Hero by Heart

Chapter 28

Link woke feeling rather uneasy. He didn't open his eyes yet, while he tried to find the source of his discomfort. Then it came back to him.
     The fight. All those monsters. There had been too many.
     He remembered how he had tried to fight his way through them, to find his way back to Zelda. He had felt such a burning need to protect her. It was his one and only job.
     Had he failed? He didn't know. He couldn't remember what had happened. How had it ended?
     Link's stomach churned at the thought that his princess might be hurt. He had to remember. He had to get to her.
     He slowly started to pay more attention to his direct surroundings. The first thing he noticed was the cold, hard floor pressing up to his left side and the pressure of something around his ankles and chest, tying his limbs together.
His head was pounding and there was a particularly nasty pebble digging into his hip.
     Link slowly opened his eyes, peering through his lashes and finding that it was extremely dark. There seemed to be a fire burning in the distance, its light flickering and reflecting on a set of iron bars directly in front of him.
He inhaled deeply, noting a musty, earthy scent.
After some careful shuffling he felt a wall at his back, implying he was in the corner of the room. There was not a single sound to be heard.
     He started to wiggle his fingers, with his hands tied to his chest, straining against the bonds and ignoring the chafing of the rope. Minutes passed, but he didn't give up until he finally freed one hand and thus another. With both hands free it was easy to untie the rope around his ankles.
     Now that he could move freely, Link started to search around the cell. It wasn't big, but it was clearly damaged. That had to be a remainder of the Great Calamity, for Link was pretty sure that he was inside the Akkala Citadel.
There was rubble and a thick layer of dust on the ground. Parts of the wall had crumbled and a few of the iron bars were bent. Where there once had been a lock now sat a heavy iron chain, keeping the door firmly in place.
Link tried to pull at the bars, trying to broaden a gap, but they wouldn't budge. Just as he was about to search for a rock to slam into it, he noticed a shifting of the light, indicating that a torch was approaching.
He quickly scrambled back to the corner and loosely threw the ropes around him again. He had to remind himself to breathe deeply as he lay down and peered through his eyelashes.
A figure appeared just behind the bars, a torch in his hand. In the dark it was impossible to recognize, but Link was certain that it was no Bokoblin or Moblin. This looked like a human.
The person watched him for about a minute and then, seemingly satisfied that he was still tied up and unconcious, turned and left.
Link waited a good five minutes and then got up once more. A little more careful, he continued his investigation of the cell, trying to find a way out.
Pressed close to the bars he could see further into the corridor behind. It wasn't very long towards his left, where he could see it ending in a solid wall. The other end went on further than he could see, but it was obvious that there was a lightsource at the end of it.
Link went over every bar again, shoving and pulling at them, but none of them gave in.
Slowly but surely a feeling of despair settled in his stomach. His guard would eventually return and expect him to wake up. What would happen then? What did they have planned for him?
Link kicked at one of the iron rungs, cursing himself at the sharp pain that erupted in his toes.
How was he going to get out of there?
Eventually, to his own surprise, he suddenly thought of trying the walls. The Citadel was in ruins. Chances were this was the most usable cell in the block, but most usable didn't necessarily mean perfect. It had to have suffered more damage than he could see.
With a spark of hope in his chest Link went around the room once more, pushing and pulling at every little crack or jut in the walls.
Finally, in the far right corner, he put his fingers in a crack low in the wall and pulled out a whole chunk of loose pebbles. They tumbled around his feet, causing a small avalanche of dust, stone and crumbled mortar.
The sound made Link jump, for it was loud and sudden enough that his guard at the end of the corridor might have heard. To be sure her retreated to his corner and lay down, this time facing the wall.
Hardly half a minute passed before he indeed heard the shuffling of feet and saw the shimmer of torchlight reflected on the wall, but whoever it was didn't come in.
The guard seemed to wait to hear the sound again, probably watching Link closely, but eventually his footsteps retreated again.
As soon as he deemed it safe, Link got up and crawled back towards the corner at the front of his cell. The end of the wall on his right jutted out into the room for the width of about two hands, into which the horizontal bars were fastened. Link figured it offered more stability to keep everything in place, but that was before hordes of Guardians and monsters had wrecked the place.
Now, with the walls themselves crumbling, it was exactly what he needed to escape.
Painfully slow, careful not to make too much noise, he clawed out more of the stone and mortar, until there was a big gap at the base of the wall and a small pile of rubble at his feet.
Link had carefully swept most of the dirt into the dark corner that would be least likely to be seen by the guard, just in case he would return.
He stood back for a moment to admire his work. He had clawed away a considerable part at the base of the wall. The lowest of the horizontal bars looked to be just high enough to fit beneath, if only he could squeeze his shoulders through the gap he had created.
All in all the hole hardly stood out in the dark. It would be a tight fit, but it would have to do.
After a few deep breaths Link lay down on his back and slowly started to pry his head through the gap. He scraped over the floor, causing him to hiss through his teeth as unexpected pain flared up. Still, Link carried on, using his feet to push himself through the gap, arms extended above his head.
After a few more moments of hard work and flattening himself as much as possible, he got far enough to free his arms and look down the corridor.
Off in the distance he saw the fire that was the source of the light. Beside it there were two shapes, sitting on the stone floor. They both appeared to be looking into the fire, which was a relief. It would be impossible for them to see him in the dark corridor, even if they did look his way.
Link now used his hands and feet to squirm through the hole, then quickly rolled into the furthest, darkest corner he could find.
He sat up on his hunches and took a few deep breaths to gather his thoughts.
His body was aching from exertion and being in the same position for too long, and his skin burned with cuts and scrapes. His head was pounding worse than ever, concentrated at the back of it. He reached out tentatively, wincing as he touched a sore, sticky spot on his scalp.
With a sigh he wiped his hands on his breeches. It was a problem for later. First he needed to get out of this cellar.
He wondered where they would keep his gear. Apart from the clothes on his body they had taken everything off of him. It was far from the first time for him to be unarmed and outnumbered, but he never felt quite whole without his sword.
Link slowly crawled forward, sticking to the shadows as he searched the floor, hoping to find something to use as a weapon. He settled on a large rock, which he clutched in his hand as he snuck closer to the guards.
They hardly moved at all. It not for their breathing Link would have thought they were statues. Again he wondered who they were and what they were doing there. Why were they guarding him? And why in this place?
He was right at the edge of firelight now. He pushed his thoughts aside and focused on the one closest to him. Then, in one quick movement, he smashed him on the head. There was hardly a sound as the guard toppled over onto his side.
For a split second Link stared right into the face of the other guard, whose eyes were wide in shock.
He quickly jumped back into the darkness and circled around the fire, while the man leapt up and looked around in alarm, reaching for his weapon.
After the bright light from the fire Link knew he would barely be able to see in the dark. Indeed, the guard squinted as he tried to search for Link's shadow. It made it easy for him to jump out and hit him square on the jaw, still clutching the rock.
The whites of his eyes reflected the firelight as they widened. Then they rolled back and he fell over, landing with a dull thud on the dusty ground.
Link took a moment to look at the guards, but couldn't quite place them. They had the build of Sheikah, or more likely, Yiga. They also wore the typical black and red colors, but that was where the comparison ended. They lacked Yiga weapons and apart from the color, their clothing didn't match. What stood out most was their lack of masks. Yiga never went out without them.
So who were they?
Link quickly searched them, but found nothing of worth, apart from their weapons. One carried a spear and a knife, the other a sword and shield. Link took the knife of the first and the short broadsword of the second, before leaving them and continuing towards what he hoped was the exit. He would have to find out more about them later. Once he was free.
When he reached the end of the corridor, Link turned the corner and walked through the gap where there had once been a wooden door, now hardly more than a few rotten scraps. He slowly went up the couple of steps there, making sure not to make a single sound.
He came out into a long corridor, with multiple doorways left and right. Some of those doorways did still have wooden doors in them, but they were clearly damaged. The entire building seemed to have gone through hell, worse than Link had experienced in Hyrule Castle.

The eerie silence was interrupted by a strange snorting. Link barely had time to move before a creature erupted from the doorway to his right and smacked right into his chest.
     For a split second it was quiet as he stared into the ugly snout of a blue Bokoblin and it stared back at him.
     Then Link's hand shot out and with a chortling sigh the monster doubled over, then turned black and went up in a puff of smoke.
     His heart hammering, Link looked down at the knife in his hand, which now dripped dark blood onto the floor.
     He now finally registered a new sound, which he recognized as the cackling of a group of Bokoblins, having a camp somewhere. Now that Link payed close attention he could see the firelight reflecting on the wall, across from the biggest doorway in the corridor. It was the only one with double doors, one of which was missing.
     Not wanting to risk another of those monsters to wander into him, he shot into a dark room to his left. From there he peered back into the hall and studied the open doorway. He listened closely, trying to judge how many monsters there would be.
     There wasn't a hair on his head that considered fighting them all to get out.
      But to get out he was certain he would have to cross the corridor, which meant passing that door.
Link sighed, silently cursing his fate. He couldn't understand why there were monsters there at all. Were they aware of the people down in the cellar? Did they work together somehow?
     He decided there was no point standing around, waiting for his guards to wake up. He had to find another way. He glanced around the dark room he stood in. It looked as though it had once been used for soldiers to sleep, with bunk beds in various states of collaps and decay.
Link walked across the room, his footsteps muffled by the thick layer of dust. As he hoped, there was a small doorway there, a wooden door hanging crooked in its hinges. He carefully stepped through the opening, making sure not to touch the fragile wood.
This room was even darker, with the big door leading to the corridor still intact and closed. In the dark Link stumbled across a bedpost, making him wince, but he immediately held his breath, listening for any sign that someone or something had heard him.
When it remained quiet he carefully walked on, feeling his way across the room towards the far wall. He truly hoped there would be another door there.
Link felt up and down for a doorhandle, or any sign of an opening, but there was none. He sighed heavily, his hopes of bypassing all those monsters crushed. He leaned his forehead against the cold rock wall, contemplating his options.
The was nothing to it. He would have to slip past that open doorway and pray to the Goddess that he would remain unseen. Or else he would have to run like hell to get away before they could catch him. If he didn't make it, all he had left was to fight.
     That he had little chance of making it out unscathed was something he didn't pause to consider.
Just as Link turned to head back, a deafening bang sounded through the halls, making the ground seem to tremble beneath his feet.
He jumped back from the wall, instantly alert and prepared to fight any enemy that came his way.
A large deal of commotion grew out in the corridor, as the monsters from the nearby room poured out into it. They seemed to be just as confused as he was, making an afwul lot of noise in their search for the source of that explosion.
Under the cover of all that uproar, Link ran back to the previous room and peered out into the hallway. No monster thought to look in his direction. They simply ran past him, brandishing their weapons at unseen threats, looking over their shoulders fearfully. 
Now that Link had a clear view, it finally became clear what the cause of the uproar was. At the end of the corridor the sparse light reflected on well-polished weapons and golden armor. They were not the kind of things the Bokoblins wore. Nor any of the monsters Link knew, for that matter.
     There was only one place he recognized it from. But that couldn't be.
What would a group of Gerudo Warriors be doing there?
That was when Link saw her. In the middle of the group, majestic and beautiful in her blue tunic, he saw the soft golden hair of none other than princess Zelda.
She had come for him. She had come to save him, just like he would always come to save her.
     Somehow the roles had reversed.
A broad grin spread across his face. Without thinking twice, Link raised his weapons and stepped out into the corridor, determined to fight his way towards the princess.