Mirrors - Chapter 1
#2 of Mirrors
A ten year old girl sat on the floor and cried. Her hair was long and golden. Her swollen eyes were bright blue. Her dress was pink and white and gold, but it was tattered and torn, stained by smoke and blood.
The door to the little shack where the girl sheltered opened. Outside it was raining. In from the rain stepped a woman. She was tall, with steel gray hair cropped pragmatically short. She wore light armor over a close-fitting body suit. A sword rode at her hip, and tucked under one arm was a parcel.
"Zelda." The girl looked up at the woman's voice. "I brought you new clothing."
Zelda sniffed, and dried her eyes on one tattered sleeve. She gathered the equally tattered remains of a royal dignity beyond her age and said, "Thank you Impa."
Impa helped her change from her ruined dress to the new clothing. It was a bit like a miniature version of what Impa herself wore, a close-fitting bodysuit, with the wrappings that were traditional to Sheikah wound over it.
"There." Impa nodded her approval. Zelda looked down at herself, feeling strange. It was nothing like she had ever worn before. It made her feel oddly vulnerable, not to be swathed in layers of skirts. "For now you must be a Sheikah boy. My adopted son, Sheik. The Princess Zelda is in hiding, somewhere far away, never seen. The world will see only the last Sheikah."
"But Sheikah have red eyes..."
Impa smiled. "So do you now. There is magic in the Sheikah wrappings. We have taken in those not of our clan before. Whoever joins us becomes one of us, child. It has always been that way. It will be that way with you, now. And I will train you. I should have trained you before. But your father didn't approve."
"Well he's dead now," said Zelda, tears threatening to begin again. "He can't stop you."
"Zelda..." Impa crouched beside her. "I am sorry. I failed him, and you. I didn't take Ganondorf's threat seriously enough. And I am so sorry. But for now all we can do is go on."
"Why? For what? Everyone is dead and everything is destroyed!"
"Most of Hyrule's people still live, child. Including one special boy, who holds all our hopes now."
Zelda blinked back her tears. "Link? But what can he do?"
"Your own heart tells you the answer to that. Why did you throw him the ocarina?"
"So he could break the seal and draw the Master Sword. So he could beat Ganondorf. But... that was stupid. He's just a boy!"
"There is a prophesy that says the Hero of Legend will always return when Hyrule needs him. Link is the hero. He's only a boy now, but trust me. The time will come when he will have the strength to face Ganondorf. And when that day comes he will not stand alone. You will stand by his side. So we must prepare you for that day."
An expression of determination crossed Zelda's young face. "I'll be ready."
"Good. But that day is still years away. And Ganondorf will be searching for you. So from this day forward you must be Sheik, and no one else. No matter how safe a place may seem, no matter how trusted a friend may be, you are Sheik. Do you understand?"
"I understand."
The years that followed were not easy. Especially at first. The lessons were hard, and Zelda often found herself pushed to the limits of her child's strength. More than once she screamed that she hated Impa, and hated Sheik too, she wanted to be Zelda again.
But even in those moments it was her happy past she missed, not her identity. She missed her parents. She missed having a comfortable bed, plentiful food, and servants to pamper her. She missed having few lessons and fewer duties. Now every day was a lesson and her whole life was a duty. So there were days when she felt she could take no more and she rebelled and shouted tearful curses.
Those days, however, became fewer and fewer as time passed. The tight-fitting suit and wrappings began to feel comfortable. The skills she learned began to come easily to her. And the soft beds and vast banquets of her childhood faded from memory, until they were unreal, dream-like. She knew they had once been part of her life, but she seldom thought of them, or thought much of them if she did. Her life now was learning to fight, learning the simple but profound Sheikah magics, and preparing for the battle that was to come.
Soon the name Sheik began to feel like her name. Zelda was a dream too, a name never spoken save by the Hylians she met, who sometimes whispered it quietly with hope. Everyone seemed to know that somewhere out there the princess planned Ganondorf's downfall. Ganondorf's servants also sometimes spoke that name, seeking always for the princess who had escaped. If they caught her, they would do unspeakable things to her. Thus even when they were alone Impa called her by no other name. Before long she became Sheik even in the privacy of her own mind.
Sheik's skills and strength grew as the years passed. By the time she, or he, began to blossom into puberty and needed additional concealing spells added to the one that colored his eyes red, Sheik could scale a seemingly sheer wall in seconds, defeat a full grown Stalfos, and work with the very substance of shadow itself. He felt completely at home in his role, so much so that it no longer felt like a role. He was a wandering warrior and bard, his lyre and Impa's drums an excuse for them to travel wherever they wished, keeping an eye on Ganondorf's growing power and preparing for the day, no longer all that distant, when the Hero of Time would step from the Sacred Realm to take up the Master Sword and bring down the Gerudo tyrant. And if his voice raised in song was a little too light, a little too high, well, the Sheikah were strange and barbaric people who might do anything, even up to castrating a young singer. So the glances and rumors might fly, but they always flew far of the mark. None suspected, and even Sheik himself seldom remembered, that the elusive princess Zelda moved among them every day.
So seven years slipped by, until at last one particular day dawned.
Sheik's heart was racing. He hung near the peak of the Temple of Time's high, vaulted ceiling. A slender cord was anchored to a buttress above, and his feet found an inch-wide purchase on a decorative molding, but the precarious perch was not the reason for his racing pulse. He was very much accustomed to such perches.
The reason was the currently empty dais below. It had stood empty, as the door to the inner temple had stood unlocked, for seven years. Seven years since a ten-year-old boy had drawn the Master Sword. And in just a few minutes that same boy would reappear. The boy that Sheik hadn't seen since he had been the almost-forgotten Zelda.
Though his face was serene, stilled by years of discipline, Sheik's emotions were a churning, chaotic boil. In a moment the hero that all of Hyrule was waiting for would appear. The linchpin of the hopes and plans that Sheik and Impa had cherished all these years. The one capable of bringing freedom and peace to a ravaged land. And that hero was Link, his childhood friend. His childhood... crush even, if he dared to think it. But Link knew only Zelda. He had never met Sheik. And he too must not know, not until the penultimate moment, when all else was ready.
In a way this made Sheik glad. He wanted Link to know him as himself, to see him for what he was, not what he had been. And yet it would be hard. Memories welled up within him, disturbing him, reminding him of what truly lay beneath the wrappings he wore. And thoughts of the future came too. He knew that when Link's quest was finished, Zelda must come back. Sheik must perish, for Hyrule would need its princess. Link's arrival brought Sheik's end that much closer.
And what would Link be like after so long? He had been a quiet child, but quick and very strong, both physically and mentally. Would he have changed? Would he remember the years he had spent sleeping, sealed away beyond Ganondorf's reach? Would he still be that same ten year old boy?
A sound, on the very edge of audibility, interrupted Sheik's chaotic thoughts. He looked down to see a blue glow beginning to grow around the pedestal. The sound swelled to a high, crystalline note, like the sound of a tuning fork. The glow grew too, then faded. There, where a moment ago there had been nothing, stood Link, the Hero of Time. Sheik's breath caught. He was just as Sheik had imagined. The promise of the boy's strength had been fulfilled in the man that now stood there, tall and broad-shouldered, with the Master Sword slung across his back. He glanced around the room, then turned and began to walk confidently towards the door.
There was no more time for thinking, it was time for action. Sheik slid down the cord he'd readied and landed with silent grace on the very spot where Link had stood only moments before. Link must have heard the faint, nearly inaudible scuff of boot against stone for he spun, drawing his sword with an almost musical scrape of steel on steel. He faced Sheik in a ready stance, but his eyes were cool and calm. He was prepared for violence if that was what proved necessary, but he did not leap to attack. Instead he looked at Sheik, the lithe young body, the red eyes, the blond hair falling loose in front, bound into a tail in back, and the mask that hid his face lest someone find it familiar and somehow guess the truth. There was no recognition in Link's eyes, he saw only a stranger. It was gratifying and heartbreaking at once. Sheik wanted to pull off his mask, to shout the truth, to say everything. But now was not the time.
Still, it was all he could do to keep his voice level as he said, "I've been waiting for you."
"Who are you?" The question was calm but wary.
"I am Sheik, the last of the Sheikah. And you are the Hero of Time." Sheik looked at him again, standing so close, his face so familiar and yet so changed. "Seeing you..." he started, then paused for an instant, remembering himself. "You do look worthy of the legends."
"What legends?" asked Link.
"The legends passed down among the Sheikah. That when evil rules all, a voice from the Sacred Realm will call the destined sages, and a hero will visit the five temples where they are held captive and set them free." He stared intently at Link, hoping the hero would read the clues that were all Sheik had to give. He knew a little more, but Impa had cautioned him against saying too much. Sheik might be meant to guide Link, but Link also must find his own destiny. If he came to lean too much of Sheik he might not gain the strength he would need.
"One in a deep forest. One on a high mountain. One beneath a vast lake. One within the house of the dead. And one in a goddess of the sand. Together with the destined hero, these sages will bind evil and bring peace to the land"
"The destined hero?"
"You. The Hero of Time."
"And who are the sages?"
"I cannot tell you."
"Then how am I supposed to... to do whatever it is I'm supposed to do?"
"Your fate, your wits, and your courage will guide you," said Sheik.
"But..." Link hesitated, and he looked so lost, so suddenly young and bewildered, that Sheik couldn't resist trying to help him a little bit more.
"You'll find the first sage familiar. She awaits within the Forest Temple. Though you cannot yet reach it. But I can tell you where to begin. Kakariko Village holds what you will need."
"I... I see." He sheathed his sword, but his expression was still wary. "How do I know I can trust you?"
Sheik felt a pang. He knew Link was right, he really didn't have any reason to trust Sheik. But he hadn't been able to keep from hoping that somehow Link would sense something of their old friendship. "I can offer you nothing but my word," said Sheik.
Link looked at him for a long time, his piercing blue eyes seeming to stare into Sheik's soul. For a moment Sheik felt terribly vulnerable, as though Link could actually see through his disguise, to the deeply hidden truth beneath. What would he think if he knew?
Then Link nodded. "Very well. Kakariko Village you say?"
"...Yes."
"Can you tell me anything else?"
"No."
Link nodded again, then turned and left, walking with easy confidence, and leaving Sheik to wonder what had just happened.