The Legend Of Zelda Fan Fiction / Legend Of Zelda Fan Fiction ❯ Navi's Redemption ❯ Chapter X: Navi's Redemption (Epilogue) ( Chapter 4 )

Chapter X: Navi's Redemption (Epilogue)

Beta Reader: Deej

Disclaimer: Zelda characters are owned by Nintendo. Kaula, however, is mine.

 

What did I tell him? Nothing.

 

I'm certain he knew, based on how stiffly I moved after my last vision or by the nervousness I tried to hide, that there was something I wasn't telling him. He didn't pressure me to say anything, instead, he kept his eyes fixated on me, never blinking, following me as I moved. I could almost feel his eyes pinned to my back, right between my shoulders.

 

It was very hard to stay focused.

 

I had invited him to break bread with me but he declined with a short shake of his head. He continued watching me as I fixed my meal, my hands unsteady and I nearly dropped my plate. It was then I wondered what he ate, this Phantom god. The way he looked at me, I almost expected him to leap and kill me, feast on me as a wolf does a doe. It was very… unsettling.

 

He stayed till I was halfway through with my meal, either bored or having better things to do. When he left, I could visibly feel the air in the room lighten, as though his very presence had weighed it down, made it thicker, harder to breathe. I was able to give a small sigh before going back to half-heartedly nibbling on my food.

 

Needless to say, five days later and my situation was still very much the same.

 

I fought back and forth over what to tell him, what ­could I tell him? I tried to seek the answers in my bowl but my visions were clouded, as was my mind and heart. How much was too much? What would aid him without harming others? What course would allow the souls their final cycle?

 

“Or more accurately, what would allow them a final cycle that ends with peace?”

 

I turned my gaze upward, the metal charms I'd hung above the house door eerily silent. For the moment, I was seated outside in Moeder Badria's old rocker, just to the left of the door. I'd bought the device from a peddler who'd wandered through, claiming spirits could talk through it via the wind. I'd yet to hear it utter a note, wind or not, but I continued to watch it with a mix of fascination and the feeling that I'd been had. I'd pose questions to it, on a whim, to see about receiving a response, but so far it remained dormant.

 

I had not told him everything. The first time I met him, when he'd killed Moeder Badria, I had told him what I knew, albeit, abridged. Since then, a few things, random things, that held little significance at this time but might one day prove valuable.

 

If he remembered them.

 

I was inclined to believe he would remember, being that his farkas was important to him, but the passage of time tends to wear away at the mind as a river cuts through stone. Gradual, but efficient.

 

There was something else I had bought from the peddler. A book with blank pages, bound by leather and sealed with a strap. I had an idea for what I would use this for… but at the moment I was still vaguely playing with the thought. For now, the book rested within my home, sitting inside a chest, out of sight but firmly in my mind.

 

Rocking in the chair, the wood crunching dirt and stones beneath it, I continued silently thinking till the Phantom God appeared sometime just after the sun peaked its highest in the sky. Though he loomed before me, his shadow dwarfing my form as though to swallow me up, I still kept rocking in the chair. He would not kill me today.

 

“I have been tolerant.” His accented voice was slightly clipped, as though fighting to keep his voice at a normal level. “Tell me.”

 

I stopped the chair from rocking. At first, I would not meet his eyes. Gradually, I got the courage to stand from the chair and reach my eyes to his.

 

“I cannot.”

 

The dark material of his clothing, something darker than even black, rippled, as though it were alive. The vibrancy of his crimson eyes became prominent against his skin, a hint of a glow emulating from them.

 

“If I told you now, what I know, it would ruin your chance of being with him.”

 

His head turned the slightest, as though taking consideration of my words, before raising his arm. The shadows of his clothing surged at me, planning on engulfing me or piercing me, I wasn't sure. I didn't move to escape it, didn't look to avoid it, the only hint of my fear a small tremble from my body. The living, not living shadows stopped a hair's width from touching my skin and I could feel a cold unlike any other radiating from it.

 

As swiftly as he sent it after me, he returned it, the matter once more looking just like ordinary cloth.

 

“You will tell me before you die.”

 

I opened my mouth to debate this when I heard a soft noise. Distracted, I glanced to where I'd heard the sound and saw, just in time, the metal charms swaying. Again, as metal hit metal, they emitted a chime, louder this time.

 

“What is that?”

 

Turning back towards the Phantom God, I saw that he was focused on the charms, an odd look of puzzlement on his face. Not that the look of puzzlement was odd, just that I'd never seen him look uncertain of anything.

 

“Some spirits talk through the wind. It's a way for them to communicate with us in a way we can understand.”

 

He seemed to think about this a moment before giving something between a snort and a laugh. “All it does is make noise when the wind touches it, there's no spirits involved in that.”

 

He turned to leave when the wind charm gave a single, one note chime that was loud enough the metal of the charm echoed and hummed, repeating the same note after it'd been uttered. He turned sharply at the sound, eyes narrowed, searching.

 

“That sound… I've heard it before…” He came back, looking it over with new measures of intensity, as though it were an enemy. “It almost sounds like… that annoying glow bug.”

 

For a moment, I could easily read the expressions on his face. There was deep, volatile anger unlike anything I'd ever seen, his arm shaking as though to suppress raising his sword and striking the charm or some long time foe. This anger gradually faded to something akin to wistfulness, though I do not think that was directed at the sound but rather the memory it brought. Finally, the wistfulness changed to an expression I can only compare to a boulder. Hard, unyielding.

 

“You will tell me before you die,” he repeated, voice little more than a growl as he moved away from the chime. “Be it naturally or at my hands, you will tell me.”

 

As he walked away, the charm rang softly again, no trace of wind stirring it.