching the red tunic-gown that swathed her figure.

Not for the first time, Link wondered what color her eyes were.

Are.

He has visited her many times during this second quest of his. But Link never touched her. It just seemed wrong, when she had no awareness of it. Or worse, if she had aware of it and didn't like it. What Princess would want to be touched by him?

An accursed forest rat, who broke more things than he fixed.

This time though, he couldn't help himself, the clever fingers of his right hand pushing the moss-soft tresses from her face, though he quickly stopped. His hands were stained with dirt and monster blood and gods-only-know-what. Normally that wouldn't bother him, but it was just so apparent in contrast to her fair skin.

He has no business touching her, ever. Raising his left hand before he could make a greater fool of himself, Link curled a fist, the golden might of the gods shimmering to life.

"Would you lend me your power?" he murmured; head humbly bowed. He made his wish. And the entire room filled with light.

*~*

The first thing she is aware of is light. White hot and blinding, it pulses gold against the blackness holding her captive. In her dream world she gasped, the shock to her soul paralyzing, burning, as the bonds holding her within the Eternal Sleep are broken with a breath of divinity. Then there is a voice, indistinct at first, but pressing in on her conscience, raspy as if unused, but growing louder. Growing firmer. Until -

“Your Highness.”

Her eyelids fluttered on their own accord at the sound, fragile as butterflies.

This is what an infant feels, the thought occurred to her, when flushed from blank nothingness out into the unknown.

She murmured, whined, a soft sigh escaped her lips. Her muscles stirred for the first time in innumerable  centuries. The golden light was too much, burning and all-consuming and never ending. It burned through more than the curse, it burned through her: her mind, her memories, her self –

“Princess,” came once again, more insistent now. There was warmth on her cheek, a stroking motion running in a line from her ear to her jaw. Up and down, repeating. She turned to it instinctively, lost in a sea of gold.

“Please wake up.”

The command was gentle, but the power behind it was the final battering ram that broke the hissing hold the curse still had on her. With a scream of rage, the spell shattered.

And Zelda Aurora woke up with a short gasp, shock waves of magic shattering the glass in the windows; its shards slicing the bindings on the curtains so that they floated freely.

Shocked with awareness, her eyes, deep blue as pure water, roll frantically in her head as she tried to take in everything. Gosh, was this what seeing things was truly like?

Everything was so clear! Vivid with defined features, making one thing from another–

Tall marble columns held up the arched roof, the torchlight casting flickering shadows around the room’s edges, the clipped tiles of mosaics and tattered tapestries hung from the walls –

“Thank Hylia,” she heard the raspy voice breath out, sounding like autumn leaves.  

Blinking, her raindrop eyes flickered towards its source.

It was a boy.

Well no, that wasn't right, not quite a boy, but not a man yet either. Hazel eyes lay in a lightly tan face, his unruly brown curls coated with ash and blood. He stood at her side, looking at her, pale under a layer of grime. 

“W-who?” she asked, whispered, brow furrowed as she tried to recall, to think. She gasped in more air, greedily, the need of anything other than steady qualities foreign to her. She struggled to sit up, and the warmth on her cheek was suddenly at her middle back, helping her.

“I’m Link,” he told her, still wide-eyed. Almost wild-eyed. “I was tasked with waking you from your slumber, my lady.”

“My…my slumber?” she repeated, parrot like, enunciating the word carefully. Viciously aware of every speck of dust and the location of every shadow, she kept glancing nervously about the room, expecting something foul to be lingering in the corners.

She found herself reaching for the young man’s – Link’s – hand. Holding on to it tight, when he willingly gave it, helping her to her feet. “How…how long was I sleeping? Where am I?”

She felt a flinch run though his body as he leaned back, shock evident on his slightly Fae features.

"You... don't known?" he fumbled.

She bit her lip, gaze dropping to focus on her hands, his were larger than her own, strong as tree branches, fingertips calloused from holding the many weapons dangling from his belt and pack.

"I know something..." she murmured carefully, hazy memory wafting around her, memories of what happened. "I remember the wizard. My brother. I remember refusing them the Power they sought."

Her vision stung as she recalled it: her older brother warped beyond from all recognition, shouting, cursing -

"Where is it?!"

"I d-don't know! I don't k-know!"

"Liar! He gave it to you! I know he did! Where. Is. It."

She swallowed the memories painfully, before it can consume her.

"I remember enough I know I must thank you," she gasped out, shoulders shaking under the red silk of her ancient bliaut. "T-thank you, H-Hero."

"Hey, no, no," her savior -Link- insisted, shaking his head. Hesitantly, he reached up and brushed away the tears rolling off her white cheeks, the golden triangles still shimmering on his hand. "I'm no Hero. I only did my duty, Princess."

"You saved me," she corrected softly, stepping closer, even as his eyes widen once again.

A gust of dry wind fluttered the curtains around them like the whisper of fairies. She came closer, limpid, soften all the more when his gaze darted away, swallowing.

"You are a real hero."

Determined to sink the message home, she placed a hand on his shoulder and leaned forward to kiss his cheek. At the last moment, Link moved his head to face hers, more denial ready on his lips when they ended up meeting her own.

Oh.

Oh.

He tasted like earth and sweat and smoke. And some other strange, boyish thing she couldn’t name. Yet for all the awkward meeting of teeth, she couldn't say it was bad for a very first kiss. They still pulled back rather quickly, stunned faces mirroring each other in the swaddling flaps of blue.

"We...we need to leave," Link finally said, voice raspier than before. He swallowed. "We...we need to get you home."

"Home?" she repeated, head tilting in such a way, it almost made him do something stupid. Like kiss her again.

"To the castle -the new castle to the south," Link explained, hurriedly. "Where the royal family live now. Its... your home, Princess. Its where you belong."

"Home," she said again, this time understanding the word, eyes lighting up like campfires with bright, timid hope. She reached out, willingly sliding her hand in his, liking it there. "Yes...please. I want to go home."

*~*

Unbeknownst to either the Awakened Princess or her Hero, the shock wave of magic didn't end within the North Palace, it echoed though the land itself, calling out the location of the Blood to every monster cultist with the means to hear it and the bloodlust to seek it.

So basically all, the tall man reflected lazily. He was a slender figure, his diet of dark magic insuring that his limbs never gain anything resembling flesh. His elongated fingers tapped a calculating pattern on the alter besides him, chains waiting to be fashioned to sacrificial limbs. He peered out from the uppermost level of his tower, the dry wind that proclaimed the Sleeping Princess' release billowing his black robes with divine purpose.

Shuddering with the enticement of a neophyte, he fingered the sharpest of his holy instruments, the one that he would use bleed the young Hero dry. Ah, the lad had proven a worth quarry, in the four years since he cast down Lord Ganon. He had dodged capture and destiny with a nimbleness that spoke of a fierce will to live. A refusal to surrender. 

It was commendable, one had to admit. And the High Priest of Ganon fully intended to reward the youth with a memorable death.