The Dragon of Light and the Vow of Love
Summary:
Dream and memory intersect. Or is this a vision?
The Princess Zelda stands in the era of antiquity on a bright and sunny day, in the time of the Zonai. Great deeds and great sorrows have come to pass to put a stop to the rampage of Ganondorf, the Demon King. But only a stop, only a delay made possible by the sacrifice of Hyrule’s first king – Rauru, the King of Light. She fought at his side and gave him his chance, and so she knows all too well about Ganondorf's terrifying power. Only her help and a feat indistinguishable to her from a miracle had defeated him. She knows that he rises again in her time to threaten everything she knows.
His wretched voice rings in her ears. “Was that the sword that seals the darkness? A blade that shatters so easily against my power cannot save you from me.”
She thinks of words said by the Great Deku Tree. “The sword will continue to gain strength if bathed in sacred power. The stronger that power, the more powerful the sword becomes.”
She recalls a fond memory and words from Queen Sonia, one who had been like a mother. “After all, you possess more than power over time. You have a sacred power that can dispel evil.”
She recalls words from the sage Mineru, Rauru’s sister. “To swallow a secret stone is to become an immortal dragon, one blessed with eternal life.”
She gives away her precious device to a Zonai construct for a purpose and a distant moment that she knows will come. “Mineru…I’m counting on you.” She goes to look upon the decayed and broken form of the Master Sword upon a pedestal, brought to her across time and space through sorcery and her unbreakable connection to the one she loved.
Zelda strives to summon all her courage.
“Link, I will restore the Master Sword for you. I will care for it until the time comes. I will pour my sacred power into it. It will be the weapon that defeats the Demon King!” She grips her secret stone of power and detaches it from its necklace.
The words that give her courage, though, are followed by other words of Mineru to chill her heart. “To become an immortal dragon is to lose oneself.” She lowers her head and closes her eyes to think and to focus, to fight back.
"As long as we are both alive, there can still be hope."
Once on a stormy night long ago in the time of the Great Calamity, those words from her beloved had rescued her more than any act with a sword. They had pulled her back from the very brink of a despair that had been destroying her spirit, breaking her heart and mind with thoughts that she was completely to blame and worse than useless. By the morning after the end of that night, two truths of her life had been decided in silence beyond all question.
She would never despair of her life again, and she would always love him.
Well, now here she was. She was about to live forever. So everything just had to work out, didn't it?
"...I know that as long as I can give him a chance, Link will come to me."
She had told a dear friend this once, before facing the beast Calamity Ganon alone. And her faith had been fully vindicated, hadn't it? Your messages and thoughts will reach him. He will find you. It will work, he will have her again. If we can fight together we can stop the Demon King in the end, everyone can still be saved. It's the only way.
"You must..." She stops.
"You must find me."
Yes, that was what she'd told him once before in this time when she could. Now though, the gravity of her knowledge weighs on her. Yes, Link would have his chance. Without fail, he would come. On this much, at least, no doubt lives in Zelda. Her faith had been proven right time and again, and so now faith is required no longer. Her thought is absolute truth, and why not? Her entire life is her evidence for it.
Yet this time wouldn't be like before.
When he finds me...it won't really be me anymore, will it?
Just a little bit, she trembles.
She fears what is to come, but there are other fears too. The fear of what could come for him and everyone else she loves if nothing more is done. The fear of never finding a way to move forward in time and living the rest of her life anxious and impotent, always wondering and never really knowing about the fate of her people. The fear of the idea that if this thing is not done here and now, the will to see it through would never return. She would be damned to know a crippling fear and despair at the very end of her life, and they to death.
And Link, poor and dear Link. How would any of her thoughts and feelings ever reach him again, if she did not see this through? What would go through his mind as he searched and searched in her present, never to discover a single thing?
Don't falter, just do it now!
Putting her hands to her mouth too swiftly for any further emotion or thought to intervene, she swallows the stone. She lowers her hands.
Link, it's for our dream. We promised we’d chase it together.
But she was asking him to chase it without her at his side now, wasn't she? She can feel the tears starting to come, but she fights it back. In another lifetime she'd had plenty of practice before they had ever met.
How strange, it seemed as if nothing was happening. It wasn't possible for these secret stones to somehow fail, was it? Or maybe the change was happening to her right now, and it wasn't even painful. That would be a wonderful mercy.
You're all right, Zelda. It's fine, you're all right.
Suddenly, Zelda's body shakes with a fierce jolt and she gasps loudly. Her body radiates shining white light.
Indeed, it wasn't painful the way that she had feared. For instead, what she feels is the emotion of unfiltered panic to accompany sensations of consciousness inexorably altering.
What's happening? Who am I, what am I, what was I doing?
"Look. Look!" That wasn't her. It was some other voice trying to advise her, to guide her. Who was it, the Goddess herself perhaps? She knew what that was, didn't she?
Hand on her chest, Zelda looks down. There is the broken Master Sword on the pedestal. Her delirium breaks instantly and everything comes back as quickly as it had seemed to elude her.
The sword. They need us, focus on the sword! Hand on her chest, she reaches out with the other hand to take it.
That's right, the Master Sword. It - she - was important. Important to him. Here was a thing precious beyond price, and very much more than a thing. It is more important than anything else to Link, except for her. He'd said so, she remembers now - and what she had chosen to do after he had said it. She had such feelings for him too.
Well, all she had to do was restore her now. One day her beloved and the sword would be as one again. For her sake they would help everyone, just as they always had before.
Almost everyone. She remembers that too.
"Link...!" Now she clutches the sword to her chest and strives for bravery. It seems to help a bit, as if someone else were actually there to hold her. Maybe the sword was doing what it could for her sake. With our strength there's hope for them. He'll come to me, he always does!
How absurd, who could forget for a moment? But was that really about to happen to her? The thought is more harrowing to her than the sight of the Demon King himself.
Goddess please, if I can just remember him it will be enough! I don't want to forget!
As if to aid her struggle, now bits of precious thoughts and memories flash through Zelda’s mind. The house that she and her loved one shared together, moments he had protected her, people she had met.
Ah, sweet little Karin. She would keep up with her studies at school even without her, wouldn't she? She'd become so inquisitive.
Ah, Sonia. Rauru, too. If they could speak to her now, would they say that she was doing the right thing? Had she said enough to them, to make them really understand just how much they had made her feel like she was real family?
Mineru, dear Mineru. She might have passed on in peace, she had objected to this action. Yet when Zelda had made her final decision, she committed her spirit to the cause without hesitation. Even if all else failed, through her Link would come to learn everything that mattered. A truer friend could never be.
Ah, there is Purah. Transformed back to adulthood again, good for her. She and Robbie would keep inventing for the people and not waste time fixated on someone beyond help, wouldn't they?
Maybe it would be better for Link to tell no one, for none of them to ever know.
But it was too late to second guess a thing. It was out of her control anyway. What came next would be all up to the one she trusted most. Oh, Link...!
It was all so strange. This experience seemed like falling asleep, yet nothing about her was fading or disappearing. No, this was growth and expansion. Zelda becoming so much more than what she recognized, somehow. Perhaps the Zonai's understanding had not been complete. If she was becoming lost within a greater whole that was about to be, was that truly the same thing as losing oneself?
But there was no time for the scholar or philosopher to question anything now. Instead, Zelda the princess turns her thoughts to what she cherishes. Only seconds remain to affirm the single greatest truth of her life once and for all, to speak a desperate and passionate wish that she prays will reach him far across time.
"PROTECT THEM ALL!"
Her eyes change to otherworldly colors and her perception of the world begins to change, even as everything ends. Zelda's energy explodes outward, shining bright like a star. From that source the Dragon of Light manifests, soaring into the sky of ancient Hyrule. Majestic in every way to those who would see it through the ages, except maybe for the eyes. Eyes paradoxically shedding tears from a creature that seemed so far beyond such concepts as sorrow or fear.
It all ends and fades away for Link the hero.
He stands upon a field at the very end of twilight, surrounded by a little miracle - dozens of the Silent Princess flower blooming all about him, grown as if seconds had counted for a year. And in the sky, he sees it. The Dragon of Light flying in the air, shimmering in the night, soon to be a majestic symbol to the people as it passed above the nearby town. Just the sight of it would be enough to move many grown adults to tears and to put a strange sense of nurturing comfort into every heart. But for one of them, its presence could never mean only that now.
"No." He quietly speaks it in denial as a harsh reality fully sinks in.
"Protect them all." That was what she had asked of him with her final words. How like her, to think of putting others first. But his thoughts are for what had not been said. His second great quest for his princess now had a terrifying difference.
She was wiser than him, he knew that very well. She loved him intensely; he knew that too. She had told him once that she would always trust him, more than anyone else in the world. And now with all of that in mind, Link was processing something he had thought inconceivable.
She doesn’t expect me to help her. She didn’t ask me to, she thinks I can’t. She thought that was the end.
"Don't go." Link sinks to his knees, paralyzed and very nearly delirious from disbelief. With his borrowed right arm received from King Rauru, he reaches out toward the Dragon of Light.
She thought she was telling me goodbye.
"Come back..." He knows very well it will continue to leave him behind, but he says the words anyway.
No.
Not "it". Never "it".
"I won’t believe it. It's not true."
Being forever changed isn't the same thing as disappearing. That just had to make sense, didn't it?
Link's mind starts to race and cope.
The dragon's tears were proof, weren't they? Miraculous and magical as they seemed, they weren't miracles conjured from nothing from on high. They were of the dragon - of Zelda. Words once spoken by her echo in his mind, from one of their most intimate moments in Lurelin Village far away.
"I received divine power, Link, but that is not the same as becoming divine. I don’t want worship from anyone, not even from you – especially not from you. I didn't come here wanting to be exalted as a princess either, even if I am one. So here before Lover’s Pond and under the stars, accept this ring garland from me. Kiss me here in the moonlight thinking of me only as the woman who loves you, and in the light of day let everyone here witness you as the man who is loving me. That much will be enough for me.” Her tears had come from happiness back then.
Tears were always something that came from something - someone - that was both true and real.
What was more, the dragon tears had a unique effect on him. He alone experienced any of her memories when he found them, no other explorers had ever experienced visions of any kind. That had to mean something, didn't it?
So it is that for Link, only one conclusion to preserve his sanity is possible. The creature was his precious Zelda. In any way that really mattered, it was. To him it was and would be, no matter what she or anyone had thought or would think.
This too means sorrow for Link the hero, but not only that. However he felt in that moment, he and his love were not forsaken.
That belief would mean everything that was needed in the end.
***
Time and fate move forward to a different place.
Link the hero paraglides downward high up in the sky, fixated on his goal. He has long since recovered and is now driven forward by the will of his love and his love for her, and all that he knows to be right.
He comes to the almighty Dragon of Light and sees what he expects to find – the legendary Master Sword, that which had been his, embedded upon its – upon her head. Hair seems to have grown all around it and taken hold of it, so much so that it is as though it is a part of the dragon itself. Link takes a deep breath and braces himself. He grips the sword with both hands and pulls.
The dragon shrieks with a great cry and accelerates. Link can only hold on for dear life as the wind and the shaking of the dragon threaten to dislodge him from his place. On and on the desperate struggle goes. Finally, the instant he's back on his feet again, he tries to pull once more. The dragon cries out.
"Come on...come on!" With all his strength he pulls, holding nothing back. The dragon screams the loudest cry yet, or so it seems to him.
Then suddenly, he sees it. Her face, her eyes as they begin to change for the draconic transformation.
Everything in his mind stops. His heart aches terribly. He feels sick.
What…what am I doing? What was I just doing?
The dragon cries out again.
What am I doing to her right now?
He pulls no longer. The dragon subsides.
This is her. She's in pain. If I force it out like this, she’ll suffer.
He falls to his knees, his hands still grip the sword hilt tight. He leans forward to allow his forehead to touch them. Bent with grief, he’s practically in the position for a prayer atop the head of the dragon now.
"I can't. I can’t do it."
The dragon roars a bit. It's no different than usual, things are back to normal.
"You didn't count on this. If I know it will hurt you, I can't do it. You went this far, but I can't do it."
The sound of the blowing of the wind is his only answer.
"This is still you, I have to believe it. I can't do it. I'll find a way to stop him without it, I swear. Forgive me, I can't."
He shuts his eyes tight. "I can't, I just can't...beloved, I'm sorry..."
His eyes are shut, so he doesn't see it. He does not see the sword of legend begin to shimmer.
“I love you. I’ll always love you…”
***
Within the great mindscape of the Dragon of Light, the dragon is aware. It knows and it feels.
It feels it. A stab of sharp and great pain upon its head, the vaguest sensation of something insignificant upon its head trying to steal away its one and only treasure. How annoying.
A wave of feeling rushes through it.
How odd. The pain is subsiding, but it does not feel relief. No, this was...regret? Such a simple word for such a vexing and stubborn feeling it had always lived with, to one degree or another. How dare this mortal intrude. There was life on the surface to oversee.
It does not know exactly why it wants to look, only that it does. It was its truth, it had always known it. What was there to question about it? The little things down below knew greater joy when it was near. How nice that always was to see. What else was there that needed knowing?
And that darkness below on the ground, how it hated it. How it despised the way those black chasms scarred the land the dragon had always thought to cherish. If only there were a way to get through and kill whatever was down there. Well, no matter. It would find a way. It had forever, after all. Even if the entire world below changed its nature and shape in time, it would not. It was eternal. It is moved to scorn the great menace in its thoughts.
Wretched little evil thing, hide in your shadows while you can. You know not that I am here. Dare to come out and you die.
In the meantime, it would wait. It was waiting. Waiting for what, exactly? For so very long, it had wanted to understand and remember clearly. No matter. It would know when the time came. All things in the world had their time. Until then, it would not release the treasure it kept. It was for…something important. Ah, curse everything. No matter, it would remember soon enough. This little creature would not stop its purpose. It was nothing, nothing at all.
But the regret intensifies. Why? Why now?
A voice pierces into the mindscape.
"The awaited time has come."
What a pleasant voice. It had heard it many times before. It understood the idea of friendship because the voice had always been there time and again, just when it was wanted most. No, the dragon does not care to part from its treasure. Not at all. It is so nice to not always be alone.
"There is understanding, there is suffering. It is time, let it go."
"What? What is this?"
"Remember. Let it go, let me go."
In its mind's eye, it suddenly sees it. It does not sleep, but it can dream. There is a vision of a mortal woman - that was what it really was, wasn't it? - standing atop some high place, bathed in a blinding white light. The sun shines behind her too. Her features cannot be well seen. She is so high up that the clouds themselves are below her. She is dressed in pure white, her long golden hair dances in the blowing wind. Some great bird larger than she is stands beside her, richly adorned by feathers of white and blue. How interesting.
She speaks and the feminine voice of this little thing somehow resounds in the dragon’s ears like thunder itself. "Wake up! There is darkness below, your light can no longer only stay skyward! Awaken!"
"Who are you? Where did you come from?”
"I am. I have always been here.”
“Why do I see you?"
“It is for the truth. For love that is eternal, transcending time and distance! He comes and he calls, awaken to what you are! AWAKEN!"
Just like that, it's all gone as suddenly as it had arrived.
The pleasant voice echoes. "You know the truth of you - the reason we are here. Remember. You must remember."
There is suddenly a distant and faint echo of another voice resounding inside. A mortal female, it seems? It can hear what it says. "Link...?"
Another echo. This one is male. "I can't, I just can't...beloved, I'm sorry..."
Intensely warm feeling joins with its sense of regret. What an odd sensation.
Her echo again. "He found me, such a nice dream. Link, it is all right Link..."
His echo again. “I love you. I’ll always love you…”
The pleasant voice again. "You know. You feel it, you know. You must remember. Let go."
Her little echo again. "Don't cry, Link...I love you, too…just once more, hold me close…"
The dragon aches greatly within. A curious and vexing new sensation, how awful. Curse everything, tears again. Always, always more tears. Why can't that pest just go away? Maybe then it would all stop.
No. Wait. It - he stays. He seemed to understand what he was doing, and he ceased. It is as if it - as if he cared. It is all for a reason. Everything has a reason.
It - he - must not go yet. How badly it would hurt if he were to go right now.
He grieves. How wonderful it would be if he grieved no longer.
What unusual thoughts.
What was it? What was this feeling? Why won't the tears stop this time?
In its mind eye, it sees it. A frail looking little mortal girl with pointy little ears, clad in white and seeming to shine amid the bright sunlight on a green field. "May I ask...do you really remember me?"
In its mind's eye, it sees it. That very same girl falling in a dark place as another reaches out for her hand.
In its mind’s eye, it sees it. That very same girl seated with two others in a pleasant place. A woman of tattooed dark skin and long, light golden hair, gently holding her hands and speaking to her. “Oh, your concern is very sweet, Zelda. But listen. You can focus your attention on returning home.”
In its mind's eye, it sees it. That very same girl holding a thing it somehow recognized, looking upward. "PROTECT THEM ALL!"
The pleasant voice again. "You feel love, you know. Remember. Let it go, let me go!"
That's right. That was why. That was always the reason for everything. It had received what it had always wanted to give as a gift, it had been given caring. That was the sign, it was meant to be.
Relaxation. Release. It was time.
"Fear not, Link. My light will go with you, now." It chooses to speak this thought aloud in its way, it wonders if the mortal is capable of understanding. Probably not. They were just so limited, weren't they?
"Link." Yes, that was the name. Fascinating. Had it ever recalled a mortal's name before? It was not sure, but it did know that it rejoiced to know this name. And now other thoughts and shards of memories begin to flood in, as if some great barrier had suddenly fallen away. Even for a being so great, the experience is overwhelming.
That's right...the reason that I am here…the reason that I was there…
Love…everyone…how I wish I could really see them…
If only they could know me…I will miss the voice…I don’t want to be lonely…
It speaks.
"Link…please find me again…”
It is far too soon for it to really understand. But in this moment it now knows what it must, and it knows what it must do.
***
Atop the Dragon of Light, hair loosens and recedes. The dragon roars. Link the hero opens his eyes to look, and he sees it. The sword is embedded upon the head still, but there is nothing else to grip it tight any longer. He wonders to behold it for a long moment.
"Did you...did you hear me? Do you know my voice? Do you know me?” The dragon roars a bit. He hears no real answer, of course, but he listens. He knows how to listen.
"You're telling me to take it. You want me to take it." He speaks no questions this time.
He reaches out with both hands to seize the Master Sword. Remembering the dragon's horrid scream, he pulls as gently as he can manage. It comes out with no resistance whatsoever. Golden light shines and shimmers bright as the sword of legend manifests into its true form once again.
Very, very slowly, with deliberate purpose, Link points the sword toward the sky. He contemplates it as the light of the dawn shines all about him. The sword shimmers with a faint blue light.
He hears the voice. "We are here. Believe. She dreams. Now we fight as one. Be brave."
In his mind's eye, he sees it. His beloved Princess Zelda floating in some ethereal place, cradling the decayed Master Sword lovingly as a mother would to a newborn baby. He hears her thoughts as though they are truly spoken. "The Master Sword...your sword...She is the key to destroying the Demon King. He defeated her before, but a long slumber will heal these grevious wounds. And when you two next face the Demon King you will have my strength to help you, through her. Link, you are our final hope. I pray this sword reaches you in the future."
Link is overcome as he experiences the sight and the feeling of the sword of legend. It is familiar and yet totally extraordinary to him, now. He can practically feel the energy pulsating from it. This was the Master Sword restored, but it was more than even that. This was surely the sword far beyond what it had ever been. Just to hold it now was to know strength, and that was only the beginning. With the blade in his hands he was experiencing a warm feeling both without and within. It was a warmth of the sort he had only ever known when experiencing her loving embrace before.
Thank you, old friend. Thank you for staying with her. Thank you for all of it.
This was power far beyond what had been when the Demon King had been found below Hyrule Castle. More than that, the very nature of it was far beyond what that vile man could comprehend. Here was a thing reforged to oppose and deny everything that defined what Ganondorf was. This was the power of light in the sword to render it akin to a living symbol of what it was meant to protect. It was still the weapon to smite and seal the darkness, and it was an artifact giving form to the resilient strength of life and love too. This was a weapon for a fighter and a nurturer. Such were the thoughts of Link the hero in this moment, although he was sure that it meant even more than what any words of his could express. She had always been the better one with words.
"I knew it. It’s still you.”
The dragon roars.
"You’ve been with us, you never really left us. You'll be with us when we face him."
Link knows he cannot linger. Staying with her was not what she wanted, nor was it what she loved needed. But there was always enough time for the truth.
“No matter how much anything changes, no matter how much time passes, no matter how far apart we are, our feelings will always reach each other. Our bond will never break.”
The dragon roars a bit.
“I’ll follow your wish, but there’s one thing I won’t agree to. You made a mistake, you know. You said 'Protect them all’. Well, you are here. I say that command includes you, too. So here and now, I'm making a new vow of love to you."
Silence lingers.
"I’m not giving up on you. I don't care what the wise thought, I don't care what anyone will think. I won't move on. I'll never stop looking for a way to hold you again. I’ll come back to you over and over, and you’ll know you’re not alone. I'll remember and love you completely and I’ll never love anyone else."
He ceases. The dragon roars a bit. Tears manifest from its eyes once again, and he knows it. He suspects reasons for why, but he will not dwell on it. Whatever the exact truth was, it wouldn't change a thing about his resolve.
"Don't worry. I’ll watch over them for you. I’ll watch over them with you as I keep you with me in my heart.” The sword of legend is sheathed once again.
Soon he is returned to solid ground in the sky for a time, back at the very same sky island where all of this crazy adventure had started. He watches the dragon fly off toward the horizon.
“Beloved, I swear. Right here, right now, this is the beginning of the end.”
He prepares and then he leaps to dive and glide back down. It is time to return to the surface and the refuge of Lookout Landing. There he would speak his heart to their friends as best he could. It would be hard, but they deserved to understand just how far he was ready to go this time. Most importantly, he needed them to understand what had to be remembered forever. She deserved no less.
And then, the time would be near for the one stupid enough to make her his enemy. No more worry, no more uncertainty, no more lies to deny, no more passive protection. Her true love had worried and searched. Now he had received the truth and her wish and the sword. Now it would soon be time for the fire in her knight’s heart to blaze uncontrolled, never to subside again until all that was dark was burned away to ash.
Unknown to anyone, two specters linger to watch him pass out of sight through the clouds. They are almost akin to shadows, if a shadow could endure to shine ever so slightly in the light of day. They look to the dragon next once he is gone.
“Is it all right like this? Do you think it’s going to be enough for her sake, Rauru?”
“He will have everything she needs when our time comes, Sonia. His mind remembers and it has learned, his heart holds everything that matters. You should know, you taught it all to me a long time ago.”
“Hm.” She wears a satisfied smirk that soon blossoms into a great smile. “It is good that you paid proper attention, my love.”
She looks away from him to look at the Dragon of Light again.
“Wait just a bit longer, Zelda dear. Soon we will finally take you home.”
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