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Serena was the type to worry easily. When Gulley had vanished, she had barely slept. Link constantly running off to who knows where at the same time hadn’t helped either. Even when Link reassured her of Gulley’s safety, she could tell from the look on Link’s face that there had been an awful lot of danger involved somehow.
Link, no matter how hard he tried to pretend otherwise, was a terrible liar. Anyone who knew him remotely well could tell what things he said were true, could see the way his nose scrunched up and his ears twitched any time he tried to speak a falsehood. And Serena had essentially taken over parenting him since he started his apprenticeship with Hendrick. Sure, he still wrote to his family back in Hytopia, but he’d had no opportunity to see them in person in five years. So when Link told her that he was fine and would have everything resolved soon in the same breath as when he said Gulley was safe, she didn’t really believe him.
Even beyond his inability to lie, there were so many blaring warning alarms surrounding whatever Link was doing. There was the eccentric merchant Link let stay in his house, for one. He only referred to Link as “Mr. Hero,” and Link was apparently the man’s only customer for his weapon shop. The fact that Link was apparently mass buying magical weapons for hundreds of rupees apiece was, put bluntly, an indication that he was not fine at all. Not to mention the specific sword that had been strapped to his back when he’d reassured her of Gulley’s safety. That merchant’s nickname for Link, if that sword was what she thought it was, was a lot more accurate than Serena wanted it to be.
But even with all these alarm bells making her worry, she couldn’t really stop him either. She wanted to stop him. He was only thirteen, he shouldn’t have to be shelling out all his rupees to an extortionist merchant who refused to show his face and carrying the Blade of Evil’s Bane around wherever he went. But her husband had already given him the time off for whatever he was doing. Serena was not his mother, she didn’t have the authority to stop him from throwing himself in front of whatever dangerous monsters were putting Hyrule in danger.
When that merchant vanished, Link, Gulley, and the other missing people returned not long after. She got her answers soon after their return, all the sages, Gulley included, explained what occurred to their loved ones and the rumors spread from there. She knew Link wasn’t fond of being the center of attention, but now it seemed he was one of the only people to have any attention. All of Hyrule now knew what he’d done, regardless of Link’s opinion of the matter or how the rumors distorted it from what actually happened. It made her sick, even when she only knew the pieces of the story Gulley had told her, which themselves were filtered through the mind of a seven year old. Link had looked distinctly uncomfortable as Gulley had babbled on about what happened.
Link then started spending far too long staring at the crack in the cliff by his house. The cracks had all stopped smoking at this point. It made Serena wonder just what that smoke was, exactly, that its absence would make Link look so upset. That, strangely, had not been explained away by the rumor mill quite yet.
Serena decided as she watched Link leave the smithy, jumpy and constantly glancing over his shoulder, that this had gone on long enough. She wanted the story from Link himself, because whatever had happened was clearly bothering him now that things had settled down, and the added stress of having all kinds of rumors circulating about him couldn’t be healthy. Tomorrow, she would offer to walk back to his house with him, with some excuse of warding off nosy villagers by preventing them from getting him alone.
The next day, Serena put her plan to get Link to quit bottling his emotions up into action.
“I’ll walk you back to your house,” she announced, after the family was done eating in the evening. The other apprentice had already left a while ago, unlike Link, he wasn’t a disaster at cooking.
“Mrs. Serena, I’m perfectly capable of handling myself.” Link replied. “It’s only a short distance anyway.”
“Link, I know people have been harassing you over recent events. It’ll be harder for people to do that if you have someone with you.”
He considered her words. “That’s… true,” he admitted. “But really, I wouldn’t be much of a hero if I let them get to me. I’ll be fine.”
“Fighting monsters and fighting rumors have nothing in common,” she huffed. “You’re stressed enough as is, I’m not letting you shoulder more than you need to by yourself.”
“I concur with my wife. Earlier, you messed up a swing when Rab asked you about the Ice Ruins Russo told him about. He backed off when he noticed the question bothered you, but not everyone will.”
“…Fine. Accompany me to my house then head straight back here.” Link’s voice was quiet. Serena gave her best attempt at a reassuring smile.
Once she and Link were out of her house, they walked in silence back to the house Link had taken up residence in for the duration of his apprenticeship. She and Hendrick had offered to let him stay with them, of course, but his mother had been quite insistent on him living on his own for some reason. She had insisted it was safer somehow, though Serena was inclined to disagree. She wondered if Link had mentioned that merchant in their correspondence at all.
She noticed, when they arrived at his house, that he seemed inclined to hide what was inside. Or at least, she couldn’t think of any other reason he shut the door in her face so quickly.
He needed to open up on his own terms. Forcing him would make her no different from the rest. Until then, she’d just have to be patient.
Walking Link back to his house became a regular activity after that. Despite the initial resistance, he seemed to come to appreciate the company pretty quickly. His shoulders loosened, and he actually started making small talk about smithing within a few days.
“I’m sorry about being suspicious,” he said on the fifth day. “I know you better than that. I think I was still on edge because of what Mr. Rab asked.”
“I understand. My decision to start doing this was sudden enough that you had a right to suspect me.”
“No, I was being unreasonable. You did this back when I first came to the country too. I was only eight, but people were really suspicious of me back then since I was a foreigner. It’s really not that different, thinking about it. And Gulley was obviously too young to pick me up then, so you did that too.”
Serena remembered those times, though they really hadn’t lasted that long. Sure, some people never dropped the xenophobia, but they had mostly chosen to ignore Link and by extension Serena’s family, and more or less just got ignored in return. Most of the more overt distrust had faded when people realized Link wasn’t any different from the average Hyrulean child.
“You barely spoke Hyrulean back then,” she noted. “At least a lot of their insults probably flew over your head.”
“I spoke more Hyrulean than I was given credit for,” Link huffed. “I had a Hyrulean father, if you recall. Just because I struggled to put sentences together in Hyrulean doesn’t mean I couldn’t understand any of what was said.”
“Does it still bother you?”
“Those insults? Not really.”
“‘Those’ insults? Are there insults that are bothering you?”
Link stopped before the doorway to his house, and sighed. “The fact the ‘Hero of Hyrule’ wasn’t even born in Hyrule is a weird sticking point for some people. I just hope word of this doesn’t get back to Hytopia, whenever I go back. I haven’t mentioned it at all in my letters to my parents.”
With how obsessed Hytopia tended to be with appearances, Serena couldn’t blame him for not wanting the country to know. Hyrule just spread rumors, while the royal family kept the full story to themselves. Hytopia would parade him around and show him off, while also spreading ridiculous rumors. Or at least, that was the impression she got based on what Hendrick and Link had said about the place in the past.
“I assume your parents don’t know about that merchant, either.”
Link tensed, if only for a moment. She probably wouldn’t have noticed in this darkness if she didn’t know him well.
“...No, they don’t. Probably for the best. I think my mother would freak out if she knew about him.”
He was lying, though only on that last statement. “ How strange ,” Serena thought. “ Freaking out about a stranger lodging with her son is perfectly in character for the woman who insisted her son live alone, rather than with a friend of her husband’s .”
“Well, I should go to sleep,” Link said hurriedly as Serena thought about the implications of that lie. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Mrs. Serena.” He rushed into the house, not bothering to look back.
It figured a terrible liar would also be terrible at obscuring that he was hiding something.
Link was back to being on edge the next evening. Serena figured that bringing up the merchant had hit a nerve, though why, she had no idea. Her first thought was that the merchant had hurt Link personally, but that didn’t match up with Link’s lie the previous night. She may not have met the woman herself, but based on what Link said about her she would take any slight against him personally. If knowing about the merchant living with Link wouldn’t cause her to freak out, the merchant himself was most likely harmless.
Her only other guess was it had something to do with the merchant disappearing. He really was an enigmatic fellow, appearing from nowhere one day and being gone just as suddenly. None of the border guards even saw him enter or leave the country. If Link had gotten attached during the recent incident, it would make sense talking about him would put Link on edge.
She wasn’t prepared for what Link actually said when they started the walk back.
“I need to return to Hytopia soon.”
“Eh?”
“I got a letter from my mother yesterday. The whole kingdom is in uproar over a curse on the princess. They’ll be needing people to deal with the culprit.”
“As far as I know, you know nothing about breaking curses.”
“They don’t need people for that, the royal family has a tailor witch in their employ. They need some people to help deal with the culprit and get the materials the tailor witch needs to break the spell. And unfortunately, my family is among the few there with the ear shape they’ll inevitably demand.”
“…Ear shape? I don’t see how that’s relevant.”
Link snorted. “This probably sounds ridiculous to Hyruleans, but Hytopia is really strict about how the hero is supposed to look. The entire country is probably willing to fight the culprit, but the royal family won’t let anyone who doesn’t have pointed ears and a specific hairstyle go. The latter’s within people’s control, but the former is a really rare trait in Hytopia compared to Hyrule.”
That… was ridiculous, he was right about that. It did sound in character for Hytopia, though.
“Regardless, I’m mostly telling you this because I’m not sure how to bring it up with the Master… I was hoping you had some advice. I can’t just leave my parents to freak out over the possibility of being cursed like the princess was, but taking time off for such a silly mission so soon after the whole Lorule mess would probably make me sound insane. And I’d rather not show him my mother’s letter, the whole thing makes her sound insane, and makes me look insane by extension for actually taking her worries seriously.”
“Well, he’s… familiar with Hytopia’s ways, more than I am.” Serena frowned. “Why would dealing with someone who cursed a princess be silly?”
“It’s, well. Please don’t laugh.” Link frowned awkwardly. “The curse itself is actually just being stuck in an unremovable ugly jumpsuit. My mother thinks it’s a fate worse than death, she’s apparently refusing to go outside at any opportunity out of fear of the witch going after her too. I really don’t want to leave her to panic like that.”
…Okay, yeah, she could see why Link would think this whole story sounded insane.
“Well…” Serena began. “You said the whole country wants a go at the witch responsible, right? Surely there’d be a few people with pointed ears aside from yourself willing to do so. Your mother can stop panicking soon enough in that case.”
“That’s true, but I…” He averted his gaze. Serena knew him well enough to know that meant “something else about this is bothering me that I don’t want to say” in Link’s bad liar body language.
Well, time to figure out what that was. “But what, Link? Is there something more to this situation than an ugly jumpsuit?”
“No, that’s the whole situation.”
Not a lie. Which meant whatever Link was so worried about was something he’d already mentioned.
It probably wasn’t the jumpsuit. Link was Hytopian, but he had lived in Hyrule the last five years and Hyrulean attitudes toward these things had rubbed off on him. He’d think it was inconvenient but not the end of the world.
His parents, while something he was obviously worried about, probably weren’t it either. They’d be fine even if he didn’t do anything, because he already mentioned someone else… would… deal…
…of course that’s what he was so concerned about. After that whole debacle with Lorule, obviously his top concern was for whoever King Tuft was sending after the witch. Whoever it was would just end up dealing with all of Link’s current problems if they succeeded, would probably die if they didn’t, and Link was far too selfless to let that happen when he could just do it himself.
“Link, your main concern is for the other people King Tuft is going to send after the witch, isn’t it?”
The shocked look on his face told her all she needed to know. She’d hit the nail on the head, as the saying goes.
“Honestly, I personally don’t think it’s a good idea to involve yourself in this. Your current situation just isn’t healthy, and going to fight that witch is just going to make that problem worse. Don’t think I didn’t notice the bags under your eyes, or that Gulley didn’t notice just how terrified you look when you’re asleep when he goes to wake you up in the morning.”
Link looked away again.
“However… I know my husband is the one with the actual authority to keep you from going. Just tell him the truth if you really want to make a return trip to Hytopia over this. You’re an awful liar, Link, he’ll believe you.”
Link sighed as he turned to the door of his house. “...Thanks, Mrs. Serena. I’ll… I’ll keep your advice in mind.”
The door clicked shut, and she was left to return home.
Link showed Hendrick his mother’s letter the next day. She watched as her husband scanned the words, brow furrowed.
“You’re worried about an ugly jumpsuit?”
“I’m worried about whoever King Tuft sends after the witch going through… everything I’ve gone through the last few months. Mostly. I am still a little worried about the jumpsuit and the fact my mother is losing it enough to not leave her house.” The honest answer was clearly something he had to rehearse, given the amount of effort Link seemed to be putting into hiding his embarrassment.
“Link… if you go, everyone in Hytopia will know your name. Given the issues that’s caused you here, are you sure you want this?”
“Better me than someone else. I already deal with it, so there’s no need to worry about me…”
“Link, that’s not how it works,” she sighed. “More stress won’t be nullified by what you’re already dealing with.”
“It can’t be worse than what I’m already dealing with, though! There’s no way I’ll lose anyone else to something like this! It’s just a small scale conflict with a witch! I can handle it!”
“...Anyone else?” She couldn’t stop herself from asking. It was a weird way to word things.
“I, um…” he faltered. “I’ll never see anyone from Lorule ever again. They’re all fine, and alive, but I’ll never see them again. There’s no risk of something like that happening with this. There’s no alternate dimensions to get cut off from. So this won’t bother me. I can handle it!” Link’s brain seemed to catch up with his frantic attempts at reassuring Serena and Hendrick, then. She was fairly confident that was the first time he’d brought up Lorule to anyone since the incident had been resolved.
“That may be, but what of the very people you claim to be worried about? If you go, you might get attached to someone and…” Hendrick cut himself off. Link’s horrified face said enough.
“I have to go. I can’t let what you’re suggesting happen. No matter the cost to myself.” Link definitely sounded more sure about his wish to go. “I can’t let a bunch of kids be sent to their potential deaths on their own.”
“...Fine.” Serena turned to her husband in surprise at his words. “On one condition.”
Link was attentive. “Anything, sir.”
“Disguise yourself. Pretend to be a Hyrulean native to the people of Hytopia. That way, any rumor spreading will be about a person who doesn’t really exist.”
“You can’t really think that’ll work,” Serena sighed. “He can’t lie to save his life. And he’ll probably want to visit his parents while he’s there.”
“I’ll do it, I actually like the idea. It shouldn’t be that hard, I probably sound more Hyrulean than Hytopian at this point anyway. I haven’t used spoken Hytopian in nearly five years. As for my parents, I’d rather they not know anyway. A disguise would really help keep the secret, at least for a while.”
“...I’ll help prepare a disguise for you then, since I’m clearly not going to change your mind.” This plan was crazy, but she’d rather it have the best possible chance of succeeding if she couldn’t talk Link and Hendrick out of it. “Hair dye will help. You should also wear the most unstylish thing you can think of. An ugly sweater or something, that’s something your average Hytopian wouldn’t want to be caught dead in.”
“Thanks, Mrs. Serena.” Link actually smiled. It was the first time she’d seen him do so since before the Lorule incident. “That sounds very effective.”
She tried her best to smile back at him. “I hope it will be.”
Saying goodbye to Link, even if temporarily, wasn’t easy. She had succeeded quite well at making it so that he’d pass as a Hyrulean traveler named Rinku. His hair was now a bright shade of lime, courtesy of a potion old Maple had made him. Serena had stitched a bear pattern on an old undershirt of his that stood out oddly. Not to mention the orange color of the shirt also clashed with his new hair color. No Hytopian would ever want to wear something quite like what he currently was, something Link himself proved by initially grimacing at his reflection when he first tried it on.
“I should be back in a few months,” he said just before he left. “It’ll take me a while to get there and back, plus some time for actually dealing with the witch.”
“I still worry about this plan backfiring.” Serena admitted. “The disguise itself works, I doubt anyone will recognize you, but try not to spin too many lies while you’re there. You’ll easily get caught, otherwise.”
“I know. I plan to write down everything I say so I can keep track of it. In Hyrulean, so no one can read it should my notes be stolen.”
“Hey, Link…” Gulley spoke up. “...Try to wake up on time while you’re there.”
“I make no promises.” Link huffed. “See you soon.”
As he turned to leave, Serena abruptly said: "Hey, Link?" Link froze. "Don't do anything too reckless while you're out there."
And with that, he was out the door.