Chapter 12: The Depths of the Dragon     Chapter 14: The Desperate Battle

Chapter 13: The Realm of Silence

Link swung the hammer with both hands and brought it crashing down on the fire-dragon’s head. Volvagia roared, pulled back underground, and exploded out, sending rocks flying everywhere. Navi yelled and Link ducked.
The dragon flew around, spewing fire at Link. He jumped sideways and rolled, dropping the hammer. Volvagia dove. More rocks flew. Link grabbed the hammer. The dragon appeared again at the far side of the platform. Link ran. Volvagia breathed fire. Link rolled sideways.
He jumped forward, trying to catch the dragon off guard. It wasn’t. It swung its head, and its long fiery mane hit him and knocked him back. Link sprang up and smacked the hammer down on its head.
“Are you trying to kill it or give it a headache?” Navi asked facetiously.
“Navi!” Link snapped, trying to concentrate and not in the mood for jokes at that moment.
“Sorry.” Link rolled sideways to avoid another blast of fire. When Volvagia popped its head out of one of its holes, the Hylian was ready. When it swung its mane, he backflipped and bounced forward again, slamming the hammer dead on target. He was also getting tired. The heat was starting to leak through even his tunic.
Happily, the next time he repeated the pattern, Volvagia erupted from his hole right away. Link crouched warily, but Volvagia burst into flames overhead. Nothing but a few ashes fell to the platform.
Darunia uncurled. “My, that was exciting. Thank you, Brother. Now Volvagia is dead forever. Let’s go to the Sacred Realm.” Before Link had time to blink, he was enveloped in blue and transported magically to the grey pedestal.
Across from him flared a burst of red, and Darunia materialized on his own pedestal.
“Brother! You have once again saved our people. Seven years ago, we were in need of food. Today, we almost became food. If not for my son and a few other hardy souls, we all would have been toast for that monster last week.”
“Darunia, how long has this… expulsion been going on?”
The bearded Goron frowned. “Ganondorf had never been friendly towards us, as can be expected. He can’t stand plain, honest people like us. But he couldn’t do anything to us until just recently when he revived Volvagia. Even though he comes from a desert country, he can’t stand the heat of Death Mountain, and he never knew that we could make protective tunics; he never saw Rana.”
“Yet, somehow he managed to call the dragon…”
“Yes. He hovered over the crater and cast his spells up there, where he can still breathe the air… and we could do nothing.” Darunia shook his head in regret. “I can only thank you again, Brother, that we lost none of our people.”
“We’re just happy to have come in time.”
“Yeah!” said Navi.
The Goron leader smiled broadly and drew himself up. “Now, my friend, it is time. Seven years ago, I gave you the greatest gift of our people. Now I give you only the greatest gift I can give. Bear it well.” He raised his arms and Link, in turn, raised his.
A glittering scarlet medallion twinkled down from the darkness above and into the Hylian’s hands.
“I give you my strength, Hero. Restore the land! Farewell!”
“Farewell, Darunia!” cried Link and Navi as they were returned to the ordinary world.

Link warped to the Lost Woods and went to sleep in his own bed. The forest was recovering; the leaves were greening in the summer sun. In the morning there was a message on his pillow asking him to come to the Temple of Time.
The next day, he called Epona and went there. He walked straight into the back room; a figure stood there.
“Hi, hero!” the young man greeted him. “You came. Good. Let’s learn a song.”
“Where does this one warp me to?” Link asked.
“Right here. Aside from the fact that it’s pretty –“
“And I like pretty tunes,” Navi interrupted.
“- it’s also useful.” Sheik played a ringing, clear melody. Link played it back easily.
“Lovely,” Link commented afterwards.
“Isn’t it?” Sheik seemed to smile behind his collar. “It is my favourite of the legendary songs… It makes me think of home, the way the kingdom used to be…” He seemed to be remembering something rather sad. Link waited silently, hoping the young man could feel his empathy.
Sheik shook his head ferociously. “Anyway,” he said, “the next temple to free is up to you. Do you have somewhere you want to go?”
“What are our choices again?” Navi asked.
“Water, Shadow, or Sand.”
“I’ll go to the Water Temple. I’d like to see the Zorans again too.”
“That may not be easy,” Sheik remarked pensively. His voice turned grim. “I think most of them have been frozen. An unnatural winter has fallen upon Zora’s Fountain, likely Ganondorf’s magic. I help out whenever I can, but I have too many places to be to help them all the time…”
“I understand,” Link said. “I’d better get to work, then!”
“See you there!”

Link hurried out to Hyrule Field and mounted Epona; she was grazing quietly where he had left her. They cantered to Zora’s River, crossing it, Epona often swimming up to her knees. At last, they came to the cliff with the waterfall and the stone arches, where Link left Epona and climbed up to stand on the carved Triforce symbol.
The water coming over the cliff was merely a trickle; icicles dripped from the top edge. Anxiously, Link jumped to the tunnel entrance. He walked slowly through the corridor, looking from right to left at the iced stone walls.
“I can see what Sheik means… this is not good. I wonder if anyone’s still here…”
They came to the great cavern, and found it frozen solid. Not a drop fell from the delicate sprays of the waterfall. As Link looked closer into the blinding whiteness, his eyes widened. “Navi, there are Zorans frozen in! That’s…”
“That’s sad…”
Link hurried up the stairs to King Zora’s chamber. The guard was frozen at her post. The king was frozen in a big lump, but the entrance to the fountain was still open. The shivering Hylian took the opportunity to search the rest of the Zora’s home, trotting through tunnels and passages still lit by magical, yet weak torches. In the living chambers connected to the corridors, there were hundred of Zoras, curled up in what Link supposed were sleeping pools – like beds, but more comfortable for Zorans. Outside of one room, he paused. His sharp ears had caught a sound. It sounded like a strangled gasp, a weak splash…
Link flung open the door and charged in. There were about five torches arranged in a circle around a sleeping pool, which hadn’t been frozen in yet, and a Zora coiled into a fetal position, shivering uncontrollably. His scales were bluish-white, not naturally, but from cold. Even as Link watched, ice was forming on the surface of the pool. Struggling for air through chattering teeth, the Zora shoved it away.     He looked up.
“Rana? You came back?”
Link, horrified by the spectacle, scooped the Zora up in his arms and hurried out. He ran flat out to the river, slipping and sliding on the slick surface. Once in the sunshine, on the grass, he stopped and sat down, rubbing the Zora’s arms roughly to restore warmth and circulation.
The Zora snuggled close to him. “Ah, Ruto, you shouldn’t be saving me… I’m not worthy…” All of a sudden, he sat up and flung his arms around Link. “Ruto! I love you!”
“Whoa, Shoza!” barked Link mock-irritably. “I’m not Ruto! Don’t kiss me, finboy!”
“Huh?” Shoza sat back, startled by the tenor voice, scrubbing his arms and spreading his fins to catch sunshine. “Uhh… Rana?”
“You said that before. I’m not Rana, it’s me, Link! Remember, the boy who was with Rana. You’re probably confused by the green shirt. …Are you sick? You seem delirious…”
“Zoran hypothermia,” moaned Shoza. “That is, I’ll be all right in about an hour, after I have a chance to defrost. Dude, it’s been seven years! Are you sure it’s you?”
Link laughed.
“Of course it’s him!” Navi chirped. “And we’ve come to save everyone, so just hold tight. How many others are still… mobile?”
“Just me here, I think. I was trying to unfreeze the Domain, but you see, you need fire – blue fire, magical – from a cave in the back of the Fountain, and I couldn’t get it. I mean, I got in, but it was… hard…” He pondered for a moment. “Lord Jabu-Jabu has gone into hibernation at the bottom of the fountain. There are some ice floes that we pushed into a sort of path to get to the cave, ‘cause it’s above the water level, and it’s a good thing he’s not there ‘cause his big tail would be right in the way.”
“Who’s we?” asked Navi.
“Um, some guy named Sheik. And me.”
“That’s what I thought,” Link said. “He’s been helping me get around, and he mentioned you at a previous meeting. He got in?”
“Yeah, and he had bottles, too, and mine’re all frozen in somewheres. So, we filled ‘em all and tried to unfreeze people… we succeeded with some, and they all got out double-quick… they’re somewhere downriver now. If you head to the desert, you might find them. I can’t blame them for getting away from all this…”
“And the princess? King Zora’s still stuck…”
“Yeah, old fatty just froze back as soon as we unfroze him. He had just time to say ‘Good job’ before his eyes glazed over again.” Shoza half-grinned. “He’s too fat to get out. And then I think the Princess is at the Temple in the lake, so she’s okay. Oh, and if you’re looking for Rana, right, well, we haven’t seen her for a couple of years… she’d come around regularly, and we gave her a blue tunic for breathing underwater, so she could swim with us, and I think it’s still in the front guard’s post. Well, she’s disappeared…” He smiled a little. “She called me finboy too, when she was annoyed with me, y’know that?”
A blue-green head popped out of the water. “Shoza, man! You’re still alive!”
Shoza smiled. “Barely, Bitu. If it hadn’t been for the Hero of Time, Link here, I wouldn’t be. Link, this is one of my buddies, Bitu. He still hangs around a bit.”
“I keep tellin’ ya, you hang around this ice pit and you’ll be an icicle! But, do you listen? No!” The new Zora was grinning his face off. “Thanks, Hero.”
“Hey, I’ve got to get into the Water Temple, too. Ruto might not be able to handle it on her own. Do you have any advice?” the Hylian asked.
“Well, in the cave…” began Shoza.
“The cave behind the Fountain…”
“There’s supposed to be a pair of boots…”
“Hyrulian boots, made of iron.”
“They’ll work. The gate to the Temple’s too far underwater to get to.”
“For a Hyrulian. I mean, Hylian. You’re a Hylian, right?”
“Yeah. I see. Thanks, guys. Take it easy, okay, Shoza?” Link rose to go. “I’ll see what I can bring you in the way of blue fire, if you like…”
“Sure, that’d be great. If you’re going to the Temple, then together you and the Princess can break the curse for sure, and restore summer to this frozen dump.”
“It’s not a dump!” Link and Navi exclaimed at the same time. “It’s really beautiful, even frozen like this…” Navi expanded.
Link smiled at the Zoras.
“Hey, man, you be careful too, okay?” Shoza pleaded. “Oh, and you can’t use the secret tunnel for obvious reasons. You’ll have to take your lovely horse, there, and ride across the country. After I’m better, we’ll get started on thawing the place out. I’ll be a lot more careful and a lot less stubborn from now on, too, so don’t worry about me.”
“Good luck!” added Bitu.
Link nodded and trotted off to the Fountain.
Within the ice cave Shoza told about, it was bitterly cold. Link and his fairy had quite the discussion about it, while Link fought off ice keese, ice demons, and dodged falling icicles.
“Link, I think that this cave is the source of the cold.”
“Yes. It’s cold in Zora’s Domain, but colder in the Fountain and this place is utterly bone-chilling.”
“And Shoza went in to get the fire…”
“Poor guy.”
“Yes, Zorans are susceptible to changes in temperature. They overheat or… or…”
“Catch hypothermia.”
“Yep.”
Link fought a pack of white Wolfos in a small chamber. When they died, he was able to kick open the treasure chest nearby. “Here’s the boots. You’ll have to take these too, Navi. If I wear them all the time…” Navi teleported them onto his feet instead of his forest boots. “Yes. They’re way too heavy.” He tried to run and managed a slothful shuffle. “I’m going to trip from trying to go too fast.”
He did so, and they both laughed.
“Let’s get out of here!”
They staggered – well, Link staggered and Navi fluttered – out of the cave and back to through Zora’s Domain. Shoza and Bitu were eating some sort of Zora food that looked like seaweed. He nodded to them, and Shoza stopped him.
“Hey, Link, before you ride off into the sunset, take Rana’s Zora tunic. It will come in handy, I promise. It’s just in the little room off to your right when you…”
“Got it,” Link said, reappearing with the blue cloth wrapped around his hand. “Thanks. Very much. See you later!” He mounted Epona, trotting down river.
They crossed the land of Hyrule and came to Lake Hylia at dusk. The lake level was low, just a pond, but that was no surprise. The river was a mere stream, and the Zora’s Domain passage was frozen right up to the mouth. Leaving his mare on the bank, he walked out onto the boardwalk to the little island with the tree, feeling sure that Sheik would be there. A crow attacked him, but he beat it off crossly.
“You bothered by those pests of Ganondorf?” came the young man’s voice casually from behind him. Link turned to see the bandaged, blue-clad youth climbing up the steep bank of the island. He was soaked.
“Looks like you got here the hard way,” Link commented amiably.
“Sure, horseboy. Song? ”
“Right.”
Sheik played a lovely, rising melody.
“No fair, you’re using accompaniment,” Navi giggled. Sheik raised an eyebrow mock-angrily.
“Do you want to use the song or not?”
“Oh, yeah, whenever he plays anything there’s always this magic music that comes out of nowhere and fills in the harmony.”
“Navi, shut up. I’m trying to learn it.” Link played it back with a few false starts, but eventually got it. Then he added vibrato.
“Nice,” Sheik said. “How’re the Zorans?”
“I helped an old friend of mine, Shoza… heard you’re a good fire-carrier, though King Zora couldn’t take advantage of that. Um… Ruto’s apparently in the Temple right now. Where is it, by the way?”
“Right under your feet,” grinned Sheik. Link looked around.
“Link! Don’t act daft. The entrance is over here,” Navi pointed out. Link climbed cautiously down the side of the island, using his hand to steady himself, and saw a portcullis underwater.
“Oh, right. What… Bitu said.”
“Well, let’s go!”
“Right. Goodb-“ Sheik was gone, and Link bit off his farewell as he realized it. “Where’d he go?”
“He keeps vanishing,” Navi complained. “Maybe he’s going to go see Shoza, or Darunia.”
“Or Saria.” Link smiled. “I think this gate needs activation. What do you think that jewel has something to do with it?”
“Well, if you hit it, and it breaks, the Zorans will be really mad at you.”
“Well, if that’s not it, then what is it?” Link demanded. Navi flew around, trying to find something, but couldn’t and said nothing. Link jumped in the water and swam to the other side of the pool to get a better shot. There, he took his bow and fired an arrow at the jewel. It came and rose to the surface, looking like a large, shining fish.
“You broke it!” Navi cried triumphantly, and horrified.
“No, see, there’s the gate opening. Boots?” Link put the Zora tunic on over his Goron tunic, but pulled the Kokiri tunic on top. With the iron boots on his feet, he waded slowly into the water. He took one last gulp of air, and ducked his head under, seeing if he could breathe thanks to the tunic’s magic. It worked perfectly, and Link almost laughed in delight. If only he could keep under like a Zoran instead of always floating to the surface, or using the great heavy boots that he must! If only he could fly gracefully under the water like the Zoras…
Link shook himself out of his sudden longing and entered the gate, walking until he saw a wall ahead, and an opening above. He gestured to Navi, and she removed the heavy boots.

Chapter 12: The Depths of the Dragon     Chapter 14: The Desperate Battle