World Tree MUSH

After visiting Faron Spring and the Sacred Grove, the royal entourage accomplished what it set out to do and turned northward, to return to Snowpeak Garrison to regroup and plan the next move.

The party has managed to leave the forests behind, returning to the open plainsland that makes up most of Hyrule Field. Winter is still here, and in force, but there's warm clothing for everyone. Additional warm clothing for Link had been guessed at; the cold-weather gear probably doesn't fit quite perfectly.

It may still be cold on the flatlands, occasionally windy, but the weather is still noticeably warmer than Peak Province. Up until now, it's been a fairly straightforward trek across the sea of grass, avoiding both areas infested by and individual creatures of the Twilight.

The princess has mostly stuck to riding in the wagon, after having been laid out by the events at the Sacred Grove. She's been recovering slowly. Now that the party has camped at the edge of a stream, hidden from plain sight by a rock outcropping, the princess has started up a campfire and settled beside it. Strewn over her lap are maps salvaged from Snowpeak, some amended and some drawn from scratch. Others are spread over the ground beside her, pinned down by various rocks. The maps aren't professional work, but they're unsettlingly close.

Mostly she's marking their path, and updating those areas afflicted by the Twilight where they'd gone around it. The job is helped along using a pen probably donated by Yumi.

...Convenient things, those.

It didn't take very long for Link to recover enough to begin riding on his own. Maybe it was a part of his power, but he just didn't seem to get taken out of it the way Zelda did when she used her own. Might be because he isn't channeling divine energy quite the same way, and might be that's just the way he is. Even so, there is a relative lack of energy in him that can't really be explained through a disparity between himself and the wolf that he was. Especially given the way he was the /first/ time they put him back to semi-normal.

"Eldin Bridge is out." He chimes in helpfully, noticing the maps as he seats himself next to the fire. Link doesn't seem bothered by the ill-fitting winter clothing, though he did remark that he would probably go hunt some wolfos to get materials for something better-fitting later.

It wasn't that this wouldn't do, but his worry had to do with /fighting/ in poorly-sized winter garb.

"Times like this I miss the fur." He adds, laying down across the ground and looking up towards Zelda upside down.

"But, er. The bridge. It was teleported. Into the sky. Still don't know where it was teleported /to/. Probably nowhere special, as long as it was 'far enough away'. Wouldn'ta been surprised to find it in Ordon, only I never did spot anything like it on any of my return visits."

"Can't imagine where they'd put it otherwise." He rambles, a bit.

"You feelin' any better?" Link asks, genially.

Eldin Bridge is out. Zelda looks up very slowly at those words, maps and papers forgotten on her lap for a moment. She stares with slow deliberation at Link, as though she were desperately hoping that he's joking. Is he joking? No. No, he's not joking. If he is, nobody's laughing.

The princess draws in a deep breath through her nose, and lets it go in a sigh that is the very essence of exasperation that is still being kept mostly civil. "Of course Eldin Bridge is out," she repeats, serenely.

She listens for a moment as he explains the circumstances, and the more he talks, the more absurd it all sounds. By the time he looks at her upside-down and explains the details, she's vigourously rubbing the bridge of her nose and trying not to look too annoyed, to varying degrees of success.

"I don't suppose you know who actually teleported the bridge?" Zelda ventures, quirking a brow as she hunches over, slashes a line through the bridge on her map, and starts penning in annotations in her characteristic tiny, but freakishly neat, hand.

She pauses, cocking a summer-blue eye up at him. "Not that this information would do any of us any good whatsoever. Do you know how long it will take to rebuild all of that? It took years to build in the first place. Still. I'm curious where one loses a bridge spanning the whole of Lake Hylia."

"I think Midna could put it back," Link says, "if we could figure out where the other piece of the bridge went. But like I said, I haven't seen it anywhere roamin' around. I'm sure we'll come across it eventually. Unless..." He frowns slightly, seeming to percolate on the problem, "Unless they teleported it to /their/ world. But I wouldn't think they'd want to, you know? It'd be an awful inconvenience to just... steal a bridge and have bits of it lying around."

To the question of /who/ did the deed, Link shakes his head, "Naw. It happened when we tried to cross one day. Big ol' black hole rimmed in red geometry splits the sky and sort of sucked it away. Couple of those big twilight beasts came out of it afterwards and took a run at us. Didn't do 'em much good, though."

"If you ask me, it probably wasn't a specific person. Probably a buncha their magicians seein' to the task, and then movin' on with their days. It ain't like that's the sort of task they can delegate to the Bulblins, you know?"

Link blinks up at Zelda's question. He seems to consider the matter for a moment, then replies, "Probably not as long as you figure. It ain't the whole bridge, just a chunk outta the middle. Find the pieces and it can probably just be put back together. I dunno how long it'll take to fix that section, though..."

"If it's like y'say, and you rebuild it wholesale, probably a few years. Maybe less if you get the Gorons to work on it."

"I'm certain Midna had a very good reason for taking the bridge away in the first place." Zelda's tone of voice is just acerbic enough to suggest she doesn't buy that for a minute. She sighs again. "Why in the Goddesses' name would... no, never mind, I'm not even going to try to guess. That sounds like an exercise in frustration."

The princess blows out another sigh, smaller than the last. Well, if it wasn't Midna, than that leaves a relatively short list of candidates. Likely at the head of the pack would be Zant, using that tainted power of his.

"So, he wanted to cripple mobility. I can understand that. Like as not the only one with the power to do something like that was Zant." Zelda looks down at her maps, lips thinning in a gesture of displeasure.

Still staring down, she reaches up to tuck an errant lock of hair behind a pointed ear. The gesture makes her seem both older and younger than her years; her eyes are fixed solely on the maps in front of her, scanning, as though she might find the immediate answers to Hyrule's problems there.

...No, not really, but she's wise enough to know that easy solutions rarely pay off in the long run.

"A few years, maybe less," she agrees, as far as Eldin Bridge is concerned. "I've heard nothing from the Gorons, either. The silence from Death Mountain is almost as concerning as the silence from Zora's Domain. I heard a disturbing rumour..."

"Er... no. Midna didn't take it away. Twilight beasts did." Link corrects, with a wave of his hand, "If she was capable of somethin' like that right now, she wouldn't be sneakin' around the way she does. But if she had, I'm sure it's be just as unfathomable as you're imaginin' it. I figure they just did it to keep us from having an easy road through that area. Worked, if that was the idea."

"But she seemed to think she could put it back, so..." He shrugs, loosely.

"I don't think it was Zant," he replies, "mostly 'cause it just didn't feel that threatening. I kinda wonder if all of those twilight creatures can do something like it, if they want to. I know Midna can take advantage of it when they do stuff like that, though. Sort of like..."

"Sort of like she's tunneling through bits of their world and coming out ours."

On the subject of the Gorons and Zora, he replies: "Ain't much point picking a fight with the Gorons. Probably, they holed themselves up when trouble started happenin'. Best thing they could do for themselves. The Zora... well. I heard Prince Ralis was sent away from their domain before things got real bad. Rumor was that he was headed your way to ask for help over somethin', but nobody has really heard from him since. Not that you'd /know/..."

"Ain't like the post is running. Could be anywhere in the Kingdom, but near as I heard he's the only Zora anyone's heard from since all of this started."

"They're probably being held captive," Link decides, "like my villagers."

Zelda tosses the pen aside with a careless flick of her wrist, sending it skittering across dead grass to rest by her ankle. That done, she reaches up to knead the bridge of her nose with both hands, muttering under her breath. "Sorry. Yes. But it doesn't particularly matter. The deed is done."

"Eldin Bridge is an important route, but we will be able to work around it, if we must. I believe the priority right now is to secure the other provinces. It will do no good to liberate Hyrule Castle, only to have the provinces collapse around it," Zelda muses, as much to herself as to Link, tracing a line around them on the map with her forefinger. "I will then be fighting a war on multiple fronts. Too many fronts. That I cannot do."

She looks up again, as though one waking from a dream. "The Gorons? Yes. Perhaps. I worry something has happened to them. I have known their chieftain, Darbus, since I was a little girl. This behaviour is not normal, and it bears investigation. It would be prudent; there are no better metallurgists in Hyrule. Their help could be invaluable."

They're probably being held captive, Link decides, and Zelda sighs again at the mention of it. "Perhaps." She rubs at her hand, worrying idly at the mark of the Triforce of Wisdom. "It is not too late, you know. To go back. I will wield the sword, if I must." She lifts her eyes from the maps, studying the goatherd, scrutinizing him with more depth than anyone her age has any right to show. "I am capable, as I carry the blood of the one who forged it. And it is not too late to turn back to Ordona. If their situation is grave... I do not know when we will pass by that way again."

"I don't think the castle would be useful right now anyhow," Link replies, with a vague shrug, "the mountains are a lot harder for anybody to get to. But no. I don't plan to go off on my own back towards Ordon. I get the feelin' that I'll wind my way back around there eventually anyway. I think that's sort of how it's supposed to be done? It's a little hard to explain what I mean."

He waves a hand animatedly, "I guess like your Goddess things. You can explain it, but it ain't something you get to experience unless you're me. The sword would probably work for you, but I don't think it's meant for you. An' I'm pretty sure rattlebones would chase me to the ends of Hyrule if I saw fit to abandon all of this anyway."

"As for the rest, I don't think metallurgists are really going to do the trick here. All the people you've been gatherin', that's the key to ending this. If an army and the weapons an army can field were gonna deal with this, it woulda been dealt with at the very start, before it ever reached Ordona."

"Since it wasn't," he says, "I don't think force of ordinary arms matters too much. Though it does help."

A glance is cast towards his bow and quiver, a few yards away.

"But, y'know," Link grins up at Zelda, "you really shouldn't be so quick to take more on your shoulders'n you've already got. It's too much as-is, even with your Goddess powers going for you."

His eyes shift to look straight up into the sky, "That's part of how I got through as much as I did. If you look at the whole thing all at once, it really doesn't feel impossible. So, I take it a step at a time, don't work myself up about what comes next."

"I think that ain't the kinda person you are, but it might help, sometimes."

"I think it's already a foregone conclusion that this war will not be won with arms, nor will my soldiers be protected by armour." Zelda steeples her fingers, arching a brow at Link. "That much is evident. No. I do not want their skills for the manufacture of arms. I want their skills because there are no finer engineers in Hyrule."

"Outfitting my soldiers would be needless. They failed the first advance. What makes you think I would trust in them to mount an offense?" The princess shakes her head, slowly gathering up her maps and rolling them up nealy in a single practised motion. "Besides, even if their skill were guaranteed in fighting such unconventional opponents -- which it is not -- they cannot even fight meaningfully. Not so long as he can control the Twilight."

Slowly, she stacks the rolled-up maps, clips the pen to her collar, and gathers up the bundle of maps, pushing herself to her feet and heading for the back of the wagon with them. She'll wait for Link to follow, although on the whole she seems to be moving more slowly than him.

She glances back over her shoulder, eyes bright. "Yes?" She shouldn't take on more responsibilities, he says, in so many words. Her expression remains blank for about three seconds before her brows furrow. "I know it seemseasy enough for you to say, but for me, that is as impossible as for you to return to Ordona before all of this is finished." She jerks her chin towards her right hand, where the mark of the Triforce is visible.

"Worry not." She turns away, hair trailing behind her as she stands tip-toe to stuff scrolls safely into the junk at the back of the wagon. "One step at a time; that is how any conquest is won. Hyrule was not built in a day or even in a generation, or so I would presume."

She's silent a moment as he reaches his point, roundabout.

Shrugging, the princess dusts her hands, folding her arms and leaning against the back panel of the wagon, looking up at the sky. "I wish we could have lingered in the Sacred Grove. I would have liked to walk it. I remember nothing of it. I have never been there before last week. But /she/ remembers."

"Oh."

Link considers the matter of the soldiers for a moment. Then, "I didn't really expect you to. I just didn't reckon you were thinking much of engineering just now. They're not entirely powerless though, you know. They caught glimpses of me, sometimes. Got real frightened, 'cause of course you get frightened at a wolf as big as horse." An exaggeration, but not much of one.

He rises from where he's laying, pacing himself to reach the wagon a little behind Zelda as he goes. Link locks his fingers behind his head as they go, "Nah. I imagine I /will/ go back to Ordona before it's all done. To get rid of the twilight there, if nothin' else. There's a place there that I'm pretty sure will have somethin' useful."

"It's also as far out from anythin' important as... well, anything. So I figure they won't pay it too much mind. It's just, I don't intend to go home before finishin' things up. Be kind of rude, not to do what needs to be done if I /can/. But I know what you mean, even if it's a little bit different for me."

"You think about things a lot more than I do." He says, halting next to the wagon and unlacing his fingers to let his arms drop to the sides, "You'll get to go back, someday."

"Speaking of though, what /do/ you want to do next? Back to the mountains, yes. But from there?"

Folding her arms, the princess leans against the back of the wagon, settling her robe more comfortably about her shoulders and huddling into it. It's cold, although it isn't the arctic chill of Snowpeak. "It is no fault of their own. They performed their duties admirably, and acquitted themselves with courage..."

A shadow passes over her expression. "The best I can do now is ensure that their sacrifices were not in vain. But I have no illusions that this is not a contest of arms. It has never been."

Her nostrils flare when he mentions getting rid of the Twilight. "It will be done," she murmurs, so softly it might be lost. "This I promise. I will not suffer that filth to sully the light of this kingdom any longer than necessary. I will travel Hyrule and stamp it out myself if I must."

She looks up to the sky. He says she thinks about things a lot more; he isn't wrong. He also says she'll get to go back, someday, and she glances at him, obliquely. "I know." Zelda looks away. "It isn't just the place from which I can rebuild Hyrule. It's my home, too. I'll go back. Yes? But not yet."

Where to go next?

"Back to the mountains. Yes. From there, we will winnow out the truth of what has befallen both Death mountain and Zora's Domain. I must address Midna's silence as well, but there is little I can do for her right now."

Zelda leans against the wagon, blowing out a breath in a tired sigh. "But right now... I would sleep. I am still exhausted." A flicker of something that might be annoyance crosses her features. "I will be some time recovering my strength."

"Mm. We didn't have many fightin' men, back home. I was one of two. No idea what became of Rusl-- the man who forged your sword." Link reaches over his shoulder to clap his blade -- HIS blade, not the Goddess Sword -- on the hilt, "I reckon he did as well as can be expected. Might be alive. Might not. Wasn't among the prisoners, though. Still don't even know why they're takin' prisoners, truth told."

"Still... sorry. Seems like I stirred up some especially bad times." He rubs at the back of his head, a little awkwardly.

"Filth, huh? You know..." He glances out into the surrounding darkness, "If it wasn't turnin' folks into spirits and bein' used as a weapon, I'd think it was pretty. Can't be that everything from the Twilight is bad, y'know? But maybe I've just spent a little too much time in it for my own good. Bein' a wolf, I can only s'pose it does strange things to your head."

Link smacks his lips exaggeratedly, "Still got a strange taste for verrrrry rare meat."

"If y'don't mind," he says, "we might want to start with Zora's Domain. If the Queen of the Zora sent her son away, I can only imagine that they were in a worse way than the Gorons. Given what they spread 'round the world, I don't imagine a volcano is all that pleasant for them twilight critters to be around."

"Probably mostly leave it alone, as long as it's kept under lock and key."

Regarding her weariness, Link nods.

"I'll keep watch. Anything I can do to help you get your energy back? Potions, or food-- I can still hunt y'know. Just with a bow, instead of teeth." He jerks his head towards Epona, "She's a good partner. But, er... it'll wait until you don't need a watchman, of course."

"My sword?" Zelda raises a brow, blinking owlishly as her gaze swivels back around to Link. The statement seems to confuse her for a moment until she realises that he's talking about the tribute blade. She shakes her head. "It is yours. I am touched by the sentiment, but I have my royal father's blade. Your Ordon blade does not suit me."

She only shakes his head to his apologies, mute.

"Filth," she agrees, with a degree or two more vehemence than may be required. "What you have seen in the areas afflicted is not what the Twilight Realm should be. I know corruption when I have felt it for myself. So too do the memories of Her Grace. What Zant wields like a bludgeon is not what should be: He has corrupted the Twilight Realm with his meddling, just as much as he has thrown the world of the light into disarray. It does not have a place in this world."

Some of that might be Hylia's vehemence, but where certain subjects run, the line between the two has stretched very thin indeed in places. For the moment, though, Zelda doesn't comment on his preferences in cooked meat. That may in part be because she remembers what he used to look and smell like when he came trudging back into camp, painted in the blood of his prey. Gross. At least... that's what the dubious look she's fixed him with seems to say.

She gives his advice due consideration, gaze straying off to the side as he lists his reasons. They're all sound reasons. In truth, she wants to go to both places, and the draw towards either one is equally strong... but she can only be in one place at a time, and there is only so much she can do.

Zelda dips her chin in what is not quite a nod, pushing off from the back of the wagon as she goes to get her bedroll prepared. She, as she so often does, prefers to sleep near the fire. "Agreed. Zora's Domain is the wiser choice. For Queen Rutela to remain silent for this long is indicative that something terrible has happened there. I must go, and see for myself. If something has... than it is my responsibility to set things right."

With a now-practised gesture, she shakes out her bedroll, pausing only long enough to kick off her boots and climb in, rolling over and facing the campfire. She doesn't move. After a moment she heaves a great but quiet sigh, weary.

"Only what we do not have: Time. Still. I thank you, Link."

After a few seconds she seems to remember something else.

"Yes. Epona is a good partner. You suit her, and she suits you..."

The princess' observation is broken by a yawn.

"Good night, Link."

If he tries to talk to her any further, he won't get any answers out of her.