Fan Fiction Legend of Zelda: Sin of Sheikari
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Sin of Sheikari Chapter 18

18: Gather With Them

Zelda quickly covered her mouth as her stomach twisted and turned, barely managing to keep its contents down. She then returned her focus towards Odan, whose expression remained pitiful, as if his remorse would change anything.

“All of you…” Zelda pointed a trembling finger at him. “How can you sleep knowing what happened to them? To the people in this temple? After what you did to become Sages?”

Odan’s expression didn’t change, though Zelda could tell he was silently calling out for her forgiveness. Yet, Zelda wasn’t sure he or the other Sages could ever be forgiven, especially not by the Sheikari.

“The Shadow Temple…” Zelda clutched her stomach. “It’s nothing but a blight upon Hyrule! It is now a place to worship shame! To worship death! It should be destroyed!”

She could see Odan flinch back, but he didn’t argue. Zelda was about to say more when her stomach lurched again. It was all she could do to keep herself from vomiting.

“We have failed the people of Hyrule,” she finally managed to say. “I am tasked with saving this kingdom from a mad sorcerer and now from itself, without the Hero of Time.”

Odan finally spoke. “Everything you say is true, princess. We have no right to call ourselves Sages. We have ultimately failed in our duties, and we are not worthy of the people’s trust.”

Zelda wrapped her arms around herself once more, trying to will away yet another wave of nausea and chills. It was all she could do to keep taking deep breaths and using the sounds of falling water to remain calm. Despite what she’d just learned, she was still in the Chamber of Sages, the cornerstone of the Temple of Light. She had to believe in the will of the Golden Goddesses, that there was still hope for Hyrule.

“I neglected one detail,” Odan broke the silence. “Perhaps because I wish to not recall anything else about that day. A great number of the Sheikah were also there on the day the Sheikari were to be banished from Hyrule. In a last attempt to save themselves, the Sheikari struck out using some of the darkest magic I’ve ever seen.”

As she listened to his tale, Zelda slowly found the strength to stand upright again. Despite what happened in the end, this madness had all started with the Sheikari. 

They believed none were worthy of approaching the Triforce, though the Golden Goddesses had left it behind for all to use. And so the goddesses had commanded them to be banished from the land. The thought of all those people, fighting and dying over a holy artifact meant to bring about salvation, made Zelda’s blood boil.

“Then I will find a way to stop them!” she declared. “I will not allow them to destroy Hyrule, no matter what shame their demise has brought upon us.”

“You will fail,” Odan slowly shook his head, the corner of his mouth rising into a pitiful smirk, “if that is your only reason to stop them.”

Zelda gritted her teeth and took a defiant step forward, but Odan didn’t flinch this time. His expression was still grim, but he also seemed to have accepted a fate he’d long known was coming. 

“You want revenge,” Odan tilted his head to the side as he studied her face. “This Ganondorf took much from you, and you want to avenge what you’ve lost. And vengeance won’t be enough.”

“I will make it enough!” Zelda shouted. “With or without your help!”

Odan nodded somberly. “Then I would only ask you to do one last thing.”

“What is it?”

“Mind the shadows.”

The Chamber of Sages plunged into complete and utter blackness as Zelda was thrust back into the Shadow Temple. She desperately groped around in the darkness, hoping her eyes could somehow adjust, before reaching for her kodachi. She had to find Impa. She had to find her guardian, and they had to start running.

“Impa!” she cried out. “Impa, where are you?”

She began wandering in the darkness, her hands stretched out in front of her. She had just reached the edge of the bouncy platform when she felt something snake around her leg, tripping her. She yelped as she fell backward, and she was just about to push herself up when a voice whispered in her ear. 

“Shadow Temple…here is gathered Hyrule’s bloody history of greed and hatred.”

And, suddenly, she was no longer in the Shadow Temple but somewhere else entirely. The stone-built chamber had no windows, and she couldn’t see any doors from where she was standing, so she figured the room’s entrance must be behind her.

An X-shaped cross had been placed against the opposite wall, and Zelda’s eyes filled with tears at the sight of it, realizing what this room was meant for. The pitiful, skeletal form bound to the cross barely looked human, his hair thin and matted from starvation, while his face was so sunken in that Zelda was certain he only had minutes left to live. 

Yet his eyes, his crimson-colored eyes, were shining. 

Two silver-haired figures wearing Sheikah armor stood before the gaunt, pitiful figure, each sporting a spear that was tinged with blood. That was when Zelda noticed the countless scars all across the man’s body. He should have already been dead, yet she somehow knew he was still alive. 

Her eyes then fell to the floor, and she instantly wished she hadn’t looked, her stomach throbbing and burning all at once. The ground was covered in blood and what looked like weeks of accumulated human waste. She gagged and heaved, yet her stomach refused to provide her with the relief of spilling her insides all across her feet.

“It won’t be much longer,” one of the Sheikah, a man, spoke. “His legs are broken now. He won’t be able to regain his breath.”

“Good,” the other, a woman, chuckled callously. “I was getting tired of his lies about seeing the truth. Besides, we have tools now that can allow us to see through their witchcraft.”

“They’ve no further use of them then,” the first Sheikah tutted. “Did you hear that, traitor? No one needs your magic anymore! You’ll die a useless dreg!”

“It won’t matter. Not even the spawn of Hylia will be able to save you.”

The two Sheikah grew still at the same time. The sound of the man’s voice had obviously startled them. He should have been far too weak to speak, yet his words were clear and held no trace of exhaustion. 

“Hyrule invites calamity, and you would be that calamity’s shepherds. That will be your pride. Your legacy.”

It was so fast Zelda almost hadn’t seen it. The male Sheikah had darted forward, plunging his spear just under the man’s chest nearest his heart while the other laughed. Zelda fanned her hands in front of her like she was trying to dismiss smoke from a campfire, and the vision faded into the sickening void once more.

“You would forge your clubs into swords! Your sticks into javelins! The weakest of you declare yourselves mighty!”

Zelda yelped at the sound of the man’s voice as she stumbled back into the chamber again, and its stench overpowered her so much that her stomach finally gave in. She looked down at her feet and found no trace of what she’d vomited up, though it gave her no relief. 

The other Sheikah had now joined in on running her spear through their captive, but the man didn’t react. Instead, his voice only seemed to get stronger. 

“Yet it was we who tempered those blades, who breathed life into your resolve! And we were repudiated!”

Zelda swatted away the vision and started to run, but it returned even faster this time. The man’s voice was soon joined by others, forming an infernal choir that cursed and spat at all who lived, and Zelda could feel it in every part of her body. 

She was certain she’d go mad at any second now. She wanted to cover her ears, but she knew it was no use. She kept waving the vision away so she could take as many steps forward as she could. She had to find Impa. Where was she?

Yet the specters continued to taunt and pull at her as she crashed into a wall. They now sounded like they were in pain, their agony growing with each passing second. Finally, the chanting stopped and was replaced by a single, unified phrase mixed with groans and howls.

“Hasten and storm, with all your surrounding kingdoms, and gather with us! Bring down the Sacred Realm, you and your mighty ones!”

The two Sheikah, having grown frustrated with the man’s outbursts, began almost-rhythmically stabbing him over and over again, the woman continuing to laugh, while the man only seemed annoyed. 

Zelda, finally at her wit’s end, screamed and lashed out, swinging her sword around wildly. Still, her blade found nothing but air, and her screaming was soon drowned out by the chorus of chanting, shrieking, and sobbing. 

“For we will be there to judge Hyrule…and all surrounding nations.”

With a guttural cry, the male Sheikah unsheathed and lifted his kodachi before bringing it down upon the man’s neck, slicing off the man’s head with a butcher’s efficiency. It rolled along the floor toward Zelda, slowly becoming coated with the man’s blood and waste. When it came to a stop, his expression looked almost satisfied, and his eyes remained open. 

Now, they were looking right at Zelda. And still shining. 

“Help me…” Zelda whimpered. “Someone please…help me.”

She jumped as someone placed a hand on her shoulder, screaming hysterically as she whipped around to face a figure that was nearly as indistinguishable from the darkness itself. 

“Do you see now what you’ve awakened?”

Zelda fell to her knees and felt water splash up against her. She looked down and saw a bright pool of water, its familiar surface rippling in the darkness. She glanced around, noticing the six symbols of the Ancient Sages nestled on the water’s surface.

“We were supposed to fade with them.”

Zelda jumped to her feet, her eyes darting around the Chamber of Sages as she searched for the source of the voice.

“Odan?” she called out. “Odan, is that you?”

“No,” an old man dressed in a brown robe rose from the symbol of Light. The top of his head was bald save for a tiny, silver ponytail, and his bushy white mustache circled his face until it blended into his sideburns. “I am Rauru, the Sage of Light.”

Zelda drew back, her eyes wide as she looked at Rauru, the only Sage who hadn’t gone to sleep. “Don’t you dare lecture me after what you’ve done! Awakening all of you was the only way I thought I could stop Ganondorf! I only wanted to save Hyrule!”

Rauru shook his head slowly. “We once thought the same, that we were merely saving Hyrule. We were supposed to be the wisest of them all. Yet, we fell victim to our hubris, a trait we must have shared with the Sheikari in the end.”

Zelda wanted to yell, even strike him, but all she could do was sigh as she gazed down at the pool. “And now Hyrule will soon fall to more than just hubris.”

“And what can we do to stop it?” Rauru leaned forward, and Zelda almost thought he meant for her to give him an actual answer. “The Sheikari were the most powerful sorcerers in the land. Only with the Golden Goddesses’ help were we able to banish them, but even the shades they left behind were strong enough to destroy us all!”

“Even so,” Zelda shook her head, though she refused to meet his gaze, “I cannot give up. I will still find a way!”

“And how will you do that?” Rauru asked. “You struggled in your fight against Ganondorf’s phantom, nearly perishing in that battle were it not for Impa and your luck with receiving Farore’s blessing. You have awakened the other Sages, but what you have unleashed is a darkness far beyond our capability to destroy. Without the Hero of Time, we are hopeless.”

“No!” Zelda glared at him while pointing at herself. “I am not the Hero of Time, but I am the Princess of Destiny. And in an alternate timeline, I was the leader of the Sages and held the Triforce of Wisdom. Ganondorf does not yet have the power he seeks, and so he can still be destroyed…without the Hero of Time.”

Rauru stared at Zelda for a moment, seemingly processing her words. Finally, he nodded. “Very well, then. We Sages will do what we can to aid you, Princess Zelda, but I fear it may not be enough.”

“I must go,” Zelda closed her eyes and looked away from Rauru, desperately trying to bury what she’d just seen in the deepest recesses of her mind. “I must leave here and find Impa before the darkness claims her.”

Rauru grunted, his eyes shifting to the symbol of Shadow. “Perhaps you underestimate yourself far more than I do. You saved her long before I found you. Now go!”

Zelda was flung from the Chamber of Sages and back into the endless, choking blackness of the Shadow Temple, once again enveloped by the sounds of chanting and wailing. A new hand brushed up against her arm, but, this time, she was overcome with relief instead of dismay.

“We must go now!” Impa shouted over the specters. “The temple will collapse soon!”

Zelda nodded, though she was certain Impa couldn’t see her in the darkness. She closed her eyes, willing her mind to touch as many hearts as she could. She imagined all of Hyrule’s people, from the Zora of Lake Hylia to the weary citizens of Hyrule Castle Town. She felt their hope and their fear, their love and their despair.

She then found herself sailing upwards, through the darkness, and into the light once more.

authordimitrius