Fight of the Champions

Chapter Fifteen - Jira

Jira stifled another yawn as she flipped through another boring book on herbs and their effects. She and the others had found her safe house, a neat little hole in a mountain that she'd built walls around and made it cozy. She had plenty of these hole in the wall safe houses, some built into a mountain side, some built into a hill, some were literally dug into the ground and some were behind waterfalls. She tried to make them as discreet as possible in case she was ever being hunted. She sat her table, surrounded by books, a small fire under a cooking pot heating the room. Corvus was outside keeping watch, she seemed rather distant since the battle, like her mind was stuck on something. Darmar had left for Death Mountain, he determined that whether or not she managed to wake up Aadil and get him to use his power, he would go and make sure they had the Gorons support. Jira thought he might've just been homesick.

Zariah and Aadil were the only two left. Zariah had long been sleeping in a chair, and Aadil still hadn't woke up, he lay passed out on the only bed. When they'd arrived, she had noticed he'd broken into a fever and the Triforce on his hand had been flickering.

He moaned behind her, and she turned around. He was still sleeping, but he'd rolled over. Jira raised an eyebrow. That was new.

She returned to her book, but quickly fell into her thoughts.

What was she doing here? She was never intended to be one of the chosen warriors, she was only here because of Kesair, and now she was giving away the location of a safe house and doing all she could to research a way to wake their chief up. She didn't even like the Gerudo, after all they'd did. It was because of them that she'd lost everything.

Aadil grunted again and moved over in his sleep.

What did she owe him? Why should she ever be helping him? His father was the one who had eradicated the Sheikah and his mother let it happen. And yet as she watched him sleeping there, a new thought came to her head. Her anger at him had diminished, for the most part, it was prejudiced and foolish, a person couldn't be judged by who their parents were. Rather, Aadil had become a representative of higher powers at play, he seemed to her to be the chosen hero of this story, he had the mystical powers of the Triforce, he was the royal, he had all the reason to be here. She wasn't going to grudge him for it.

But why did there have to be a chosen hero? Why did the only person who could save the day have to have some special power? Why couldn't more people have that chance?

Aadil grunted again and his eyes flickered open.

She jumped to her feet.

"Jira?" He said, groggily, "What happened? We were— We were fighting and then—"

Jira pulled up a chair, "Well, uh, he took Miko, and then he vanished and— next thing I knew it we were stuck in the pit, he made into some sort of prison. We worked together and we got out of there, but you were knocked out. I was certain Bahuma had something to do with it, but— well, you're awake now, and we've got work to do"

He sat up, "We have to get back to Gerudo Town, I have no idea what's happened, remember Bahuma said it was his next target, I can't let anything happen," he gripped his hand tight, "I can fight him, I know I can, I'm ready for it,"

"No,"

He froze, "What?"

Jira took a breath, "I have spent my entire life studying history, studying everything I could find about Hyrule, about the Sheikah, about the goddess, about every single legend, from the days when Hylians lived in the skies to when they settled the seas, from the times of darkness and shadow, to times when perfect harmony was at risk. Almost every single legend, there was always the chosen hero, the princess, and the beast,"