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Over the course of his adventure, Link had got pretty good at ignoring pain and pressing on anyways. He’d always had a sister to rescue, or a friend to help, or a goal to fulfill, and there was never much time for thinking about how much things hurt till each task was done and the King of Red Lions was letting him cry and giving advice on wrapping bandages. But now the King of Red Lions would never talk to him again, there were no tasks left to complete, and there was saltwater stinging in his open wounds as him and Tetra floated in the middle of the ocean.
Tetra was cursing enough to make Grandma try to cover his and Aryll’s ears at the same time, even though Grandma only had two hands. Between all the swears she was mostly going on about how somehow the gods had enough gratitude in them for the people who just did them a huge favor to bring them to the surface, but somehow not enough to get them to dry land.
Link was just glad she looked properly like Tetra again. He had a feeling that if her crew’d seen what she looked like down below, she’d have shot them.
They seemed pretty nice, and probably wouldn’t enjoy being shot.
And also, most important, they were keeping Aryll safe, which meant he extra owed them a favor or something. He’d been the Hero now, he’d done his whole duty as the Hero, he remembered being the Hero now so many times all the way back to living in the sky and one step to the side and dizzyingly far into the future, and he still couldn’t really figure out how the whole Hero thing worked. Or maybe that was the Hero thing, not knowing how it was much supposed to go but doing his duty anyways. Link didn’t know, and anyways Tetra was shouting at him and pointing at something not-him and his whole body was sore and stinging something awful from the saltwater, so he abandoned that whole line of thought to see what she was so worked up about.
It turned out to be a ship. He narrowed his eyes a bit more, and “a ship” turned into “a very familiar pirate ship”, and it made sudden sense why Tetra was yelling so much. Link was definitely gaping now too. If Tetra wasn’t so distracted she’d probably be laughing at how big his eyes were.
Aryll might be on that ship!
He’d have thought they shoulda taken her home already, but they were so occupied bringing the other girls back and hopefully not charging their families too much money for the trouble, oh Farore it was probably his job as the Hero to make sure they didn’t do that wasn’t it, and anyways from Aryll’s letters she seemed to be enjoying their company well enough, so there was a good chance. There was a good chance he might get to see his sister again, finally. Finally, finally.
He made to swim over, but the sudden movement from gently treading water to a front crawl tore at the wound in his side until his vision went all blurry with pain and he wasn’t seeing anything except spots, and he wasn’t keeping himself up at all —
He blinked his eyes open to see Tetra supporting him and making a face.
“You idiot!” she snapped. “They’ve seen us, don’t waste energy like that!” Her touch on him was light enough it didn’t make him all twitchy, but firm so that he wouldn’t sink, and he appreciated that, and she was right, so he didn’t make a face back at her and focused on getting back to treading water.
In the meantime, the ship got closer, and Link could make out the usual collection of pirates, and Aryll among them in some bright dress he didn’t recognize, and was that Medli, hovering in the air, and Makar beside her? A grin broke out on his face, a sort of pure, sourceless relief, and he waved back at them with a frantic energy he hadn’t thought he still had in him, not after the past… well, howevermany hours he’d been under the ocean.
Medli swooped down and snatched him right out of the water.
Her talons snagged in his shirt, and he almost screamed before he realized what was happening. In the seconds before he was deposited roughly on the deck — Medli must have been tired, she usually set him down gently — he leaned into the thrill of flight instead, the song of the wind rushing past his ears.
“Link!” trilled Makar, alternately bouncing on various shoulders and floating on his leaf from excitement.
Link noticed idly that some of the crew had thrown Tetra a rope and were pulling her up, then he grinned back at Makar and patted the top of his head, to let Makar know it was alright to sit there.
Makar trilled again, and made a beeline for the perch. Meantime, Medli was smiling shyly at him; she ducked her head in greeting and so did he. The enchantment of the Command Melody might have worn off, but they still understood each other well enough without words. From the corner of his eye, he thought he saw a flash of Aryll’s bright dress pushing through the crowd, but Tetra caught his attention instead with all her spectacle.
She was yelling at her crew, or maybe crying, or maybe being hugged by them, or maybe scolding them, Link wasn’t sure. She had so much energy — she always had so much energy, even when she was a proper princess raised all princess-like. He remembered her waking him up before dawn to watch the sunrise in some life, and all he’d wanted to do was sleep a little more; he remembered chasing her around a festival and trying so hard to keep up he’d hardly paid attention to the actual goings-on. It wasn’t really fair, that most of the time she was stuck some place ‘cause of some wise thing she was doing, or even a not-so-wise thing.
Link mostly kept going ‘cause he had to, someone had to and it may as well be him, but Tetra, Zelda, whatever, she wasn’t so much made of unbending determination. She’d been built out of boundless life, instead, and a gift for making sarcastic remarks right in the middle of almost dying. It was kind of annoying. But also a bit comforting. The same kind of annoying and comforting as Grandma nagging him into eating all his dinner even though him and Aryll wanted to go out and play pretend on the lookout tower already, the sun was setting fast and she wouldn’t let them go out when it was dark so she ought to let them go now.
...he missed Grandma.
But at least Aryll was here, now, in front of him, for real and smiling and he was smiling too— he reached out and touched his fingertips to hers, to shape her in his mind and confirm her reality, and she smiled even bigger. He’d never had a sister in any life he could recall. Aryll was the best sister.
Her dress, which was yellow and covered in skull designs like a pirate flag, was something Grandma would never’ve let her wear, probably it had been Tetra’s at some point before she grew out of it, but Link thought it rather suited Aryll. Or at least, she’d taken well to pirate life, with the way she was all bright and full and smiling. Last time he’d seen her, she’d been pale, and malnourished, and afraid, and he didn’t like that Aryll one bit.
“Hoy, Big Brother,” she said, and pressed harder against his fingertips. “G’morning.”
He tilted his head a little at her, then pointed at the sun.
“‘kay, fine, maybe it’s not morning! Bleh.” She stuck out her tongue. “How’d you know, anyways? Weren’t you under the ocean? Medli and Makar, they were under the ocean, they said!”
With his free hand, Link gestured at his eyes and made a face.
Aryll rolled her eyes with all the dignity of an eight-year-old. Which wasn’t very much, but Link was pretty sure now that nobody actually had any dignity, ‘cept maybe spirits and really old people.
Then he remembered that there were all these people who’d want to know what had happened, and Aryll and Medli and Makar mostly, and he could get across a lot with him and Aryll’s secret gesture-language but it hadn’t really been designed for things like and then Ganondorf talked a lot and hit me really hard and stole my Triforce piece. Tetra could tell the story, but she was Tetra, so he wasn’t gonna trust her to tell it not-sarcastically.
So, he slipped the Wind Waker out from its snug little spot in his sleeve. The winds rushed to gather themselves, restless and waiting for direction, humming and whispering and howling in his ears. Medli and Makar took notice and readied their instruments. Tetra turned her head a little in recognition. Aryll asked, “What’s that?”
Link answered her with the gesture that meant, I’ll show you. And then he conducted.
All the winds of all the seas came to him, followed his movement with inhuman pitch and wild imprecision. They were called to a certain kind of order by Medli’s harp and Makar’s violin and the rise and fall of his baton, and together they all played a vast, reaching rendition of the Command Melody, almost orchestral with the bass thrum of stormwinds and the high hissing of gales.
He'd conducted for Tetra, down below — she hadn't had an instrument to play for him, so the connection hadn't gone both ways, but she had her own ways to communicate secretly in the middle of a fight so that it didn't so much matter.
She'd laughed at him when he showed her images of her with a harp, her with an ocarina, but he could tell she recognized the memories, even if she had no intention of touching an instrument this life. Well, she was looking kind of curiously at Makar's violin, now that he thought of it. Whatever. That was her problem.
(Possibly everyone’s problem, if she decided to go through with learning it, but. Mostly her problem.)
As the phrase drew to a close, he was suddenly aware of Medli’s careful care, cautious concern, Makar’s bright joy.
He sent something to them that might have resolved into words, You’re here, and, You’re safe, and, You made it, and, It’s over, but might also have just been a vast wave of relief, he wasn’t sure.
Medli sent him back the same, in another wide, unrestrained wave — Makar sent it back too, but more sharply, in that directed way of his, like planting a seed. Link leaned into that breath, shutting his eyes for an instant and feeling light like air, like floating on high breezes full and fuzzy with magic, like sailing face into a storm with the wind so loud he couldn’t hear the King of Red Lions scolding. Then he remembered, again, that he’d never hear the King of Red Lions scolding, not ever again (or Ezlo, or Navi, or Fi— he stopped himself.) Opened his eyes.
Everyone was looking at him all confused, except Tetra, who just looked amused, and Aryll, who was making some sort of face. She was annoyingly hard to read, sometimes, for someone as excitable as her who he’d known her whole life.
He glanced at the crew consideringly for a moment, then shrugged and sent them all Hoy! to see their faces. Tetra stuck her tongue out at him, which basically proved his point about dignity.
Very unheroically, Link left her to deal with their (totally worth it) reactions. There were more important things to attend to.
So he turned to face Aryll fully, pressed his fingertips back against hers in that way they had that was almost like a hug, and sent her love and worry and care and you're safe, we're going home. Link hoped that his thoughts weren't leaking to everyone else; he hadn't ever done this with more than one person around before. If the way Medli was sending him amusement was any indication, though, he wasn't succeeding much.
Aryll blinked at him, and kept making that face, and then she said, “I know we’re going home, silly. ‘Course we’re going home, we just couldn’t ‘till you got here! That’s not what’s important at all. ” She rolled her eyes. “Can’t believe you’re turning into an adult, not noticing important things.”
Link sent her question.
“Well, I haven’t asked for my telescope back, have you noticed?”
Oh. No, he hadn’t.
“See?”
Yes, he saw. He missed her, he’d missed her, he’d even missed the gulls.
Aryll crossed her arms, at that. “And you’re sad,” she proclaimed, like it was more obvious than her liking seagulls and also like she was winning an argument. “I dunno how you’re doing this magicky thing — but you gotta tell me later, ‘kay? — but I saw you’re sad. About a boat or a hat or a sword or something.”
Well… he was. There wasn’t any point denying it, and anyways it’d be rude to the King of Red Lions to not be sad over him. And plus, the more he thought, the more he remembered to be sad about. Not just all the stuff from other lives, which was also sad, but Aryll trapped in the Forsaken Fortress, and Tetra trapped in old Hyrule, and Medli and Makar trapped in their Temples, and the Master Sword trapped under the sea, and Grandma so sick with worry she was trapped in her chair, and the distinct, suffocating aloneness he’d gotten so terribly used to over his adventure that it chilled him even when he was next to people.
There was lots to be sad about. It wasn’t important, it was just how it was.
Makar sent him an image of a tree growing roots, then added, That's me, in your hair.
Link didn't know what to say to that.
Medli and Aryll had started a low conversation at some point, and Medli was apparently better at this thought-sharing thing than Link was cause he couldn't hear her at all. The awkwardness of just standing there getting talked about pulled him right from his head, and then Tetra untangling herself from her crew and marching over like she hadn't got hit on the head a couple hours ago did it more.
“Here, Aryll,” Tetra said, “this is how you do it.” Then she turned to Link, folded her arms, fixed him with the same glare she'd used on Ganondorf, and intoned, in a voice spilling over with divine wisdom, “You're being an idiot.”
Link made a face at her.
“Um, Miss Tetra?” said Aryll, hesitantly, when a few moments had gone by. “I don't think it's working…”
“Ugh, Heroes,” scoffed Tetra. “Every time. You never change.”
Link sent smug victory.
“Actually,” said Aryll, even more smug than him, “Miss Tetra won, cause of you're not sad anymore.” She pointed right at his face. “Take that! ”
Link ducked his head to hide a smile. Those two together could only mean trouble for him, and he was so excited for it. He'd missed them both so much.
“Well, victory aside,” said Medli, leaning up against a barrel in a way that made Link jealous all of a sudden of her having something to support her weight, “we all played our parts. We all did our duty, and did it well, and we won. We won .”
The King of Red Lions, one hand on the Triforce. I desire hope for these children!
“We won,” repeated Tetra, like she was affirming it to herself. “We won!” Link's vision was getting sort of hazy for some reason, but he saw her glancing around all calculating. “You jerks had better not have drank all the alcohol while I was gone. We're having a party!”
Wait, Tetra drank that stuff? He sent disgust, but like, the biggest disgust he could muster, even more disgust than getting half a Chu-Chu in your mouth and swallowing without thinking. It was just gross! That's all there was to it!
“Goody-two-shoes Hero,” said Tetra back.
But he didn't have time to figure out an answer, because suddenly the haze resolved into pain and he was swinging the Wind Waker up to spare everyone else from it at the same time as he was feeling Makar slip off his head because the wounds from his side and his head and his whole body were exploding back into shape and his legs were stopping working but he'd managed to close the melody so at least it was only him feeling it and —
Medli was catching him.
One of her hands was firm on the center of his back, and the other caught under his knees and lowered him to lying flat on the deck, and her touch burned like light magic against his skin, right through his clothes. As soon as he was flat, though, she slipped her hands out from under him and whispered an apology, and Link was impossibly grateful, for her remembering things and for her odd quiet protectiveness.
“You’re injured,” she said, her voice way more distant than it should have been. And then: “Of course you’re injured, you just fought Ganondorf.”
He got a vague impression of someone — Tetra, from the color of the fabric — flopping down next to him, like she’d just got her knees knocked from under her. She swore. “Nayru, that hurts.”
Sure, Link had got the brunt of Ganondorf’s attention, given he was the one with the short-range weapon and also the distraction, but Tetra hadn’t got out unscathed either, and it sounded like her injuries had come back as quick as his. He grimaced. That wound in his side hurt. It wasn’t as bad as dying, but also, it was fresh and hurting right now and there was probably still some saltwater in it and all that walking around and being dropped on ship decks and stuff with it not hurting because of excitement or some Goddess-blessing or something’d probably made it worse. And the King of Red Lions wasn’t there to show him where to put the bandages.
Medli made a sound in her throat like a distressed bird. Makar trilled, somewhere near his head. Someone, maybe Aryll, or maybe one of the pirates, or maybe both, was shouting for the ship’s doctor. The hazy thing that had slipped over his vision and right into his mind wouldn’t go, and he kept remembering things. At least nobody got stuck in a crystal this time, he thought wildly. Or turned to stone. Wait, Ganondorf got turned to stone.
He hadn’t stopped at all to rest or to think since the Triforce of Courage had burned itself into his hand and burned all these memories into his mind, and they kept sneaking up on him and surprising him. Fighting Ganondorf had been especially bad, uncountable other fights flashing in his mind and spread on top of their rooftop battlefield, Demise’s curse ringing in his ears and the bit of his hand where the Triforce of Courage had rested pulling insistently towards Tetra and Ganondorf.
They won, somehow; Ganondorf died at his hands, again; Link spent the whole bubble-ride up making faces at Tetra and wondering if Medli and Makar were alive and thinking about all the times in all the lives the Master Sword had drawn blood and all the times in all the lives people had died around him.
One of the pirates was poking at him, trying to get his patched-up tunic off without actually touching him — Medli or Aryll must’ve said something — and without making his injuries even worse. They weren’t having much success at any of that, and he did his best not to shout much, which was a pretty good best. He’d got lots of practice at it.
Medli sat down by his head, all fuzzy in her reds and browns and oranges. He was so relieved the gods had remembered her and Makar. So relieved.
She said again, “You’re injured. I can hardly stand to look, Link, do you realize how bad you look?” Well, he was trying not to scream in pain. “Okay, I don’t need to be able to hear your thoughts to know that was a dumb question.” She paused. “Is that the same wound you took for me in the Earth Temple?”
He made a face, which probably didn’t tell her anything ‘cause it could have just as well been from being in pain. The answer would have been sort of, anyways; technically Ganondorf had just got him right on top of the old gash, and it’d hurt like having a timeline where he died ripped out from him and into existence had hurt, except less headachy and more oh goddesses he could see his guts.
Someone cleaned it, which hurt, and then started stitching it closed, which hurt even more. Medli was still sitting there, and Tetra was doing Tetra things where she’d sat down, which was probably mostly also getting doctored but while drinking rum or something, and Aryll had a fingertip touching the heel of his left hand, and Makar was burrowing into his hair somehow, nudging at his cap, and even though Link was trying desperately not to scream and the King of Red Lions was gone forever and the Master Sword was trapped at the bottom of the ocean —
Even then, something felt light, and maybe it was just the pain turning his mind wobbly, but he was surrounded by friends, and safe from danger, and free of duty, and he thought —
“We won,” repeated Medli, a sort of awe in her voice.
We won.
He thought it might be hope.