Chapter Text
Time half-heartedly kicked at the small rock in the path as he walked on, curious to see how long he’d be able to keep going with it before he nudged it so far off the road that it wasn’t worth fetching or until he grew bored of it. He wasn’t in the mood for chatting as many of the others were doing, and it gave him something to do for entertainment besides listen to snippets of conversation and the sound of eight other pairs of boots against dirt.
They’d been told of increased monster activity south of the village they’d spent the previous night in, and the sweet older woman who’d expressed her concerns to them had been relieved when they’d promised her they’d check it out but after walking for hours they’d yet to come across anything. Time had started wondering if somehow they’d gotten turned around and had wandered off in the wrong direction, but when he’d brought up his worries an hour ago the captain had assured him they were following the lady’s instructions perfectly.
“We’re following the path, exactly as she said, and we can’t be going the wrong way,” Warriors had sighed, brushing his hair out of his face before pointing at the sky where the sun had started to duck behind a cloud. “The sun rises in the east and sets in the west, so we have to be moving south.”
Time knew how the sun worked and he’d grumbled as such to the captain, as well as several additional comments that he’d grown up in the damn woods and wasn’t an idiot, all which had earned him a friendly swat. Years ago, during the war, he might’ve slapped his brother right back, but he’d found himself too tired to do so and with too many thoughts swirling around his brain. And besides, if he changed his mind at any point, Warriors was always close by. He hadn’t missed how the captain now always seemed to station himself behind his right shoulder, and he knew it was because his brother was well aware of his glass right eye and lack of vision on that side. He was touched by the man’s attention to detail and it made him feel safer to know the captain always had his back.
Though Warriors’s confirmation that he wasn’t crazy and that they were going the right way hadn’t been the comfort he’d needed it to be, because the woman had made it seem like the monsters were nearby. They’d been travelling so long Time was starting to worry they’d somehow passed them and left the village vulnerable, or that they were being stalked by the beasts, or that maybe this was all a trap. It was too quiet, the world around them seemed too still, and he knew very well that when nature made no sound something was very wrong.
But nothing had happened. Nothing had happened for hours.
So distracted by his thoughts, he’d stopped paying attention to where he’d kicked his small rock and ended up stepping on it, letting out a small sound of alarm when his foot slid off it and caused him to stumble. He managed to regain his balance and avoid slamming into the ground, but he wouldn’t have been able to do it without the hand that’d grabbed his shoulder to steady him.
“Careful, irmãozinho,” the captain laughed, but Time could see concern in the hazel eyes scanning over him. “Don’t need you falling and messing up your shoulder again.”
“Thanks,” he mumbled, glaring at the innocent little rock he’d tripped over before kicking it off the path.
“Something on your mind?” his brother asked, no doubt knowing exactly what was troubling him but trying to give him a chance to talk about it anyway.
Time could just tell him no. He knew Warriors would go away if he did, but he felt bad lying to him and he didn’t particularly want the captain to leave either. He just also didn’t want to keep repeating how he couldn’t relax because the world around them felt weird. There was this irritating itch in the base of his spine like he’d just watched someone draw their bow but after several long hours they’d yet to release it and he still didn’t know what the target was.
It was annoying.
Before he had a chance to properly think of how to answer the captain, a shout from the back startled him from his thoughts.
“War!” the champion called. “C’mere, I need your opinion on something!!”
“Wild, can’t you see I’m in the middle of something?” Warriors responded with a huff, turning around and no doubt giving him an irritated look.
“Wild’s trying to tell me I’m wrong about something,” Legend yelled, cupping his mouth with his hands. “You have to help me!”
“Go.” Time waved his hand in a dismissive motion. “I’m alright, and we both know Wild’ll start blowing things up if he gets bored enough.”
He didn’t miss how his brother frowned at him, but the captain didn’t argue with him and headed off towards where Wild and the veteran were grinning with a little too much excitement on their faces for his comfort. They were both incredibly intelligent individuals, but whenever they put their heads together Time found himself fearing for himself and whatever property was nearby. He’d one time caught them plotting to use an ice rod to freeze a glass in his home on the ranch instead of getting ice from the ice box to chill their water. One of those was a lot easier and a lot less destructive than the other, and Wild and Legend had stared at him with wide eyes like he was some kind of genius when he’d reminded them that ice was a thing that existed outside of magic.
They were going places for sure, with brains like they had, just maybe not together-
Fully prepared for something chaotic to happen when Warriors was added to that mix, he simply sighed when he turned around after hearing a shriek, ready to find the captain looking offended or Legend looking betrayed, but instead his eye caught a quick flash of gold before landing on Wild and the veteran just standing there with their mouths open in shock. They weren’t the only ones, everyone except for him had already turned around and was staring at the spot where the captain had been standing just a second ago, because Warriors was no longer there. The captain was nowhere in sight, there wasn’t any trace of him at all.
He was simply gone.
Link wanted to celebrate when he finally saw Lana, though he wished he had a better reason to see her again. He felt a little weird asking for a favour when they haven’t spoken face to face for so long but if anybody understood why he needed to get back to the others, it would be Lana. He wished they could sit and chat for a bit, especially since he found out more about his vampirism, but they didn’t really have time for a lot of idle chatter.
“Zelda said you need to go back to the others, yes?” she asked with a smile that didn’t seem quite natural to him.
“Yeah, this was the only way to get them to leave me behind to recover,” he answered, looking down at her hands. She had her tome, which she was frantically looking through. “Is it ready?”
“Almost! Looking for your group is harder than it may seem.”
That was his cue to shut up and let her work. Link imagined it couldn’t be easy to figure out where the shadow decided to go, and that was assuming that the others stayed in the same era the whole time he was recovering. They must have gone to another era at some point. He waited quietly for Lana to finish until she suddenly turned to him, holding one of her hands up while she had her tome in the other other.
“Ready?”
“Ready.”
Lana’s tome glowed as she made a circular motion with her free hand, then spun on her heels. A golden outer ring appeared, with three overlapping rings in the middle. He only had a moment to watch as the rings glowed brighter, summoning one more ring that opened up to a golden portal that obscured Lana. All the gold made his eyes sting, especially since it was like the golden light that burned him in the first place, but nonetheless, he walked through.
As soon as he stepped out of the portal, Link was first hit with a blast of cold air and the moon hanging in the sky. The time of day didn’t seem quite right to him but he didn’t need his mask when the moon was out, so he wasn’t going to question it too much. He took it off and shoved it in his bag for later, but he decided to keep his new gloves that covered his fingers on for a little extra comfort. He didn’t really need them to deal with the cold but it was still nice to have them.
There was no sign of the others. He couldn’t see them, he couldn’t hear them, and he couldn’t smell any of them either. It was just him, a lot of snow, and some trees. Maybe Lana couldn’t put him right beside his brothers, which would be annoying, but he could look for them. It’s been well over a month since he last saw them, what is a few more hours on top of it? Link picked a direction and walked, sniffing the air and watching his surroundings as he trudged through the snow.
He walked for what he guessed was about fifteen minutes or so before an unexpected scent hit his nose. It was... some sort of citrus. Oranges, maybe? It wasn’t a scent he associated with any of his brothers but it meant that somebody was with him on the mountain. It wasn’t like an orange tree could grow on a snowy mountain, so the only reason why he could smell oranges had to be because somebody had oranges. It was the best lead he had so far, so he began trailing it, going from tree to tree until he could actually see somebody in the distance.
The smell of oranges was coming from them. Perhaps it was because of his time with the chain and because of the war, but he felt the need to give the figure a nickname until he knew them better. Unfortunately for them, all Link knew of them was that they had oranges. Wind and Legend would never let him live it down if they found out he decided to call somebody Oranges, but they didn’t have to know.
Link made out a blue scarf before he hid behind the tree again. It reminded him of his own scarf, as it was also long and blue, though he didn’t get the best look at it before he had to hide. He could also hear Oranges talking to themselves but he couldn’t pick out any familiar words. They paused, looked around, and continued walking. Link waited until he was sure they were far enough ahead that he could sneak to another tree without being noticed. He wished he could float like other vampires could as it would have been a lot quieter, but he made it to the next tree without the person turning around.
Oranges paused again, so Link slipped behind the tree for cover once again. He couldn’t tell if they knew he was following them, if they were just as lost as he was, or if it was some sort of combination of the two. He took a chance and peeked around the tree to watch them. They moved a little bit, but they were looking around, looking into the canopy of branches above them and side to side. Oranges was definitely lost. They both were.
But that didn’t mean he could trust them to help.
When Oranges continued, so did he. The pace was slow, his target moving slowly and methodically. Link followed them until they found a clearing, a spot on the mountain that was absent of trees for him to hide behind if Oranges continued forward. Link had no choice but to stay where he was if he wanted to remain hidden but if he did, he would lose track of them.
They turned around.
“Who are you, and why are you following me?”