A Shadow of Hope Chapter 2
By Bane Nathos
When Link got to his room he was surprised to find Zelda in it. She was standing by the bed and looked as if she had been waiting for a while but upon seeing him Zelda immediately got up though and said, "Father wanted to know if were done for today, he wants you to actually have dinner with us tonight."
She asked with such a tone and look that Link just couldn't refuse. "Sure" Link replied and unbuckled his sword and placed it by his bed. "How long do I have?" He asked as he stood back up.
"Only about ½ hour, you need to clean up first, and change if possible and I'll do the same," Zelda said, with a tone of glee.
"Alright then, I'll be down." Link replied and looked at his sister, she was a beauty even though she was only thirteen. "Who ever gets her will be a lucky man," he thought gazing at his beautiful sister.
"So, what do I have to do tonight then? Just go down and eat, hopefully nothing embarrassing." Link stated.
"It'll be alright brother, you'll be just fine there aren't too many guests tonight." Zelda said as she stepped forward and kissed Link on the cheek and turned around to go. "By the way, I think it was a good idea for father to adopt you, now I can have someone to talk to more often." And with that she was out the door and walking through the castle corridors, with an unusual amount of energy in her step, for just preparing for a feast.
Link looked for something appropriate to wear in his belongings, but since the clothes the king had ordered made for him hadn't been finished yet, there weren't any clothes appropriate for the accession. So Link just grabbed a clean green tunic and slipped it on and went out the door and down the spacious corridors to the main hall, and dinner.
Link arrived in the main hall just when the guests started arriving, there were many. Link gulped at the number of guests that qualified as just a "few" and took his place on the right side of his father, who was talking to some of the guests at the time. Link watched the guests filter in and waited for Zelda to enter. Not much later Zelda entered the hall wearing a long pink ball gown and walked through the hall looking like a princess, as usual and sat in her spot next to Link.
"I thought you said a "few" guests?" Link asked Zelda after she had sat down.
"Silly this is a few according to our standards." Zelda replied, "we usually have about five times more people than this for our feasts."
Link gulped, thinking about the prospect and asked Zelda, "So how have you and father been doing, since I have been given all these little jobs, I have had much time to talk or even look for you guys,"
"Well not too much has been going on really, father has been doing the usual, king stuff, and I have been doing the usual princess stuff, but we have missed seeing you. You haven't spent time with us for quite some time." Zelda replied, and with that Zelda got up to talk to some guests that had just arrived. Link was left alone at his seat in a room filled with dozens of people chatting about this and that and his father and sister mingling with them to add to the chatter.
Link was about to get up and start talking to some of the guests too when his father finished his conversation and sat down on the other side of Link and said to Link, "I'm glad you could finally make it son, you haven't been to a feast since the victory feast celebrating your defeat Ganon. Zelda was so pleased when you actually had time to come, she's been wanting to teach you how to dance for some time now and now she'll finally have the opportunity."
"Dance? I thought this was a dinner?" Link asked, a little confused.
"Of course it is, but was is dinner without some dancing and music afterward," and with that Link's father, the King got up and called everyone to attention and with a few words the feast started.
Link had been to some feast before but after being raised in the forest he never had gotten over how much food there was, and how much he was given to eat. Link had course after course of meats, soups, fruits, and other foods shoved in front of him, so much that Link knew for certain that there was no way he could eat it all, even if he had all day to do it. Link ate as much as he could and afterward talked to his sister and father about different things.
When everyone had eaten his or her fill the feast was announced over and the dancing started. Servants came in from their spots on the walls and cleaned off the food and dishes off all the tables and moved them to places along the walls and couples started pairing up to dance across the dance floor.
Link tried to melt into the crowd but Zelda would have nothing of it, Zelda went looking for Link as soon as the dancing started and dragged him into the dancing throng. At first Link was cautious and pretty clumsy with his dancing but with Zelda as his tutor he soon caught on, and soon they seemed to glide as one across the dance floor. By the time the music had stopped Link bowed and thanked Zelda for the dance and was preparing to stop and retire to his room to sleep, but unknown to him Zelda had promised all the young ladies who had come that Link would dance with them, and after his dance they immediately started swarming around him for their promised dance, so Link had to dance every dance till he had danced with all the young ladies and then he had to dance with some others who weren't so young that also wanted to dance with the new prince of Hyrule. By the time the evening was done he was thoroughly exhausted.
"It wasn't that bad, was it?" Zelda asked him as she walked up to him as the guests were leaving.
"Well it wasn't that bad, but why did you set me up like that?" Link replied waving good-bye to some of the guests as they were leaving.
"Well I just knew you would never ask anyone so I had to set you up, but take it this way, as least you learned how to dance." Zelda said and with that she started heading up to her room to retire for the night. Just before she left the hall, Zelda turned around and blew Link a kiss saying, "Lets to this again brother, after enough of them, you'll get used to it." With that she disappeared into the castle corridors, Link could only hear the click of her shows as she walked down the large stone castle corridors.
Link also retired to his room for the night. By the time he entered his quarters the shadows had lengthened. Outside the gate of Hyrule was being locked up for the night, as the people of Hyrule also retired to their homes. Link didn't even bother slipping off his tunic and just collapsed into bed and let the softness suck him in. After pulling his covers over himself he listened to chirping of the crickets outside for a little while but soon he drifted of to sleep.
Outside a figure waited in the shadows of the castle courtyard waiting for the shades of night to deepen. Near midnight the noise from the guests leaving the feast and the servants cleaning had died down so the figure arose from his hiding place and slowly made his way through the courtyard and to the gate into the castle. There he waited for a while listening for any noise inside the castle, but upon hearing none, he slowly creaked open the door and entered closing the door behind with carefully so he would not make a sound. Inside he entered the main castle corridor and made his way up two flights on stairs and down a hall to the room where he had seen, the boy Link retire into. Moving stealthfully to not arouse attention of the castle guards the figure worked his way up to Links room and after taking a look around to be sure he hadn't been followed, opened the door and like a dark shadow, walked in.
Inside the dark figure surveyed his surroundings; great tapestries and pictures of Knights fighting dragons and other dangerous creatures covered the walls. Along the far wall was the window overlooking the castle courtyard that he had figure had seen Link enter here through, and near the window on a bed, sleeping blissfully unaware of anyone in the room, was the boy named Link.
Putting one of his hands into his dark cloak, the figure slowly advanced towards the sleeping figure completely silent so not to awaken the sleeping boy. Before reaching the boy, the figure heard a clank on stone outside in the castle corridors the heard the voices of some sentries as they passed on their usual vidual of the castle. Standing still until they passed then the figure got good look at the boy. He was about five foot with unusually broad shoulders and arms. He had a sword on the floor by his bed and wore a green tunic. Seeing nothing that the boy might have hidden the figure waited a few more seconds to be sure the guards had passed then covered the final distance between him and the boy and stooped down.
After pulling out a piece of cloth from his cloak to use as a gag, the figure attempted to cover the boy's mouth. The boy immediately woke up and the figure was knocked backwards from a kick in the face. Flying backwards till he was able to plant his heals onto the ground the figure was amazed at the speed of the boy. Pausing for a second the figure saw Link lung for his blade and with lightning reflexes pick it up, got into a defensive position.
The figure also had sword, a scimitar, dark and sleek, which was brought out and also was put into a position ready for action. After which both combatants judging the other searching for a weakness eyed each other wearily.
The dark man attacked first with a lunge. Link parried the attack and countered with a quick kick at Feroc's knees causing them to buckle and fall to the ground. A bit shaken up the stranger shook himself and lunged at Link again this time swinging his scimitar in a wide arc. Link flipped backwards, forcing the man to nearly trip from the momentum of his missed blow. Link then charged forward and sent a kick into the stranger's head sending him flying into the far wall, knocking down one of the pictures with a crash. Link then advanced on the stranger and brought his sword up to the intruder's throat.
"Who are you and why are you here?" Link asked breathing heavily. The dancing had unexpectedly worn him out and this little battle was causing him to tire.
The man remained silent and tried to shake off the grogginess he had got from the force of Links blow.
"Well?" Link as again this time bringing his sword up closer to the stranger's throat examining him.
"What's wrong sir?" some guards said at they charged into the room. "We were alerted fighting in here,"
"This man attacked me," Link told the guards. "He won't talk yet, so I would suggest that you guys take him away."
The guards saluted Link then advanced on the intruder slowly pikes ready to strike if need be. Suddenly the stranger was cured of all grogginess and with lighting like speed, his arm flew up and from it a bright blue light appeared. Staring in astonishment, Link saw the light go straight into the guard's chests and sent them flying with amazing speed out the door and into the wall beyond hitting it with a sickening crunch. The man then got up and turned to face the astonished Link. The figure advanced with small but definite steps on Link and his scimitar behind him.
Link seeing the stranger's advance stared in amazement after seeing what he could do. "But he is unarmed, I can still take him," he thought. And with that he advanced on the dark figure also and swung his sword at the man's unprotected chest.
Moving as if in time had been fast-forwarded the strangers hands came up with lightning swiftness one grabbing the tip of Links sword, crushing it, and the other a ball of fire emanated from and the figure launched the ball at Link, hitting him in the abdomen sending him flying into the bed where he fell face down onto the ground and dropped with now useless sword.
"Don't worry young pup, you're coming with me and now one can stop that now," the figure stated as he walked up to Link and took of his cloak. Link's body was raised off the ground and put into the man's cloak. After securing Link onto his back the man made one look around to make sure the guards weren't there watching. They weren't though; the guards were still moaning and groaning in the hall where he had hurled them. The man then jumped out the window into the courtyard and beyond…
Link woke up from the grogginess a few hours later. He was in a dimly lit
room now, and was tied to a sturdy bed. In a chair across from him the man
who had attacked him and another man were talking in low voices in front
of a small fire burning in a modest fireplace. Upon hearing his stirring
the men walked towards him and the one that had attacked him said, "Sorry
about the rough ride, my name is Feroc and this is Akon and we have a few
questions to ask you…"